It's common to take a psalm at
a time when teaching from the psalms, but I just don't want
to hurry that much. There's so much teaching here. I don't want to miss anything,
but I know we will. But I want to get what we can
by the Lord's grace. Let's read the first two verses
again, and then verse three we'll look at tonight mostly. Blessed is the man that walketh
not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners,
nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful, but his delight is
in the law of the Lord." How many times have we seen in God's
Word how that everything boils down to this. It's either us
or God. It's our way or His way. Our
glory, His glory. Our works, His righteousness. But His people delight in His
word, in His truth, in His doctrine, and in His law doth He meditate
day and night. And He shall be like a tree planted. By the rivers of water that bringeth
forth his fruit in his season, his leaf also shall not wither,
and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper. In the first two verses, our
Lord declared and described who the happy man is. And as we saw,
this is a pursuit that every man woman and child takes up
every day. That's our desire every day is
to do what makes us happy. And our Lord only can declare
to us what happiness is and how it's discovered, how it's found,
how it's enjoyed. This is the man that's favored
by God. We talked about the two meanings
of the word. It means happy, but it also is
used in such a way as to mean the favor of God. It's the same
thing. There's no happiness without God's favor. There can be the
appeasement of the flesh, there can be entertainment, but there
can't be true happiness. Happiness is not about personal
gain, contrary to the thinking and philosophy, and as our text
says, the counsel of this world, the philosophy of this world.
It's not about personal gain. It's not about the favor of men
or any of the things that the world strives for, including
and especially the religion of this world. Happiness comes from knowing
and submitting to the truth of God. But what does that mean? Does that mean I read my Bible
through every year? Does that mean I do my scripture
readings, you know, when I'm supposed to? Is that what knowing
and submitting to the truth of God is all about? We know this from God's Word.
Happiness is knowing His Word, His Truth, and meditating upon
it, delighting in it. If you're not happy with God
and what He said, then you're not happy. That's what David's
saying here. Happiness is the Gospel. God's
good news to sinners. It's Old Testament and New Testament
is Gospel. It's the Gospel concerning God's
Son. The Savior of sinners, the Lord
Jesus Christ. That's what this book is. He's
not just being able to quote some scripture that he's talking
about here. He's talking about knowing the Son of God. How do
you know Him? By meditating in this book and
delighting in it and God giving you faith to believe it. To believe
this truth. The Gospels concerning God's
Son. That's what this book is about.
Paul said in Romans 1 that the prophets spake of Him. The Lord
said, he opened the scriptures and opened their understanding
that they might understand it. And he expounded in the Psalms
and the prophets and in all of the word of God, the things concerning
himself. So what David is talking about
here is knowing Christ. He's saying happiness is the
gospel of God, knowing that gospel and delighting in it, not being
offended by it, but delighting in it. The gospel teaches us of Christ.
This book from cover to cover teaches us of the Lord Jesus
Christ. It's by the power of the Holy
Spirit in the preaching of the gospel that we are brought to
Christ by faith. And by that same gospel we grow
in grace and in the knowledge of Christ. So it's all about
Christ. So happiness is knowing, submitting
to, and believing on Christ. This book reveals to us his son. Paul says it's the gospel concerning
his son, Jesus Christ. David here said that the man
who meditates in and delights in this book of God is happy.
Is that what he said? This book. And you know what
John said about this same book that David wrote this about?
John said this book is written that you might believe that Jesus
Christ is the son of God. and that believing, you might
have life through his name. So when we compare scripture
with scripture here, we see that what David is saying is, happiness
is knowing Christ. That's why God wrote this book,
that you might know his son. And as I said, Old Testament
and New Testament. Philip began at Isaiah 53 and
preached under that Ethiopian eunuch. You know what the subject
of his message was? The scripture says he preached unto him Jesus.
