All right, if you would open
your Bibles with me to Psalm 122 Psalm 122 you may want to
mark that place in a few moments brother Dan's gonna read Psalm
121 for us As you're turning I'll make this announcement,
I'd really don't have very much information on it, but last I
Either Sunday evening or Monday, Darwin Pruitt had a stroke. Apparently
it was fairly significant and he's out of the hospital now.
I'm assuming he went to a rehab facility. I don't know, but don't
know the details there. We wanted to remember him in
prayer. Psalm 122. I was glad when they said unto
me, let us go into the house of the Lord. Our feet shall stand
within thy gates, O Jerusalem. Jerusalem is builded as a city
that is compact together. Whither the tribes go up, the
tribes of the Lord, unto the testimony of Israel, to give
thanks unto the name of the Lord. For there are set thrones of
judgment, the thrones of the house of David. Pray for the
peace of Jerusalem. They shall prosper that love
thee. Peace be within thy walls and prosperity within thy palaces. For my brethren and companions
sake, I will now say, peace be within thee. Because of the house
of the Lord our God, I will seek thy good. Thank God for his word. Let's stand together as Sean
leads us in singing our call to worship. to stand before thy face. Thy spirit must the work perform,
for it is all of grace. In Christ's obedience glow, and
wash me in his blood. I lift my head with joy among
the sons of God. To Thou my sins remove, Thy sovereign
love make known, The Spirit of my mind renew, And save me in
Thy Son. Let me attest thy power, let
me thy goodness prove, till my full soul can hold no more of
everlasting love. Now turn in your hymnal to song
number 118. 118, When I Survey the Wondrous Cross. When I survey
the wondrous cross, On which the Prince of Glory
died. By richest gain I count but loss
and poor contentment. save in the death of Christ my
God. All the vain things that charm
me most, I sacrifice them to From his head, his hands, his
feet, sorrow and love flow mingled down. Did e'er such love and
song which the crown were the whole
realm of nature mine that were a present far too small love
so amazing ? Demands my soul, my life, my
all ? Welcome back, if you will, to
the Book of Psalms. As Frank said, he's asked me
to read Psalm 121 I will lift up mine eyes unto
the hills, from whence cometh my help. My help cometh from
the Lord, which made heaven and earth. He will not suffer thy
foot to be moved. He that keepeth thee will not
slumber. Behold, he that keepeth Israel
shall neither slumber nor sleep. The Lord is thy keeper. The Lord
is thy shade upon thy right hand. The sun shall not smite thee
by day, nor the moon by night. The Lord shall preserve thee
from all evil. He shall preserve thy soul. The
Lord shall preserve thy going out and thy coming in from this
time forth and even forevermore. May the Lord bless his word.
Let's pray. Our holy, righteous Heavenly
Father, we thank you for your word. Lord, we thank you for
the comfort in times of trial that you've given us through
your word. Father, we thank you that in the Lord Jesus Christ,
was made man, and even more, was made sin, that we might become
the righteousness of Christ in him, has allowed us to come before
your throne of mercy, crying, Abba, Father. You've made us Israel. that we
might have power with thee to cry for mercy from our Father.
Father, we pray that you would bless this service here this
morning. Lord, leave us not alone. Don't let us meet here in vain,
Father, but give a message for the hearts of your people to
our pastor. Give him liberty. Lord, feed
your sheep. We know that if you don't bless,
Lord, that we meet in vain, but we pray that it might be your
will to bless us, to send your spirit to be among us, to anoint
the hearts of your children, to give us hearing ears, Lord,
and receiving hearts. Father, what we pray for this
local congregation, Lord, we pray wherever men this morning
stand to proclaim the name of our righteous Lord Jesus Christ.
