First Corinthians chapter 16,
starting in verse 5. We'll go down to verse 18. Now I will come unto you when
I shall pass through Macedonia, for I do pass through Macedonia.
And it may be that I will abide, yea, in winter with you, that
you may bring me on my journey with us however I go. For I will
not see you now by the way, but I trust to tarry a while with
you, if the Lord permit. But I will tarry at Ephesus until
Pentecost. For a great door and effectual
is opened up unto me, and there are many adversaries. Now if
Timotheus Come, see that he may be with you without fear, for
he worketh the work of the Lord as I do. Let no man therefore
despise him, but conduct him forth in peace, and he may come
unto me, for I look for him with the brethren. As touching our
brother Apollos, I greatly desired him to come unto you with the
brethren, but his will was not at all to come at this time.
But he will come when he shall have convenient time. Watch ye,
stand fast in the faith. Quit ye like men, be strong.
Let all your thoughts be done with charity. I beseech you,
brethren, you know that the house of Stephanus, that it is the
first fruits of Achaia, that they have addicted themselves
to the ministry of the saints. that ye submit yourselves unto
such, and every one that helpeth with us and laboreth. Gracious,
gracious Heavenly Father, we come before thee. Oh, we're so
thankful for the salvation that we have in and through your Son,
the Lord Jesus Christ. And Lord Jesus, we thank thee
again for leaving the glories and splendors of heaven and coming
to this sin-cursed world to redeem us from all our sins. Thou art
the Ancient of Days. Thou art King of Kings and Lord
of Lords, and we praise Thee. There was a time when we didn't,
but by Thy grace and by Thy mercy we've been born again. And now
we praise Thee and thank Thee for Thy mercy and Thy goodness
shown to us, Father, in Christ Jesus our Lord. And Holy Spirit,
we thank Thee for teaching us the things of Christ, for regenerating
us while we were dead in trespasses and sins, and making us alive
in Christ, taking us from the darkness that we were in and
bringing us into the light of Thy dear Son, the Lord Jesus
Christ. Oh, thank you, Father, Son, and
Holy Spirit. Salvation is all of thee, and
we are so thankful that you saved us by thy precious, precious
blood. Oh, that we'd be redeemed by the blood of the Lamb. And
Lord Jesus, I pray that you'd be exalted today through the
preaching of your word. Oh, that sinners would be drawn
to you. And as the message goes out forth into the internet,
oh, that you'd use it for your glory and honor and praise, and
that you'd awake your sleep and elect, Lord, if it be your will,
and draw them to you, all by the power of God, the Holy Spirit.
We praise you and thank you, and we love you only because
you first loved us. In Jesus' name, amen. Well, good morning. Good to be
here again, as always. Always wonderful. Always wonderful. Open your Bibles, if you would,
to Psalm 18. Psalm 18. We're going to look
at seven reasons to love Christ. Seven reasons to love Christ.
There's a lot more reasons than seven, but we're going to just
look at seven reasons for the believer to love Christ. Oh my, we're but sinners saved
by the grace of God. It's absolutely wonderful to
think that the Lord's had mercy upon us, held deserving sinners,
and yet Christ has had mercy upon us. It's just amazing. Look at verse one, he says, I
will love thee, O Lord, my strength. The psalmist writes. It's the
psalm of David, the servant of the Lord who spake unto the Lord
the words of the song on the day that the Lord delivered him
from the hand of all his enemies, from the hand of Saul. And he
said this, I will love thee, oh Jehovah. That's Jehovah in
the Hebrew there, my strength. The Lord is my rock and my fortress. in my deliverer, my God, my strength,
in whom I will trust, my buckler, and the horn of my salvation,
and my high tower. I will call upon the Lord who
is worthy to be praised. So shall I be saved from mine
enemies. Now, the only one who is worthy
of our praise is our great God. He's the only one who's worthy
of praise. He's the only one. The Lord Jesus Christ, the Father,
Son, and the Holy Spirit, they're the only ones who are worthy
of our praise. See, men, we like the praise, don't we? That's
why we're told in Colossians that Christ is to receive all
the preeminence. He gets it all. He gets all the
glory. He gets all the honor. He gets
all the praise. All of it. And why? Because he's
the only one worthy to be praised. He's God. He's God incarnate
in the flesh. He come to save sinners from
their sin. The sinless one dying for sinners. My oh my. And the believer in Christ loves
Christ. Why? Because of all the things that
he's done for us. All the things he's done for
us. He's absolutely amazing. He's absolutely amazing. He saved
us from all our sins. We're forgiven. We're forgiven
for all our sins. In the first verse of our text,
the psalmist, after being delivered from the hands of his enemies,
proclaims these wonderful words. And we're going to look at these
words in the first three verses, but I'd encourage you to read
the whole psalm at home, because it proclaims the absolute sovereignty
of our God. He's absolutely sovereign. He's
in full control, beloved. And how much peace can that bring
us? How much peace, how much joy can that bring we who are
the people of God to know that our God is sovereign? That He
reigns. That He reigns. You don't hear
a lot of that anymore, do you? But He reigns. The God of the
Bible is a sovereign God. He reigns over all things. The
scripture says, how much does He reign? He reigns so much that
not even a bird falls to the ground without Him knowing. Not even a drop of rain falls
to the ground without him knowing. He's so sovereign. As one preacher
said, there's no maverick molecules in God's universe. Not one. Not one. And here in this first verse
of the psalm, again, the psalmist David's been delivered from his
enemies by the mighty hand of God. And he says this, and remember
he sings this, he says, I will love thee, O Lord, my strength.
