you a lot of good. I have two
more messages, one this morning and one this evening on this
psalm, and then we'll finish it out. I haven't really kept
up with how many messages I've brought on Psalm 91, but it's
been several, and yet we haven't exhausted it because you cannot
exhaust the scriptures. This is such a cheerful psalm. It is, I would say, one of the
best preservatives in any time of trouble. And when this virus,
when we were being warned about it and notified of the seriousness
of it and that it's going to evidently be with us for some
time, it was this psalm that I went to. And I thought, well,
if this does me good, then it'll do you good also. I would say
this is a heavenly remedy or a heavenly medicine for earthly
spiritual ills. That's what Psalm 91 is. It's
heavenly medicine. When we get sick, when we have,
issues with our bodies, we go to a physician. Well, you and
I, who are the people of God, we still have issues, we still
have the spiritual disease of sin with us, and we're always
in need of heavenly medicine. We're always in need of the remedy
for that which ails us, and that which truly ails us is our own
sinfulness. Yes, we are the people of God,
and yes, we are forgiven by the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ,
and yet we still have struggles, we still have difficulties, we
still have problems, problems with the flesh, we still have
the issue of sicknesses and those sorts of things, and in those... under those conditions, and most
especially in the situations in which we find ourselves now,
it would do us good to go to the scripture, such as Psalm
91, and this is what we discovered, the word of God ministers to
us, it speaks to us. Now, if it doesn't speak to you,
I'm very sorry. It speaks to those who've been
given spiritual ears. It speaks to those who've been
given a new heart of faith. And it gives to us relief. It
gives to us joy. And it may be that we're hurting.
It may be that we have some kind of physical illness. I heard
from a gentleman in New Jersey who actually has this virus and
he's been listening to us. It may be that you're sick, but
he said to me, he said, the Word of God as you preached it, he
said, it's done me a world of good. Now, it may be that the
Lord won't relieve your physical illnesses. It may be that He
will not remove from you your physical diseases. But He has
done much, much better than that. He has healed us of our spiritual
diseases. He has given us this great salvation
in this marvelous Savior, the Lord Jesus. So we have infinite
mercies and blessings that are ours every day from the Lord. So here's heavenly medicine again
from Psalm 91. Now, as you've been reading with
me, and I hope you've been certainly following along in the messages,
And if you haven't been, you can listen to them, of course,
on Sermon Audio, just go to our website and you can listen to
them. But as we've been reading this
song, the observant reader will notice that there has been, in
the first 13 verses, two different speakers. And I wonder if you've
picked up on that. And I've waited till this morning
to make you aware of it if you haven't noticed it before. The
first voice that is heard, the first words that are spoken are
the words of Moses. And of course, Moses is the inspired
writer of this psalm, but he speaks and he speaks to He speaks
to the head of the church. That is, he speaks to Messiah
and to those who are in him. Now remember, there is a head
of God's people. There is the Savior. He heads
up the body of Christ Jesus. We read in Ephesians chapter
one that he's been exalted to be the head over the church.
And all the promises of God in Christ are yea, and in him, amen. And all the promises of God to
Christ are not only to him, but they're also to us, that is to
those who are in Christ Jesus. Now, you'll notice that Moses,
first of all, gives a description of the kinds of persons to whom
whom he's speaking. Look at verse one again. He that
dwelleth, he that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most
High, he who dwells behind the veil, he who abides in the presence
of God, he abides, he lodges under the shadow of the Almighty. Now what's the psalm about? The
psalm is about divine protection. but it is not saying that everyone
is divinely protected. It is not saying that everyone
is protected by God. There is divine protection, there
is divine safety, there is divine deliverance, but only for those
people who are in the secret place. These promises of God
made to our Savior and made to all the people who know Him,
all those that He has redeemed by the blood of the cross of
Calvary, all of these promises are to those who are in Him. If you're not in Him, you can't
lay hold of any of the promises of God. And it's not unusual
when People get in trouble. And I'm talking about unbelievers
as well as believers, but especially unbelievers, it is not unusual
for them to go to the word of God and they'll find some promise
in the scriptures that seems to soothe their aching heart. And they'll lay hold to this.
