Turn to Jonah chapter 2. Jonah
chapter 2. There's a second lesson from
Jonah chapter 2. It's not distinct from the first
lesson. It's really just a carryover.
So if you want to turn there. And after you find Jonah, I'm
going to also ask you to look at Psalm 130. Psalm 130. But before we start, I want to
ask the Lord to be with us. Let's pray. Father, thank you
for your mercy. Thank you for the Lord Jesus
Christ, the one on whom you poured out all that we owed, all that
was due to us, and who gave in return all the obedience we could
never give. that we fail to give out of rebellion
and out of our sinfulness. And we pray, Lord, that you would
cause us to see him clearly and come to you on the basis of his
work and his goodness, your grace to us and him, and come boldly,
because we have many needs, needs for much grace from you. And
we pray, Lord, you'd be with those who are attending on the
Zoom meeting. We pray that you would be with
Jimmy and Jamie and help Jimmy as he's recovering from his eye
surgery and as he faces so many difficulties. And give Jamie
the patience and the love for him and help her to, as a mother,
guide him in the things of the Lord. Thank you for your grace
to us as a congregation. We pray that you'd be with our
families and our and all of us together, in Jesus' name we pray,
amen. In Psalm 130 it says this, out
of the depths have I cried unto thee, O Lord. Out of the depths. I say that because, I point you
to this verse because this is a place we find ourselves, the
depths. Psalm 130, out of the depths
have I cried unto thee, O Lord. Jonah found himself in the depths.
And the depths are a metaphor for, in Jonah's case, being in
the sea, in the fish's belly, in Jesus' case, being under the
wrath of God, and in our own case, the depths of our guilt
and our broken fellowship with God that we sense. at times,
and that broken fellowship, that lack of communion pains us, a
sense of our guilt causes us great desperation, and we cry
out as someone who's under the waves, the sea, and like Jonah,
in the belly of the whale, so here, out of the depths, the
sinner, the believing sinner cries to the Lord, Jesus Christ,
and says, out of the depths have I cried to Thee, O Lord, hear
my voice, What grace it is that God hears sinners. for Christ's
sake. Let thine ears be attentive to
the voice of my supplications, pouring out his heart, his need
for God. That's what supplications are,
supplicating God. If thou, Lord, shouldst mark
iniquities, O Lord, who shall stand? But there is forgiveness
with thee, that thou mayest be feared. The only way we will
truly fear God is knowing that we've been forgiven for Christ's
sake, and that causes our scalp to tingle to the very core of
who we are to know that we sinned against God and at the cost of
his own son God has forgiven us freely for his sake. So now
if you turn to Jonah chapter 2, you know what has happened at
this point. God sent Jonah to Nineveh God sent Jonah to Nineveh. Jonah
rebelled and turned away and went in a boat to Tarshish. The
Lord sent a storm on the sea. Jonah with the mariners was in
the storm. They were all about to perish. The boat was about
to be broken up. The mariners cried to their idols,
They found Jonah, they asked him who he was, they learned
that he was a man of God, that he feared God, he belonged to
the Lord, the God of the Israelites, the God of glory. And so they
asked him, what should we do? And Jonah told them, God's will,
you have to throw me in so that the sea may be calm to you. It
was substitution. And he willingly substituted
himself for those sailors, those mariners on that ship. As soon
as he was cast in, the sea was made calm, and then the mariners
feared God. They knew then that Jonah's God
was the true God, and they called upon him, and they made vows,
and they worshiped him. And so they learned to fear God
because of the testimony of Jonah, because of this testimony of
substitution. So now we find it in the last
verse of chapter one, the Lord had prepared a great fish, God
prepared a word for Jonah. God prepared the storm. God prepared
a fish to swallow Jonah. Now God's going to tell the fish
with him in the fish's belly. He's going to leave that man,
Jonah, in that fish's belly three days and three nights. So it
says, now the Lord had prepared a great fish to swallow up Jonah,
and Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three
nights. Notice in all this that Jonah rebelled and God brought
the consequences of his rebellion on him. The consequences weren't
just wrath. They weren't the consequences
of destroying him. They were the consequences that
would do two things. Number one, they would irresistibly
bring him to do what God had given him to do. And number two,
it would point to Christ, who did suffer the wrath of God in
order to take God's wrath from us. And so we see both of these
in Jonah. It's amazing, God could have
used anybody here. He could have found an obedient
prophet, I would suppose. He could have found someone much
more pliable. But he found this man who was obstinate, a man
who was rebellious, a man who hated the people he was sent
to preach to, a man who was angry with God for what he did in showing
them mercy. And you can see that God always
gets his way. If it had not been the Lord,
