Let's open our Bibles to begin
our service to Psalm 141. Lord willing, this will be our
third and final message from this psalm. I've enjoyed it so
much. Psalm 141. Lord, I cry unto thee. Make haste
unto me. Give ear unto my voice when I
cry unto thee. Let my prayer be set forth before
thee as an incense, and the lifting up of my hands as the evening
sacrifice. Set a watch, O Lord, before my
mouth. Keep the door of my lips. Incline
not my heart to any evil thing, to practice wicked works with
men that work iniquity. And let me not eat of their dainties.
Let the righteous smite me. It should be a kindness. And
let him reprove me. It should be an excellent oil.
which shall not break my head, for yet my prayer also shall
be in their calamities. When their judges are overthrown
in stony places, they should hear my words, for they're sweet. Our bones are scattered at the
grave's mouth, as in one cutteth and cleaveth wood upon the earth.
But mine eyes are unto thee, O God the Lord. In thee is my
trust. Leave not my soul destitute.
Keep me from the snares which they have laid for me, and the
gins of the workers of iniquity. Let the wicked fall into their
own nets, whilst I withal escape." Thank God for His Word. Let's
bow together. Our Holy Heavenly Father, how
thankful we are that You have allowed us one more opportunity
to meet together, to worship Thee. Have Your Word read, have
Your Gospel preached to us, have this opportunity to worship and
praise and adore the Lord Jesus Christ, our Savior, to lift up
his name. And Father, I pray that you'd
be with us, that you'd send your spirit to meet with us and enable
us to have an hour of true worship. Father, enable me to rightly
divide the word of truth, to preach your word, this message
that you've given for your people, Father, enable me to preach it
in the power of the Spirit. I beg of you that you would not
leave me alone. Father, for thy glory's sake,
don't leave me alone and don't let people just hear the words
of a man. For their good and, Father, for your glory, cause
your gospel to run well. Give us a hearing ear and a believing
heart. For just the next few minutes,
let us lay aside the cares and thoughts and worries and goings-on
of this life, and let us hear of Thee. Let us have a desire
to hear of Thee. Father, give us a refreshing
from Thy Word, we pray. Father, we pray for those who
are sick and going through great difficulty that can't be with
us tonight. We pray for Judy. You continue
to be with her. We pray for Charlie that you'd
heal and strengthen him. Aaron, as he's going through,
preparing to go through these treatments, Father, be with him.
Thankful that you brought Ralph through these treatments and
others, Father, and each especially, how we pray for them. And we
do thank you for your goodness and kindness and help that you
give to your people. How thankful we are to know that
with everything that's going on, our God is in control. Father, we pray you give us Very
soon, some relief from this pandemic and let us go back to our normal
activities. Watch over us and be with us.
Give us the patience to wait on thee. All these things we
ask and we give thanks in that name, which is above every name,
the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. Man of sorrows, what a name For
the Son of God who came Ruined sinners to reclaim Hallelujah,
what a shame Sharing shame and scoffing rue
In my place condemned he stood Sealed my pardon with his blood
Hallelujah! What a Savior! Guilty, violent, helpless we,
Spotless Lamb of God was He. Full atonement can it be, Hallelujah,
what a Savior! Lifted up was He to die, In His
finish was His cry. Now in heaven exalted high, Hallelujah,
what a Savior! When He comes, our glorious King,
All his ransomed home to bring. Then anew this song we'll sing. Hallelujah, what a Savior. All right, let's open our Bibles
now again to Psalm 141. I titled the message this evening,
Let the Righteous Smite Me. Our text begins with verse 5,
Psalm 141. Let the righteous smite me. It
should be a kindness. And let him reprove me. It should
be an excellent oil, which shall not break my head. Now, first
and foremost, these are the words of the Lord Jesus Christ, our
Savior, describing Calvary. First, the Savior describes why
Calvary happened. What is it that's happening at
Calvary's tree? He says, let the righteous smite
me. That's what happened at Calvary,
the righteous smoke, the Lord Jesus Christ. He's talking about
the Father, the righteous judge. And he said, let him smite me. The Lord Jesus is the willing
sacrifice. He willingly, on purpose, fully
intending to do this, knowing for whom He was dying, sacrificed
Himself for the sin of His people, for the likes of you and me.
