Now look back with me here in
Psalm 37. We're going to start in verse
10. And you remember that I talked
last week about trusting in the Lord, delight thyself in the
Lord, and commit thyself unto the Lord. When we get bad news,
what the world would call bad news, sickness, or somebody's
wife leaves them, or somebody's husband dies, or something happens,
what would you say to them? Only thing you can say is that
the Lord's ways are perfect. That's what he said here, the
ways of the Lord are perfect. And he says, trust in all you
can say to them, trust in the Lord. Trust in the Lord. Delight
thyself also in the Lord. And commit thy way unto the Lord.
Ain't that what he said in verse 3? Trust in the Lord. Verse 4,
delight thyself also in him. Commit thy way unto the Lord.
Trust also in him. And that's the thing that we
can tell everybody to do. No matter what goes on. Trust
the Lord. Trust the Lord. Don't trust yourself. Don't trust
the church. Don't trust anybody else. Trust
the Lord. Trust Him. He cannot possibly
do wrong. He would never ever mistreat
you. Whatever goes on in your life and whatever comes your
way in life, trust Him. Because His ways are perfect
and He knows exactly what's right for you. And then we can delight
ourselves in Him. What's there to delight in this
world as far as what we have for eternity? Delight thyself
in Him. Enjoy Him. Rejoice in Him. And then whatever says is, comes
and goes. You say, Lord, I commit myself
to You. I'm just throwing myself on You.
I'm resting in You. I'm casting myself on You. But I also said this, and this
is particularly all the way through this particular song. David describes
that Natural enmity, that's between the righteous and the wicked.
And notice he makes a distinction between them two classes. The
righteous and the wicked. And it's very vivid in this particular
psalm. He says the distinction between
the wicked and the righteous. And God always makes that distinction. There ain't but two classes.
And look what he said here in verse 12, the wicked. Now when
we think about wicked, how would you define wicked? If you were
to define wicked, how would you define wicked? Well, when we define it, we think
of somebody who's really vile, a class of people that's particularly
evil. And the reason we do that is
because we're comparing men to men, using men as our standard. But God's standard is much different
than our standard. There's only two classes of people
in this world as far as God's concerned. And you know the wicked
go astray from the mother's womb speaking lies, but as far as
the scripture's concerned, as far as God's concerned, as far
as the gospel's concerned, as far as the word of God's concerned,
ain't but two classes of people in this world. Those in Christ
and those outside Christ. You know we talk about wicked
or what you define it. God himself called us ungodly. Christ died for the ungodly. I have no problem because I was
ungodly. Christ died for me to make me
godly. To make me acceptable to God. So there's only those
in Christ and those who aren't. The righteous and the wicked.
Those who trust Christ and those who don't. And just because we
know we call somebody wicked, we're using our standards, but
God's standard is much different. But look what he says here in
verse 12, the wicked plotteth. Plotteth against the righteous,
plotteth against the just, those who have been justified. And
then he gnashes at him with his teeth. That word plot means the
thoughts of somebody. They're plotting something, planning
something. And they're plotting something,
planning something against someone. And what it is, his thoughts,
his plans are against the righteous, against the just. And the righteous
and the wicked, their ideas and their outlook is entirely different. Believers and unbelievers have
a particular state of mind that unbelievers, they plot against
the just. They don't like the just. They
don't like those that know Christ. They don't like that. And there's
a great distinction between the two. Look with me in Psalm 1
just a minute. Let me show you what I'm talking about. You know, believers and unbelievers
each have a particular state of mind. The believer, he says
here, blessed is the man who walketh not in the counsel of
the ungodly. Now the world, that's where he
wants to go. They sit around and make their plans and use
all kinds of language and just care on the side about what they're
going to do and all this, but that's not the way the righteous
are. And he won't stand in the way of sinners, nor stand in
the seat of the scornful. But what his delight is, is in
the law of the Lord, in the scriptures, and in the law doeth he meditate.
And this is the way God will make him to be. He shall be like
a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth
his fruit in his season. His leaf also shall not wither,
and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper. Now listen to the ungodly.
The ungodly are not sober, but they're like the chaff which
the wind driveth away. Verse 6, the Lord knoweth the
way of the righteous, but the way of the ungodly shall perish.
He makes a distinction there. We think differently. The righteous
man, when he looks at a righteous man, when he looks at a believer,
The unbeliever, the wicked as God calls them here, when they
view us, they say we're a continual reminder of a life that's submitted
to Christ. Our life is bound up in Christ. Our life is submission to Christ.
And he despises that. The actions of the lost men,
just because they're not particularly evil, we can't be good buddies
with them. I cannot be good buddies with
somebody that's a worldly person. Somebody that doesn't know Christ.
