We're looking in Psalm 73, and
this is the, as we read last week, the prayers of David, the
son of Jesse are ended. Now, that doesn't mean that in
the book of the Psalms are not other Psalms that are written
by David, because there are. We know that these things are
not set forth in a chronological fashion. But this particular
Psalm that we're looking at here is a Psalm of Asaph. And as you
study the name Asaph in the scriptures, there are several times Asaph
is mentioned. I'm not sure that they're all,
every time Asaph is mentioned that it's speaking of the same
Asaph. It could be, but he's known in
some places in the scripture as the recorder, that is, as
a scribe. He was one that wrote down the
things that, were said in the King like a court reporter, I
suppose. He's also called a singer, which
is a prophet. And he is a singer. He was one of the singing men. He was one of those whose primary
purpose was to sing. And some of the Psalms that David
wrote are given to Asaph. It says so in the title. It says
this is a Psalm given unto Asaph. So Asaph was one who was used
of the Lord, and no doubt. And so he's given him this Psalm
here. Now I do notice that in the Psalms
of Asaph, there is a difference in the things that the Lord impresses
upon the heart of Asaph that are a little bit different than
those of David. I think most of the Psalms of David, if not all of them, are the prayers
of Christ. and uh... set forth uh... we
can see most clearly uh... the glory of christ set forth
in in all of the songs of david and not that we cannot see uh... some of those things in the songs
of asap but uh... asap i believe these songs are
more geared to the uh... as the experience that Asaph
would set forth in his own mind as he surveyed things, as he
looked at these things. And so we read this, we'll read
the Psalm and then we'll go back and look at it. The Psalm of
Asaph, and this is Psalm 73. Truly God is good to Israel,
even to such as are of a clean heart. or a pure heart. But as
for me, my feet were almost gone, my steps had well nigh slipped.
For I was envious and foolish when I saw the prosperity of
the wicked. For there are no bands in their
death, but their strength is firm. They are not in trouble
as other men, neither are they plagued like other men. And therefore
pride compasseth them about as a chain, violence covereth them
as a garment. Their eyes stand out with fatness.
They have more than heart could wish. They are corrupt and speak
wickedly concerning oppression. They speak loftily. They set
their mouth against the heavens, and their tongue walketh through
the earth. Therefore his people return hither, and waters of
full cup are wrung out to them. And they say, How doth God know,
and is there knowledge in the Most High? Behold, these are
the ungodly who prosper in the world. They increase in riches. Verily I have cleansed my heart
in vain and washed my hands in innocency. For all the day long
have I been plagued and chastened every morning. If I say I will
speak thus, behold, I should offend against the generation
of thy children. When I thought to know this,
it was too painful for me until I went into the sanctuary of
God. Then understood I their end. Surely thou did set them
in slippery places. Thou castest them down into destruction. How are they brought into desolation
is in a moment. They are utterly consumed with
terrors. As a dream, when one waketh,
so, O Lord, when thou awakest, thou shalt despise their image.
Thus my heart was grieved and I was pricked in my reins. So
foolish was I and ignorant. I was as a beast before thee.
Nevertheless, I am continually with thee. Thou hast holden me
by my right hand. Thou shalt guide me with thy
counsel and afterward receive me to glory. Whom have I in heaven
but thee? And there is none upon earth
that I desire beside thee. My flesh and my heart faileth,
but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.
For lo, they that are far from thee shall perish. Thou hast
destroyed all them that go a-whoring from thee. But it is good for
me to draw near to God. I have put my trust in the Lord
God, that I may declare all thy works. Now, Asaph begins with
a very plain and straightforward and
full of truth statement when he says, Truly God is good to
Israel. Surely the Lord is good to the
people of His choice. He's good to Israel. Now the
natural man, and of course Israel as a people, they consider that
the Lord has respect unto carnal bloodlines. But that's not what
it means here when Asaph says truly God is good to Israel.
