We're continuing to look at Psalm
86. As we had said and continue to say,
these Psalms are primarily the prayers of Christ. And most especially as He prayed,
not for His own sake, but for ours. And he being one with the
Father, he was in constant communication with his Father. He could not
be separated from his Father. He said, Philip, Philip, if you've
seen me, you've seen the Father. But yet, as a man walking in
this world and learning obedience by the things which he suffered,
he undertook our griefs and our sorrows. They became his. And so he can be touched with
the feeling of our infirmities. And so whenever we read here
in the Psalms, it says, Bow down thine ear, O Lord, hear me, for
I am poor and needy. He didn't need anything. But
yet he became needy. He poured out his soul unto death. We're looking in Verse 7 says, In the day of my
trouble I will call upon thee, for thou wilt answer me. Now, there is a fine line between
faith and presumption. Natural men presume that God
will hear their prayers. because they just think that's
what God does. I mean, that's why you have a God, isn't it?
I mean, what would be the use of having a God if He didn't
hear your prayer and answer it? I mean, that's the way most people
think about it. I mean, why would we serve God
if He wasn't going to do what we wanted Him to do? That's how
most men think. But that's not how the Scriptures
indicate that God is. He doeth according to His will.
He said, if you ask anything according to my will, he heareth
us only according to his will. And so there is a presumption
that men have that God will hear them when they pray. Very few
people in the earth that don't pray. I mean, the publican prayed,
didn't he? I mean, the Pharisee prayed,
Scripture said, but he prayed thus with himself. And most of
the praying that men do is with themselves, because they are
thinking, well, God, you know, He's pretty much got to do this.
I'm gonna back Him up into a corner, and I'm gonna ask Him, and He
said He'd hear us if we prayed, and so I'm gonna ask Him, and
so He's got to hear. Well, He doesn't have to hear,
and often does not, in terms of deaf-eared men. So there is
a fine line between faith and presumption, but there is. that
abiding faith that God is pleased to give to His children wherein
they know that He will answer them. Now He may not answer them
like they in the flesh would desire for Him to, but they know
that He will. This was exhibited with Job when
he said, ìThough He slay me, yet will I trust Him.î See, there's
nothing that can turn the heart of God. You read about people
and people say, well, I lost my faith. Well, no, they didn't
lose their faith because they never had any to start with.
Because true faith cannot be lost because true faith is the
gift of God. And that which God begins, He
will continue and He will cause to triumph. And so there is a
faith that is not presumption. Only when men think that they
dictate the terms of how they relate to the Lord will they
be in presumption. As long as a man by the grace
of God knows that he is at the mercy of God, then to have faith
that God will hear is a good thing. And we encourage the children
of God to trust Him. And so he says, I will call upon
thee for thou wilt answer me. You're my hope, is what he's
saying. You're that one in whom is all my cares cast. I mean, I don't have any other
hope but thee, Lord. If you cast me off, then I'm
done for. Like Peter said, when the Lord
said, will you go away? and they were saying lord the
whom shall we go down past the words of eternal life i mean
we we don't have any place else to turn i mean we're at the end
of the road lord you're our help you're our hope and it is because
we have the expectation of his help that we rejoice and we trust
in him but we can do nothing by the grace of god For thou
wilt answer me, among the gods there is none like unto thee,
O Lord, neither are there any works like unto thy works." Well,
I thought there wasn't but one God. No, the Scripture says there's
many gods. But there's one true God, one
living God. See, all of the gods that are
spoken of in the Scripture other than the one true and living
God, they are just the gods of men's imaginations. They are
those gods that David speaks of when he said they have mouths
but they speak not. They can't do anything. They
are wheelchair gods. You see, they have to be carried
wherever men will carry them. But God is in the heavens, he
said. he hath done whatsoever he hath
pleased. So he's not in a situation where
he needs somebody's assistance. And God's not waiting on men
to help him out. I know, you know, it's a lot
of these radio and TV preachers, they want to pull at people's
heart strings so they can get some of the goods flowing to
keep the gospel afloat because they believe that unless men
do something, God is in a mess. I mean, He just can't do anything.