look at Psalm 124. Psalm 124, I'll read this with
you. If it hadn't been the Lord, where
would we be? Psalm 124, if it had not been
the Lord who was on our side, now may Israel say, if it had
not been the Lord who was on our side when men rose up against
us, then they had swallowed us up quick. when their wrath was
kindled against us. When the waters had overwhelmed
us, the stream had gone over our soul. Then the proud waters
had gone over our soul. Blessed be the Lord who had not
given us a prey to their teeth. Our soul is escaped as a bird
out of the snare of the fowlers. The snare is broken and we are
escaped. Our help is in the name of the Lord who made heaven and
earth. If it hadn't been for the Lord, if God hadn't reserved
for himself a very small remnant, then we would have been destroyed
like Sodom and Gomorrah. If God hadn't turned Jonah, then
he would have never had mercy on Jonah. But God did have mercy
on him. In Acts chapter 5 and Acts chapter
11, it says that the Gentiles were given mercy. They were given
repentance. Christ from his throne sent them
his spirit and turned them by a preacher unto himself and gave
them repentance. And so Jonah is turned. But Jonah
was not just a man sent to preach. The lesson is not just about
a man who was avoiding preaching and was turned and then did the
job. It was about a man who himself
was a prophet in all that God did to him It was God's message
of Christ and him crucified. And so we have chapter two here.
He's in the belly of the fish and he cries to the Lord. Notice
this, chapter two, verse one. Then Jonah prayed unto the Lord,
his God, out of the fish's belly. Jonah prayed. Why did he pray? Because he only had one hope.
He prayed because he needed God. He needed salvation, so he prayed.
And he prayed to the Lord, Jehovah, his God, the Lord Jesus Christ,
his God. He prayed to his God, the Lord
Jesus Christ, out of the fish's belly. That was what God had
put him in. He cried out of the affliction
God put him under, the affliction that came upon him for sin. And
it says here, he said, and he said this, he said, I cried by
reason of mine affliction. He cried, he cried to the Lord,
it was because he was afflicted. And he heard me. That's amazing
grace. God heard this man. When God
had afflicted him, God heard him. Of course, God knew that
the affliction would cause this prayer. He knew that he would
give him that grace so that his heart would be turned to the
Lord, that he would call in his trouble. In Psalm chapter 50
and verse 15, let me read that to you. in Psalm 50, 5-0, and
verse 15. I like these verses because they
teach us as sinners to do as God brought Jonah to do. It says
in Psalm 50, verse 15, Call upon me in the day of trouble, I will
deliver thee, and thou shalt glorify me. We're objects of
mercy. That's how we glorify God. We
call, he saves, we are objects of his mercy, trophies of his
saving grace. Call upon me, what a promise,
call upon me in the day of trouble, I will deliver thee and thou
shalt glorify me. The trouble that Jonah was in
was his own dumb fault. but it was for God's purpose.
The immediate cause was his own sin, but the larger cause was
God's salvation in Christ. And so Jonah, like us, we live
our lives, we experience the immediate, weakness and frustrations and
failures and the results of our own foolishness. And we're completely
overtaken by these things. They occupy all of our mind and
all of our energy, just going day to day, living. We don't
realize the larger purpose that God has in view so much of the
time. But when we're enabled, when we're at the bottom and
we cry, then God lifts our eyes up to His eternal purpose in
Christ and we see that even our trouble is just a vehicle for
God to glorify himself in our salvation. Call upon me in the
day of trouble. I will deliver you, and then
you shall glorify me. We give him willing praise at
that point, and he gets praise because he did it. He points
to his work and says, see, this is a good work. The Lord did
it. So, back to Jonah 2, verse 2. He said, I cried by reason of
mine affliction to the Lord, and he heard me. Out of the belly
of hell cried I, and thou heardest my voice. The belly of hell,
who could think of a worse place? I can't. I don't think there's
a worse place. He, Jonah, thought he was in
the belly of hell. In the belly of hell. In fact,
this is the way God describes his condition. He was under the
water. In the fish, weeds wrapped around
his head with no hope. And there, without, was there
air for him to breathe these words? I doubt it. I doubt that
he was able to actually breathe them out. God hears us no matter
where we are. Now that's a simple truth, but
it's a comforting thing, isn't it? No matter where we are in
the darkness, whether we're speaking in our heart or speaking out
of our heart with our mouth, God hears us. Let me read some
of Psalm 139 to you along these lines as well. Psalm 139, I'm
sure that you have heard this Psalm many times. It says in
verse one, O Lord, Thou hast searched me and known me. Thou
knowest my down-sitting and mine uprising. Thou understandest
my thought afar off. The Lord knows our weakness,
doesn't he? He knew what we were when he saved us. When we were
yet sinners, Christ died for us. He knew that we were sinners.