He did that on purpose. What a Savior. What a Savior. He went into this thing willingly.
He willingly was made sin, knowing everything that that entailed.
You and I don't know what that means, to be made sin. He did. the Holy Son of God. He was willingly
made sin. He willingly took the sin of
His people into His own body on the tree and He willingly
suffered everything that sin deserved at the hand of His Father. He said, let the righteous smite
me. The cross is an act of justice. The righteous Father smote His
Son because His Son had been made sin. He gave him what he
deserved. He gave him what that sin deserves. When the father poured out his
wrath against sin upon his son, it was an act of justice. It
was the righteous judge smiting the sacrifice. It was right. It was just for the father to
smote his son because the Lord Jesus Christ had been made sin.
You know, the sin of his people became his sin. It wasn't just
like the father was taking out his wrath on sin His son happened
to be in the way. The sin of God's elect became
the sin of the Lord Jesus Christ. He called it mine iniquity. He
became guilty of that sin. That's why he said, I cannot
even look up. He was guilty of that sin. If he had not been
made guilty of that sin, and you and I have no idea what I'm
talking about right now. We just know from scripture he
was made sin. But if he was not made guilty of that sin, the
righteous judge could never smote him. He was made guilty and the
righteous Father smote Him. Gave Him absolute justice. Gave Him everything that that
sin deserved. The Father smote Him with His
rod of justice. He smote His Son. How this smote,
the soul, the being of the Son when the Father turned His back
on Him. When He took away His loving
presence from His Son. Our Savior had to remember there
in Proverbs 8 when He talked about it was daily His delight.
Now He took away His loving presence from Him. He smote His soul.
And He put Him to death when He smote Him with the sword of
justice. Now that was an act of justice
against sin. And the Lord Jesus Christ was
a willing participant. He was the willing sacrifice
for the sin of His people. And that's why Calvary happened.
That was what was going on there It was justice being carried
out. Let the righteous smite me. Here's the second thing. The Savior describes the grace
that flows from Calvary. Now there can be no question,
the cross is an act of justice. But it was also an act of grace,
wasn't it? At the cross, the Lord Jesus Christ, our substitute,
suffered absolute, pure, unmitigated justice that his people would
have absolute, pure, unmitigated grace. He says, let the righteous
smite me. It should be a kindness. It should
be a kindness. The only way God's elect could
be saved in loving kindness and in mercy is if justice was satisfied
by the sacrifice of Christ, by the suffering and death of our
substitute. And Christ willingly suffered everything he suffered. because he loved his people.
He honored his father. He was willing and desired to
honor his father's justice, to honor every character of his
father. His justice ain't his mercy. He suffered because he loved his people,
to give kindness and mercy and grace to his people. The father
can now be gracious to his people because the son had been sacrificed
for them, satisfied justice for them. And that ought to break our hearts.
That ought to soften our hearts. I know we hear the gospel every
week. This is something that everybody
here is so familiar with. The substitutionary sacrifice
of Christ for sinners. I don't know about you, I'm speaking
for me now. I'm very afraid of over-familiarity
with that. To ever think of the sacrifice
of Christ and it not break my heart. Did it not thrill our
hearts? Did it not fill our hearts with
worship and praise? And just wonder that our minds
can never comprehend that the Lord Jesus Christ suffered so
much so that God's pure grace could be given to sinful men
and women like us. There is a river of grace that
flows from Calvary. A river that's deep enough, that's
wide enough, that's long enough, to save all of God's elect. A
river of grace. Oh, it's a kindness. Let the
righteous smite me. It should be a kindness. Grace
is flowing from Calvary's tree. Here's the third thing. The Savior
describes the success of Calvary. He said, let the righteous smite
me. Let the righteous reprove me.
