Psalm 49. Once again, this is
a psalm for the sons of Korah, and it is for all the people,
as we read in the first line of this psalm. It says, hear
this, all ye people. Give ear, all ye inhabitants
of the world, both low and high, rich and poor together. My mouth
shall speak of wisdom, and the meditation of my heart shall
be of understanding. I will incline mine ear to a
parable. I will open my dark saying upon
the harp. Wherefore should I fear in the
days of evil, when the iniquity of my heels, or those that would
ensnare me, shall come past me about? They that trust in their
wealth and boast themselves in the multitude of their riches,
none of them can by any means redeem his brother, nor give
to God a ransom for him. For the redemption of their soul
is precious and it ceaseth forever, that he should still live forever
and not see corruption. For he seeth that wise men die,
like wise the fool, and the brutish person perish, and leave their
wealth to others. Their inward thought is that
their houses shall continue forever, and that their dwelling places
unto all generations. They call their lands after their
own names. Nevertheless man, being in honor,
abideth not. He is like the beasts that perish.
This their way is their folly, yet their posterity approve their
sayings, say law. Like sheep they are laid in the
grave, death shall feed on them, and the upright shall have dominion
over them in the morning, and their beauty shall consume in
the grave from their dwelling. But God will redeem my soul from
the power of the grave, for he shall receive me, say law. Be not thou afraid when one is
made rich, when the glory of his house is increased. For when
he dieth, he shall carry nothing away. His glory shall not descend
after him. Though while he lived, he blessed
his soul, and men will praise thee when thou doest well to
thyself. He shall go to the generation
of his fathers. They shall never see light. man
that is in honor and understandeth not is like the beast that perish. Now, this psalm, again, as I
have said of the other psalms, I believe is a declaration by
the Lord Jesus Christ and through the psalmist, which we believe
to be David, who wrote this, but yet, the message is that
which comes from the lips of the Lord Jesus Christ. And this
is a dark saying. Now you wouldn't pick this passage
of scripture to read if you were trying to win friends and influence
people. Or you're trying to cause people
to have a happy day. Because it sets forth some pretty
somber truth. Some pretty startling truth.
I mean, some things that are hard to receive. And in the religious
climate in which we live today, some very difficult things to
receive. And so he says, hear this, all ye people, give ear
all ye inhabitants of the world. Now, that covers a pretty broad
range, would you not say? I mean, he didn't leave anybody
out, I don't think. I mean, you know, when we preach
the Word of God, we're not trying to pick out who it is we're speaking
to. We're speaking out the truth
of God. Now, in the mercy of God, He
causes some men to hear it. Some men don't. By nature, No
man will hear it. You see, men often get to think,
well, you know, that's not really fair. God, He's going to call
some people to hear this and not going to let other people
hear it. Well, nobody is going to hear it. Unless... The Lord in mercy causes them
to hear it, because man by nature is not going to hear the Word
of God. The Lord said to the Pharisees, He said, Search the
Scriptures, for in them ye think ye have eternal life, but they
are they which testify of me, and ye will not come to me that
ye might have life. You won't do it. You won't listen. That's just the nature of man.
There's none that doeth good. There's none that seeketh after
God. But yet we preach the message,
and the Lord causes men to hear it. That's an amazing thing.
Now, isn't that an amazing thing? See, people get all worried about,
well, God didn't let somebody hear it. Well, why did He let
anybody hear it? I mean, that's the amazing thing
to me, is that He causes some men to hear it. He could have
just wrote us off. You know, He could have just
destroyed the whole thing. Who could have said anything? I mean, if God just tomorrow
destroyed the whole earth, what could anybody say? It's His earth.
