Good morning. I bring good tidings
from a lot of people in Kingsport. My pastor said to say hello to
everybody. I got some messages this morning
from my parents and Brandon and Megan, a bunch of people saying,
make sure you tell them all we said hello. So hello from everybody
in Kingsport. If you would open your Bibles
to the book of Psalms, Psalms 142. Psalm 142. And this psalm opens with two words,
I cried. I cried. Now when we use the
word cry, we so often think of tears. If I said I saw so-and-so
cry, you would think that I saw them crying with tears. And though
that word sometimes means that, there's a broader definition
of the word cry. And it can be explained as someone
giving a noise or an expression of emotion. The key thing with
crying is that there's emotion behind it. It doesn't always
have to be something where you bring tears, but it can be something
in anger. It can be in happiness. It can
be sadness. It can be desperation and so
many other things. But when we use the word cry
and in the book of Psalms, David uses this phrase over and over
and over again, around 60 times, he says that he cried or he's
crying or he cried. And it's important to see that We have this phrase we often
use that, you know, a real man doesn't cry or like all these
things about crying is a bad thing. But David, a man after
God's own heart, an amazing soldier, an amazing king in so many things,
was not ashamed to cry. And as we look at this story,
I want us all to put ourselves in David's position. David here
has been anointed king by God. And of course, what the current
King Saul naturally would do in this moment is not be very
happy. And he is trying to kill David. And he is chasing him
with his entire army, trying to kill David. David has 600
loyal men with him. And they have been cornered in
a cave. David and his men are hiding
in a cave somewhere. And Saul and his army have reached
the cave and know they're in there. thousands of troops at
the entrance of this cave. And we don't know when exactly
David said this, if he said it when Saul and them got to the
cave, when they're searching in the cave for him. I don't
have a lot of experience with caves, but there aren't that
many in the world that 600 people can hide from an army. David is fretting here. While
we read this, we need to understand this is the same situation that
we are currently in. We are in a place with no exit. We are in a place with no light. It is completely dark. Our enemy,
our sin is haunting us. It is ever before us. We can't
get away from it. There's no retreat. There's no
exit. There's no way to fight. There's nothing we can do. And
if we understand this, if the Lord opens our eyes and lets
us see where we truly are, there's only one thing we can do. We
just have to cry to Him. That's all we can do. Look here
in verse 1 of Psalm 142. It says, I cried unto the Lord
with my voice. With my voice unto the Lord did
I make my supplication. When we cry, it doesn't have
to be audible. I have a feeling when David wrote
this and he said, I cried unto the Lord with my voice. I don't
actually think David was hiding in a cave, fearing for his life
and all the men with him that he actually yelled out loud.
We don't have to be heard by others when we're crying out
to the Lord. I was in a situation recently
where someone told me a story of they were talking to a neighbor
they'd never met before. And this person came up to them
and they talked for a minute. And then the person was getting
ready to leave. And they said, do you mind if
I pray for you? And the person was just caught aback by it.
And the person just started praying out loud right there. They didn't
know each other. He didn't even know the guy's
name. The reason we so often, or people do this so often, is
we want to get the effects of being heard. So often when people
pray, they do it because they want others to know they pray.
But personally, I think the most effectual prayers are so often
when it's just in our heads, it's just to ourselves. When
we don't care what anyone else thinks is when we should cry
out. David here is not concerned with
anyone around him. He is concerned for himself and
he knows he must cry unto the Lord. Saul was either in the
cave or at the mouth of it. And all of David's men were beside
him, but they couldn't help him here. When he cried, he was making
supplication humbly for grace and mercy from his God. He was
not pleading his merit or his worthiness. He was in that cave
with no hope and no way out. And he was pleading to the Lord.
Look at verse two. I poured out my complaint before
him. This word complaint is not one
of complaining of God's providence or this position he's been put
in. But David. Is pouring out his complaint
of his situation that he is in himself. Not as the Lord doesn't
know or was ignoring him, but to affect David's own soul and
to beg for grace and mercy. So often when we cry out to our
Lord, it is in a moment of fret. We think of something, we realize
of a situation, we look at ourselves, we get a glimpse of it and we
think to ourselves, Lord, please just help me. I'm so sorry for
the way I am. and what I do and what I think.