I just can't. Evil communications corrupt good
manners. But that, when somebody knows
that you submitted to Christ, And that's what we're talking
about. Then when you start talking about Christ, you start talking
about the demands of Christ. You start talking about Christ
and that anything other than your submission to Christ and
your obedience to Christ and bowing to Christ is not, no matter
what you do, it's no good. It's not worth anything. And
let me ask you this. Do you think that the corrupt
generation in Noah's day Is any worse than the corrupt generation
that we live in? You know what they were? They
were average people. Going about with an average life.
Doing everything that people are doing today. Let me show
you that. You know, we're talking about the difference between
the righteous and the wicked. Look at Matthew with me. Matthew 24. Now God says the way of man is
corruption itself on the face of the earth and his thoughts
are only evil continually. But now look what he says about
how they done here. And we look at men and we say,
well he's not theologian because he's not as wicked as he could
be. And there's lots of people that don't do as evil as they
could possibly do. But they're without Christ and
without God and without hope in this world. God says they're
ungodly and they're without Christ and they're wicked. And look what he said here in
Matthew 24 and 38. But as it was in the days of
Noah, shall also the coming of the Son of Man. For as in the
days that were before the flood, now listen to it, they were eating
and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage,
until the day that Noah entered into the ark. Now they were just
people going about their lives. But God wasn't in their thoughts.
Noah had preached righteousness for 120 years. Nobody paid any
attention to him. There's Mary. Oh, I said, you
know, the preacher, they got a preacher said, oh, come over
here and marry me. I want to be married. So they
got a preacher and they got married. Then they got them a job and
they made enough money to go eat and go to drink and have
a big time. And they raised families and built houses and they've
done everything that everybody does today and God said they
were corrupt. All flesh had corrupted itself. And they didn't know anything
about what was going to happen until the flood came and God
shut the door. Now that's where we're at today,
that's what he says here. That's what he said, they plot.
And I tell you, our Lord spoke of the evil in adulterous generation. Was He only speaking of His own
generation? No, He's talking about every
generation is the wicked and adulterous generation. And when
He talks about adulterous generation, He's not talking about men and
women adulterating with one another. He's talking about adulterating
people with other guys and worshipping other ways. James gives me stuff
all the time, and Gary said, you know, if you're a basket
case, that's alright. Moses was one too. Now you know
what kind of a wicked man says something like that? And then
we turn around and tell him that that's a wicked, blasphemous
statement. And that Christ, that's against God, it's against Christ,
it's against the Scriptures, it's against everything that's
right, just, holy, and true. But he does that in church. And you tell him about a relationship
and what you say, I'm one of God's elect. Oh boy, I don't
know if I like that or not. That's what we're talking about.
And that's what he says. When they find out about us and
our relationship with Christ, they automatically say it's different.
I heard a preacher tell today, he says that he's preaching one
time and he got through preaching. And a man walked up to him, an
old man, way older than the preacher was, and he says, you know what,
you just preached. He said, that's the way God saved
me. That's the way God, no, I never heard it put that way, I never
heard some of the things you said, but that's the way God
saved me. They're preaching the grace of God. They asked another
fellow to dismiss in prayer, and he said, Lord, if I sin to
come and hear this man, please forgive me. One man said, you
know, that's the way God saved me, and why don't you preach?
Another man said, I hope I didn't say it against you. Come, let
this man preach. What goes on in a man's mind?
One fellow, you know, he hears the gospel and another don't.
And our Lord also warns His disciples of the nature of lost humanity.
You know what He said? He said, I'm sending you forth
as sheep among wolves. I mean, you're sheep and you're
out there and you're among wolves. And he says, so you be as harmless
as doves, but be wise as serpents. He says, you be very careful,
you be meek, you be gentle, you be kind, but you better be wise
when you're dealing with this world and the people that's in
it. And David describes the animosity between the righteous and the
wicked in intense, intense feelings. Look what he said here in verse
10 again. He said, He gnashes at the wicked,
plods up against the just, and gnashes upon him with his teeth. And what does that mean, gnashing?
You know, he don't actually bite them. He don't reach out and
and bite and break blood, and that he's talking about, he's
using his tongue, he's using his mouth to show his maliciousness,
to show his animosity, to show his hatred, to show everything
that he don't like that. And the first thing, I don't
care if it's a member of your own family, and particularly
members of your own family, when you tell them what salvation
really is, and what righteousness really is, and that you haven't
earned it, you haven't married it, you haven't worked for it,
you haven't done anything for it, and you start telling them
that the righteousness of Christ is the only acceptance between
you and God and that you're only accepted in the Beloved. Your
own family will say, now wait a minute, I go over there, you
mean that we don't believe the truth over there? I didn't say
that, but I just told you what salvation really is. And your
own family rise up against you. Is that not right? They can do all kinds of things
as long as they're busy doing something for the Lord, something
for Jesus. Their conscience is okay. Until
you start telling them that what they do for Jesus don't amount
to nothing. It's what Christ does for them.
