We are looking in Psalm 35. We read there, "...plead my cause,
O Lord, with them that strive with me. Fight against them that
fight against me. Take hold of Shield and Buckler
and stand up for mine help. Draw out also the spear and stop
the way against them that persecute me. Say unto my soul, I am thy
salvation. Let them be confounded and put
to shame that seek after my soul. Let them be turned back and brought
to confusion that devise my hurt. Let them be as chaff before the
wind, and let the angel of the Lord chase them. Let their way
be dark and slippery, and let the angel of the Lord persecute
them. For without cause have they hid
for me their net in a pit, which without cause they have digged
for my soul. Let destruction come upon him
at unawares, and let his net that he hath hid catch himself.
Into that very destruction let him fall. And my soul shall be
joyful in the Lord, it shall rejoice in his salvation. All
my bones shall say, Lord, who is like unto thee? Which delivers
the poor from him that is too strong for him, yea, the poor
and the needy from him that spoileth him. False witnesses did rise
up. They laid to my charge things
that I knew not. They rewarded me evil for good
to the spoiling of my soul. But as for me, when they were
sick, my clothing was sackcloth. I humbled my soul with fasting,
and my prayer returned unto my own bosom. I behaved myself as
though he had been my friend or brother. I bowed down heavily
as one that mourneth for his mother. But in mine adversity
they rejoiced, and gathered themselves together. Yea, the abjects gathered
themselves together against me, and I knew it not. They did tear
me, and cease not. With hypocritical mockers in
feasts they gnashed upon me with their teeth. Lord, how long wilt
thou look on? Rescue my soul from their destructions,
my darling, from the lions. I will give thee thanks in the
great congregation. I will praise thee among much
people. Let not them that are mine enemies
wrongfully rejoice over me, neither let them wink with the eye that
hate me without a cause. For they speak not peace, but
they devise deceitful matters against them that are quiet in
the land. Yea, they opened their mouth
wide against me and said, Aha, aha, our eye has seen it. This hast thou seen, O Lord,
keep not silence, O Lord, be not far from me. Stir up thyself
and awake to my judgment, even unto my cause, my God and my
Lord. Judge me, O Lord, my God, according
to thy righteousness, and let them not rejoice over me. Let
them not say in their hearts, Oh, so would we have it. Let them not say we have swallowed
him up. Let them be ashamed and brought
to confusion together that rejoice at my hurt. Let them be clothed
with shame and dishonor that magnify themselves against me. Let them shout for joy and be
glad that favor my righteous cause. Yea, let them say continually,
Let the Lord be magnified, which hath pleasure in the prosperity
of His servant. And my tongue shall speak of
thy righteousness and of thy praise all the day long." Now,
this is one of what some great scholars and what not would call
a pejorative psalm. That is, it is a psalm wherein
the Lord or of course David in this manner. And of course some
scholars puzzle over what is actually going on. They try to
justify David's mind in this as a man, in desiring that the
Lord bring down wrath upon his enemies. And yet, it seems to
me quite clear that this psalm is clearly the words of the Lord
Jesus Christ, because He is the only One who has walked among
the sons of men that can rightfully come before the Lord and ask
the Lord to destroy His enemies. Because when He walked among
us, did He not say, Pray for them that despitefully use you?
I mean, He taught us to do good to our enemies. He didn't call
down the wrath of God. Now, human nature, in our natural
man, we would say, boy, we want them to be destroyed, would we
not? But the Lord Jesus Christ, as He walked among men as a perfect
man, not only as man, but as God Himself, it would be right
and it would be proper that He should called the judgment of
God upon those to whom he has appointed unto that judgment. And he demonstrated that in some
of the very first words that he said as he spoke on what we
call the Beatitudes. He said, I thank thee, O Father,
that thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent and
revealed them unto babes. Because He would do the will
of His Father. He came into the world to perform the purpose
for which He came into the world. And the purpose for which He
came into the world was to magnify the glory of His grace that He
might redeem that people which He loved from the very beginning. Now that message alone will never
sit well with the natural man and with the religious men of
the world. They hate such a doctrine as that. They just cannot abide
that God would be God. They want Him to be what they
want Him to be. And they would accuse Him of
much injustice. Just like the politicians and
as Brother Al ably pointed out there, the tax as the Lord set
it forth was for all men. Whether you're rich or whether
you're poor, that's it. Now, of course, the thing that
he's teaching is that all men are the same before Almighty
God. And the things that you possess
or the things that you know or the things that you claim to
do that are good, they count for nothing at all. But it is His righteous judgment
that is that which separates. Now, those that are in rebellion
against Him, they don't like the fact that God is the One
that does the choosing. Now, I heard a fellow say one
time that all men believe in election. It is just that all
men do not believe that the same one does the elected. You see, the religious man, the
man that loves his own way and exalts men above God, would say
that it is only right and fair and good that men do the choosing.