He knew we had no contribution. He knew that he would have to
do all the saving. He knew that he would have to
overcome our opposing will and our ignorance and our unbelief. He knew he would have to turn
us and give us a new heart. He knew all that. And then he
says in verse three, thou compassest or compassest my path and my
lying down and art acquainted with all my ways. You know everything
about me, whether I'm going forward, backward, sideways, upside down,
you know everything about me. The Lord is never surprised by
our sin. He's never surprised by our cold heart. He knows us. And he always takes notice of
his work when he gives us grace to look to Christ. Verse four.
For there's not a word in my tongue, but lo, O Lord, thou
knowest it altogether. Thou hast beset me behind and
before, and laid thine hand upon me. This is in a saving way.
In front of us, behind us, and upon us, the Lord has his hand.
That's true of all of God's people. Such knowledge is too wonderful
for me. It is high. I cannot attain to it. Whither
shall I go from thy spirit? Or whither shall I flee from
thy presence? Jonah couldn't get away from
God, not even in the belly of the fish. If I ascend up into
heaven, thou art there. If I make my bed in hell, behold,
thou art there. If I take the wings of the morning
and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there shall
thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me. If I say,
surely the darkness shall cover me, Even the night shall be light
about me. Yea, the darkness hideth not
from thee, but the night shineth as the day. The darkness and
the light are both alike to thee." Because God sees, then we are
saved, you see. Then He takes care of us for
Christ's sake. For Thou hast possessed my reins,
my inward parts. Thou hast covered me in my mother's
womb. I will praise Thee, for I am fearfully and wonderfully
made. Marvelous are Thy works, and that my soul knoweth right
well. My substance was not hid from
thee, when I was made in secret, and curiously wrought in the
lowest parts of the earth. Thine eyes did see my substance
yet being unperfect, before I was fully formed. And in thy book
all my members were written, which in continuance were fashioned,
when as yet there were none of them. God had it all mapped out
before I was even fully formed. How precious also are thy thoughts
to me, O God! How great is the sum of them!
If I should count them, they are more in number than the sand.
When I awake, I am still with thee. Amazing, isn't that? God, who is above all and should
take no account of the things on earth, knows my every thoughts
and all my ways and set me before and behind. He's familiar with
me and he's done it all for my salvation. And so out of the
belly of hell, in the fish's belly, far from any man, far
from the ear of any man, God heard Jonah cry. Crying to me,
call upon me in the day of trouble. I will answer thee, I will hear
you, I will deliver you, and you shall glorify me. Here it
is. He cried, he was heard. Amazing grace. Have you ever
called to your mom or someone you loved and they didn't answer
you? You were heartbroken. Maybe mom can't hear me, I'll
cry louder. And you know how it goes with kids. Mom! All the way through the house.
Doesn't matter where she's at. We don't care what she's doing.
How busy she is. I want you now. And so the sinner
cries to God, and God, as if you're the only person he has
to listen to, he hears us. That is grace. He brought us
low, he raises us up. He brings the poor out of the
dust. He brings the beggar out of the
dunghill and sets him among princes. This is God, God in his grace.
So, what we see here, what do we see? Let's go on reading through
it here first. He said in verse three, thou
hast cast me into the deep, in the midst of the seas, and the
floods compassed me about, all thy billows and thy waves passed
over me. Notice, they're God's waves,
they're God's billows, they're God's floods, and God cast him,
who was his prophet, into that deep. It's all the Lord's doing. Our trouble is at God's hand. Hell is open before Him. Death and the grave answer to
God. And so we're going to see here
in a minute what happened. The Lord spoke to the fish. He
said, here, swallow up this man. Now spit him out. Hold him for
three days, three nights. Now spit him out. There are all
these troubles that come upon us. They're all under God's hand.