Look at the second half of this verse too. I showed before Him
my trouble. Now we all know the Lord knew
exactly what situation He was in. He knew exactly what David
was thinking. He knew everything that was going
on around David. Remember, David's in the dark.
And when you're in a cave, if you've ever been in one, if you
go a little ways into it, it's true darkness. I mean, you can't
see anything. You can't see your hand right
in front of your face. Yet David knew that the Lord
knew what was going on. But David said, I showed before
him my trouble. David is expressing he understands
that he can't save himself. When we show our trouble before
the Lord, we're expressing our sin, our guilt. We're saying,
I can't do anything about this. I am so helpless. I'm so sinful
that I'm desperate for the Lord for you to do something for me.
And that first little phrase of what David said he did, I
poured out my complaint before him. If we take everything to
the Lord, it's the same effect as pouring out a glass of water.
We take our troubles to him and we pour it out. And what happens
when you pour something out? It's empty. If we take everything
to the Lord, which he has to make us do this, if we take and
give our burden to the Lord, he carries it for it. He takes
everything off of us. On the cross, the Lord Jesus
Christ died bearing our sin and shame. He took the burden. And
what did we get? We got his righteousness. We
have no sin, not because of anything that we could have done, but
he took everything from us. He poured it out. We poured it
out and he took our sin. Look in verse three. When my
spirit was overwhelmed within me, then thou knewest my path. David was ready to sink and faint
with the present affliction. The hiding of God's face from
him was unbearable. He was in an unbelieving frame
sometimes. When we get in a place of trouble,
and we'll look at something in Revelation here in a bit. When
we see when John went into glory, he described what they did. And
they cried out. And we'll read that in Revelation
here in a bit. And they kept crying out and they kept crying out.
But we are so afflicted with sin that we cannot actually cry
to the Lord in the way we should. We should look to our God and
just praise Him. That's all we should really do.
But our sin, our troubles, they make us talk about ourselves.
We ask for things. We plead for things. We do all
these things that are selfish and personal. And what we should
do in these moments is we should praise Him. But David says, when
my spirit was overwhelmed within me, then thou knowest my path. In the way wherein I walked have
they privily laid a snare for me." The Lord knows everything. He knows our path before we even
get to the trail. If it were left to me, I would
walk straight into the snare. David is in a place where it's
dark and people are coming after him to kill him. He knows every
single step he takes on his own gets him closer to his death. Every single thing that we do
trying to attain our own righteousness just takes us further down the
path of death. There's nothing that we can do
to save ourselves. I'm going to keep repeating that
through this. David has come to a place where he realizes
there's not a single thing I can do to help myself. Every single
step I take, thought I make, word I say, Everything leads
to my destruction. And we have to look to the Lord
for everything. He makes us completely dependent
upon him. And thankfully, he orders our
steps. Look at verse four. I looked
on my right hand and beheld there was no man that would know me. David looked, he beheld everyone
that was around him, but no one knew him. David was with 600
men who had they had given everything to him. They were putting their
lives, their families, everything at stake by standing with him.
Yet David said, I looked around me on my right. I could not find
anyone that knew me. I could not find anyone to help
me. Not only do we look to ourselves so often for help, we look to
others for that. David realized here, as we should
realize, no one can help us. No one else can be our Savior
except the Lord Jesus Christ. There's no help from men, nowhere
to escape and no place to flee. In the cave, in the pitch black,
my refuge fails me. Look at the second part of this
verse. Refuge failed me. No man cared for my soul. A refuge
is a hiding place or a safe place. And it says here that it failed
me or it perished from me. David's title of king couldn't
save him. His 600 devout soldiers couldn't
protect him. He had no defense against his
enemy. He was helpless. And this is
such an amazingly great place to be. To realize that you're
in the dark, no one can help, and nothing in your power can
save yourselves. Anyone who has heard the gospel
and the Lord has opened their heart, comes to a place that
is truly helpless. A place where you get to see
who you are and who He is. And the phrase of fearing the
Lord, before you understand that, it just means something totally
different. but the thought of being in the hands of a holy
