It's lovely to see you once again.
Thank you for your kind welcome. It's a privilege to be able to
come amongst you and to share the fellowship of the Lord Jesus
Christ and to worship together with the Lord's people. We sang
together a few moments ago, we rest in thee, our shield and
our defender. With the Lord Jesus Christ, is
the believer's place of rest. It is the Lord that we rest in. He has become our dwelling place. We rest in Him. The Lord Jesus
Christ has promised to give rest to all who come to Him. Have you come to him. He promises to give rest to all
who come to him for it. Indeed, this is one of the great
invitational verses of Scripture. Come unto me, all ye that labour
and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. And for the church
in every age, in every place, from generation to generation,
the Lord Jesus Christ is the only true source of rest for
weary sinners and comfort for tried saints. There is this twofold aspect
to our thoughts this morning. He is the rest for weary sinners
and the comfort for tried saints. And I know that there are sinners
here this morning. He is our rest. And I trust that there are saints
here this morning. and he is our comfort, our dwelling
place from generation to generation. Moses knew that way back then. In the earliest times of the
revelation of God to men, Moses knew that. And in the passage
that has been read for us this morning in Psalm 90, it is the
Lord Jesus Christ that is being spoken of in this psalm. And in the eternal terms that
are used to describe him. Look at Psalm 90 with me, if
you will. Lord, says Moses, thou hast been
our dwelling place in all generations. Lord Jesus Christ, is what Moses
might have written, had those names as such been identified
in these earliest days of revelation. But still he knew him as his
Saviour. Call his name Jesus, for he shall
save his people. Still he knew him as the Christ. For he was the one who was anticipated
in the Old Testament writings, in the prophetic writings, and
never was there a prophet like Moses. They knew Christ in these early
days. And so it is that Moses turns
his attention to the Lord Jesus Christ and he says, Lord, thou
has been our dwelling place. Thou has been our place of rest. Thou has been our place of comfort
in all generations. before the mountains were brought
forth, before the earth ever was formed, before the world
was created, from everlasting to everlasting, thou art God. Here we see the eternal nature
of the understanding of the Lord's people, of that revelation which
God has given of Himself. We worship the God who is from
everlasting to everlasting, who reigns and rules in eternity,
who has no beginning and has no end, who is indeed the very
beginning and the end, the Alpha and Omega, outside of whom there
is nothing and no one. For he is all in all. And Moses knew this even then. So make no mistake about it,
it is the Lord Jesus Christ that Moses is here addressing and
Moses is speaking to. Jesus Christ, Alpha and Omega,
the beginning and the end. And we know that it is Moses
speaking of Christ. Because the Lord Jesus Christ
tells us that Moses is speaking of Him. He believed Moses. If you truly believed Moses,
you would believe me. Because Moses spoke and wrote
of me. And so the Lord Jesus Christ
in his own ministry tells us that Moses here is speaking of
him. There's a lovely title to this
psalm and I'm so pleased that Angus, when he read the psalm,
read the title. Sometimes the titles are not
read when the psalm is given, but the titles are part of Holy
Scripture and ought to be read, not the strap lines that run
along the top of your Bible. They're created by the publishers
to give us an overview of what that passage is about. Sometimes
right, sometimes less than helpful. But these introductions to the
Psalms These introductions are part of Holy Scripture. And so
here we are told that this is a prayer of Moses, the man of
God. Moses, the man of God. Isn't
that an amazing title for that to be said about anyone? And
here is Moses, the man of God, speaking to us today. Here is Moses, the man of God,
telling us from his own day and his own perception and his own
understanding, the revelation that was given to him, something
of the Lord Jesus Christ. And today, as we consider the
Lord Jesus Christ as Moses here viewed Him, as Moses speaks of
Him, I think we might be surprised. I think there might be a surprise
in store for us as we consider Moses' revelation of our Saviour. There are many sermons going
to be preached this morning. Here, all around us, all around
the world, churches will be gathering. Ministers, preachers will be
getting into their pulpits and they will be preaching sermons. And many of them, no doubt, will
be preached on the subject of the love of the Lord Jesus Christ. And I suspect that fewer will
be preached on the wrath of the Lord Jesus Christ. Many will
preach about the love of Christ. Fewer will preach about the wrath
