Let's open our Bibles again to
Psalm 31. I believe the Lord has given
me a message I believe is just ideal for Wednesday night. You all have come in fresh from
the fight, from a difficult day out in the world. The Lord has
given a word of comfort to His people. I hope that you'll bless
it to our hearts this evening. I titled the message, God's Great
Goodness. You may recall in the verses
we looked at last week, Christ's substitute spoke from the cross,
told us how he endured all of God's wrath for the sin of his
people. And the church listened to Christ
speak. They heard what he said and they
understood what he meant. So now beginning in verse 19,
the church speaks. They speak out of a heart that's
overcome with love and gratitude to be able to speak about the
goodness of the Lord. How good the Lord is. Verse 19 begins, Oh, how great
is thy goodness. How great is God's goodness to
his people. God's goodness is great in its
height. It reaches all the way to heaven.
God's goodness is great in its depths. It comes all the way
from heaven. down to find the lowest center at the bottom of
the barrel. God's goodness is great in its breadth. It reaches
to the farthest away center. God's goodness is so great, not
one of His objects of mercy can ever escape it. His goodness
is so great. And this word goodness that David
uses has to do with being the best. God's goodness is the best. There's none like it. I want
us to look at some characteristics of God's goodness that make it
the best. First of all, God's goodness
is laid up for his people. Verse 19, Oh, how great is thy
goodness, which thou has laid up for them that fear thee. Now,
goodness is God's very character. There's none good, but God. God
is good. You remember when Moses asked
the Lord, Lord, show me your glory. And Lord said, I'll make
all my goodness pass before you. I'll be gracious unto whom I
will be gracious. I'll show mercy to whom I will
show mercy. God's character, his glory is
his goodness. And God has gathered up all this
goodness for his people. He's just heaped it up so that
it will, he's heaped up so much of it. It'll never run out. The phrase here, David uses laid
up. means hoarded up. It's like a hoarder just hoarding
up all his goodness for his people. He's gathered it up so there'll
always be plenty of goodness for his people. Look over 1 Peter
chapter 1. The Lord has hoarded up his goodness
as an inheritance for his people. I saw documentary recently about,
I forget even who it was, I just watched a little bit of it. This
man was utterly ate up. He became a very, very wealthy
man and he was just ate up every day with making more and more
and more and more money for this purpose, to give it to his son. He brought in, if this is a true
story, I reckon it is, he brought in a bag This is back in the
early 1900s. He brought in a bag, a paper
bag, put it in his son's, son's eight or nine years old, put
it in his hands. He said, feel that, feel the weight of that,
feel that. And he did, he held it. He said,
now open it up. It's cash. He said, that's what
a million dollars feels like. He did all, he said, I'm doing
all this to give it to you as your inheritance. Our heavenly
father has gathered up his goodness as an inheritance to His people,
and it can never be lost. 1 Peter 1, verse 3, to an inheritance,
incorruptible and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved
in heaven for you who are kept by the power of God through faith
unto salvation, which is ready to be revealed in the last time.
God has hoarded up this great goodness as an inheritance to
His people, and God's goodness is so great, it causes them to
rejoice. even in the midst of trial, verse
six, wherein ye greatly rejoice. Though now for a season, if need
be, you're in heaviness through manifold temptation, that the
trial of your faith be much more precious than a gold that perisheth,
though it be tried with fire, might be found under praise and
honor and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ. The Lord has
hoarded up his goodness as an inheritance to his people. He's
laid it up for them. so it'll never run out. All right, second, God's goodness
is found in the Lord Jesus Christ. Back here in middle verse 19,
our text. Which thou hast wrought for them
that trust in thee before the sons of men. Now God's goodness
is most clearly seen in the Lord Jesus Christ, who wrought, who
worked out salvation for his people. God is so good He sent
His only begotten Son to work out this salvation for His people,
to work out the goodness that God had laid up for them. God
is so good, He gave the very best that He had to save His
people from their sin. You reckon He's going to withhold
anything else that's good from His people? He didn't withhold
His only Son. He's not going to withhold any
goodness from His people. Now God is good, but God's holy
and just too. You know, God's goodness will
not make Him overlook sin or ignore sin. So salvation had
to be wrought. It had to be produced by Christ
our Savior. The word wrought here means to
make. Christ came to make His people righteous through His
obedience. He came to make His people justified
by the blood that He would shed for them. He came to make His
people live. by his death as their substitute.