of that promise as though it was for them. Listen, don't read
somebody else's mail. You see, all the promises of
God are made to those who are in Christ Jesus. They're made
to those who believe Him. They're made to those who are
saved by His grace. And if you are yet an unbeliever,
If you're not under the grace of God that brings you to Christ
Jesus, to where you see in Him all that you need, wisdom, righteousness,
sanctification, and redemption, if that is not your condition,
you must not go to any portion of the Word of God and lay hold
of a promise of God, for all the promises of God are only
for those in Christ Jesus. And you see in this Psalm, Psalm
91, it is going to speak to us about protection for God's people. But immediately Moses identifies
those who are the objects of this protection. It's those who
dwell in the secret place. It's for those who abide under
the shadow of the Almighty. So here's the voice of Moses. But then there's another voice,
the second verse. I will say of the Lord, he is
my refuge and my fortress, my God in him will I trust. And
then you go to the third verse and you'll see that it goes back
to the speaker of the first verse. Surely he shall deliver thee.
It was first of all, I, or in verse two, it's I, in verse three,
he shall deliver thee. So here are two different speakers,
two different speakers. The speaker in the second verse
is our Lord Jesus and all who are in him. The Savior says,
I will say of Jehovah, He is my refuge. He is my fortress. My God in Him will I trust. And
indeed the Lord Jesus walked every step He took in this world
was a step of faith. He walked by faith in the Lord.
He trusted in the Lord. And this is the way the people
of God are. We're those who say of the Lord,
He's my refuge. He's my fortress. He's my God
in whom I will trust. So the second voice is the voice
of the Messiah and the voice of every person in whom the Lord
has revealed his saving grace. And then from verses three through
15, or 13 rather, Moses sets forth the safety of Messiah and
all who are in him. But then we get to the last section
of the psalm, and we have a third speaker, a third voice is heard. There's the voice of Moses, there's
the voice of Messiah, and in him, our voice. So here's the
voice of Moses, the voice of Messiah, but when we get to the
last three verses of the psalm, this is the voice of God. This
is the voice of God. and he speaks to reinforce everything
Moses has said. He gives a divine declaration
that all the promises that he has made to Messiah are valid,
and not only valid for him, but if you're a believer, all these
are valid for you. and you lay hold to these eight
promises. Look at verse 14. Now remember,
here's the voice of God. Moses has spoken, our Lord Jesus,
and in him we have spoken. In the second verse, Moses continues
to speak from verse three through verse 13, and now watch this,
verse 14. God says, because he had set
his love upon me, therefore I will deliver him. You can tell it's
a change of language here. This is the voice of our Lord. Once again, because he has set
his love upon me, therefore I will deliver him. Notice all these
different promises that God makes concerning his son and those
who are in him. It's because he set his love
upon me. Therefore, number one, I will
deliver him. Number two, I will set him on
a high. And it's for this reason, because
he's known my name. Number three, he shall call upon
me. Here's the promise of God. I will answer him. Number four,
I will be with him in trouble. Number five, I will deliver him. Number six, I will honor him. Number seven, and with long life,
I will satisfy him. The last one is, and I will show
him my salvation. Now remember this, when the Savior
speaks, He speaks as our representative. Listen, folks, we've gotta have
a representative to God. We've gotta have a mediator.
We cannot do business with God ourselves. The Bible says God's
a consuming fire. You can't stand face to face
with God, toe to toe with God, eyeball to eyeball with God.
You can't do that. Why not? God's a consuming fire. When Israel was at the base of
Mount Sinai, and the Lord was speaking, and the mountain was
shaking, and the lightning was flashing, and the thunder was
crashing, and the mountain was belching out smoke, the scripture
says, they said, Moses, you speak to God for us. We don't wanna
speak to him. And you see, when we see, when
we understand, when we begin to realize who God is in the
awesomeness of His person, in His unusual, extraordinary holiness,
He being the Immaculate One, and then we begin to see a little
of our own dilemma, of our own sinfulness, then we'll say, Lord
Jesus, You speak to God for us. You deal with God for us. I can't
do it. That's why it's so foolish for
people to say, I've made my peace with God. Or for an individual,
for a preacher to say, you need to make your peace with God.