Now his understanding of Israel was indeed those that were of
a certain bloodline, those that were of a certain nationality,
if you want to speak. Now we understand, as the scripture
has, as the Lord has delivered to us, more understanding of
the scripture and talks about that mystery which was hid from
the foundation of the world, that the Lord would gather in
one all people, that is, those people that belong to Him, so
that there is not Jew and Gentile, but he is a Jew, not which is
one which is circumcised in the flesh, but he that's circumcised
in the heart. And so Israel are indeed the
people of God, but it's not a nationality. It's not a people who dwell in
a certain land. And when we pray for Israel,
we're not praying for a governmental authority or a governmental region. we're praying for the people
of God and we are to pray for Israel even as the Lord Jesus
did when he said I pray not for the world but I pray for them
whom thou hast given me out of the world so surely God is indeed
good to Israel and that's his prerogative now some people take
exception with God if you get speaking about God as being giving
more goodness to one people versus another. And they say, well,
that doesn't seem quite right. I mean, if He's going to be God
like I know God to be, then He ought to be the same to all people.
He's got to give everybody a chance and give everybody love and all
of that. But that's to fail to understand
who God is. Because the reality, and it's
to fail to understand what man is by nature. Because why should
God be good to anybody? I mean, why should God show love
to anybody? Why should God have favor to
anyone? Why should mercy be visited upon
anybody? And usually, you see, when people
get worried about God not showing mercy to everybody, it's because
they don't understand that he has no obligation to show mercy
to anybody. And that he would show mercy
to rebellious creatures as we are is an amazing thing. It is
the grace of God. And that's what we've been sent
into the world to declare. Truly God is good to Israel. He causes all things to work
together for good to them who love God, who are the called
according to his purpose. That's a particular people. He
doesn't just cause all things to work together for good to
everybody. And that's not what Paul says. He says he causes
all things to work together for good to a particular people,
to those who love God, those who are the called according
to His purpose. See, those are one and the same
people. A man can't truly love God unless
he has been called unto it. Now, a lot of people say, oh,
well, I love God. But what they mean is they love
how they think of God. They don't necessarily love God.
I mean, because you get to tell them what the Bible says, how
God is, and they say, oh, well, wait a minute. I can't serve
a God like that. You ever had anybody tell you
that? I wouldn't serve a God like that. Well, no, but you
wouldn't serve God, because God will be God, and He will do according
to His will in the army of heaven and among the inhabitants of
the earth, and none can stay His hand. And we love Him because
He first loved us. Men can't just love God. It's
by the grace of God that a man is brought to that place. Truly,
God is good to Israel, even to such as are of a clean heart. Now that kind of rules out a
bunch of folks, doesn't it? I mean, if you took that just
literally, if you come along, see, now a lot of people look
at that and they say, well, man, I'm in. I read that and I say, oh, woe
is me. You know, when the Lord says
that He, when Asaph says that the Lord is good even to such
as are of a clean heart, Is he talking about that that's just
the way they are? Of a clean heart? The Scripture
says, who shall dwell in the presence of the Lord? It says,
he that hath clean hands and a pure heart, who hath not lifted
up his soul into vanity, nor sworn deceitfully. Now that's a troubling thing
to a man that knows himself to be a sinner, is it not? If you think that on the basis
of your clean hands and your pure heart that you're coming
into the presence of God, you don't understand who you are
or what you are by nature. So the purity of heart is, in
some ways we might say it is a relative thing, and then in
another way we would say that this is speaking of a pure heart
that has been imputed to us. We have a clean heart. But it's
not because of what we've done, but it's because of what Christ
has done in our behalf. Now there is the sense in which
it is true that the Lord has cleansed the hearts of His people
and so they can be said to have a clean heart before Him. Not because of their own activity,
but because of His. And when he looks on his people,
he looks on them as those of a clean heart. Why? Because he's
taken their sins away as far as the east is from the west,
and he remembers them no more. Now that's a difficult thing
for a man to come to grips with. Now, if a man doesn't have a
problem coming to grips with that, then again, he doesn't
understand the depths of the wickedness of his own heart.