And it should be an excellent oil. Now, the grace that flows
from Calvary as the result of Christ's sacrifice is an excellent
oil. And that oil is a picture of
the work of God, the Holy Spirit. See, since Christ died, now the
Holy Spirit has something to apply. Since Christ died, there's
blood to be applied to the hearts of God's people, to give them
a new heart. Since there's blood to be applied,
there's righteousness to be applied. He was made sin that we might
be made the righteousness of God in Him. There's righteousness
to apply to God's people because Christ has died for their sin.
Since Christ has died, the Spirit can wash God's elect white as
snow. Since Christ died, the Spirit
has oil to apply to all the sin wounds of God's elect and heal
all their spiritual diseases. And when the Holy Spirit comes
and He applies this excellent oil, He applies the blood of
Christ's sacrifice. He applies that to the hearts
of God's people. Brother, they go free. They're free. Just like the children
of Israel were in bondage in Egypt for over 400 years. They
went free in one night. What was that night they went
free? The night the Passover lamb was slain and the blood
was applied to the doorposts of their houses. On that very
night, Israel went free. That's what's being pictured
here at the end of verse five. He says, for yet my prayer also
should be in their calamities. When their judges are overthrown
in stony places, they should hear my words for their sweet. The Savior here, what he's saying
is he prays for his people. He prays for his people and his
calamities and their calamities. And he's got something to plead.
He's pleading his sacrifice for them in all of their sins. in all of their rebellion, in
all of their bondage to sin. Christ prays for them. What a
calamity. Just what a calamity. Adam's
fall is just a calamity. Put his whole race under the
bondage of sin. And the bondage of sin is not
just that it makes you keep sinning and you can't sin. The bondage,
it won't let you sin. This is the power and bondage
of sin. It makes a person so they cannot believe Christ. It
makes a person so that they cannot see Christ. They can't believe
Him. They can't rest Him. They can't come to Him. They
can't see. They're dead. That's the bondage of sin. What
a calamity. What a calamity. And Christ prays
for His people in that calamity. And the Holy Spirit comes and
reveals Christ in them. He applies the blood that's been
offered as a sacrifice for their sin. He applies it to their heart.
And that very moment, the power of sin is broken. They believe
on Christ and they can never not believe Him again. They have
life. They have faith in Christ because
they're free. They're free from sin. They're
free from death. And the Savior prays for His
people in their calamities, in their bondage to false religion.
That's who these judges represent, false prophets, those who have
this authority, this rule over them. And God's going to overthrow
those prophets. What a calamity to be under the
influence of these false prophets. What a calamity. And God's elect
are just not going to stay under the power of that false gospel,
under the power of that. What a horrible calamity. How
can they ever get out of this thing? Well, the Savior is praying
for them and their calamities. And the Spirit comes. and He
reveals Christ to them. He says here, they're going to
hear My words for they're sweet. Oh, they hear the sweet words,
sweet words of the Lord Jesus Christ, who He is, how He's the
Savior of sinners. He gives salvation to His people
freely. Oh, come taste and see. This
is so sweet. His words are sweet and God's
elect hear it and they believe. They believe Christ. They don't
just believe a new doctrine. They don't just come to a new
set of catechisms or something. They believe Christ. And when
we see Him, when we believe Him, we're free. You can't be deceived
by that anymore because we see Him. The Savior prays for His
people and they're set free. And it's all because of Christ's
sacrifice for them. He says here in verse 5, Let
the righteous smite me, it should be a kindness. Let him reprove
me, it should be an excellent oil, which shall not break my
head." Now at Calvary, the Lord Jesus Christ suffered unimaginable,
untold agony. I mean, we can talk about His
physical sufferings and we think we have some grasp on it, and
we don't. Never man suffered. ever suffered
like this man physically. But the sufferings of his soul,
he made his soul an offering for sin. His soul was that had
the sword of God's justice plunged into him, smote him with it.