So who should we cry to? the one who holds us in his hand,
and the one who chastens us with these things. Verse four. Then
I said, I'm cast out of thy sight, yet I will look again toward
thy holy temple. See here the grace of God. This
man, this man who had no hope, who was helpless, who was as
good as dead, if not dead, in the grave of the fish's belly,
no hope, no way out, He's going to stay under the depths of the
sea, the bars of the earth, all about him. Yet, though he's cast
out of God's sight, he says, I will look again toward thy
holy temple." That's trust, isn't it? He trusts God no matter what. What else will he do? God's given
him that grace. Verse five, the waters compassed
me about even to the soul. The depth closed me about, closed
me round about. The weeds were wrapped about
my head. I went down to the bottoms of the mountain. The earth with
her bars was about me forever. Yet hast thou brought me up.
Yet hast thou brought up my life from corruption, O Lord my God."
Even at the gates of death, even in corruption, God brought up
his life. This is speaking about the resurrection,
isn't it? God raises the dead. That's his
glory. He raises the dead. Jonah's talking
about what already happened. He's in the fish's belly. He
speaks about his salvation as a done thing, as something in
the past. because he knows God's grace
to him. It is certain and sure. Verse seven, when my soul fainted
within me, I remembered the Lord, and my prayer came in unto thee.
Why did he remember? He was dying. Well, he remembered
because God sent him a remembrance. He remembered the Lord. Have
you ever noticed that? You're going along and you find
yourself, you're stressing out over this and that and the other
thing and it's been days and suddenly you remember the Lord
and you call to Him. That's grace. That's grace from
the throne. He remembered the Lord, and my
prayer came in unto thee, into thine holy temple. They that
observe lying vanities forsake their own mercy, in other words,
idolaters. Those who trust in anyone but Christ forsake their
own mercy. But I will sacrifice to thee
with the voice of thanksgiving. I will pay that that I have vowed.
Salvation is of the Lord. And the Lord spoke to the fish,
and it vomited out Jonah upon the dry land. Notice here that
this has got to be speaking of more than Jonah. More than Jonah. Jesus said, as Jonah was three
days and three nights in the fish's belly, so the Son of Man
will be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.
So what happened to Jonah is telling us this is what happened
in prophecy to Christ. So now we need to look at it
this way. And from this way, primarily, I want to take you to a few of
the psalms, and I want you just to take note of how the psalms
open up in so many places. Start with Psalm 22. Notice how the psalm opens up.
My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Why art thou so
far from helping me and from the words of my roaring voice? He's not like, now I lay me down
to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep. No, he's roaring. He is in trouble, and there's
only one to help, and he can't, he doesn't feel like he's heard,
so he roars. Oh my God, I cry in the daytime,
but thou hear us not, and in the night season, and am not
silent. Now look at Psalm 28. Psalm 28. Unto thee will I cry, O Lord,
my rock. Be not silent to me, lest if
thou be silent to me, I become like them that go down into the
pit. You see how he cries? Look at Psalm chapter 31. In thee, O Lord, do I put my
trust. Let me never be ashamed. Deliver
me in thy righteousness. Bow down thine ear to me. Deliver
me speedily. You see that? Look at Psalm 35. Psalm 35. Plead my cause, O Lord,
with them that strive against me, or strive with me. Fight
against them that fight against me. Take hold of shield and buckler
and stand up for my help. He's asking the Lord to be his
hero, to stand in front of him and to defend him. Draw out also
the spear, not just defenses, offenses too. Draw out the spear
and stop the way against them that persecute my soul and say
unto my soul, I am thy salvation. This is the heart of the child
of God. But look at some more here. I want to take you to several
of these. Look at Psalm chapter 40. Psalm
40. You can just go through and just
read the first two verses of the Psalms and you'll see how
many of them are like this. Psalm 40. I waited patiently
for the Lord, and He inclined to me, and He heard my cry. He brought me up also out of
a horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a
rock, and established my goings. He hath put a new song in my
mouth, even praise to our God. Many shall see it in fear, and
shall trust in the Lord. And now look over at Psalm 42.