It's a very foolish statement. It's a statement that hasn't
been thought out. You know, lots of times people
in religion, and even preachers will do this, they'll make statements
they've heard somebody else say without thinking those statements
out, without going into it and saying, is this really an accurate
statement? Make your peace with God? Why,
that's the role of the peacemaker, the Lord Jesus. That's what He
came to do. And the Scripture says, He made
our peace by the blood of His cross. That's how peace was made. It's not by you dealing with
God. It's not by you making promises
to God, making vows and then trying to keep your vows to God.
No, peace was made by the peacemaker, the Lord Jesus, by His bloody
sacrifice. And here in this psalm, this
is our Lord Jesus, in the second verse, who speaks to God. And
it's our Lord Jesus who represents us as our peacemaker and as our
mediator and as our surety. Remember this, our redeemer, he is the son of
God. He is divine. But in order to
do something for us, in order to save us, he had to leave his
heavenly glory and he had to come down to this earth. Now
that does not mean that he ceased to be God. He did not cease to
be God. He did not lay aside his perfections,
but rather he hid those and he joined himself to our flesh. And in doing so, he became what
he was not before, he became the God-man. He veiled his deity. Now let's be careful here. The
Son of God, he did not take on himself all that we are. He did not. But he did take upon
himself flesh and blood. that through death, he would
save us from our sins. He who created all things and
who upholds all things by the word of his power, he condescended
to become the seed of Abraham, the seed of David, the seed of
the woman. He shared our nature, but he
did not share our sin. He could not have atoned for
our sin if he had shared in our actual guilt. He could not have
washed us if he himself needed to be washed. In the Old Testament,
the priests of the Levitical system, they had to offer sacrifices
for themselves first, and then they offered sacrifices for the
sins of the people. But the Son of God was the spotless
Lamb of God. who offered himself unto the
Father to redeem us. He who is all pure came to save
those who are impure. He who is the Holy One ever remained
the Holy One, and he died to make us holy and to make us righteous. And so in these three verses
that finish up the psalm, in this text, the first application
of the words is to our Savior, is to the Messiah. And here we
find eight promises of the Father made concerning his son, that
one who became the servant of Jehovah and was obedient unto
death, even the death of the cross. You know, I would venture
to say this, and I may stand corrected, I've been wrong a
time or two, but I really think that A more comprehensive account
of God the Father's attitude toward and promises toward his
Son will not be found in all the rest of the scripture, especially
condensed in such a short fashion. And I do not hesitate to say
this either, that while we know a little about this one whose
name is Wonderful, there's much, much, much more about him that
we don't know. Wouldn't you agree with that?
And we know a little about him. We know a little about him and
it's enough to make us happy, thrill us, make us glad, to make
us rejoice. But there's much, much more.
There's an infinite more glory about the Lord Jesus that we
don't know that we will, when we see him, we'll be satisfied. And I think we'll be learning
of his glory forever as we gaze on him, as we see him face to
face, as every child of God does as soon as they leave this world.
Well, let me give you these eight promises, and I'll give them
to you quickly. Number one, here's the first promise. The Father
says, I will deliver him. Verse 14, I'll deliver him because
he set his love upon me. He loved me with all his heart,
mind, soul, and strength. That's God's command to love
him that way. Now we can't do that, and I'll
address our love to the Lord this evening, but our Savior
did. He loved God perfectly and therefore
there is a reward for that obedience of our Lord Jesus. There's a
reward for Him and there's a reward for us. The reward is, therefore
I will deliver Him. Why will God the Father deliver
Him? Because this perfect man loved
God the way a man ought to love God. He loved him with every,
as we would say, every fiber of his being, every motive, every
thought, every word, every action of our Lord Jesus was done out
of love for the Lord. He loved him and the Father says,
therefore, I will deliver him. Will deliver him from what? Well,
verse 3 says, He'll deliver thee from the snare of the fowler.