Father, bring your sheep home. Feed your sheep. Father, we pray
especially for the young people in our congregation, Lord, Have
mercy on their souls. If thy will, you can make them
whole. And what we pray for them, we
pray for each of us. Lord, continue to regenerate. Continue
to cause us to look to Christ. To let go of this world gradually
day by day. and cling more and more to Christ,
who is the name above every name. Father, we pray that you would
have mercy on those who are going through difficult trials. Lord,
we know every trial is appointed by thee, and that it will accomplish
your will. We pray that it be your will
for those who aren't able to be here this morning to return
them to health and strength and give them the ability to come
and worship with us. Wherever, Lord, we think of Pastor
Pruitt, we pray for that congregation, pray for him. Lord, bless. Have mercy. Lord, we ask all these things
knowing that thou art able and thou will be done for the mercy
of our souls, for the good of our souls, and for the glory
of our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. Keep your Bibles open to Psalm
121. That's going to be our text this morning. I've titled the
message, Looking to Christ. Whenever our Lord sees fit to lay me low,
this is one of the passages that always come to my mind. As I
was reading it this week, I felt led to preach on it. I pray it'll be a blessing to
you as it was to me. Now, this psalm is a psalm of
degrees. when the people traveled up to
Jerusalem for the annual feast, they would sing these psalms
of degrees that go up, up, up, up, up, up, up in glory the further
they went along. In our psalm this morning, the
traveler is going up, but right now he's way down in the valley,
and he's looking up at the mountains for help, looking up to the mountains. Now what does he see there? What
is it that we spiritually see there. He says in verse one,
I will lift up mine eyes into the hills from whence cometh
my help. When I was a boy, I liked Westerns
and baseball. Those are the two things I love
the most in this world, Westerns and baseball. So when David says,
I'll lift up mine eyes to the hills, I get a picture in my
mind of soldiers or cowboys, you know, we're in a gunfight
and they're outnumbered. The battle doesn't look good,
but they keep looking to the hills. Did the fellow they sent
after help, is he bringing the calvary? Is the calvary getting
ready to ride over the hill and help me? Coming to my rescue? They're looking to the hills
for help. David must have had something like that in mind,
I think. Because he writes this psalm
in the beginning of it. Now he's in trouble. He's in
trouble. He's thinking about a place of
safety. He's thinking about a place of refuge, a good refuge up in
the mountains. David frequently resorted to
finding refuges up in the mountains where he could hide and be safe.
And spiritually, it didn't have what we need. We need a place
of safety. We need a place of refuge. Where can I look when I'm in
trouble? I mean, I'm in trouble. Like
Peter going down into the waters. What could he do? Lord, save
me. He had one place to look. He
had one hope. Where can I look when I'm in trouble? I need safety
and a refuge for my soul. Where can I look when I need
comfort and peace for my heart? This where I look is so important
because salvation's in a look, isn't it? The cry of the gospel
is look and live. look and live. But now where
do I look? Where do I look? I can look in
some right places and I can look at some wrong places. Where do
I look? Well, David says he's looking
to the hills, to the mountains. And I thought of three main mountains
that we read about in scripture. First is Mount Sinai, where God
gave the law. You know, in scripture, anytime
you read about Sinai, it always represents the law. Now don't
look to the law. God did not give the law as something
that you could do to earn his favor and earn a righteousness.
Don't look to the law. Don't look to that mountain.
You're not going to find any help there. You're not going
to find any safety there. You're not going to find a refuge
there. You'll find no life there because the law of God requires
perfection. And unless you can be perfect,
the law offers you no hope, nothing. The law has nothing but condemnation
and death for anybody who's even violated one of God's laws. It
says we're guilty of it all. Don't look there. Don't look
to that mountain, to the law. The second mountain I thought
of is Mount Calvary, where Christ was crucified. Oh, now you can
look there. You can look there. Look to Mount
Calvary. Look to the one crucified on
Mount Calvary. and be saved. Look to Him and
live. When you look to Christ crucified,
you're trusting Him. Look to Christ crucified as all
of your salvation, as all of your justification, as all of
your sacrifice for sin. Look to Christ. Trust Him as
the one and only reason the Holy God would accept you. Look to
Him. Look to the blood. Look to the
blood of Christ. to cleanse you from all of your
sin. Don't try to clean yourself up. If you're trying to clean
yourself up and make yourself a little better before you come
to Christ, you know what you're doing? You're looking at Mount Sinai.