It's beginning at Isaiah 53. I don't know where he ended,
but it doesn't matter. It'd be Jesus, Savior. His name is Jesus, for he shall
save his people from their sins. He preached unto him the sovereign,
effectual Savior of sinners from the Old Testament. And that eunuch
said, after hearing that message, I believe that Jesus Christ is
the Son of God. We just, I just quoted how that
John said, that's why God wrote this book right there. It was just fulfilled in that
Ethiopian eunuch. God wrote this book that you
might believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. And from the
Old Testament, Philip preached under that man, Jesus. And he
said, I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. That's why
God wrote it. And David's saying here, happiness is delighting in this book, meditating
in it day and night, receiving the message of this book, seeing
the son of God revealed in this book and delighting in him. David said in Psalm 144 15 that
happy the happy people in this world are the ones whose God
is the Lord When Thomas looked upon the Lord
Jesus Christ when the Lord said behold my hands Reach hither
that finger and behold my side and be not faithless, but believing
in Thomas Looked at him He looked at Christ crucified and he said,
my Lord and my God. David said, there's the happy
man right there. The man whose God is the Lord. The man who, by God's grace,
shuns the counsel and false man-centered doctrine of this religious world,
the free-will doctrine of this religious world, and whose very
steps are ordered by the Word of God, will find himself right
there where Thomas was. Because this book is an H-I-M
book. You're gonna look into this book,
into the Word of God, the perfect, holy Word of God, and you're
gonna say with Thomas, that's my Lord, and that's my God, my
Savior, my Redeemer. If God gives you faith in his
Son, and that's how he does it, by his Word, Believing on the Son of God,
confessing Him to the salvation of the soul. You will never be
happy, never be happy. I don't care who you are, what
you do. The religionist of this world,
he can have a job that he enjoys and he can be prosperous in this
life and he can go along thinking, well I'm happy, I don't have
any problems, you know. Is it Psalm 73? I always forget, Dee,
you talked about it Sunday. I believe it was that the psalmist
of Psalm 73 said, I've looked at the prosperity of the wicked
and I was envious. It looks like they're happy to
me, doesn't it, you? That's because they don't know what happiness
is. Because when a sinner finds out what happiness is, when his
delight is in the Lord, he'll cast all of that aside as nothing. A palace will seem like a prison,
John Newton said, if the Lord Jesus is in there. You believe
that? Then you know what happiness
is. Oh, we can't lean to our own
understanding. Not our own counsel, nor the
counsel of others concerning who God is. Concerning what we
are before God by nature and concerning how God saves sinners
by his free sovereign almighty grace in Christ Jesus His grace
is almighty If you do through the preaching
of the gospel by God's regenerating grace life-giving grace ever
see the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. And that's how
you'll see God's glory revealed in his word in the face of his
son. If you see God's salvation, that
he is a just God and a savior. If you see how God can be holy
and just and yet justify a wretch like you, If you ever look into
this word of David, you delight in his word. If you look into
this word and you see all of God's goodness pass before you
like it did Moses. In other words, you see Christ
crucified. All of God's goodness is in Christ. You can only see his goodness
from the cleft of the rock. If this word spoken of in verse
two of our text ever comes to you and is mixed with faith as
you hear it, faith in your heart, and you believe God, you believe
the record that God has given concerning his son, and this
is the record, John said, that God has given unto us eternal
life, and this life is in his son. That's the record. That's the law David's talking
about. God gives sinners eternal life and He does it in His Son. If you by God's gift of faith
have come to Christ for life, for peace, for righteousness,
for forgiveness of sin and cast your very soul upon Him, leaned
all of your weight upon the scapegoat, committed yourself as Paul did,
body and soul, unto the Son of God, then You will delight forever
in that gospel whereby he saved you. You'll meditate in it day
and night. It'll be the very sustenance
of your soul. His word will feed your soul
and you will be forever blessed, happy, favored of God. And our text goes on to further
describe these happy ones. He shall be like a tree planted. Not a wild tree that just happens
to spring up in a good place. In the spiritual world, no tree
ever springs up accidentally by this river. No, it's planted there, planted
by God. God has a garden. You remember
Matthew chapter 13 when we studied there, we saw in that parable
in which Christ is pictured as the one who plants good seed. He's the gardener, he's the farmer,
he has a garden. God planted a garden in the beginning,
didn't he? And put his people in that garden
and every good thing was there for them to enjoy. Our Lord Jesus
Christ resorted to a garden when he would commune with his father
on this earth. It's because he loves his garden,
his spiritual garden. He explained to his disciples
in that parable in Matthew 13 that the field in which he planted
his good seed is the world. This world is God's garden and
he loves those ones that he planted. that's what he's saying in John
3 16 for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten
son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish God
loves his garden this world this field also has
tears in it as he explained in that parable but he never loved
them he never planted them he said I didn't plant them Satan
sowed the tares. He declared there in Matthew
13 that he would burn them up. He never planted them. They were
sowed by Satan. And in Matthew 15, our Lord said,
every plant which my heavenly father hath not planted shall
be rooted up. That's who David's talking about
in the last few verses of this song that we're looking at tonight. Every plant which he didn't plant
will be rooted up. Now when he says, I love my garden,
you suppose he's talking about them? Of course not. He loves the world,
his garden, because he's planted his good seed here. These trees
that are planted by the rivers of water. He planted us in good ground.
