Looking in Psalm 37, last week
we finished up there going through verse 20. It says, But the wicked shall perish,
and the enemies of the Lord shall be as the fat of lambs, they
shall consume into smoke, shall they consume away, and they shall
not be found again. The wicked borroweth and payeth
not again, but the righteous showeth mercy and giveth. For
such as be blessed of him shall inherit the earth, and they that
be cursed of him shall be cut off or destroyed. The steps of
a good man are ordered by the Lord, and he delighteth in his
way. Though he fall, he shall not
be utterly cast down, for the Lord upholdeth him with his hand.
I have been young, and now am old. Yet have I not seen the
righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging bread. He is ever merciful,
and lendeth, and his seed is blessed. Depart from evil, and
do good, and dwell forevermore, for the Lord loveth judgment,
and forsaketh not his saints. They are preserved forever, but
the seed of the wicked shall be cut off. The righteous shall
inherit the land, and dwell therein forever. The mouth of the righteous
speaketh wisdom, and his tongue talketh of judgment. The law
of his God is in his heart. None of his steps shall slide.
The wicked watcheth the righteous and seeketh to slay him. The
Lord will not leave him in his hand, nor condemn him when he
is judged. Wait on the Lord and keep his
way, and he shall exalt thee to inherit the land. When the
wicked are cut off, thou shalt see it. I have seen the wicked
in great power, and spreading himself like a green bay tree.
Yet he passed away, and lo, he was not. Yea, I sought him, but
he could not be found. Mark the perfect man, and behold
the upright, for the end of that man is peace. But the transgressors
shall be destroyed together, the end of the wicked shall be
cut off. But the salvation of the righteous
is of the Lord. He is their strength in the time
of trouble. And the Lord shall help them
and deliver them. He shall deliver them from the
wicked and save them because they trust in Him. Now, this psalm, as we mentioned
a week ago or a couple of weeks
ago, really puts a great contrast between the righteous and the
wicked, between those who are in Christ and those who are not,
because that is the difference between the righteous and the
wicked. Now, men like to think that when they read about the
wicked, they think, well, that's all those people over there,
you know, that's those people that's doing the bad stuff. That's
the wicked. I mean, that's how people consider
that. But the fact of the matter is
that all men are alike in what they're made of and how we are
by nature. And so when we read in the Scripture
a contrast between the wicked and the righteous, it is put
there in order that we might magnify the grace of God, not
so that we might stand in judgment of others and look at them as
being on a lower plane than we are. Because remember the prayer
of the Pharisee who prayed thus with himself, he thanked God
for what? That he wasn't like all those
other people. I mean, he gave thanks that in
all the Scriptures he prayed thus with himself, and when we
sit in judgment of other people considering their wickedness
to be worse than ours, then we've basically entered into the same
place that the Pharisee did. And that's really of no value. When we look at the wicked and
what it ought to do, when we look at those who are going contrary
to the way of God, It should remind us that we would be in
the same place were it not for the grace of God. Because there
is nothing really that makes us any different except the grace
of God. And so we see this contrast here. He talks about that the wicked
shall perish, they shall consume away. Then he says, the wicked
borroweth and payeth not again, but the righteous show of mercy
and giveth. Now, I believe here is a contrast
between the perfections of Christ and the men of the world, because
he says here, see, this is the way the wicked are, the wicked
borroweth and payeth not again. Have you ever? Probably have.
And has anybody ever done this to you? You are more mindful
of those that have done this to you than you are of those
who did it to you. You know, when somebody borrows
something from you and they don't bring it back, or they pay it,
you know, you loan them money and they say, well, I'll pay
you back, but somehow or other they forget about that. Well,
the reality is that's in the heart of man. That's the way
man is. And the Lord would show that
that is the way of the wicked. It's not them over there, it's
us. That's the way we are. But you
see, what does He say here about the righteous? Showeth mercy
and giveth. Now who is the righteous? It
has to be Jesus Christ. He is the righteous because He
came and He didn't borrow and pay not again, but He gave out
of everything that He had. And He demanded nothing in return,
but He gave. He showed mercy and He giveth. For such as be blessed of Him,
who? The righteous man. Now who are
the ones who are blessed by the righteous man? It's those who
are made righteous by Christ. For such as be blessed of him
shall inherit the earth. Those who are blessed of who?
The righteous man. So who could it be but Christ?
