Psalm 5 verse 1 says, Give ear
to my words, O Lord. Consider my meditation. Hearken
unto the voice of my cry, my King and my God, for unto Thee
will I pray. My voice shalt thou hear in the
morning, O Lord. In the morning will I direct
my prayer unto Thee and will look up. For Thou art not a God
that hath pleasure in wickedness. neither shall evil dwell with
thee. The foolish shall not stand in
thy sight. Thou hatest all workers of iniquity. Thou shalt destroy them that
speak leasing or lying. The Lord will abhor the bloody
and deceitful man. But as for me, I will come into
thy house in the multitude of thy mercy, and in thy fear will
I worship toward thy holy temple. Lead me, O Lord, in thy righteousness
because of mine enemies. Make thy way straight before
my face. For there is no faithfulness
in their mouth. Their inward part is very wickedness. Their throat is an open sepulcher.
They flatter with their tongue. Destroy thou them, O God. Let
them fall by their own counsels. Cast them out in the multitude
of their transgressions, for they have rebelled. against thee. But let all those that put their
trust in thee rejoice. Let them ever shout for joy,
because thou defendest them. Let them also that love thy name
be joyful in thee. For thou, Lord, wilt bless the
righteous. With favor wilt thou compass
him as with a shield." continuing our understanding
that the Psalms are primarily the prayers of the Lord Jesus
Christ who He gave to David to record. And when we consider
that many times, and this is one of the examples of it, of
one who comes to the Lord with an expressed desire to see the
wicked destroyed. As we get into this, as we've
just read there, of course, that's not the theme of the psalm. The Lord Jesus Christ didn't
come into the world primarily destroy men, but He came into
the world to save His people. The destruction of men is something
that is already set in motion from the beginning. Had it not
been that the Lord had come into the world to save the world,
then the world would have been destroyed because of its corruption. And it would have been a thing
that would have been put apart, so the Lord didn't come in order
to destroy the world. He said, I didn't come to judge
the world, but He came to save sinners in the world. And so
when we read these things, we understand that the Lord Jesus
Christ, being a perfect man, saw things a little differently
than we can see them as imperfect men. He saw things as they are. We like to make things to be
like we want them to be, don't we? I mean, we look at somebody
who is a fine, upstanding citizen in the community may have a kind
demeanor or whatever, and we start thinking about that person,
well, you know, they're a good person and they deserve that
the Lord would show mercy to them. But see, that's not the
way the Lord works. Because when the Lord sees men,
the Scripture says, for all have sinned and come short of the
glory of God. So it doesn't make any difference
how men appear to us. That's not how they appear unto
God. I mean, how men may look to us
is not at all how they appear to God. The Lord made men just
to be exactly what they are, and He could have made man to
be anything He wanted him to be. He could have made man in
such fashion that man would have never sinned if it so pleased
him. He did that with the angels,
did He not? Those that He ordained, the elect angels, the Scripture
says, they've never done anything but praise the Lord. That's what
they were created for, and that's what they've done. And they've
never failed in a moment of it. And the Lord could surely have
created men to be in the same way, but He did not purpose to
do so. But He created man to be what
man is. according to His purpose. Now
some people get all mad about that, and they think that's unfair
for God to do what He wants to do, but they think it's quite
fair for God to do what they want Him to do. You know, that's
kind of the way it is, isn't it? I mean, we can judge better
than the Lord can. I mean, we're kinder than the
Lord is. I mean, does anybody really think
that your mercy is greater than the mercy of God? I mean, is
that possible that a man's mercy could exceed that of the Lord?
I mean, I don't know the extent of His mercy, dear brother. I
know the extent of His justice. I mean, He has shown us that.
He said, the soul that sinneth, it shall die. He didn't say you may die. He
didn't say to Adam, in the day you eat thereof, you might die. He said, in the day you eat thereof,
you shall die. And so there is no ifs, ands,
or buts about that. Now what the Lord may do from
His mercy standpoint is that which no man can consider. I mean, I don't know the extent
of God's mercy. Some people claim they think
they do. You know, they know those to whom God is going to
show mercy. And they know, you know what's going to happen?
