Well, good evening, Grace Church.
It is a joy to be here this evening to open the Word of God with
you. Michael, thank you for those kind words. Michael told me,
hey, I put your whole family in the front row, I did this
for you. First time they've all sat in the front row. I knew
there was a trick. So thank you, Michael, though,
for introducing them, and thank you for allowing me to address
Grace Church from the Word of God. It is God's kindness to
our family to bring us to this campus. 27 years ago, as Michael
said, we came here. And you know, the thing about
immigrants is they stay in their little communities. So for our
family to not stay in a Russian context was unique. So thank
you, Mom, for bringing us to Grace Church from a Russian context.
And it's been a delight to be a part of this church for 27
years now. Well, if you have your Bible,
open to Psalm 36. Psalm 36. Our hearts are restless until
they find their rest in you." These are the words of Augustine,
who's considered to be one of the foremost figures in church
history. One of the scholars said, Augustine
was the greatest man the church has possessed between Paul the
Apostle and Luther the Reformer. Augustine lived in the fourth
into the fifth century in the Roman Empire, in the part of
the Roman Empire that is now Tunisia and Algeria. And if you
were to read his autobiography entitled, Confessions, you'd
observe that his life was one of long pursuit after pleasure. And he spared no expense and
no effort at that pursuit of pleasure. Augustine came from
a well-to-do family. His father was a middle-income
farmer, and all he wanted for his son was to be a great orator. And so he sent him to Carthage,
a city considered to be one of the greatest cities at that time
for rhetoric. And so Augustine writes about
his time at Carthage. In Carthage, I found myself in
the midst of a hissing cauldron of lust. My real need was for
you, my God, who are the food of the soul. I was not aware
of this hunger. I was willing to steal and steal
I did, although I wasn't compelled by any lack. I was at the top
of the school of rhetoric. I was pleased with my superior
status and swollen with conceit. It was my ambition to be a good
speaker for the unhollowed and inane purpose of gratifying human
vanity. He took a concubine in Carthage,
lived with her for 15 years, and had a son with her. And after
he finished his education in Carthage, he became a teacher
and would move from Carthage to Rome, ultimately to Milan. When he landed in Milan, he quickly
befriended Ambrose, who was the bishop of Milan, who introduced
him to Christianity. It was about two years later,
under the weight of his sin and through some difficult life circumstances
that Augustine was walking through a garden in Milan. And in the
distance he heard some children say, take it and read it. Take it and read it. He felt
compelled to run back to the house and he opened the book
of Romans. And the first passage that his
eyes fell on was Romans 13, 13 to 14. And this is what he read. Let us behave properly as in
the day, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual promiscuity
and sensuality, not in strife and jealousy, but put on the
Lord Jesus Christ and make no provision for the flesh in regard
to its lusts. As he read these verses, he writes
that he suddenly realized that what his pursuit was was of God. All his pursuit of pleasure was
really his pursuit of God. He was looking for God. And he writes, how sweet all
at once it was for me to rid of those fruitless joys which
I had once feared to lose and was now glad to reject. You drove
them for me. You who are true, the sovereign
joy. You drove them for me and took
their place. You who are sweeter than all pleasure. though not
to flesh and blood. You who are brighter than all
light, yet are hidden deeper than any secret in our hearts.
You who surpass all honor in themselves. At last, my mind
was free from the gnawing anxieties of ambition and gain. From wallowing
in filth and scratching the itching sore of lust, I began to talk
to you freely. Oh Lord, my God, my light, my
riches, and my salvation. Few men and women in church history
surpass Augustine and his portrayal in the greatness, in the beauty,
and in the desirability of God. He writes elsewhere, he is happy
who possesses God. And I would say deep down in
our hearts, we affirm the claim, our hearts are restless until
they find their rest in you. But so often, God's rebuke of
Israel applies to us in Jeremiah chapter 2 verse 5 God says, what
injustice did your fathers find in me that they went far from
me and walked after emptiness and became empty. It's the same
word, emptiness, that Solomon uses in Ecclesiastes three dozen
times or so, describing his own pursuit of pleasure. Vanity of
vanities, vanity of vanities, all is vanity. It is the same
exact term that Jeremiah uses to describe our pursuit of pleasure
outside of God. And David, in Psalm 31 verse
6, calls these vanities idols. Because in due time, if we continue
to pursue these pleasures, they become our idols. They take our
time away from God. And so we are tempted to pursue
them. And so we think we can find more pleasure, more delight,
more satisfaction, more joy in a specific status at work, a
promotion, perhaps a new salary, a raise, perhaps a new role,
even a church. You think that might give you
more satisfaction than God himself. Perhaps a zip code. or a specific
item that you've been waiting for. See, as we look at Psalm
36, David speaks to this condition in the heart of man, this longing
for pleasure, for delight, for joy, and David says it is only
to be found in God. Let's read Psalm 36. Please follow
along as I read Psalm 36 for us. For the choir director, A
psalm of David, the servant of the Lord. Transgression speaks
to the ungodly within his heart. There is no fear of God before
his eyes, for it flatters him in his own eyes concerning the
discovery of his iniquity and the hatred of it. The words of
his mouth are wickedness and deceit. He has ceased to be wise
and to do good. He plans wickedness on his bed.
