In that Psalm there where David
read 141, it said in verse 5 there, let the righteous smite me and
it shall be a kindness. And then in verse 10 it says,
let the wicked fall into their own nets. And so the righteous
and the wicked are referred to there. And in our text in that
Psalm 1, We'll look at the last few verses of that Psalm in our
study, and we see the same thing. Psalm 1 verse 4, the ungodly
are not so. And if you've heard the first two messages
in this study, You know what he's saying there, the ungodly
are not blessed of God. They're not happy. They're not
favored of the Lord. They're not planted by God. You
remember our Lord said, every plant which my heavenly Father
hath not planted will be rooted up. So the ungodly are not so. They're not like these ones mentioned
in the first three verses. but are like the chaff which
the wind driveth away." There again, it reminds us, doesn't
it, of that parable our Lord told in Matthew of the wheat
and the tares. God planted the wheat and Satan
sowed the tares. God never planted the tares.
And the field is the world. God loves His field. He loves
the world. He loves His wheat. But not the tares, not the chaff.
The chaff is driven away. It's burned up. The wind driveth
it away when it's winnowed. The wind drives the chaff away,
and the wheat has weight and value, and so it's preserved. But the ungodly are not so, therefore
the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment. You remember, I
believe it was David also that said, Lord, if you should count
iniquities, who shall stand? Well, in the case of the ungodly,
the Lord is going to mark their iniquities. But he hasn't found
iniquity in Jacob, the righteous nor sinners in the congregation
of the righteous. For the Lord knoweth the way
of the righteous, but the way of the ungodly shall perish. Now, there are two kinds of people
in the world, and we see it as we saw in Psalm 141. They're
all through the scripture in our text and many others. Two
kinds of people. They're both described here in
some detail. We've said many times that there
are only two religions, and that's significant here also because
these two correspond with those two. If we're to understand who these
two kinds of people are in our text, we have to abandon first
our natural ideas about goodness and evil. And I think with me, all of us
growing up in school and in the neighborhood in which we grew
up on the school bus, there was always a shy, nice, polite, well-mannered
child who would sit and ride the bus and was only concerned
with getting to school and doing what they're supposed to do and
never got into any trouble, no mischief, not looking for some
somebody to pester or something bad to do just to see if they
can get away with it. Just well behaved. And then there
was always that one that was just the opposite. Which one
were you? Don't raise your hand. Don't
answer that. Always looking for something
to stir up. Always bucking the system. Always
rebelling against authority. always doing something unruly. And we got the very, very early
impression in our lives that there were good kids and bad
kids. And that's undeniable in that
sense, in the sense of outward behavior, in the sense of the
temperament of a person. No question about that. And no
matter what we were told, and no matter how many times adults
tried to be politically correct and say, well, there are no bad
kids. There are just some that need to be taught a little more
than others. We weren't buying that. You could see that some
were bad. It was evident. Maybe you were
one of them. Maybe I was. I'm not telling.
But we knew better than that. We could spot the bad kids. He
didn't hide it. He didn't try to hide it. And there were some in between.
But this is not the righteous and the wicked that the Lord's
talking about in our text. It's not. And as adults, there
are those that are the same way as those kids that we all remember.
We can all probably think of the name of one example of each,
one extreme or another. But this doesn't refer here at
all to a temperament or even to behavior at all. Although
there is a resulting change in behavior when God makes you righteous. But this has nothing to do with
behavior, has nothing to do with outward temperament or the outward walk, the outward
tendency of the personality. temperament. We have to understand that evil
sinners can be well behaved or poorly behaved and yet both are
equally wicked before God. We're all born the same in our
condition of depravity, total depravity. before God, though
some may be more outwardly expressive of that evil than others are.
