Psalm 39. We had looked through verse 6
last week. I begin reading there in verse
7. It says, And now, Lord, what
wait I for? My hope is in Thee. Deliver me
from all my transgressions. Make me not the reproach of the
foolish. I was dumb, I opened not my mouth,
because thou didst it. Remove thy stroke away from me.
I am consumed by the blow of thy hand. When thou with rebukest
thus correct man for iniquity, thou makest his beauty to consume
away like a moth. Surely every man is vanity, say
thou. Hear my prayer, O Lord, and give
ear unto my cry. Hold not thy peace at my tears,
for I am a stranger with thee, and a sojourner, as all my fathers
were. O spare me that I may recover
strength before I go hence, and be no more." Now, as we ended last week speaking
about the folly of the things that the Lord is pleased to bless
us with in this earth, the folly of our consideration of them
as being long-term, or that being things that we need to make our
lives to revolve around. You know, only as the Lord teaches
a man what He is by nature, And the fact that all that he has
comes to him by the mercy of God and the grace of God, can
he have a proper view of the things that he might possess
in this world? And, you know, we read there,
and we talk some about this, as he said, Lord, make me to
know mine end and the measure of my days, what it is that I
may know how frail I am. Now what a blessing it is for
a man to be shown how weak he is. Now, you know, we hear a
lot of talk about men telling us, you know, we need to be strong
and we need to have faith and we need to do all these things
for God and we need to, you know, get busy and get out there and
do it. I mean, we can do it, you know,
and all of these things. And so there is a place for encouraging
God's people, and we do read, Paul said in the book of Philippians,
he says, I can do all things through Christ that strengtheneth
me. But a lot of times what is left out of that, what the emphasis
is placed on the I, and the de-emphasis is not put on Christ, it's put
on what I can do. I can do all things through Christ.
You hear this a lot. You know a lot of these athletes
and what not, they quote that scripture and they talk about
how they made a touchdown because of that and all that kind of
stuff. And different people are at different places in their
understanding and development in the things of God. But Paul
said, I can do all things through Christ. His emphasis was on Christ,
not on I, what I can do. He wasn't concerned about what
he could do. He was concerned with men knowing that it was
Christ and Christ alone that empowers the people of God to
do whatever it is they do. So, you know, if we do this or
we do that, the only one that deserves any praise in the midst
of all of that is Him. Man, we always know that. May
we never lose sight of that. And may we spend more time in
praise to Him than we do in praise to one another. And we are thankful
and we do hope to encourage one another in the journey because
the Lord sent us to do that. But that is not the main thing
He sent us to do. The Father seeketh such as worship
Him in spirit and truth. And we ought to worship Him.
And I will sing of my Redeemer. Surely every man walketh in a
vain show. I mean, that's what we are. We're
just in a display. And if you were to add up everything
we did in our lifetime, It would just be vanity. I mean, what
did it amount to? I mean, think of the greatest
man that ever lived, George Washington, would be in the minds of some
as they think of this country, you know, and the founding. I
mean, he's always been presented. Of course, now they're trying
to make him out to be a villain, you know. was just a man of his time. But anyway, think of Thomas Jefferson
and all these great men that have gone on in time past, and
they were great men. They did great things. God blessed
us through them. I mean, as a nation, He blessed
us through them and the wisdom they had and all of these things.
But in the bigger picture of things, what does all that amount
to? I mean, you know, we talk about America's the greatest
nation on earth and all of that. Okay, I wouldn't dispute that
we're probably militarily and all of that the greatest nation
on earth and in many other ways. But what does that mean? I mean,
can a man hang his hat on that and say, well, man, we've made
it now, we've got it? No, that doesn't amount to anything.
It's vanity. before Almighty God, every man
at his best state. It's not talking about the worst
state. I imagine George Washington had
some bad days, but you know, it's not talking about his bad
days was vanity. It's talking about his every
day was vanity. Every day of our life is really
empty in that sense. Now, some people say, oh, well,
man, that's... That's discouraging. That makes
people feel down and all of that stuff. No, dear Brandon, we've
got to have a right understanding of what we are before we can
ever have a right understanding of our place before Almighty
God. I mean, all that we have and
do and are, Solomon summed it up. He looked around. He was
the wisest man on earth at the time, at least. And he looked
around him. And he looked at all the things
that he had. He was a fabulously wealthy guy. I mean, he would
make these guys that are billionaires today, he'd make them look sick
with the wealth that he possessed. And he looked at all of it and
what did he say? He said, it's vanity. It's empty. There's nothing here. It's not
worth anything. Surely every man walketh in a
vain show. He heapeth up riches, and knoweth
not who shall gather them. Does that make any difference?