of Christ. But the wrath of Christ was known
to Moses. Moses knew Christ, make no mistake
about it. Moses met Christ. Moses spoke with Christ face
to face. Moses encountered Christ in the
burning bush in the desert. He encountered him and met him
in Mount Sinai when he was spoken to at the deliverance of the
law. He was placed inside the cleft
of a rock and Christ passed by and allowed Moses to look upon
the hinder part of his garments. Oh Moses knew Christ alright. And certainly in the opening
part of this psalm, what predominates in Moses' understanding of Christ is Christ's wrath and Christ's
anger and Christ's judgment. And these are the characteristics
that stand foremost in Moses' mind as he brings this word to
us. Moses knew Christ as the Eternal
God, as the Great God, the One who was from everlasting to everlasting,
the Great I Am. And this characteristic that
Moses brings before us, this characteristic of the wrath of
Christ, is seen here in verse 3. He says, Thou turnest man
to destruction. Now that's got to be wrong, hasn't
it? Surely what Moses meant to write
was, thou turnest man from destruction, not to destruction. But no, Moses wrote what he knew. Moses wrote what he understood
and we need to hear him and we need to know Christ for who he
is, the eternal God, the one who turns men to destruction,
the one who has ruled over this body and this soul, the one who
is in himself the judge of all men, the one who said to Adam,
in the day that thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die, the one
who is the eternal voice, the triune God speaking, to men in
revelatory terms. This is the Christ, and this
is the Christ who is revealed as the judge of all the earth. And he is the one who says, return
ye children of men, return to the dust from whence you came.
Return to the ground from which your bodies and your flesh was
drawn, and I will take that breath of life that I placed in your
nostrils, and your bodies will go to the ground, and there it
will sleep a long time. This is the Christ that Moses
knew. And this is the picture that
is set before us. Here is the Christ, the Eternal
One, from everlasting to everlasting. And here is man. Here is man
in his mortality. Here is man in his fealty, and
in his fickleness, and in his feebleness. In verses 5 to 6,
they speak about the fact that man in his nature, man in his
flesh, is temporary, is passing quickly. Thou carries them away
as with a flood. And there's nothing left. It's gone. They are as asleep. In the morning they are like
grass which groweth up, in the morning it flourisheth, it groweth
up, in the evening it is cut down and withereth. Whether it's
man and his flesh, whether it's man's reputation, whether it's
his accomplishments and achievements, they are nothing in the sight
of God. The picture Moses is giving us
is a picture of the great gulf that is between the eternal God,
Christ, and man in his weakness and frailty. Carried away in
a flood, grass that is grown and cut in a day withers. We're told that a thousand years
in thy sight are but as yesterday, when it is past, and as a watch
in the night. A watch in the night is even
less than a day, it's just a shift. A thousand years to God is as
nothing, And yet we count the days of our lives. Moses is contrasting
the Lord's enduring power and man's fleeting life. God's eternal majesty and man's
nothingness. And Moses is bringing this picture
before us. Life is cut short by Christ's
anger. and we are beset by trouble throughout
this life because of the wrath of Christ. In verse 7 he says,
we are consumed by thine anger and by thy wrath we are troubled. What is this anger? What is this
anger of Christ that Moses has before his eyes? This anger that
consumes men. It is his righteous indignation. It is his attitude towards us
in our sin, as he is the holy God. It is the response of His
holiness to our iniquity. He is of purer eyes than to behold
iniquity. There is a detestation of it. We were speaking just the other
day about the fact that it is beyond our comprehension to understand
How much God hates sin. We put up with it. We make allowances
for it. We excuse it. God expels men
and women out of his presence for all eternity because of their
sin. He sends a deluge upon the face
of this globe to destroy everything and everyone, save its souls
and that which he placed in the ark. He slew nations. He brought down families. He
killed kings. He made even those that were
his people suffer the smart of his rod of discipline because
of their sin. He hates sin. And we need to
understand that. The extent of the hatred of sin
is seen in the way that the Lord Jesus Christ came to this earth
and died on the cross. Never man suffered as this man
suffered. And that was the price of sin. And there is to be an eternity
of separation for many, many people in this world because
of sin. Let us never underestimate it.
