Psalm 110. I'd like to read this
psalm to you this morning. It's a short psalm. And speak
on verse 3, if God wills. Psalm 110. The Lord said unto
my Lord, Sit thou at my right hand, until I make thine enemies
thy footstool. The Lord shall send the rod of
thy strength out of Zion. Rule thou in the midst of thine
enemies. Thy people shall be willing in
the day of thy power, in the beauties of holiness, from the
womb of the morning thou hast the dew of thy youth. The Lord
has sworn and will not repent. Thou art a priest forever after
the order of Melchizedek. The Lord at thy right hand shall
strike through kings in the day of his wrath. He shall judge
among the heathen. He shall fill the places with
the dead bodies. He shall wound the heads over
many countries. He shall drink of the brook in
the way. Therefore shall he lift up the
head." I wanted to speak this morning
on the subject of a willing people. a willing people. The text says
that thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power. Now
this psalm seems to me to be kind of a coronation psalm. Christ is bidden to take his
throne. We read in the first verse, look
at it, where the Lord says, the Lord said unto my Lord, sit thou
at my right hand. This is David speaking. He says,
the Lord said unto my Lord, sit thou at my right hand until I
make thine enemies thy footstool. The Lord shall send the rod of
thy strength out of Zion. He says, rule thou in the midst
of thine enemies. And so Christ is bidden to take
His throne and sit at the right hand of the Father. The scepter
is put into His hand, and that we learn when the Lord says,
I'll send the rod of thy strength out of Zion. But the question
that comes to my mind, and I won't spend a lot of time on any kind
of a preface here, but the question that comes to my mind is, we
have the King. and he's bidden to rule. He's
bidden to be seated at the right hand of eternal majesty. Now
the question is, where are his people? Where are his subjects? Where are the subjects that he
is to rule over? Where are his people? For a king
would be no king whatever without subjects. The title of being
king or the title of kingship is but an empty title if he has
no subjects to make up its fullness. Where then shall Christ find
that which shall be the fullness of him that filleth all in all?
Where will he find a people to reign over? Where will he find
people that will be his subjects, that will be fit subjects for
him to rule and reign over? Now we have no worry about Christ
being king. I believe that Jesus Christ is
King of Kings and Lord of Lords. I believe that Jesus Christ sits
on no precarious throne nor borrows leave to be. I believe that Jesus
is truly King and I believe that he shall reign over all the kingdoms
of the world and righteousness shall cover the earth from shore
to shore this world is and belongs to the Lord Jesus Christ. There
was nothing made that was not made by Him and He rules over
all. Christ is indeed Lord Christ
is indeed King, so our concern is not about Him being King.
We believe Him to be so, and we believe that He is reigning
now. We believe He is the Sovereign, and that He will rule until every
one of His enemies are made His footstool. The Lord Jesus is
king. But our concern is about where
will he find his subjects? Our concern is who now will be
his people? And how will they become his
people? How will they be his subjects
in this world? How will he find his subjects? Now, beloved, we preach to hard
hearts, and we prophesy to dry bones, and we are preaching and
declaring to men and women the gospel, but we know we have no
power in and of ourselves over them. We have no ability to affect
them. Their hearts are hardened by
sin and rebellion against Almighty God. We know their lives and
hearts are contrary to God. We know their natures are contrary
to God. And how are we going to affect
them? Our unbelief tells us, in our
own hearts, our unbelief asks us where will we find willing
subjects for King Jesus. Where will we find them? How
are we going to make them? We have no power over men. We
cannot break the hearts of men. We don't have a sledgehammer
big enough to break the carnal hearts of men and women. We don't
have the ability to get in there where their heart of hearts and
affect them to where that they become willingly subjects to
the Lord Jesus Christ. Well, our fears are laid to rest
by this text here that we have this morning. Our fears are laid
to rest. The text here is to lay aside
the anxieties of the Lord's living family and let them see how that
Christ shall indeed be King and never lack for a multitude of
subjects. Our Lord Jesus Christ is well
able, God the Father in His eternal purpose of electing grace, is
well able to raise up subjects for His Son to rule over. There's a few things here that
I'd like for us to notice in that text that we've read here
a couple of times. Verse 3 of Psalm 110 we're talking
about. First of all, here we have a
promise concerning time. And the verse of scripture says
to us, thy people shall be willing in the day, in the day of thy
power. So these subjects will be made
willing in a day. Now this is not every day, but
this is one special day and it's a day, it's a personal special
day in the lives of everyone of God's elect when God visits
them and he makes These people willing in the day of his power
now. It's not in the day of our power
It's not in the day when we get eloquent and when we can wax
eloquent when we can get Intelligent enough to know how to converse
with a with the English language so as to be persuasive It's not
our day, but it's in the day of his power not in the preacher's
day not in the day when the church gets so soul-minded and so concerned
that they become great prayer warriors praying for the Lord
to send revival. It's not necessarily in that
day, but it's in the day when God is pleased to manifest His
power in a personal way in the heart of one of those that He
has chosen. You remember Zacchaeus? There
came a day when old Zacchaeus was up a tree and our Lord Jesus
came to him and he said today, he says to this, he said, I must
abide in thy house. Come down, he said, come down. I must abide in thy house this
day. And so old Zacchaeus came down.
