Well, thank you once again for
your warm and kind welcome. It's a pleasure to be here. Angus
was saying about the little baby being in Sydney now, and that
being a reason for us coming back. I remember when my son
first came. good number of years ago, I think
that's over 10 years, is that right? He said that he was thinking
about going to Sydney to do a course at the university. I said, is
there nowhere closer? Is there no one else does that
course, maybe a little bit nearer home? And he's heading Well,
I've always said that he wanted to go as far away from his dad
as he could. But see, his dad chased him.
His dad followed him out. And little did we know that when
the Lord was pulling all these strands together, that he was
opening a door of access that we might be able to share fellowship
in the succeeding years. with one another who otherwise
would never have crossed each other's paths. So the Lord is
at hand in all of these things and even our surprises, sometimes
our shocks, invariably bring good to us at the close of the
day. So it's a delight to be back
with you, to be able to worship with you, to be able to share
in the things that the Lord has taught us at one and another. And we might come from long distances
apart, but it is always, and I say it frequently, it is always
a joy when the Lord's people come together because there is
immediately that bond of fellowship which which binds them together
and enables them to enjoy sweet fellowship one with the other. So thank you once again and it's
a delight to be here and a privilege to have this responsibility of
preaching the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ in your hearing.
I do take it seriously and I trust that the Lord will be pleased
to minister his word to our hearts this morning. Turn with me please
in your Bibles to Psalm 91. Psalm 91. Psalm 91. Now our focus is going to be
on Psalm 23 today. The 23rd Psalm. I always say to people when they're
looking for the Psalms, just open your Bible in the middle
and you'll find the Psalms right there. So we're going to be reading
Psalm 91, but then we're going to be turning back to Psalm 23. And we're looking at the third
verse of that Psalm, particularly this morning. So Psalm 91 is
where we will begin our reading. Psalm 91 and verse 1. He that dwelleth in the secret
place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the
Almighty. Let me just pause there for a
moment and redirect your minds back again to some of the things
that we said on a previous occasion, and that is namely that The person
we are talking about in this psalm is the Lord Jesus Christ. So when we read, he that dwelleth
in the secret place of the Most High, we are talking about the
Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, particularly in his mediatorial
office. That means that the Son of God
existed in the presence of God, long before he ever came to earth
as a little baby, the baby Jesus in the manger. The eternal Son
existed with the Father in the three persons of the Godhead,
Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. But the Son undertook to fulfill
the will of the Father by coming to the earth and taking upon
himself the role of a servant. And it is in that capacity that
these words are spoken of the Lord. For the father holds the
son dear to him. The son is called my dearly beloved
son. He that dwelleth in the secret
place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the
Almighty. I will say of the Lord, he is
my refuge and my fortress, my God, in him will I trust. Surely he shall deliver thee
from the snare of the fowler and from the noisome pestilence. He shall cover thee with his
feathers, and under his wings shalt thou trust. His truth shall
be as thy shield and buckler. thou shalt not be afraid for
the terror by night, nor for the arrow that flyeth by day,
nor for the pestilence that walketh in darkness, nor for the destruction
that wasteth at noonday. A thousand shall fall at thy
side, and ten thousand at thy right hand. but it shall not
come nigh thee. Only with thine eyes shalt thou
behold and see the reward of the wicked, because thou hast
made the Lord, which is my refuge, even the most high thy habitation. There shall no evil befall thee,
neither shall any plague come nigh thy dwelling. For he shall
give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways. They shall bear thee up in their
hands, lest thou dash thy foot against a stone. Thou shalt tread
upon the lion and adder, the young lion and the dragon shalt
thou trample under feet. because he hath set his love
upon me. Therefore will I deliver him.