He did it according to His good pleasure and His will. So hear
this, all ye people, give ear all ye inhabitants of the world,
both low and high, That is, men of great esteem and those of
low esteem. Rich and poor together. Lumps
everybody all in one thing. See, the amount of money that
a man has doesn't mean anything. His station in life doesn't matter. My mouth shall speak of wisdom,
and did not the Lord Jesus Christ come speaking forth the wisdom
of God? He said, The Lord hath made me
to preach tidings unto men. My mouth shall speak of wisdom,
and the meditation of my heart shall be of understanding. Now,
the understanding, that's the thing we need, is it not? I mean,
when the Lord Jesus Christ reasoned when He was twelve years old,
and He reasoned, the Scripture says, with the men there in the
temple, Do you think he was getting something from them? I mean,
did they have anything to offer to him? He'd say, you know, I
never thought of that. No, he reasoned with them. I
believe he reasoned with them of sin, righteousness, and judgment.
I think they were astonished of the things that he spoke.
Now, they were astonished, but did they Believe what he said, evidently
not. Evidently not. But his mouth shall speak of
wisdom, and meditation of my heart shall be of understanding. That is of seeing the deep things
of God, the truth of God. That is those things which we
desire to know. See, that's what we're hungering
and thirsting after is understanding. See, we can stand here and read
the Bible all day long, and it's a good thing to read the Bible.
I wish everybody read it. I hope you read it. But you know
the thing that you really need more than you do to spend time
reading it is for the Lord to give you understanding of the
things that you read. I mean you are better off to
read one verse a week with understanding than you are to read through
the Bible three times a year. i remember brother uh... uh... charles part and all the
uh... uh... some uh... i don't remember
the exact instance but anyway somebody came to him uh... well
brother spartans is he said uh... i've read through the bible three
times on my knees and i still don't understand he said well
he says you've probably been better off if you've sat in a
comfortable chair The things that men think they
can do, oh, well, I'll really get into the word here. I'm gonna
really get it. I'm gonna get all these commentaries
and I'm gonna get all this stuff and I'm gonna just learn all
this. Colleges and seminaries are full
of people that, oh, they can tell you some stuff now, don't
get me wrong, far more stuff than I could ever tell you. But
the question is, is it with understanding? Because brethren, if we don't
have the understanding of what it is that God is setting forth
in this book from beginning to end, then it doesn't make a difference
how much of it you know. If you don't see Christ from
the beginning to the end, then you miss the point of the book.
because this is a book about Jesus Christ. It's a book given
to exalt the name of Jesus Christ. Whatever else men might get from
it, and you can get a lot of things from it. There's a lot
of good advice in here. Every morning when my alarm clock
set, And it goes off and shortly after the news plays, there's
a guy comes on there and he's reading through the proverbs
and giving his comments on them. I don't appreciate his comments
a whole lot because they're pretty works-oriented type stuff. The fact that the proverb is
there, there's a lot of good information about the proverbs.
I mean that you can gain by reading through the proverbs. But if
the only thing you get from reading through the proverbs is the literal
thing that the proverb says from a carnal standpoint, then you've
missed it. Because there's far more in the
proverbs than just simply telling you some pithy sayings and things
that you can, little neat things you can tell people and what
not. And how to guide your life. Now you can learn a lot about
living life in a proper way by reading the Proverbs. But I don't
believe that's the purpose that the Proverbs were given. The
purpose that the Proverbs were given was to show men the wisdom
of Christ. The glory of Christ. So with
understanding, but the Lord says, my heart shall be of understanding. Why? Because He is that one who
has all understanding. He said, I will incline mine
ear to a parable, or I will set forth a parable before in your
hearing. Now we know that the Lord went
about, did He not, teaching in parables. And the reason that
He taught in parables, He said, was so that those that see could
see and those that couldn't see wouldn't see. Now, that's just
plain as he said it. He said, Father, I thank thee.
You've hid these things. The disciples said, well, why
do you teach in parables? He said, because I want you to
understand it, but I'm not interested in whether or not they understand
it or not. It's not given to them to know it, but it's given
unto you. Now you see, they didn't understand
it, did they? Unless he taught it to them,
but you see, he was pleased to teach it to them. They said,
well, what does this mean? And he said, here it is, here's
what it means. Now see, that's what we need.