He sets himself on a path that is not good. He does not despise
evil. Your love, O Lord, extends to
the heavens. Your faithfulness reaches to
the skies. Your righteousness is like the
mountains of God. Your judgments are like a great
deep. O Lord, you preserve man and
beast. How precious is your love, O
God, and the children of men take refuge in the shadow of
your wings. They drink their fill of the
abundance of your house, and you give them to drink of the
rivers of your delights. For with you is the fountain
of life. In your light we see light. Oh, continue your love to those
who know you, and your righteousness to the upright in heart. Let
not the foot of pride come upon me. Let not the hand of the wicked
drive me away. there the doers of iniquity have
fallen they have been thrust down and cannot rise as david
david writes the psalm he begins with a focus on the wicked he
ends with a focus on the wicked in the last two verses but right
in the middle in verses five through ten he focuses on god's
love And it demonstrates that that is the only source of true
joy and true satisfaction. So if we are to reject these
competing desires, these pleasures that constantly vie for our attention
and contradistinction to God, David says we are to pursue our
delight in God. And this is how it begins. He
said, first of all, if you are to delight in God, recognize
the corrupting influence of sin. That's verses one through four.
If you are to delight in God, recognize the corrupting influence
of sin. John Piper says, sin is what
we do when our hearts are not satisfied with God. And that's
the beginning of the psalm. transgression speaks to the ungodly
within his heart. It all begins with a simple conversation. Literally, it says, transgression
whispers to the ungodly. David personifies sin as whispering
to the sinner. This evokes imagery of secrecy,
isolation, seclusion, It begins in the heart of a man and continues
into a conversation that develops into a plan that ultimately is
acted upon. This isn't a picture of somebody
who falls into sin. It's a picture of somebody who
plans his sin. And in verse two we read that
it flatters him in his own eyes. I think I can be clever. I can
be crafty. I can be private. No one We'll
find out. And so sin flatters him. Instead
of telling the truth that, yes, sin might be pleasant for the
moment, but its consequences are bitter, sin will not be secret. It will be shadowed from the
rooftops. And as our pastor so frequently says, time and truth
go hand in hand. Give it enough time, the truth
will come out. So instead of telling the truth,
sin lies to the sinner. As he continues to converse with
sin, he paves the way for more sin. And the image here, if it
flatters him, is actually the idea of making a path smooth. Essentially, sin talks us into
sinning. The sinner removes all obstacles
in his mind as he plans to commit sin. Whatever guilt he may feel,
he tries to talk himself out of that guilt. Whatever hatred
for a specific sin, he or she might feel, they try to talk
themselves out of that hatred. All that might be an obstacle
is smoothed out by the flattery of sin. This is the Old Testament
equivalent of Romans 1.18. They suppress the truth in unrighteousness. The sinner talks to himself And
he listens to the sin. The sinner deafens the cry of
the conscience through self-flattery. And once sin takes hold of the
individual, there is a spiraling effect of sin upon our lives. Look at verses 3 and 4. The speech
becomes corrupt in verse 3. The thoughts are perverted. The
direction of the person's life is toward evil in verse 4. And
the last phrase in verse 4, he doesn't hate evil. He's caught
in this downward spiral, and it all began with a simple conversation. And the first manifestation of
sin is in our speech. Jesus is the one who said in
Matthew 12, 34, the mouth speaks from that which fills the heart.
And you see in verse three, the words of his mouth are wickedness.
This is the first expression of listening to sin. Your speech
is affected. It is deceptive. It is distorted.
It is manipulative. You see, our conversations become
expressions, manifestations of what is really on the inside.