And that's undeniable, as I said. But in order to understand good
and evil in spiritual terms, in scriptural terms, we have
to consider, for example, the Pharisee and the publican. You
remember that story in Luke 18, 9 through 14. The Pharisee came
into the temple and stood there in his flowing robes and his
religious garb and began to thank God that he wasn't like other
men, especially like this sinful publican that happened to be
also there praying that day. I thank you that I'm not like
him. And the publican came in And
it says that he would not lift up so much as his eyes to heaven,
but he beat upon his, he smote upon his breast and said, God,
be merciful to me, a sinner. God be merciful to me. Now, let
me ask you a question. Which of these was the good kid
and which one was the bad one? This completely blows up. our
idea of good and bad because the Pharisee was the
good one as far as men are concerned. He was the one that sat on the
bus and didn't stir up anything and grew up and and nodded every
eye, crossed every T, and did great in school, and became respected,
well respected in his community, and was a civil servant, and
became religious, and came to be respected in religion, became
an authority on the Bible. He was the good kid. And he went
to hell, the good kid. You see what this teaches us
tonight? Who was the bad one? Oh man, that one that came in
there, there was a reason why he couldn't look at God. And we have to also consider
the prodigal and his brother. In other words, we have to not
lean on our own perception of good and bad. We got to look
at what God said. That's what we got to do. The
prodigal and his brother, Which one was the good kid and which
one was the bad apple? The brother stayed home. He did
what he was supposed to do. He was the kind that wasn't about
to stir up any trouble. He did everything his father
told him to do and stayed home and served his father and worked
in the field. He probably read his Bible every morning and went
to Sunday school every Sunday. You see what I'm saying? You
see what God's saying? And who was the bad kid? I want
what's coming to me now and I want to go out and live it up. There's
the one you saw on the bus shooting the spit wads at somebody. Or
pulling some girl's hair and then looking innocent. And just
making the bus driver wish that they were anything but a bus
driver. You know what I mean? That's him. And God saved him. He was the righteous. And that brother that stayed
home, he's the one described in our text in verses four and
five, the wicked one. Why? Because he was proud and
self-righteous before God. Both thieves on those two crosses,
on either side of our Lord, as he hung there redeeming his people
from their sins with his precious blood, Which one of them was the good
one and which one was the bad one? There wasn't a good one
there, was there? And yet our Lord said to one
of them, today thou shalt be with me in paradise. And you don't get to go there
unless you're righteous. Perfectly righteous. That's who
David described in the first three verses of this chapter. Although if you ask anybody who
knew him, is he a good kid or a bad kid? He had just confessed to being
a criminal worthy of crucifixion. But you don't go be with Christ
unless you're righteous. So you see, we've got to adjust
our idea by nature. God's got to make us repent,
give us repentance, grant us repentance, a change of mind. We're going to have to change
our mind about what's good and what's evil, about righteousness
and wickedness. We see in all three of these
examples, two people, just like we do in our text, the righteous
and the wicked. And there are some striking consistencies
in these three examples that I want to look at tonight, particularly. The righteous one in all three
cases was never good, was never the good one, would have never
been picked out by anybody that knew them as the good one. Why? Well, you see your calling,
brethren, Paul said, Turn there with me to 1 Corinthians 1. Look
at that. 1 Corinthians 1.26. Let's see
this again. Why? Did God always single out
the bad one if there was any difference? Outwardly even. Why did he save that publican
and not that Pharisee? Because the Pharisee would have
gone around bragging about how he wasn't like other men, and
that's why God picked him. That's what he was doing. And
God left him in his sin. Look at it, 1 Corinthians 1,
26, you see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after
the flesh, you know, the smart one, and I tell my children this,
You don't even have to try hard to distinguish yourself in the
world these days to be well respected on your job and to be highly
valued by those that employ you. All you gotta do is just do what
you're supposed to do because 99% of everybody else is not
doing that. They won't even show up. They
won't even put an effort for it. And I always try to teach
them to to be wise about it. Think about what you're doing.
Think about it in the right perspective. Don't get bogged down in the
day-to-day. Think about, look what God's blessed me with. Look
at the good responsibility He's given me, the good job He's given
me. Let me do it wisely. And look, not many mighty, that's
mighty in the eyes of men, of course, like that Pharisee, well-respected,
a great man. Naaman was a mighty man, but
he was a leper. Not many noble. Not many noble. Not many with that good temperament
and character about them that aren't troublemakers. Not many. Some, some certainly. I don't believe Solomon was like
The thief on the cross and outward behavior. Do you? But exactly
the same before God. There is no difference between
Mama and Hitler. No difference. No difference.
That's what we're talking about. The righteous and the wicked
doesn't have anything to do with how Mama acted or how Hitler
acted. Nothing to do with that. It has to do with how God sees
you and why. Not many noble are called. He didn't call the brother that
stayed home. He called the one that spent
all that he had in riotous living. And he usually does that. That's what Paul said. Not often
does he do other than that. Why? He hath chosen, but God
hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the
wise. He's chosen the weak things of the world. to confound the
things which are mighty, and the base things of the world,
and things which are despised hath God chosen. Yea, and things
which are not, to bring to naught things that are, that no flesh
should glory in his presence. But of him are ye in Christ Jesus. Of him. How'd you get in Christ?