Now who's the true author of these words? God, the Holy Spirit,
right? But David's singing this, he's
singing this from his heart, isn't he? He's born again of
the Holy Spirit of God, just as we're born again of the Holy
Spirit of God. And he says this, he says this wonderful phrase
here, he says, I will love thee. Why do we love God? Only because
He loved us. Right? We didn't love Him in
our natural state, did we, before we were saved? I didn't love Him. Did you? No. And I sure love Him now. Sure
love Him now. And that's because of God's mercy
and grace. He says, I will love thee, O Lord. It's specific.
Jehovah. The self-existent one in the
Hebrew. the self-existent one, the one who needs no one and
nothing. That's the God of the universe.
That's the God of the scriptures. My strength. You see, we're weak. We can't save ourselves, can
we? We're weak. We can't do anything without
God. He gives us the strength that we need. And He is our strength. He is our strength. And the love
spoken of here is a hearty affection that comes from a It comes from
a new heart, beloved. Because the natural heart is
like a stone, isn't it? We've had heart surgery by God,
haven't we? He's given us a new heart now.
And what does this new heart do? It hungers and thirsts after
righteousness. Who's our righteousness? The
Lord Jesus Christ. So now we hunger and thirst after
Christ. And all we got to do is look back in our lives before
the Lord saved us, and we know we didn't hunger and thirst after
Christ before then. We may have heard the gospel.
We may have been even around religious people. May even have
been around the elect and not even knowing the gospel. Didn't
even, might have been sitting in a church pew and not even
know him. And one day the Lord shows us the truth, doesn't he?
We're born again by the Holy Spirit of God. Spurgeon said
God can save you without you moving a muscle, right? Because
it's a heart work. You must be born again, the Lord
said. And that's the work of God, the
Holy Spirit. And out of that comes this love for God. Out
of a regenerate heart comes now this love that we didn't have
before. A love for God, a love for the
Bible, a love for the Lord's people that we didn't have before. And this love here is spoken
of is like a child to a parent. Remember how we used to hold
on to our moms? Oh my, or our dads. It's an intimate
love, a love of the deepest kind, which is what our Lord deserves
from his elect. It's what he deserves from his
sheep, right? Because he's the only one worthy
of our praise. John Trapp says, I will love
thee dearly and entirely from the very heart root, from the
bottom of my bowels, with like intention of affection, as a
tender-hearted mother doth her dearest babe. This is a love
like we've never had before. And the triune God, God the Father,
God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, They alone are worthy
of this love. And again, this love springs
from a redeemed heart. This love springs from a new
heart. When we think of what the Lord saved us from all our
sins, past, present, and future, when we think about that, what
does it do? It fills our hearts with love,
doesn't it? With joy, with awe. that all our sins are totally
forgiven in Christ. It's absolutely amazing. Absolutely
incredible. And in our text here, verse one
is translated again, for Lord is the self-existent one or eternal
one, Jehovah. This is none other than the great
I am. David's praying to the great I AM. What did the Lord
say to those in John chapter 8? At the end of John chapter
8, He says, before Abraham was, I AM. Christ is all through the Old
Testament, beloved. What did Paul preach from when
he preached Christ? He preached the Old Testament,
didn't he? What did Peter and James and John preach from when
they preached Christ? They preached from the Old Testament,
didn't they? The law and the prophets, our
master said, they testify of me. All those types and shadows were
pointing to Christ. All those sacrifices were pointing
to the great sacrifice, the great substitute, the Lord Jesus Christ,
who died for the sins of his people. And then look at verse one again,
he says, I will love thee, O Lord. So his love is targeted love,
isn't it? See, who is the object of our
faith? Christ. Christ is the object of our faith.