We need not only to know the parable, to hear the parable,
we need for the Lord to teach us the parable. Lord, teach us
these things. Help us to get it. I know Brother
Ed and I were talking about some of the parables here a while
back and about the lost coin and those various things. And if you don't see what those
things are, then, you know, if the Lord doesn't give you an
understanding of them, they're but a mystery. I will incline
mine ear to a parable. I will open my dark saying upon
the harp." Now, the word harp there means a twang. That's kind
of an interesting word. I believe he's basically saying
he's going to play a chord, and it's a somber chord. on the harp. He said this is a dark saying.
Now he goes on to say some dark things, does he not? When he
tells men about where they're going and what little use the
things of this world are. I will incline mine ear to a
parable. I will open my dark saying upon the harp. Wherefore
should I fear in the days of evil when the iniquity of my
heels shall come past me about? I know that in some ways this
may be controversial. And I know a lot of people, they
look at this as David saying this and they say that he's speaking
about the sin that encompasses him. But this particular word
that's used here for heals is never used but one time in the
scripture. And the literal meaning of the
word is that ensnare me. In other words, that's the literal
the Hebrew word. It's what it literally means
is to be ensnared. And so what I believe that actually
as this is set forth that this is the Lord Jesus speaking here
and he's saying, wherefore should I fear in the days of evil when
the iniquity of those that conspire against me shall come past me
about. Now in my understanding of this Psalm, in the context of it,
that seems to fit in here a lot better than just simply saying
that this is David talking about his own sin. Because he would
be just pulling that out of there. But the Lord said, these can
pass me about. He goes on to speak about the
rich and those powerful and those in places, you know, of ability
to do that. And the Pharisees had that power.
And they did seek to ensnare him constantly. He said, they
that trust in their wealth and boast themselves in the multitude
of their riches, none of them can by any means redeem his brethren
or give to God a ransom for him. he said a man that has great
well he can't do anything for anybody really or maybe you might
buy somebody a car if you've got enough money you might buy
them a house you might set them up for life i was listening to
something the other day on the radio and said they were fixing
to give away some money it's going to be five thousand dollars
a week for life and i was thinking to myself you know i said man
that would be nice to just have five thousand dollars a week
that you didn't really have to do anything for. But now in reality
what good would that be? Oh you know it'd make life easy
wouldn't it? It'd be nice. Don't get me wrong if you got
extra five thousand laying around that you want to send my way
I'll take it. But what good would that really
do me? I mean what would be the value
of it ultimately? If you think of it in the bigger
picture, that's what he's saying here. They that trust in their
wealth and boast in their multitude of their riches, what have they
got? What have they really got? I mean, how long does a man live? If you live a hundred years.
Let's say you live a hundred years. I mean, you're probably
not going to be running a marathon when you're 90, even if you do
live that long. You know, there may be some people
that are, I don't know, I don't keep up with all that kind of
stuff, but there's not a lot of people that will be. And so
if you live 100 years, what is that? You know, I used to think
when I was a kid, you know, my daddy died when he was 54 years
old. And I always thought of him when
I was growing up as being an older, old man. I mean, I just
thought of him as being an old man. And now I'm 68 years old,
or will be my next birthday. And that, I just say, that's
a young guy. I mean, I see guys come in the store, you know,
in their 50s, and I'm thinking, man, that guy, you know, he's
young. Because it's all in the perspective that you have. But
I'm telling you, you know, time is fleeting. It has a vapor,
the scripture says. We live our years as a tale that
is told. They that trust in their wealth
and boast themselves in the multitude of their riches, they can't do
anything for anybody else. Really, they can't redeem their
brother. You can't give to God a ransom for him, but our elder
brother can. And he has, because you see,
