Psalm 103. I know that it's cold
outside. I've been out there. And it's a temptation to stay
at home and stay warm. But I hope the Lord will warm
our hearts this evening. Psalm 103. Look at verses 13
and 14 again with me. Psalm 103. Like as a father, pitieth his children. So the
Lord pitieth them that fear him. For he knoweth our frame, he
remembereth that we are dust. Remember, the Father, Heavenly
Father's pity for his children. I hope he'll bless this. We cannot
fully comprehend or even appreciate Our Heavenly Father's love and
kindness and mercy and grace and pity for His people. Pity. You're going to see what
that means in a minute. But our Lord Jesus Christ, His
Sermon on the Mount, put it this way. He said, if you, being evil
or sinful, know how to give good things unto your children, How
much more? How much more will your Heavenly
Father give good things to His people? How much more? He said
this, our Lord said, as my thoughts are not your thoughts, my ways
are not your ways, He said, as the heavens are higher above
the earth, so are His thoughts and ways than our ways. His love,
His mercy, His pity, that's how great He is. His faithfulness?
Great! Is I faithful? We're going to
try to look into something that we cannot fully understand or
appreciate. And I'm not sufficient to tell
it, but we'll look a little bit. But first, it's vital that we
understand who He's speaking to. Okay? Look at verse 13 again. Like as a father pitieth his
children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear Him. See that? It says this three
times, look at verse 11, as heaven is high above the earth, so great
is his mercy toward them that fear him. Look at verse 17, the
mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting upon them that
fear him. Now, it's absolutely true that
mankind is not to be pitied, but to be blamed. Do you understand
that? Mankind is to be blamed, not
pitied. There's nothing lovely. There's
nothing in man for God to love. We're born rebels. All of us. We're born rebels. We're born
loving ourselves. We're born loving sin. Hating
God. That's what the Scripture says.
Now, if left to ourselves, we don't want any authority. We
sure don't want God to reign over us. We love sin. We hate holiness and righteousness. And this is a fact. That God
is truly angry with the wicked every day. If we don't clarify
who God loves and who God pities, We're guilty, just like these
false prophets, of bearing false witness against God and lying
to people, prophesying smooth things. And you remember Malachi, the
Lord said, I'm weary of what they're saying. They're saying
everybody that does evil is good in the sight of the Lord. You
read that with me, didn't you? It's important that three times,
in just a few verses, this is for those that Fear Him. Fear
Him. All right? The wrath of God abides
on the ungodly. God hates some. He hates workers of iniquity.
And He will destroy. And unless God sovereignly had
chosen us and redeemed us, and revealed Himself to us, and loved
us, and shed abroad His love in our hearts, and given us repentance,
we would perish. Everybody in this room. Isn't
that right? That's exactly right. So like
tender mercies, God doesn't pity everybody. Right? The way He's saving mercy. As I said, this is the distinctive
mark in God's people. When the Lord sends His Word,
like John Newton's psalm, it was grace that taught my heart
to fear. You find out who God really is,
the God of the Bible. And this fear is a deep, heartfelt, reverence and respect for God. When you find out God is holy,
God is sovereign, God is just, and you are utterly guilty and
worthless, undeserving, it breaks your heart over sin against God. And you realize, I need mercy.
That God shouldn't love me. God shouldn't spare me. But I
sure hope he will. That's fear. It makes us call
to God for mercy, and it makes us see that we need a substitute. We need Jesus Christ to bear
our sins and our punishments in His body on the trail. This
thing of fear is something you don't hear in Christianity today. Do you? You don't hear it? And you sure don't see it, but
this is the characteristic that distinguishes God's people from
those who just seem to fear Him. Okay? Alright, this is for those
who fear Him. Now the rest of this I'm going
to talk about His pity, okay? Do you fear Him? Do you fear
Him? You know, fear is so many things.