But you see, the Lord said that He would do the choosing. He said, You have not chosen
Me. But He said, I have chosen you. Now, what can a man say
to that? Who is sufficient for these things?
I mean, is that something we can go around and boast about?
No. I mean, when we see the wicked
perish, does it cause us any delight? No, it just drives us
upon our knees that we have been delivered from such. Dear brethren,
and through no ability, power, or will or want of our own is
simply the mercy and grace of Almighty God that makes the difference
between one and the other. And you know, the man who who
hates God, he'll rebel against that. He will. It will come out
somewhere. You can get folks to be religious
all day long and they'll talk all about God's love and all
this until it's mentioned, well, who is it that He loves? And
if you tell them it's not everybody, all the same, then that won't
do. Because it wouldn't be right,
would it? For God loves one more than He does another. But yet,
they'll read his own words where he told the nation of Israel,
he said, I didn't choose you because you were greater than
any other people. He says, I chose you because
I loved you. And that's the reason that he loves his people, because
he loves them. And dear brethren, all men know
that love must be particular. Now you can go around and you
can say, a lot of people like to pat themselves on the back
and say, oh, I love everybody. That's the biggest lie that's
ever been told. There's never been a man born
in the earth that loves everybody. Because then love wouldn't mean
anything, would it? I mean, if you just love everybody
out here, then when you tell somebody, I love you, what does
that mean? It doesn't mean anything because
you just love everybody. And that's really kind of the
way that most people think. about the way that the love of
God is. He's like a dog. You get some
dogs that are really friendly dogs. There are a lot of dogs
that they'll just come up and lick anybody's hand. You can't
tell if they love their master more than they do you. They just
do it. And that's kind of how everybody figures it. that God
is. He's just like one of those dogs,
you know, that you can always be happy. Well, here He is. I
mean, He's just like you want Him to be. But, dear brethren,
the Lord would demonstrate the power of His grace and mercy
by being particular. And the very fact that He has
died for sinners on Calvary's cross must testify to the particular
nature of His atonement, or once again, His atonement does not
mean anything. Because if He did not actually
die for a people and purchase their redemption, then He did
not actually do anything, did He? I mean, if he just did something
and he left it all up to men to cast the deciding vote or
do their part or whatever and however you want to describe
it, then he didn't really do anything. But dear brethren,
the Scripture says that he did do something. When that angel
told Joseph, what His name would be, He said, Thou shalt call
His name Jesus, for He shall save His people from their sins. Now, He is going to try to do
the best He can and get as many in as He possibly can. If He
can just find a few, you know, that will actually believe Him.
No. He said He came for a purpose
and that was to save His people from their sins. The book of
Hebrews tells us that when He He didn't go into the Holy of
Holies with the blood of bulls and goats, but with His own blood,
having what? Obtained eternal redemption. Now if you obtain something,
it means you've got it. It means it's in your hand. Now
you know somebody can come and buy a car from you, or they can
tell you, they can call you on the phone and say, I want to
buy that car. And you can sit there and you
can wait. And they may show up or they
may not. But you know you've sold the car when? When they
put the money in your hand and you have obtained the money.
Then you have it. Now, the Lord Jesus Christ, when
He went to Calvary's cross, He obtained something, dear brethren.
He didn't try to do something. He did something. And so this
is Him. And He is pleading His cause
because His cause is the cause for His people. He didn't come
into this world for His own benefit. He came into this world for His
people's benefit that He might manifest His grace. And so He says, "'Plead My cause,
O Lord, with them that strive with Me.'" Now, as a man, he
endured the suffering of a Savior. He endured the pain, and he was
a man of grief, a man of sorrows, acquainted with grief. And he
came, dear brethren, as the eternal God walking among men, as a man,
just as much as any man ever lived upon the face of the earth.
And he subjected himself unto the same vanity that men were
subjected unto. And he felt fear, and he felt
pain, and he felt rejection, and he felt sorrow, and he knew
the grief. And he said, Plead my cause,
O Lord. Now, you know, you don't really have to teach a man how
to pray. Now a lot of times, it's a good
thing to teach children to pray. And I'm not telling you that
you might not lead them in some way of praying, even as the Lord
taught His disciples, gave them basically an outline of prayer.
I'm not saying you can't do that. But don't think that you can
teach your children to pray by teaching them some little thing
to say. But you can't teach them not
to pray when the Lord begins a work in their heart and He
constrains their soul unto Him. And they will cry out to the
Lord. And they will say the same thing that the Lord Jesus said,
plead my cause, O Lord. Be my advocate. Be that one who
stands for me. Help me. Plead my cause, O Lord,
with them that strive with me. Fight against them that fight
against me." Now, again, like I say, this is a perfect prayer
because it is prayed by a perfect man. It is prayed by a man who
had the right to pray such a prayer. He did not give us that right.