That was that personal day in the life of that Jew when the
Lord Jesus appeared to him and broke his heart and humbled him
and he came down And the Lord Jesus dwelt with him that very
day in his house. And so it is a time, it is a
promise concerning time. Some time between the cradle
and the grave if you be one of God's elect. If God set His affection
on you in old time, if when God wrote down names in the Lamb's
Book of Life, your name was written there, there will come a time,
a time when God will visit you and break your heart. And it's
your business as long as you live to be listening for the
voice of the Son of God in your own soul, and for you to be reading
the scriptures and listening for God to speak to you. Listening
and looking for that day when the power of God will come to
your soul and you will be brought savingly to the Lord Jesus Christ. I told a story a few times about
this little boy. They used to sit in Spurgeon's
Tabernacle He would come to church with his grandmother and he would
sit there and sit way out on the front of the pew and he would
hold his hands over his ears and his grandmother said, Sonny,
why are you doing that? He said, well, I want to hear
what Brother Spurgeon has to say because he has said that
that God speaks to sinners, and He calls sinners by name, and
I want to make sure I hear when He calls me. I want to make sure
that I hear. Because there is a time, there's
a promised time, when God will visit the souls of men, and we
want to be sure that we hear. And that should be our attitude.
Now God will see to it that His people hear, but our attitude
ought to be, I want to hear. I want to hear. Because if you
don't ever hear... My friend, if there's never a
day, a personal time of power in your own soul, a special day
when God visits you and when God touches you with a touch
from heaven, you will never be saved. You will die in your sin. So we have then a promise concerning
the time that God will visit the souls of those that will
be his subjects. Now the second thing we have
here is we have a promise of a people he said thy people thy
people shall be willing in the day nobody else thy people the
Lord Jesus says I have other sheep that I must bring There
shall be one foal and one shepherd. I have other sheep, I must. I
must bring them. The Lord Jesus has a people. Now this is a promise that Christ
shall always have a people. You remember that during the
dark ages. It was a tragic thing in that day and time to be numbered
among believers, to be numbered among true Christians, because
they suffered, suffered so unmercifully at the hands of the Roman Catholics. Terrible, terrible pressure.
To the point where that there was no registers kept of the
membership of churches. There was nobody that had a list.
Fact is that when a person would come into the church, many times
they wouldn't even tell anybody their name. They would just come
in, and they would say, I want to be a member of this church,
I'm a living soul, the Lord has appeared to me, I'm saved, and
nobody asked them their name. Because they weren't interested
in no one, and those people that came in weren't necessarily interested
in anybody else's name. because if they ever was persecuted,
they wouldn't have to say. And if somebody asked them, said,
well, who else is involved in this underground church that
you attend at night? You sneak out and attend at night
in that old barn over there or in that cave up there. Who else
are members there? They wouldn't have to say anything. They wouldn't have to lie because
they wouldn't know who was meeting with them. They'd know them by
sight, but they would not know their name. And in that dark
day, beloved, God had a people. God had a special people. Thy
people. The Lord had His own. He owned
them. They belonged to Him. And they
owned Him. And they were faithful to Him
in that dark day. And if the day gets darker, than
that which it might very well the Lord will still have a people
the gates of hell will never prevail against God's church
and let the devil turn up the heat as high as he will the Lord
will have his people because he chose them in old time He
purposed to save them. He will come to them and visit
them, and He will call them out. They will hear the gospel. They
will believe the story of the Lord Jesus, His coming, His death,
His vicarious life on their behalf. They will hear, and they will
become subjects of the Lord Jesus Christ. He will always have a
people. Isn't it wonderful that you find
some of the Lord's family everywhere? It's an amazing thing that you
just, you know, you don't realize where people that belong to Christ
really are. They may be in your very neighborhood.
