Turn back with me now to Psalm
chapter 34. My message this morning is in
verse 19, The Lord our Deliverer. The gospel is a message that
declares Deliverance. Deliverance. Not the possibility
of it. Not the offer of it. Not something
to help you to deliver yourself. But the deliverance of our God
and Savior, Jesus Christ. Over in Luke chapter 4, you don't
have to turn over there, you'll recognize the story as I tell
it to you. But our Lord stood up for us
to read. Back in those days they stood
to read and sat down to preach. I don't know how it got twisted
around. He stood up to read, and they delivered unto him those
ancient scrolls. They didn't have Bibles like
this marked in chapters and verses, but they had scrolls by these
old prophets. And they delivered to him the
scroll of Isaiah the prophet. And he searched in the scroll
until he came to what's marked in our Bibles as Isaiah 61, verses
1 and 2. And he found that place where
it was written, and he read these words to those that God had assembled
there to hear him. The Spirit of the Lord God is
upon me, because the Lord hath anointed me to preach good tidings
to the meek. He hath sent me to bind up the
brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening
of the prison to them that are bound, to proclaim the acceptable
year of the Lord, and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort
all that mourn." Now that day of vengeance, he's talking about
that satisfied justice of God that would be accomplished in
his death. He's not talking there about
the vengeance of God against the wicked, there'd be no comfort
in that, but there's comfort in the fact that this day of
vengeance of our God that came down, He bore the wrath of God
upon our sins in His own body on the tree. And that is to comfort
those that mourn. Now the acceptable year of the
Lord, when He says that, that's in reference to the year of Jubilee. How many of y'all know what that
is? Every so often, under the Law of Moses, there was a year
proclaimed as the year of Jubilee. And in that year of Jubilee,
during that year, was a proclamation of liberty declared to all those
who were slaves. All those who, because of their
debts, had to be sold into slavery. They were all free. The Declaration
of Liberty was declared. all that were in captivity. And
during this year of jubilee, there was a forgiveness of all
debts. Wouldn't that be something? I
think we ought to have one today. All debts forgiven. All debts
cleared. And during this gracious year,
there was a restoration of all your lost inheritance. You had
to sell the farm. You had to sell everything, the
place where you was raised. You had to get rid of it. But
in this year of Jubilee, you got it back. You got it back. All inheritance was restored. And during this year, there was
a cessation from all work. There was no work to be done
in this year. No fields to be planted. No crops
to be raised. Just rest. It was a year, a whole
year of rest and praise unto God. And this gospel year had
come in its fulfillment to them. That's what he's reading to them
here. And having read these words,
our Lord sat down and he said this, This day is this scripture
fulfilled in your ears. And they wondered, it says, they
wondered over the gracious words that proceeded out of his mouth. Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ
is that deliverer foretold in the types and in the prophecies
of the Old Testament. But what is this deliverance?
What in the world is He talking about? Is He talking here about
a deliverance from debt? Is He talking here about a deliverance from being in bondage to somebody,
slavery? What's He talking about? We live
in a free country, a country of good opportunity, and a country
in which slavery has been abolished. What does this deliverance have
to do with me? Well, let's begin here. Deliverance
implies trouble. If you're not in trouble, you
have no application for deliverance. You have no reason for deliverance. Deliverance implies trouble.
from which a man cannot of himself escape. Deliverance implies an
enemy too strong for us to overcome. Like Israel down in the iron
furnace under Pharaoh, that lord of the land, under that bondage
and oppression, they had a ruler that they could not, he was too
strong for them to overcome. And then deliverance implies
a captivity and bondage which leaves us helpless to break free. He said, I've come to set the
captives free. What captives? What's he talking
about? The gospel then is that which
brings deliverance to the captives, sets at liberty them that are
bruised, and opens the prison door to them which are bound.
Now there's five things. I suppose if I went through the
Scriptures, there's probably nine or ten things, but we don't
have time for that. So I went through and just got
you five things in general that this deliverance has to do with. And the first thing is this.