Here is the evidence of it. There is an anger of God, a wrath
of God towards the iniquities of men. Thou hast set our iniquities
before thee. Verse eight. Our secret sins
in the light of thy countenance. What are our secret sins? Well,
they're the sins that we thought that no one knew about. but they
are the sins that are secret no more, because God has set
them in the light of his countenance. He has shined his light upon
the secret sins that we harbour in our privacy, in the darkness
of our own hearts, in the depths of our own thoughts and minds,
the sins that we think no one else knows about, are glaring
to God as he places them before the countenance of his light. Our iniquities are set before
Him like the evidence is set before a judge in court. Our secret sins are examined
assiduously in the light of His gaze. How serious is our sin? It is serious enough to sink
us into the depths of hell for all eternity. Such is the God
with whom we have to do. Moses writes in verse 11, verse
9, verse 11. For all our days are passed away
in thy wrath. Thou knowest, who knoweth the
power of thine anger, even according to thy fear, so is thy wrath."
Now I fear that this view, Moses' view, Moses' view and understanding
of Christ is little considered and appreciated today. We live
our lives careless of our end. We are thoughtless of God. We are ignoring and denying the
first-hand evidence that is set before us of our fearful state
and condition. In verse 10, Moses writes, the
days of our years are three-scored years and ten. And if by reason
of strength they be four-scored years, yet is their strength
labor and sorrow, for it is soon cut off and we fly away. In truth, my mind was drawn to
this passage just last week. when my mother celebrated her
80th birthday. The condition of my mother's
health is such that she knew nothing about it. But some family
members gathered around her bedside and we shared a little bit of
time together. Three score years and ten. And
then, by the power of strength and the strength of power, we
are able to make it extend a little bit longer. It's all we have
in this life. Here the Bible is perfectly correct. Moses is right in what he says. Perhaps this is an average gathering,
looking around about ages and People, I guess we are just an
average group of people that you might encounter anywhere
on the street, in the towns and villages around here. How many
of us are not taking tablets of one kind or another? How many
of us don't know just how weak this body is? How many of us
don't sense just the frailty of these frames that we inhabit
at this time? And the aches and the pains and
the trials and the troubles that are part and parcel of our lives? And if we get into our emotional
realm, or into what goes on in this head of ours, is it not
that we have so many demands upon our spirit that so often
we feel we are being ground down into the dust? What is that? but the consequence of sin. What is that but the fact that
we are a sinful people and this body and our minds and our whole
beings give the evidence of sin in our lives. Oh Adam was made
well. But sin ruined all that he was,
and we carry the consequences in our body today. The days of
our years are threescore years and ten. This morning we got
a note from back home about a lady whose life was much shorter than
threescore years and ten, and she's passed away. A friend of
our children has passed away. We cannot take for granted the
days of our life. And it is a terrible thing if
we do not consider our soul's well-being, our eternal state
before the holiness of God. Let not the message of the love
of Christ distract us from the reality
of sin that must be judged and a wrath that exists on the part
of God towards our very soul. Friends, I implore you, consider
your end this morning. Wake up! to your predicament
and don't walk blindly into eternity with no thought of the judgment
to come. A thousand people, ten thousand
people will die today who knows their names or their places or
their circumstances. and they're going into eternity. And I fear the vast majority
have no concern for their everlasting soul. It is a fearful thing, writes
the writer to the Hebrews, to fall into the hands of the living
God. What is to be done is all lost
Is there any hope? Is there something, preacher,
that you can give us? Moses, is there something that
you can say beyond that which you have told us of the nature
of God and the person of Christ of whom you speak? Well, let
me show you something. This psalm is actually a prayer. The title tells us that Moses
prayed these words. He didn't write them down as
a song. He didn't write them down as
a psalm. It's been culled from Moses'
own writings, preserved by God the Holy Spirit in the writings
of the Old Testament saints, and it has been included here
amongst the Psalms that we might read it today. But I suspect
that Moses uttered these things in the privacy of his own heart.