I will set him on high because he hath known my name. He shall
call upon me and I will answer him. I will be with him in trouble. I will deliver him and honour
him. With long life will I satisfy
him and show him my salvation. Amen. May God bless to us this
reading from his word. Now if you'll just flip back
with me a few pages in your Bible to Psalm 23 and there in verse 3 we will find the verse
that will take our attention for the rest of the morning. Verse one says, the Lord is my
shepherd, I shall not want, he maketh me to lie down in green
pastures, he leadeth me beside the still waters, he restoreth
my soul, he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his
name's sake. We have said, in our thinking
upon some of the early verses of this passage, that we wish
to place these words in the mouth of the Savior Jesus Christ. We read these words, and we get
a lot of comfort, and we see that this psalm has been well
used down through the years by many, many people. who have gleaned
something of the sweetness and simplicity of the words which
are here recorded. But we wish to place these words,
first of all, in the mouth of the Lord Jesus and remind ourselves
that before we ever came to speak these words and gain comfort
from them, the Lord Jesus Christ himself spoke these words. and indeed of him are they most
meaningfully recorded in the Word of God. This is a prophetic
psalm in exactly the same way as the whole of the Old Testament
spoke of Christ and looked forward to the coming of Christ, so we
discern the Lord Jesus Christ as both the author and the speaker
and the subject of this psalm. Yeah. Let us remind ourselves
of a few things concerning this ministry of the Lord when he
came into this world, first as a little baby and then throughout
the years of his life until the culmination of his life when
he laid it down upon the cross. Let us this morning, as the Lord
enables us, think for a little while about some of the experiences
of the Lord Jesus Christ in the context of that which is said
of him here in this psalm, particularly the restoration of the soul of
Christ. The Lord Jesus Christ said of
his father, he restoreth my soul, he leadeth me in the paths of
righteousness for his name's sake. In what sense was the soul
of the Lord Jesus Christ restored? The Lord Jesus Christ, in his
earthly ministry, endured great suffering and pain. And it's not inappropriate, I
don't think, for us to say that the sufferings of the Lord Jesus
Christ were greater than the sufferings that anyone
else upon the face of this earth has ever endured. I believe I
can make a strong case for that statement, and there has been
much suffering in this world. But I don't believe that anyone
ever suffered, either in the breadth, extent, severity, or
depth as did the Lord Jesus Christ in both body, mind and soul. The writer to the Hebrews speaks
of the Lord Jesus Christ's reproach He speaks there of the Lord enduring
such contradiction of sinners against himself, such that everyone
that was around the Lord Jesus Christ was a contradiction to
his soul. The purity, the holiness of his
soul was offended by the presence of everyone. around about him. He endured the contradiction
of sinners against him. Isaiah says in the Old Testament
that he was acquainted with sorrows, and that, if we take the word
acquaintance and acquainted in its normal usage would suggest
to us, I think, that there was a regularity and a frequency,
there was a commonness about the sorrows that the Lord Jesus
Christ knew. It wasn't just as if at one point
in his life, suddenly, he had a terrible experience. No, he
was acquainted with sorrows. Sorrows, as it were, were shoulder
to shoulder with him. They were always present. He continues, Isaiah, to say
that he was bruised for our iniquities. Peter, the apostle, the one that
went with the Lord Jesus in many of his journeys and ministry
through those three years of his service, speaks of the sufferings
of Christ, the sufferings of Christ. And so this morning,
I want to take a few moments to look at some of those sufferings
of Christ, some of the bruises that he had. and think of them
in the context of the restoration of his soul and the need for
the Father to restore the soul of the Lord Jesus Christ because
of the things that he endured. The birth of the Lord Jesus Christ
occasioned hundreds perhaps thousands of deaths of infants. Think about that for a moment.