It has to be Christ. And they that be cursed of him
shall be cut off. Now why are they cursed? They
are cursed because it pleased Him to do so. Now, are they wicked? Sure they are wicked. But remember
when he said, and Franco and I were talking about this last
night, when the Lord said, Jacob have I loved and Esau have I
hated, He said that He did that before they had done any good
or evil, did He not? And so it's a true thing. We
can say that the Lord did indeed curse Jacob or curse Esau in
his wickedness because Esau was a wicked man. But guess what? So was Jacob. He was a wicked
man. But you see, God in mercy showed
mercy to Jacob. Why should he? Now, men get all
up in arms when you talk about Jacob having loved and Esau having
hated, and what they get up in arms about is that God hated
Esau. What should cause us the greatest
amazement is that He loved Jacob. Why should He have loved Jacob?
Jacob was not any different than Esau. I mean, Jacob, he went
about to rob Esau, did he not? But yet God showed mercy to him.
And so there is the contrast. Such as be blessed of him that
shall inherit the earth. Now you see, what made Abraham
different from all those other people there in Ur of the Chaldeans?
I mean, they were all going along together. If you had been there
and you had seen Abraham, he was right along there with them. What made him different? The
grace of God. The Lord called. Abraham out
of Ur of the Chaldees, such as be blessed of him shall inherit
the earth, and they that be cursed of him shall be cut off." And
then it says, "...the steps of a good man are ordered by the
Lord, and he delighteth in his way." Who is a good man? There is none good, no, not one.
There has only ever been one good man that walked on the earth.
the Lord Jesus Christ. His stamps are ordered by the
Lord. The purpose of God, like we spoke
there a moment ago about, you know, it's impossible that you
could come to the Scriptures and ever have a working understanding
of what the Bible is about from beginning to end. if you don't
understand that it has been the purpose of God to redeem His
people from the beginning. He created the world for that
purpose, that He might magnify the glory of His grace in the
redemption of His people. And if you can see that, then
when you begin to read over the book of Genesis, in the beginning
God created the heavens and the earth, you see the wonder and
the glory that surrounded that creation. I mean, God was under
no obligation to create anything. You hear all these stories and
people have this, well, God was lonely and so He decided to create
man. Or He needed somebody to worship
Him. Those creatures that Isaiah saw
flying around the throne, it ceased not day and night to cry,
Holy, Holy, Holy. The Lord didn't need any men
to worship Him, did He? I mean, He can create anything
He wants to anytime He gets ready for any purpose that He desires. So why did He create the earth?
Was it a grand experiment which went awry? And He said, man,
now I've got to do something. I had all this in mind of what
I was going to do. Isn't that what we're told? God
created the world. Adam, you know, he had this perfect
thing and the Lord had all these plans for Adam and all that,
and Adam messed it all up and then God had to go to plan B.
How ridiculous! No, God purposed these things,
dear brethren. And He ordered the steps of a
good man, ordered them by the Lord, and He delighted in his
way. Though he fall down, Though he
fall, he shall not be utterly cast down, for the Lord upholdeth
him with His hand." Did He not say that His angels would be
given charge over Him, lest at any time they dashed Thy foot
against a stone? Was that not Christ? But was
He not at the same time? This is an amazing thing. You
see, you have all those prophecies that the Lord would uphold the
upright. He would uphold that one who
was His. So that no harm would come to
him, and yet, he was harmed. Was he not? He was hurt, was
he not? But he did that for our sake,
not in himself, even though he gave himself. But it was not
on account of what he was, it was on account of what he became
for us. He upholdeth them with his hand.
I've been young, and now I'm old. And that gets more true
every day. You know, there's a lot of things
that a young man can't possibly understand. He can't possibly understand.
I remember, I may have shared this story with you, but I remember
when I was growing up and we worked in tobacco and what not,
and my brother-in-law's uncle was one of the people that we
worked for, or I worked for, and his brother, John, he was
one of my best friends growing up. And so we worked for his
uncle, and we worked in tobacco. And his uncle was elderly. Actually,
he probably wasn't really all that old, but at the time it
seemed to us that he was, you know, pretty old. He was probably
in his early 60s or whatever. He might not have been that old.
I don't even really know. But anyway, when he would go
to get in his truck, like at lunchtime he'd park his truck,
And then he'd drive us out to the field in his truck and we'd
all be in the back of the truck. And he would just back up. He
wouldn't ever turn his head and look behind him. He'd go out there and he'd make
sure there was nothing behind him when he got in the truck
and he'd just back straight up. And then he'd turn and he'd go.