You cannot pray that prayer. The Lord did not teach you to
pray that prayer. He has taught you to forgive
your enemies. Did He not? We don't say, Lord, fight against
him, fight against me. We say, Lord, show mercy to him,
help him. Did he not give us that illustration
when he hung on Calvary's cross? Now, a lot of people have puzzled
over that, but he was a man. He said, Father, forgive them
for they know not what they do as a man. As a man, he looked
at Jerusalem and he said, Oh, Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how oft
would I have gathered thee But thou wouldest not. Now what was
he doing? He was praying with the compassion
of a perfect man as he looked upon his fellow men, as he looked
upon mankind as it is. And his heart was touched. It
was moved. Take hold of shield and buckler.
Stand up for mine help. He says, come to my defense.
Be my defender. Draw out also the spear and stop
the way against them that persecute me. Say unto my soul, I am thy
salvation. He said, Lord, take your arrow
of death and put it through their heart. Let me know that you are
my salvation. Now, does not every one of us
want to know that the Lord is our salvation? Now a man that's
never been stirred up to seek the Lord, he doesn't care if
the Lord's his salvation or not, does he? But you see, a man that's
been taught that he's a sinner, he wants to know. It ought to
be that he's got just a passing thing with him. You know, some
people say, well, I took care of that a long time ago. I've
had people tell me that. Oh, I took care of that a long
time ago. Well, if you took care of it
a long time ago, You were mistaken. Because the work that the Spirit
of God does in the hearts of God's people reminds them every
day what they are and how much they need the Lord that day.
Today is the day of salvation, not last week. Oh, I was saved
way back there, were you? Well, are you saved now? Is He
saving you? You see, salvation is an ongoing
work. Now, we know redemption took
place, dear brethren. The Lord has, in that measure,
saved all of His children. But He is presently saving us.
He is pleading our cause. And He is applying the benefits
of that salvation to us. And that is what we desire, is
not, Lord, let me know that You are my salvation. And oh, the
blessing of God is He does minister to His people and He gives us
a place of rejoicing in belief and in faith. as He gives it
to us to come before Him. And we see this wine and we see
this bread and we believe and we say, Lord, You are our salvation. And we are encouraged. Stand
up for mine help. Draw out the spear. Say unto
my soul, I am thy salvation. See, wasn't that the place that
Jonah was brought? When the seaweed was wrapped
around his head, and he was in the belly of the great fish,
and he said, salvation belonged unto the Lord. Oh, dear brethren,
what a glorious thing. And you know, the amazing thing
about that is, as soon as he said that, what's the next thing
the Scripture says? It says, and the fish vomited
him up onto the dry land. Soon as he came to that place.
Brethren, it's a blessing when the Lord applies that to our
soul and we recognize that the Lord is our salvation. What a
glorious deliverance that is. It's not our doing. It's not
something we can maintain. Let them be confounded and put
to shame that seek after my soul. Let them be turned back and brought
to confusion. that devised my hurt, letting
them be as chaff before the wind, and let the angel of the Lord
chase them." And the Scripture says that the wicked are like
the chaff which the wind bloweth away. They are indeed. I mean, the Lord Jesus as He
prayed this prayer of judgment, because dear brother, He is not
only the Savior of His people, but He is the Judge of the earth.
And only He can speak both mercy and justice with the same mouth. Because He is that One who has
those things in His hand. Let the angel of the Lord chase
them. Let their way be dark and slippery. And let the angel of
the Lord persecute them. Now, there's something to tell
you. Oh, well, Jesus would have never prayed a prayer like that.
What do you believe He's God? Will God destroy the wicked?