His sufferings are unimaginable. Just unimaginable. But it didn't
break his head. It didn't break his power. Just
exactly like the Lord promised Adam and Eve when Adam fell.
Oh, his heel be bruised, but not his head. Christ's sufferings,
all that unimaginable sufferings did not destroy him, did not
destroy his head, did not destroy his power. As a matter of fact,
Christ's sufferings and his death gave him the power, gave him
the right to set his people free. That's why his people go free
from these wicked judges, from this false religion that they,
by nature, they're so bound up in it, they believe it just with
all of their heart. They're so sincere. You know,
people say, well, they're sincere. So what? They're sincere in false
religion, just because that's all their flesh knows. But as
people go free from that, because of Christ's sacrifice for them,
His sacrifice gave Him the power, the right to set them free. Even
Satan can't stop it. Even Satan can't hold God's elect. See, at Calvary, Christ's head
wasn't crushed, was it? All his sufferings were unimaginable. But scripture describes that
as his heel being bruised. But Satan's head, his power was
crushed when Christ died. When Christ died, his death,
his blood put away all of the sin All of the guilt of his people. All of it. All of it. Well, Satan's
the accuser of the brethren. Buddy, you can't accuse an innocent
man. He's got nothing left to accuse.
God's elect. Their sin's gone. Their guilt
is gone. So everyone for whom Christ died,
all that the Father gave Him to save, all of God's elect,
they must go free. because the Lord Jesus Christ
is the successful Savior. He died successfully, putting
all the sin of His people away, and He's going to have them all.
They're all going to be brought to Christ. Not one of them is
going to be lost because He's the successful Savior. And all
of that is applied to the hearts of God's people. Since Christ
died, their guilt is gone. Their sin is gone. Since Christ
died, the Holy Spirit has got something to apply that gives
his people freedom, free. All right, now here's the fourth
thing. Christ, we see him describe God's justice. We see God's grace. We see the success of his sacrifice.
But here's a solemn warning. The Savior describes those who
do not believe on him. Now somebody's going to believe
on him. Somebody's going to be set free because of the sacrifice.
But somebody's not going to believe him. Our bones are scattered at the
grave's mouth, as when one cutteth and cleaveth wood upon the earth.
But mine eyes are unto thee, O God the Lord. In thee is my
trust. Leave not my soul destitute.
Keep me from the snares which they have laid for me, and the
gins of the workers of iniquity. Let the wicked fall into their
own nests, whilst I withal escape." Now, the cross is an act of God.
The cross was planned. and purpose from God from all
of eternity. That's why he called his son
the lamb slain from the foundation of the world. This has always
been the father's means, his purpose of redemption. He always
saw his people. The father elected a people and
gave them to his son, and he's always and only seen those people
redeemed in the blood that Christ shed in his sacrifice for his
people. Always. That's the only way he's ever
seen them. This was the act and purpose of God being carried
out. But this is the way the Lord does things. The Lord accomplishes
His will through the actions of His creatures. Through what
seems to us to be the free will actions of His creatures. In His whole earthly ministry,
He had to be the most hunted, hated man in those three and
a half years of anybody on the planet. and nobody could ever
lay a finger on him. Remember that time? They even
sent those soldiers to go get him. It wasn't that the soldiers
were not permitted to. They heard him speak and they
thought, never a man speak like this man. I'm not going to lay
a hand on this guy. And suddenly, he was in the hands
of men. His hour had come. And in that
horrible dark time, The Father, for a time, allowed Satan to
do as He pleased. Satan moved the hearts of men
to want to crucify the Lord Jesus. And you know why the Lord allowed
Satan to do that? To accomplish His will. His eternal will. Remember,
Lucifer at one time tried to take God's throne in Heaven.
He was cast out of Heaven. Well, now Satan's making another
run at it. He's trying this again, and he
thought he had the Lord this time. He thought all he had to
do was kill God's Son, manifest in the flesh, and if he can get
that done, if he can kill Him, all of God's purpose of redemption
would be a failure. And Satan would freely rule the
world, and God would lose all of His glory. And Satan was just
moved to make that happen. It was Satan who moved men to
fulfill every prophecy of the Messiah in the Old Testament.