God and being completely full of sin, knowing that one day
we have to stand before a holy God in judgment. And if we stand
in who we are and what we've done, you talk about fear. Our God must punish sin. But if the Lord shows us who
we are and where we are, it makes us to cry out to Him to approach
Him, to ask for forgiveness for Him. And the Scriptures are full
of moments that says, ask and thou shalt receive. Look at verse
5. I cried unto thee, O Lord, I
said, thou art my refuge and my portion in the land of the
living. Finding no relief from man and
nothing worthy inside this flesh, we are forced by our Lord to
cry unto Him. Thou art my refuge. The Lord
is the only protection from our enemy. He gives us shelter from
the storm, the storm that we have created. We've created our
own problems in him. He gives us sustenance, protection
and safety. The Lord has to force us to cry
to him. That shows how weak and how it's
impossible for us to do anything when it comes to salvation. The
fact that there are a lot of people who have read the words
that say all are sin. That's all we are is sin. None
are good, no, not one. All these things about who we
are. And how many hundreds if not thousands of times it says
in this book that the Lord Jesus Christ is the only hope for salvation. Those are two facts that if you
understand I'm a sinner with no hope, And God is holy and
will save those that believe on him. How in the world would
we not do those, put those together? Yet not a single person has ever
been able to do that apart from the Lord's Spirit teaching us
that it just shows how awful and how empty that we are. It's a scary place. And it would
be our downfall if it were possible. This place to be in that we have
no place to abide. There's no place, there's no
hope for us in this flesh. Turn with me to Hebrews chapter
13. Hebrews chapter 13. Every child of God flees to their
refuge. The Lord Jesus Christ. Because
He has made us to do that. But unfortunately, and shamefully,
we continuously leave our refuge. Whether it's unbelief, foolishness,
pride, or some other sin, we seem to want to abide in this
flesh. The Lord Jesus Christ. We'll
look at verse 5 here. Hebrews 13 verse 5. Let your
conversation be without covetousness and be content with such things
as you have. For He has said, I will never
leave thee nor forsake thee." Our refuge will never leave us
or forsake us. So think about that. Our place
that we go for safety, our safety has to never leave us. You would
think that someone who would flee to a place of refuge. So
if you have a safe place, you're scared, whatever, say you're
outside of your house and someone's coming, you're scared, you run
inside your house, lock the door for safety. What is the one thing
you are not going to do? You are not going to go back
out of the house. Yet we have one place of refuge, our Lord,
and when we flee to him, we find comfort, we find peace and so
many other things. Yet it doesn't take long at all
until we think to ourselves, I'm just going to go back out
here in this world and see what's going on. I enjoy it out there. I want to go out there. If it
were possible, we would never go back. But he said here, I
will never leave thee nor forsake thee. We are bound to Him. We are His bride. We are joint
heirs with Christ. If so be that we suffer with
Him, that we may also be glorified together. Because of what He's
done for us. Because before time began, He
chose a people. He elected a people. He chose
us, took us. When He died on the cross bearing
our sins, He saved us from a death that we deserved. He rose again
into glory and sits on the right hand of God, conquering over
all, victorious over death. Because of those things, we have
a refuge, a safe place, and we can't get away from it. Now,
in this flesh, we constantly just flee to our own device.
But thankfully, we can't leave Him. The Lord is my helper, and
I will not fear what man shall do unto me. Look at verse six
here. So that we may boldly say an
emphasis on boldly, we can boldly say the Lord is my helper and
I will not fear what man shall do unto me. Not only what other
men shall do unto me, but what this man will do to myself. I'm
so grateful that I don't have to fear what I'm going to do.
I'm scared of it. I hate it. I can't stop it. I
can't say I'm not going to do blank and not do it just within
just moments after it. But the Lord tells us we don't
have to fear men. We don't even have to fear our
sin because he paid the price. Turn back to our text. In Psalm
142. And let's read verse five again.
It says, I cried unto thee, O Lord, I said thou art my refuge and
my portion. in the land of the living. Throughout
history, man has built many of impenetrable refuges or fortresses,
a place that no army can get inside, a place where everyone
inside feels safe. We've seen this in fiction. We
see it in the History Channel. People build huge castles and
they put moats around it and draw bridges and so many other
things to protect themselves. And they all seem impenetrable.