They may be up the road from you a few miles. And you travel
about sometimes and you find somebody who is praying to God
just like you are. You find somebody that's got
a burdened heart. You find somebody who has a contrite
spirit. You find somebody whose heart
is broken and who is a seeker after God. You find these people
everywhere. And beloved, these are people
that God has visited. They're the Lord's people. Thy
people. God has a people. And there's
no one congregation that can lay claim to being the people
of God exclusively. of other people. God has family
in this world. They belong to Him. He owns them.
They're His special treasure. They shall make up His jewels
when God gathers them together. And they're everywhere. They're
all over this world. I'll tell you, God has a people.
He has a people that He ordained of old that will believe on Him
and that will trust Him. Now the third thing that we come
to next here is disposition. Disposition. The text says, thy
people shall be willing. Willing. Now, this has to do
with more than one act that that person will be involved in. We think sometimes that to get
religion, one needs to do something. One needs to do something. We
think sometimes that to get saved, that one needs to make a trip
up front, or one needs to go into a prayer room and do something,
that one needs to do something to become a Christian. But we
see here that being a child of God, belonging to the Lord's
family, being a subject of King Jesus has to do with disposition. Disposition. It has to do with
an individual being willing, willing in the heart. And you
see here that God says, thy people shall be willing in the day of
thy power. They'll be willing. Their disposition
will be changed. I've told you all along that
repentance is more than an act. that it is a disposition of the
heart. And no man can break his own
heart. No man can ever give himself
true feelings of repentance. No man can ever give himself
true love toward God, where a man will deny himself and where a
man will cut off the right hand of his sin, where a man will
give himself lock, stock and barrel over to God. No man can
enable himself to do that and you're helpless to do it. You
cannot do it. You're not able to do it and
only God can do that. Now this verse teaches And here's
what it teaches, and I want you to get this in your mind. This
is what this verse teaches. Contrary to what all the Armenians
have to say, this verse teaches the irresistible operation of
the grace of God on the souls of the elect, thereby making
them willing to receive Christ as their Savior. Now, beloved,
that's what this verse really teaches. It teaches that God's
grace does an operation on the heart of the sinner, on the soul
of the elect, and those people are made willing, they're given
a disposition to receive Jesus Christ as their Savior. Your mother and your daddy can't
give you that. Your grandparents cannot give
you that. I don't care who they are, where
they came from, they can't give you that. Nobody can give you
that but God Almighty, give you a disposition, give you that
operation that would enable you to believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ. Now if you've read the Bible
rightly, you understand, do you not, that men by nature, that
they are not subject to God and that they will not come, they're
not willing. Let me say that. They are not
willing by nature. No man by nature is willing until
God gives him a disposition to be willing. Now then, Jesus said
in John 5 and 40, you will not come to me that you might have
life. You won't do it. You will not
come. That's an act of your will. You
will not come. Somebody says, I don't agree
with what you said this verse teaches. Don't the Bible say,
turn with me to 2 Peter chapter 3, if you would, and verse 9.
Look at this, chapter 3 and verse 9 of 2 Peter. Does not the Bible
say that the Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some
men count slackness, but is longsuffering to us, were not willing that
any should perish, but that all should come to repentance? that's
exactly what god said somebody said what that is not in accordance
with the verse you're reading out of some one hundred and ten
that's not according to barbara's hundred-and-ten someone again
verse three but we love it is notices for this is not an armenian
there's not an armenian text in all of the bible there is
no such thing as an armenian text the bible is a book about
sovereign grace. The Bible is a book about elective
grace. The Bible is a book about redemption
by blood. It's a book about effectual atonement. It's a book about irresistible
grace and perseverance of the saints. Listen to this verse.
It says the Lord is not slack concerning His promise, meaning
that if God says He's going to do something, He's going to do
it. Mainly if God's going to send His Son back, He's going
to send Him back. He'll send Him back when He's
ready to send Him back. He'll send Him back. But listen
to this, as some men would count slackness, but is long-suffering
to who? Usward. Usward. Peter includes
himself in this. He says usward, meaning those
that are God's elect. God will not send Jesus back
until all of his people are in the fold. Usward. Those who are
elected to believe, chosen to believe, ordained to believe,
They will be in the fold when the Lord Jesus comes back because
God is not willing that any of them should perish That any should
perish any of these Usward any of us that we should perish them
God even Jesus did not pray for them in John 17. He said I pray
not for them them it's them and us and It's those that are elect
and those who are non-elect. It's those who God has chosen
and whose names He's inscribed in the Lamb's Book of Life and
those whom He has not. I have no control over that.