I suspect that Moses had an understanding of these things and this was
a prayer that he prayed to God. Moses made a request. When he
prayed to God on these matters, when he considered the temporariness
of men, when he thought about the years of our lives, when
he thought about the fact that we are just like grass, we are
carried away in a flood, that we stand before the great God,
the everlasting God. and we are nothing in his sight
and we are consumed by his wrath and his anger. Moses took all
of that and he said, Lord, that's how it is. I accept it. I believe it. I see it to be
true. Lord, let me ask you something. And he says in verse 12, a little
word. So, so, When the psalm was read to us
a little bit earlier, Angus helpfully emphasized the word when he read
it. So, he says, because of this,
because of these 11 verses, because of my petitions heretofore, because
of that which we know to be true, so Lord, teach us to number our
days that we may be able that we may apply our hearts unto
wisdom. Teach us to number our days because
of your glory, because of our sin, because of the judgment
to come, because of the need that we have. Teach us to number
our days. Moses is saying, Teach us to
see our need. Teach us to understand our predicament. To be sensitive to the need of
our soul. Now, you could all tell me how
old you are. If I were to go around, I guess
each of you could tell me. Somebody might have to think
a little bit about it, but that's okay. but you could tell me how
old you are. It's not that. It's not teaching
us to count our birthdays, teaching us to count our days, the days
of our life, whether it's three, four years and 10 or 30 years
or 50 years or whatever it might be. We're not talking about what
age you are. We're talking about honesty before
God. We're talking about you being
honest before God. Numbering your days is to have
an understanding of who God is and what you are before Him.
And realising that every day you've got is a mercy from Him,
because you don't deserve it. You deserve nothing. You deserve
to be washed away in a flood. You deserve to be cut down like
dry grass. You deserve to be consumed in
his wrath. So count the days and realise
what that means and be honest about it. And be humble. Honesty. and humility is what Moses is
directing us to. He is saying to God, so God,
because of what we are and who we are, teach us to be humble. Teach us to be honest. Teach
us to cut the talk. To get rid of the pride. to no longer imagine that we've
got anything in our pockets that we can bring to you or something
that will recommend us to you. Teach us to cut the talk and
to be quiet in thy presence, realizing what you are and what
we are. We're so full of ourselves. We think of ourselves as better
than the next man or the next woman, that we've got something
that recommends us in some way. We're full of bluster. We're
full of nonsense. Turn our hearts to the serious
matter of our eternal welfare and our destiny, heaven or hell. And I say to you today that if
ever a prayer was needed like this, if ever a prayer was needed
like Moses' prayer, it is, teach me thy way, O Lord. And I fear there are few that
truly and honestly are prepared to pray that prayer today. Teach me thy way, O Lord. In Psalm 90, verse 13, we begin
a list in the each, in the succeeding verses, of petitions, spiritual
petitions, that Moses makes on the foundation of being taught
the things of God. Help us to have wisdom in spiritual
ways that we might lay these things to our heart. And so he
says, return, O Lord, how long? And let it repent thee concerning
thy servants. Moses is off to a good start
here with these petitions because he understands that that's all
we are. is servants of God. Do you know what that means?