Psalm 42. As the heart or the deer panteth
with, I'm sorry, as the heart panteth after the water brooks,
so panteth my soul after thee, O God. My soul thirsteth for
God, for the living God. When shall I come and appear
before God? My tears have been my meat, day
and night, while they continually say to me, where is thy God?
When I remember these things, I pour out my soul in me. For
I had gone with the wicked, I'm sorry, I've gone with the multitude.
I went with them to the house of God, with the voice of joy
and praise, with the multitude that kept holy day. Why art thou
cast down, O my soul? And why art thou disquieted in
me? Hope thou in God. For I shall yet praise him for
the help of his countenance. And he goes on in that Psalm.
Look at Psalm chapter, let's see, I could read several. Let's
try, we could read Psalm 51. Remember
that one? Psalm 51. How about Psalm 54? Psalm 54. Save me, O God, by thy name,
and judge me by thy strength. Hear my prayer, O God. Give ear
to the words of my mouth. You see that? How about Psalm
55? Give ear to my prayer, O God,
and hide not thyself from my supplications. Attend to me and
hear me. I mourn in my complaint and make a noise. These people,
this man who's praying here, he's not bashful. He's not reluctant. He roars out of his sorrow, out
of his complaint, out of his trouble, because God brought
it upon him. God allowed these enemies. God
allowed this despondency. God raised the need in him because
God cut off the sense of his presence, and these things drove
him to despair, and he cried to the Lord. Look at Psalm chapter
60. O God, Thou hast cast us off,
Thou hast scattered us, Thou hast been displeased, O turn
Thyself to us again. You see that? Look at Psalm 57,
going backward. Be merciful unto me, O God, be
merciful unto me, for my soul trusteth in thee. Yea, in the
shadow of thy wings will I make my refuge until these calamities
be overpassed. I will cry to God most high,
unto God that performeth all things for me. We could just
go on and on. You just go through the psalm
and you can note these things. Look at Jeremiah chapter 17. Take another prophet, not just
Jonah, but Jeremiah chapter 17. Notice how Jeremiah prays in
verse 17. Chapter 17, verse 17. He's praying
out of his trouble. Terror is coming upon him, and
notice what he does. Be not, this is Jeremiah 17,
17, be not a terror unto me. Thou art my hope in the day of
evil. Can you pray that? Lord, don't
be a terror to me. You are my hope. He's pouring
out his complaint, his fear, the trouble of him, and he's
expressing his trust. He's expressing his trust in
God. Look at Isaiah chapter 9. Isaiah chapter 9. See the fault God charges Israel
with. in contrast to Jeremiah or the
psalmist. Isaiah chapter 9, Isaiah 9 verse
13. For the Lord, it says, for the
people, the people turneth not unto him that smiteth them, neither
do they seek the Lord of hosts. God had brought affliction upon
them. What was their response? They didn't turn to him. They
didn't seek him. Why did Jonah? Why did Jeremiah?
Why does the psalmist throughout? Because God gave them the grace
to see that the Lord was their only salvation even though he
was the one who brought the trouble upon them. It's just like a child
when he is chastised by his parents and that child buries his face
into his mother or in his father's chest. He comes to the one who
is chastising him. And he says, you're all I have.
I know that you do this, and it's right that you do, but my
trust is in you. I am depending on your love. I need you. He cries. He doesn't
hold back. He lets it all out. Now, understand
that these prayers that Jonah prayed were a prophecy of what
the Lord Jesus Christ prayed. This is, he, Let me just remind you of some
things that scripture has said. He himself bore our sorrows. He said, my soul is exceeding
sorrowful, even unto death, to his disciples when he was in
Gethsemane. Why was he sorry? What had he done to be sorry
for? Nothing. He was sorrowful because of the
affliction he was experiencing in his soul because he took our
sorrows. But why were we sorrowful? Because
of our sin. And Christ took our sin and therefore
he bore the consequences, the sorrows for it. So that when
he cried out, he was crying out of his own sorrow because of
our sin. And because he cried out and
he was holy, he feared God. He trusted God. He cried with
a holy prayer. He prayed according to God's
will to save him. He was under the depths. He was
in the grave. He went to death. He experienced
all that those men who crucified him brought upon him. And he
experienced in his soul all that God afflicted him with. Thou
hast in faithfulness afflicted me. And yet he justifies his
God. He clears his name. You are holy. And so we see this prayer of
Jonah has got to be a prophecy of Christ's prayer because of
our sin. He took our place. And having
taken our place, and having prayed, he prayed for himself, but note,
he did not pray just for himself. He was there as our high priest. And the Lamb of God, expressing from His heart the
pain and the suffering and the sorrows of the forsaking of God
and the shame of our sins and the mocking and the cruelty of
those who hated Him, Even though he did all that was right, they
hated him. Remember, it says in 1 Peter,
he did no sin. And yet when he was reviled,
he reviled not again. When he was threatened, I'm sorry,
when he was, how does it say it there? In 1 Peter 2, verse 21, it says,
even here unto where you called, because Christ also suffered
for us, leaving us an example that you should follow in his
steps, who did no sin, neither was guile or hypocrisy in his
mouth, who when he was reviled, reviled not again. When he suffered,
he threatened not, but he committed himself, he entrusted himself
to God to save him. To him that judges righteously,
this is coming upon me from God, then the Lord is merciful. He's
just, he will do what's right. And he trusted himself to his
father. So in that holy fear and trust that Christ had, when
he prayed, he was heard. Look at Hebrews chapter five.