Don't look at Mount Sinai. Look to Christ. Look to the blood
of Christ to cleanse you from all of your sin. Look to Christ
crucified to be everything that God requires of you. Look to
him. And then keep looking. You know, we don't look to Christ
and then move on to looking at something else, do we? No, look
to Christ and keep looking to him. The writer of the Hebrews
said to whom looking, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher
of our faith, looking. Peter said to whom coming. We
don't come to Christ once, we're continually coming to him. We
don't look to Christ once, we continually look to him and trust
him. Always be looking to Jesus. He's the author and finisher
of our faith. He's the beginning and the ending of the whole thing.
Look to Christ. And the third mountain I thought
of in scripture is Mount Zion. Mount Zion represents the church. It's Jerusalem that David talked
about in Psalm 122. It's the picture of the church. Mount Zion, God's church, that's
where he dwells with his people. The Lord Jesus Christ is with
his people right now in this hour. Now that's a miraculous statement,
isn't it? But he promised he'd be here. He's here right now.
Oh, what a blessing it is to be where God dwells with his
people. Mount Zion, that's where Christ
is preached. Do you want salvation for your
soul? Look to the place where Christ is preached. Do you need
comfort for your soul? Have you been dragging yourself
through this wilderness, this world all this week and you need
some comfort and refreshing for your soul? Come to the place
where Mount Zion, where Christ is preached. He's your refreshing,
he'll comfort your soul. Look to him, look to this place
where Christ is preached. That's where God meets with his
people. That's where God speaks to his people in peace. Oh, look
to him. Now those are the three prominent
mountains in scripture. Now, what do we see when we look
to those mountains? We look for a picture of Christ. What do we see in those mountains? What do you see when you look
to Christ? When you look into Christ now,
what do you see? Let me give you four things.
Number one, when we look to Christ, we see our help. David says in
verse one, I will lift up mine eyes into the hills, for whence
cometh my help? Like I said a minute ago, you've
got to look to Christ if you want help. If you look to Mount
Sinai, you're not going to find any help at all. The law's not
going to give you any help. The only thing the law can do,
suppose for the sake of argument, we know it's not true, but suppose
for the sake of argument, we'd say nobody here has sinned yet. You know what the law would tell
you to do? Keep obeying. The law would just
give you more and more and more commandments for you to keep.
The other thing that the law can do is say we're guilty. And
for those of us who have done nothing but sin, the only thing
the law can say to us is you're guilty. The law can't give you
the remedy for sin. The law can't forgive your sin.
The law can only say you're guilty. But if a sinner needs help, I
can tell you where to look. Look to Mount Calvary. The sacrifice
of Christ is the only hope we have that our sin be forgiven. Look to the blood of the Lord
Jesus Christ that's shed on Calvary's tree. You know what you'll find
there in that blood? Your sin's all been blotted out.
God doesn't see it anymore. Now don't be confused about this
word help. You know, we only need help doing
what we cannot do for ourselves. The help we're talking about
is not like, now I've done some of the things, if you can just
come over here and help me do the part I can't do, the job
will be done. Brother Marvin Stoniker told
this story one time. Marvin's a painter, many of you
know that. And when he would go down to
Mexico, used to be, when he'd go down there every year, he'd
paint a picture of one of the groovers. And he was painting
a picture one day, and Cody asked him, he said, can I help? And
Marvin said, no. He said, but I really want to
help. And he just kept begging him and begging. He said, let
me put a dot. Marvin said, OK. And so he got the brush, and
he dipped the brush in the paint to get just the right amount
of paint on that. But he didn't let Cody stick
the paint in the brush, or in the brush in the paint. Marvin did that. And he told
him, hold it just like this, and just touch it right there.