We kind of tend to think of a sort of upstairs-downstairs, you know,
the servant that used to get breakfast ready in the kitchen
and take it up to the lord and lady in the house. Well, that's
a kind of sanitized, polite servitude. A servant in the days of Moses
was the property of the owner, and he did with him what he wanted
to do, or with her whatever he wanted to do. And no one could
say, don't do that, that's not right. A servant could be done
with whatever, and that's what we are. God's to do with as he
pleases. There's a sense of real appreciation
to our standing before God. Most people think that salvation
is an easy thing. If only they knew. It was neither easy for Christ
to provide our salvation, nor is it easy for a sinner to receive
it. I'm not looking here for a decision
to turn to Christ. I'm not looking for a raised
hand of free will or for someone to come to the front and make
a public declaration of commitment. I'm not interested in that. You
see, that's the bluster. That's the nonsense. That's the
trash that gets peddled so much in churches today and has nothing
to do with an appreciation of who God is and what man is. No, salvation's a hard thing,
and you don't get it by lifting up your hand, and you don't get
it by coming to the front. I say you don't even get it for
the wanting. Salvation is a hard thing. You have no possibility of gaining
salvation except the Lord shows you mercy. And it's Him to do
with His servants as He will. No possibility of peace with
God except He grants it to you. This verse is speaking of justice,
for that's your right. You will have justice. Make no
mistake, the judge of all the earth will do right. And we deserve
punishment. And we deserve all the wrath
of Christ. And we deserve hell itself. A separation from God that was
inflicted upon our first father and mother as they were sent
from the garden out of the presence of God. and the angel with the
flaming sword set between him and the rest and the peace and
the comfort he affords and them in the trials and the troubles
and travail of their lives. And that separation prefigured
there in the exclusion from the Garden of Eden, will be the reality,
the spiritual reality of everyone who passes from this life into
eternity without knowing Christ as their Saviour. Moses knows
that unless the Lord provides the way of escape, we are lost. And as guilty, hell-deserving
sinners, we have no hope outside of his mercy. So in verse 14,
he asks another petition. He says, satisfy us early with
thy mercy, that we may rejoice and be glad all our days. When a sinner is brought to see
their need, They learn that there is no peace in this life. No joy, no gladness outside of
the Lord Jesus Christ. You could have every material
provision. You could have perfect health
and strength. You could have never a shadow
of doubt. You could have everything that
this world has to offer given to you on a plate and you would
still have no peace. not in your heart, not in your
soul, because you're outside of Christ. And a sinner brought
to see their need knows that the only place of rest, the only
dwelling place from generation to generation, is in Christ himself. And that causes us to ask for
mercy, to seek forgiveness, and to knock on the door of salvation. That's all we can do. We can
ask. We can seek. And we can knock. And we can hope that God will
grant us that peace that we require. We had the opportunity to spend
a few hours with our friends yesterday and Beth remarked in
our conversation about all the wasted years, all the wasted
years in man-made religion. And that's the reality of so
much of our lives. We thought we were on the right
road. We were sincere. We were enthusiastic. We followed
it with a passion. We took on board everything they
told us. And you know what? Not worth a thing. Not worth
a thing. Lord, satisfy us early with thy
mercy. Come quicker, Lord. If you're
going to give us mercy, then bring it to us quickly. Satisfy
us early. Early mercy. Early mercy, what
a divine gift. What a blessed kindness for God
to give us mercy early. The Lord's people know, too,
amid this world of sin and the weakness of our flesh and the
needs that we have, you've got your problems, every one of you.
And I don't know what they all are. You tell me a little bit.
We speak and we share about the circumstances of our lives. And
I know that they're like a big pile that lie at your front door.