Christ is the object of our love. If you take Christ from the gospel,
there's no good news, is there? Because there's no redemption
for sinners. He says here, I will love thee, O Lord, my strength.
See, God's our strength, isn't he? He's our life. He's our hope. He's our all in
all. Christ is my strength. It's being
strong in the sense of being powerful in salvation. See, that
which is impossible for man is possible for God. We can't save
ourselves. But Christ can save sinners. And we're living proof of that,
aren't we? We're monuments to His grace. We don't feel like
monuments, but we are. God's people are monuments to
the grace and mercy of God. Living epistles. And God's our
strength. He's our hope. He's all our righteousness. He is our sanctification. He's
our redemption. In all the trials and tribulations
that we go through in life, He says, I'll never leave you nor
forsake you. Think of that, even before we were saved, He was
watching over us. That's pretty amazing, isn't
it? Look back on your life and see how many times you thought
you could have died, and you didn't. Hadn't heard the gospel
yet. Plus the scripture says it's
appointed unto men once to die and after this the judgment,
right? But the believer has therefore now no condemnation to those
in Christ Jesus who walk not after the flesh but after the
spirit. Condemnation is judgment. There's no more judgment for
God's people. There's not gonna be some television
screen playing back all the things that we did. There's not gonna
be that, beloved. There's not. Christ finished
the work. God says, I don't, now think
of this. Now think of how contrary that is to the statement that
God makes. He says, your sins and your iniquities I'll remember
no more. No more. Why? Because they're all washed under
the blood. When I see the blood, I'll pass
over you. Whoo, that's good news for sinners.
Good news for this old sinner, let me tell ya. That's wonderful.
It's the best news I've ever heard in my life, and now I just
proclaim it, right? Look to Christ and live. He's
the only savior of sinners. Cast your works aside, cast anything
that you're trying to do to gain merit and favor with God aside,
and just look to Christ by faith. And that's God-given faith. He'll
give us that faith to believe, won't He? And you know what?
He's never turned one away. He's never turned any one away
that's come to Him. Never. Never. And He's our strength,
isn't He? Oh my. And this list of reasons
why we should love Christ is absolutely endless. We're just
going to look at seven. but it's endless reasons why
we should love Christ as God's people. It's endless. My. Look at this though. Look at
verse two. The Lord is my rock and my fortress and my deliverer,
my God, my strength, in whom I will trust, my buckler and
the horn of my salvation. in my high tower. So we see here
the first reason to love Christ is because he's my rock. You
notice it's personal? He's my rock. Mine. The Hebrew word here translated
rock refers to a cleft in a cliff where you can find safety. Oh, he's our shadow in the time
of storm, isn't he? He's the rock of our salvation.
And it also speaks in the Hebrew of a cleft where you can hide
from your enemy. You can hide from your enemy.
It's also translated as stronghold of Jehovah and speaks of security. We are secure in Christ, beloved.
He's our rock. He's our rock. the cleft of the
rock of ages, beloved. And in him were safe. Dwelling
among the crags in the mountains of Judah, David had escaped the
hatred of Saul. And here he compares God to such
a place where he could hide from Saul in a cleft of a rock. Oh my. And he compares God to
such a place of concealment. Scripture even calls us the hidden
ones. Who are we hidden in? Christ. We're hidden in Christ. And think of how we're hidden. We're hidden from the tongues
of our enemies. Sometimes we hear it. But I believe the Lord
conceals us from a lot of what the world thinks and feels about
us as believers. We're hidden in God. We're hidden
in God the Son. Again, He's the Rock of Ages,
isn't He? Scripture calls Him the Ancient of Days. And we are absolutely secure
in Him. We're not securing anything we've done, are we? No merit,
no merit, no merit. That's what we say. No merit
in ourselves. No reason why God should love
me. None at all. But the scripture
says it pleased him to do so. My, what a great God we have.