And Cody did. He was so proud of himself. This
is a good-sized picture. Marvin finished the picture,
and Cody says, look at the picture Marvin and I did. That's not the kind of help we're
talking about. The kind of help we're talking about is when I
need somebody to do it all for me. That's what I need. That's what I need. When I find
I'm incapable, of doing anything spiritually at all. I'm incapable
of producing any righteousness. I'm incapable of producing any
goodness, any holiness. I'm incapable of producing anything
that God is pleased with that I'll say, I need help. I need
Christ, my helper, to come and do all the work of salvation
for me. And you know, that's what he
did. He came to finish all of the salvation of all of His people. And you know how you can find
that out? Look to Mount Calvary. What did He cry? It is finished. That's what He came to do, to
finish the salvation of His people. Now you look to Christ and you
trust Him to be everything the Father requires of you and you'll
have salvation for yourself. Then, if you want to find out
about this savior, you want to find out about this helper, you
look to Mount Zion, God's church. The gospel of Christ is preached
there. You and me take that for granted. And we do. I say that to my shame
and yours. We take it for granted. Sean,
as long as we've been alive, I mean as long as we've been
alive, we've had a place to come hear the gospel. Don't take it for granted. I
beg of you, don't take it for granted. When the gospel's being
preached, there's help for your soul. It's not just a religious
habit that we do. I feel better on Sunday afternoon
because I sacrificed, woke up early to go to church Sunday
morning. There's help for your soul in the gospel that's preached
here. Every single message that I prepare,
I have two goals, just two. One, our Savior be glorified
in his truth as high as he can possibly be glorified. And two,
that there'll be a blessing for your soul in it. This is where
you find it. When Christ is preached, the
souls of God's sheep are fed. They're fed the green pastures
of his word. When Christ is preached, God's little children are fed
the children's bread. The children's bread. That sounds
better and sweeter and Softer and more enjoyable than
a dull bread, doesn't it? This is the children's bread.
The children's bread. This is where God's sheep are
strengthened. How in this world can you make
it through the rest of this week? I need to be strengthened. My
spirit needs to be strengthened. When Christ is preached, the
dry, parched souls of God's sheep, they're refreshed by Christ the
living water. Give me another drink. The souls
of God's sheep that have been beat down. Beat down by this
life. Beat down by our own sin. Beat
down by the trials that God sends us. We're comforted. We're comforted. How many times
have you been in a trial and you think, I'm going to quit. There's no point going on. I
can't go on. And you hear the Gospel preached. And you think,
that's it. It might not last through tomorrow,
and it probably won't, but for that moment, doesn't it strengthen
you? And you put line upon line upon line upon line, precept
upon precept upon precept upon precept. Pretty soon, you'll
have help for your soul. You'll have comfort for your
soul. It's by being where Christ is preached. When Christ is preached,
I'm reminded Oh yeah, keep looking to him. Keep looking to him. He's my shield. He's my defense. He's my sustainer. Oh, I'm looking
at Christ. All's well, all's well. He's your helper. Then number
two, when you look to Christ, you'll see your creator. Verse
two says, my help cometh from the Lord, which made heaven and
earth. Now our God is the creator. He
didn't take something that was already there and fashion it
into something that we see. God spoke everything into existence. Everything that you see, God
spoke it into existence from nothing. From nothing. God said, let this globe appear,
and it appeared. Let the water be separated, and the dry land
appear, and it appeared. Let the grass appear, and the
animals appear, and the sun appear, and the moons, and the stars,
and they appear. I mean, they appeared from nothing.