Of course He will. Now, you know, if you don't believe
the Lord Jesus could pray a prayer like that, then you don't understand
that He's God. Because He does persecute the
wicked. For without cause have they hid
from me their net in a pit, which without cause they have digged
for my soul." Now what could men accuse the Lord Jesus Christ
of when He walked among men? What could they have accused
Him of? They kept trying to come up with
stuff. The best they could come up with, well, He ate corn with
His disciples on the Sabbath day. Showed mercy to a woman taken
in adultery. See, they dig the pit for his
soul. That is, they devise deceitfulness
that they might destroy him. Let destruction come upon him
and unawares let his net that he had kept himself into that
very destruction let him fall just like Haman and his designs
upon Mordecai. And he built that great gallows
that he was going to just delight in seeing Mordecai hung on. And lo and behold, he was hung
on the same gallows. And that is what those folks
are saying here. The very snare which they have laid for me is
that snare that is going to catch them up. All my soul shall be joyful in
the Lord, it shall rejoice. in His salvation. All my bones
shall say, Lord, who is like unto Thee, which delivers the
poor from Him that is too strong for Him? Yea, the poor and the
needy from Him that spoileth them." Is that not the message
of the gospel of grace? Is it not? I mean, my soul shall
be joyful in the Lord. He is the One who delivers the
poor from the strong. We've all been taught, and this
deal comes from the mouth of some from time to time, that
the Lord helps those that help themselves. Brother, I'm glad
that's not true. Because if it was, we would be
in a mess. The Lord helps those that can't
help themselves. And that is exactly what the
gospel of grace is given to us to declare, that the Lord is
the one who helps the poor and the needy, those that are in
places of trouble. He's full of mercy. And He delivers
them out of the mouth of them that spoileth Him, or that takes
their goods away. False witnesses did rise up. They laid to my charge things
that I knew not. Now, he doesn't mean he didn't
know what they were doing. He means these were things that
he didn't do. These were things that didn't
arise out of him. The false witnesses did rise
up. They paid men to come in and
bear false testimony against him. They rewarded me evil for
good to the spoiling of my soul. Is that not true? I mean, did
not men And this One who did good among men walked among them
and ministered to their help and needs, and yet they desired
to destroy Him. But as for me, now listen to
this. If this isn't the Lord Jesus
Christ, because this isn't the ability of men, dear brethren,
of sinful men. But as for me, when they were
sick, who's he talking about? He's talking about those that
spoiled him, those that devised his hurt, those that were out
to get him, those that would destroy him, those that bore
false witness against him. What does he say here? But as
for me, when they were sick, My clothing was sackcloth." He
said, I felt their pain. I understood their need. I had
pity. I humbled my soul with fasting
and my prayer returned under my own bosom. I behaved myself
as though he had been my friend or brother. I bowed down heavily
as one that mourneth for his mother. The Lord has given a special
love for children for their mothers. Some more than others, of course.
But when a man's mother passes away, there's a mourning that's
in his heart that just can't be... it's not like any other
thing. It's an empty... The Lord said that of those that
spat upon me, those that devised my hurt, those that bore evil
witness against me, he said, when they were sick, he said, I behaved myself as
though they had been my friends. I acted just like they were my
best buddies. And I mourned for them just like
I would have mourned for my mother. But in my adversity, they rejoiced."
Because you see, that's the way men are by nature. Now, we know
that he goes on to say, and we don't have time to finish this
today, but he goes on to say that there are some, which he
describes in the last two verses, there are some for whom he prayed. that do love His way. Now we
know in the greater understanding of things that the reason they
love His way is because He has constrained them to love His
way. But nonetheless, they do love His way, do they not? But
never forget that there is an element of the prayer of the
Lord Jesus Christ which is in the behalf of men as men. And He would demonstrate to us
how we ought to look at men. You see, we don't know who the
elect of God are. We don't know who the people
of God are. But we do know that we are given
the command to love our neighbors ourselves, do we not? And to
show mercy and to desire the good of all that are around us. And I believe the Lord Jesus
Christ demonstrated that as a perfect man. And he said, I was touched
with the feeling of their infirmities. Not in the same measure and fashion
in which he is touched with the feeling of the infirmities of
his particular people that he loved, but nonetheless as a man
he was moved by the plight of men. of Him who says to sinners, Come
unto Me, all you that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give
you rest. You know, I can't qualify that. He doesn't tell me to go and
say to some this idea, but He says all that labor and are heavy
laden. Dear brethren, there is not a
sinner on earth who shall ever seek the mercy of God, who shall
not find it. Because he said, All that the
Father giveth me shall come to me. They will come to me. As brother Al said, that is in
our DNA. God's people will come to him.
And him that cometh to me, I will in no wise cast out. He will
not break the bruised wreath or quench the smoking flags,
but He will bring forth judgment on the victory. And that's what
we come to remember today, is that which the Lord has, that
victory which the Lord has wrought. Because here, when we remember
the Lord's death until He comes again, we don't just remember
something that He tried to do, dear brethren, we remember something
that He did. This is a manifestation of what
He has accomplished. And He has given this to the
saints of God to remember Him until He comes again. Now who
can take this? Well, it is given first off for
every man that knows himself to be a sinner and believes that
Jesus Christ is the satisfaction for his sin. Now if a man falls
in that category, then I believe it suffers for him. If you don't
believe that, it's certainly not for you. If you think that's
all just a bunch of baloney, then it's certainly not for you.
Don't take it. But if that is your confession, then the Lord
said, remember my death till I come again. And He gave us
the bread and the wine to do so.