You fear His law. You fear His word. You fear His
wrath. You fear His justice. You fear sin. You fear self. You fear being forsaken, being
cut off, being cast out. You fear God. You fear being
cast away because you're such a sinner and God's holy. Fear
the Lord. But Newton said, it was grace that
taught my heart to fear. What relieved his fear? Grace. God's saving grace in Christ.
The gift of righteousness and redemption. Alright, pity. As
a father pities his children. God the Father pities his children. Those who know him, those who
fear him, those who love him. They fear him and he pities them. Now, this Like a father pities
his children, I'm a father, and some of you are fathers and mothers. I know something about pity for
my children. I've told you before when Hannah
was born that the first thing I felt for her was pity. I looked
on her poor little, you know, she was just awful. I just felt so sorry for her.
Pity. But God's pity for us far exceeds
our pity for our children. And that's hard to grasp. You know that? Those grandbabies. Can you love your grandchildren
as much as your own children? Oh my. Oh my, yes. And God's pity far exceeds our
pity for our children. Far exceeds. That's hard to fathom,
but it's true. Pity means this. Pity means deep
feelings, folks. Pity means having a desire to
relieve the suffering and the troubles and the sorrows, a desire
to relieve that, an inner yearning to relieve those. Pity means this, the word fondle. is first used in the Hebrew word,
it means to touch lovingly, to handle tenderly, to caress, like
a father or mother soothing a troubled child, oh baby. Anything touch you like the cry
of an infant or a baby? You remember Mary? That's what pity means. Pity
means deep, heartfelt, tender feeling. It means you're touched. You're touched. Deeply touched
and moved by their sufferings and their trouble. Like a father
pities his children. Deeply touched with feeling,
love and compassion. Verse 14, He knows our frame. He knows our frame. It remembers
what is our frame. Look at verse 14. Dust. We came
from the dust, and that's where we'll return to. Dust. I want you to turn. I want to
have you turn to four or five Scriptures, okay? Not too many. But every one I have you turn
to. I had to rule out a hundred. Every one I have you turn to.
You're going to love it. Isaiah 40. Isaiah chapter 40. Dust. What is dust? It's utterly
insignificant, isn't it? Dust. It's insignificant. It's microscopic. It's worthless,
isn't it? Well, look at Isaiah 40. Look at Isaiah 40, verse 6. The voice said, Cry. He said,
What shall I cry? All flesh is grass. The goodness
thereof is the flower of the field. That's what David wrote
there, didn't it? Grass withereth, the flower fadeth. The Spirit
of the Lord bloweth upon it. Surely the people is grass. Verse
9, O thou that bringest good tidings, O Zion that bringest
good tidings, get into the high mountain. O Jerusalem, lift up
thy voice with strength, lift it up, be not afraid. Say unto
the cities of Judah, Behold, your God." Your God. Look at what God, how God likens
man. Verse 15. The nations are as
a drop of a bucket. All of them. Put them all together. Mankind, all of them. It's counted
as the small dust of the balance. Verse 17, all nations before
Him are as nothing. Verse 22, grasshoppers. Nothing. Dust. He remembers our
frame. That we're just dust. He knows
what we are. What we're made of. And that's
what we're going to return to. Have you ever seen a picture
of all of the planets in relation to the sun? You ever seen that? You need to see that. Okay? Mankind
thinks he's something. Mankind really thinks he's something.
Big, something great. The Earth is not the largest
planet by any means. It's Saturn? No, not Saturn, it's Pluto. Pluto? Who cares? But anyway, alright,
the Sun is hundreds of times larger than the Earth. If you
hold up the Earth next to the Sun, it's like a, somebody said
it's like a basketball compared to the head of a pen. That's
the Earth in relation to the Sun. All right, now where are
we on that little speck? Huh? Oh, we're something greater. This is why the scripture said,
what is man? He sits on the circle there.
What is man that you're mindful of him, or would come to visit
him? He's dust. Nothing. That's our insignificance. We're completely insignificant. If you put all the dust together,
what is it? Dust. But now when do His people take
on insignificance? When He redeems them and they
become His children. We're going to see how in a minute.