What you have when you die is going to pass to the hands of
somebody else, and it may or may not be who you want it to
go to. You don't have any control over
it. And now, Lord, what wait I for? I mean, the riches of
the world can't do it. Nothing, fame, fortune, none
of the things that men could possibly gain in this world. So what am I waiting for? Lord,
I mean, none of this stuff is of any value. What wait I for? What do you say? My hope is in
Thee. The same thing that Paul said,
God forbid that I should glory save in the cross of Jesus Christ,
by whom the world is crucified unto me and I unto the world.
I mean, that is the place God has called us. Our hope is in
Him. Deliver me from all my transgressions. Make me not the reproach of the
foolish. Now, you know, it's one thing to recognize your
sin when you have committed it on the back side of it. And David,
his prayer is that the Lord would deliver him from his transgressions.
Not from having committed his transgressions, but deliver me
from them. That is, don't let me fall into them. Because he
knew what it was to fall into them, did he not? I mean, the
51st Psalm, one of the most blessed Psalms in the Scriptures, came
forth as a result of what he understood about his transgression.
And so having knowledge of the fact that he was a sinner, he
says, Lord, deliver me from my transgressions. Don't let me
fall into them. I mean, wasn't that part of the
prayer of the Lord Jesus, His prayer that He gave to His disciples?
Lead us not into temptation. Now, a lot of people get kind
of worried if you start talking too much about that, but He said,
He said, Lord, lead me not into temptation. Now, how does a man
fall into sin? Now, he falls into sin by his
own nature, does he not? But is not the steps of a man
ordered by the Lord? Well, keep this in mind, man
is never off the hook for his sin. He can't blame anybody for
his sin because had he not, was he not a sinner, he would never
sin. So he is a sinner. But dear brethren,
the Lord has ordained the faults of His people as much as He has
their triumphs. Now, they are ordained for different
reasons, but they are ordained nonetheless by the Lord for the
purpose of bringing them to the place where they needed to be,
for the benefit of His people. Does the Scripture not say that
we know that all things work together for good to them that
love God, according to His purpose? Is there anything in your life
that has ever occurred, be it what you might call good or what
you might call bad, that the Lord has not brought to pass
to bring you to the place where He wanted you to be? I mean,
could David ever have penned the 51st Psalm had he not walked
in that way? Now does that make what he did
okay? Of course not. Well, as the Scripture says,
it's sin. Dear brethren, we serve a God
who is a true God. He is in charge of all things
and no man can blame Him or point an accusing finger at Him for
their own wickedness. Your wickedness is your wickedness.
It's not mine. Mine is mine. Yours is yours. And that's the way that it is.
But our hope is in Him, and we pray, Lord, deliver us from all
my transgressions. Why would I pray that? Because
I know I'm prone to it. See, I'm headed that way. I don't
have to say, Lord, keep me on the path here, because I'm going
the right way, but I might fall. Is that what we pray? I'm mostly doing right, but I
just want you to every now and then give me a little tune-up
Going the wrong way, no. We know for a fact that we're
looking on either side looking for a cut off. When we're going
down the way, aren't we looking over here and looking over there
and seeing in a way that we can maybe just fudge a little or
go over here or whatever. I mean, that's the way we are.
And he knows that. He says, deliver me from all
my transgressions. Make me not the reproach of the
foolish. Now, as we have spoken about
the Psalms, and I believe this is true, they are indeed the
prayers of Christ. And Christ as a man understood
and was acquainted with the transgressions of men, even though he had no
sin of his own personal sin. He was not inclined to sin. But
yet He bore our sin just as if He was a sinner. He knows the heartache of sin. Not just as the Redeemer, but
as a man who has sin put upon Him. He felt the agony of your
sin, the trouble of your sin, the heartache of your sin, He
knows the overwhelming nature of it. Deliver me from all my
transgressions because He has taken our transgressions upon
Himself. Now, he did not need to pray,
Lord, keep me from being a sinner because he was not a sinner. He could not be a sinner because
he was pure. But he could indeed ask the Lord
in our behalf. deliver me from my transgressions. Isn't that a blessed thought
to consider that the Lord Jesus Christ has prayed for you to
be delivered from your transgressions more so than you ever have? Have
you ever thought about that? I mean, anything that you've
ever desired that was beneficial and useful to you as a child
of God walking in this world, and you've hungered and thirsted
after it, the Lord Jesus Christ has already done that for you
in a far greater and more effective way than you have as a man. Deliver me from all my transgressions.