Hebrews chapter 5, in verse 7, it says, who in the days of his
flesh, when he had offered up prayers and supplications with
strong crying and tears. Strong crying and tears. That sounds like the psalmist
throughout. That sounds like Jonah, doesn't it? Like Jeremiah.
He offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears
to him that was able to save him from death, and he was heard. in that he feared. He was a holy
man. He was without sin, without guile. He had no sin, he did no sin,
he knew no sin. He was holy, harmless, undefiled,
separate from sinners. He feared God. He feared to do
anything that was opposed to his God, the will of God, or
the ways of God. God was holy. He knew that what
was coming upon him was God's will. He submitted to it willingly,
trusting his God. He was the only one he could
trust. He had cast upon him from his mother's womb. He was always
with him. And so he feared. And because
he feared, he was heard. This is very important. Christ
was heard. And he didn't cry because of
his own sins, though they were made his, or his own sorrows,
though they were his sorrows, but they were ours, he took them
from us. And so when he prayed and was heard, we were heard. Our sins were removed. The chains
of death that were about him were taken away. He was raised
again. God delivered him, just like
God delivered Jonah from the fish's belly. He heard him. God
hears us because he heard his son. He heard his son and he
hears all those he stood for. Jesus didn't, a high priest doesn't
act for himself. It says, every high priest is
taken from among men and ordained for men in things pertaining
to God that he may offer gifts and sacrifices for sin. He acted
for us because of our sins towards God. But as the Lamb of God,
he also bore all that he experienced as our substitute. He's our substitute,
he's our forerunner, our captain, his prayers were heard. He believed
God, he feared God, he was holy, and God heard him. And God raised
him from the dead. And because he was heard, we
are heard. Now, also, we also learn this
from Jonah here in chapter two, that there's never a time Never a time when we cannot trust
God. There's never a time when we
should not trust God. We should trust him at all times, even
in the worst of circumstances. Never go inward into the dark.
Always go upward into the light. Call upon God. He says, call
upon me in the day of trouble. Trouble is given to us to show
us our need and to make us dependent upon him. I was turning to a psalm. Now
I forgot which one I was turning to. These things are given to us
by God in order that we would learn from Christ what to do
in trouble. Remember Job? Though he slay
me, yet will I trust him. The people don't call upon him
who smites them. They don't turn to him. They
don't seek the Lord. And Jeremiah said, Lord, don't
be a terror to me, as you are my hope. And the psalmist throughout
cries, oh my God, save me. Oh my God, save me. Hear me,
don't turn a deaf ear to me. Lord, I cry. And these are the
prayers of the Lord Jesus. Now look at Psalm chapter 22.
Psalm chapter 22. I want to take you to this. We
know this is a prayer of the Lord Jesus Christ, don't we?
Psalm 22. This is what Jesus uttered from
the cross. My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? And he
calls upon him, but notice, I want you to look further on in this
Psalm, at verse 30, Psalm 22, verse 30. Read this Psalm, see
his trust. He trusted God when there was
no evidence, because he knew his God was faithful. But look
at Psalm 30, I'm sorry, Psalm 22, verse 30. A seed shall serve
him. It shall be counted to the Lord
for a generation. Isn't that amazing? Who is the
one praying in this psalm? The Lord Jesus Christ. In prophecy,
David writes of Christ here, and he fulfilled it on the cross.