The Lord Jesus Christ wrought. He worked out a perfect salvation
for his people. It can never be lost. Every one
of them will happen. Not one of them will perish because
God's good. All the Lord's good to his people. Then verse 20, God's goodness
is a keeping goodness. Thou shalt hide them in the secret
of thy presence from the pride of man. Thou shalt keep them
secretly in a pavilion from the strife of tongues." Now, God
is so good, He hides His people. He hides them in His Son. That's
what the secret of His presence means. He's hidden His people
in Christ. Now, if we're hidden in Christ,
no enemy can ever touch us. No enemy from without and no
enemy from within. Notice what the psalmist says
here. He says believers are hidden from the pride of man. He doesn't say the pride of men,
the pride of man. We don't just need to be hidden
from the pride of men that are around us. Tell you what we need
most of all, we need to be hidden from the pride of our nature,
the pride of man that's in our nature, the nature that we're
carrying around with us. We desperately need to be hidden from that pride,
that nature of man that's in us. We'll never be rid of it
until we lay him down in the grave. It's this pride of man,
the pride of man's nature that makes us think a whole lot more
highly of ourselves than we ought to think. When we think more
highly of ourselves, we think we're better than we really are.
You know what that produces? Self-righteousness. We start
to think, I can do something to earn this from God. I can
do something to start helping God out. I can do something to
start earning some blessings from God. And Christ's righteousness
is of no use to us whatsoever as long as we're trusting in
anything about ourselves. We trust Him wholly or not at
all. If we're trusting in any of our
righteousness, Christ's righteousness is of no use to us whatsoever.
So we desperately need to be hidden, protected from the pride
of man, the pride of the nature that's in us. And if we're in
Christ, the Lord will do that. If we're hidden in Christ, He'll
keep us from trusting in ourselves. And I'll tell you how He'll do
it. By constantly reminding us of
who we are and who the Savior is. Ken tells me every once in
a while, thank you for reminding me I'm a sinner. Thank you for
reminding me how awful I am. That's how the Lord keeps us
from the pride of man. By reminding us who we are, by
constantly whittling us down and constantly exalting the Lord
Jesus Christ. That'll protect us from trusting
in that nature that we carry around with us. Being hidden
in Christ protects us from the enemies within and also the enemies
that are without. The Lord keeps his people from
the strife of tongues. That word strife means adversary
or it means contending. I look back at Exodus chapter
17. Here's a good example of what I'm talking about. The strife
of tongues. It's being an adversary, it's
contending against God. It's false religion that causes
people to constantly question God, to constantly question his
gospel, and to question his word. Exodus 17, verse 3. And the people thirsted there
for water, and the people murmured against Moses and said, Wherefore
is this that thou hast brought us up out of Egypt, to kill us
and our children and our cattle with thirst? They're contending
against God. They're arguing against God.
What have you brought us out? You brought us out here to die
of thirst. And then after that is when Moses,
the Lord told Moses, smite the rock and it gave forth all the
water for the people. But look down at verse 7. And
he called the name of the place Massa and Meribah. because of
the chiding of the children of Israel, because they tempted
the Lord, saying, is the Lord among us or not? Moses named
that place temptation and chiding. And that word chiding is the
exact same word translated strife in our text. Words of strife
are words that question God's goodness, that questions his
love for his people, that questions his wisdom and what he's doing.
that questions His sovereignty, how He rules and reigns over
all things. Words of strife question God's
ability to save. God must not be able to save
me unless I do something, make a decision or walk an aisle or
do something, you know. Words of strife question God's
Word. Question God's Word. Someone will go through and read
Ephesians chapter 1. Oh, it's all in Christ. It's
all God's purpose in Christ. He foreordained before the foundation
of the world. And they say, well, now that
doesn't mean that. That's strife, words of contending. Well, when times get hard, why
don't God's people go off? Why don't they go off and leave
the Lord? Why don't they chide with the Lord? Why don't they
go off and agree with these false prophets? It's just easier to
do that. Just go off with them. Question
God's free and sovereign grace. Why don't they do it? Because
God protects them from doing it. He hides them in Christ and
protects them from the strife of tongues. God is good to his
people. He protects them, preserves them
always. Then here's the fourth thing.
God's goodness is a distinguishing goodness. Verse 21, Psalm 31. Blessed be the Lord, for he has
showed me his marvelous kindness in a strong city. I looked up,
I thought I knew where I was going with this first, but I
looked up the word marvelous and it didn't mean what I thought
it would mean. It means distinguishing. God's goodness is distinguishing.
God's goodness is not for every son of Adam. God's goodness is
for people. Now, the Lord is good in a general
sense to all men and that he gives rain and sunshine and food
and air to breathe and so forth. But you know, that's not real
goodness. Remember what God's goodness
is. It's His character. His character of mercy and grace
to His people. Well, that's not for everyone.