No one's ever going to get in there. But all man-made refuges
have the exact same problem. They are great at protection,
but they can't sustain everyone inside. In the Old Testament,
there's a story of a siege that happens, or everyone's hiding
inside the city or the castle walls. And an army comes, and
instead of attacking, they just stand outside and say, we'll
just stay here until you run out of food. We eventually have to leave all
of our refuges and its protection to go out to get what we need,
what we need to survive, our sustenance. Once outside our
refuge, we have to defend ourselves again. So many people put their
hope in something or someone other than Christ. Whether it's
our own self-righteousness, whether it's religion, whether it's baptism,
whether it's some confession, whatever it is, we have a tendency
to put our hope in man-made things. And they make us feel good. We
genuinely feel good about things like that. But what happens is
one day we leave this world and we go before a holy God and all
of that is gone. And we go there and we stand
totally unprotected in this flesh and in our sin. And what do we
have then? We have to be in the Lord Jesus
Christ, our refuge. Not only does He protect us,
but He's a refuge where it says He provides us a portion, my
portion. In Christ, we have both a refuge
and our portion. He is our portion. It's important
to see that it says my portion. Our portions are particular.
The portions are inconceivably large. It's a portion that is
made just for us, yet at the same time, it is made and provided
for all of us. It's amazing to think. We're
so bound by our flesh and our thoughts. We can't actually even
wrap our mind around so many things. But let's put these two
things in perspective real quick. The Lord's salvation for us as
a group of the children of God, His bride, joint heirs with Christ,
Everything that we do all lines up for our good and for His glory. All of it. Every bit of it does.
As we go through this world for thousands of years, everything
is aligned perfectly for all His sheep. At the same time,
every single individual child of God has a portion, a refuge,
grace and mercy that is particular to them. I can't think about two things
at once. If I start thinking about something
and someone says something, if I'm driving in the car over here
this morning, I'm thinking about something and the kid says something
in the back and I'm like, huh? And I can't think of either one
of them at that point. Our Lord thinks of each and every single
one of his children at all times in every single step that we
take. Everything are numbered and protected
by him. It is such an amazing thought
to think that he cares for us as a group and as an individual. There's no part of anything that
we do that is not in his hand. It's not under his wing. It's
not in him. And because of that, this soul
satisfying portion, it will never be taken away. It can't be consumed. We always have this portion.
Our portion is forever. It's a portion for this present
life as well as for eternity. It's not just a portion that
protects us here, but it will be with us forever. It's something
we will always have. All right, look at verse six. Attend unto my cry, for I am
brought very low. David, in this moment, has expressed
his feeling, his situation, and has cried unto the Lord. And
then he says something He says, attend unto my cry. The Lord
has told us he will hear our prayers. Yet at the same time,
David says here, Lord, attend to my cry. He says, please listen
to me. Please be here. This word can
be translated as being present unto my cry. He's saying, Lord,
be with me. I need you here. I know you're
watching over me. I know you're numbering my steps,
but I want you here. I need you to attend unto my
cry. Be with me. Says for I am brought very low. All this we've talked about David
being in this situation and us being in our situation in our
sin. We must be brought low before we cry into him. If you've ever
been in a situation where you've been brought low, whether it's
through illness, sickness, depression, whatever it is. It makes you
to cry unto the Lord. We find ourselves in a position
where we don't have any other options. And once we are brought
back up, which He inevitably does for us, we forget to cry
under Him. And what does He have to do?
He has to bring us low again. You would think that me saying
these words right now would sustain me to continually cry under Him. I'm telling all of you, cry under
Him. You've got to cry unto Him. Yet,
I'm going to find myself in the very near future not crying unto
Him. And what has to happen? We must
be brought low. I don't like being brought low. I hate it. I don't like being
sad. I don't like being sick. I don't
like being depressed or whatever these things that cause that.
Yet, if that's what it takes for us to cry to our Lord, we
have to have it. We have to have it. We must be
brought low. Be brought low. Look at the second
part of that verse. Deliver me from my persecutors,
for they are stronger than I. David says, deliver me here.
David understands that the numbers are against him, the strategies
against him. He's got nowhere to go. A wall's
at his back. The army's coming. He understands everything in
war is against him here. Everything in our battle against
sin is against us. We fight against ourselves. The
world fights against us. Everything is against us. We
have to realize at the last part of this verse, for they are stronger
than I. Do you know what in this world
is stronger than you and I? Everything. Everything is stronger
than you and I. The things we laugh at, the things
we mock, all those things, everything is stronger than you and I. I
saw a video recently of people at like an arboretum and hundreds
of butterflies around. And butterflies are about as
harmless and slow and just this perfect little thing that everybody
likes watching and no one ever thinks, no one's scared of a
butterfly and everything. And this person turned in a room
with hundreds of butterflies and a butterfly was right there. And they turned and screamed. They were scared of a butterfly.