He remembers our frame, that we're dust, we're flesh. Psalm
78. Go back to Psalm 78. I started
to read that down through verse 39. I changed my mind just at
the last moment. Just too many verses, but I...
Look at verse... And Psalm 78, read it for yourself.
It's another psalm like 106 and 107 about what all God has done
for His people and what they did against Him. Just sin after
sin after sin after sin. Provoking and provoking and provoking.
Sinning against how good God was to them, is, and keeps doing
for them, and they kept sinning against it. They kept sinning.
Kept sinning. Alright, look, this is wonderful. Psalm 78,
but he, verse 38, he being full of compassion, Forgave their
iniquity and destroyed them not. Many a time turned his anger
away. Did not stir up all his wrath.
He remembered they were but flesh. A wind that passeth away and
cometh not again. Flesh. Back in our text. Go back there. Flesh. Sinful flesh. Dust. Insignificant. Flesh. Sinful
flesh. Weak flesh. Our Lord put it this
way, that which is flesh is flesh. He said the spirit is willing,
but what? The flesh is weak, helpless,
vile, sinful. Paul called it a body of death,
a prison to the soul. And Psalm 103 in our text, it
says here, He remembers. He remembers that we're but flesh,
dust. He knows our frame. He remembers
that. He remembrance. He knows what we are. Weak, helpless,
sinful. Don't you love Psalm 139? I started
to turn there. That's one of those I had to
rule out. He knows us. Nothing doesn't know about us.
He knows us better than we know ourselves. He knows that we're Our time
is short. Look at verse, I love this, verse
15. As for man, his days are grass,
flower of the field, he flourishes. The wind passeth over, it's gone.
The place thereof shall know it no more. We're here for a
little time, and then we're gone. And it won't be too long after
that that nobody will ever know we existed. The greatest of men. Man at his best state. He reaches
his highest level in whatever it is. Quick, Mike, name the
22nd President of the United States. Come on. 23rd. No. 10th, Mike. Let me pick on
somebody else. Sarah, you smart. Give me the
8th President of the United States. 3rd? This is the President of
the United States. You don't even know who they
are. They don't matter to you. He remembers His people. We will
see that in a minute. Isaiah 49, go over there. Isaiah
49. We're sad creatures, aren't we?
We know sooner we're born and we start getting old and then
we die. Isn't it true? Like a sleep, Psalm 90. And we're
forgotten. We're quickly forgotten. People
that mean so much to us. Go to a nursing home. You're
going to see where we're all going to end up. Go to a nursing
home. It's sad, isn't it? Man was created
in the image of God because he sinned against God. It's sad,
isn't it? It's just sad. The world doesn't
care about all those people in nursing homes. And when they're gone, they'll
all be forgotten. But Isaiah 49, look at verse 14. Isaiah 44. Zion said, the Lord
has forsaken me. And my Lord hath forgotten me.
Listen to what the Lord said. Can a woman forget her sucking
child? That she should not have compassion on the son of her
womb? Yes, they do. Now he might forget, he said,
but I will not forget thee. Behold, I have graven thee upon
the palm of my hand. That's Christ crucified isn't
it? Thy walls are continually before
me. Amen. He remembers. He remembers
his people. What was it that the thief on
the cross said? Now first of all, who was the
thief on the cross? The whole world wanted him dead.
And as soon as he was dead, he was forgotten. Long forgotten.
Good riddance. But he asked the Lord, hanging
on that crown, Lord, remember me. And our Lord said, today. He'll be with me in paradise.
He'll never be forgotten. My, my. He remembereth. Isaiah 64. Look
at this. Isaiah 64. He knoweth. He remembereth. Somebody says,
I'm just too sinful. I'm just too sinful. No way the
Lord's going to remember mercy for me. No way. I'm going to be in His care.
I'm just too sinful. I told you about the thief, didn't I? I'm
just too sinful. Here's the fact of the matter.