That's only reserved for His people. And you think, well,
what about the Lord just blessing all the wicked with just giving
them everything their heart can desire? David did. David said,
look at them. Their eyes stand out with fatness.
They're one of nothing. What about all this? Well, I'll
tell you what God's doing when he does that. He may give them
food and riches and ease of life, for what? To a rebel. But all
he's doing is fattening them up for the slaughter. I have
a very dear friend, his name is Danny Belcher. Danny attends
up there at Millsite Baptist Church, where Mike Walker is
the pastor. Danny raises cattle, he's a farmer. I'm telling you,
this guy takes immaculate care of his cattle. He's got 150 head
or something. I mean, he takes immaculate care
of them. When one of those cows is getting
ready to give birth, Danny Belcher is there. I mean, that calf,
when it first comes out, comes into Danny Belcher's hand. He
takes care of it and washes it and does all the stuff for it,
you know. He watches the mother, makes sure she's being a good
mother. He takes those cows and weighs them. And oh, this one's,
you know, not heavy enough. He feeds it extra. This concoction
to feed it. I mean the detail that he goes
into to take care of those cows. It's just shocking to me. There's
one reason that he does that to those cows. His wife Kathy
sometimes thinks, what is he doing out there at 3 o'clock
in the morning with his cows? The cows have been giving birth
for 6,000 years. She knows how to give birth.
She might think, what is he doing? He's doing that so he can slaughter
them. He's doing that because the way
he takes care of them makes the best beef. And I can attest to
it. I've had it. I mean, it's good
beef. But Danny don't treat his wife that way. He treats her
good. See the difference? That's what
the Lord does with the wicked when He blesses them. He's just
fattening them up for the slaughter. His goodness, His mercy and grace,
His eternal love and redemption is reserved for His people. God's
goodness is only for His people. Look over at Exodus chapter 18.
This is the first time the word goodness is used in the Bible.
It'll show us that God's goodness is a distinguishing goodness.
Exodus chapter 18, verse eight. And Moses told his
father-in-law all that the Lord had done unto Pharaoh and to
the Egyptians for Israel's sake and all the travail that had
come upon them by the way and how the Lord delivered them.
And Jethro rejoiced for all the goodness which the Lord had done
to Israel whom he had delivered out of the hand of the Egyptians.
The first time the word goodness is used in scripture is when
God, his goodness in delivering Israel and destroying the Egyptians. And that goes back to our very
first point about God's or our last point, excuse me, about
God's keeping goodness. God, his goodness is distinguishing
his first people and he protects his people. David says here in
a strong city. I look over in Proverbs chapter
18. God protects His people in a
strong city where nothing the enemy does can make any difference
to what's going on to His people in the city because they're defended
in a strong city. I look this word up, strong city,
trying to see something in Scripture that might give me some way to
help us understand how safe, how protected God's people are
in this strong city. Proverbs 18, verse 19. A brother offended is harder
to be won than a strong city, and their contentions are like
the bars of a castle. You know exactly what that's
saying. If somebody really offends you, they do something that just
really offends you. I mean, it's wrong, it just comes
out of left field. You don't have any idea why they
did that, but it was a serious harm to you. It's almost impossible
for them win your trust back because they've so seriously
offended you. They come to you and tell you I'm sorry. They
could come and ask for your forgiveness. They could come and say, let's
just forget this ever happened and start all over again. You
know, they say all the right things. And you might say all
the right things. You say, OK, that's what we'll
do. But those bars of the castle,
those bars are strong as the bars protecting the king and
the castle are still around your heart. It just is not going to
be very easy for them to win your trust back. It's going to
take a long time and nothing that they say can move your heart
because you've been so offended, you've been so hurt. Well, this
is the lesson I want us to get from that. You got a lot to say
there about how we ought to be forgiving and so forth, but you
already know that. This is the lesson of the verse
we're looking at. God's people are protected, safe
in a strong city. And nothing the enemy says, nothing
the enemy does is going to affect God's people in that city. One
iota. It's not going to make any difference
to our souls. God is so good to His people, He protects them
in the walls of a strong city. And those walls are strong and
sure and thick. Nothing can penetrate God's goodness
to get to His people to harm them. God's good to His people.