Every prophecy concerning His death was fulfilled on that day.
Now, Satan moved them to do it, but when they did, they did what
God determined before to be done. What God prophesied before would
be done happened. It was just like they took the
Old Testament Scriptures and used it as a playbook. What are
we going to do? It's like a play script. You
know, this is what you say next. This is what you do next. This
is where you walk next. It's like they used the Old Testament
Scriptures to know what to do next. But they weren't. But Satan moved
them to do all of these things. And you know why? So that all
this time later, it would be absolutely crystal clear to you
and me, the cross is God Almighty accomplishing His eternal purpose. There wasn't one event there
that was happenstance. It was Satan who moved Judas
to betray the Lord, so that the Lord Jesus would be betrayed
by a friend. It was Satan who moved Judas
and the Pharisees to sell the Lord for 30 pieces of silver.
Why not 31? Why not 50? Why not 100? Why
not 20? To fulfill the prophecy. It was
Satan who put it in the hearts of men to shout, crucify him
and give us Barabbas. Give us this criminal. It was
Satan who put it in the hearts of the Roman soldiers to beat
the back. that he gave to the smiters,
to pluck out the beard, the face that he willingly gave to them.
It was Satan that moved them to crucify the Lord, not to stone
him like the Jewish form of capital punishment, not to behead him
like they did John the Baptist, but to crucify him. That wasn't
an accident. That happened so that the scripture
would be fulfilled. Cursed is everyone that hangeth
upon a tree. Christ died bearing the curse of the sin of His people
that put it away forever. Men did that. But that was God's
eternal purpose. Not just for the salvation of
God's people, but for the comfort and calmness and assurance of
our heart. This is God's eternal purpose. I don't claim to know everything
there is to know about God. And the more I learn, the more
I realize I know very little. But I do know this. God's going
to accomplish His purpose. Whatever God's purpose is, is
going to happen. He's making it clear to us here.
This is God's purpose. He's going to save His people.
He's going to put away the sin of His people by the sacrifice
of His Son. He told us how it was going to
happen in the Old Testament, and then it happened. Just the
way God said it would. So that we'd know the death of
Christ saved God's people. Now you rest in Him. They even
parted his garments and cast lots. I guess they rolled dice
or drew cards. I don't know how they cast lots
for his vesture. They did that to fulfill the
Scriptures. Every detail. That all happened to show us
God's eternal will being carried out. And Satan did absolutely
everything he desired to do. Everything. But when Christ died,
Satan was not victorious. It looked like the Lord Jesus
was completely helpless. It looked like he's a victim
here. But when he died, Satan was not victorious. The Savior
was. When Christ died, Satan's doom
and failure were sealed. And Satan fell into his own trap. And now all he can do is await
judgment. Because the death of Christ accomplished
God's purpose. Saved God's people from their
sin. He bought redemption for his people. And you know, the
same thing happened to the Jews. They did everything their wicked
hearts wanted to do. They carefully planned this out.
They plotted it and they did what they wanted to do. Nobody's
making them do it. And this is what they thought.
that by killing the Lord Jesus, they would keep their place of
power, they would keep their place of prestige, they would
keep in place their religion of laws and ceremonies and works
and self-righteousness and glorifying them, glorifying those Pharisees
who made broad their phylacteries and go around saying, look how
religious we are, look how holy we are, look at all this, look
at me. They did everything they wanted
to do, but they didn't accomplish their will. In doing everything
they wanted to do, all they did was accomplish God's will and
God's purpose for the salvation of His people. And they fell
into their own trap. They tried to destroy the Lord
Jesus. They said, give us Brabus and
destroy Jesus. Instead, their religion was destroyed. They lost their religion. They
lost their land. As far as I know, roughly 30-35
years after the Lord died, Jerusalem was destroyed, the Jews ran out
of that place, and Israel didn't have a nation again until they
made one up after World War II. They lost their land. They lost
their place. The temple and the ark that they
held so dear were destroyed. And today, as far as men see
it politically, Esau's descendants, Esau's descendants, have as much
claim to that place, the land where the ruins of that temple
sit, as the descendants of Jacob do. They lost their place. And to make matters much worse,
God took the word from them. He took the prophets from them.