Really, our conversations betray our most innermost thoughts. And the next stage is perverted
thoughts, as you see in verse three. He has ceased to be wise
and to do good. He can't think clearly about
life anymore. He doesn't realize that what
follows sin is judgment. He doesn't see life from an eternal
perspective. He sees to do good and to be
wise. Verse four gives us this picture
of a man who's completely devoted to sin. He plans wickedness. He sets himself on a path that
isn't good. He doesn't despise evil. All these verbs are in
the imperfect tense, suggesting ongoing action. He's continually
thinking, planning, setting himself on this path, continually not
despising evil. The life of the individual is
consumed with sin, constant pursuit of sin. He is so consumed with
sin, look at verse four, he plans wickedness on his bed, the place
of rest And refreshment becomes a place of strategy and planning
for more and more sin. Proverbs 4 verse 16 says, they
cannot sleep unless they do evil. A person's devotion to sin can
make him an insomniac. He's so devoted to sin. But as
we think of this description of the wicked as David describes
it, Sadly, frequently that is true of us as well as believers.
We lie in our beds. Our thoughts wander. We lose
control of our thoughts. And at times they end up in less
than sanctifying areas. We become jealous of people as
we just lie there in our beds. We're envious. We think angry
thoughts. We begin to become anxious with
whatever circumstances might be in our lives. We stop trusting
God. Perhaps even we entertain lustful
thoughts. Contrast this with the believer. Psalm 63 verse five. When I remember
you on my bed, I meditate on you in the night watches. You
see, the true believer spends his time in his bed thinking
about God. But specifically, instead of
hurting people, instead of being jealous of people, according
to Ephesians 2.10, Titus 2.14, we are created as Christians
for good deeds. So let us plan, strategize, become
creative in ways that we can serve people. We can do good
deeds to other individuals. As we lie there in our beds,
we can't sleep for whatever reason, let's be creative. Instead of
strategizing for sin, let's be creative in serving other people. And so in verse four, we see
in the middle of the verse, he sets himself on a path that is
not good. That refers to the trajectory
of his life. The direction of his life is not good. It ultimately leads to judgment
and to sin. But notice, he sets himself. He wasn't forced onto that path.
He placed himself on that path. The way the Hebrew phrase it,
it's a reflexive verb. It focuses on the individual
doing the act of placing himself intentionally in the area that
he's in in order to sin. What's the root of all this?
What is the root of this sin? Well, look back at the second
phrase of verse one. There is no fear of God before
his eyes. There are phobias out there.
Some of you have phobias. You are afraid of spiders, or
snakes, or heights. Maybe you're claustrophobic.
You're afraid of closed spaces. Maybe you are agoraphobic. You're
afraid of open spaces. Maybe you're both, and then I
don't know how you exist. There are some fun phobias. Paganophobia,
fear of beards. Consectelophobia, fear of chopsticks. of thalmophobia, fear of being
stared at. Stop staring at me. There's also this one called
Anuptophobia, fear of being single. Hmm, interesting. I think my favorite is Russophobia,
fear of Russians. And Putin isn't helping us these
days. But verse one speaks of theophobia,
fear of God. There's a website, changethatsrightnow.com. It promises to get rid of your
fear of God. For $2,497 and eight simple steps,
you can get rid of your fear of God. This is not a prank website,
it is a true website, a business that describes why people fear
God and promises to eliminate this fear of God once and for
all. What happens to the individual who removes his fear of God? Verses one through four. His
life becomes consumed with sin. Now, there are two ways in the
Hebrew to express fear of God. In Proverbs, frequently fear
of God speaks of our dependence on God as our creator. It's a
more intimate fear. Here, though, David speaks of
terror, trembling. There is no terror in this individual
before God. The verses that immediately follow,
verses five and six specifically, focus on God as the creator.
We'll look at them in just a minute. But because of this juxtaposition
of this statement in verse one, verses five and six, God is the
creator of the skies and the heavens and the mountains and
the great deep and men and beast, the accent falls on God as the
magnificent, as the majestic creator. You see, in the ancient
Near East, the people feared gods. That's why they offered
sacrifices, in order to appease God. various gods. This individual
is so godless, so callous, that his basic attitude toward a deity
is absent. He acts as if there is no God.
Contrast this attitude with the wise person in the book of Proverbs. Chapter 8 and verse 13 of Proverbs
says, the fear of the Lord is to hate evil. Proverbs 16, six,
by the fear of the Lord, one keeps away from evil. There's
a partnership between fearing God and not sinning. Fear holds you back from allowing
your mind to flatter you, to smooth talk you into sinning.