How'd you become righteous? Of him. of Him, of His grace,
of His free mercy. Of Him are you in Christ Jesus,
who is made unto us everything that we're not by nature. Wisdom,
righteousness, sanctification, and redemption. We're foolish,
weak, despised, base, ignoble by nature, but Christ is unto
us everything we're not. in ourselves, vile and wretched,
no matter how we acted on the bus, but righteous in Christ by God's free grace. Those who
are righteous are the ones that God hath chosen. God hath chosen. God hath chosen, he kept saying.
That according as it is written, nobody gonna be glorying in the
flesh. If you're going to glory, glory in the one who's worthy
of it. The Pharisee was glowing in himself.
Oh, it's so good. I'm not like that publican. I'm
so thankful to God. I'm not like that publican over
there. No, he was right. He not like him. That publican's
righteous. Justified. And that Pharisee wasn't. Salvation is by the free, sovereign
grace of God. And God only saves righteous
people. You know that? He only saves sinners in their
own estimation. And He only saves the righteous.
He planted the righteous by the rivers. And their way is blessed from
start to finish. They've always been righteous
as far as God is concerned. Blessed with all spiritual blessings
in Christ from the foundation of the world. Salvation by free sovereign grace,
the grace of God. He hath chosen whom he hath chosen
for his own glory, not because of who they are. I don't recommend
that you be the bad kid because God saves more of them than the
good ones. No, be the good kid. But be the good kid not trusting
in your own imagined goodness. Be the good kid looking to Christ
for righteousness because he is the sinner's righteousness,
the only righteousness in which we can stand before God. The truth is, we're all the bad
kids. There's just some of us better
at hiding it than others are. You know why I didn't shoot a
lot of spit wads on the bus? Because I didn't want to get
in trouble. That's the only reason. It wasn't because I was good.
It was because I was selfish. I loved myself. We're all the bad kids. That's
the teaching here. We're all the bad kids. The outward temperament
doesn't have anything to do with it. It's what's on the inside. You can't get a clean thing out
of an unclean. Before Jacob or Esau, what did
Paul say? Had ever done any good or evil. God said, I love Jacob and I
hate Esau. Which one's righteous and which
one's wicked? They neither one had ever done anything. The righteous
one is the one that God loved and chose and predestinated to
be conformed to the image of his son, the righteous one. And there's another consistency
in those three examples that we gave. Righteousness has something
to do with confession of sin. And it doesn't matter whether
you're the good kid or the bad kid. Paul was the bad kid. But
you know what his confession was? Oh, wretched man that I
am. Did I just say he was the bad
kid? He was the good one. To men, highly respected. But he said, I'm a wretch. Don't
even call me an apostle. That's just what the prodigal
said. Don't call me your son anymore. I'm not worthy. I'll
be your servant. Paul said, I'm not worthy to
be called an apostle. I'm a servant of Jesus Christ. upon slave. Righteousness has something to
do now with confession of sin because that prodigal said, as
I just mentioned, I'm no longer worthy father to be called your
son. And he was right. And if I can just be your servant,
I'd be I'd be so happy just to be a servant. The publican, as
I said, would not so much as lift up his eyes to heaven. There
was a reason for that. He was ashamed of himself. He
gave himself a name before God. He named himself the sinner. That's what I am. And cried for
mercy. That thief on the cross said
to the other, don't you fear God? We're getting exactly what
we deserve. They're nailing us to a cross. A shameful, violent, despicable
death. And it's just exactly what we
deserve. But this man, this man has done nothing amiss. Turn to 1 John 1, 9. This is the teaching here. David talking about the righteous
and the wicked. He's not talking about the good
kid and the bad kid. There ain't no good kids. He's talking about who God is
calling righteous, who he sees as perfect in his sight. 1 John
1, 9. Here he is. If we confess our sins, He is
faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us
from all unrighteousness. If we confess our sins, He is
faithful. Though we are unfaithful, that's
what a sinner is, unfaithful to God's righteous claims upon us,
unfaithful to our business as God's creatures, unfaithful to
God as our Creator and the One who deserves glory from us. But He's faithful. If we confess
our sin, He is faithful. faithful to His promises of mercy
to all those that call upon Him, and just, faithful and just. He will cleanse us from our sins,
from all unrighteousness, in a way that is consistent with
His own holiness. He must be both just and justifier. And Paul told us in the book
of Romans how he's able to do that, through the redemption
that is in Christ Jesus. By washing you clean, which is
what the last, he's faithful and just to forgive us our sins
and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Would that make you one of the
ones described in Psalm 1? Verse 6, the Lord knoweth the
way of the righteous. If God cleansed you from all
unrighteousness, would that make you one of those? You see, it