Make me not the reproach of the foolish. But he did become the
reproach of the foolish, did he not? But not for his own foolishness. I was dumb, I opened not my mouth. He was led as a sheep to her
shears. He was dumb, the Scripture says,
and he opened not his mouth. Not directly a quote from who
he is. He says, I opened not his mouth.
Now listen to what he says. He said, because thou didst it. Now when we complain, what do
we usually complain about? We are complaining because the
Lord brought this on us or brought that on us. But he said, I didn't
complain. I was dumb. I didn't say anything. Because thou didst it. See, that's
the reason that we should never complain. It's because it is
in the hand of the Lord. I mean, when some heartache or
trial comes upon you and just drives you to the ground, why
should you complain? Because the Lord did. See, He's
our trust. I mean, that's the evidence of
the fact that a man trusts the Lord when he can praise Him and
thank Him in the midst of his trouble. Everybody can praise
God when everything's going great. I mean, you win the lottery,
man. There'll be people that never mention the Lord. They'll
be saying, Praise the Lord! But what about when you're stripped
of all the riches that you have and you're penniless? Can you
say the same thing then? The Lord did it. And that's why
the people of God should never complain. That should not be
in our vocabulary. Remove thy stroke away from me.
I am consumed by the blow of thy hand. And did not the Lord
Jesus Christ pray, Father, remove this cut from me? Now, was he praying to be delivered
from that which he purposed and came to do in the Father's will?
Was he saying, Father, overturn Your will? No. He was feeling
the pain of it. Is it not within a man to desire
to escape from pressure? I mean, do you like being in
a situation where you are being crushed? No. I mean, that's just not the way
it is. I mean, he as a man knew these
things. He felt these things. And he
said, remove God from me. He said, this is greater than
I can bear. And the Scripture indicates that
in his weakness the angels came and ministered to him in the
midst of that, as the winepress of God pressed upon him and crushed
him. and squeezed, as it were, the
very life out of him. You see, he had the life squeezed
from him long before he ever breathed out his last breath.
And he said, it is finished, because the weight of the sin
of his people was upon him. I am consumed by the blow of
thy hand. And any man who has ever been
brought to a place of conviction of sin can identify with that
because the Lord will lay His people low. Now all people don't
have the same experience. The Lord doesn't work in the
heart and life of every person in the same way. But He always
brings a man to the end of himself and causes him to look to Him.
You know, it's not about kind of like, well, I'm just going
to get this as kind of a... I'm going to ask the Lord to
help me just to help me along the way. See, this will be good
for my business and it will be good for my life if I can get
involved in church and I can, you know, become religious. I
mean, get me a little aspect of that in. You know, everybody
needs a little bit of that. No, you see, the people of God,
They have to have that which God has because they are consumed
by the blow of His hand. They don't have any options in
this matter. It's not like they can go here
or they can go there. They've got to go to the Lord.
When thou with rebukes dost correct a man for iniquity, thou makest
his beauty to consume away like a moth. Surely every man is vanity. Now why is that? Remember when
Daniel fell before the Lord, and he said, I saw him as an
ancient of days, and he says, all of my comeliness, all of
my beauty was turned in me to corruption. He was consumed away. He was laid out before the Lord.
He said, Lord, what about Job? He said, I heard about you. He says, you know, my mom and
daddy, they taught me of you. And I learned about you all through
my life. I heard about you by the hearing
of the ear, but he said, now my eyes see of thee. And I repent
in dust and ashes. John brought before the Lord
in his vision, and he fell on his face, he said, as a dead
man. I mean, he just fell out. I always get a kick out of these
guys run around slaying people, you know. And they make a big
theatric show of them and they always fall backwards and stagger
around and all that stuff. And look, I don't have an answer
for all that. I don't know. I mean, the Lord
may use some of that. I don't know this, but I know
one thing. In the Scriptures, whenever the
Lord brings a man to the end of himself, he doesn't fall backwards. He falls on his face. The only
people who ever fell backwards at the sound of the Lord's voice
was those thieves in the garden, our thieves in the garden, when
those men in the garden came to take Him. And they said, we're
looking for Jesus of Nazareth. And He said, I am. Now the Scriptures, the King
James Version puts He in there in italics. It says, I am He. But what He actually said was
the same thing He said to Moses. He says, I am. And you know what
happened? They were slain in the Spirit.
I mean, they were slain by the Spirit, and what did they do?