This is David's description of a mindset of the wicked. But
at times that is also true of us. as we allow our minds to
smooth talk our way into sin. And there are times when we gravitate
to take an advantage of Romans 6.1. Paul writes, I will continue
in sin so that grace may increase, may it never be. Do not think
that because God gives you grace for your sin, now you should
sin more and more and more to gain more and more grace. There
are times when we're so consumed with sin, so focused on sinning,
we might misuse that verse and think, I'll ask for repentance,
God will forgive, I'll get grace. Romans 6.1 is true. You see,
David's personification of sin is a reminder that what begins
with an almost innocent conversation can lead to a life of total sin. Not even despising sin in yourself,
or others. And David's antidote to this
kind of a life, to this kind of proclivity, is in verses five
through 10. And it says, if you are tempted
to sin, reflect on the satisfying experience of God's love. Recognize the corrupting influence
of sin, reflect on the satisfying experience of God's love. And
so we see in verses five and six, your love, O Lord, extends
to the heavens. Your faithfulness reaches to
the skies. Your righteousness is like the
mountains of God. Your judgments are like a great
deep. O Lord, you preserve men and beasts. How precious is your
love, O God. And he mentions love one more
time in verse 10. continue your love to those who
know you. David presents the power of God's
love in verses five and six. God's love is powerful and he
looks at the entire creation as the arena of the display of
God's love. It's this canopy like a sky just
covering God's creation and it is the canopy of God's love. David is awestruck with God's
love. He's trying to grasp it. He's trying to understand it.
So he goes to the skies. He goes to the heavens. He goes to the
great deep in verse six. He cannot fully comprehend God's
love. It is unsearchable. It is beyond
his understanding. It has no limits. And so he says
it is vast in verse five, it is precious in verse seven, it
is continuing in verse 10. And the pairing of God's love
with faithfulness in verse five is frequently found in the Old
Testament. And that speaks to the stability, the certainty,
the dependability, the trustworthiness of God's love. God's love is
reliable. We live in an unreliable world.
Our cars break down. We get flat tires. I remember
a time when I bought a car without an engine because I was looking
at pictures that didn't show the fact that it had no engine.
That's not a reliable picture. Our houses get flooded. There
are earthquakes. There might be fires. Our home
appliances break. Our friends betray us. Even our
most intimate friends, closest people in our lives, like family
members, abandon us. Our world is filled with unreliability. God's love is faithful. It is fully trustworthy. It is dependable. And God channels
this love to us. It's like a dam that erupts over
us. It's a wave that envelops us. Psalm 103 verse 11 says,
As high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is His loving
kindness toward those who fear God. You see, the love of God
is reserved for those individuals who fear God. That is why verses
5 through 10 do not apply to the sinner who's consumed with
sin, who has no fear of God. And so David continues his profile
of God's character. God is loving in verse 5. God
is righteous and just in verse 6. You cannot have a loving God
who isn't just. Our hearts cry out for equity.
They cry out for equality. We hope that all the wrongs will
be made right. Whether it's in history or in
our present time, we hope that ultimately God will give us justice. And for those that we know who
have been misused, we also hope God will give them justice. One
commentator says, God's love, His faithfulness, His righteousness,
His justice form the complete and secure foundation for human
trust and dependence on God. God has to be that in order for
us to trust Him. How righteous is God? Verse six. Like the mountains of God. And that's a superlative statement.
Like the highest mountain that you can imagine. God's love is
like the Rockies if you want a picture of that. But his judgments,
verse six, are like a great deep. There's this chasm between the
righteousness and justice. Again, David is unable to fully
understand and convey the greatness of God's righteousness. And in the ancient times, whichever
God was associated with the highest place, that became that God's
sacred place. The higher the place, a mountain,
the greater the God. By taking God and His righteousness
and placing Him on a mountain, the mountains of God, David says
God's justice is superior to any other type of justice and
righteousness you might be able to find. God's justice, God's
love, verse seven now, cannot be matched. It's higher than
the heavens, verse five. His righteousness cannot be moved.
It's like a mountain. His justice cannot be measured.
It's deeper than the deepest part of the earth. And it's on these attributes,
that his creatures depend. As it says in verse six, you
preserve man and beast. And so the right response to
this kind of love, to this kind of faithfulness and righteousness
and justice is in verse seven. How precious is your love, oh
God. And when the ancient reader would
hear those words or read those words, he would immediately think
of value. Something that is precious, valuable. It's frequently described, the
word is used frequently in the Old Testament to describe wisdom,
the value of wisdom. It's used to describe the beauty
of a princess. But most often, more than any
other description, it is used in reference to a costly, valuable
jewel, a stone. The Queen of Sheba brought precious
stones to Solomon. Ezekiel 28 verse 13 says, the
stones in the Garden of Eden were valuable, they were precious.