has something to do with confession, doesn't it? It has something
to do with God bringing you to the place where He brought that
publican, where He was able to say honestly from His heart,
I'm the sinner, and I'm going to have to have mercy if God's
going to save me. If there's any hope for me, it's
the mercy of God. Mercy. And it's going to have
to happen, as we'll see in a moment, a certain way. There's only one
way God can have mercy. Well, let's just talk about it
now. One more thing that we see in all three of these examples
is that salvation is a person, it's faith in a person, trusting
a person, casting your soul upon a person, committing yourself,
the care of yourself to him, as Paul said. I know whom I have believed and
am persuaded that he's able to keep that which I've committed
unto him against that day. What have you committed to him,
Paul? My soul? My hope? Think about that publican for
a second again. What did he say? What was the
first word out of his mouth? What was the first word out of
the Pharisee's mouth? Ah. Ah. Thank thee, Lord. Oh, he's thanking
God. That's good. He was thinking about himself
when he walked in there, and he was thinking about himself
when he left. The first word out of his mouth was ah. But
that publican came in there. God. God. God be merciful. to me. Now he is, first of all, addressing
the only one who can forgive sin. He didn't go to a priest
and say, absolve me. You know, what do I need to do
today to clean the slate? He confessed his sin before God. That's the only place a sinner
can confess sin rightly. The one you've sinned against,
that's who you confess your sin to. And though David had greatly
wronged Bathsheba and her husband, he said, against you, God, and
you only have I sinned. Sin's against God, and confession
of sin is made to God. And that's where that publican
came, before God. But also, that word merciful,
as we've seen before, is so significant. If you look up the word, mercy
seat. I know that's two words in English,
but it's one in the original. If you look up that word mercy
seat in the Old Testament, and look at the original definition
of that word, and then look up this word merciful in Luke 18,
where that publican said, God be merciful to me, the sinner,
you'll see one common defining word in both definitions. You
know what it is? Propitiation. The mercy seat was the place
of propitiation or sin offering. It's where the sin offering was
brought. The blood of that animal was brought in. The high priest
entered into that holy of holies once a year, not without blood. And propitiation was made there.
He splashed that blood with the hyssop on the mercy seat. And
God said, I'll commune with you. Propitiation. And this publican
in the New Testament was making reference to that mercy seed
of old where the blood was splashed. He couldn't even look at God
when he came in there. But he said, oh Lord, be propitious
to me. Meet me at that place where you
said that you would meet a sinner and commune. A sinner that can't
even look at God. How is he going to have communion
with God? Propitiation. mercy, blood, cleansing from sin. And I can't think about that
without thinking of God's gracious call to the sinner. In Isaiah
118, He said, Come now and let us commune together. Let's reason
together. Sayeth the Lord. Where's God
going to commune with the sinner? At the mercy seat. Nowhere else. Nowhere else. Let's reason together, saith
the Lord. What about, Lord? About your sins. And how they
can be washed as white as snow. Are you ready to talk to God
about that? Are you ready to do business with God about your
sins? You're going to sooner or later, one way or the other.
And I am too. Though your sins be as scarlet,
they shall be as white as snow. If you ever come to that mercy
seat, begging for mercy, communing with God, reasoning with God,
your sins are fixed to be white as snow. He didn't say they can be. He
said they will be. You're already there. You're
already at that place where they're made white. Washed in that precious blood.
Who are these arrayed in white? Well, they're the ones that have
washed their robes in the blood. They came to that mercy seat
like that publican and said, God, propitiation, propitiation
for us sinners. Let the blood be applied. and received in my behalf, that
I might be made white before thee. Though they be red like crimson,
they shall be as wool. That's what propitiation is. And it's not accomplished by
the blood of the animal that was killed and its blood splattered
there on that mercy seat. That didn't accomplish. Paul
said that didn't accomplish propitiation. Though God instructed them to
do that, that was a figure, a shadow. Turn to Hebrews 9. You know,
if we're studying anywhere in the Old Testament, we're going
to wind up somehow or another in Hebrews. Before long. Hebrews 9, 23. It was therefore necessary that
the patterns of things in the heavens should be purified with
these, with what? The blood of those animals, the
bullock that was slain, that lamb that was slain on the altar,
the brazen altar and brought into that holy place. They should
be purified, but the heavenly things themselves with better
sacrifices than these. The people were made ceremonially
clean by God's prescribed way in that figuring shadow. But
your soul before God can only be made clean one way, and that's
not it. Better sacrifices than these are going to be required.