The birth of the Lord Jesus Christ occasioned the deaths of hundreds,
perhaps thousands of infants. How would you like to live with
that? in your knowledge, on your conscience, for the whole of
your life. That because of your birth, a
whole generation was wiped out in the whole of a geographic
region. Because of the vileness and wickedness
of one man who thought that your birth was going to be a threat
to his throne. The Scriptures tell us throughout,
often casually, often not making a great point of it, but that
the Lord Jesus Christ was good and sensitive and gentle. And as he grew up, he knew that
he didn't have any children of his same age in his village. or in his locality or in his
region, because all of those children had been slain. The Lord Jesus Christ endured
personal and family hardship. It is perhaps likely that as
a young man, perhaps a teenager, he lost his father, because we
never hear, I say his father, I mean by that Joseph who was
called his father, the husband of Mary, but we do not hear of
Joseph later in the Lord's life. And it may well be that his mother
was bereaved of her husband early in the Lord's teenage years. We don't hear about him after
the age of 12. The Lord Jesus Christ was therefore the breadwinner
of that house, even as effectively just a very young man. In his ministry he was mocked
He was maligned by those that he encountered, although he only
ever did good. He was insulted in the town of
Nazareth, the place where he grew up, the place where the
people still used the things that he had made as a carpenter. still employed the tables and
the chairs and the gates and the doors that his handiwork
and his sweat had produced, tried to kill him. They took him up
to the top of a hill and they designed to throw him off that
hill because of the claims that he made and because of the miracles
that he did. He was rejected by his natural
family and they, we're told in John 5, verse 7, didn't believe
him. Those who were closest to him
by natural contact did not believe the things that he said. And he was doubted, and he was
denied, and he was betrayed by his closest friends. In Psalm
41, verse 9, we have the psalmist prophetically declaring of the
Lord Jesus Christ, my own familiar friend, in whom
I trusted, which did eat of my bread, hath lifted up his heel
against me. And we see both Thomas and Peter
and Judas Iscariot fulfilling some of these elements and aspects
of the denial and betrayal of the Lord Jesus Christ, this doubting
that was part and parcel even of his apostles' reaction to
the things that the Lord Jesus Christ said and did. It was a
lonely life for the Lord. there were few places where he
could find comfort and succour. That is perhaps why, when he
did find somewhere, like in the home of Mary Magdalene, or Mary
and Martha and Lazarus, that he resorted hither often, and
he enjoyed the company of just a few people. He was reviled of kings and governors,
His own nation conspired against him and gave him up to a foreign
nation that they might put him to death. The common people of
his age, despite the fact that they were amongst the ones upon
whom these miracles had been afforded, the healings and the
feedings and the provision of all that was needful for their
physical well-being, and the words that were spoken to the
help and encouragement and blessing of their souls, nevertheless
turned against him at that moment when perhaps as a man he might
have hoped that they would have rallied to his defence. And they cried and said, away
with this man. We will not have this man to
rule, to reign over us. In Matthew chapter 27, they aggravated
that cry to the extent that in the 25th verse, they declared,
his blood be on us and on our children. That was how the people spoke
of the Lord Jesus Christ. His blood be on us. We don't
want this man. Slay him, kill him, be done with
him, be away with him. And we'll take responsibility
for it. His blood can be on our account
and on our children's account. What a thing to say about the
blessed Son of God. What a thing to say about that
one who had only done good throughout the three years of his ministry,
only healed and blessed and helped and encouraged and comforted. A murderer, Barabbas, a robber,
was preferred to the Lord Jesus Christ despite all the good that
he had done. And in Matthew chapter 27, verse
26, we read, Then released he Barabbas unto them, and when