This is a very mysterious thing. You know, the scripture says
that our Lord Jesus, and this is, the statement is made in
Isaiah. He would be, he would be instructed. He would be upheld by the Holy
Spirit. The Spirit of God would be to
him the Spirit of wisdom. and the spirit of knowledge and
the spirit of strength, unusual strength. You say, but he's God
in the flesh. Yes, he was. But as the perfect
man, he had to be totally dependent upon God because you see, that's
what God requires of us. He requires of us total dependence,
total reliance. And the Lord Jesus was, he lived
that way. That's the way he was. and the
Spirit of God delivered him from the snare, the fowler. And think
there of Matthew chapter four, we addressed this a little bit
last week when he was led into the wilderness and then taken
to the temple and then taken to the highest mountain and Satan,
he tempted him. And those are just three illustrations
of the temptation, but he was tempted 40 days by Satan. And all those 40 days, the Spirit
of God upheld him and delivered him from the snare of the fowler. And then, during our Lord's lifetime,
he was oft times delivered from danger. When he was just an infant,
the angel of God came to Joseph in a dream and said, Joseph,
take the child and his mother and go into Egypt, because Herod's
on the warpath. Herod wants to kill him. So the
Lord delivered him. He delivered him from that danger. And the angel said, I'll let
you know when it's time to come back, when it's okay to come
back. He delivered him. And all through our Lord's public
ministry, he was delivered out of one trap, out of another. One difficulty after another. One danger after another. They'd
pick up stones to stone him and he would pass through the midst
of them. They would throw him off a hill and dash his brains
out. But it wasn't his time to die.
The Father would deliver him. But then the time came for him
to die and the Father did deliver him up to die. He delivered him. See, look at it this way, because
He set His love upon me, because He has proven Himself to be the
perfect man, therefore I will deliver Him up to be the sacrifice
for my people. He had to be perfect. He had
to be without spot. He had to be without blemish.
He had to be obedient in all things. And once he had proved
himself worthy of being the sacrifice for his people, God delivered
him up to die for the sins of his people. And so we read in
Acts chapter two, him being delivered by the determinate counsel and
foreknowledge of God. Romans 8.32, he that spared not
his own son, but delivered him up for us all. Who delivered
him? The father did. For ages, people have debated
who killed Jesus. Well, you can go to Acts 4 and
we read that The Gentiles and the Jews and Herod and Pontius
Pilate and all of them, the soldiers, they all gathered together. The
scripture says, for to do whatsoever thy hand and thy counsel determined
to be done. Who killed Jesus? Who delivered
him up to die? The Father did. The Father did. Listen, God is behind everything. Can we understand that? He rules
in every situation. If you had been an observer there
at Mount Calvary, and there's the Son of God, the Son of Man,
bleeding and dying on the cross of Calvary, He's suffering untold
agonies, what would you have thought if somebody had said
to you, you know God brought this about? Most people would
have said, you're crazy. You've lost your mind. But God
did bring it about because he was the lamb who was slain from
before the foundation of the world. This is a way God would
save sinners. And may I say it was the only
way God could save sinners. This is the only way God could
be just and justify the ungodly was through delivering his only
begotten son up to die. And then he delivered him from
the grave. He delivered him from death. Thou would redeem or deliver
my soul, he says, from the power of the grave. He delivered him. Now let's move on. Secondly,
I will set him on a high. That's the second promise. Now
the word set, S-E-T, it indicates a fixed, a settled, a permanent
position. And we know when the Savior came
into the world, he had a work assigned to him. A work which
he willingly undertook to do to lay down his life for the
sheep. This was a work that he set about to finish. He told
his disciples, he said, I have meat to eat that you know not
of. The work that the Father gave me to do, shall I not do
it? He had to finish that work. Now,
upon the basis of finishing that work, this is a work God delivered
him up to do. A tremendous work. to save all his people, to deliver
us from Satan, deliver us from sin, from the penalty of breaking
God's law. All of these things, this is
the work Christ came to do and he did it to the Father's satisfaction. Therefore, God took him back
to heaven and he set him at his own right hand. He set him, S-E-T,
a fixed position. Do not feel sorry for Jesus. He's the king, God has set him
upon his throne. He's the sovereign. In Hebrews
chapter 12, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our
faith for the joy that was set before him endured the cross,
despising the shame and he sat down. Not sit, S-I-T, though
he did. But he set down, God the Father
set him down. I set you there upon the throne.