I have nothing to do with that. That's God's business. He'll
do what He will with His own. He's an absolute sovereign. You argue with Him if you want
to, but nobody's going to argue with God. He's a God of purpose. and he does all things according
to his own purpose, not willing that any should perish, but that
all should come to repentance, all the elect, that they should
come and the will and God will give them space. There will be
time for that personal day of power to come to all of the elect. That's what it's saying. That
will happen. That definitely will happen. So what I'm saying here is That
this disposition that it must come I want to show you another
verse if you would turn with me to John 6 Let's look in John
6, and I want to look here just a moment at verse 44 and this
shows that this disposition to come that no man can create it
himself and that no preacher can create it, that this is God's
Word. No man, look at it, you know
we're asking the question, where shall the Lord get his subjects?
Where will the Lord get his people? Where will the children of Christ
come from? Well look at it, no man can come
to me except the Father which has sent me, draw him, verse
44. the father which has sent me
draw him and I'll raise him up to the last day look here at
verse 45 and 46 it is written in the prophets they shall be
all taught of God every man therefore that hath heard and hath learned
of the father cometh unto me now you take note here that the
prophet said that they shall all be taught of God all my children
they should be taught of God. God must teach them. God must
give them a disposition. They must be made, M-A-D-E, made
willing. And only God can do that. And so when they're taught of
God, every man therefore that hath heard and learned of the
Father, Jesus said, they're mine, they come to me. They come to
me. Now then, look up here in the
let's see it's verse 65 of this same chapter and Jesus said therefore
said I unto you that no man can come to me except it were given
to him of my father now these people that come to the Lord
if you look back here in Psalm 110 again it says that these
people here this verse is a very difficult and about every bible
commentator that you would read after admits that this is a very
very difficult verse to understand as far as the intricacies of
it now for an example he says, thy people shall be willing in
the day of thy power and the beauty of holiness from the womb
of the morning thou hast the dew of thy youth but the best
that I can discern and what I believe that this verse is saying is
that these people when they have this disposition given to them
where they are made willing and where they are willing found
willing that these people they come from the womb of the morning
just like the dew comes when you would go out in the morning
and you don't notice it maybe so much here as you would if
you lived in the east, if you lived back in the Midwest. You
go out early in the morning and the dew is all over the grass
glistening. Now I'm sure it does happen on
certain days here and I think I've witnessed that here. But
you see the dew glistening, dew drops everywhere glistening.
Where did they come from? It's mysterious where they came
from, but they came out of the womb of the morning. The womb
of the morning is where they came from. Now the people of
God they come to Christ as it were out of the womb of the morning. They come just like there's a
mystery connected with those dew droplets, there's a mystery
connected with how God gets a hold of his people everywhere and
draws them. They hear from the Father and
they come to Christ. There's a mystery about it. And
if we all were to go around this room, those that are saved and
those that believe that they belong to Christ, they would
tell you a little different story about how it happened in their
soul about how the Lord appeared to them how the Lord brought
them to where that they would trust unreservedly in the Lord
Jesus Christ and they would tell a little different story about
that and so it's a very mysterious thing but the dew comes out of
the womb of the morning and all God's elect come out of the womb
of the morning very mysterious but they come they come and no
man can come except the father Jesus said which sent me draw
him They must draw Him. And so that's what that phrase,
thou hast the dew of thy youth, that's all that it refers to. And then there's some other things
that I want us to notice, and I'll deal a little bit with that
in the beauty of holiness in just a moment. But I was thinking
about this willingness. This disposition, and let me
say just a few things about that before we close. My, the time
has gotten away from us today. What are the Lord's people, these
people that are given this disposition to be willing, what are they
willing to do? What are they willing to do? Well, the first
thing that they're willing to do is to own, and I'll just give
these to you, and you can work them out, but they're willing
to own and confess their sins. They're willing to own their
sinnership. They're willing to own the fact
that they had a part in the fall, that they were affected by it,
that they were there in their daddy Adam, and when he did what
he did, they did too. They own that. And they confess
their sin and their depravity. They're willing to do it. If
you meet somebody and they are not yet convinced that they took
part in the fall, that they're as guilty as old daddy Adam himself,
you know that person has never, never come forth out of the womb
of the morning. He has not come to Christ if
he does not own his guilt and his sin and will not admit his
sinnerhood. Number two, they're willing to
repent of their dead works. their dead, I should say, religious
works, and lay aside all personal merit. They have come to see
that even their righteousness are as filthy rags in the sight
of God, and that anything they have produced and have been involved
in, that there's no merit in it. It's sin, because it was
contaminated and polluted by their own natures. and that God,
if He is going to have mercy upon them, that He will only
have that mercy in Christ. And that's the third thing I'll
mention, is they're willing to call on God for His mercy and
grace only in Christ Jesus. They don't come and say, well,
my mama did this, my daddies did that, and I've been a member
of that church all my life. I was born into it, baptized
and confirmed in it, and I'm this and I'm that. No, no, no,
no. They say, Lord, if I get mercy, it'll only be in Christ
Jesus. It's only as I stand in Him.