And then now we see here we're safe in him, as believers. Our dear brother David says,
He's my concealment from my enemies. He's my safety. He's my security.
In him I dwell. Same word is translated rock
in Isaiah when speaking of Christ. It says, and a man shall be in
hiding place from the wind, in a covert from the tempest, as
rivers of water in a dry place, as a shadow of a great rock in
a weary land. Christ is our hiding place, beloved. We're hidden from the wrath of
God in Christ, aren't we? It fell upon him instead of us
in our room and place. We're hidden from the law of
God because he fulfilled it for us. It's wonderful. He is the Lord,
our righteousness. Just as the city of refuge, we
flee to him. We flee to him. We find safety
in Christ. Let's look at our text again,
verse two of Psalm 18. The Lord is my rock. And then
here, another reason to love Christ is He's my fortress. And notice this, my. Is He yours? Every believer can say, what
David's saying here, this is so true of me. He's my strength. He's my rock. He's my fortress. The English definition here for
fortress is a military stronghold, especially a strongly fortified
town fit for a large garrison, heavily protected and impenetrable
building. And in the Hebrew, it's translated
a stronghold. A stronghold. I was watching
the thing about the mongrels and the Hungarians last night,
and when the mongrels came down with the Golden Horde, they came
down into Hungary, and the first time they came in, they wiped
out huge swaths of the population. I think one-third of the Hungarian
population was wiped out and multiple cities destroyed. Well,
the king, he decided that if that would happen again, because
he knew they'd come again, he started collecting heavy cavalry
and special guys with crossbows from other countries, and all
the cities, the main cities, he had them walled up. And then he died before he ever
seen what was accomplished, but the Mongolians came back again,
and all the people of the small towns went into these fortified
cities. So there was nothing for the
Mongolians to pillage. They started starving to death.
Thousands of them died from starvation alone. And they couldn't penetrate
the city walls. That's what Christ is to us.
He's our stronghold. The enemies cannot penetrate.
The enemies of God cannot penetrate His walls. He's like a bulwark.
He's a fortress for His people. And scripture even says this
about God's elect. about God's people, who are kept
by the power of God. We're not kept by ourselves.
This is 1 Peter 1.5, who are kept by the power of God through
faith unto salvation, ready to be revealed in the last time.
Our Lord Jesus Christ is the believer's fortress. We find
refuge in him, don't we? Now, there's a lot going on in
this world, isn't there, right now? There's a lot going on. But we
can rest our head on our pillows at night, knowing that God's
absolutely sovereign, and knowing that we are secure in Christ. He's our stronghold. He's our
fortress. He's our strength. He's everything
to us. Let's read our text again. We
see the third reason that David brings up here to love Christ.
He says, the Lord is my rock, my fortress, and look at this.
My deliverer. My deliverer. The Lord, Jehovah, he's saying
here, Jehovah, God, the self-existent one, the one who needs no one
or nothing, is my deliverer. My deliverer. What is the Lord
Jesus Christ for his people? He's our rescuer. He's our deliverer. He's our savior. And not only
does our great God and King protect us while we're here on this earth
in times of trouble, but he delivers his people out of trouble. And think of this. He's delivered
us from our greatest enemy. Our sins. Can you pay for one sin? I can't
pay for any of my sins. I can't pay for anybody else's
sins either. But Christ paid the price demanded of God for
all the sins of all those who the Father gave him. We have
no clue who they are, so we preach the gospel to all, right? And
God does the saving, doesn't he? God does the redeeming. My, oh, my. He's our deliverer. During the believer's hour of
peril, the Lord is our deliverer. What's he delivered us from?
Well, he delivers us from our trials, doesn't he, and our troubles.
But even more so, he's delivered us from our sins, and he also
delivered us from the wrath of God. Do you know the wrath that was
due us fell upon Christ in our room and place? Do you know that
the sinless one bore the sins of his people? Scripture says
in Matthew 121, call his name Jesus for he shall save his people
from their sins. And he did. He did it. He did it. He cried, it is finished.
It is finished. Oh my, He's our great Deliverer. We are rescued from one above.
Further down in the psalm, look at verse 6. It says, in my distress
I called upon the Lord and cried unto my God, that's Elohim. He
heard my voice out of his temple and my cry came before him, even
unto his ears. God hears the cries of his people.
