Samuel, the book of 2 Samuel
in your Bibles. I want to read beginning with
verse 17 and read down through verse 22. Verse 17 through 22. According to all these words,
and according to all this vision, so did Nathan speak unto David. Then went King David in, and
sat before the Lord, and he said, Who am I, O Lord God? And what is my house, that thou
hast brought me hitherto? And this was yet a small thing
in thy sight, O Lord God, but thou hast spoken also of thy
servant's house for a great while to come. And is this the manner
of man, O Lord God? And what can David say more unto
thee? For thou, Lord God, knowest thy
servant. For thy word's sake, and according
to thine own heart, hast thou done all these great things to
make thy servant know them. Wherefore, thou art great, O
Lord God, for there is none like thee, neither is there any god
beside thee, according to all that we have heard with our ears. I want to speak this morning
on this subject, God's heart the source of all blessing. God's heart, the source of all
blessing. Now as we read this chapter,
from which we take our text, and our text will be primarily
verse 21, verse 21, as we read this chapter, we see and notice
that David had a desire to build a house for his God. He said he lived in a house of
cedar himself, and the ark of God had been a long time in just
dwelling inside of curtain walls. And he felt somewhat neglectful. He felt that it was neglectful
on his part to leave the ark of God where it was, and for
him to remain housed in this house of cedar and so he resolved
to build for the ark and for the worship that was associated
with it a temple. A temple in order that the worship
of God could go forward. Now he had for years, David had
gathered gold and silver and he meant to continue to do so
that he might erect this house for the Lord. And he wanted to
build a house that was more glorious than any that had ever been built
by the greatest heathen prince for his false deity. Now this
was the thought that was in David's heart. And Nathan the prophet,
not knowing any different, he said, just go right on, David,
and do what's in your heart and the Lord be with you. But there
came in the night time a voice, the voice of God to Nathan the
prophet and told Nathan, Nathan you go tell David some things. I want you to relay some things
to David. Now this was in fact the great
ambition of the life of David. It was his greatest ambition
and that was to build, be permitted to build this house for the worship
of Jehovah God. And you must understand that,
that this was not just a passing idea that came into his mind,
but this was something that was the ambition and the passion
of his life. Yet the Lord, He was not willing
to accept this at David's hand. Because David had been a man
of war from his youth up, and a man who would build this temple
for the Lord, he could not have blood-stained hands. He must
be a man of peace. Now the wars which David had
fought, they were necessary wars, and they were wars which God
was with him in those wars. And these wars were for the liberation
and for the defense of the nation of Israel yet nevertheless David
could not build this house Because his hat his his hands were stained
with blood and the house of peace Must be built by a man of peace
now Solomon the son of David in whose reign There was no war
he would have the honor of raising this house this great house a
prayer in the name of the Lord. Yet we have observed that though
the Lord refused David this realization to which he wished, that realization
which he wished, but the Lord did it in a most gracious manner.