That's a fixed position, a reward based upon your obedience. And
he who is set in heaven, he sits in heaven because his work was
done. Now watch this, here's the third
promise. He says, and the reason he sets
him on ice is because he's known my name. He loves me. That word known has the word
love in it. He lovingly obeyed me and he
lovingly knows my name. Verse 15, he shall call upon
me and I will answer him. Don't you find it? astounding
that the Son of God was a man of prayer, and he was always
dependent upon the Father, but that's what was necessary. He
was a man given to prayer. Hebrews 5, 7 says, who in the
days of his flesh, when he had offered up prayers and supplications
with strong cryings and tears unto him, that was able to save
him from death and was heard in that he feared. He was a man
of prayer. How often do you read in the
scriptures of our Lord Jesus going up to the mountain to pray? Frequently. In John chapter 12,
he prayed just a few days before his death. A very brief prayer. Father, glorify thy name. That's not a long prayer, but
it is weighty. Father, glorify thy name." What
a powerful prayer. And the Father answered him.
He says, you call upon me, I'll answer you. The Father answered
him and said, I have both glorified it and I'll glorify it again.
My name was glorified when I sent you. My name's going to be glorified
when you die for sinners. My name's going to be glorified
when you're raised again. Because of the justification
of sinners. And then of course, he went to
the garden of Gethsemane. There he prayed three times,
the same prayer. If it be thy will, let this cup
pass from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but
thy will be done. Now, could that cup pass from
him? Not if we're to be saved. Not
if God is going to pour out all his vengeance on our substitute. He can't be spared the cup. He
must take the cup of God's wrath and he must drink it dry. You
see, the weight that pressed down upon his holy soul was separation
from the Father due to bearing the weight of our sinfulness.
The full weight of our iniquities, the scripture says in Isaiah
53, 6, was made to meet on him. And if we're to learn anything
from this threefold prayer request of the Savior in the Garden of
Gethsemane, it is this, there was no other way for God to save
people, us sinful creatures, except through the sacrifice
of His Son. If there'd been another way, He'd have used that way. Christ
had to die. He must bear infinite wrath.
He must be separated from the father. He must answer for all
of our sins. He must feel in his soul, the
vengeance and the anger of God against our sins. And he prayed
about that. And then of course his, in John
17, his high priestly prayer. He had several requests that
he asked of the father and the father answered him. He said,
glorify thou me with the glory that I had with thee before the
world was. You remember he said, I pray
for them. I don't pray for the world. I pray for those which
thou hast given me. He prayed, he said, sanctify
them through thy word. Thy word is truth. And then He
said, Father, I will that those whom thou hast given me be with
me where I am, that they might behold my glory. And then when He was on the cross,
hear Him pray again. Father, forgive them, for they
don't know what they're doing. And everybody for whom He prayed
that are forgiven of their sins. He said it then, father into
thy hands, I commend my spirit. Do you think the father heard
him and your father answered him? Of course. He went immediately
into paradise and the father welcomed him home. As he had said before, father,
I know that thou hearest me always. So he says, he shall call upon
me and I will answer him. And now here's another promise.
Number four, I will be with him in trouble. Think of all the
adversities that the man Christ Jesus endured during his life. And here's what the promise of
the father is. I'll be with you. I'll be with
you in trouble. Whenever he was in trouble, the
father was with him. Of course, the father was with
him always, but the father manifested himself, especially during those
times of trouble. In John chapter 11, you remember
when Lazarus died and our Lord Jesus, he had met with Martha
and then he went to the tomb of Lazarus and there was Mary
and Mary was weeping. You know what it says of the
Savior? It says he groaned in spirit and he was troubled. That shows you the reality of
his humanity. He was troubled. Are you ever
troubled about anything? He was troubled. And the word
means agitated. A good illustration is, and I
know the new washing machines are a little bit different, but
those old washing machines used to have big agitators that just
churns up the water. Well, that's what this means.
His soul was troubled, it was agitated. He was churning on
the inside. You say, this, our Savior was? It's what the scripture says.