I don't know what's going to happen, but I know this, that
the justice of God shall, without any equivocation, shall be done. That's why He sent His Son into
the world, that He might be both just and the justifier. That's His purpose. And He will
do that. And so with that in mind, we
pick up on the prayer here of David as he speaks these words. And of course, he's not commanding God to give
ear to his words, but he's pleading with God. He says, Oh Lord, give
ear to my words. Oh, hear me. Help me. Oh Lord,
consider my meditation. Consider the thoughts that are
in my heart, the things that are stirring my soul. Consider that my groaning that
can be translated, that word meditation. Consider my groaning. Hearken unto the voice of my
cry, my King and my God, for unto Thee will I pray. Now it
is just the nature of man that he will not pray unless he's
in trouble. Isn't that true? It's true. Even, you know, those that are
moved to worship the Lord, most often, most of the real, sure
enough, stirred up prayers that we bring to the Lord because
something's happened, isn't it? Or something may happen, or we're
fearful of something. and that we cry out to the Lord.
That's just the nature of man. But it's a good thing that the
Lord stirs His people to pray. Hearken unto the voice of my
cry, my King and my God, for unto Thee will I pray. I'm not
going to call you up in the middle of the night and say, help me,
because I know you can't do it. You know, I mean the things that
we pray about is not things that other people can do anything
about, is it? And so David says, unto thee
will I pray. Why? Because he knew that the
Lord alone could help him. Now even men that don't claim
to believe in God often find themselves in that situation,
don't they? Because there's not a man on the earth that will
not pray in the right situation. Now, I mean, that's just fact. I mean, that's just the way that
men are. And they might not like to admit
it, but it's nonetheless truth. My voice shalt thou hear in the
morning, O Lord. In the morning will I direct
my prayer unto thee, and will look up. Now, this is interesting. My prayer shall come unto thee
in the morning. Now, the beginning. Now see,
the Lord Jesus Christ, why I say these prayers are the prayers
of the Lord Jesus Christ is because He was faithful in those things
that He would do. And in the morning, that is upon
arising, in the rejoicing of his consideration of the Lord,
he called upon the Lord. My voice shalt thou hear in the
morning, O Lord. In the morning will I direct
my worship unto Thee. The word that is used for prayer
is often used for worship. That concept is interchangeable. When the Lord said, My house
shall be a house of prayer, He did not mean that it would be
a place where people would come and get down on their knees.
and bow their head, though that would be found there. But what
he literally meant was, my house shall be called a house of worship. Because that is what prayer essentially
is. Now we think of prayer most of
the time as supplication. That is what we consider a prayer
is, is supplication, that is asking for something. But prayer
is essentially worship. And we see that in the Lord's
model prayer when the disciples said, Lord, teach us to pray.
And He said, When ye pray, say, Our Father which art in heaven,
hallowed be thy name. It was worship. That's it. You know, that's what it is. And so in the morning, while
I direct my prayer unto thee, and we'll look up, because we can't look to one another
for help in the morning. I mean, you don't get up in the
morning and think about what I'm going to do for you that
day. I hope you don't, because I'm probably not going to do
much. But in the morning I will look up, I will look to thee,
for thou art not a God that hath pleasure in wickedness, neither
shall evil dwell with thee. The foolish shall not stand in
thy sight, thou hatest all workers of iniquity." Now I don't know if that goes
along well with some of these smiley-faced preachers that you
see on TV. You know, I've never heard them
actually deal with that passage of Scripture right there, because
that doesn't fit the narrative, does it? But you see, David understood
who God is. And until a man knows and understands
that God will judge sin and that He hates those that commit it,
He cannot begin to have any understanding of who God is. I mean, that's
the first thing he needs to know. Because it is how God would show
Himself. He said He'd harden whom He would,
and He will destroy the wicked. He's not a God that has pleasure
and wickedness. The foolishness and wickedness
of men is not a thing which He takes delight in. He doesn't
look at the contrariness of men and say, man, that's great. If you want to know what's pleasing
in the Lord's sight, look at the Lord Jesus Christ when He
walked in the earth. Everything he did, he came to
do to fulfill righteousness. He came to please his Father. He said, I want to do my Father's
will. And so if you want to know what
righteousness is, if you want to know what the pleasure of
the Lord is, look at Christ. He wants Him the pleasure of
the Lord. He did the Lord's will. No one could look at the Lord
Jesus Christ and say, well, look at the wickedness that we find
in Him. No, because the Lord does not take pleasure in wickedness.