The Lord Jesus Christ is the sower. And he's the river. The tree that's in my backyard,
I have one tree in my backyard. I chose it. I picked it out from
among others. I said, that one's mine right
there. Paid for it. Planted it with a little help
from my friend. A lot of help from my friend. And I will prune and cultivate
that tree. It blessed my heart to see the
leaves begin to grow on it this spring. I said, look there, it
survived the winter. My tree is doing well. If I find any pests on it, anything
that would harm it, I'll kill them without a second thought. If it gets dry, I'll water it.
God's trees don't get dry. Our Lord supplies us with water
by a perpetual flow of rivers. As the text describes here, his
word is clearly intentioned by this because the context is immediate. But not just his word on the
page. Understand this. Of course we value this book
and his written word is precious. Do you have anything in this
world that you'd give up After you give this up? To not have the word of God in
this world? Could you bear that? Precious, but he's not just talking
about the word on the page here, but the living word. The word
himself, the Lord Jesus dwelling in us. Our Lord Jesus said in John 4
14, but whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him
shall never thirst The water that I shall give him shall be
in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life Do you
have that well within you? That's Christ himself the Living
Word We live by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of
God. His word is our daily spiritual food. The gospel is our spiritual
food as water, as life to the tree. He said, my body is meat indeed,
and my blood is drink. Indeed, we sang about that fountain
filled with blood. That's where this tree is planted. Christ himself, his gospel, his
promises, his blessings, his communion, his fellowship. These
are the rivers by which we're planted in this world and by
which we prosper. Thank God. We're planted by the
rivers and the rivers of his mercy. The river of His precious
blood, the river of His peace that passeth all understanding. That river that flows from the
very throne of God, that refreshes our soul continually. And there will be fruit. He said
His leaf won't wither, and He'll bear fruit. The barren tree is cursed by
God. That fig tree in Matthew 21,
19, it had leaves. It says right there in the text,
it had leaves only, but no figs. From a distance, it looked good,
but you come close and examine and there's no fruit. And this
is the Pharisee. You know, the Pharisee, is still walking this earth. Not by the same name, but a rose
by any other name is still a rose. And a Pharisee is a Pharisee.
And this is the one that has leaves only, but no
figs. He appears righteous, our Lord
said, on the outside unto men. But he's not profitable unto
God. It's fruit that glorifies God. Our Lord said, and they have
no fruit. This tree in our text has both leaves and fruit. It's
beautiful and profitable to God by His grace. The Pharisee appeared
righteous unto men, showing leaves, but was barren. And not having
the Spirit of God, the unregenerate sinner can't bear the fruit of
the Spirit. as described, as clearly revealed
in Galatians 5. And all through the book of God
that's displayed in His people, in their actions, in their...