I mean the Lord didn't come and and in any way upgrade David
because he had desired to do this great thing. No, the Lord
honored David. And it's evident in our reading
here this morning that the Lord honored David, his servant, even
in the non-acceptance of his offer to build this shrine, this
temple under the Lord, and he multiplied many blessings upon
the head of David I suppose as many as could have been given
to him even if he had been permitted to carry out his intention and
his desire and his ambition. God poured out great mercies
upon David and upon his house and God said, David, I'm gonna
build you a house. I mean, you wanted to build me
one, I'm gonna build you one. And not only that, but God said
things concerning the house of David and he said to David, that
he was going to be with him and that he was going to be with
his house and establish it forever. Now, do you and I have anything
in our hearts that we would like to do for the glory of God? Well,
I'm sure that I would like to say that I have some things that
I would like to see happen, that I'd like to see come to pass,
things that I desire to see for the glory of God before I leave
this world. Before I go to the grave there
are some things, and I'll maybe tell you about them sometime,
but nevertheless I do have some things in my heart. Is there
something, is there a burden upon your heart, is there a desire
upon your heart toward the glory of God and toward the service
of your God that you'd like to see be brought to pass? Now if
it were to come to pass that we should never be permitted
to do that particular work or that particular thing upon which
we've set our hearts, let us not be surprised and let us not
be disappointed. Let us not be surprised if God
does not allow us to do the things that we would like to do in this
life. A servant of God's true obedience
can sometimes be as well seen in what he does not do as in
what he does. And we must remember that it
is not for us to choose our place or our work in this world. It's up to a sovereign God to
appoint unto us what His will is, and it is ours to say, thy
will be done. I am thy servant. in the doing
or in the not doing. I will bow my knee to you. And
we do not see any rebellion on David's part. We see that David
was very submissive to the Lord in this situation and gladly
received of the Lord the blessings which God heaped upon his soul
and upon his house and he did not in any way show any sign
of being terribly, terribly aggravated and disappointed at not being
able to do that which he wanted to do. Now David would say, I'm
absolutely at your disposal in this matter, and in all other
things also, and so I wish it ever to be. That's what David
would say. Lord, I'm at your disposal, whatever
you would do, whatever be your will, whatever you would want
me to do. Now notice that Nathan was sent to David to reveal to
him this great purpose of grace towards David and his house and
also towards Solomon who was not yet born. Solomon was not
born until over later in this book of 2 Samuel. The situation
with Bathsheba had not yet occurred and Solomon was not yet born.
Yet God was speaking to David about Solomon. Now we take note
of this that Nathan came back to David and he revealed all
these things And that's what we read in verse 17. According
to all these words, and according to all this vision, so did Nathan
speak unto David. And so we see where that the
promise that God had given to David through Nathan, that it
was that a descendant from him, that he would sit upon the throne
forever as he does and will, For Jesus Christ, the King of
kings and the Lord of lords is the son of David and he reigns
and shall reign until all of his enemies be put under his
feet. And so not only was he talking
about Solomon, he was also talking about the Lord Jesus Christ also. Now as this revelation was given
to David, he seems to have been somewhat overcome with the weight
of the mercy which God has put upon him. So he went in, we're
told in verse 17 or 18 it is, he went in and sat before the
Lord. He went in and sat before the
Lord and he began to pray, he began to speak unto God. And I think that there was two
questions that rose in his mind and these two questions I think
he attempted to find an answer to. And the first was, why should
God speak such great and precious promises concerning such weighty
matters, such everlasting blessings to a man? Why would God do this? Why would God speak these words? I'll build you a house, David.
Not only that, but I'm going to raise up one of your seed
after you, and I'm going to be with him. He's going to be my
son, and I'm going to bless him. He's going to be my adopted son. I'm going to bless him, and he's
going to sit on the throne, and I'm going to preserve your kingdom
and your throne forever. Why would God speak such words
as these to a man? And the second question, I guess,
that was in his mind was why should these great promises,
if spoken to a man, why should they be spoken to me? Why should
they be spoken to me, David, of all people? David was a humble
man. David was indeed a humble man
and he knew himself, and so these questions came out to him. Why to David rather than to somebody
else? And of course, I'm sure that
you are thinking now in your heart, about what God has done
maybe for you and the great blessings that God has promised in his
word to you, and you're asking yourself, well why would God
ever make promises like we find in the Bible to men, why would