he had scourged Jesus, he delivered him to be crucified. Scourging
was a terrible punishment in itself, but it was only the prelude
to what was to come in the crucifixion of the Lord. Turn with me to
Matthew chapter 27, if you will, just for a few moments. I want
to read a few verses there, beginning at verse 27, because I think
it is just worth our while realizing the factuality, the actuality
of this suffering of the Lord. Matthew 27 and verse 27. This was before The Lord was crucified. He had
been scourged in verse 26. That means whipped. Then the soldiers of the governor
took Jesus into the common hall and gathered unto him the whole
band of soldiers. Now that wasn't just a few men. It's actually thought that that
could have involved hundreds of men. The whole band is emphasised
in that verse. And they stripped him and put
on him a scarlet robe. And when they had plaited a crown
of thorns, they put it upon his head, and a reed in his right
hand, and they bowed the knee before him and mocked him, saying,
Hail, King of the Jews. They had fun with the Lord on
the night before he was crucified. They took great pleasure. He
was their entertainment. In a place where probably entertainment
was difficult to obtain for a group of soldiers, they had to find
their own. And what better than to take
someone who's just newly been scourged, and to drag him into
the company of all the soldiers, and there dress him up and beat
him up, and just give vent to the most evil desires of their
hearts. verse 30, and they spit upon
him and took the reed and smote him on the head. And after they
had mocked him, they took the robe off from him and put his
own raiment on him and led him away to crucify him. Another
one of the gospel writers in the same context tells us that
they covered his face so that he couldn't see, and then they
struck him, and they buffeted him, and they punched him, and
they slapped him, and they said, tell us, if you're a prophet,
which one of us was it that hit you? These things were done to the
Lord. The extent of the suffering of the Lord Jesus Christ was
considerably greater than that which people often imagine when
we think of him hanging upon the cross. That was just the
culmination of all the things that the Lord Jesus Christ had
endured, body, mind, and soul throughout the days of his life. When we think about the way in
which he endured trouble in his own heart, we cannot either exclude
the fact that he was tempted of Satan, that he endured much of the hardship
of that temptation. Forty days in the wilderness
without food, He knelt alone in the garden
of Gethsemane. We call Gethsemane the Mount
of Olives. Actually, Gethsemane, the word
means the place of the olive press. And so it appears that
on the Mount of Olives there was a garden called Gethsemane
in which there was a press where the olives gathered off the trees
on that mountainside were brought and there they were crushed so
that the olive oil would flow freely. Symbolism, I trust, is
not lost upon us because it was there in the garden that the
Lord Jesus Christ's spirit was crushed in those hours before
he was taken to the cross. Let us never underestimate what
it cost our Lord to pay the price of sin. Truly from birth to death he
was a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. Hebrews chapter 5
verse 7 We read there, it says, the writer to the Hebrews says,
who in the days of his flesh, when he had offered up prayers
and supplications with strong crying and tears unto him that
was able to save him from death and was heard in that he feared. In the days of his flesh, He offered up prayers and supplications
with strong crying and tears. The Lord Jesus Christ knew what
it was to weep. He knew what it was to face the
trials of his life. He knew what it was to have these
bitternesses in his soul, in his heart, in his mind. To see
all those around about him, contrary to him. To know that the people
that he was kindest to, that he depended most upon, were the
very ones that would deny and betray and distrust him. He looked to family, he looked
to friends, he looked to the common people, he looked to the
rule of law, he looked to the religious leaders of his day,
and he found no comfort anywhere amongst them. The Lord Jesus Christ had no
one. And so he prayed to his father. And we're told that he was heard.