Then back in our text, look at verse 22. God's goodness is a
forgiving goodness. For I said in my haste, I'm cut
off from before thine eyes. Nevertheless, thou heardest the
voice of my supplications when I cried unto thee. Now we know
that the sin of God's people has been put away under the blood
of Christ. We know that, don't we? God's not angry with his
people. He said there's no fury left
in me. His wrath has been fully poured out. upon our substitute,
and he loves his people. He's well pleased with his people
in Christ. He's not angry with them. But at the same time, how
did our Lord teach us to pray? In the disciples' prayer, forgive
us our debts, as we forgive our debtors. And I tell you why the
Lord taught us to pray that way. Because all we do is sin. I'm
talking to believers now. All we do is sin, even after
we're born again. Now that new man, born of God,
he can never sin. But in the new birth, this nature
of this flesh has not changed one iota. It seems as much as
it ever did. We never stop sinning. So we always ask forgiveness.
And you know, after we're born again, after we've been converted,
our sin bothers us like it never bothered us before. Because only
the new man can see the sin of the old man. Only the new man
can see how awful that old man is. And when we see our sin,
when the Lord gives us some glimpse of our sin, our heart just smites
us. Now, it doesn't do it all the
time. It doesn't do it as much as it should, but often enough,
the Lord's going to give us a glimpse of ourself often enough that
our heart will smite us. And I tell you what really troubles
the heart of a child of God, what troubles them so much, when
we see our lack of trust in the Lord. After all His goodness
to His people, after all the times He's proved Himself faithful
to us, we find ourselves doubting Him. Maybe this time He won't
provide. I know He always has in the past,
but what am I going to eat? What am I going to wear now?
You ever found yourself in that shape? David did. God made David a promise. David,
you're going to be the king. He sent his prophet Samuel to
anoint David. David had a good life before
he met Samuel. And from that time on, David's
life was a life of hardship, heartache, just trouble and turmoil. Saul's trying to kill him all
the time. David's on the run, living in caves and depending
on the goodness of people to, you know, to defeat him and his
little band of men, you know. David said, in my haste, I spoke
before I thought, and I said, I'm cut off from the Lord. Before
I even thought, I spoke and said, God's cut me off. He's not going
to keep His word to me. I'm not going to be king. I'm
going to die right here in this cave. That's going to happen to me,
David said, because God's abandoned me. He just turned His back upon
me. Now that's inexcusable. Mistrusting the Lord is inexcusable. I don't know of anything that
hurts the heart of a child of God more. We see that in ourselves.
It's just inexcusable not to trust the Lord. But it's not
unforgivable. It's not unforgivable. David
said, nevertheless, I didn't trust the Lord like I should.
I distrusted him. But nevertheless, my sin is great. My sin is inexcusable. But God's goodness is never less
than my sin. God's goodness is never less
than my badness. My badness is never going to
overwhelm God's goodness. My faith was so weak. But nevertheless,
God heard my prayer. My faith was weak. I didn't trust
the promise of the Lord. But when I cried to him, he still
granted the request with an open, generous hand to this mercy beggar. You know why? Because God's good
to His people. He's forgiving to His people.
He doesn't give to His people because we're any good, because
we're not. God forgives His people because
He's good. I was looking at this yesterday,
such a comfort to me. When I consider the poor way
that I pray, When I consider my poor words in prayer, my weak
faith in prayer, do you know that never stops God from hearing
our prayers? Because we're not heard for our
much speaking. We're not heard for our good speech, our eloquence,
and how we, you know, arrange our arguments and talk to the
Lord. I'll tell you why we're heard. For Christ's sake. We're heard because God's good.
He forgives His people. He's good to His people. And
He hears the cry of their heart. Cry to Him. Cry to Him for mercy. Ask Him for mercy. Ask Him for
help. Ask Him for strength. Ask Him to forgive you. God's
good. He's the only one who can. Cry
to Him. All right, verse 23. God's goodness is a just goodness. Oh, love the Lord, all ye His
saints, for the Lord preserveth the faithful, and plentifully
rewardeth the proud doer. Now, the Lord preserves those
who trust in Christ. Back up in verse 19, he talks
about the salvation wrought for them that trust in thee before
the sons of men. This faith that Dave is talking
about here is an open, confessed faith in Christ. But you know,
we're not preserved because of how faithful we are. We're not
preserved because of how faithfully, you know, we do whatever it is
we're supposed to be doing. If that were true, Some part of
salvation, either getting it, obtaining it, or keeping it,
would be dependent on something that we do, how faithful we are.
Well, that can't be. Because salvation is by grace.
It's not by works. It's by grace. If any part of
salvation, from the very beginning of it to the final glorification
of it, depends on you and me, we're going to lose it in just
a split second. We'll lose it. But a believer
is preserved. in Christ, the object of our
faith. If we have faith in Christ, God
is just to forgive us our sins. God is just to preserve us, even
in our weakness, because we're one with Christ. We're preserved,
we're kept in Christ, the object of our faith. Now here's how
good that God is to his people. His people that are faithful.