The emphasis of this term is on beauty, value, and something
that is rare. I'm sure you have something that
is valuable to you. Something that is precious to you. Perhaps
a book, a classic book, a first edition of a sort. Something
that is even pricey perhaps. Maybe a ring, a wedding ring
or a diamond ring that has been passed down from generation to
generation within your family. You can think of the story in
the gospels when Jesus speaks of a man who finds a diamond
in a field. bears it back in the field, sells
all that he has, buys that field in order to get the diamond.
Something that is valuable, something that is precious, you would be
willing to give up all for that. And it becomes something that
we do not want to part with. That's the idea in this verse.
How precious, how valuable is your love, oh God? How precious
is God's love to you? You're precious to God. You think
of Psalm 116 verse 15, precious in the sight of the Lord is the
death of the godly ones. You can think of Jesus standing
by the tomb of Lazarus weeping because he was his friend. That's
an expression, a physical manifestation of God's love for his creatures. that Jesus, who embodies God,
the character of God, wept when one of his friends passed away.
Even though he knew he was about to resurrect him, he still wept. It's not difficult to measure
your love for God. God loves you, we know that.
God treats us with value, we know that. But how do you measure
your love for God? Let me give you three ways. First
off, obedience to Jesus' word. John 14, 15, if you love me,
you will keep my commandments. John 14, 23, if anyone loves
me, he will keep my word. So obedience to the word of God
is an expression of your love for God and valuing that love. Secondly, loving others sacrificially.
In 1 John 3, verse 16 and 17, we read, we know love by this,
that he laid down his life for us and we ought to lay down our
lives for the brothers. But whoever has the world's goods
and sees his brother in need and closes his heart against
him, how does the love of God abide in that individual? Little
children, let us not love with word or with tongue, but indeed
in truth. Loving other people is an expression
of your love for God. And third, investing into other
people's spiritual growth. Think of John 21. After the crucifixion, after
the resurrection, right before the ascension, Jesus is spending
some time with his disciples by the Sea of Galilee, and he
looks at Peter and asks him three times the same question, do you
love me? And every single time, Peter says, yes, I love you. And every single time, Jesus
responds, tend my sheep, feed my sheep, shepherd my sheep.
In other words, the expression of love is to invest into the
people that God has brought into your life who are other believers. Shepherding, helping them become
sanctified into Christ-likeness. Are you investing into the spiritual
health, into the spiritual progress of those around you? Whatever
fellowship group you might be in, whatever Bible study you
might be in. Sunday night, a perfect time
for that kind of a practice. Investing into the people around
you. Well, in addition to investing
into other people, there's another way to express our value of God's
love, and that's in the second half of verse seven. The children
of man take refuge in the shadow of your wings. We find God's
love protective. It is powerful, verses five and
six. It is protective. Under the shadow
of your wings, we find refuge. It's a picture of a little bird
finding protection and safety under the wings of the mother
bird. You remember Jesus looking over
Jerusalem in Matthew 23 and saying, how often I have wanted to gather
you, to gather you as children, the way a hen gathers her chiclets
under her wings, and you were unwilling. This evening, Jesus offers the
same care, the same protection, the same security to every single
individual. If you do not have a relationship
with this Jesus, the one who offers this love, this protection,
don't leave tonight without bowing before Christ as the only Savior,
as the only God. who can give you this love, who
can extend this protection to you. God promises that He does not
withhold any good thing from those who walk uprightly in Psalm
84 verse 11. In Romans 8.1, God promises that we will never be
judged for our sin if you are in Christ Jesus. In other words,
there's spiritual security and there's physical protection and
security. God controls our lives. He protects
our lives in order to make sure that we are secure and protected
under his wings. So David looks at the image of
creation. and says when you look at creation
and you consider God's love, it is powerful, it is protective,
and then David transitions to a different image, to the image
of a temple, and then he says God's love is satisfying. God's love is satisfying. You see, if you run to God for
refuge, you will be satisfied in this God. And in verses 8
and 9, David speaks of the satisfying love of God. You drink their
fill of the abundance of your house. Your house, that's the
reference to the temple. You give them to drink of the
river of your delights. For with you is the fountain
of life. In your light we see light. And verse 8 literally
says, you give them fatness, in your house. And it's an image
of God as a host. God brings you into his house,
he welcomes you in, and he gives you the choicest meat. That's
the fatness reference in verse eight. It's the best meat that
was reserved specifically for God when sacrifices were offered. And with certain sacrifices,
like the sacrifice of Thanksgiving, the ones making the sacrifice
would be able to partake in this meat. God wants to set up a perfect
environment. You are his guest, and he will
treat you to the finest food. And then in verse nine, to the
finest water. He gives you of the fountain
of life. We know what it's like to host
people. We clean the house all of a sudden. We spent a lot of
time preparing for that event. We put in our effort into the
best meal we can possibly make. We value that time. We want to
be hospitable to our guests. That's the image here. God is
the host and we are his guests. And he offers this love and this
love satisfies. But David doesn't merely leave
it there. David wants to take the reader
deeper. And he wants to create even a greater image of satisfaction. For the ancient Israelite, the
place of perfection, bliss, tranquility, was the Garden of Eden. So what
this verse actually says in verse eight, this is the literal translation,
you give them to drink of the river of your Edens. He takes the word Eden and he
makes it plural. You think of Eden, it's a singular
place. It was perfect, it's blissful. That is the beginning of God's
relationship with man. God walked and talked with man.