But when a man knows in himself to be wicked, it is an amazing
thing to him to consider that he is considered before Almighty
God as one who has never sinned. Isn't that what Paul said, Reckon
yourselves to be dead unto sin, but alive unto God in Christ
Jesus. I mean, that's a hard thing,
brother, for a man to come to grips with. You see, you can't
believe that, only by the grace of God. Can a man believe? Once he's been taught what a
sinner he is, it's only by the grace of God that he can then
come to the place where he realizes and rejoices in the fact that
he has been made clean before Almighty God. You see, that's
why we preach the Gospel. It's to lift up the hands and
hang down. to strengthen the weak knees,
those that feel themselves to be fully gone, those that look
upon themselves and say, man, there's no hope for me. But there
is hope in Christ, because He has cleansed His people. And
so indeed, He is good to such as are of a clean heart, as we
understand how it is that a man's heart becomes clean before Almighty
God. But then he says, but as for
me, because you see he knows the standard which the Lord has. Now as Brother Al was bringing
out this morning, see what happens in society and in the ways of
men, they get to thinking that they have the right to define
what's good and what's right. And that's why it is that all
our society has slipped so far And things that were considered
to be just a few short years ago completely out of the realm
of acceptability have now come into the mainstream. And a man
is looked on as being some kind of a bigot or a weirdo or something's
wrong with him if he stands up and says, this is not according
to the way of God. Because men can say, oh but,
See, it's all about love. I mean, if we love one another
and you love somebody and all this, it makes it all right.
No, it doesn't make it all right before Almighty God. Regardless
of what men do, nothing becomes right in the sight of God by
the decision of men to say it's okay. You know, it's not what I say
is okay. It's not what you say is okay.
It's what God says. And that's the only place that
we have to stand there, brethren. If we're going to design the
world, where would the world be at the present time if God
removed His restraint and it was all left up to men to just
go their own way? I mean, if God just stepped back
from the picture, and said, well, here, you all have it. I mean,
we wouldn't even be here because everybody had already killed
each other, number one, but society would cease to exist. And that's
fast what's happening in the world in which we live is the
standards of society have been degraded to the point that in
a few years, I can't even imagine if we keep going on the same
pace, what it'll be. I mean, what will be the limits?
Where will be the bounds? What will be acceptable? It won't make any difference,
just whatever. Truly God is good to Israel,
even to such as are of a clean heart. But as for me, he said,
my feet were almost gone, my steps had well nigh slipped. He said, you know, I know that
God is good, but I got the thinking in my mind. That's a dangerous thing, isn't
it? Huh? I mean, when you leave off, you
know, you're saying over here, God is good and he does good
to Israel. But then he said, but then, I
know that to be true. But he says, I got the thinking. And he said, My steps, my feet
were almost gone, my steps were well and I slipped because I
was envious at the foolish. He says, I've got the thinking.
You know, that doesn't seem quite right for the wicked to prosper. Now see, the prosperity preachers,
that's what they tell you, that it's not right and that's not
the way that it is. That if you're really a child
of God and following in the right way, you're going to prosper.