You just don't know how sinful you are. No, you don't. You say, I'm too sinful. You
don't know the half of it. God does. He knows. There's not a thought
in your head He doesn't know. You don't know what you could
do. You don't know what you're capable of. You don't know what
you could do if God didn't keep you from it. You don't know where
you would be if God hadn't restrained you. Nobody in you. God does. He does. He does. You don't know you like
He knows you. You know that? It's like a parent
with their child. Our children, you know, in their
early days, especially when they start to get, you know, adolescence,
10, 11, 12, and teenagers especially, my parents just don't understand
me. Yeah, right. They understand you better than
you understand you. Are you hearing? Listen to me,
young people. You hadn't been them. They've been you. I think
children think that their parents went from birth to 40 overnight. That they completely bypassed
teenage years. They don't have a clue what I'm
going through as a teenager. I'm 17, 18. They just don't understand
me. Yeah, right. They understand you better than
you understand you. You don't understand you. You
don't know. You just don't know. They do.
And you don't know and you don't understand, you do not appreciate,
and you're not thankful for how much they love you and pity you
and think about you all the time. How much do you think about them? What do you do for them? What
have you done for them? And they've done everything for
you. That's exactly the child of God. Years, years of giving God thoughts. But yet he thinketh on us. Brother Kelly, I was going to
go to Hosea and go through the whole book tonight. But as it
is, I'm just going to quote a couple of verses for you. But that's
the book in Hosea. Ephraim. I've got to wait on
that. Hold that thought. Did I tell
you Isaiah 64? I did, didn't I? Isaiah 64. He knows, our friend. He remembers. We say, I'm just too sinful.
No, no. No, he knows. He knows how sinful
you are. He remembers. He remembers. We forget him,
but he never, he cannot forget us. We just read that. We forget
him all the time. Yeah, we do. Yeah, we go. We go hours and hours and sometimes
days. God forbid if we go longer, but
we have. But he never, ever. You know, our grandchildren at
the age now, you know, when, boy, do I miss this, don't we,
Mindy? We used to go over, they lived
on Herbert Street here in town, and before, especially before
Sophie was born, but Isabella was, you know, two, three, and
we'd go over there, and she knew we were coming, and she was standing
there at the glass door, and she'd see us pull up, Chop it
up, chop it up, chop it up, chop it up, chop it up, chop it up,
chop it up, chop it up, chop it up, chop it up, chop it up, chop it up, chop it up,
chop it up, chop it up, chop it up, chop it up, chop it up, chop it up,
chop it up, chop it up, chop it up, chop it up, chop it up, chop it up, chop it up,
chop it up, chop it up, chop it up, chop it up, chop it up,
chop it up, chop it up, chop it up, chop it up, chop it up, chop it up, chop it up,
chop it up, chop it up, chop it up, chop it up, chop
it up, chop it up, chop it up, chop it up, chop it up, chop it up, chop it up, chop
it up, chop it up, chop it up, chop it up, chop it up, chop
it up, chop it up, Their life and all that. And Pawpaw and
me, Mom. Oh, yeah. I love them. But they're
going their way. We ain't never been thinking
about that. Think about them all the time
now. There are pictures everywhere and thoughts. Isn't that right?
How much more? You're a heavenly father. Hosea, he says, I'll never forget
you because I'm God, not man. He can't. What can we do? He can't. We forget His Word,
His counsel, we sin, we fall. He remembers His covenant. He seeeth the blood. No matter
what, John. No matter what. Why did you do that? How could
you do that? You ought to go to hell for it,
shouldn't you? Praise God. And then there's
time when we remember our sins. You and I love this. We remember
our sins like David. Our sin is ever before us. We
can't forget our sins. But you know what he says about
our sins? He says there's sins and iniquity. I remember no more.
Their past. You don't have a past. To God. I've told you that, you know,
later on in my adult years, I was trying to apologize to my mother
especially. How little I thought of her and
what all I did, you know. And she didn't remember anything.