Just by speaking. God did that. I mean, what power
is it to be able to create a universe from thin air, from thin air? That's the power of God. Our
helper, and we look to Christ, we see our helper. Well, can
he really help me? If he's got the power of the
creator, he can't. Oh, he can, hell, he's got the
power. Not only did our God have the power to create all the physical
universe from nothing. He also has the power to rule
everything in it. Since he created it, he does
rule everything in it. He's sovereign over everything
in it. So everything in God's creation,
everything, always happens according to his will. Always. Always. Because he's the ruler
of it. And there's no one can resist
his power. Now, David, he talked about the hill of the Lord, this
mountain that we're looking to. He talked about as being the
throne of God. Look back at Psalm 24. Psalm 24. Verse one. The earth is the Lord's and the
fullness thereof, the world and they that dwell therein. It all
belongs to him because he created it. For he hath founded it upon
the seas and established it on the floods. Who shall ascend
into the hill of the Lord? Or who shall stand in his holy
place? Now that hill of the Lord that
David's talking about there is the throne of God in heaven. That's where Christ sits on the
throne. He's the creator on the throne of heaven. And from his
throne, Almighty God rules everything that happens in his creation.
He rules it all. He ordains it all to happen just
the way it happens so that he can work everything together
for good. Everything God does in his creation
is for this purpose, this one purpose, to glorify his son in
the salvation of his people and the glorification of His people. God's working every event that's
happening in our world today to bring His people to faith
in Christ and to ultimately bring them to be with Christ in bodily
presence. Now that's the purpose of the
Creator. Is anything going to stop it? Why, of course not. That's just silly. What enemy
can harm our souls? Not one. Because our Creator,
He's more powerful than every enemy. Our Creator has the power
to overcome our worst enemy. My enemies out there are nothing
compared to the enemy in here. Our Creator has the power to
overcome the dead sin nature of His people so that we believe
on Him. So that He delivers His people
from the power of sin. Now what's the power of sin?
The power of sin is what stops us from believing on Christ.
It stops us from looking to Christ. It stops us from trusting Christ.
The nature of the flesh will not do it. It's not subject to
the law of God, neither indeed can it be. So God overcomes that
old, wicked nature by causing a new nature to be born in us.
The Creator does that by this, look at 2 Corinthians 4. God uses that same power that
he used to speak the world into existence, to speak new life
into the hearts of his people. Galatians 4 verse 6, he creates
a brand new man there. For God, who commanded the light
to shine out of darkness, has shined in our hearts to give
the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face
of Jesus Christ. And that life that God creates
in the hearts of his people, it's a brand new nature. It can
never sin. It will never sin. It will always
trust Christ. It's eternal life. It's eternal
life. Now life that can't be lost,
that's pretty helpful, isn't it? But where do we find it? By looking to Christ. By looking
to our creator has the power to create that life in us. Lord,
I'm dead. Would you create that power,
life in me? Give me life. All right, number three, look
to Christ and we'll see our keeper. Verse three in Psalm 121. He
will not suffer thy foot to be moved. He that keepeth thee will
not slumber. Behold, he that keepeth Israel
shall neither slumber nor sleep. Now the Lord keeps his people.
says here, not suffer thy foot to be moved. He keeps his people
by establishing our feet on the rock. Christ Jesus. Now, if God
establishes your feet on Christ, you're not going to slip off
of him. Oh, you may stumble and stagger flail around, but you
can't fall off the rock. If your feet are founded on the
rock. Now, we're gonna make a big show of flailing around, but
the believer will not depart from Christ. He will not do it.
That's why David said in Psalm 62, he only is my rock and my
salvation. He is my defense. I shall not
be moved. David, pretty confident in yourself
there that you won't be moved, aren't you? I mean, it looks
like you're moved by the slightest little thing all the time. I
won't be moved because my rock won't be moved. My mountain won't
be moved. My savior won't be moved. I won't
be moved because my keeper will not allow me to be removed from
Christ. I'm going to stumble. I'm going
to embarrass myself, but I won't be moved away from Christ because
I'm anchored on Christ. who's already in the veil. He's
already behind the veil. He's already seated in heavenly
places. He's seated on the throne of
glory. And if you're anchored to him, here you are sitting
in this body of flesh and these seats, but you're anchored to
heaven. You're anchored to the savior
in heaven. Now you think of that. If you're
anchored to the savior in heaven, what's the possibility you'll
go to hell? You're already anchored in heaven.