The Scripture says they all fell backwards. They could not stand
before His presence. But you see, when God humbles
His people, He brings them down upon their face. When thou with rebukes dost correct
a man for iniquity, because you see, when a man is corrected
for iniquity, it's because he's brought face to face with the
living God. See, David said, Lord, my sin against Thee and
Thee only have I sinned. See, a lot of people know they've
sinned. I mean, every drunkard that ever sobered up you know,
realized that he had beat his wife or whatever. Every one of
them, the next morning they are sorry for what they did. Oh,
it was terrible. I have done the wrong thing.
But you see, the problem, the thing is, they don't recognize
what their sin is. When a man recognizes that his
sin is before God, See, David says, Lord, I have sinned against
Thee and against Thee only. See, that's the only thing that
matters. That's what a man is brought
to the place to understand, that he may have done a lot of terrible
things in his life for which he should be sorry and for which
he should try to make amends, no doubt about. But the problem
that man has is not all those things he's done to other people,
it's the things that he has done before Almighty God. The Lord
Jesus, no man has ever been more humble for sin, though not his
own, than that Christ bore in our behalf. Because He was brought
face to face with the Judge of all the earth for our sin. Thou makest His beauty to consume
away like a moth. That's what Daniel said, was
it? All my beauty turned into corruption. It just flittered
away, went away. I didn't have it anymore. Isn't
it amazing how the Lord can humble a man just like that? Think of
Nebuchadnezzar. One day old Nebuchadnezzar, he's
flying high. I mean, he's making decrees in
the kingdom and he's doing this and lifting this one up and putting
that one down. And the next day, what's he doing? He's out in
the field eating grass like an ox. But oh, the mercy of God! Because
when the Lord brings to pass what we are talking about here,
see, this is what the Lord does when He is bringing a man to
Himself. See, now, there is coming a day when the Lord is going
to cause all men to fall into the dust before Him. And they
are indeed, their beauty will consume away as a moth. I mean, it will be gone. They
will be done for. But the people of God, of course,
those who are in Christ, will be lifted up. Every man is vanity. And as Nebuchadnezzar was brought
to eat grass, I mean, I don't know if the Lord was teaching
him the whole time with every mouthful of grass that he ate.
I don't know. When the dew came on him, I don't
know if each time you know those things, he woke up and there
he was and the Lord was just teaching him a thing, or if just
in a moment of time, the Lord brought these things to his awareness.
I think probably the latter is truth. You see, he had to go
through a lot of stuff. The Lord brought him to the place
where He wanted him to be, but he said, When my understanding
returned unto me. He says, And I declare that the
Most High ruleth in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants
of the earth, and there is none that can stay his hand, or say
unto him, What doest thou? Now this was words coming out
of the mouth of the most powerful man on earth. The Lord made his
beauty to consume away like a moth, did he not? I mean, he didn't
have any left. There was nothing to boast in.
Surely every man is vanity. Selah. Hear my prayer, O Lord,
and give ear unto my cry. Hold not Thy peace at my tears. Now, a man doesn't pray just
to be praying. Now, some people do. Some people
think that prayers what you do when somebody calls on you and
they say, will you pray? And you pray. And maybe you do,
I don't know. But that's not what prayer is. See, prayer is when the Spirit
of God moves a man to cry out to the Lord. That's what prayer
is. And the Lord has to work that in us. I mean, I can say,
well, I'm going to pray. Well, I might. May the Lord give
us grace to pray. We say, well, we're going to
pray for you. Well, are you? I mean, what you probably really
ought to say is, I'm going to pray for you if the Lord enables
me to do it. Because that's really the only
way you're ever going to pray for anybody is if the Lord enables
you to pray for them. Now, you might sit around and
talk about them, and you might say some things, but dear Brendan,
when the Lord enables a man to pray, that's what prayer is. And so this is the prayer of
somebody who is praying, Hear my prayer, O Lord, and give ear
unto my cry. Hold not Thy peace at my tears.
See, the effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.
Now, I've always, or not always, but I have heard that taught,
Well, brother, what you need to do is you need to get fervent. I mean, you need to have an effectual
prayer. You need to have a fervent prayer.
Well, that's well and good. How are you going to do that?
I mean, can you just one day decide, well, I'm going to pray
fervently? No, you can't do that. But I'll tell you this, when
the Lord moves upon your heart and He shows you what you are
before Him, or He puts a pressure, a trial for you to bear upon
your heart, you will then pray perfectly with passion. You will
pray in a fashion that can't be taken from you. Hear my prayer,
O Lord, and give ear unto my cry. Hold not Thy peace at my
tears. Now listen to this. Now this
is a glorious thing, and if you don't get anything else, I want
you to notice this. says, for I am a stranger from
thee. No, he didn't say that. He says,
I'm a stranger. No, he didn't say that either. He says, I am a stranger with
thee. Now that's a glorious thing.
