I'm thrilled that the Lord brought
you here this morning. I want us to turn in the Psalms,
Psalm 145. Psalm 145. We never hear this portion of
God's word read and spoken from a lot, but I want to read the first
13 verses. Psalm 145. I will extol thee, my God, O
King, and I will bless thy name forever and ever. Every day will
I bless thee, and I will praise thy name forever and ever. Great
is the Lord, and greatly to be praised, and his greatness is
unsearchable. One generation shall praise thy
works to another, and shall declare thy mighty acts. I will speak
of the glorious honor of thy majesty and of thy wondrous works. And men shall speak of the might
of thy terrible acts, and I will declare thy greatness. They shall
abundantly utter the memory of thy great goodness and shall
sing of thy righteousness. The Lord is gracious and full
of compassion, slow to anger and of great mercy. The Lord
is good to all, and his tender mercies are over all his works. All thy works shall praise thee,
O Lord, and thy saints shall bless thee. They shall speak
of the glory of thy kingdom and talk of thy power, to make known
to the sons of men his mighty acts and the glorious majesty
of his kingdom. Thy kingdom is an everlasting
kingdom. And thy dominion endureth throughout all generations. We'll stop the reading with those
13 verses. Sometimes I'll read a passage
of scripture and pick up on the repetition of a specific word. I don't really pick up on it. The Lord causes it to jump out
at me. That's how it works. I'm not
smart enough to pick up on anything. God said, but he calls it to
jump out at me. And I read these verses as I
read these verses this week, I underlined the word several
times. Great or greatness in verse three, we're told of the
greatness of God's person. Great is the Lord himself. Then the greatness of his worthiness,
he is greatly to be praised. You cannot overdo it in praising the Lord privately,
publicly, audibly, or silently get on with it. And then. Further in verse three,
the secrecy of his greatness, his greatness is unsearchable. In verse six, the Psalmist professes
to declare God's greatness. The latter part of the verse,
I will declare thy greatness in verse seven refers to God's
great goodness. They shall abundantly utter the
memory of that great goodness. He's great in goodness. And verse
eight speaks of his great mercy. The last line of his great mercy. So there's an emphasis on God's
greatness. I'm drawn to the statement at
the end of verse three this morning. And his greatness is unsearchable. His greatness is unsearchable.
So that'll be the title of the message today. The unsearchable
greatness of God. Not that it's wrong for us to
make an effort to search out the greatness of God. Everything's
right about that. And we do so in reading his word,
studying his word, teaching and preaching. meditating upon it. It's not unlawful. Matter of
fact, it's very healthy for the inner man, for the new creation
to search out and to seek, to learn and to know and to meditate
and to worship in the greatness of God, the unsearchableness
of his greatness. But the meaning is that the greatness
of God is such that all the searching, all the effort, all the reading,
all the praying, all the meditating, we don't even scratch the surface,
so to speak, in our efforts to lay hold of his greatness. It is in the words of the Psalmist
here, unsearchable, unsearchable. His greatness so transcends his
creation. Such creatures as we are cannot
comprehend the Creator. It's not just that God has great
knowledge more than we do. He has all knowledge. It's not that he's just somewhat
wiser than we are. But he's the God of all wisdom. It's not that he's just a little
bit more powerful than we are. He's the God of all power. He's not just somewhere, sometime. He's everywhere all the time. How are you going to get a hold
of that? His greatness is not limited
by or confined to and within time we are, we are. His greatness is an eternal greatness
without beginning, without end. We see anyone in a certain position,
a certain level and think, wow, how did they get there? When
did they get there? How long did it take them to
get there? God's always been there. Always been. That's why he says
repeatedly in scripture, I am. It's never, I was, it's never,
I shall be, but it's, I am. You and I are confined to this
realm of time. Our God is not only here with
us right this morning, but at the same time, He reaches
both ways and lays hold on eternity past and eternity future. And nothing in time is going
to change what he was or going to make him anything he wasn't. His greatness is unsearchable.