Christ's got to do something for them. And I'll tell you what. And listen,
no matter what the wicked do to us, and it probably gets to
just nash on us with their teeth, it must always be one-sided.
If they don't like us, they may tolerate us as God's people,
but as soon as you mention Christ and His demand, everything changes.
But our attitudes towards them must be different than their
attitudes towards us. Now that's right. Whatever people,
no matter how people treat us, we can't treat them the same
way they treat us. We can't do it. That's what our Lord Jesus
says. Love them, love your enemies. Pray for them that despite the
illusion. Ain't that what He said? Bless them, they curse
you. Look over in Romans 12. And I'll tell you, And this is what's so funny.
You'll be talking to somebody and they'll be bragging on all
that they've been doing for the Lord and how faithful they are
to God and all that kind of stuff and they'll go bragging about
it. And you just start talking about Christ and Christ done
everything for you and you ain't never done nothing for Him. And
they don't ever hear that. All they're doing is hearing
themselves toot their own horn and shine their own light. I
don't care what, they just don't never hear it. You say, well,
you know, you're talking, well, you know, I haven't done it.
You know, Christ did everything for me. I'm saved by His faithfulness. I don't care how many times I
go to services. Me going to service does not
put one star in any crown that I'll ever have. Will it? It won't even make my crown shine. They start that way and you start
telling them that. And it seems like they just don't
never register with them because they're so caught up in what
they themselves see themselves to be. But look here in Romans,
we've got to treat people, you know, if we have enemies and
they plot against us and mash at us and show maliciousness
and animosity, But look what he said here in Romans 12 in
verse 18. If it be possible, as much as
life in you, as much as you have the ability, live peaceably with
all men. And dearly beloved, oh, don't
you avenge yourselves. Don't you avenge yourselves.
Oh, don't you do that. But rather give place unto wrath.
Let wrath just stay back from wrath. Don't give place to it.
Don't give in to it. For it's written, Vengeance is
mine, I will repay, saith the Lord. Therefore, if thine enemy
hunger, feed him. If he thirsts, give him something
to drink. For in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire on his
head. Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good.
That's just exactly the opposite of the way the world operates.
But now let's go back over here to the text. I took an awful
long time on that. We're trying to establish what
the wicked is and define it according to what our Lord said. Then look
what it says in verse 13. The Lord shall laugh at him,
for he saith that his day is coming. God laughs at them. Over in Psalm 2, it says, you
know, if the Lord looks down from heaven and laughs at them,
mocks them, and derisions them, wouldn't it last year, it's not
talking about God's hilarious. It's talking about He looks at
them, but laughs at their plans and their plots and all that
with mockery and contempt. And it says that God sees the
end, that His day is coming. God sees the beginning and end
of all things. And how foolish is it to spend
your life in wickedness only to die and perish and go to hell. It's an awful thing to think
about. And God laughs at them. You've got all these plans, you've
got all this animosity, you've got all this hatred. And God
said, He just laughs at them, mocks them, makes fun of them. He says, I see what your day
is going to be. That's why David said, one day
I was envious of the wicked until I went into the sanctuary and
I saw their end. And look what he goes on to say
now. The wicked have drawn out their sword, have bent their
bow, and they've done this to cast down the poor and the needy. Oh my, the poor and the needy,
and I don't care about anything about it. And such as are of
an upright conversation or of an upright life, manner of life. Oh, they sharpened it. They've
got it ready. And they're asked of the poor.
David said, I'm poor and needy, yet the Lord thinketh upon me.
And look what happens. Their sword shall enter into
their own heart. You've got it and you meant it
for somebody else. And God said, the sword shall
enter into your own heart. And the bones that you want to
break, I'll break them myself. I'll break them. And then look
what he goes on to say. A little, in verse 16, he describes
the futility of their lives. He said, A little that a righteous
man hath is better than the riches of many wicked. What good are
their riches? What good are they? What good are they going to do?