Let that sink in for a minute. The Lord Jesus Christ walked
upon the earth And none of them pitied Him. No man cared for
Him. He was not received in any way. He was a stranger in the
earth, was He not? He was a sojourner. And so the
people of God would say, O Lord, I am a stranger with Thee, because
that's the place I want to be. See, when you go into a place,
and all of us have had this situation, and you don't know anybody, And
it's just kind of disconcerting. I mean, you know, you look around
and you're trying to find somebody that you know and there's nobody
there. And you can feel what it is to be a stranger. Ralph
Stanley sang a song about it, right? Strangers. But that's the way the people
of God are in this world as strangers. He says, Oh, spare me that I
may recover strength before I go hence. For I am a stranger with
thee, and a sojourner, as all my fathers were." And Christ,
see, this is the prayer of Christ. He says, I am a stranger. He
was with His Father, was He not? He was one with the Father. And
He was a stranger in the earth. And none of us did pity Him.
Even those whom He loved forsook Him. He said, Lord, I am a stranger
with thee. But oh, you see, He gives us
the blessing of being strangers in this world. It is a blessing
to be a stranger in this world. To have no fellowship with the
unfruitful works of darkness. To be oddballs in the world. Now, some people try to be oddballs. Some people work at being oddballs. When the Lord makes you an oddball,
you don't have to work at it. You can't help it. I mean, you'll
just be strange in the sight of people because that's just
the way the Lord made you, to be strange. And the people of
God that call upon Him and desire nothing but the righteousness
of Christ are strange people in the earth. We're strangers with Him. And
the sojourners, all my fathers, were, O spare me that I may recover
strength before I go hence and be No more. Now, the Lord has
put us in this world, and we don't really know a whole lot
about what happens when we die. Now, these people have written
whole books and all kinds of stuff, and they are experts on
what happens when you die. Well, we know some things that
Scripture says about dying, and we know some things about the
ultimate standing of the people of God in Christ, Indeed, there
is coming a day of resurrection. I mean, the Scripture plainly
teaches that, I believe, that there is coming a day when the
graves are going to give up the dead. But, you know, really to
talk a lot about those things, even the psalmist, he says, I'm
going to go from this place and I'm not going to be anymore.
That is, we're not coming back here. This is a one-time deal. We're going to die. And we're
going to go, Oh Lord, work into thy perfect work. Now I believe
that the standing of the people of God is going to be far more
glorious and pleasant than it is in the present time, but at
the present time, this is all we've got, isn't it? I mean,
it's all we have. I mean, we can't praise... You can talk about, well, I'm
going to praise God then. Well, I guarantee you one thing,
if a man's not praising God now, he's not going to praise God
then. But praising God is a blessing that He has given
us now. Oh, spare me that I may recover strength. Oh, let me
stand strong before You, O Lord. Let me walk in the power of Thy
might. O Lord, keep me back from my
secret sin. Keep me back from my transgression.
Cause me to walk in the light that You have given to Your people.
before I die and I go and people forget who I even was. You see, one day you're not going
to be anymore. I mean, how many times have you
thought about all those folks over there in the graveyard?
I bet you not a one of you in here got up this morning and
thought about somebody that was in the graveyard. I might be
wrong, but I bet you didn't. I mean, there are no more, are
there? Now we know that if they belong to the Lord, The Scripture
of Paul said to be absent from the bodies, to be present with
the Lord. And how all that is, I don't know. You know, how all
that comes to pass or whatever. And I know there's coming a day
when all those graves are going to open up out there. And I hope I'm not here to see
it. Because if you are, you might
get that in a minute. But when the Lord comes back,
He's going to open the graves. The dead in Christ shall rise
first. Brethren, that's the hope of
the children of God, is it not? But in this world, and this is
what David is speaking about, is, Lord, let me walk before
You now. Let me recover strength now before
I go to my long home. Now is accepted day. Now is the day of salvation.
This is the time. wherein God has given us to work
in us both to will and to do of His good pleasure. What a
glorious place to be! I wouldn't want to be anywhere
else right now, would you? People talk about, well, I can't
wait to get to heaven. Well, you will. So, I mean, you know, we're where
we are. And I'm thankful that the Lord's
put me here right now. I'm thankful that He's given
us the privilege to be made mindful that Christ is our Redeemer. Is there a more glorious thought? I mean, when God floods your
soul with that understanding and knowledge, is there a more
sweet place in all the earth than that? To be reminded, if
it's just for a glimpse, just for a moment, just to get a glimpse
of the glory of God revealed in Jesus Christ. What a wonderful
thing, what a privilege it is to be called.