in the grace that God gives them. By faith, Moses. By faith, Abraham. That's the fruit of the Spirit,
is faith. And love. They loved. He loved Christ more
than the riches of this world. That's the fruit of the Spirit,
love. They rejoiced in Him. All of the fruit. of the Spirit
of God. As we grow in grace, the fruit
of the Spirit is produced in our hearts and lives by the grace
and power of God. It's not that we should bear
fruit. We should bear more fruit, but
if you're His tree, you're going to bear fruit. He didn't say
that it'd be good if He did. He shall. He shall bear fruit. He bringeth forth his fruit in
his season. Paul said Galatians 2.20, here's
how we bear fruit. I am crucified with Christ, nevertheless
I live. Yet not I, but Christ liveth
in me. Now remember those words, in
me, because we're going to see them in another verse in a moment. Christ lives in me. And the life
which I now live in the flesh. I live by the faith of the Son
of God who loved me and gave himself for me. That's why I
live the way that I do now, because Christ loved me and gave himself
for me. All right, our Lord said in John
15, four, abide in me and I in you. That's what Paul said, he
abides in me. What's going to happen then?
As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself except it abide in
the vine, no more can ye except you abide in me. I am the vine,
ye are the branches. He that abideth in me and I in
him, the same bringeth forth much fruit. You see, Paul said
the way I live, I live that way because Christ is in me. And
that's what our Lord just said. If I dwell in you and you in
me, you'll bear much fruit now. For without me, you can do nothing. I'm not sure a day goes by that
that verse doesn't somehow become impressed upon me. Without
me, you can do nothing. I don't want to do anything without
him, do you? Because I know if I do something without him, it'll
be nothing. Whatever I may think it is, it's
nothing. And you see how in every aspect
of our text that Christ is essential. He is himself the cause and the
life and the source of this blessedness. We can't bear fruit without Him.
He just said that in John 15. But we're going to bear fruit
because we're going to have Him. He's going to dwell in us. Happy
is that man. Happy. It happens by His Word. We're begotten again unto a lively
hope by the Word of God. That's how God does it. And then Christ dwells in our
hearts by faith. and we bear fruit unto his glory. That's why God planted this tree in that same chapter, John 15,
where we just read. Our Lord said in verse 8, herein
is my Father glorified that you bear much fruit. David
said, this tree that's planted by the rivers of water He'll
bring forth His fruit in His season. That's why God planted
that tree. For His own glory. God does everything
He does for His own glory. He's worthy. He's worthy of all
glory. Oh, that we would do what we
do for His glory. And so He planted this tree by
the waters for His own glory. And think
about this, the fruitfulness of that tree is what glorifies
Him. Now think about that. That's
our blessedness, that's our prosperity, our happiness, our life, and it's what glorifies Him. This was difficult for me to
write, and it's going to be difficult for me to say, but I pray that
the Lord would cause us to see this. The very thing that is
my blessedness is what is his glory. That's a happy condition
right there. The very life and nutrition and
prosperity of the tree, in other words, my good, is that which
is also glorifying unto God. Isn't that a blessed thing? That
our blessedness, our spiritual life and well-being is integral,
essential to God's glory. He's arranged it that way. By
grace. Would He be any less glorious
without us? No. But He has made it so. in His
almighty, invincible purpose of grace in Christ Jesus that
the very thing which gives us life and health and prosperity is the very thing that brings
Him glory. And that thing that brings Him glory and gives us
life and fruitfulness is the one thing needful. It's Christ
Himself. It's the reverse. It's the word,
the truth. We cannot live and thrive unless
we abide in Him and He in us. And that which glorifies God
above all else is the same Christ crucified. Because He has loved
us with His everlasting love. That's the only way God can love,
is everlastingly. And the objects of His love,
He bestows upon the objects of His love everything that He can
bless them with. No good thing will He withhold
from those that He loves and from those that love Him. And
because He has loved us and chosen us, and redeemed us with His
precious blood and planted us in His good ground. And that's Christ, of course,
but of Him are ye in Christ Jesus, who is of God, is made unto us
wisdom and righteousness and sanctification and redemption.