These things are bigger than most of us got the brain to think
about. Unsearchable. If I had the mentality, the vocabulary,
the eloquence to exceed all men with all my abilities, I sought
to declare the greatness of God. He's greater than that. His greatness
is unsearchable. Now, one ancient definition of
this word unsearchable is this, not to be tracked by footprints. You cannot track God as you would
a man or an animal or anything within creation. It's hard for
us to grasp that God has his being apart from his creation. Everything we see with our eyes
is part of his creation. Everything we touch with our
hands as part of his creation. Everyone we know around us is
part of his creation. We ourselves are part of his
creation. And to conceive of him as part
of all this is idolatry. He is superior to his creation. One of Job's friends in Job 11
asked the question, Canst thou by searching find out God? Canst
thou find out the Almighty unto perfection? He's as high as heaven. What canst thou do? Deeper than
hell, what canst thou know? The measure thereof is longer
than the earth and broader than the sea. Can the creature search
out the creator? No, no. Can the matter of clay Search
out the mind of the potter. No. Who is he? What is it he's doing with me
and why? What can I know of a God who
exists eternally with all knowledge and all wisdom and all power
and infinitely holy? What can I know of a God who
exists in three persons equal father, son, and Holy Ghost? How can I comprehend such a thing
as incarnation? Eternal God being made flesh. His greatness is in every aspect
unsearchable. Unsearchable. He's unchanging
in His nature. I am the Lord, He said, I change
not. Every day that we live, everything
and everyone is different to some degree than it was the day
before. And change is constant in all
creation and all creatures, but not in
the Creator. His greatness is unsearchable. It's just a totally different
level. He is in a class all by himself. If you didn't, but no, well,
two verses of scripture, two things I wish to comment on in
our God that are unsearchable. Number one, his ways, his ways. Romans 11 33 says this. Oh, the depth of the riches,
both of the wisdom and knowledge of God. How unsearchable, there's
the word, are his judgments and his ways past finding out. How unsearchable are his judgments. The choices God makes and why he makes them cannot
be traced, cannot be tracked by footprints. They're unsearchable. If you could study the things
God does with your natural mind only, you would conclude that
He is so wrong in so many things. He has such poor judgment concerning
certain matters and certain people. He just doesn't do it the way
it looks to me like would be the right way to do it. He does
the wrong thing and He loves the wrong people. That's the
natural mind. But Paul told us in first Corinthians
two 14, the natural mind receiveth not the things of the spirit
of God for their foolishness unto him. Neither can he know
them because they're spiritually discerned. Now, one example of
God's unsearchable judgments going to give you a little old
Testament story here. his unsearchable judgments. In the days of judges, it was
perilous times. The Bible said there was no king
in Israel. Every man did that which was
right in his own eyes. A serious famine was on. And
there lived a man in Bethlehem of Judah. by the name of Elimelech. He went against the grain. He
went against his raising. He left his farm. He left his
people. He walked away from all he had
ever known and went down into the country
of Moab to sojourn there. And I've heard preachers for
50 years condemn this man. Why did he do it? Because he could not do it. God sent him. I don't know that he knew God
sent him. He certainly didn't know why,
but he thought he was doing the right
thing. God made him so discontent, so desperate, he went. If you
asked Imalek, he'd have told you it was his own decision to
do it. He thinks this is the best thing
to do for him and for his family in the time of famine. But it
was really God's doing. Imalek would go to Moab and would
die there. And his two sons would die there. In Adam all die, but Elimelech's wife, Naomi wouldn't
die there. She was a missionary sent to
Moab by the Lord. And she didn't even know it. The Lord through Naomi. won the heart of a young Moabite
woman named Ruth, her daughter-in-law. And Ruth, you know, came back
to Bethlehem with Naomi after 10 years and married a godly,
wealthy man named Boaz. And she became the great grandmother
of David. of whom Christ, after the flesh,
was in his loins. Ruth was a Moabite, a people
sprung from the incest of Lot with his daughters. How despicable. Ruth was not a virgin. She had
been married to one of Elimelech's sons. She's a widow. Ruth was
not wealthy. What was God's reasoning? Were
there not plenty of young, virtuous Israelite women to carry the
seed line of Abraham and bring forth a David and then Christ?
There was plenty of them. Plenty of them. But God made
this judgment. It was His call. No one else
would have done it this way. God did it His way. His judgments
sometimes are so strange, so unheard of, so unsearchable. There's no possible way to track
Him. in what he does. There's no traceable
footprints. We can't even track each other
with some of the crazy things we do. Let alone our God. Not one soul in Israel saw Naomi and Ruth coming up
the road home. and said, that's God, not one,
not one. They couldn't. They didn't know. They didn't know. The depth, the depth of the riches, both
of the wisdom and knowledge of God, how unsearchable are his
judgments. And his ways pacified it out.
Not only God's ways in that story of Ruth, but the second thought is God's wealth. He said in one place in the old
Testament, the gold is mine. The silver is mine. He said, the land's mine. Everything's mine. We own nothing in this world. In Ephesians 3 again, we find
this word unsearchable. Paul said that I should preach
among the Gentiles. The unsearchable riches of Christ. Really, the riches of God in
Christ. The gospel of grace. What a treasure
of wealth. the glorious redemption that
he's wrought in Christ Jesus to save sinners. Paul wrote in
1 Corinthians 1, not many wise after the flesh, not many mighty,
not many noble are called. He didn't say not any, but he
said not many. But he said God had chosen foolish,
weak, and base. Yea, in things that are not.