In Psalm 22, another one of these beautiful messianic Psalms, we're
told that many bulls, I don't know if you've ever spent any
time in a field, in a paddock, with a bull. Many bulls have compassed me,
strong bulls of Bashan have beset me round. These were the enemies
of the Lord and he likens them to bulls, whose size and viciousness
and ferocity he had to endure. Again in verse 16 of the same
psalm, he says, dogs have compassed me, the assembly of the wicked
have enclosed me, they pierced my hands and my feet. Now let us not dare to imagine
that our Lord was weak in all of this. No, he was strong and
I don't know a braver man and I don't know a bolder man. We
made reference to this last week. When the Lord Jesus Christ stepped
out of the darkness amongst the trees in the garden
of Gethsemane and said to that band of soldiers, come with torches
and swords and spears, who are you looking for? Well, I am he. I think that was
one of the bravest things that I have ever encountered. If for
no other reason than that the Lord knew exactly what was about
to happen to him, he knew that they would take him to the governor
and he would be scourged. He knew because he was the son
of God, that they would take him and cover his head and punch
him. They knew that they would spit
on him and pluck out the beard of his face. They knew that he
was going to be taken, and his hands pierced, and his feet pierced,
and his crown pierced, and his side pierced, and that he would
be hung on a cross for hour after hour in the sun of the day. He knew all these things, and
yet he stepped out of that place of concealment, in the midst
of the dark garden, on the side of a mountain, and he said, here
I am, you've come for me, take me. He did not flee, He did not
turn away, He did not recoil from that which He had come to
do. The Lord Jesus Christ faced His foes, faced His adversaries,
and He went with them. Matthew chapter 26 and verse
38, we read another aspect of this suffering of the Lord. And there he says, my soul is
exceeding sorrowful, even unto death. Tarry ye here and watch
with me. He was asking for Peter, James
and John, three of his close friends and disciples, to wait
with him, to watch with him, to be with him in the midst of
the soul sufferings that he underwent in the run-up to the experience
of the cross. He said, my soul is exceeding
sorrowful, even unto death. In John chapter 12 he had alluded
to something similar as he anticipated his journey up to Jerusalem.
He said, Now is my soul troubled, and what shall I say? Father
save me from this hour, but for this cause came I unto this hour. Father, glorify thy name. You see, the Lord Jesus Christ
knew why he had come into this world. He knew that he had come
to go to the cross. He knew that there would be this
contradiction of sinners against him. He knew that he would be
acquainted with sorrow all the days of his life. What could
he say to his father? Father, save me from this hour.
I don't want to go there. If it's possible, let this cup
pass from me. But for this hour I came. Let
thy will be done. Glorify thy name. Do that which
is in accordance with thy purpose. And these two verses in themselves
show us both how the Lord's soul was troubled. His soul was troubled. Not just his emotions, not just
his fears, not just his mind, not just his physical frame reacting,
recoiling against the suffering that it must endure, but his
very soul in the very depths of his being. His soul was troubled. But it also tells us that the
Father heard the Lord Jesus Christ's prayers for help. And that, I
think, is what leads us into a proper understanding of the
third verse of Psalm 23. I spent a long time this morning
talking to you about the sufferings of the Lord Jesus Christ, but
I did so for this reason, because I want you to realise the significance
of the first few words of Psalm 23, verse 3. He restoreth my
soul. The Lord could say, now is my
soul troubled. The Lord could say, my soul is
exceeding sorrowful, even unto death. But the psalmist, giving
us the words of the Lord that he prayed, that he spoke, that
he took to his father in his own personal dealings with his
father, he could declare, he restoreth my soul. The Lord God, His Father, the
Shepherd of the Lamb of God, restored the troubled soul of
Christ. How many times did the Father
have to restore the soul of the Lord Jesus Christ? How many times
did that occur? as often as it was needful. The Lord Jesus Christ was sustained
throughout the whole of his life by the fact that the Father came
to him on occasion after occasion after occasion and restored his
soul. Particularly it appears in those
occasions when the Lord was peculiarly anticipating his death and the
punishment for sin that he would endure. It seems as if the Father
designed it in such a way that he reassured the Lord Jesus Christ
that the cup would indeed pass from him. The cup of suffering,
having been drunk, would pass from him. That the Father would
accept the sacrifice of the Son, that the Father would raise the
Son to life. that the Father would restore
his soul in the midst of his afflictions. And that gave the
Lord Jesus Christ cause to rejoice. And so here we have this situation,
that the man of sorrows and acquainted with griefs nevertheless knew
the joy of the Lord in his soul, because the Lord came to him.