Because of all this and because He keeps us in Christ to this
very day unto salvation, kept by His power, put us in his son
he keeps us in his son and he in us unto salvation ready to be revealed
in the last time because of him and where we're planted in him
everything shall work together for our good everything we do
will prosper everything well wait a minute
chris What about my sin? My sin's not gonna prosper. What
sin? What sin? God's talking about his tree
here. He has not beheld iniquity in Jacob. He don't see sin in
you. Not if you're in his son and
he in you. There's no sin in everything you do. And I'll tell
you this, even your sin, Even your mistakes, even your foolishness
will redound to your good in this world. You'll prosper in
spite of it, won't you? Has that not been the case with
you? We're prospering even when it
appears that we're failing. Job didn't know on the ash heap
that God was teaching him the one thing he needed to know.
who God is. And let me make this one final
point. Just as in our first lesson, we must view this truth as not
applying only to ourselves. We are to understand it that
way. This is talking about us, but
it's us in Christ. And so the scripture applies
primarily to Him and to us in Him. As we saw, only Christ Himself
can perfectly glorify the Father. He's the only one that can bear
fruit that's worth eating. If He doesn't dwell in us, we
can't bear anything. And only Christ Himself as a
man can perfectly render unto God the glory that's due unto
His name. There's one man that ever glorified
God, and that's the man Christ Jesus. And we glorify Him now only as
He dwells in us, and we in Him. But even that, even our glorifying
of Him now is not meritorious. Only He can bear that fruit.
Only He can fulfill that purpose for which man was created, the
glory of God. Only Christ can do that. And only what he has done can
prosper in the ultimate sense of the word. The truth about all that we do,
the Lord Jesus said, when you've done everything you're supposed
to do, you're an unprofitable servant. But only the Lord Jesus, what
he has done can prosper in that true and ultimate sense. Because he has prospered in the
work that he was sent to do, therefore we prosper in him,
as this tree described in our text. In other words, as he is,
so are we in this world. Isaiah 53.10, it pleased the Lord to bruise
him He hath put him to grief. When
thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed. His seed. Paul said that seed is Christ. But he said, if you have the
faith that Abraham had by God's grace, then you're the seed. He shall see his seed and he
shall prolong his days and the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper
in his hand. Everything he does shall prosper. You see how our text must cause
our hearts and by faith draw our eyes to the Lord Jesus Christ,
the only one of whom this can truly be said. everything he
did, prospered. Unto the glory of God, unto the
righteousness of his people, unto the honoring of God's law,
unto the redemption of his people. Everything he did, he did as
my redeemer, as my substitute, as my righteousness, and all
of it, thank God, bless God, has prospered. Now you think
about these words in Isaiah 53 here, verse 10, and I'll close
with this thought. The pleasure of the Lord shall
prosper in his hand. What's the pleasure of the Lord?
All of God's pleasure, his will, his desire, his purposes shall
prosper. They can't fail. Why? Because he's laid help upon one
who is mighty. The one who came to accomplish
all of God's pleasure cannot fail. What is his pleasure? Well, it's
his pleasure to glorify himself. That shall prosper. Where? In the hand of my Savior. Not
in mine. No, my very glorifying of him
would send me to hell if considered outside of Christ. His honoring of his son and giving
him a people for his everlasting glory. The kingdom of heaven
is like unto a man who made a marriage for his son. That's gonna prosper. He gave
his son a people. He said, I'll give you the heathen
for your inheritance. He has. The honoring of his perfect holy
law. God will be honored. His law
will be honored, will be kept, will be obeyed. That's going
to prosper. His obtaining of eternal redemption
for those people whom he hath from the beginning chosen unto
salvation. That shall prosper. He shall. He has obtained eternal redemption
for us. His eternal purpose in predestinating
those people, the happy ones. What has he predestinated us
to be? Could you quote it? Conformed
to the image of his son. That's His pleasure. It's God's
pleasure that we be just like His Son. He's going to bring
many sons unto glory. And we're all going to be like
Him. That's His pleasure. That's going to prosper, Isaiah
said. And it has. Where? In the hand
of Christ, the almighty champion of sinners. We will never think
of Christ aright until we think of him as our champion. The one who has undertaken for
our very souls. The one who defeated every enemy
that we have. He came down here to do that.
And the last enemy that he shall destroy is death. And then we'll
be with him forever. He has won the victory and given
it to us. He's our champion. And may He
give us grace to bear fruit unto His everlasting glory, who loved us and gave Himself
for us. Let's pray together.