And our keeper is on watch all the time. He never slumbers or
sleeps. He can't be taken by surprise.
The enemy can't come in and snatch us away while our keeper is asleep
or while he's busy looking somewhere else. His eye is on his children
and he watches. and his eyes never off of him.
He watches when we can't watch. Oh, aren't you thankful for that?
He watches when we can't watch. Maybe I'm too spiritually dull
and I can't watch. He watches. Maybe I fall asleep
and I had no idea what's going on around I mean, none whatsoever. I'll get up in the morning sometime,
Janet said, oh, I was up seven, eight times last night. Did I
keep you awake? Never even knew it. I mean, never
even knew you were out of bed. Never. Dead to the world. Our
keeper's watching. He sees. And that's all that matters.
Thou, Lord, seest me. Oh, if he'll see me, if he'll
see me in mercy and grace, he'll see me as one of his dear children. He'll keep me. He'll keep me.
Verse five says, the Lord is thy keeper. The Lord is thy shade
upon thy right hand. The sun shall not smite thee
by day nor the moon by night. You know what a blessing it is
to have the Lord be our keeper. He calls his people, his peculiar
treasure, his gemstones, The Lord keeps his people better
than a rich man keeps his treasure. He keeps them. We are safer in
the Lord's hand, under his watchful eye, than gold is in the safe
at Fort Knox. It really is. The Lord's our
keeper. And he's the great shepherd of
the sheep. His eye is always on the sheep. And boy, isn't
that a good thing? Because sheep are just dumb. I mean, that's just all there
is to it. They'll wander off a cliff. I mean, just sure shooting.
They'll wander off a cliff. They'll fall into a ditch. They'll
wander into a den of lions. But his eye is always on his
sheep. His rod and his staff keeps him near him. His eye is
always on the wolf and on the bear. He knows where they're
at. So they can't come take one of his father's sheep. But our
keeper doesn't just watch over his sheep. He's also the shield. the protector of his sheep. Our
keeper doesn't just point out, now listen sheep, there's some
shade over there. If you wanna go lay in the shade,
get some rest from the heat of the day here, then we'll go have
a drink and look for some cool grass later. There's some shade
if you wanna go over there, find some rest. Our keeper is the
shade. He's that great rock in a weary
land. He's the one that provides shade
for his people to rest in. And He doesn't invite them to
do it, He makes them. He makes them lie down and rest
in His shade. And oh, we need that. We need
that. This world is not our home. And
aren't you glad? This world is a hot, dry, weary
desert that God's sheep are forced to walk through. There's the
heat of sin, other people's sin. Again, the worst heat, the worst
problem is my sin. The heat of hatred. I don't care
who you are. You don't want to be hated. Everybody
wants to be liked. You don't want to be hated. That's a heat
you got up there. There's a heat of trials. There's
a heat of suffering. I mean, it's just exhausting,
isn't it? It's exhausting. And God gives his people shade
to rest in, his shade, so we don't get heat exhaustion. Now,
come rest. Come rest. Why wouldn't you? Our Redeemer has already shielded
His people from the worst, hadn't He? From the fire of God's wrath
against the sin of His people, Christ stood as the shield. He
bore the sin of His people, and He took all that fiery heat of
His Father's wrath and shielded His people from every single
drop of it. If Christ died for you, the Father
has no fury left in Him for you. You think of that. He had no
fury left in him. If Christ can shield you from
the Holy Father's wrath against sin, you reckon he can shield
you from this world too? Come rest in his shade. David
says he won't let the sun smite you by day, and he won't let
the moon smite you by night. Now the moon's a powerful force.
The moon moves the oceans. And when there's a full moon,
people act funny. But you know, in the part of
the world where David lived, people can get what you call
a moon stroke. It can cause temporary paralysis to your face or something.