The Father came to him with words of comfort, with words of encouragement,
with help. And we read in Psalm 16, verse
nine, therefore my heart is glad. and my glory rejoiceth, my flesh
also shall rest in hope. There was a gladness granted
to the Lord Jesus Christ by his Father. Why? Because he restoreth
my soul. Psalm 16, verse 10, for thou
wilt not leave my soul in hell, neither wilt thou suffer thine
Holy One to see corruption. Can you conceive of how much
comfort the Lord Jesus Christ must have drawn from those words
as he read them and applied them to himself? Do you understand
that when he was given this word of prophecy, thou wilt not leave
my soul in hell, neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to
see corruption, that the Lord Jesus Christ gleaned some gladness
from that prophecy. In the midst of all the antipathy,
in the midst of all the distrust, in the midst of the contradiction
of sinners that he endured, the Father sustained the soul of
the Son. And often in the Lord's ministry,
we hear that voice coming from heaven, speaking to the comfort
of the Son, particularly granting him peace. This is my beloved
Son, in whom I am well pleased." That was the restoration of the
soul of our Saviour. Blessed Father, blessed Father,
thank you. for restoring the son's soul. Thank you for upholding him in
his sufferings. Thank you for comforting him
in his hours of need. Thank you for answering him in
those periods of strong cryings and tears. Thank you for sending
the angel there into the garden of Gethsemane, when that weight
of sin started to come upon the shoulders of the Saviour, when
it took him down to the very ground, and as he lay there swearing,
as it were, great drops of blood, anticipating that which must
be endured in his body and his soul in the coming hours, that
the Father restored his soul. sent an angel to lift him up
and to sustain him in his hour of need, gladdened his heart,
fortified his spirit, restored his soul. And that brings us
to consider what it is to be led in the paths of righteousness. Lord Jesus Christ says in Psalm
23 verse 3, He restoreth my soul, he leadeth me in the paths of
righteousness for his name's sake. Did the Father so lead
the Son in paths of righteousness? We read about the Holy Spirit
leading the Son into the wilderness where he was tempted 40 days
of the devil. We hear of soldiers leading the
Lord Jesus Christ to Ananias and to be crucified. But do we read of the Father? leading the Son in paths of righteousness. Well, let me ask you first of
all, what is the meaning of paths of righteousness? What does that
phrase mean? In Proverbs 8, verse 20, we read
these words, I lead in the way of righteousness in the midst
of the paths of judgment. And in 2 Peter 2, verse 21, for
it had been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness
than after they had known it to turn from the holy commandment
delivered unto them. And so the paths of righteousness
or the way of righteousness, to use another biblical phrase,
is that way, is that path, is that road, if you like, which means acceptance with God. It is the way and the manner
and the means of a sinner's justification in the sight of God. Now, please,
don't let these simply be words to you, right? I'm not here to
spout jargon. That's the last thing that I
want to do. I want to communicate with you this morning. I want
you to know what it is I'm talking about. I want you to understand,
if at all possible, what it is that I'm referring to. The question that is being asked
is this. How do you get right with God? What is the path of righteousness? What is the way of approach to
God? What is the way that leads a
man to God? So that when the time of death
comes, when the time of judgment arrives, when the time of meeting
together between you and the holy creator of the world, that
it will be a meeting of joy and of peace and of blessing and
not a meeting of fear and judgment and separation. What is the path
of righteousness? How does a man get right with
God? That's an old question. That
question was asked right at the beginning of the Bible. How then
can a man be justified with God? Comes from the book of Job. How
can he be clean that is born of a woman? How can he be clean? How can I be clean? How can I
be clean before the holiness of God? How can I be right before
the all-seeing, all-knowing gaze of the holy God? How can I be
as holy as him? Acceptable to him? Do you recall when the Lord Jesus
Christ was baptized by John? the beginning of his ministry.