I read it to you back in Psalm 34. He said, He delivered us
from all our fears. All our fears. What do we fear? What do we fear? You know, whenever
the Lord came to someone, and He came and appeared to them
in His glory, they feared Him. John fell at His feet like a
dead man. Daniel's comeliness melted into
corruption. Job covered his mouth, said he'd
never speak again. But do you know what the first
words out of our Lord's mouth to them was? Fear not. Fear not. He hath delivered us
from all our fears, David said. I sought Him, and He answered
me and spoke to me and delivered me from all my fears. Fear not. Listen as David recounts
this blessed experience here in Psalm 34 verse 4. He said,
I sought the Lord and He heard me and delivered me from all
my fears. Somebody said, well, I don't
have any fears. You will if the Holy Spirit of
God ever gets hold of you. You have fears. You have fears. You will if the
Holy Spirit of God ever brings the Gospel to you in power. You will when God drives home
your lost condition and you see yourself helpless and hopeless,
a sinner in the hands of an angry God. You'll fear Him then. You'll
have fears. You'll have fears. You will if
you ever discover that the well you've been drinking from is
an empty, broken cistern. You'll fear then. You'll fear when you find out
that refuge you've been hiding in is a false refuge, and that
spring you've been drinking from is a poison spring. You'll fear
Him then. You'll fear Him when you find
out that He's the Lord, the sovereign Lord of glory, and you're in
His hands. And He's the potter and you're
the clay, and He can make you into a vessel of honor or a vessel
of dishonor. He can come to you in grace and
speak peace to your soul, or He can turn you over and send
you strong delusion to believe a lie and be damned. You will
fear Him then. Our Lord said to His disciples,
I don't know what provoked Him to say this, but He said to His
disciples, He said, fear not men who can destroy the body,
but you better fear God who can destroy both soul and body in
hell. Fear God. Fear God. You won't have any problem then.
You'll find fear at every window and every door and fear in every
direction. You find out that you've got
a nature that can only sin. That's all it can do. All it
can do. It's prayers are sinful. It's worship is sinful. Do you
know that there were sacrifices under the Old Testament law specifically
for sins of the tabernacle? Sins of their prayers and sins
of their worship. They had sacrifices to atone
for that. Why? Because that's all they
could do. That's all they could do. A nature that can only sin. Paul
said, when I would do good, what did he say? Evil was present.
He said, I know that the law is spiritual. It's holy. It's righteous and just. And
it's spiritual. I know that. But he said, I'm
carnal. Sold unto sin. A nature that can only sin. A
righteousness that's nothing but filthy rag. Justice demanding
payment in full, and the law demanding what you cannot produce.
You'll fear Him then. False religion on every corner.
The flesh lusting beyond anything you can control. Now a man with
no understanding, a soul left in darkness, and a sinner apart
from the intervention of God, it don't take much to put him
at ease. It don't. It don't take much. Least little
thing. Walk down an aisle, make a decision,
join the church, be baptized, whatever. It don't take much.
It don't take much to put them at ease. And they hang on to
that. They'll hang on to that rest
in that hope in that experience, that feeling, whatever it was,
that meeting, that preacher, that aisle, whatever it was.
They'll hang on to that catechism, whatever it was. They'll hang
on to that until they go out and meet God in judgment. It
don't take much. He can walk down an aisle, join
the church, go to his deathbed in perfect peace. David said
there's no bands in their death. They die and there's no bands.
I'm over here worried. I'm over here fearing God. I'm
over here knowing what He can do, at least in part, what God
could do. But there's no bands in the death
of the wicked. He's not worried. He's not worried. He's made his decision. He accepted
Jesus as his personal Savior. Just give him an experience of
feeling something to do, something to sacrifice. It'll pacify him
the rest of his life. But I tell you, when God convicts
a sinner and convinces him of what he is in the presence of
a holy God, he'll fear. He'll fear. And when he does,
those sweet words will ring in his ears, fear not. Fear not. No one except the elect of God
are brought to real repentance and faith. No one but his beloved
are ever truly convicted of sin. Repentance comes from believing,
knowing in your heart what you are. And like David, you'll hate yourself. You'll hate yourself. Have you
ever done something that just got mad on the spur of the moment
and said something? Just spit it out and said something? Been sorry for it the rest of
your life. Oh, I wish I hadn't said that. Wish I hadn't said
that. That's just one little piece
of it. When you come to understand what you are, you'll hate yourself.