He took the gospel from the Jews and sent it to the Gentiles.
The Jews were destroyed in their own trap, and God's will was
done. He even said he was going to
send the Gospel to the Gentiles way back in the Old Testament.
This is not a surprise. This was not plan B. God didn't
get mad at them and say they're doing that. Oh, well, I'm going
to take the Gospel away from you and the Word and the Prophets
away from you. He told us way back in the Old Testament he
was going to do that. And the same thing will happen. You say,
what has this got to do with me? Well, the same thing that
happened to the Jews, that happened to Satan, will happen to everyone. who refuses to believe on the
Lord Jesus Christ, they'll be damned. And it'll be of their
own making. Nobody in hell is ever going
to blame God for being there. They're not going to be able
to do it. It's going to be their own will, their own purpose, their
own works, their own rebellion. They want to trust in their own
works. They want to. They want to trust
in their works and their morality and all their church going and
all the stuff that they do. And they're going to fall into
their own trap and be destroyed by it. Because their works aren't
good enough. They didn't trust Christ who
finished the work. They want to trust in their own
decision. They say it's not fair. I want to be able to make my
own decision, have my own chance. And God will let them have it.
And they'll fall into their own trap. I tried to show you this
Sunday morning In the Bible lesson, they want their own decision
and God will let them have it. You better be careful. The only decision
fallen flesh can make is the decision to not believe on Christ. Unbelief is a choice, is a decision. Faith is a gift of God. We don't have a choice in it.
You can't help but believe. God gives you faith. And this
would happen, this damnation, this destruction, this falling
into our own trap, thinking we've got this clever way of doing
things and just fall into our own trap, would happen to every
son of Adam if it weren't for God's grace that flows from Calvary. God's grace that flows to God's
people and saves them completely and utterly from their sins because
of the sufferings, the death of Christ. Because somebody comes
and tells them these sweet words, look and live. Look to Christ. Oh, I know you're in a calamity,
but you look to Christ. He came to save sinners. And
that's why we keep preaching the gospel. That's why we keep
just over and over and over again preaching the same gospel, telling
folks who Christ is and what Christ has accomplished for His
people. We just keep preaching Christ because the way people
are going to believe Him is to hear of Him. To hear of Him preached.
So these words are primarily the words of the Savior. But
do you know they also describe the believer's experience whenever
the gospel is preached. When the gospel is preached,
if it's preached right, it always smites the flesh. Always. The gospel says, don't trust
in your words. Your own works are filthy rags. Now that doesn't just mean dirty
rags. It means rags that are defiled with sin. They can't
cover you. They can't cleanse you. They're
defiled with sin. That's your works. That's what
you can produce. Well, that smites the power of
the flesh, doesn't it? The goodness of the flesh. The
gospel says everything, everything about our flesh is offensive
to God. There's no hope in anything about
your flesh. Nothing. Well, that smites the
pride of the flesh, doesn't it? You know, I'm kind of proud of
where I'm from. I'm kind of proud of, you know, the gospel smites
that, doesn't it? There's nothing to be proud of
in the flesh. The gospel says our decision for Jesus is a calamity. The only decision that you can
make is to reject Jesus and give me Barabbas. That insults our
intelligence, doesn't it? That smites our intelligence.