And we'd laugh about that because he couldn't hardly turn his neck. And so we thought that was really
funny. But now every time I go back up, Every time I get ready
to put the car in reverse, I think about Arnett, and I think about
us laughing at him. And we were like those little
old kids, you know, that laughed at Elijah, or Elisha. They said,
Go thou up thou bald head. They made fun of him. Of course,
he took care of the business right then, didn't he? But, you
know, when we're old, There are some things you can't learn until
you're old, and it's a blessing of God that He allows men to
grow old and to be able to see things that they couldn't possibly
understand when they were young. The mercy of God. A young man
can't understand the mercy of God. I mean, he can to a certain
extent. I mean, the Lord can teach you
what He wants you to know, But there's a certain measure of
seeing over time the unfolding of God's mercy and the kindness
that He shows that can only be seen as you get older. And that's
just the way that it is. Why does the Lord cause men to
get old? Well, it's all in His hand why
it is, but it's the mercy of God when the Lord shows a man
as he ages the mercy of God. Now, you know, a man that doesn't
have regard, a man can't get old and learn the mercy of God.
He's got to be shown the mercy of God, and as he gets older,
he appreciates it more. I remember Aunt Kelly McInnes
told me one time, she said, you know, son, the older people get,
the more like themselves they become. And you know, a person
that loves Christ, will love Christ more. You know, as they
get older, and a person that has no regard to the things of
God, they're just... As a kid, I used to think that
older people, you know, they got where, well, they didn't
have nothing else to do, so they just sat around thinking about
God all the time. But that's not true, because
if a man is not given grace to trust the Lord, and those things
are not precious to him, It's not going to come to him because
he gets old. He's going to be just like he
was. He's just going to be an older version of it. And if he's
cantankerous, he's going to be cantankerous when he's old. That's
just the way that it is. But he says here, I've been young
and now I'm old, and yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken,
nor his seed begging bread. He did not seem the righteous
forsaken. Christ was forsaken, was He not?
But only for a moment. He was forsaken, but He wasn't
ultimately forsaken, was He? I mean, because on the third
day He arose from the dead. He was not cast off forever because
of the infinite value of His person. And so he says here,
I've not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging for bread.
Now, if you look at that in a carnal interpretation, you could say
in the Scripture there's plenty of illustrations where that wouldn't
be true, is it not? And we used this illustration
last week concerning Lazarus, the one who was the leper and
he died and went to Abraham's bosom. You remember that story. Well, he was a beggar. I mean,
he was. In that sense, he was begging
for bread. So was blind Bartimaeus. So were
many in the Scriptures. So it's not talking about carnally
that we won't ever be hungry or we'll always be blessed. I mean, the only way you can
always be blessed is get you a TV program and get people to
send you a seed gift. And then you'll be blessed right
on. I mean, you won't ever be without because there's enough
silly people in the world that will send you money. And you'll
always have plenty of money. So if you always want to have
plenty of money, get you a TV show. claim to be a preacher
and tell people, you know, they can be blessed by giving you
money. And some people will send you some money. But the seed
of the wicked shall be cut off. The righteous will not be forsaken.
They are not begging for bread. But he is ever merciful and lendeth,
and his seed is blessed. The righteous one will bless
his people. He said he would. He said He
wouldn't leave them comfortless. So He says, Depart from evil
and do good, and dwell forevermore. For the Lord loveth judgment,
or justice, and forsaketh not His saints. They are preserved
forever. What a glorious thing. They are
preserved forever. Why? Because of that which Christ
has done for them. But the seed of the wicked shall
be cut off. Now how many times has he said
that in this psalm? How many times does he say that
very same thing? The seed of the wicked shall
be cut off. The righteous shall inherit the
land and dwell therein forever. The Lord has inherited all that
the Father had. He is the inheritor of His Father's
estate. And He is the testator of His
own will. And He has made us heirs and
joint-heirs with Him. And He will not forsake His people.
The righteous shall inherit the land and dwell therein forever. The mouth of the righteous speaketh
wisdom, and His tongue talketh of judgment. You know, that was
seen. When the Pharisees didn't perceive
Him as a threat, they marveled, didn't they? When the Lord Jesus
Christ, being the righteous, when the Lord Jesus Christ as
a young lad reasoned with the Pharisees in the temple, they
said, Man, this kid is really something. He'll grow up and
be one of us one day. Little did they know. But his
mouth, you see, he spoke the same justice and truth, they
just didn't perceive because of the mouth of the one that
spoke it, the threat that it was to their own righteousness.