You'll hate all of it. I asked Brother Mayhem one time,
I said, you ever say anything you want to take back? He said,
I'd like to take back what things I said this morning. I said,
that's right. That's what repentance is. It's
a turning from yourself. It's an understanding of what
you are. You're the sinner. Many, he said, many are the afflictions
of the righteous. but the Lord delivereth him out
of them all." He has fears of judgment, and fears of the rulers
of darkness, and fears of deceit and subtlety. When you're convicted
by the Lord God, the Holy Spirit of God, and He teaches you in
the Scriptures what real repentance and faith is, and you come to
an awareness that you've been duped, you've been lied to and
deceived for years and years and years, You come to see that,
you'll fear those rulers of the darkness then. You'll fear because
you were deceived. And if God hadn't intervened,
you'd have rested in that and went out and met Him in judgment.
Believers have fears of judgment and fears of the rulers of darkness
and fears of deceit and subtlety and fears of time and circumstance. Fears of falling into the hands
of the living God. What if God were to come on your
way home? All of a sudden, a car comes
out from a side road. Boom! You're gone. You're standing
in His presence. What then? What then? That's what I'm talking about.
Falling into the hands of the living God. That's fear. Fear. Of those unrepentant. unregenerate
souls, dead in trespasses and sins. Those under sin, Paul said
that he proved that they were all under sin. He said there
is no fear of God before their eyes. Deliverance in Christ is deliverance
from all our fears. And then secondly, deliverance
has to do with the curse of a fallen nature. Sin entered and man died. That's the story. That's the
story. You can read about it in Romans
5 verse 12. By one man, sin entered into
the world, and death by sin, and so death passed upon all
men, for that all have sinned. Sin entered and man died, not
physically, at least not right away, but spiritually. Everything
in him spiritually disappeared when he sinned against God. Immediately
after the fall of Adam, who communed with God on a regular basis.
That's what it said. God would come down and walk
with him in the cool of the day. You think about that. What he
did, he communed with God, no telling how long. He was immortal
until his sin, wasn't he? No telling how long he walked
with God, communed with God. He didn't have any problem then.
God commanded him to name all animals, he named them. He was
wise, he had wisdom. He had all these things. But immediately, after the fall
of Adam, who communed with God on a regular basis, he didn't
know how to approach God. When God came down, he ran from
Him. He tried to hide from God, the
living God. All seeing God, all knowing God,
he tried to hide from Him in a garden. Tried to hide his nakedness
behind fig leaf aprons. Blamed God for his sin. And sold out the woman that he
loved. Death. That's spiritual death.
It's the fallen nature of man, his sinful self, his sinnerhood
that constitutes the death of man. Sin entered and man died
and death passed upon all men for that all have sinned. And
left to himself, a natural man cannot produce a righteous man.
Only another like himself. Spiritual death is bondage. That's what I'm I'm trying to
tell you, that's the point I'm working on. Spiritual death is
bondage. We're free within the confines
of a fallen nature to do what we will. And here's what you won't do.
Our Lord said, you've got the Scriptures, and you search the
Scriptures, but you won't come unto Me that you might have life.
You will not. You will not. You will not believe the prophets
that you might be saved. If you believe Moses, you believe
me, because Moses spoke of me. If Abraham was your father, you
would love me, because before Abraham was, I am. Abraham rejoiced to see my day,
and he saw it and was glad. Paul talks about this death in
his letter to the church at Rome. He said in Romans chapter 8 verse
6, to be carnally minded, naturally minded, sinful minded, to be
carnally minded is death. That's what it is. What is this
death? It's the way you think. It's the way you reason. It's
the way you walk and the way you live. That's what it is.
It's death. It's death. It's what we are. And to be carnally minded is
death because the carnal mind is enmity against God. And then
in chapter 7, verse 18, he tells us that in this flesh, he said,
we know that. I know that, he said. In this
flesh, well, it's no good thing. And then finally he cries out
down at the end of the chapter, there in chapter 7, and he said,
Oh wretched man that I am. Now listen to this, who shall
deliver me from the body of this death? Who's going to deliver
me? I can't deliver myself. I can't
escape it. I can't get clear of it. And
he said, I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. David
said, I'll render praises unto thee, for thou hast delivered
my soul from death. But how can that be? How can
that be? Well, he said in Galatians 4.4,
when the fullness of time was come, God sent forth his Son,
made of a woman, made under the law. to redeem them that were
under the law, that they might receive the adoption of sons. That's how God intervened. He Himself, the Word Himself,
was made flesh and dwelt among us. A holy representative, a
chosen head of a people beloved of God, came into this world
and was tempted in all points like as we are, yet without sin. In Him, the believer has a standing
before God. Christ is our righteousness.