It smites the flesh. But if God's merciful, he's going
to send his gospel to smite the flesh and to kill it. To kill
it. If God's going to save us, we've
got to die. This flesh has got to die. God sends his gospel to smite
the flesh and at the same time give life to the spirit. And
to the believer, who's been hearing the gospel a long, long time,
even the flesh of a believer is smitten by the gospel every
time we hear. And the reason for that is the
awful filth and decay and sin of this flesh. It just cannot
be made better. It just cannot. We just do our
best to teach our children to mind and we discipline them,
we spank them, we send them to their room, we just take pleasures
away from them, just doing everything we can do to teach them to act
better. And sometimes we do it. Policemen out here, boy, they've
got a never-ending job just trying to keep people from doing this
horrible crime and horrible stuff, just trying to reign that flesh
in. But you can't make the flesh
better. I mean, don't misunderstand me. Act better. Don't break the
law. You know what I'm saying? But there's no hope for this
flesh. We have to be constantly reminded,
trust Christ. Look to Christ. Rely upon Christ. Don't rest anything you're doing.
Don't put any confidence in your works. Don't put any confidence
in your morality. Don't put any confidence and the fact that
you give some credence to good doctrine, don't put any trust
whatsoever. Find no rest for your soul in
anything that you do or don't do. But trust Christ. Rest in Him. We have to be told
that over and over and over again. The flesh has to constantly be
smitten because in this warfare between the flesh and the spirit,
the flesh will always lust against the spirit. The flesh will always
fight against it. constantly smited. It has to
be constantly smitten by the gospel so we don't come under
its rule. Believers have to be constantly
warned about this. We live in this world and this
world is sweet to this flesh. We have to be constantly reminded,
live in this world, but don't get caught up in it. Be the salt
of the earth, but don't get caught up in this thing now. Don't get
caught up in the things of the world that are perishing. Don't
get caught up in the ways of this world or the way this world
thinks which is always wrong. The things of this world are
at best perishing and usually they're poison. Poison to your
soul. So don't hang on to them and
perish with them. Run away from them. Just get rid of them. And
that smites the flesh doesn't it? That just smites the flesh.
But it's a good thing. We have to be reminded. It's
kind of like getting your hands smacked every time you reach
for something you're not supposed to be reaching for. The gospel has
to smite the flesh and remind us, don't reach for these things,
but look to Christ. That's what the gospel, it smites
us. But now listen, the gospel smites us, but our head's not
broken. We're not killed by it. We, as
preachers, we need not make it our goal to smite people. Because
if we do, you know what we're going to do? We're going to take
the rod of the law and smite people with it. And not just
preachers, everybody. Everybody's got a pulpit with
the internet and stuff now. Don't make it your goal to smite
people. Because what we'll do is take the rod of the law and
smite people with it. And it won't do anybody any good. But when the Gospel smites us,
yes, our flesh is smitten. But we're not made sick, are
we? Our head's not broken. The gospel smites our flesh for
this reason, so that we'll look to Christ. See, you don't look
to Christ just once, do you? The Apostle Peter said, to whom
coming, coming. The flesh is smitten so that
we're constantly forced to look to Christ again, to come to Christ
again, to rely on Him again. When the flesh is smitten, we're
forced to look to Christ for life. for spiritual healing,
for forgiveness of our sin, for cleansing from our filth, for
comfort in this civil war, this fight that we're fighting as
we go through this world, and for correction. You think it's
odd to say that a believer wants correction, but a believer does.
Let the righteous smite me. Let the gospel smite my flesh.
It'll be a blessing to me. It'll be a kindness. Keep preaching
Christ to me. Keep telling me that there's
no hope in myself. Keep telling me how rotten my
flesh is. It'll be a kindness. Because
that makes me look to Christ. And you know when the gospel,
you know, this is not always a perfect thing. It ought always
to be that way. Every time the gospel smites
our flesh, we ought to just be humbled and look to Christ and
be thankful and count it as a kindness, shouldn't we? Boy, our flesh
is a problem. And when the gospel smites our
flesh, there are times even a believer can get our back up. It just
offends our flesh. And it's just unfortunately,
the flesh is still part of us. And we're just going to get our
back up. We're going to be mad about this. We're just not going
to like it. We're not going to take it. And it happens. And hopefully, the Lord won't
let us stay twisted up for too long. And when that happens,
this is what I would like to ask. Same thing the Apostle Paul
asked the church at Corinth. Am I becoming your enemy because
I told you the truth? There was a man texting me just
this week. And when he had become a pastor,
I kind of told him about some things that this is going to
happen. And when it does, you just remember this. Their fight's
not with you. It's with God. And he had somebody
give him a whole lot of trouble, cause a big commotion, get up
and leave in the middle of service. Well, am I becoming your enemy? Because I told you the truth?