Look at verses 46 to 48. Do you know none but God can
deliver his people? We can't deliver ourselves from
nothing. But you know, God, I think when we get to heaven, we are
going to look back and we're going to see God delivered us
countless times. We can't even fathom how many
times he's delivered us. Isn't it wonderful? But the ones
we can remember, we sure rejoice about, don't we? Oh yeah, look
at this. The Lord liveth. Now he's, see,
all these other gods that people talked about back in those times
and even that they talk about now, they're just false gods.
Wood and stone. Wood and stone. The Lord saved
me out of Catholicism. We were bound down to statues,
just a bunch of stones. Worthless idols. It says here,
the Lord liveth. And blessed be my rock. And let
the God of my salvation be exalted. See, this is a redemptive heart,
praising God, a born again believer, praising God. Blessed be the
name of my Lord. Blessed be my rock and let the
God of my salvation be exalted. It is God that avenges me. We
don't need to seek revenge. God is our avenger. and subdueth the people under
me. Look at this. He delivereth me from mine enemies.
Yea, thou liftest me up above those that rise up against me,
and hast delivered me from the violent man. What a great God. Let's go back
to our text for our next point. The fourth reason to love Christ
is, again, He's our strength in whom I will trust. The Lord
is my rock, verse two, my fortress, my deliverer, my God, my strength
in whom I will trust. A lot of people put the trust
in a lot of different things. We trust other people. Sometimes they prove to be faithful,
sometimes they don't, right? And the word translated here,
strength, It's not the same Hebrew word as verse one. The word strength
here means powerful or strong. And the word strength means rock
and movable. It denotes Christ being our hiding
place and our strength, a place to flee for refuge that is sure
and safe. And we trust him, don't we? We
who are the redeemed of the Lord, we trust him with our eternal
souls. We trust him. And Christ is our rock again,
in whom one may trust for defense, but one who we also march forward
under his banner. Look at verses 31, And to 36
of this wonderful Psalm, Psalm 18 verses 31 to 36, this was
a reality for David. For who is God save the Lord?
There's no other gods, but our one true God is the Father, Son,
and the Holy Spirit. Or who is a rock save our God?
Only our God can save. All the other gods people worship
are just false gods. Refuge of lies. It is God that
girdeth me with strength and maketh my way perfect. Look at
how he's giving all the glory to God. He's not saying, well,
look what I've done, Lord. I remember in religion, I used
to do that. Look what I've done, Lord. Oh, my. It's awful. Look what God's done. Look what he's done. This is
amazing. It's God that girdeth me with strength and maketh my
way perfect. He maketh my feet like Heinz feet and sends me
upon my high places. Heinz feet there is like those,
you ever see those mountain goats? They're so sure footed going
up the side of that mountain. Sometimes they run up those things
without slipping. That's how God makes our feet.
It's not us doing it. It's God that does that. Because
we're safe and secure in him and in him alone. He teaches
my hands to war so that a bowl of steel is broken by mine arms. Thou hast given me the shield
of thy salvation. Who's the shield of our salvation?
Christ. Do you know that all that armor
points to Christ in Ephesians chapter 6? It all points to Christ,
the helmet of our salvation. It's Christ. The shield of faith. Who's our faith in? Christ. Feet shod with the preparation
of the gospel. Who's the gospel all about? Christ. The breastplate of righteousness.
Who's our righteousness? Christ. The belt of truth? Who's the way, the truth, and
the life? Christ. Who pictures the believer in
Christ? And we see here, thou has given
me the shield of thy salvation, and thy right hand hath holden
me up. Who's on the right hand of God?