Anything bad. As far as she's concerned, I
was a perfect child. Oh, my. That's love, isn't it? What we can't forget, our sins,
he can't remember. And what we forget all the time,
his word, his counsel, his covenant, his gospel, he can't forget. Isaiah 64, look at verse 9. Be not wroth, very sore, O Lord,
neither remember iniquity forever. Behold, see, we beseech Thee,
we are all Thy people. Remember us, He said. Remember
us. Now let me go back one chapter,
just one page, over one page. How does God know us? How does
He know our prayer? God is in heaven. How could He
possibly know what we're like? Huh? God became a man to know us, to enter into a union
with the flesh, to take on the likeness of sinfully. Well, that's
Him. And yet, He knows. He became flesh. Look at Isaiah
63. This is wonderful. Who is this?
I want to preach a message on that. I started looking up verses,
John, where it says, Who is this? What a message that would be.
Who is this? that cometh from Edom, with garments
dyed from Basra, this that is glorious in his apparel, travelling
in the greatness of his strength, I that speak in righteousness,
mighty to save." This is to save. This is the Lord Jesus Christ. And down in verse 9 it says,
"...in all their affliction he was afflicted." Angel of His
presence saved them. In His love and in His pity,
He redeemed them and buried them and carried them all the days
of old. Oh, they rebelled, but He had
pity on them. Hebrews 2 now, and I'll wrap
this up. Hebrews chapter 2. Here's how
God knows our frame. He took our frame. He took the
likeness of sinful flesh. And this is God's greatest glory.
And people, if you listen, this is your greatest comfort. God
was manifest in the flesh. The Son of God became flesh in
the likeness of sinful flesh to know us, to enter into what
we are, become one with us, and to save us. To know us and to
save us by His life, by His death. By His life, He glorified God
in the flesh. By His death, He condemned sin
in the flesh. He was made sin. He knew no sin. He made sin. Sinless flesh, God
made Him us. And made us Him. But He came. Hebrews chapter 2. These are
some of my favorite verses in the Bible. Such comfort right
here, people. Hebrews 2, verse 14. For as much
then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself
likewise took part of the same." I told you that, well, the Scripture
says we're dust. God calls Jacob a worm, doesn't
He? Fear not thou worm, Jacob. Worms, I told you that story
about the worms I bought. That's what we're like. We're
crawling around and riding in this earth, just earthbound worms. by nature, lovers of darkness
rather than light? Well, what did Christ say about
Himself in Psalm 22, John? Psalm 22 is the psalm of the
cross. One of them. One of the many. And He said,
I'm a worm. No man. Christ became flesh. And He knows. that through death,
verse 14, he would destroy him that had the power of death,
that is the devil, and deliver them who through fear of death
were all their lifetime subject to bondage. He came to live and
he came to die. Why? Because we've got to die.
And we're afraid of death. And death casts this horrible
shadow over everything and it puts fear in us. The slightest
sickness or plague come along, we're all scared to death. Why? We're scared of death. But Christ
came to live and die. He said, that's why I came. To
live, to come one with our flesh, to take on the likeness of flesh,
to glorify God in the flesh, then condemn sin in the flesh.
What's the condemnation of sin? Death. And so he came to die. And John, because he died, we won't die. He promises that. Why? Because Christ died. Look at verse 17. In all things
it behooved him to be made like unto his brethren, that he might
be a merciful and faithful high priest, thanks pertaining to
God, and make reconciliation for the sins of the people by
his sacrifice. He himself has suffered being
tempted. He is able to succor or help
them that are tempted. Turn to page chapter 4, verse
15. He says, we have not a high priest
that cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities. But
in all points, he knows our friend. In all points,
tempted like us, get without sin. In all points. So he says, let's come boldly
to the throne of God. Look at chapter 5, verse 2. Look on down
there, verse 2. He can have compassion on the
ignorant, then they're out of the way, for that he himself
is compassed with infirmity. All points. Part of the reason
we pity our children, our grandchildren, is because we were just like
them, weren't we? Brother Mike was helping somebody,
a young man, and he said, that was me. He's just like me. That was me years ago. Right? Do we know? Well, our Lord came
down here. That's hard to fathom in it,
John. All points. Tempted. Tried in all points. Touched.