There was protection, there was security, until sin entered. But David says, if you think
that is perfect bliss, perfect delight, perfect satisfaction
in Eden, think again. With God, there are rivers, rather
river of Now, this isn't the first reference to Eden. If you
think back to verse 5, he speaks of heavens. The heavens were
created in Genesis 1. He speaks of the great deep in
verse 6. That's Genesis 1 and 2. He speaks
of man and beast. Again, that is Genesis 1 and
2. Eden is mentioned here, and then light in verse 9. All those
terms refer the reader back to the Garden of Eden. A few weeks
ago, actually I think a few months ago, Paul Twiss spoke from the
book of Ecclesiastes. And he said how Solomon, in his
kingdom, attempted to recreate Eden. And by extension, we attempt
to create our own little Edens. We remember this perfection,
this bliss, this tranquility. We want that, we long for that,
and so we recreate our little gardens of Eden on a regular
basis. There was such an insightful comment into a text made by Paul. That's what David is doing here.
He says, you think perfection is Eden? Let me take you a step
further. God is the source of all perfection,
of all satisfaction. You as a believer, you're on
a journey. And you're moving away from the garden of Eden
to a more perfect, eternal place with God. But there is this proclivity,
this ambition to create our little gardens of Eden here. David says,
God is the one who can give you Edens. For with you, verse nine,
is the fountain of life. The most precious image for the
desert dweller would be fresh water. And so David focuses in
on this image. An individual who's walking through
the desert, David lived, in israel if you've been to israel it's
a big desert and at times david was in the desert escaping from
his enemies we don't really know when this psalm was written there's
no historical marker But we know that Israel is a desert. So for the desert dweller, living
water, which meant flowing water, there were pools that had stagnant
water, but the water that came from a source that had living
water, flowing water, that was the most precious and the best
of water. That's the water that was required
for ritual cleansing, for example. And so David says, you are the
fountain, constant, living, flowing water. You're the fountain of
life. And we can't help but think of
Jesus' conversation with the Samaritan woman. When He says
to her in John 4, everyone who drinks of this water will thirst
again, even if it's coming from the well of Jacob. But whoever
drinks of the water that I will give him will never thirst. But the water that I will give
him will become in him a well of water springing to eternal
life. Jesus is promising in that moment
the coming of the Holy Spirit. We see that from John 7, 37 through
39. This living water is the Holy
Spirit of whom we learn in the Word of God. So you can look
at the water of life in John 4 as the Word of God coming from
Jesus and the Holy Spirit that will be coming soon. Jesus is
not the water because he's the source of it. With a believer, God promises
permanent abiding presence of the Holy Spirit. And this is
our present experience. This ever-present living water
in our lives who keeps us sanctified, who moves us toward Christlikeness. Where is this water obtained?
Verse eight, in your house. In the temple. Access to the
Garden of Eden is prohibited. But man can find a relationship
with God, one like Adam had in the temple. Now for David, there
was no temple yet. So he's referring to the tabernacle
that was in Shiloh. His Solomon would build the temple.