That's what all of us are, are nots, nothing. A zero with the ring kicked off
of it. To bring to naught the things
that are. God went and only he knows why
he went to Moab. He went a secret passenger in
a lim-lex wagon, and he won the heart of a fallen
sinner, a heathen Moabite by birth. Become a widow, desperate
in life, nothing to live for, but God won her heart. She told Naomi, I'm casting my
lot with your God and with you, and I'll not leave you. God did this long before he promised
Abraham anything, long before he created Adam, long before
he hung the stars. It's a secret in the unsearchable
mind of God. He made a judgment. He chose
Ruth. And he did it when she never
even existed, except in his mind and purpose. That's when he chose me. He chose
me before anyone rejected me. Any idea of a God? that looked
at you after you got here and then decided to smile on
you is no God at all. If God's eternal and he is. If God's unchangeable and he
is. All he's ever done in time is
what he's already done in eternity. Fixed. decreed in his purpose,
or it don't happen. Paul said it clearly in Ephesians
1, 4, that he has chosen us in Christ Jesus before the foundation
of the world. When I got here, sin started
destroying me. Hell started chasing me. The
world started attracting me. My own flesh ran from God in
rebellion. But God had made a judgment.
He had called the shots from eternity. Who would have thought
it? How unsearchable are his judgments? Why has he done what he's done? Because he's rich enough to do
it. He's the only one could afford
to save anybody like you. He can afford it because he has
the power. He can afford it because you don't care what anybody else
has to say about it. You won't be wrong this morning to cast
your lot with him. He's on top of it. He's on top
of it. He's rich in love, rich in mercy,
rich in grace. Rich in righteousness, rich in
forgiveness. And he's infinite in power. He
could have made Ruth an Israelite maiden. He made her a Moabite. He could have kept Ruth a pure
virgin. He made her a widow. He won her
heart. How foolish we are to think we're
smart enough to choose the right way and avoid the wrong way when
it's God all the time. The unsearchable riches of Christ,
the unsearchable greatness of God. Men's riches are measured
by millions. How many millions? Says just
how rich a man may be. But God's riches is in Christ. What he's done in becoming flesh
and dying on a cross and conquering sin, Satan, death, hell, the
grave. He's conquered. He's conquered. He's rich. What he's done in
Christ for poor sinners like you and I, it's a wealth unsearchable. He's forgiven me of so much.
What if I mess up this one more time? You reckon, you reckon
he's bankrupt. He's not bankrupt. He's not bankrupt. We have Ruth's story in the Bible.
I don't know your story. I don't even know all of mine. If I did know your story, I'm
sure I'd say, why in the name of heaven didn't God put him
or her in hell? They've always been a liability,
not an asset. And you'd say the same about
me if you knew my story. But the riches of His grace,
the unsearchable riches of Christ When you try to think of just
how great God is, just how holy he is. If you try it all and then, and then you reach
into the deepest dark places of your own heart and find secrets,
you wouldn't have anyone to know about you. So vile, so ugly. so unholy and
yet you know that God knows. How could he ever approve of
the likes of you and I? He does it through the unsearchable
riches of Christ, the great wealth He has made known in sending
His Son. What is Christ worth to you this
morning? If you're His, if you're really His, He's worth more than
all earth's gold and silver and precious stones. He's worth more
than houses and lands. He's worth more than power and
position and prestige and Reputation. No, no. We'll soon leave all
of this behind. Not all of this we can see around
us, but the stinking carcass we're walking around in. We're
going to leave that too. The only part of us ascending
into the presence of God is that new creation. That little lamb in here that'll look just like him who
died for us when we get there. Some of you need to quit trying
to qualify yourself. You'll never get there. I've tried it for 50 years, but
the truth is Christ Qualified for us. Lay hold of him. Tell him your heart. Tell him
all about what a wretch you are, fallen, filthy, in mind and heart. Quit wrestling to make the grade. You can't. You have it and you
won't. Worship him who's made it for
you. Sing it to him. Own Christ. The solid rock I stand, all other
ground is sinking sand. Some of us have lived a life,
so to speak, and we've done nothing but carry rocks and pour concrete
and trying to build us a firm foundation to stand on where
we're doing it on our own. You will never carry enough rocks. You'll never pour enough concrete,
Joe, and that's what he does every day. You'll never build a foundation
that you can stand on in the presence of God. But there is no other foundation
that is laid but Jesus Christ. On Christ, the solid rock I stand. All other ground is sinking sand.
His greatness is unsearchable. It's unsearchable. But oh, how
we love to search after Him, know Him, worship Him. I'm glad you're here today. Thank
you for coming. Let's stand together.