he's contrasting himself with the wealth of the world. They
couldn't do anything with the wealth. They trust in their uncertain
riches, but he said they can't redeem a man before God. They can't give themselves a
ransom. They can't pay a ransom. But
I can, and I have. You see, that's the glorious
message of the Word of God to the people of God, is that Jesus
Christ has paid the price for our ransom. He has set us free
from sin and death. For the redemption of their soul
is precious. Precious in the sight of the
Lord is the death of His saints. Why? Because He bought them. He bought them. They're precious to Him. And
their death is precious to Him because they belong to Him. That's
His. For the redemption of their soul
is precious and it ceaseth forever. You see, there's nothing that
a man can do to cause himself to go on. The Lord redeems men. And they do indeed endure forever. But if a rich man, he uses his
money to procure something for men, what if you could go and
pay off a man's fines? What good would it do him? It
would help him in a short period of time, but it wouldn't help
him in the long run, would it? Because men cease. It ceaseth
forever. that he should still live forever
and not see corruption because you see there is nothing that
will cause a man not to see corruption in and of what he does. Now you
know we hear about all these guys talking about what's the
guy that's Musk, they were talking about
the other day, he's working on or got somebody working on some
kind of process or serum or something that you can take and you just
wouldn't ever die. I mean you just take this stuff
and you'd just go right on. How foolish is that? I don't
know what God might enable somebody to do, but in the long run, this
is the truth, it is appointed unto men once to die. Methuselah
lived 962 years old, but guess what? He died. Now 962 is pretty old. I mean, even I think that's old. But what can a man do to remove
himself from it? He shall seek corruption, for
he seeth that wise men die, likewise the fool and the brutish person,
and leave their wealth to others. Their inward thought is, now
they don't, they think they're going to escape this, somehow
or other. Men, you know, men, it's amazing
how that men will keep doing what they're doing even when
they got one foot in the grave and they got an oxygen bottle
You know, one thing, and they're walking on a walker and whatever,
and they're still making plans for what they're going to do
tomorrow. And all of those things, why?
Because that's just the nature of men, that's the way we are
by nature. And there is a part of us that
says, we're just going to continue on. Isn't there? I mean, when
Eve, when the devil came to Eve, And he told her, ye shall not
surely die. The scripture says she was deceived.
She believed what Eve said. I mean, she believed what the
devil said. Eve believed what the devil said.
The devil said, ye shall not surely die. She said, huh, that's
right. I won't. Well, I'm immortal. I'm just going to keep going
on. But it was a lie. She was deceived.
and so it is that men entertain that notion now. I mean, every
time somebody dies, what's the first thing they say? Well, he's
in a better place now. How do they know that? I mean, he's in a better place now. Where
does that come from? Men don't want to face the fact
that they are going to die. And in fact, as we'll read on
in this thing, that not all men shall live forever, according
to what the scripture says. Their inward thought is that
their houses shall continue forever and their dwelling places to
all generations. They call their lands after their
own names. You know, people, a lot of these
rich people, they give a lot of these big piles of money to
these universities and whatnot, but they don't just give it because
they just want to give it. They give it because they want
to be able to ride by this building, and it's got the Ed Dennard building. You know, they see that up there
and they think, man, this is it. I'm going to live on forever
in the minds of these people. That's just how people are. It's the way they think. They
believe their houses are dwelling places to all generations. They
call their lands after their own names. You know, when you
go up and you look in the courthouse, And they got deeds and stuff
going back, now I don't know how far back they go, but good
ways back. Do you think that when these
people put their name on that deed that they didn't have in
their mind, this is mine? Huh? This is my piece of land. I mean, go up there to the courthouse,
it says right there on it. But let me tell you something.