It's only because of Him. The connection is in Him, and
we have no deserts. except judgment and hell outside
of Him. In Him we seek for mercy and
grace. Willing to do that. Give up on
everything else. Willing to say, the Lord never
gave any consideration to good or evil. He just chose me and
put me in His Son. Hallelujah. Praise God, I'm in
His Son. And I look to Him for mercy as
I stand in Him and I've got nothing else. not by works of righteousness
which I have done but according to his mercy he saved me who
has saved us and called us not according to our works but according
to his own purpose and grace which was given us in Christ
Jesus before the world began that's the way it is we're willing
to do that God's people are willing and then we're willing to be
saved by the obedience and blood of Christ that God might be just
and the justifier of those that believe on his son, willing to
be saved by the obedience and blood of Christ, and we're willing
to part with, now get this, willing to part with all and everyone
which would hinder our fellowship with him. We're willing. He's
number one in our lives. Now thank God for those that
scotch for us and pry us and help us on to God. But those
that would drag us down and those that would hinder us, my friend,
we must be willing to part with them and to go on in fellowship
with Christ. It's a very serious thing. And
then in verse 6, or this sixth point I want to make, willing
to confess and bow to Him as Lord in Christ. Willing to confess
Him to be Lord of our lives. The Bible says that no man can
call Him Lord except by the Holy Ghost. Willing to say, Lord Jesus,
You're my Lord. I bow my knee to You. Now this
is the beauty of holiness. The very essence of sin is self-centeredness. Don't ever forget it. The essence
of sin is self-centeredness. The ugliness of sin is self. I am who I am. I'm number one. God this and God that, that doesn't
affect me. I am the important one here in
this outfit. I am the important one. That
is sin. The beauty of holiness and if
an angel came down from heaven to get the most beautiful thing
he could find and take it back to heaven, it would be a poor
sinner. dressed in the imputed and imparted
righteousness of Jesus Christ taken back into glory having
denied himself and give up everything and bowed his knee to the Lordship
of Christ. It's the most beautiful thing
that God Almighty ever looked on because it's the most Christ-like
thing that God could see in His people. A bowed knee a humble
and submissive heart. I'm telling you that the beauty
of holiness is submission to the cause, purpose, and person
of the Lord Jesus Christ. That is what the beauty of holiness
is. And all these trinkets, these
people run around One person's got on short sleeves and another
person's got hair cleared down, you know, to their hips and this
person's got this and they got that and they don't do this,
they don't do something. All of those trinkets got nothing
to do with holiness. Not one thing to do with it.
Holiness, the beauty of it is Christ first and me last. It's
Christ and everything else go to hell wherever it should be.
That's where it ought to be. Let it go! That's the beauty
of holiness. Christ first! Christ number one. I bow to Him. I submit to Him. It's His will. It's His way. I must submit to Him. That is
the beauty of holiness. And the people of God will be
willing and they'll be beautiful because they're willing. to give
it up and bow their knee to the Lordship of Christ. Now I know
that that might be difficult for some, but most of you know
that what I'm telling you is the absolute gospel truth. And I do hope this morning that
the Lord has given us a blessing. But thy people shall be willing,
I'm glad of that, disposition, disposition, disposition. Now, it's not that we don't have
to argue with ourselves. Many a time we've got to argue
with ourselves. We've got to spend a lot of time
sometimes on our face before God because the old man just
rears his ugly head and says, it'll be my way. It'll be my
way. I am important and it'll be my
way. Well, A Christian will come around
sooner or later, somebody that has the disposition and says,
the only thing important here is that God have his way, that
God's will be done, and I'll bow to it. I'll bow to it. We
sang a song here a while back, something about letting him have
his way with thee. And that's exactly the attitude
of a believer, is bowing their knee to the Lordship of Christ.
May the Lord use this message for His glory and His honor.
Sorry that I took a little bit more time.