And so during the Solomonic reign and then beyond into the United
Monarchy before the temple was destroyed, that is where God
met with man. Now, according to John, Jesus
is the mediator between God and man. According to Colossians
2, 3, he embodies all the attributes of God. But there's also a future
temple. And in a sense, we see a prophecy
of a future river of life. Look at Ezekiel chapter 47. Verse
one. Ezekiel 47, this is that future
millennial temple that has a similar imagery. Flowing river. Ezekiel 47, verse one. Then he brought me back to the
door of the house, and behold, water was flowing from underneath
the threshold of the house toward the east, for the house faced
east, and the water was flowing down from under. from the right
side of the house, from south of the altar. Now look down to
verse seven. Now when I had returned, behold,
on the bank of the river, there were many trees on the one side
and on the other. Verse eight, then he said to
me, these waters go out toward the eastern region and go down
into the Arabah. Then they go toward the sea,
being made to flow into the sea, and the water of the sea becomes
fresh. And verse nine. It will come
about that every living creature which swarms in every place where
the river goes will live. And there'll be very many fish
for these waters go there and the others become fresh. So everything
will live where the river goes. And verse 10, and fishermen will
stand beside it from En Gedi to En Eglayim. That's a reference
to the Dead Sea. Now, if you go to Israel right
now and you go to the Dead Sea, there's not a single fisherman
there. Because there are no fish in the Dead Sea. That's the idea. The temple of God, there's a
river flowing from that. And it's the image of life. It
infuses life to a sea that is dead. That's the prophetic image
that David draws here. This is David's promise to every
single individual who would find satisfaction in God. They will
partake in the water of life. They will feast on the choicest
meats, in verse 8. They'll be protected under the
shadow of God's wings. And this doesn't happen only
now, in the present. It extends into the millennial
kingdom, according to Ezekiel 47. But while we hear these promises,
we so often act like the people in Jeremiah 2.13. For my people have committed
two evils. They have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters,
to hew for themselves cisterns, broken cisterns that can hold
no water." It's an illustration of a foolish desert dweller.
He finds a spring of water. And instead of taking water from
the spring, he looks around and finds broken pottery. And he
looks through this pottery, hoping to find some water. We do that. We have God as the source of
all satisfaction and a God of all living water. And yet, we
look through the broken pottery in our lives that surrounds us
in this world, hoping to be satisfied. The rebuke that God extends to
His people is true of us as well. We do not always go to God as
the fountain of living water. Grace Church, let's not forget
that God is the fountain of living water, the one who truly satisfies. Well, David continues in verse
nine, and after talking about this water of life, he now focuses
on light. In your light, we see light. Psalm 27, verse one says, the
Lord is my light. Psalm 119, 105 says, the word
of God is light. So it could be a reference to
God, it could be a reference to his word. It's unclear in this
specific verse, but I would say, in your light, reference to the
word of God, we see light, we see God, the character of God. God's word opens our eyes to
see God. In Isaiah 42, verse six, Isaiah
prophesies that the Messiah will come and he'll be a light to
the nations. And when Jesus shows up, and
you read in John chapter one, verse four, this is what it says. In him was life, a reference
to the first part of verse 9. And the life was the light of
man, a reference to the second part of verse 9. You see, verse
9 becomes true in John 1, 4 in reference to Jesus Christ. He
is the light and he is the life. And on multiple occasions in
the gospel of John, Jesus declares, I am the light of the world.
He who believes in me will not remain in darkness. He will walk
in the light of the day. Jesus is that path to God. And you hear the prayer of the
sons of Korah in Psalm 43 verse three. You can just flip there
just to the right a couple Psalms. Psalm 43 verse three, oh send
your light and your truth, let them lead me, let them bring
me to your holy hill, to your dwelling place. And that comes
true in Christ. God sent his light. And Jesus
Christ brings us to God, to the dwelling place of God. And then
verse four of Psalm 43, that's the response. Then I will go
to the altar of God. To God, my exceeding joy, I will,
upon the liar, praise you, O God, my God. This is our response
to the gospel of Jesus Christ. That God sent his light, We have
been enlightened spiritually speaking, we now see the truth
about ourselves, we see the truth about God, and we have repented
and we have begun to follow Jesus Christ. We're no longer like
the blind man stumbling through darkness, not even with a white
cane, groping, looking for something to get through this darkness.
We see, we have the light of day in our lives. If you're not a believer, I ask
you again, have you been listening to the whispers of sin in your
life? Or have you been listening to
the voice of God who calls you to the light, who offers you
life and satisfaction? If you acknowledge that you have
sinned, And you bring those sins to Christ, you lay them at His
feet. You confess your sins that you have been that individual
in verses 1-4. If you confess your sins, He
is faithful and just to forgive us of every iniquity. That's
1 John 1. That's an invitation for you
who may not be in Christ. Christ is eager to forgive. And
so in verse 10, we see of Psalm 36, David says, oh, continue
your love to those who know you. You see, this love is reserved.