I mean, you might like the truth, but now... And the believer answers,
no. No, you're not my enemy. And the believer's corrected,
eventually. And the unbeliever answered,
yes. Yes, you're my enemy. You and I can't get along about
this. And they get angry with the preacher and they up and
leave. and they fall into their own trap. Because I'm telling
you, really, the thing is, is they're mad at God. And nobody
gets anywhere being mad at God. The only thing for us to do when
the gospel smites our flesh is to follow God's feet. Don't get
mad at God. Follow His feet. Look at Proverbs chapter 9. I'll
show you the difference here, what the wise man told us about this
very situation. Proverbs 9, verse 8. Well, verse 7, the psalmist says,
He that reproveth a scorner giveth himself shame, and he that rebuketh
a wicked man giveth himself a blot. He probably gets a black eye
because the scorner, the wicked man, is not going to be corrected
by the gospel. In verse 8, he says, So reprove
not a scorner, lest he hate you. If you reprove a scorner, he's
going to hate you. But rebuke a wise man, and he'll love thee. Let the gospel smite a wise man,
he'll say it's a kindness. Give instruction to a wise man,
and he'll be yet wiser. Teach a just man, and he'll increase
in learning. You give instruction to one of
God's children, they've been made wise unto salvation. They
know the word, they know the gospel, but you keep giving them
instruction, they'll become more wise. And here's what we teach
them. Verse 10. The fear of the Lord
is the beginning of wisdom. And the knowledge of the holy
is understanding. So I say with David and with
our Lord, let the righteous smite me. It'll be a kindness. But
now let a false prophet, let somebody in the flesh smite you
and you'll be broken. And you just watch them. The
smiling, flattery of the wicked. Butter. Oh, their words are smoother
than butter. Sugar won't melt in their mouth.
The smiling flatter the wicked. Oh, it makes the flesh feel better.
But it's a false veneer. They smile in your face and reach
around and take your wallet. Or they stab you in the back.
One or the other. But when the flesh is smitten
by the gospel, when the flesh is smitten by the gospel, preached
in the right attitude, it won't break the head. No, it'll be
a blessing to the believer. The believer will be thankful
to be taught, to be corrected, to be reminded, to look to Christ
alone. And we would be wise to pray
for the right attitude in preaching and in hearing. Pray for the
right attitude that the gospel will correct us and make us look
to Christ and depend upon him and rest in his loving arms rather
than make us mad. Let's pray to be able to hear
the Savior say these words. Let the righteous smile at me.
It would be a kindness. Let us hear the Savior, our substitute
say that, and our hearts will be blessed. We'll be corrected
because we hear Him say that. The only place we'll have is
to look to Him. And we'll find comfort and peace for our souls. And I pray the Lord will give
that to us. Let's bow together. Our Father, how we thank You.
for the Lord Jesus Christ, our substitute, how he took the sins
of his people and bore it away by suffering the wrath of God
and justice against our sin. Father, how we thank you. And
Father, I pray you'd give each of us the faith to look to Christ,
to constantly depend upon and rest in him, in Christ, our perfect
Savior. And Father, I pray you'd use
the word to teach us, to instruct us, to constantly remind us to
put no confidence in the flesh, but to rest entirely on Christ
our Savior. To desire no glory for ourselves,
but desire that all the glory belong to our Savior. For it's
in his precious name that we pray. For his sake we pray. Amen. All right, you're dismissed.