Well, listen, God doesn't need the money of men. He doesn't
need the talent of men. He doesn't need anything. He's
able to raise up the stones of the earth to praise Him. And
so we're privileged, brethren, to be called to follow Him. So it's not a bit of God waiting
upon us. Among the gods there are none
like thee. There are none. I mean, He is
singular. He said, Thou shalt have no other
gods before me. That is, before my face. It's
not a pecking order. Some people think, well, you
know, you can have another god, but you've just got to put Jehovah
number one. No. Thou shalt have no other
gods before me, not before my face. I don't want to see them. Neither are there any works like
unto thy works, because his works are true, his works are powerful,
And his works are without repentance. See, what God does, he does. You know, we often do things
and then we say, man, I wish I hadn't have done that. I mean,
about half of my life's been spent doing things and then saying,
man, if I'd have just, you know, done this, I'd have been better
off. Well, God's not like that. He does according to his will. And his works are mighty. There
are no works like unto thy works. All nations whom thou hast made
shall come and worship before thee, O Lord, and shall glorify
thy name. All of the creation will bring
glory to God, that which he is pleased to preserve forever and
that which he will destroy in an instant. It shall all bring
praise unto him. who shall not fear thee, O Lord,
and glorify thy name. All nations of the earth shall
come and worship before the Lord. I think this specifically has
reference to the fact that the Lord knoweth them that are His,
and out of every kindred, tribe, and tongue in the earth, He has
a people whom He calls unto Himself. There won't be a nation on the
earth that is not represented in the kingdom of God. because
he will save all that he has purpose to save. Not one will
be lost. All nations whom thou hast made
shall come and worship before thy name, before thee, O Lord,
and shall glorify thy name. For thou art great and doest
wondrous things. Thou art God alone. Teach me thy way, O Lord. I will
walk in thy truth. Unite my heart to fear thy name. Now isn't that the desire of
the children of God? Teach me thy way, O Lord? I mean,
do you have to corral God's people up and beat them with a stick
to get them to desire to do the things God has taught them to
do or to get them to desire the teaching of the Lord? No, the
Lord said He would send His Spirit to us to guide us into all truth. That's what He does to His children.
He causes them to love His way. They want to know what the way
of God is. They're not content to be ignorant
of it. Now unfortunately, sadly, the
vast majority of the religious world today, many of which are
professing Christians, they're not interested one whit in the
Lord teaching them His way. They just want to know something
that will make their life better. Isn't that mostly what most of
the so-called preaching today is about? It's just how to make
your life better, how to be happy. You know, how to have a good
marriage. And all those things are good. I'm not against any
of them. But that's not what the Lord's
doing. I mean, the lives of God's people
are often surrounded by sin, by sadness
and heartache and trouble. And all of these things are those
things which God is pleased to bring upon His people because
the works of God are wonders. And He does work in His people
and causes them to desire to walk in thy truth. Teach me thy
way. Unite my heart to fear thy name.
That is, give me a singleness of purpose. The Lord said, a
man that puts his hand to the plow and looks back is not worthy
of the kingdom of God. What does that mean? That means
that the people of God pursue the things of the kingdom of
God. They're not looking back to see the leeks and onions of
Egypt. That's not the things that they're
desiring. They're desiring to move forward. Unite my heart, fear thy name.
That unite, make me of one heart and one mind. I will praise Thee, O Lord, my
God, with all my heart, and I will glorify Thy name forevermore."
Of course, that is the result of that oneness of purpose, that
we would glorify His name. I mean, who else would we desire
to have any glory but Jesus Christ? He's the only one worthy of glory.
He said He came to be glorified, and He is glorified, and we desire
to give Him glory. For great is Thy mercy toward
me, and Thou hast delivered my soul from the lowest hell. You know the word hell, we don't
have a lot of time to go into this today. The word hell is,
I believe, one of the most greatly misused terms in the Scriptures. Now, don't misunderstand what
I'm saying. The Scripture speaks about hell,
and the Scripture speaks about a lake of fire into which all
whose names are not written in the Lamb's Book of Life will
be cast. There's no doubt about that.