John, bless him, there he was. Maybe he was standing sort of
waist deep in the water and the Lord comes to him and the Lord
says to John, I want to be baptised, I want you to baptise me. And
John said, I can't do that. I'm not worthy to baptise you. You remember what the Lord said
to him? Matthew chapter 3 verse 15, the
Lord said, Suffer it to be so now. Suffer it, allow it, allow
it to happen. Just, just go with me on this,
John. Allow it to happen. Suffer it
to be so now. For thus it becometh us to fulfill
all righteousness. then he suffered him, and the
Lord Jesus Christ was baptised there by John. You see, the life
of the Lord Jesus Christ, the whole of his life, not just his
baptism, but the whole of his life was the fulfilling of all
righteousness. When it says in Psalm 23, He
leads me in the paths of righteousness. What it is saying to us is that
the Lord Jesus Christ walked the path of righteousness, fulfilled
the path of righteousness, was himself all righteous. was himself
perfect and holy in all of his ways, and despite the opposition
and despite the suffering and despite the hardship that he
endured, yet he fulfilled every demand that the holy God made
upon him. Such was the man. No other man
could have done this. No other man was able. What is
it the hymn writer says? There was no other good enough
to pay the price of sin. He only could unlock the door
of heaven and let us in. The Lord Jesus Christ fulfilled
all righteousness. He walked in the paths of righteousness. His Father led him in the paths
of righteousness for his name's sake. The Father led the Son in the
paths of righteousness, that his will, the will of the Father,
would be done, and would be satisfied, and every demand would be met. In Isaiah chapter 48, verse 16,
I've got a few verses I want to read to you here, but we read
these words. Come ye near unto me, hear ye
this. I have not spoken in secret from
the beginning, from the time that it was. There am I. And now the Lord God and His
Spirit hath sent me. Thus saith the Lord thy Redeemer,
the Holy One of Israel, I am the Lord thy God, which teacheth
thee to profit, which leadeth thee by the way that thou shouldst
go. God the Father led the son in
the way that he should go. He led him in the paths of righteousness. He restored his soul in those
times of need that he might lead him in the paths of righteousness. For this great work, this covenant
office, had to be fulfilled for the salvation of a needy people. In Luke chapter 4 verse 18, the
Lord Jesus Christ here is speaking. He's recounting a passage from
Isaiah. He stands up in the synagogue
in Capernaum and he declares these words, The Spirit of the
Lord is upon me. The Spirit of the Father is upon
me. This is a man that's speaking.
You look at him, you can't tell any difference. He doesn't have
a halo around his head. He doesn't have that sort of
gentle smile of absolute peace that you see in the artist's
pictures of Christ. This isn't a storybook. This
isn't a child's Bible Jesus. This is the man that from his
earliest age was acquainted with grief and is a man of sorrows. This is a man that you would
look in his face and you would see that he had the wrinkles
of a man who had suffered all the days of his life. You know,
when the Lord Jesus Christ was 30, somebody said to him, huh,
I don't even think you're 50. He was 30, and this person was
saying, you're not even 50. He was an old man. Because of
the things that he endured, because of his suffering. He stands and
he says, The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because he hath anointed
me to preach the gospel to the poor. He hath sent me to heal
the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives,
the recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them
that are bruised. He led him in the paths of righteousness. because these were the things
that needed to be done for the accomplishment of the way of
salvation, for the deliverance of a people like you and like
me. Peter said to Cornelius, when
the Gospel was first coming to the Gentiles in Acts chapter
10 verse 36, the word which God sent unto the children of Israel,
preaching peace by Jesus Christ, he is Lord of all, that word
I say ye know, which was published throughout all Judea and began
from Galilee after the baptism which John preached, how God
anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with power,
who went about doing good and healing all that were oppressed
of the devil. For God was with him. God was
with him. He led him in the paths of righteousness. He gave him these things that
he must do and accomplish and fulfil. So when the Lord Jesus
Christ says, he restoreth my soul, he leadeth me in the paths
of righteousness, it was the Savior's song, it was the Savior's
psalm, long before it was ours, for he walked this path, he came
this way. And all of it, what was it for? Why did his soul have to be restored? Why did he have to walk in these
paths of righteousness? Well, the Lord himself tells
us in the verse, he says, he restoreth my soul, he leadeth
me in the paths of righteousness. For why? For his name's sake. For his name's sake. Well, what
does that mean? Well, you put your name to something,
you sign at the bottom of a letter, my signature. What does that
mean? It means that you're putting your mark to that. You're saying
that this is what I agree to. Here's the contract. Here's the
agreement document. I'll sign that. Now, it used
to be that a man's word was his bond. Now you need it in triplicate
and multiplied times and a photocopy for everyone so that we all just
know exactly what page we're on. For his name's sake. You see,
God had spoken. God had said what he was going
to do. God had said that there was a
people, a people of choice, a people whom he loved, a people whom
he knew, a people whose sins he was going to forgive, a people
that he would gather from the four corners of the earth, a
people like you and like me, nobody special, nothing much
to look at, And yet a people whom God's love
was placed upon before time ever began, before we were ever in
this world. What is it they say? Before we
were a twinkle in our mother's eye. God loved us. The all-knowing,
the all-seeing God loved us as a people. and he would have us
joined together with himself. How can a man be just with God?