For Christ is not entered into the holy places made with hands,
which are the figures of the truth, but into heaven itself. Now to appear in the presence
of God, two beautiful words, for us. Nor yet that he should offer
himself often as the high priest entereth into the holy place
to every year with blood of others. He didn't bring his blood in
there, like Christ did. He brought the blood of an animal.
For then must he often have suffered since the foundation of the world,
but now once in the end of the world hath he appeared to put
away sin. What the blood of these animals
could never do. There's the lamb John said that taketh away sin.
And he came to put away sin, how? The only way it can happen. The only way propitiation can
be had. The only way that publican can
go down to his house justified by the sacrifice of himself,
by the precious blood of God's lamb, the Lord Jesus Christ. And as it was appointed unto
men once to die, but after this the judgment, so Christ was once
offered to bear the sins of many and unto them that look for him
shall he appear the second time without sin. We don't have any,
he don't have any. Where are they? They're gone,
he said. They're gone. Unto salvation. That's propitiation. And our friend the publican cried,
cried for propitiation. Turn to Romans 3. Romans 3.24. God be propitious to me. That's
what he said. Romans 3.24. Being justified
freely by His grace. By grace are you saved, through
faith, Paul said. Being justified freely by his
grace, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, God
came to be gracious to you, without blood, without his redemption,
without the blood of Christ shed for you, whom God has set forth
to be exactly what that publican was crying for, a propitiation. through faith in his blood, through
faith in that Christ crucified, in the finished work of the Lord
Jesus Christ as our propitiation by grace justified freely by
his grace through faith in his blood. Whose blood? The propitiation. to declare his righteousness
for the remission of sins that are passed through the forbearance
of God, to declare, I say at this time, his righteousness
that he might be just and the justifier. That's how he can
do it. That's how he can be faithful and just in forgiving your sin. through that precious blood.
The justifier of him which believeth in Jesus. Who's righteous and
who's wicked? Paul said the righteous one is the one that believes
in Christ. Didn't matter what he was doing
on the school bus. He believed in Christ. Why did he believe in Christ?
Because God justified him freely, without a cause, by his grace. So which one on that bus is the
righteous one? I don't know. Only God knows. Where's boasting then? I've stayed home, I've done what
I'm supposed to do and he went out and partied and you're gonna
kill a fatty cat for him? That's excluded. Don't you do
that before God. By what law? The law of works? Nay, but by the law of faith.
Therefore, we conclude that a man is justified, not guilty, righteous
by faith without the deeds of the law. Doesn't matter which
kid he was in the eyes of all of his schoolmates. Without the deeds of the law,
justified freely or not. the righteous and the wicked.
He cried for propitiation. This is how a man is righteous
before God and not wicked. By grace, verse 24, there we
saw, through faith in the Redeemer. We see that also in the other
examples, don't we? Briefly, tonight the prodigal
said, I will return to my father. How about you? We fail. in the garden and were
banished from the presence of God. Have you made a decision,
you know, in the church somewhere and said, I think I'll return
to God? Really? How are you going to do that? How are you going
to get back to God? I'll tell you how a sinner must
return to the Father, like the Prodigal said he would. The Lord
Jesus Christ said, no man cometh unto the Father. His faith in person. Returning
to the Father is believing on Christ. And that happens by, freely by
His grace, through that redemption. I am the way, the truth, and
the life, and no man cometh unto the Father but by me. That dying thief looked upon
a broken and bloody man dying the most humiliating and disgraceful
death that a man could ever die. And said to that man, when you
come into your kingdom, remember me. You see how God saves sinners? Salvation is a person. That thief
had nothing going for him. except he knew a person. And he cried, Lord, remember
me, Lord. There wasn't too many people
crying Lord that day when they looked at that one on that cross.
But this one was. The bad kid. Our text said, for the Lord knoweth
the way of the righteous. But the way of the ungodly shall
perish. Who's righteous? Who's ungodly? The Lord Jesus said to that thief,
today you're going to be with me in paradise. David said in Psalm 106, for
remember me, O Lord, with the favor that thou bearest unto
thy people. Oh, visit me with thy salvation. that I may see the good of thy
chosen, that I may rejoice in the gladness of thy nation, that
I may glory with thine inheritance. Remember me." Let's bow in prayer
tonight.