It's restricted for those who know God. The very last words
of Jesus before he was crucified. In John chapter 17, the very
last two verses of that chapter, 25 and 26, Jesus is praying to
the Father, and he has this request on behalf of every disciple who
would ever believe. And he says this, O righteous
Father, although the world has not known you, yet I have known
you, and these have known that you sent me. And I have made
your name known to them, and I will make it known to them,
so that the love with which you loved Me may be in them, and
I in them." Jesus appeals to the knowledge of God as the medium
or as the reason why God should extend the same level of love
that He extends to Jesus to us. So David and then Jesus in John
17 speak of the same thing. God's love is continued to those
who know God. Do you know God? If you want
to experience this love, you must know God. Well, David transitions
from this beautiful description of the Garden of Eden, but truly
it is the God of this universe who is the true delight. He transitions
from the picture of God as a host, God is light, God is the fountain
of life. And he now focuses back on the
wicked. And in this final statement,
recorded in the last two verses, we see the third and final component. of how we can delight in God.
We recognize the corrupting influence of sin, we reflect on the satisfying
love of God, and we remember the devastating judgment for
sin. Remember the devastating judgment
for sin. We are in a constant battle.
We have distractions and we have detractors in our Christian life. And David prays in verse 11,
let not the foot of the proud come upon me. Let not the hand
of the wicked drive me away. Most likely David here is thinking
as a shepherd. a shepherd would bring his sheep
to a water source. And they would drink until another
shepherd would come and drive them away from that water source.
We see that happen in Exodus 2 when Moses had to protect the
daughters of the priest of Midian against shepherds who were driving
away their livestock from the water source. That was happening
in Genesis 13 between Lot and Abraham and their shepherds.
David is a shepherd. He's probably thinking, I don't
want anyone to drive me away from the true fountain of life. God. Why? Because they have no fear
of God in verse one, because they're proud in verse 11, and
in verse 12, because they will be judged. They will be thrust
down in the second half of verse 12, and they will not rise up. David is writing as a prophet.
He looks into the future, into the final judgment, and he says,
they will be judged. And it's a violent picture. It's
a picture of a wall collapsing. during a storming of a city.
It is violent destruction. And look, notice it says, they
will be thrust down. Somebody else is judging them.
That someone else is Jesus Christ, according to John chapter five,
verse 22. He is the only judge. God has
given all judgment to Jesus Christ. This is the end of the wicked.
Their end is certain judgment. Therefore, do not be distracted
by sin. lest that be your future judgment. Do not be attracted by those
who distract you from following Christ. They will be judged. In the next Psalm, Psalm 37,
David says, so why do they prosper then if they will be judged?
Why are they continually prospering? And David says, look at their
lives from an eternal perspective. They will be eternally doomed. Well, that is the certain future
of the unbeliever. What is the certain future of
the believer? Well, we get that in the last book, in the last
chapter of the Bible. Revelation chapter 22. John, a thousand years after
David, takes the same three images, water, life, and light. Almost picking up where David
left off. and describes a scene when God
will welcome every single believer into His dwelling place. And
the same language appears here. You see Revelation 22 beginning
in verse 1. Then He showed me a river of
the water of life. clear as crystal coming from
the throne of God and of the Lamb in the middle of its street.
On either side of the river was the tree of life bearing twelve
kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit every month, and the leaves
of the tree were for the healing of the nations. There will no
longer be any curse, and the throne of God and of the Lamb
will be in it. and His bondservants will serve Him. They will see
His face, and His name will be on their foreheads. And there
will no longer be any night, and they will not have need for
the light of a lamp, nor the light of the sun, because the
Lord God will illumine them. They will reign forever and ever."
This is the eternal, Edenic state of every single believer. That's
where we're headed. A place with light, life, and
water. The little foretaste we've gotten
in our Christian walk of being satisfied with God will be realized
permanently and eternally and perfectly in this place, the
new Jerusalem, in the eternal kingdom of God. That's the end
of our journey. That is the certain end of our
journey. So when we're tempted to not
find satisfaction in God alone, remember this song. Remember what sin will do. It's
devastating consequences. It's corrupting influence. But
in the middle of that, remember the satisfying love of God that
should propel you forward. And let me leave you with Jonathan
Edwards' words In this regard, the enjoyment of God is the only
happiness with which our souls can be satisfied. To go to heaven
fully to enjoy God is infinitely better than the most pleasant
accommodations here. These are but shadows, but the
enjoyment of God is the substance. These are but scattered beams. God is the sun. These are but
streams. God is the fountain. Let's pray. God, you are the fountain of
life. Many of us here have come to you, and we're so grateful
that you have given us life. We are possessors of eternal
life. We have been satisfied with you. We find our delight in you. But
we do ask that you would protect us, protect us from anything
that may distract us from following you faithfully, from seeking
satisfaction elsewhere. Help us to remember this song,
David's words, that you are the all-satisfying God. We pray this
to you, our amazing creator, to you, our majestic savior,
to you, the Holy Spirit, who keeps us in a relationship with
Christ and the Father. Amen.