The piece of land that we're on right now, there's no telling
how many different people had the same piece of paper. I don't
even know who they were. They thought it was theirs. What
happened when they died? It wasn't theirs, was it? Huh? They
found out that it wasn't theirs. They thought it was theirs. Nevertheless,
nevertheless, man being in honor abideth not. In other words,
a man thinks of himself as this highfalutin thing, but what does
it say? But he is like the beast that perished. Oh, well, wait
a minute now. Hold on now. Wait. No, he can't be like the beast
that perished, because, why, he's going to live on somewhere
forever, isn't he? I mean, he's got an eternal existence. He's got what somebody says is
an immortal soul. Now, I know that this is a controversial
thing, but it's not controversial if you go to the Scripture and
look for that. I mean, I've looked for it. I've
searched to find where the Scripture says that man has an immortal
soul. I ain't found it. Now, I've found
where God gives to men eternal life. I found where some men
will live forever. He said he was going to prepare
a place for them, and if he went to prepare a place for them,
he'd come back and get them. But man by nature and in himself,
he has no eternality attached to him at all. He's like the
beasts that perish. It's an old natural body. It's
not any different. You know a lot of times they'll
dig up these bones and they have to do chemical analysis and all
that stuff to determine what they are because it could be
a dog. I mean it's just an old bone laying down there. They
don't know if it's a dog or a cat or a cow or whatever it is. It might be a man. It has a beast. This natural body decays, passes
away and that's it. And dear brethren, if God in
his mercy has not visited us In the time of our existence,
that is what we are going to wind up being. Like the beasts that perish,
this their way is their folly, yet their posterity approve their
sayings. It's their folly. See, that's
man's folly to think that, but what happens? Next generation
comes along and says, well, that's right. You know, old daddy was
right. Now, if daddy could tell them,
you know, if he had some means to communicate with them, he'd
tell them, no, I wasn't right, I was wrong. But, that's not
the way of men. This their way is their folly,
their posterity approved their sayings. Like sheep, they are
laid in the grave. Death shall feed on them. And
the upright shall have dominion over them in the morning. Because
you see, there is a morning. The night cometh, but the morning
is coming. and the people of God. The triumph
of the people of God is going to be seen because it is the
triumph of Jesus Christ. It is going to be manifested.
The upright shall have dominion over them in the morning, and
their beauty shall consume in the grave from their dwelling. That is a dark saying, isn't
it? I mean, if you tell a man, look, you are going to rot in
the grave. The name of the wicked shall
rot is what the Scripture says. That's a dark sign. That's not
anything that's going to cheer somebody up. But God will redeem my soul from
the power of the grave. Who is that? The Lord Jesus Christ. He told Pilate, who said, don't
you know, I've got power to turn you loose kill you. The Lord
said you don't have any power over me at all. He says I have
power to lay down my life and to take it again. Now why did
he? Because he had confidence as a man in his heavenly father
who he said he will redeem my soul from the grave. for the
grave could not contain him. It could not hold him. But God
will redeem my soul from the power of the grave for he shall
receive me. Now brethren, our hope of being
received into the presence of God has nothing at all to do
with anything that we have accomplished or done. But it is that we believe,
according to what the Scripture teaches us, that He has hidden
us in Jesus Christ. And all that Jesus Christ, as
in Adam all men die, so in Christ all are made alive. And our hope's
in Him. It's not in being a man. See, a lot of people, they just
think that man is just, he's in some special place. You know,
God's got the cows and the hogs and all this over here, and then
He's got men over here. And men are just of so much greater
worth and value than the hogs and the cows and stuff like that. Maybe we've got anything to worry
about, really. Because God thinks we're special.
Well, brethren, the only thing that makes a man special is that
God has had mercy upon him. The only thing that delivers
that man from certain destruction is the mercy of Almighty God. God will redeem my soul from
the power of the grave for He shall receive me. Our hope is
built on nothing less than Jesus' blood and righteousness. We expect
to be received. We hope and expect that He shall
say unto us, Well done thou good and faithful servant, enter thou
into the joy of the Lord. Not because we think, well money,
we've already been doing it down here. But because we believe
He is going to receive Jesus Christ, that He has received
Jesus Christ. And that our reception is in
Him. Our expectation and our hope.
Be not thou afraid when one is made rich. That is, when men
get power in this earth. And men do have power in this
earth, do they not? I mean, if we knew how much power
the government had over us at this present time, they probably
know everything we're saying. I'm not, I mean, I'm not, well,
they might. I mean, you know, if you've got
a cell phone, they might be listening now. They probably wouldn't take
time or be worried about it, but they probably have the capability
If they wanted to listen to what we're saying here this morning,
I'm sure they've got the capability to do it. But does that concern us? It
shouldn't. That's what he says here. Be
not thou afraid when one is made rich. When men become powerful,
when the glory of his house is increased, when men get in places
of power, how does that affect us? What has it got to do with
us? For when he dieth, he shall carry
nothing away. His glory shall not descend after
him. Think of all the nations that
have risen up. You remember when old Pharaoh,
he was pretty powerful at one time. Egypt was the most powerful
nation on earth. Now they're just a pipsqueak.