and you're going to have plenty of money and you're never going
to be sick and all these things are just going to the blessings
of God is just like sitting up here in a big pot just waiting
for you to act right and it's just going to be poured out on
you that's not the way that it is and it is true that there is
a lot of prosperity and happiness as far as the flesh is concerned
in this world See, I've shared this with you before. I remember
listening to this guy one time. He was talking about, he grew
up in a, his parents, they were real religiously oriented, and
they went to church every Sunday morning, Sunday night, and Wednesday
night. I mean, they was always going. And he said he remembered going
to church And riding by this bar room, and there would always
be music playing and people, you know, you could look in there
and see people dancing around having a big time. And he said
his mama would always say, yes, those folks are miserable. And
he says, a little kid, he always thought, well, they don't look
miserable to me. And they're not miserable. Look,
the people of this world are not miserable. They're having
a big time. They're enjoying it. I mean,
you go to Hollyweird, I mean, those people are happy. I mean,
they got plenty of money. They can do all kinds of stuff,
you know, fly all over the world, and then they can lecture us
on the carbon that we're putting into the world, and all that
kind of stuff. I mean, they're happy. And it
is sometimes when we get to thinking. We say, well, that don't seem
right. And that's what Asaph said. As
for me, my feet were almost gone, my steps were well and I slept.
I almost had dropped over into questioning God as to why these
things were so. When I was envious at the foolish,
when I saw the prosperity of the wicked. For there are no
bands in their death, that is, there's no pains, there's no
pain. They're not worried about dying. by and large. Now you know, the
Lord, and this is a blessing, ever since I have been a little
kid, I've been afraid of dying. I can remember just waking up
in the middle of the night, worrying about dying. I thought maybe
sometimes I'd dreamed that I had died and I'd gone and I was standing
before the Lord. And I can remember waking up
sometimes and being scared and getting out of bed and going
to look to see, you know, if everything was still like it
was. The wicked are not so. Death's
nothing to them. I used to think that the older
a man got, the more he thought and worried about death. He thought
so. The older that a man goes, if his heart, if he has no concern
for the things of God, he's no more concerned about dying than
he was Twenty-five years ago. He just figures, well, he's just
going down the line. He figures, I guess, in the back
of his mind somehow that he'll just keep on going. There are no bans in the death
of the weak. But you see, God's people consider
it. You remember that song we sing
sometimes? Sometimes I am afraid to die. Now why are we sometimes afraid
to die? Because we know that it is appointed
unto men who wants to die and after this the judgment. You
see we do sometimes fear death because we know that God is a
righteous God and that He judges righteously and we tremble in
fear. There's no fear of God before
their eyes. They are not in trouble as other
men, neither are they plagued like other men. Therefore pride
combusteth them about as a chain, violence covereth them as a garment.
Now we're gonna have to stop here, because we've run out of
time. But this is, as Asaph begins this psalm, he is understanding the way of God,
but yet as a natural man, as we are, he sometimes forgets
where his mind ought to be. And brethren, you and I can get
to a place where we are envious at the wicked. And you know when
a man is envious at the wicked, he really is angry at God. Is it not? Because how does the
wicked continue on in their way? How are they prospered? How do
they have the things they have? According to the will and purpose
of God. And so it is. And so in all things
we bow down before Him, give Him thanks, because you see,
as we'll read on about Asaph, he said, you know, but I came
to see. He said, and that's, you see,
that's the glorious thing. It's not where a man begins,
but it's where he winds up. That measures as to whether or
not he is a child of God. If you looked at the thief who
was on the cross, or one of the thieves that was on the cross,
and you'd seen him as a youth, and you'd have seen him as a
man growing up and committing the crimes that he did, you would
have never had any consideration that he was one of the children
of God. But you see, in the Lord's time,
according to his mercy, he demonstrated that he was his, that he loved
him from before the foundation of the world, but he brought
him by a way which he knew not. And He brought him down that
path to bring him to a better place. And so it is. So we need not be envious that
the prosperity is wicked, knowing that the Lord has ordained all
things. And some of those who are prosperous,
in their wickedness, because that thief, he was prosperous
in his wickedness at one point in time. I mean, it might not
have lasted long, but whatever he stole, I mean, right after
he stole it, he probably had a big dime, you know, didn't
he? Because you see, all these things
are in the hands of the Lord to do as He wills, but He does
bring His people to a place to acknowledge Him. and give him
glory. And that's the place ASAP is
going to be brought to by the mercy of God.