Are they going to just leave them all behind? And look what he
goes on to say. And the arms of the wicked shall
be broken. The arms that they use to perform
deeds against God, against Christ, against the Scriptures, they're
going to be broken. Going to be broken. And oh, and
he says down here in verse 16, look what he says. And he contrasts
the way of the wicked with the righteous. He says here, now
look at the righteous man again, the little that a righteous man
hath is better than the riches of many wicked. A righteous man hath just a little
bit, just a little. God said it's more wealth than
the riches of lots and lots and lots and lots of wicked people
and all their riches put together. That's what he said, but if you
gain the whole world, A little that a righteous man has. You
know Lazarus didn't have anything. He laid it to the rich man's
game. But what did the rich man end up with? What did he do? He fared sumptuously every day
and rode out in his chariot with his, what do they call these
guys? Chauffeurs. Chauffeured him out
of there. His butler put his clothes on
for him and he went out there and went by them. Now what was
the use of him having all those riches? What was the use of it? What did it profit him? And Paul, he took offerings up
for the poor people in Jerusalem. But now not all of God's people
were poor in Jerusalem. Not all of them were poor wherever
they were. But what he's saying is that the righteous man doesn't
have his heart set on this world. I mean, what little he has is
better than the riches of many wicked. I'd rather have. I've
done, I've told you all this before. Old Mr. Bunyan went in to eat supper
with a woman one time. And his cabin went in there and
all she had was bread and water. That's all she could say before
Him and herself. And she bowed her head and she said, Lord,
oh, thank You for this bread. Oh,
thank You for this bread. Oh, to have a piece of bread,
to have water, and then with all that that You give me, I've
got Christ too. I've got Christ too. Most folks have said, oh my,
that poor old woman, I don't know how she, she said all this
and Christ too. But oh, the righteous man he's
talking about here, he doesn't have his heart set on the world.
He knows his life doesn't consist of the things that he possesses. He has joy in his heart because
he's content. And our riches are in Christ
and they are a reality to us. You know, in Ephesians there's
five different riches that Paul talks about, of Christ's riches
in Ephesians alone. You look at it sometime, you
go through the book of Ephesians, and five different types of riches
that we have in Christ. And that's the word they use,
riches. And then look what he goes on to say in verse 17 again. The arms of the wicked shall
be broken. But look what happens. Oh, they want to strike out,
they want to hurt, they want to do things against the Lord's
people, want to do things against God. And God said His arms will
be broken, but the Lord upholdeth the righteous. And all the ways
that He wanted to do it, God broke His arms and He can't get
what He wants to. But everything about it is cursed.
But God said here that He upholds the righteous. He upholds the
righteous. And oh, the Lord knows the days
in verse 18. He upholds the righteous. He
breaks down the wicked but upholds the righteous. We'll be upheld
through all eternity. We'll be upheld. We're upheld
now. We'll be upheld through all eternity. And then look what
He said in verse 18. The Lord knoweth the days of
the upright. Oh my. That don't mean that He
just knows how many days we have, but He knows the days because
He orders the days. He knows us. He knows our days. He knows what goes on with our
days. He orders our days. Ain't that what He goes on down
there and says in verse 23, the steps of a good man are ordered
by the Lord? And what does that order mean?
That means established. And so you see, beloved, God
just... Knows the days of the upright,
knows every day, knows everything about us. And I tell you what
he says here, he says, and they shall not be ashamed in the evil
time, and in the days of famine they shall be satisfied. And
I tell you, those are the days of famine right now. And when
he talked about the days of famine, you know there's a famine, not
for bread, not for water, but for hearing of the word of the
Lord. And oh, the wicked shall perish. Look what he says here
now. Verse 20. The wicked shall perish and the
enemies of the Lord. The enemies of the Lord. You
mean God's got enemies? He says, they're my enemies.
He says, he that loves the world is an enemy of God. And God said,
boy, I tell you what. How would you like God to, for
the Lord to say, you're one of my enemies? Ooh, that would be
awful. And how do you know that you're
not an enemy of the Lord? I'll tell you how you know. God slays the enmity, the hatred
that we have in our hearts. That inability to submit, that
carnal nature that was full of enmity toward God. Christ slew
that enmity. Took out that heart of stone,
put in a heart of flesh. And we can feel, the Spirit Himself
bears witness with our spirit that we are the children of God.