Well, how do they become faithful? Well, God had to give them faith
then. Faith is the gift of God. The only way they could get faith
is if God gave it to them. And then, God so good, He turned
around and blessed them for having it. Isn't that something? He
blessed them for having it. He blessed them for having faith
that He gave them. All because we're found in Christ. God's
good to His people. But here's the other side. God
is just to give His people to preserve them and protect them
because they're one with Christ. But the other side, of God's
justice is how he deals with the proud. The proud are those
people who trust in themselves. And they're going to be damned
for it. They're trusting in the things that they do, and they're
going to be damned. So they're so proud, they think too highly
of themselves. And they will be plentifully,
plentifully rewarded. They wanted rewards in eternity.
They said, I want to do this. I want this for my rewards. And
God said, all right, I'll give you those rewards. but they're
not going to be rewards in heaven. They're going to be rewards in
hell. Rewards. You look through the scripture,
you will never one time find the word rewards plural in reference
to a believer. Believers have one great reward.
Same reward God told Abraham, you've got one reward. I am your
reward. The reward of every believer
is to be made like Christ and to be able to be with him throughout
eternity. He's our reward. But rewards
are always for unbelievers. God's going to give them the
just rewards of their evil works. And those works they thought
were good enough to earn them salvation are going to earn them
damnation. That's the two opposite sides
of God's justice. His goodness to his people because
they're one with Christ and his justice to people who trusted
in themselves. Robert Murray McShane. wrote
this verse in a song I love, How Much I Owe. He said, when
I hear the wicked call on the rocks and hills to fall, when
I see them start and shrink on the fiery dayloos brink, then,
Lord, shall I fully know, but not to the end, how much I owe. Then we're going to know more
about how truly great God's distinguishing goodness is to His people. All
right, here's the last thing, verse 24. God's goodness is a
strengthening goodness. Be of good courage, and he shall
strengthen your heart. All ye that hope in the Lord. David ends with a blessed exhortation. Be of good courage. Be of good
courage. It's the same thing. That Moses
told the children of Israel he was getting ready to depart from
them. Joshua would take them into the promised land. Remember
we read it to open the service and he told them be of good courage.
The child of God needs courage for the journey. We face so many
dangers. We face dangers from within. If we spend any time at all thinking
about what we'll do if God lifts his finger off of us for a second,
we'll be scared to death. We think about our enemies that
are without. Every single one of them is too
powerful for me. We face frightening trials and
we think I'm going to be overwhelmed by this one. I can't do it. We think this
trial comes upon us and we think I can't do it. I can't, I can't,
I can't. Be of good courage. Be of good
courage. Now listen, don't be of good
courage. because you'll find you're stronger than what you
really think you are and you really can. No, you really can't. You're right, you can't do it.
You can't take care of these things by yourself. Be of good
courage because of God's goodness to His people. If you hope in
the Lord, David said, maybe the Lord will strengthen you. That's
not what he said, is it? He said, if you hope in the Lord,
He shall strengthen your heart. then hope in the Lord. Don't
hope in yourself. Don't hope in whatever it is that you've
done good for the Lord. Don't hope in how well you've
lived before men. Hope in the Lord and His goodness
to His people. He shall strengthen your heart. You will be enabled to endure
the unendurable because He'll strengthen your heart. The Lord
is so good to His people. He gives strength of heart to
face and to endure every trial. And he knows just how much strength
to give because he's the one that's in the trial. He knows
how hard it is. He knows how hard it is. He knows
how difficult the way is. And he's going to give the right
amount of strength to endure the trial. God's goodness to
his people is a strengthening goodness. After all that, I hope
we can say with David, oh, how great. is thy goodness. God's
goodness is so great to his people. Let's bow together in prayer. Our Father, how we thank you
for your great goodness to your people. Human language can't begin to
express our thanksgiving. But Father, our hope is in thee.
Our faith is in thee. We look to thee to supply everything
we need. We look to you to guide us, to
lead us. We look to you to strengthen us for the journey ahead. We
look to you to strengthen us for our next breath, our next
step, to endure whatever it is we're enduring at this very moment. How thankful we are to be able
to hope in the Lord, to hope in your goodness, your never-ending
goodness to your people. Father, how we pray You'd forgive
us of our sin, our weakness, our weak faith, our unbelief,
and see us and hear us only in the Lord Jesus Christ, who is
our goodness. It's in His precious name we pray and give thanks.