And you see them every morning and you get up and you get out
and you go about your business and these things hang around
you like a weight. The troubles of our lives, they
are a reality. They're real. They're part and
parcel of your life's experience and mine. And we need early grants of His
mercy. We need early gifts of His grace
to assuage the sorrow and the anxieties that we feel. Let it
be our prayer, Lord, give us early mercy. He goes on in verse
15. Make us glad according to the
days wherein thou hast afflicted us. and the years wherein we
have seen evil. There's a verse in Revelation
that speaks about the giving of a white stone. And it has
been suggested that the meaning there was an old thought, an
old Greek thought, that a person's life could be valued. extent and its nature and its
character could be assessed by the number of good days that
you had compared to the number of bad days that you had. and
that life was like a bag into which a white stone would be
placed if you had a good day and a black stone would be placed
if you had a bad day. And at the end of your life,
you could empty out that bag and you could tell the value
of that life by comparing the numbers of the stones in the
bag. Well, I don't know if that's
right or not. But I do think that that's what Moses has in
mind here. He says, make us glad according
to the days wherein thou hast afflicted us. Give us a day of
gladness for every day of affliction that you've already given us.
That's what he's saying. This is Moses. This is Moses
that's speaking. This is Moses that stood before
the burning bush. This is Moses that spoke with
the Lord. This is Moses that understood
God perhaps more than any other man until the fullness of the
revelation of the Lord Jesus Christ was brought into the world. This is Moses and he is asking
that the Lord would ease his afflictions and at least give
him some balance in his life. some balance whereby at least
some gladness to offset the wear of affliction that he has and
that he feels. Don't imagine for a moment that
entering into the Christian life is going to be the beginning
of ease and trouble-free existence. If anything, it's the contrary.
We see things and know things and understand things and feel
things that never bothered us when we were outside of the kingdom. But now they weigh heavily upon
our minds and our souls, and the trials and afflictions of
this flesh remind us daily of the sin which has so spoiled
that which Christ first made. We have felt the rod of God's
affliction. Grant us, we pray, some gladness
in these days of our life. All the providences, all the
circumstances, all the apparently random events come from God. And yet they all work together
for the good of his people. Moses knew affliction. And here
as he asks this petition, he reminds us that the church of
the Lord Jesus Christ is an afflicted church and the people that comprise
that church are people who smart under the trials and the troubles
of this world of sin. In verse 16 he says, Let thy
work appear unto thy servants and thy glory unto their children. Perhaps this is Moses the prophet
speaking and anticipating that day when the God of all glory,
when the Lord Jesus Christ would come in the incarnation And he
says, let thy work appear unto thy servants. I'm looking forward
as Job did. I know that my Redeemer liveth
and he'll stand the last day upon this earth. And I'll see
him with my own eyes. And maybe Moses is saying the
same thing. Lord, I'm looking for that day. I'm looking for the evidence,
the demonstration of thy work. I'm looking for the incarnation,
anticipating the coming of Christ. Let thy work appear unto thy
servants. Those, the two that were in the
temple, waiting for the coming of Christ. So the Lord's people
throughout the Old Testament waited for the revelation, the
work of Christ to appear. What is the work of God? Well, John 6, 29, Jesus answered
and said, this is the work of God, that ye believe on him whom
he hath sent. What is the work of the Lord
Jesus Christ? I have glorified thee on the
earth. I have finished the work which
thou gavest me to do. God's great work of redemption
is the deliverance of sinners from judgment and wrath. It is accomplished in the death
of the Lord Jesus Christ as he died on the cross. It is founded
upon that great atoning work whereby the substitute stood
in the place of his people and he took their sins and he made
them his own. And he suffered and he died and
he brought them into peace with God and He reconciled them to
His Father in all of His holiness by making them holy in Himself
and bestowing upon them a righteousness that they could never achieve
by their own works or their labours or their trials. If God is merciful to you, the
sinner, It will be in these two things. He will show you Christ
on the cross and what his death means. And he will enable you
to believe and to trust in the Lord, his sacrifice for your