That's who we are. Everything is stronger than us.
Everything is. We need to flee to our Lord,
to our refuge. Look at verse seven. Bring my
soul out of prison that I may praise thy name. David here is
in a prison. He's in a place that he can't
get out of against his will. He's been put in a position where
he can't get out. And he says here, bring my soul
out of prison that I may praise thy name. When we ask of our Lord and we
cry unto him to save our soul, to save us, it's important that
we realize the reason that he saves our soul. Is a couple of
different things. First, he does it because he
loves us. Secondly, he does it for his
glory. He does these things not just
for us, but if he does these things, David in this moment,
and we'll see this in a second. When David comes out of this
situation and the Lord takes care of him and he hides them
in there, he had 600 men from this army looking for him and
they finally just leave like they just don't know where they
are. David says, I need to get out of here that I may praise
thy name. If the Lord Jesus Christ saves
my soul, anyone who sees that and understands that will give
Him the glory and praise His name. When a situation becomes
dire enough, as sinful as we are, everyone can see how glorious
God is for what He did. The last part of that verse,
the righteousness shall compass me about, for thou shalt deal
bountifully with me. When David leaves this situation
and comes out and David gets away from Saul, eventually David
escapes and David becomes king. But before he becomes king, everyone
is so amazed and so thankful that the Lord has delivered David.
At the end of all this trials that David went through, the
end result is not anything for David. It's everyone sees that
God chose a king. that God was the one who saved
this man. And that's what we get. When
the Lord Jesus Christ saves us, He gets all the glory. Now turn
with me over in closing to Revelation chapter 7. Revelation chapter 7. I said at the beginning of this
how we must cry unto our Lord. And because of our sin, our prayers
and our cries end up being more of us asking for things. It's
shameful how many things I ask of the Lord that are frivolous.
It's a shame of the things I say and I cry unto Him for. But we
do that because of our sin. And He brings us low and makes
us understand that we have to do that. A passage was read recently
in one of our services and it just hit me in thinking of this
subject. Look at Revelation 7 and verse
9. After this I beheld and lo a
great multitude which no man could number of all nations and
kindreds and people and tongues stood before the throne and before
the lamb clothed with white robes and palms in their hands. This
is when John was taken up and he saw these images in glory. And look at verse 10 here. All
of those people, a number that no man can number, cried with
a loud voice saying, Salvation to our God which sitteth upon
the throne and unto the Lamb. And all the angels stood round
about the throne and about the elders and the four beasts and
fell before the throne on their faces and worshipped Him. All
of them saying, Amen. Blessing, and glory, and wisdom,
and thanksgiving, and honor, and power, and might be unto
our God forever and ever. Amen. There's one thing that's
missing between our prayers, our crying out, and these two
verses that are said. Everyone in glory is not cumbered,
is not bothered, has no effect from sin. All of these people,
their sins have been washed in the blood. They've been saved
by the Lord Jesus Christ. And because of that, what are
they still doing? There's a few things that are
descripted that happen in there, and almost all of them all fall
under the category of crying out to the Lord. Yet every single
thing they say is praising His name. Every single thing they
say. I'm going to read these two things
again. Cried with a loud voice saying salvation to our God,
which sitteth upon the throne and under the Lamb. And in verse
12, Amen, blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and
honor and power and might be unto our God forever and ever.
Amen. We will spend all our days crying
unto our God. But once we shed this flesh,
once we are like Christ, once we are like him in his likeness,
we will spend forever crying unto him, glorifying his name. It's such a pleasant thought
to think that I could cry unto our holy God and not be thinking
of myself. Instead, what we'll do in that
day is we'll look to Him and give Him thanks. And eternity
is a time that we can't really grasp. I can't think of doing
anything for more than a certain length of time. That's pretty
short without getting bored with it, tired of it, unable to do
it, whatever the reason is. But for eternity, we will be
crying out about how great our God is. We get that because of
what the Lord Jesus Christ did for us. And we need to give him
all the glory for it. All right, you're dismissed.