But when he came on the scene and they began to really hear
what it was he was saying, they said, wait a minute, we don't
want any of this wisdom and judgment. We don't want that, because that's
going against what we think. And you know, unfortunately,
that's the way we are by nature. We get something in our mind
and we get it ingrained in our thought, And it's hard for us
to listen to the truth when it goes contrary to that which has
been ingrained in us that kind of salves us a little bit and
lifts us up. And when somebody comes along
and tells us something that gives us no place to glory, then we
don't like that a whole lot. We'd rather somebody pat us on
the back a little. We don't expect a whole lot,
but we would like to be recognized to some extent, wouldn't we?
We don't want to just have nobody that has any thought to us. The mouth of the righteous speaketh
wisdom, and his tongue talketh of judgment. The law of his God
is in his heart. None of his steps shall slide. Who can that be speaking of?
It has to be speaking of Christ. He was tempted in all points
like as we are yet without sin. None of His steps did slide,
dear brother. Now we do slide, unfortunately. I mean, Jonathan Edwards preached
a very famous sermon. It has been reprinted thousands
of times. A sinner is in the hands of an
angry God. And in that sermon he took the
text, "...their foot shall slide in due time." The steps of the righteous do
not slide. And Christ is that righteous
One whose feet shall not slide. The wicked watcheth the righteous
and seeketh to slay him. Is that not what they did to
him? He walked among them. They saw him. They said, we've
got to get rid of this guy because he's making us look bad. That
was it, was it not? I mean, they said, look, we can't
take this. I mean, he's over here undermining
our power. We're going to be pretty soon
the people not going to be paying heed to us because he's calling
us vipers. I mean, they didn't like that
at all, did they? They watched the righteous and they sought
the slain. The Lord will not leave him in his hand, nor condemn
him when he is judged. Now this is an interesting consideration
if you consider that Christ is the one who is being spoken of
here as the righteous, and I believe He is. It says, "...the Lord
will not leave him in his hand, that is, in the hand of the wicked,
to slay him, nor condemn him when he is judged." He didn't
leave him in their hands, did he? I mean, the Lord said, you
don't have any power at all against me. You see, he wasn't left in
the hands of the wicked. Now, the wicked did, by wicked
and cruel hands, crucify the Lord Jesus Christ, but they did
so in order to fulfill the very purpose of God, so He was not
left up. It was not left up to them. Now,
that is kind of the way a lot of times people think about how
the Lord does. You know, the Lord, He orders
and does some things and then He leaves the rest of it up to
man to finish up the job. Well, here, I got it started
and now you all do it. And then if you don't do it right,
well, I'll come along later and I'll fix it. That's how people
think of how the Lord works, but the Lord works all things.
He said He did all things according to the good pleasure of His will.
He accomplishes that which He sets out to do. And so the Lord
will not leave him in His hand nor condemn him when he is judged
by men. Now you see, he was condemned,
but he was condemned not by the judgment of men, but he was condemned
by the judgment of God. They didn't have anything whereof
to condemn him. Everything they said was a lie. See, Christ went to the cross,
but not because of the crimes that they accused him of, because
he wasn't guilty. But he was guilty in the sight
of God because he undertook our redemption according to the will
and purpose of Almighty God. And so he is saying here, he
will not leave the righteous in the hand of the wicked. Wait
on the Lord. Keep His way, and He shall exalt
thee to inherit the land. When the wicked are cut off,
thou shalt see it. Now indeed, these are the blessings
of the people of God. Wait on the Lord. He's the one
who has shown us that which is true and good, and we are to
wait on Him. What else would we want to do?
I mean, could we encourage one another not to wait on the Lord?