There was no wickedness in Christ. Neither shall evil dwell with
thee. The foolish shall not stand in
thy sight, thou hatest all workers of iniquity. Thou shalt destroy them, that
speak lying. The Lord will abhor the bloody
and deceitful man." You know, when John speaks about what he
saw there in the revelation that was given to him, he speaks about
the fact that all liars shall have their part in the lake of
fire. Now, what's a liar? A liar is
somebody who doesn't tell the truth. Here again, there's not one of
us that hasn't told a lie. There's not a person in here
that hasn't lied. And the one you've lied to the
most is yourself. You've told far more lies to
yourself than you've ever told to anybody else. You've cooked
up schemes in your mind to fool yourself that you'd never think
about. Telling somebody else, because
you'd know they'd see through it in a heartbeat. But you think
you can fool your own self. But the Lord, He hates lying. Deceitfulness. It says He will
hate the bloody and deceitful man. That is, that one who desires
to destroy men. Satan, the Scripture says, has
been transformed into an angel of light. He came appearing that
he was one thing. Now, appearances are deceiving.
You can't tell always that somebody is lying by their demeanor. I
mean, you know, somebody... I'm going to pick on used car
salesmen. Now, used car salesmen... They're
usually pretty outgoing, gregarious people, you know, the kind of
people you want to like. And a good one, and this is good
in tongue in cheek, but a good used car salesman can tell you
a lie and make you want to believe it. Isn't that the truth? I mean,
that's just the way that it is. But that's just the nature of
man. The Lord hates that. There's no place among the people
of God for lying, most especially when we come to the Word of God.
I mean, it's better to just ignore the Word of God than it is to
lie about what it says. I mean, I can't think of anything
worse. I can't think of a crime that rises any higher than looking
at the Word of God and misrepresenting it to someone. I mean, that's the biggest lie
that could be told, is it not? Because you're dealing with the
truth of God. The Lord hates liars. And even
as Paul said, you know, if a man comes preaching some other gospel,
he said, then that which I have preached, what did he say? Let
him be accursed. I mean, that's strong language.
That's the same thing that's being said here in this psalm.
But as for me, I will come into thy house in the multitude of
thy mercy, and in thy fear will I worship toward thy holy temple."
A man who has not learned to fear the Lord can never love
the Lord. Now there are a lot of people
that love the Lord because they do not fear Him. I mean, they
say they love Him, you see. In other words, they love their
idea of who God is. There's a lot of people that
have that notion. Oh, because what will they say
to you when you tell them what the Scripture says about God?
They'll say, oh, well, I wouldn't serve a God like that. Well, Job said, though He slay
me, yet will I trust Him. It doesn't make any difference.
I mean, what the Scripture says about God is the truth. And I'm
going to tell you there are some things that I read in the Word
of God that causes me great consternation and causes me to fear and tremble
before Him when I think of what I am and who He is. And what
the Scripture says is that He hates the workers of iniquity
and that He's got reason to hate me for sure. So the man who does not fear
as he comes into the presence of God is never known who God
is, because he is indeed a God who is not to be trifled with.
As Brother Al mentioned here in one of the commandments, thou
shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain. That is,
in some empty consideration of Him. Just an all-handed thing. Make a joke out of it or whatever. I will worship toward thy holy
temple in thy fear. Now, there is one place, you
know, people think that God is wherever they want Him to be.
But the Scripture says the Lord is in His holy temple. He says,
let all the earth keep silence before Him. And the Lord says
here, and David says, I will worship toward thy holy temple
where you are. I want to come to where you are.
I don't want to come where I think you are. I want to actually be
where you are. I don't want to design a God
that fits my parameters of how I think God ought to be. But
I want to know the true and living God as He is. I will worship
toward thy holy temple. Lead me, O Lord, in thy righteousness
because of mine enemies. Make thy way straight before
my face." The man who has been acquainted
with who God is by the Spirit of God, and who has become acquainted
with what He is by nature, desires to be found in the righteousness
of another. And there is only one righteousness
that is that which is acceptable to the Lord, and that is why
He says here, Lead me, O Lord, in thy righteousness. That is
the righteousness we desire. Because of mine enemies, make
thy way straight before my face. That is, my enemies, they surround
me. They fight within me. Who is
the greatest enemy that children of God face? That's right, the
flesh. The flesh is constantly seeking
to turn us aside from the ways of God. And so we desire, Lord,
cover us with Thy righteousness. Lead us in Thy righteousness
because of mine enemies. Make Thy way straight before
my face. That is, put it right there in
front of me where I can see it. Lord, don't let me have to wonder
what Thy way is. There is a way which seemeth
right unto man, the Proverbs say, but the end thereof are
the ways of death. I don't want to go in the way
that seems right to me. See, religious men are content
to go in the way that seems like the right way. I mean, well,
that just sounds right, doesn't it? I mean, a man will never arrive
at the truth of God by just doing what he thinks is right. Because
the Word of God is right. There is no faithfulness in their
mouth. Their inward parts bear wickedness,
their throats an open sepulcher. They flatter with their tongue.