Christ. My, oh my. See, this book's all
about him, isn't it? Book's all about our King, all
about our Savior. And look at this, and thy gentleness
hath made me great. Think of the gentle, loving kindness
and longsuffering the Lord has towards his people. Think of
how longsuffering he is with us. Even after we're saved, we're
still sinners, but now we're saved sinners, right? And think
of how longsuffering our King is with us. He doesn't cast us
away. He says, you're mine. I bought you. You're my bride. And I've loved you with an everlasting
love. Then he goes on and says, thou
hast enlarged my steps unto me that my feet did not slip. Who
keeps us? Who keeps us from falling? Christ. He's the author, and He's the
finisher of our salvation, right? And everything in between is
all Him too. It's all Him. It's all Him. He gets all the
glory. That's why He's worthy of our
praise, you see? Because salvation's of the Lord. We're but receivers of this mercy
and this grace. Undeserving receivers. of this mercy and grace that
we find in Christ. And the God of the heathens,
they were just rocks, hewn out of stone, made by man. They couldn't do anything. They
can't hear. They can't speak. They can't
save. But our God liveth. He lives. And what's out of Him? Because
He lives, I can face tomorrow. We know who holds all our tomorrows,
don't we? And that's our Savior. And when
it's the appointed time for us to go home, He's going to take
us home, beloved. He's going to take us home to
be with Him forever. Deuteronomy 32, 31 says this,
for their rock is not our rock. even our enemies themselves being
judges. Christ is the only one we can
trust for salvation. No one else. You know what the
scripture says about Christ? Thou wilt keep him in perfect
peace, whose mind is stayed upon thee. That's why Paul tells us,
now there's all kinds of stuff going on in this world, right?
Right now, all around us. Now remember, the scripture's
relevant for today just as much as it was for, right? It's timeless,
right? This is the amazing thing. It
surpasses culture, right? It surpasses time, and it's relevant
and perfect for God's people no matter where we are and what
time we're at, right? Because it's God's word. The
world might say, well, that's just an old book. No, it's not.
It's God's word. It's God's work. My oh my. Isaiah says this, thou will keep
him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on thee. Paul tells
us in the book of Colossians chapter three to set your mind
on things above. That being Christ. Because he trusteth in thee.
Trust ye the Lord forever. For the Lord Jehovah is everlasting
strength. Christ is a strong and mighty
one. He's the Son of God. He's the Word incarnate. He's
the Word incarnate. In the beginning was the Word,
and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was
in the beginning with God. And then further down in John
chapter 1 it says the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. He's
the Eternal One who's become man. I was talking with John, Marcus's
dad. He asked me a question about
Hebrews. In Hebrews, it says that he learned
obedience. So I went that night, I went and looked it up and everything,
and John Gill and Robert Hawker were saying, as God, he can't
learn anything, but as man, as man, he's made himself servant
to God, subservient to God. Think of this. In glory, he's
got angels falling down before him, right? He now has to learn
something he's never learned before. You see how low he made
himself for us? And now he's a servant for the
Father. All he's seeking to do is glorify the Father, right?
By the salvation of his people. By redeeming them out from under
the law, by the shedding of his precious blood. So he becomes a servant. My oh my. Now as God he can't
learn anything, but as a man he can. And that's what he learned
to be obedient to the Father. Can you imagine that? He's got angels falling down
before him in glory. And now he's a servant. And he
did that out of love for you and I, beloved. No wonder the scripture says,
greater love hath no man than this, and the man lay down his
life for his friends. He's a strong and mighty one.
He's the covenant savior, redeemer, and surety of his people, whom
the Father gave him in eternity. Let's look at verse two again.
It says, the Lord is my rock and my fortress, my deliverer,
my God, my strength, and whom I will trust, my buckler. The buckler is a small shield.
It was carried by light infantry back in the days when this was
written. And look at Psalm 1830, it says,
as for God, his way is perfect. The word of the Lord is tried.
He is a buckler to all those that trust in him. He's our shield,
beloved. He shields us from God's wrath. so that not even a drop of God's
wrath will ever touch His people. It's gone. That's why the Father
says, I don't remember your sins no more. Isn't that amazing? It's absolutely
incredible. What a Savior, what a Redeemer.
So the fifth reason to love Christ is because He's our shield, He's
our buckler. Again, how's the Lord our shield? Well, He's shielded
us from the wrath and justice of God. having died in the room
and place of his people at Calvary's cross. And verse 35 even of the psalm
says, thou hast also given me the shield of thy salvation.
We have Christ now. And thy right hand, that's Christ,
hath holden me up, and thy gentleness hath made me great. None who
have Christ for their shield shall ever suffer condemnation.
Do you know that? Do you know the believer will never suffer
condemnation? Will never be judged again? Never. I'm telling you, that's
what the scripture says. Romans 8.1, write it down. There's
therefore now no condemnation, judgment in the Greek, for those
in Christ Jesus. I remember a young fella came
to the Bible conference with Joe Terrell. And this guy was
struggling with dispensationalism and all that. And he says, man,
I just can't reconcile being forgiven in Christ by all these,
now I'm gonna be judged for the things I did after I was saved.