I mean, if I came to you, Brother Ed, and I said, well, Ed, you
don't need to wait on the Lord anymore. I mean, would you say,
well, good, I thought, man, that's great. Now, a lot of people are
glad to get off the hook. Well, good, I don't have to do
that anymore. But no, you see, the man who is wrought upon by
the Spirit of God, this is like good news to him. Wait on the
Lord. Wait upon Him. Now sometimes,
you know, in the flesh we grow weary of that, just like the
children of Israel did, waiting on Moses to come back down. And
they did grow weary, and sometimes we do grow weary, and sometimes
we grow faint. But the exhortation, we're encouraged. You see, the man who has not
given grace, when the mind comes, well, where's the Lord? Where's
the promise of His coming? And he says, you know, I'm tired
of waiting. And he's satisfied to not wait
anymore. But you see, the man who hungers
and thirsts after Christ, he may have the same thought. The
same thought might come into his mind. Well, you're a fool
for sitting around here waiting on this. This stuff, you know,
is not going to happen. This is just ridiculous. But
yet, he's encouraged when he hears, wait on the Lord. He doesn't
count it to be a ridiculous thing, but he's encouraged and he's
strengthened and he says, yes, that's what I want to do, is
wait on the Lord. Wait on the Lord, keep His way,
and He shall exalt thee to inherit the land. When the wicked are
cut off, you shall see it." I'm not sure exactly how that
occurs or when it occurs exactly, but there is a separation. I believe the Scripture teaches
that there is a resurrection of the good and the evil. I don't
know how that occurs. There's a reanimation in some
fashion of all men. And there is a judgment. There is a coming day when the
Lord shall separate the sheep from the goats. It's going to
be a visible thing. And He's going to say to the
goats, depart from me. And He'll say to the sheep, enter
thou into the joy of the Lord. And we shall see it. When the wicked are cut off,
I shall see it. I have seen the wicked in great
power and spreading Himself like a green bay tree. I thought about
Nebuchadnezzar when I was reading this, because
you remember Nebuchadnezzar had in his dream, he saw this great
tree. And Daniel said, you are that
tree. And the psalmist says, I've seen
the wicked. Now, again, I'll go back to what
we talked about there a minute ago. When we think about the
wicked, we think about them, don't we? All those wicked folks.
But he says, I've seen the wicked spreading himself like a green
bay tree. That's the way we are by nature.
And the only thing that makes us different is the grace of
God. You know, it's not gradations of wickedness. I mean, why does
the Lord bring men like Hitler onto the scene? Now, see, we
can sit back and we say, oh man, you know, we may be sinners,
but we're not like Hitler. I mean, we're not like Jeffrey
Dahmer. Now, why does the Lord bring
men like... are these aberrations? See, that's the way society...
if you go out here and ask people, people would say, oh, well, Hitler,
he was just kind of a special case. Jeffrey Dahmer was a special
case. See, that's not like people are. No, what the Lord does with men
like that is He shows men what they are. You see, He shows us
what we are. When a man like Hitler comes
on the scene, that's not showing us how much better we are than
him. It's showing us what we would be if the grace of God
didn't restrain us. See, it's hitting the heart of
man to be Hitler. Oh, wait, I don't believe that.
Well, then you don't understand the nature of your heart. The
heart is wicked and is desperately wicked. Who can know it? I mean,
when the Lord shows us what we are by nature, if He showed us
everything about ourselves all at one time, we'd be overwhelmed. We'd be destroyed. But in the time when it pleases
Him, He shows us. You see, Peter thought he was
a strong man, didn't he? I don't know about all these
other guys over here, but Lord, you can count on me. I'll stand. Well, the Lord showed Peter what
he was. And Peter went out and wept when
the Lord showed him what he was. Now, dear brethren, when you
see the jails full of people, Don't look over there and say,
well, I'm sorry, it doesn't count. They're getting exactly what
they deserve. Look over there and say, Lord, except for your mercy,
I'd be right there in the middle of them. Only the kindness of
the Lord's work has prevented it. And so when he says, I've
seen the wicked in great power spreading themselves like the
green bay tree, he's talking about mankind. He's not talking
about one individual. He's talking about certain ones.
Now, we can certainly see this illustrated in certain ones. I mean, Nebuchadnezzar even said,
you know, those that are put in places of power, he said,
the Lord sets over in places of government the basest of men. You wonder why the politicians
and all that is a bunch of corrupt people? Well, the Scripture tells
you why they are. Because the Lord sets over men
the basis of men. He doesn't pick out the best
ones. People criticize Trump. They say, well, look how sorry
of a fellow he is. Well, he was sorry before he
went in there. And he's sorry now. And he'll be sorry when
he gets out. And whoever else gets back in
there will be sorry. Some of them might even be sorrier.
You know? It's only the goodness of God
that makes a difference. I've seen the wicked in great
power, spreading themselves like a green bay tree. Because you
see, when a man's in power, he thinks he's something. Remember
the rich man? He said, man, look at all I've
got. I've got all this grain stored
up for many years. I've got plenty of money in the
bank. Everything's good. I'm just going to go to Hawaii
and lay out on the beach and have me a good time. You know
what could go wrong? That's the way of the wicked,
the way of us, how we think. Yet, he passed away. The wicked spread itself like
a green bay tree. And it says in Nebuchadnezzar,
when Daniel told him, he said, that tree you saw, that's you.