I mean, you look at Europe and you think of all those different
European countries that at one time they were to Italy. I mean,
Christopher Columbus, You know, I mean Spain, Spain was a big
deal. And they came over here. I mean, I think I've got my history
right that Christopher Columbus was from Italy, but he went to
the Queen of Spain and she's the one who gave him the money
basically and wherewithal that he could come and come across
the ocean. But where's Spain? I mean, when you think of the
great nations of the earth, I mean, here's Spain that sent out explorers
to find the new world. But what is Spain now? The United States is a great,
powerful nation, are we not? A man's a fool that thinks if
the Lord purposes to have this world continue on as it has for
the next thousand years. Do you think the United States
will be what it is now? You know, the likelihood is no
if you look at the history of the world. Because God raises
up men and he puts them down. Why? Because of the nature that
he created men with. For when he dieth, he shall carry
nothing away. His glory shall not descend after
him. Now that's interesting that he
uses that word there, shall not descend. Now I think what it
primarily means is that his glory shall not descend to his offspring. Now, that's generally true. You
know, even though there are families that do pass on their wealth
from generation to generation, by and large, money is generally
squandered away. And you very seldom find any
long-term wealth. There's a few cases of it, but
in general, it's not true. You know, that just goes away.
I mean, you know, you could write a book on, I could write a book
on people I've known that had just been handed, you know, the
world on a silver platter, and in just a few years, it was all
gone. I think that's probably primarily
what is meant here, but it says, his glory shall not descend after
him. But I think also it has to do
with the fact that man is going into the grave, and that glory
is not going into the grave with him. You can't carry it with you.
I mean, you can have them, after you're dead, you can leave behind
money and say, I want you to put me a big old monument up
out here. They might not even do that. Do you understand that? I mean, you know, your family,
they might say, well, they don't need to spend the money on that. Or it's like the fellow I heard,
this guy, he wanted to be buried with all of his gold rings and
stuff on his head. So they put them on him and then
later on they opened the coffin up and the rings was gone. This was like years later they
dug him up, but there was an old check in there. for ever
what the grains was worth. So somebody had that and really
stole them, didn't he? I mean, they gave him a check
for what the things was worth. He could have cashed it any time
he got ready. His glory shall not descend,
though while he lived he blessed his soul. And men will praise
thee when thou doest well to thyself. He shall go to the generation
of his fathers, they shall never see light. They pat one another
on the back. He did good. He lived a good
life. While he lived, he blessed his
soul. And men will praise him. See, the praise of men is an
empty thing, is it not? he shall go to the generation
of his fathers, they shall never see light. Man that is in honor
and understandeth not is like the beasts that perish. There's that understanding in
it. I mean, a man without understanding is no different than a hog. That's basically what it says.
I mean, in the same fashion which a hog dies, so does the man that
is without understanding. Oh, that the Lord might give
us understanding of His truth, that we might know that there
is indeed an appointed death for each man, and there is an
appointed judgment. Now don't ask me to tell you
how all of that occurs. I don't know how a man can be
as a beast that perishes, but yet the scripture says that they
shall be reanimated to stand before God in judgment. So because
that bone's in the ground doesn't mean that it won't one day be
raised to stand up before God just like that valley of dry
bones in Ezekiel's vision was caused to come together. Now
who could explain such a thing as that? I can't. But I know
this, that hell and destruction awaits those who are outside
of Jesus Christ. Now, that's a dark saying. May
the Lord give us understanding that we may apply our hearts
unto wisdom. May He give us grace that we
might seek after Him. Because He said, those that seek
Him shall find Him. Those that knock, to them it
shall be opened. And if a man asks of his father
bread, will he give him a stone? The Lord is kind. to all who
call upon His name. He's full of mercy to all who
seek Him. Oh, that we might have understanding
to do so. May we know for a surety that
our hope is built on Him who said, God has power to redeem
me from the grave and He shall receive me. or that we might
be there, that we might have understanding. May the Lord help
us.