How can that meeting between God and man ever be a righteous
meeting? How can we ever be justified
in his sight? only because He sent His Son. He agreed that if the Lord Jesus
Christ fulfilled all the obligations that were needful, then He would
honour that contract. He would honour that covenant. He would accept and enter into
the outcomes of this agreement. If Christ did all that was needful
for that people, satisfied every demand, paid for their sins,
carried the burden of their guilt on his own shoulder and carried
it away, if he paid the price, then God would bring that people
and present that people as a very bride of Christ himself. And he put his name to it. He
signed the contract. I'm not saying there was a pen
and ink. I'm not saying there was a piece of paper. God's Word
was His bond. He put His name to it. And the
Lord Jesus Christ said, He restoreth my soul. He leadeth me in the
paths of righteousness for His name's sake. Philippians 2, verse 8. tells
us that the Lord Jesus Christ was found in fashion as a man. He humbled himself and he became
obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. This was
the great object. This was the great purpose. This
is what the 33 years led up to. This is what all of the grief
and the suffering and the pain was all about. This was what
the restoration was required for. This is why the Lord Jesus
Christ had to be upheld, that he might go to the cross, that
he might take the sin that they Anger of God's wrath, the sword
of his judgment, might be unsheathed, might be unleashed, might find
its place in the very soul of Christ. And so the Lord God sustained
him right to the end, and the Lord received of his sacrifice
and accepted his blood on our behalf. If the Lord God restored Christ's
soul, Will He withhold restoration from us? If the Lord Jesus Christ
was led in paths of righteousness, will we not be led into those
gospel truths? Will we not be led to find that
way of acceptance with the Father? If God led Christ in these gospel
paths, the way of righteousness, the way of peace and justification
with God Almighty, God all holy, Will he not lead us too as we
follow that Son who has gone before us? The only reason, the
only reason that we find any comfort in Psalm 23 is because
the Lord Jesus Christ found comfort there before us. And we best enter into the meaning
of this psalm, into its sweetness, into its beauty. when we first
see our own Lord Jesus drawing comfort from its words, when
we hear it as the expression of the Lord Jesus Christ's trust
in God's covenant promises. And it is as we stand behind
Christ. It is as we stand, as it were,
in his shadow. stand in him, that we obtain
through his sacrifice, his representation, his surety ship on our behalf,
all the power and comfort of this psalm as our own personal
experience. For God was with him. And God
in Christ will be with us as we read this psalm, as we rest
in him, as we look to him for our acceptance with God, for
our justification before God, for that holiness which is not
of our own efforts or our works, but which is derived from him
who is our Lord and our saviour and our friend. May the Lord
bless these thoughts to us and give us the same comfort in this
psalm as the Lord Jesus Christ drew for himself as we seek to
repeat it and recite it. Amen.