He said, and all these things came upon Nebuchadnezzar. And
of course we know what happened to him. He went out and ate grass
in the field like an ox. He spread himself like a green
bay tree, yet he passed away. And though he was not, he was
brought down from that place of exaltation. And by the grace
of God, I believe Nebuchadnezzar was brought to repentance. He
at least was brought to recognize who the God of heaven and earth
was, was He not? He said, The most high rule is
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? There's not a lot of people that ever come to that
conclusion. But Nebuchadnezzar, by the grace
of God, was brought there, marked the perfect man. Now mark the
perfect man. Who is the perfect man? Have you been looking around
trying to find Him? If you won't find Him here, I'll
guarantee you that. But the perfect man is Jesus
Christ. Mark the perfect man. Look at Him. See who He is. Behold the upright, for the end
of that man is peace. The purpose for which He came
was to bring peace. Now He said He didn't come to
bring peace, and that was true. He didn't come to bring peace
in this world. as men count peace, but He came
to bring a sword to destroy that. But He did come to bring peace,
did He not? Because He said, My peace leave
I with you. Not as the wall giveth peace,
but He gave peace to His people. Mark Him. Look at Him. But the
transgressors shall be destroyed together. The end of the wicked
shall be cut off. The salvation of the righteous
is of the Lord. He is their strength in the time
of trouble. Salvation of the righteous. I
thought the Lord saved sinners. Well, He does. You know, the
Lord saves sinners, but He also saves the righteous. Why? Because
they are made righteous in Christ. See, we were made righteous in
Christ before we ever became sinners. Now that blows minds
of some people, but dear brother, you were made righteous in Christ
before you ever committed any sin at all. Now you were made righteous by
the righteousness of Christ because the Lord put you in Christ if
you belonged to Him. And so it is true, the salvation
of the righteous is of the Lord. He is their strength in the time
of trouble. And the Lord shall help them
and deliver them. He shall deliver them from the
wicked and save them because they trust in Him." They do trust
in Him. The people of God are brought
to trust in Him. I mean, we were talking about
that yesterday afternoon, you know, about how Some people,
when they think about the elect of God, they think about them
in some kind of an abstract way. Well, here's the elect and here's
the non-elect and, you know, one day the elect are going to
wake up in heaven and one day the non-elect are going to wake
up in hell. No, dear brother. It's like I
believe as old Ralph Martin said, there's a lot of heaven on the
road to heaven and there's a lot of hell on the road to hell.
Because you see, the Lord is going to bring His people to
believe. He's going to cause them to believe.
He's going to cause them to see Christ as the Savior. Now, He
might not do that in their infancy. He might not do it in their middle
age. He might not do it until they are as the thief on the
cross. I don't know the timetable of
the Lord, but I know this, that the people of God will trust
Him. And that's the only fashion, that's the only way
in which we can see in the Scripture that is the differentiation. Now, it's not those that say
they are the children of God. It's not those that call upon
the name of the Lord. I mean, the Lord said, many shall
call upon Me. He said, many shall say unto
me, have we not done many wonderful works in thy name? And he'll
tell them, depart from me. Now how do we... I mean, they
said, Lord, we're trusting you. But they weren't trusting Him.
How do we know? Because they said, Lord, look
what we did. See, the man who's called to
trust in Christ, when the Lord asks him, what have you done
for me? He's not going to say, well, Lord, here it is. I've
got a list for you. He's going to say, Lord, I didn't do anything. I was unthankful. When you called,
I did not listen. When your mercy was shed round
about me, I despised it. Lord, save me or I'll perish. See, that's the place that God
brings His people to. They will trust Him. They've
got no other choice. A religious man's got a lot of
different avenues he can go down. You know, he can do a lot of
different things. He can remember back when he
first got saved. I mean, back when he was eight
years old or whatever. And he can say, well, I don't
know, but I know back there I was saved. If you trust in anything like
that, you trust in the wrong thing. The only thing there is
to trust is Christ. He is the Savior of sinners.
He saves such as call upon His name. He is full of mercy to
all who trust Him. Oh, that He might give us grace,
dear brethren, to be those that are found trusting Christ and
Christ alone, casting off all hope in anything else, as we
sang that song a moment ago. One of the greatest hymns that
has ever been written. Nothing in my hand I bring. Simply
to thy cross I cling. Naked come to thee for dress.
Helpless look to thee for grace. Thou art to the fountain fly.
Wash me, Savior, or I die. Oh, He is the Savior of sinners.
May He visit us today and help us.