Boy, that describes this old flesh, does it not? I mean, isn't
that pretty much how it is? There's no faithfulness in their
mouth. I'll be unfaithful in a heartbeat left to myself. There's no faithfulness in their
mouth. Their inward part is very wickedness. Make me to know who I am. Their
throat is an open sepulcher. They flatter with their tongue.
Now, the Grace Gazette this week is on flattering lips. And the
word flatter means smooth. You know, something that's smooth,
something that's easy, something that's just no effort involved
in it. And that's the way that this
flesh is. It's always appealing to us.
Is it not? It's always presenting things
to us in a smooth way. Oh, come on. You know, it's alright. They flatter with their tongues,
"...destroy thou them, O God. Let them fall by their own counsels.
Cast them out in the multitude of their transgressions, for
they have rebelled against thee." You see, when the Spirit of God
works in a man, Paul said, the good that I would, I do not.
Oh, who shall deliver me from the body of this death? I thank
my God through Jesus Christ my Lord. See, he is speaking here
about the host. See, we come to the place where
we desire to be free and rid of this body of this flesh. Now, I'm not talking about this
that I can reach out here and pinch. I'm talking about that
old fleshly nature that would destroy me. Listen, your flesh
is not your friend. It will not lead you to Christ.
It will lead you away from Christ. It will cause you to desire things
contrary to the way of Christ. That's just the nature of it. And the children of God desire
to be free from it. Oh, let them fall by their own
counsel. Cast them out, for they have
rebelled against thee. But let all those that put their
trust in thee rejoice. Let them ever shout for joy,
because thou defendest them. Let them also that love thy name
Be joyful in thee. Oh, to be somebody that is described
therein. Isn't that the desire of the
sons of God? Lord, work in me thy perfect
work. Draw me unto Christ. Cause me
to walk in the light that He gives. Let me be found walking
according to that way. Let them also that love thy name
be joyful in thee. I mean, the grandest of blessings
for the sons of God is to rejoice in the Lord. The grandest of blessings is
to be brought to that place where we can rejoice. Well, how can
we be brought to that place? It is only as the Lord works
in us, both the willing to do of His good pleasure Let them
also that love thy name be joyful, for thou, Lord, wilt bless the
righteous with favor, wilt thou compass him as with a shield."
And this reminds me of Psalm 1. It says, "'Blessed is the
man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth
in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful,
but his delight is in the law of the Lord. And in his law doth
he meditate day and night. And he shall be like a tree planted
by the rivers of water that bringeth forth his fruit in his season.
His leaf also shall not wither, and whatsoever he doeth shall
prosper. The ungodly are not so, but are
like the chaff which the wind drives away. Therefore the ungodly
shall not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation
of the righteous. The wicked are not going to be
numbered among the sons of God. For the Lord knoweth the way
of the righteous. The Lord knoweth the way of the
righteous. That is the way of the Lord.
But the way of the ungodly shall perish. I can't think of any greater
contrast that can be made between the righteous and the wicked
And we're not talking about that which men stir up within themselves,
are we? I mean, you know where we can
pat one another on the back and say, well, brother, you're doing
righteous things. No, that's not what David's talking
about here. He's talking about righteousness
in the inward parts. He's talking about that which
only comes as the product of the work of the Spirit of God
in the sons of God. And that they stand in that one
righteousness. which is acceptable to the Lord. Because you know, when I've done
everything that I think I ought to do, there's still only one
righteousness that I want to be found in. And it's the righteousness
of Christ. Because nothing that we should
or could do in this world, in this life, could ever gain us
one moment's favor with the Lord. But that which Christ has done
is that which is eternal. And that's where our desire stands.