But most of the time, when you read the word hell in the Scripture,
it's not talking about the lake of fire. The word hell basically
means the grave. It basically means the place
of death. That place from which a man cannot
return by nature. Job said, If a man dies, shall
he live again? Now most of the time, most people
think that is a positive Scripture that Job was saying he can live
again. No, Job was saying if he dies,
can he live again? No, he can't live again. I mean,
you can go cut down a tree out here and that thing will sprout
back up. But when a man dies and he's
put in the ground, he's not coming back. I mean, duh, he's going back
to the dust from whence he came. There's no hope in the grave.
There's no hope in the nature of man. He's dead when he's dead. Now, by the grace of God, however,
we have been taught of one who came into this world to destroy
death. And that's who prays this prayer.
He said, Thou hast delivered me from the lowest hell. The lowest hell is the pit of
destruction. It's the place from whence a
man cannot come back. But one did come back. One came in a fashion that has
set the world on its ear even though it doesn't know it. Because even though men denied
And even though, you know, as time goes on, they change things
around. I think we've mentioned this
before, but it used to be that the time was divided as B.C. and A.D. And those two turned
around before Christ and Anno Domini, which is in the year
of our Lord. See all the great scientists
and whoever decides these things, they've changed all of that.
You won't see that anymore on official documents. It's either,
I forget what the first one is, but the one that's now, what
used to be called AD is now CE, Current Epic is what it's called. But you know the funny thing?
The dividing line is still Christ. It's still Christ, because the
current epic begins with Christ. You know, men can't escape these
things, but yet the Lord, He has determined purpose, and He's
hidden these things from the wise and prudent, and revealed
them unto babe. So I don't care what they call
it. You know, it don't make any difference to me. They can come
up with a new name next week. But the dividing line of time
will always be Christ, because before Christ came, men sat in
darkness. But when He came, the light shone
in the earth. And He has been delivered from
the lowest hell. The grave cannot hold Him and
did not hold Him. And based upon that glorious
truth rests all of our hope. If a man dies, shall he live
again? not by his own power. He shall not live again, but
by the power of Christ who rose from the dead and became the
first fruits of them that sleep. We shall live again. What a glorious
thought! We shall indeed be delivered
from the lowest hell, from the grave, from that place from which
we could not return apart from the glorious work of Christ in
our behalf. How wondrous are His ways! O
God, the proud are risen against me, and the assemblies of violent
men have sought after my soul, and have not set thee before
them. Is that not true of Christ? The
assemblies of proud men. I mean, the assemblies of proud
men are set against Him even now. They'll not have this man
to rule over them. Oh, you know, men like the religious
aspects of Christianity. I mean, they like the holidays,
you know. We got Easter when everybody remembers that the
Lord rose from the dead, along with the Easter bunny and all
that stuff. You know, and then we got, they remember the Christmas
time and all these different things, and they like all of
that. But still, that doesn't change
the fact that men by nature despise Christ. And they will not worship
Him. But thou, O God, but thou, O
Lord, art a God full of compassion and gracious, long-suffering
and plenteous in mercy and truth. And it is upon that that our
hopes rest that He is indeed a God of mercy and compassion.
Otherwise, we wouldn't have any hope at all, would we? I mean,
if we read in the Scripture that He was not a God of mercy, what
hope would we have? I mean, all we'd have to look
forward to would be destruction. Be it. Oh, turn unto me and have
mercy upon me. Give thy strength unto thy servant,
and save the son of thine handmaid. You know, the Lord came in humility. And he was the son of the Lord's
handmaid. Who was the Lord's handmaid?
It was Mary, a young girl whom the Lord visited. And he made
her the greatest among all women. We don't worship Mary, but we
do realize the place of honor that she was given. the handmaid of the Lord. And
the Lord loved his mother. And he provided for her even
after his death. He said to John, Show me a token for good that
they which hate me may see it and be ashamed because thou,
Lord, hast opened me and comforted me. He said, Give me a sign And the Lord, of course, speaking
in that as we remember the Lord's given us a sign, has He not?
He said, here's my body and here's my blood. He says, as often as
you do this, do it in remembrance. And so we come here this morning
with the only sign that the Lord has given us. Just like He had one temple,
He had one tabernacle, He's given us one sign, one place of remembrance
of Him. It's not a thing of man's design,
it's not something we came up with, it's something He commanded
us to do. And it's actually pretty simple. It's
an everyday thing, isn't it? And so may the Lord cause us
this morning, our heart and mind, to be turned to remember His
death until He comes again.