But here now he says, a seed, the one praying, the one afflicted,
the one who was heard, says, a seed shall serve him. It shall
be counted to the Lord for a generation. This man served God. This man
was heard, and this man was counted to the Lord for all of the people
of God. All that he did, he did for them.
And many other things are like that. Just remember the gospel.
What is the gospel? Christ died for our sins. He was buried. He rose again the third day,
according to the scriptures. We're saved because he was heard,
and we learn to pray just like him in trouble. We expect God
to hear us because he heard Christ for us. We expect God to hear
us because his character and nature towards us is a character
and nature of grace, because he had grace and mercy on us
in Christ. We expect God to hear us because this is his promise.
Call upon me in the day of trouble. I will deliver you and you shall
glorify me. What an amazing promise. One
more verse and then we'll quit. Look at Psalm, I'm sorry, Isaiah.
Isaiah chapter 53. Isaiah 53 and verse 10. You know what Isaiah 53 is about.
Listen to this. It pleased the Lord to bruise
him. Even though he had no deceit,
even though he had done no wrong, it pleased the Lord to bruise
him. Isaiah 53, verse 10. He, the Father, God the Father,
hath put him to grief, when thou shalt make his soul an offering
for sin. He shall see his seed. He shall prolong his days and
the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in his hand. God's delight,
his will is going to be successful because of Christ. He put it
into the hand of his son and he made it successful. Look at verse 11. He shall see
of the travail of his soul. How did his soul travail? Well,
in many ways we don't understand, but one way we do understand.
He cried. He prayed. Jonah, chapter 2.
He shall see the travail of his soul, and he shall be satisfied. By his knowledge shall my righteous
servant justify many, for he shall bear their iniquities.
Now, focus on verse 12. Therefore will I divide him a
portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoiled with
the strong, because he has poured out his
soul unto death, and he was numbered with the transgressors, and he
bare the sin of many, and he made intercession for the transgressors."
How did he do that? Well, when he said things like,
Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. Or when
he said to the soldiers, if you seek me, then let these go their
way. Or when he was mocked on the cross and they said, he saved
others, himself he cannot save. Well, of course not. He couldn't
save them unless he gave himself to death. But he also prayed
in this way. When he cried because of our
sin and our sorrows laid on him and God heard him, then God released
us. Full remission was made, full
payment was accepted by God and God released us. We were redeemed
by the precious blood of Christ. And when the high priest went
into the holiest of all, what did he do first? He put the incense
up, and then he offered his blood, the blood of the animal. So Christ,
first crying out of his soul's anguish, offering up his prayers
for his people in his own salvation for them, and God heard his prayers,
and God accepted his blood, and God justified him and raised
him from the dead. This is our salvation, isn't
it? This is the basis for our cry. We cry because our forerunner,
our captain of our salvation was heard. Our intercessor, he
stands in heaven, or he sits in heaven now, interceding for
us, but while he was on earth, he was still interceding for
us. There was never a time when the Lord Jesus Christ did not
do what he did for his people towards his Father. Let's pray.
Lord, thank you for your mercy towards us, that you've given
us a high priest, a mediator, a surety, a substitute, one to
go before us, one to stand for us, one to plead our cause, one
who was heard, one who was holy, one who feared, one who trusted,
one who did all that was right, and even when he was When he
suffered for doing right, he never complained, but committed
himself to the Lord who judges rightly, who judges all things
right. He trusted in the Lord. There
was mercy in no other, salvation in no other. And Lord, so we
come to you now, knowing that in ourselves we are sinful. Our
bodies are dead because of sin, and we have a sinful nature.
We can't deliver ourselves from our sin, a guilt of our sin,
or our nature of sin. We can't deliver ourselves from
death, but we trust in the Lord Jesus Christ that in His stripes,
in His death, we were healed and we were raised. Our sinful
selves died with Him so that we're raised to live to God in
Him and by Him. And so we come, Lord, trusting
in His merit, in His pleading, in His intercession. And we trust,
Lord, that these words would move us because of how much He
bore for us, and move us because we have warrant by His example
and His prayers in trouble, that we can pray in all of our troubles
and come boldly to the throne of grace by His blood, looking
to how our Savior prayed in His trouble. In Jesus' name we pray.
Amen.