And I said, you won't be. Either Christ forgave all our
sins or he didn't forgive any of them. And if the scripture
says there's now therefore no condemnation, no judgment to
those in Christ Jesus, that's what it means. See, and I came out of that too,
and it's so hard, because you always feel like you never measure
up, you never, but you know what? We just rest in Christ, don't
we? And people say, well, if you preach like that, people
go out and do whatever they want. No, I've never seen one believer
do that, you know that? I've never seen one of God's people
do that. No, freedom, liberty in Christ. No condemnation, no
judgment. And we say hallelujah to that,
don't we? That's wonderful. That's absolutely wonderful.
My. Now let's look at verse 2 again.
We see the sixth reason. that we should love Christ. And
this is just as one verse here, it's just amazing. The Lord is
my rock, he's my fortress, he's my deliverer, he's my God, my
strength in whom I will trust, he's my buckler, and now it says
he's the horn of my salvation. Well the horn is to animals the
means of defense and their instrument of power. Their strength lies
in the horn. Hence the word is used here as
elsewhere to represent that to which we owe our protection and
our defense in danger. God is David's strength, God
is David's power, and God is David's defense. And that's how
he is for all of us, beloved. Isn't this amazing? This is incredible. Christ saves with eternal and
immutable power. And do you know His salvation
is eternal? Do you know His salvation is
eternal? It's immutable. It's not dependent upon us. Do
you know that? Isn't that wonderful? If God's eternal, and He is,
then His salvation is eternal, and God cannot lie. And he says
that Christ obtained eternal salvation, which is eternal.
Salvation for his people, according to Hebrews. Then God's salvation
is eternal. God's salvation is immutable. And his power is eternal too,
isn't it? His power is eternal. How are we saved? How are we
born again? by the power of God? How are
we kept? We know that in ourselves, if
God didn't keep us, we'd be gone, wouldn't we? We'd be like what some people
accuse of, go out the door and just live a riotless life. We
don't want to do that, do we? And I ain't never heard one preacher
ever say that, that preaches the gospel. No, the love of Christ,
you've heard me say it many times, the love of Christ constrains
us from sin. Constrains us. And I believe
God restrains us from a lot. If God didn't restrain us, think
of how we'd be. That's why it says we're kept
by the power of God. We're kept by him. We're saved by the power of God.
And we praise His mighty name for that, don't we? In 2 Samuel,
verses 2 and 3 of chapter 22, it says, And He said, The Lord
is my rock, and my fortress, and my deliverer, the God of
my rock. In Him will I trust. He is my
shield, and the horn of my salvation, my high tower, my refuge, my
Savior. Thou savest me from violence.
He's our Savior, not just from our sins, but all the time in
life. Let's look at the last point
brought forth in this text here. The Lord is my rock, my fortress,
my deliverer, my God, my strength, in whom I will trust, my buckler,
and the horn of my salvation, and my high tower. He's my high
tower. Is he yours? Oh, this is wonderful. The Hebrew word here is defined
as a high place, a refuge, secure height, and retreat, a stronghold. This Hebrew word is translated
defense seven times in the Old Testament, and refuge five times,
and tower three times. So you could say he's our defense,
he's our refuge, and he's our tower. And you know what? He's our high tower, right? Where
is he right now? He's in glory, isn't he? High
above all the stuff that's going on in this world, isn't he? My oh my. That's where our King is. And
he's interceding for us right now. He's our high tower. He's high
above all these things. Christ is the believer's high
tower. He's our refuge and defense. And what comfort and what peace
that can bring us in the midst of this world. What peace. That's why Paul says we have
the peace that passes all understanding. Now we don't always have that.
We're like this, aren't we? We're like waves in the sea.
But you keep hearing me say, Christ is the constant, right?
He does not change. He's the same yesterday, today,
and forever. And he says, I'll never leave
you, right? I'll never forsake you. Never. And that's God who says that.