Well, what was he churning over? What was he troubled over? Well,
I think it was because of the weakness of the faith of Mary
and of Martha. And he was, you know, he is touched
with the feelings of our infirmities. He saw that she was troubled
and so he entered into that trouble. That's our savior. Nobody else
can do that. Six days before he died, he said,
now is my soul troubled. Again, agitated. Troubled over the hardness of
the heart of the Jews. Troubled over their rejection
of him. He was troubled over the coming
betrayal of Judas, troubled over the threefold denial by Simon
Peter that would happen, troubled by the forsaking of his own people. He was troubled in that he saw
the wrath of God coming after him and he knew the severity
of that wrath because that was his wrath. After all, he is God. And he's troubled by all of this.
shows you the reality of our Savior's manhood. But the Father said, I'll be
with him in trouble. And then the fifth promise says,
I will deliver him. Once again, repeated, because
I think this especially points to his resurrection. Repeated,
I suspect, to denote the certainty of it. He would not stay dead. He would finish the work of redemption
the Father gave Him to do. I will deliver Him. And then
the next one just naturally follows. I will honor Him. I will honor Him. He honored
the Father. You know what God says? Him that
honoreth me, I will honor. Christ Jesus honored the Father.
The Father has honored Him. Christ honored the Father in
His full obedience. Obedience unto death, even the
death of the cross. And the Father has exalted Him.
He has honored Him. Listen, neither is there any
name by which we can be saved in all of the world except the
name of Jesus Christ. That's the honor that God has
put upon Him. He rules over his enemies and
he shall rule till they be made his footstool. That's the honor
that the father has given him. And then the seventh promise
is this. Look at verse 16. With long life will I satisfy
him. He said, but he only lived about
33 years. This is not talking about length
of life as we measure life. This is life without end. This
is a life of exaltation. This is everlasting life. This
is a life that will never wind up. I will satisfy him with long
life. Do you remember what it says in Isaiah? He shall see
the travail of his soul and he shall be, you know what that
next word is? Satisfied. Satisfied. I'll satisfy him. I'll seat him
upon his throne of majesty because he did the work I gave him to
do. and He'll rule forever. Then the last promise is this,
I will show Him my salvation. I will manifest to Him the fullness
of salvation in bringing all the sheep that He has redeemed
safely home to glory. The Father sent the Spirit to woo and win and quicken and
cause to be born again all of those in whose stead Christ died. The Son is seeing the fulfillment
of that which He did. He's seeing that salvation fully
accomplished as one by one redeemed ones come to glory. It's the promise of the Father.
I'll manifest to him the fullness of this salvation by bringing
everyone you redeemed back home to God. This is our head. This is our representative. This
is our savior. And surely you can see in these
eight promises that God made to him, you can see the reality
of the manhood of our representative. You know what he said to be? He said to be our surety. What
does that name mean? It means one who's responsible
for the safety of another. one who bears the responsibility
for the indebtedness of another. You remember back in the book
of Genesis when, I don't want to go into the whole story, but
Joseph is, he's been finally exalted to be the second position
to Pharaoh in Egypt. And of course, the Lord's gonna
send a famine and Jacob, when they run out of food, Jacob sends
some of his boys They go to Egypt and they, little do they know,
but they have to meet with Joseph who's been exalted. And he's
got, Joseph has got authority over all the greeneries of Egypt. And he recognizes them, but they
don't recognize him. And Joseph said, well, if you
really have a father at home and you got a younger brother
at home, I'll tell you what, I'll keep one of you here. I'll
keep Simeon, I'll keep you. And the rest of you go home and
you bring your youngest brother back and then I'll know you tell
them the truth. And of course he's putting them to the test.
And so they go home and Jacob said, all these things are against
me. And Reuben says, Reuben's the oldest. And Reuben said,
listen, I'll take Benjamin with me. to just show this fellow
in Egypt that we're on the up and up. And Jacob said, no, no,
you're not gonna take him. And then Judah speaks up, and
Judah's a picture of our savior. He's the, Christ is the Lion
of the tribe of Judah. And Judah speaks up and says,
Dad, I'll be surety from my younger brother, Benjamin. I'll be surety
for him. I'll be responsible for him.
Hold me accountable for his safety." And of course, he did keep him
safe. And in that, Judah is a picture of our Lord Jesus. He is the
surety for all of God's people. He has vowed himself to God. I will bring all your children
home to you. I bear full responsibility for
their safety and I'll pay all of their indebtedness. That's
what he did. And here in the end of Psalm
91, we have these eight wonderful promises made by the Father concerning
the Messiah, the sent one. Now this evening, We're gonna
go right back to these three verses, and I hope it's kind
of whetted your appetite for a little bit more, because I
wanna show you tonight these eight wonderful promises of God
are for us. And I hope that we'll feast on
the Word of God once again this evening. Let's bow our heads
together.