Christ is our atonement. We stand in Him. When God sees
Him, He sees you. He sees you. He is our deliverance
from this body of death. You are dead, Paul said. I wish
I could get hold of that. You are dead. And your life is
hid with Christ in God. That's where you're at. That's
your standing. That's where you're at. That's
your salvation. That's your righteousness. That's
your atonement. That's your wisdom. He puts you
in Christ. Your life is hid with Christ
in God. And when Christ who is our life
shall appear, then shall you also appear with Him in glory. And then thirdly, God's people
are delivered from the law. Delivered from the law. I want you to hear me. The law
cannot help an unregenerate man. It cannot help him. It can only
aggravate his condition. Because he's ignorant of its
nature and he's ignorant of its demands. He thinks the law is
a teacher. that it teaches him something,
that it teaches him how to behave, that it teaches him how to be
moral. And he thinks he can obey that
law, and he can conform to that law, and he can honor God by
his keeping of that law. He's ignorant of its nature and
demands, and he can easily be deceived into believing he can
be saved by his obedience to it. In Galatians 4, verse 21,
the apostle asked these people who had been deceived into believing
that they could honor God and win God's approval by their works.
And he said, Tell me, ye that desire to be under the law. Do
you hear the law? Do you hear what it says? Do you not know its demands?
The law demands continual obedience, unbroken, from the cradle to
the grave, unbroken. Break it in one point, you've
offended the whole law. Listen to this. Cursed is everyone
who continueth not in all things written in the book of the law
to do them. To do them. And the law demands perfect love
as the motive. You could keep these things.
Paul said he was touching the law. He said I was blameless
back in that day because he didn't understand what the law was and
what it said and what it demanded. It demands perfect love as a
motive. Our Lord said the whole law hangs
on these two commandments. Love the Lord thy God with all
thy heart, soul, mind, and strength, and your neighbor as yourself.
If you could keep them, you'd keep the whole law. But if you
offend that law in any point, it's because you didn't love
the Lord thy God with all thy heart, soul, mind, and strength.
You see what I'm saying? You that desire to win the approval
of God by keeping the law, do you hear it? Do you hear what
it says? Do you understand its demands? The law is enforced
by Him who is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the
heart. Hebrews 4 verse 12. And God who is perfect demands
perfection and we can't give it. Our Lord said, Be ye perfect
even as your Father in heaven is perfect. Anybody in here perfect? I am in Christ. You see? You see that deliverance? In
Christ, that law is exalted. It's unbroken. From the cradle, from Bethlehem's
manger to the cross, that law is perfectly honored. He exalted the law and made it
honorable. Made it honorable. And in Christ,
I have that perfect standing before God. Continual. Unbroken. spiritual obedience. Actually, the Scripture says
the law, as it concerns natural men, is a curse. Did you know
that? It's a curse because it demands
what he cannot and will not do. It's a curse because he can be
deceived into believing that he can. But he tells us in the book of
Galatians, he said, as many as are of the works of the law are
under the curse. I don't care who they are. I
don't care what church they belong to. It doesn't make any difference. If their hope is in this law,
in their keeping of the law, if that's their righteousness,
if that's their hope before God, they're under the curse. And
then let me add this nail to the coffin. He said the law is
not of faith. It's not of faith. But the man
that doeth them shall live in them. It's not believing in the
law. It's the doing of the law. If
you're going to be under the law, you've got to do it. It
has nothing to do with faith. The law has no place in the life
of a believer except as it's honored and exalted in Christ.
Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone
that believeth. Believers perfectly honored the
just demands of the law being put to death in its substitute.