It can cause temporary blindness. Brian, there's troubles I didn't
even know I had to worry about. I knew I got to worry about the
sun. I got to have sunscreen and drink plenty of fluids and
have some shade and protection. I didn't know how to be protected
from the moon, too. I mean, there's dangers out there
I know nothing about. I didn't even have to worry about
that one. But our keeper knows. Our keeper
knows. And that's all that matters.
He rules over those two great lights, the sun to rule by day
and the moon to rule by night. And his people are kept safe
day and night because who our keeper is. Now quit trying to
keep yourself and just snuggle up to Christ. Snuggle up to him,
ask him to keep you. And then last, when we look to
Christ, we see our preserver. Verse seven, the Lord shall preserve
thee from all evil. He shall preserve thy soul. Now
the Lord preserves his people from all evil, and that's evil
from without, and again, more importantly, the evil from within.
I fear the evil from within more than anything, because left unchecked,
it's the evil from within, it's my own sin that will make me
quit trusting Christ, will make me leave Christ, will make me
become a religious hypocrite, will leave me apostate. But the
Lord preserves his people from their own sin by taking their
sin away from him, from them, putting it into his own body
on the tree and making them the righteousness of God in him.
Our Savior traded his righteousness for the sin of his people and
made them righteous. He preserved them because He
left them with no sin. Where there's no sin, you can't
die. Where there's no sin, you can't spoil. God's elect are
preserved from condemnation because Christ, our substitute, was already
condemned for us. He already paid the price for
the sin of His people. He preserves His people. He keeps
them from spoiling. When we're washed in the blood
of Christ, how much sin is cleansed away? Scripture says all of it. All of it's cleansed away. If
it's all cleansed away, I can't spoil. My soul can't spoil. There's still so much sin left
in his flesh that it's all the flesh is. It'll decay, it'll
spoil, it'll rot, it'll stink, but my soul won't. Because Christ
has preserved it in his blood. The Lord preserves his people
from falling away from him. He keeps his people from falling
away because he's the keeper who's established our feet upon
the rock. But he also preserves his people by giving us a nature
that believes Christ and can't not believe Christ. It can't
quit believing on Christ. It won't look away from Christ.
It won't start trusting in the arm of the flesh. The Lord preserves
his people. Now this is very important because
David points it out here. He'll preserve thy soul, thy
soul. He'll preserve the souls of his
people. Don't take this to mean that the Lord's going to preserve
you now from your body, from every bodily ailment and problem
and difficulty in this life because he won't do it. The effect of
sin is in our flesh and we're going to suffer the effect of
it. But our souls, the souls of God's people are preserved.
He's preserved the souls of his people so sin does not have dominion
over us. So that our soul cannot be lost.
We can't quit believing on Christ. He preserves his people from
the infection of error. Oh, I guard this pulpit so carefully. And what you hear here so carefully
that there be no error in it because error will lead us to
trust something besides Christ alone. And the scary thing is
we all know we'd fall for a lie, hook, line, and sinker, but God
preserves us from it. He won't let us do it. So our
soul's not lost. He preserves us from the way
of this world. You know, we're in this world,
but we don't have to be of it. We don't have to be acting like
it. The Lord preserves his people from the way of this world. He
preserves us from the way of Cain, from having an outward
show of religion without any blood. without any sacrifice,
without any righteousness. The Lord preserves our soul. If the Lord's preserving your
soul at the top of your lungs, can't you say it's well with
my soul? It's well with my soul. And our preserver is the one
who directs all of our steps. Verse eight, The Lord shall preserve
thy going out and thy coming in from this time forth even
forevermore. The Lord preserves all of our
going out and all of our coming in. Tomorrow morning when you
get up, go off to work, when you go up and go off to school, the Lord's directing you when
you go out and the Lord's directing you to come back home in the
evening. The Lord's the one who preserves us when we leave here
this morning. We're going to go back out into
the world. I always hate that, don't you? I hate leaving here
and going down them steps and just back out into the world.