salvation. I love the final phrase of this
petition which Moses gives to us in this verse 16. He says,
let thy glory appear unto their children. Let thy work appear unto thy
servants and thy glory unto their children. And what parent does
not wish this for their children? Moses did. Moses longed for the
glory of Christ to appear before his children. He shares that
with us. There's the human empathy. There's
the interest that we have with this man Moses. The task was
that was set before him and the labor that he did, that he served
before God. but he had a care, a concern
for his children as we do. I know very, very few, I know
very, very few people for whom this prayer is not a continuing
reality day by day. The long for desire that their
children might come to a knowledge of Christ. Would that God grant
his glorious salvation to our children. Moses made it a prayer. In so doing, he is an example
as to how we should carry our children, whatever age they may
be, before the Lord for his mercy. Verse 17 is the last verse in
this prayer of Moses. And in the first part of it here
we read, and let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us. What a delightful petition that
is. Let the beauty of the Lord our
God be upon us. I think Moses has given us a
wonderful prayer here in Psalm 90. Who is he speaking of? Who is the beauty of the Lord
our God? Well, you've spent, I know, some
time in the Song of Solomon. Who is it that is the altogether
lovely one? Of whom there did Solomon speak? Who is it that is the fairest
of ten thousand to our soul? who is adorned with the beauty
of holiness. Isaiah in his prophecy says,
in that day shall the branch of the Lord be beautiful. Let the beauty of the Lord our
God be upon us. See, Moses is asking for more
even than an understanding of the beauty that is in Christ. Moses is asking that that beauty
be his beauty. Moses is asking that the beauty
of Christ be the beauty of Moses. Let Christ's beauty be my beauty. Let Christ's worth be my worth. Let Christ's holiness be my holiness. Let the wonder of Christ be the
wonder of his people. Let it be upon us. Moses began his prayer by lamenting
his ugly sin. And he ends it by seeking Christ's
beauty. And that's the gospel. That's
it. That is the gospel. Sinners made
righteous. Sinners made holy. Sinners beautiful in the sight
of God. upon the work of the Lord Jesus
Christ, the Redeemer and the Saviour. Paul says, we know not
what we should pray for as we ought. Well, maybe not, but here's
a good start. Let the beauty and the holiness
of Christ be on me. The last part of this verse we
might think in some respects is an anti-climax. Establish
thou the work of our hands upon us. Yea, the work of our hands,
establish thou it. We've had such a sublime request
given by Moses. Let the beauty of Christ be upon
me. What a thing for a sinner to
be able to say in his prayer to God, let the beauty of Christ
be upon me. And yet here in this second part
of the verse we have a repetition. It seems as if Moses is saying
to us, indeed the Holy Spirit has given this revelation and
Moses records it for us in duplication. You see, once our iniquities
set before the Lord rightly cause us to fear, there comes a change and alteration
through the conversion of His people that brings them into
peace with God through the Lord Jesus Christ. and the old things
pass away, and a newness, a new creation takes hold in the life
of the sinner. And now that converted people,
that changed people, they serve their Lord and Saviour. They
serve their God and King. They serve their Father and Friend,
their Husband and their Brother. and they serve with pleasure,
and they serve with gratitude, and they serve in love and thanksgiving. The bride's service to her husband
is not a legal duty, but it is a loving delight. And so it is
for the Church, the true Church of God. Those who have been made
beautiful by Christ, they love Him and they serve Him. And she serves her Beloved, and
the works of our hands are employed for the glory of Christ's Kingdom
and the praising of His name. That's true service. the service
of thanksgiving, that all we do for Christ is simply to say,
thank you for all you've done for us. There's no law in that. There's no need for law. There's
no force of law. There's no demand of duty in
that for us. The works of our hands are the
works of our gratitude. Thank you, Lord, for what you
have done. Oh, there is a love of Christ. Absolutely, there is a love of
Christ. It prompts such prayers for mercy
and grace in the hearts of God's people. And it answers them positively,
freely, liberally, to the praise of His glory. because God grants
them an understanding of their true nature and their true need,
and he brings them into the experience of his love. May God grant each
of us the grace to apply our hearts to wisdom, that he who
is wisdom personified might apply his love to our hearts. Amen.