And we know we're not the Lord's enemies because we want Christ. And not one of His enemies want
Him. They don't want to bow to Him,
they don't want to submit to Him. And oh, listen now, there's
a great difference. And he goes on to say in verse
21, I'm going to go back up a minute and say some things about the
righteous. But look what he says, the wicked, that the enemies
of the Lord shall be as the fat of lambs, and they shall consume
them. They may be wealthy, they may
be fat, they may be blessed. And you look at them and say,
boy, God has blessed the world. Look at how everything they've
got. Fat is a big old lamb. Oh listen, and then he says he
throws him in the fire and there will be a lot of smoke and the
smoke fire is going to consume. And the wicked borroweth and
payeth not again. Runs himself into such a state
of payment and gets overhead over hills and that and he borrows
and he can't pay again. He don't have the means to pay
again. But oh the righteous is not like that. He'll show mercy. And you know what he does? He
gives. He gives. He gives. And then look back
up here in verse 18. The Lord knoweth the days of
the upright, and their inheritance shall be forever. You know we
got an inheritance. An inheritance. An eternal inheritance. Paul said in Colossians, he said
it's laid up in heaven for you. And you've been made fit to be
uptakers of that inheritance of the saints that's already
in light. And these righteous, this righteous who have this
eternal inheritance, they're beloved of God. He knows them. He watches them. And their inheritance
is sure. How do you know it's sure? I'm
going to show you something in 1 Corinthians 1.20. And then
I'm going to quit. 1 Corinthians 1.20. Look what
it says over here. How do we know that our inheritance is
good? 2 Corinthians 1.20 Oh my! You see, beloved, God
gave us a down payment over our inheritance. He gave us the earnest
of our inheritance. And we have the evidence of our
inheritance by the Spirit. He said here in 2 Corinthians
1.21 For all the promises of God in him are yea, and him amen
unto the glory of God by us. Now he which establishes us with
you in Christ and hath anointed us is God. And now watch this,
who hath also sealed us And that word seal means he put a mark
on us and said, you know, they got the seal of the United States. The Marine Corps has got a seal.
Semper Fidelis. Ever, ever, you know, the president's
got his seal. The state of Tennessee's got
a seal. And he says, God has given us a seal. He sealed us. Put a mark on us. This is my
seal. God's got a seal, and He puts
that seal on us, and watch what He says, and then He gives the
earnest of the Spirit in our hearts, sealed us to make us
know that the inheritance is ours! And who in the world can begin
to measure our inheritance? Oh my! I know one thing about
it. I know one thing about our inheritance.
Whatever Christ has got, we got. Ain't that right? He said, He's the heir. He's the heir of everything. And He's
the elder brother, and if God put everything in His hands,
and He said, we're going heirs with it, so whatever He gets,
we get. He got a new body after the resurrection, we're going
to get a new body. He went to a place where there's
no sorrow, we're going to a place where there's no sorrow. Where
there's a place where there's not tears, we're going to inherit
a place where there's no tears. We have sin here, we're going
to a place where there'll never be sin. We're going to inherit
righteousness eternally on heaven, a new heaven and a new earth.
Oh, no sadness, no sorrow, no grief. God himself will wipe
away tears in there because there's no reason for us to ever cry
again. and eternal inheritance. And
it's incorruptible, it fades not away, and it's reserved,
guess where? In heaven. Who's it for? You. Are you one of them you's? Are
you? I'm a you. Yes sir, reserved
in heaven. When I get there, and I'll tell
you what, we'll know as we're known. We'll know as we're known. I won't have the same body. You
know, I'll have a glorified body, but I'll still be recognizable
like I am now. And when I get there, I'll know
as I'm known. And when I get there, I don't know, you know,
God said, Christ ain't gonna give us a new name. Had a stone
with a new name. When we get there, I'm gonna
look for whatever name He gives me. But as far as just for today,
when I get there, This inheritance reserved for me in heaven, I'm
going to go look and say, now, there's Donnie Bell's name. Boy,
there's his inheritance. What is his inheritance? Dear
Lord, when you see Christ, boy, everything here belongs to Him.
Oh my, this new heaven, this new earth, this wonderful place
here where righteousness dwells. So this is my inheritance. Oh, what a day that's going to
be. What a day that's going to be. Our blessed, blessed Savior. You're so kind. You're so gracious.
You're so patient with us. And Lord, we do trust You. We find You delightful to us
when we think of You and consider You and Your wondrous grace and
the salvation You've walked for us. The spirit you put in us
where we cry, I'm a father. And we've committed ourselves
to you. Find you to be our rest. We rest ourselves, lay ourselves
bare before you. And oh, we bless you that you
enable us to do it. Thank you, Lord, for meeting
with us tonight. Bless these dear saints as they go to their
homes, their jobs tomorrow. And they go home this evening.
God give them a nice rest. Give them peace of heart, peace
of mind. We ask these things in Christ's
name. Amen. There is a name I love to hear. I love to sing His word. Sounds like music in my ear,
the sweetest thing on earth. Oh, how I love Jesus. O how I love Jesus, O how I love
Jesus, because He first loved me. Amen. See you Sunday.