It says Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law being
made a curse for us. Believers are delivered from
the law. And then fourthly, he tells us
that we've been delivered from this present evil world. This
present evil world describes this world in every age and in
every generation. It doesn't matter where you're
living, when it was. Genesis chapter 6, when our Lord
looked down from heaven and saw that every imagination of the
thoughts of men were only evil continually, that describes every
generation. clear through to the end of the
world. Man's not changing. He's not going to change. God has chosen a people out of
every nation, kindred, tribe, and tongue under heaven. And
He chose them in Christ. He chose them unto salvation. And He chose them by His grace. And He chose them to manifest
the glory of His name in the person and work of Jesus Christ
their Savior. The only thing a believer has
in common with this world is his sin. That's it. That's it. You that believe the
Gospel, I challenge you to sit down and see if you can find
some common ground with anybody. I don't care who it is. Your
closest relative. You sit down. See if you can
find some common ground in there with any unregenerate man. You
can't do it. Not one thing. Not the first
thing. The only thing a believer has
in common with this world is his sin. And everything else
is just firewood. That's all it is. Just firewood. Everything else, Peter said,
is reserved unto fire. John said, Love not the world,
neither the things that are in the world. And if any man love
the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that's
in the world, the lust of the flesh, And the lust of the eyes
and the pride of light, they are not of the Father. They are
of the world. And listen to what he adds. The
world passes away. It passes away. Be careful what
you treasure. The Lord may be going to burn
it up. I remember old Ralph Barnard one time. Henry told this about
him. He said this fellow came up and
he had this big old packard. And I guess it was something
to see in its day. Big ole chrome bumpers on it
and big bullet headlights and all these things. And he drove
it up and he was rubbing around on it and getting the last little
bit of dust off of it and telling Barnard all about this big car
and how it rolled and all that. He said, boy, that's a wonderful,
wonderful vehicle. Shame the Lord gonna burn it
up. That's what's gonna happen with all of it. the moth and the rust, consume
it. And then, fifthly, believers
are brought to see their deliverance from the wrath to come. You know, one of the things which
marked the election of the Thessalonians was their patient waiting for
the Son of God that Paul said was raised from the dead. Even
Jesus, now listen, which delivered us from the wrath to come. Delivered us from the wrath to
come. Seems commonplace, don't it?
We've heard it so much. Judgment's coming. It's coming. I tell you, yesterday it was
Monday. Huh? And I told my wife, I said,
it's Saturday. Where did the week go? Day before yesterday, it was
June the 1st. Time, time is, I'm telling you,
our lives, James said, like steam on a tea kettle. You see it rise
up and it's gone. Gone. That's how fast it is.
Our life is but a vapor. And you've heard this since you
were little. Judgment's coming. Noah preached that for 120 years. Judgment's coming. Judgment's
coming. And just like he reads over there
in 2 Peter, he said, they said, well, since the fathers fell
asleep, all things are the same. They're all the same. It is appointed unto men once
to die, and after that to 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 unto salvation. I tell you, sweeter words were
never penned for a guilty sinner than Romans chapter 8, verse
1. He said, There is therefore now
no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus. No condemnation. No judgment. No judgment. It says in the book of Revelation,
when it describes that great day of judgment, that the Lord
Himself shall separate the lambs from the goats, and He'll gather
His lambs on His right side. On His right side. And the goats
He'll send away into everlasting punishment. These people walk with the mind
of Christ and the mind of faith and the mind of accomplished
redemption. The law of the Spirit of life
in Christ Jesus has made them free from the law of sin and
death. I'll go back to my text in Psalm
34 and I'll close. We could talk here about the
fears of afflictions. how the Lord delivers us from
these things, and of sickness. And we could go on and on with
these things. But he says here, many are the
afflictions of the righteous, afflicted by his fears and his
foes and his future, and afflicted by death and by the law and by
this world and by the eternal judgment and wrath of God. But
the Lord, not man and the Lord, But the Lord, the Lord delivereth him out of
them all. Amen. Our Father, we thank You for
this time to gather together this side of eternity and sing of Your praise and hear
of Your name. We pray that you'll take these
words which we've spoken this morning, and these scriptures
which we've read and quoted, and press them hard upon the
hearts of those that are here this morning. Father, be pleased this morning
to show mercy, and to honor your name by magnifying your grace
and mercy in the salvation of sinners. We ask it for Christ's
sake. Amen.