My, oh, my. In Christ, we have a refuge like
no other. We have a refuge from the law
of God, which we could never fulfill, so Christ fulfills it
for us. We have a refuge from the wrath of God, which fell
upon Christ instead of us. We have refuge from the justice
of God, which demanded the soul that sinned, it must die. So
God the Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, becomes a man and satisfies the
law of God, the justice of God, and takes our wrath that was
due us. And Christ, it is finished. Now, finished there means perfect
in the Greek. Now, can we add anything to perfect
by anything we do? Nothing, right? So let us just
rest in the finished, complete, perfect, sin-atoning work of
the Lord Jesus Christ. Just rest in Him. And again, the sinner who flees
to Christ has found a refuge like no other. We who are but
saved sinners proclaim that, don't we? What a refuge we found. What a savior. And you know, let's turn to Luke. I almost
preached on this this weekend, but I'll have to save it for
another time. Look at this in Luke chapter 15. Oh, we've been saved. We've been
saved from all our sins. Look at this. Luke chapter 15. Let's start in verse 1 here. Then drew near unto him all the
publicans and sinners for to hear him. Praise God, that's
in the Bible. Publicans, the ones who the Jews
hated because they collected taxes for the Romans. And sinners,
well, that's just me and you, right? Just sinners, just normal folks.
And look at this. They all drew near him. And the
Pharisees and scribes, mother, now here comes the religious
Pharisees. Here comes the self-righteous
ones. This man receiveth sinners. Well, praise God he does. Praise
God he does. And he doesn't just receive them,
he eats with them. Praise God. I'm so thankful. I'm so thankful that's there.
And he spake this parable unto them. What man of you, having
a hundred sheep, if he leaves one of them, doth not leave the
ninety and nine in the wilderness, and go after that which is lost,
until he find it? So he poses this question to
these self-righteous religious Pharisees, and he says, if you
had a hundred sheep, and one of them went missing, you'd go
look for it. You wouldn't wait, you wouldn't
say, well, it's a Sabbath day, I'm, that sheep's, I'm just gonna
let him be. No, he'd go look for him. A good
shepherd will go look for the sheep. Here find us, well I'm
thinking of that in a spiritual light, he found us where we were,
dead in trespasses and sins, with no hope. That's where he found us. We
were lost sheep. So he's gonna give us a picture
here. And when he had found it, he
laid it on his shoulders rejoicing. Now, do you see anywhere there
where it says He breaks its legs? I used to hear that all the time
in religion. I used to hear, they used to say, well, Christ
goes and gets the lost sheep and He breaks its legs and puts
it on His shoulder and then it's lame and it's gone. Christ won't
do that to His people. Not at all. He loves us. He tenderly
picks us up and puts us on His shoulders. And you know why He
puts us on His shoulders? So we can go like this. and gaze
in his face. Yeah, we're little sheep, right? It's my king. And you know what? We're still gazing at his face,
aren't we? We're still on his shoulders.
You know, there's no two, Zane and I have talked about this,
Zane got rid of that picture, that footprints in the sand, oh, there's
two. No, they're just one set of footprints my whole life,
and that's Christ carrying me through this whole life, right?
Same with you, right? were on his shoulders. He found us. He
found us dead in trespasses and sins. He gently picked us up,
right, born again by the Holy Spirit of God, puts us on his
shoulders, and now we just get to gaze in the Savior's face.
Oh, this is my King. This is my Redeemer. This is
my Lord. Oh, it's wonderful. And when
he cometh home, he calls together his friends and neighbors, saying
unto them, Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep. He was
wandering out there, caught up in the thickets and the fence,
way off in the middle of nowhere. Where were we in life? Oh, we
were way off, weren't we? I wasn't looking for God when
he found me. I was so far away, I was running the other way.
Dave and I, we talked about that. We were gone. And he saw us out,
didn't he? He saw us out. My, it's wonderful. When he cometh
home, he called his friends and neighbors, saying to them, rejoice,
rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep, which was lost. See,
before we're saved, we have to be shown we're lost. And we were
dead in trespasses and with no hope. We were lifeless, spiritually
dead, physically alive. And now we're born again by the
Holy Spirit of God. Now we're alive. We've been translated
from the kingdom of darkness to the kingdom of his dear son.
He says, I say unto you that likewise
joy shall be in heaven over one sinner that repenteth more than
over ninety-nine just persons which need no repentance. Praise
be to God for his wondrous salvation. He's the Alpha of our salvation
in the beginning, and He's the Omega of our salvation. He keeps
us, He saves us, and He keeps us. Brother Brian, would you
close us in prayer, brother?