Touched. He had the absolute power to
resist sin. Satan came, John, and there was
nothing in him to tempt him. He had complete mastery over
his body, his mind, everything. And he knows our frame, that
we can't resist anything. He knows. Does that comfort you? He was hungry. We miss one day's food. I want to die. Yeah, right. You have 40 days and 40 nights
without food. You ever done that? Voluntarily. Thirsted? Oh, we just don't know how thirsty
he got. Hanging on a cross. Thirsty? Tired? Tired? Oh, I've worked
my... yeah. He worked from the time he was
born to the time he died every waking hour of the day for other
people. No pay. Weary, sorrowful, man of sorrows. He had much more sorrow than
his own. Sorrow of all his children. Grief. Have you ever experienced
deep grief? Trouble. He said, I'm exceedingly
sorrowful even unto death. He said, now is my soul troubled.
Trouble. Flesh. Time bound by flesh. He bound himself to flesh. Think
about that. He bound him. He had to depend
on his Heavenly Father for everything. And he did. He lived by faith. Satan came and said, make stones
bread. You're the Son of God, make stones. My Father's not going to give
me bread. He lived by faith. He waited. He's patient. Sin? Tempted at all points like
it was sin? We just don't know. He was made
sin. We feel something of sin. But
we're not going to bear the heaviness of it that He bore. He sweat
blood in the garden. And shed His blood on the cross.
He felt it. The infirmity of the flesh, He
knows, He knows, He knows. And let me close with this. You're
going to be glad. Jeremiah 31. You're going to be glad. You're
going to be glad you read this. If you can read this with a dry
eye, there's something wrong with you. Jeremiah 31. Jeremiah 31. I told you I was
going to turn all the way through Hosea and tell you the story
of Ephraim. The Lord kept saying about Ephraim.
And Ephraim is a picture of us. Ephraim, He said, he's a silly
dove. He's without heart. He said he's
joined his idol, leave him alone. He said he backslides like a
heifer. You ever, I've seen some of you
with your dogs pulling you. A heifer, you know, you rope
it and it's just, you have to pull it back again, sliding back
like a heifer. Just won't, you don't mean it
any harm. You mean it good. He said, Ephraim is joined to
his idols. He's sinful. He's weak. He's sick. And in chapter 11,
verse 8, the Lord says, I just can't give you up, Ephraim.
How am I going to give you up? Ephraim didn't want anything
to do with God. God says, I cannot give you up. I've set my love
on you. I love you. Is he a pleasant child? Look
at Jeremiah 31. This is wonderful. He said, verse 18, I've heard Ephraim
bemoaning himself. Thou hast chastised me, I was
chastised, as a bullock unaccustomed to the yoke. Turn thou me, and
I'll be turned. Thou art the Lord my God. The Lord reveals Himself to us,
and we repent. Surely after that I was returned,
I repented, and after I was instructed, I smote upon my thigh. I was
ashamed of myself. Hey, confounded, because I did
bear the reproach of my youth. Oh, what I've done, my God. And
here's what God said. Is he from my dear son? Is he
a pleasant child? Since I spake against him, convicted
of sin, I do earnestly remember him still. Therefore, my bowels
are troubled for him. I will surely have mercy upon
him, says the Lord. I remember him. I'll never forget
him. How will I give you up, Ephraim?
How will I give you up, sinner, child of God, that fears me and
trusts me? No matter what you do, where
you go, What you get into, I will remember you. My bowels are touched
with feeling for you. I pity you as a father pities
his children. I will surely, you can count
on this, God can be trusted, I will surely have mercy. Okay,
stand with me.