The Lord's going to preserve us when we go out, and he'll
preserve you when you come back Wednesday night, too. The Lord
preserves all the comings and goings of his people, all of
them. You know, we got to go out into
the world, handle our responsibilities in the world, and the Lord will
help you. He'll direct you. But then He's going to direct
us too. We come back seeking manna for our souls. We come
back here seeking the business of our souls, to feed on Christ,
to hear of Him. The Lord will direct you for
that. He's supervising all of our comings and all of our goings.
But I'm sure of this, that primarily, David here is speaking about
the last time that we go out and come in. When it's time for
us to die and leave this world, the Lord is going to preserve
thy goings out and thy coming in. The Lord is going to preserve
you going out of this world. He's going to preserve you. You
know how well He's going to preserve you? He's going to preserve you
going out of this world into the next so well that you'll
go straight into the presence of Christ the Savior and look
on Him face to face. That's the thing about the new
birth. The believer born again is forced
to live the rest of his life to natures, a nature of sin. A nature of wickedness, a nature
of unbelief, a nature of the flesh. You just cannot paint
it ugly enough. But the believer also has a nature
of holiness and righteousness. It's the nature of Christ. It's
the partakers of the divine nature. You can't paint that glorious
enough, can you? You can't paint one black enough and low enough.
You can't paint the other one high enough and glorious enough.
Here's how perfect that new nature is. At the moment this flesh
dies, without any probationary period, without any other fixing
up, without any other changing, the new man leaves this clay
prison and goes straight into the presence of God Almighty
accepted. Welcome. I've had you sit here
prepared from all of eternity. Your name's right on it. How I pray that the Lord will
keep us looking to Him. and nowhere else. We find everything
we need for our souls in Him, won't we? All right. Lord bless
you. Let's bow together. Our Father, how we thank you
for this precious portion of your word that you've preserved
for us to read and study, to have our hearts encouraged, to
look to Christ, to look to Him, to keep looking Him, to trust
Him, to keep trusting Him as our all and in all. Father, how
can we thank you? How can we thank you for your
mercy and your grace? How can we thank you for the
gospel of your son that brings life to the hearts of dead sinners,
that feeds your people, that instructs us, that points us?
Father, how we thank you. How we thank you for a savior
who will never, no never, no never leave us nor forsake us.
Father, I pray that you give each one of us here faith to
look to Christ, and in looking to him, find eternal life in
him. Father, it's in Christ's name.
For his sake, we pray and give thanks. Amen. All right, Sean. OK, if you would, turn in your hymnals
to song number 443. And stand as we sing, there is no name
so sweet on earth. There is no name so sweet on
earth, no name so sweet in heaven, the name before His wondrous
birth, to Christ the Savior given. We love to sing of Christ our
King, and hail Him blessed Jesus. For there's no word here ever
heard so dear, so sweet as Jesus. T'was Gabriel first that did
proclaim to his most blessed mother that name which now and
evermore we praise above all others. We love to sing of Christ
our King and hail Him, blessed Jesus. For there's no word here
ever heard so dear, so sweet as Jesus. And when He hung up
on the tree, they wrote His name above Him, that all might see
the reason we forevermore must love Him. love to sing of Christ
our King, and hail Him, blessed Jesus. For there's no word here
ever heard so dear, so sweet as Jesus. So now upon His Father's
throne, Almighty to reign, From sin and pain he ever reigns,
the Prince and Savior Jesus. We love to sing of Christ our
King, and hail Him blessed Jesus. For there's no word here ever
heard so dear, so sweet as Jesus. O Jesus, by Thy matchless name,
Thy grace shall fill us ever. Today as yesterday, the same,
Thou art the same. Love to sing of Christ our King,
and hail Him blessed Jesus. For there's no word here ever
heard so dear, so sweet as Jesus. Jesus, every knee shall bow,
and every tongue confess Him, and we unite with saints in line, We love to sing of Christ our
King, and hail Him blessed Jesus. For there's no word here ever
heard so dear, so sweet as Jesus.