he ever make them in the first place? And secondly, if we have
reason to own these promises for ourself, The question most
surely arises in our mind, why would they ever be spoken to
me? Why not to somebody else? And I can well see why maybe
the Lord ought to speak them to some good people, some religious
people, some super holy people, but why would He ever speak them
to me? And so that's a question. Now
look at verse 18 here, where David, as he went in and sat
before the Lord, he said, Who am I, O Lord God? And what is my house that thou
hast brought me hitherto? Who am I? These questions I think
he answers them in verse 20 and 21 when he asks or would ask
himself why do you speak these words to men and then why do
you speak them to me? And what can David say more to
thee for thou Lord God knowest thy servant? You know everything
about your servant. All things are naked and open
unto your eyes. The eyes of him with whom we
have to do. There's nothing that God don't
know about us. And God knew his servant David. He knew all there was. He knew
his going in and his coming out. He knew his down settings and
his uprisings. There was nothing about David
that God did not know. For thy words sake, he says in
verse 21, and according to thine own heart hast thou done all
these great things to make thy servant know them. And so here
David explains it to us as to why God had spoken to him and
he said it was according to your own heart. It was according to
thine own heart hast thou done all these great things. And so,
beloved, here we find the reason, here we find the cause of all
of God's goodness to His people. If God has been good to you,
here we have the cause, here we have the reason. There are
two things that I want to speak to you about this morning. And
the first is the cause of the reason why we have goodness from
the Lord And the second thing is I want to show you the measure
of God's goodness. How God's goodness is measured
to us. It is measured by the heart of
God. Now then, in discussing this
this morning, I want to give you some things that I believe
will be helpful to you to establish some things in your mind and
your heart at the outset of this this morning. The reason of God's
goodness. Why does God bless his people? The question might be asked.
What is the cause? What is that cause that causes,
which moves the heart of God? to bless his people. Why? We
believe the doctrine of election. We believe in personal and particular
election. We believe that God chooses his
people. Well, why would God ever choose
any of us? Why would God choose any of the
fallen sons of Adam and put them into his family, adopt them into
his family? Well, the Bible says the Lord
Jesus Himself made this statement. He said, Even so, Father, for
so it seemed good in thy sight. Now, beloved, sovereignty, it's
according to God's own heart that He does all these great
things. Divine sovereignty. God is a
sovereign God and He does all things according to His good
pleasure, according to His will, and He does it as it pleases
Him. Sovereignty ruled the hour in
old eternity when God set His love and affection upon His people
and put them into the Lord Jesus Christ. Sovereignty ruled the
hour. I will have mercy on whom I will
have mercy, God says, and I'll have compassion on whom I will
have compassion. Now these are statements of Scripture
found in Romans chapter 9. But what it really points us
to, that it's not him that willeth nor him that runneth, but it's
God that shows mercy and its cause is to be found In the Living
God now, I would like for you to turn with me to the book of
Isaiah chapter 43 the book of Isaiah chapter 43 and I'd like
to read here just a few verses beginning with verse 21 and This
people have I formed for myself, they shall show forth my praise. God said this people, speaking
of his chosen people, he said, I have formed them for myself. And he said, they're going to
show forth my praise. But thou hast not called upon
me, O Jacob, but thou hast been weary of me, O Israel. Thou hast
not brought me the small cattle of thy burnt offerings, neither
hast thou honored me with thy sacrifices. I have not caused
thee to serve with an offering, nor wearied thee with incense. Thou hast brought me no sweet
cane with money, neither hast thou filled me with the fat of
thy sacrifices, but thou hast made me to serve with thy sins. Thou hast wearied me with thine
iniquities. I, even I, am he that blotteth
out thy transgressions for my own sake, and will not remember
thy sins." Now, we see here that the Lord has said, this people
I formed for myself. I have a purpose. Have a will
I have a desire and my soul has been moved Toward this people
he said now I formed him for myself But you can look at verse
22 down through verse 24 and you see that these people did
nothing That would suggest to us this morning that God was
moved toward them because of their holiness because of their
righteousness or because of their merit and God was not moved to
do great things for them because of who they were or what they
were. But we see this clearly in verse
25. God said in the last part of
verse 24 that you've wearied me. You've wearied me with your
iniquities. But in 25 he says, I, even I,
am he that blots out your transgressions, and I don't do it because you
begged me to do it. I don't do it even because you've
been repentive. I don't do it because you have
promised me that you would never do these things again. But God
said, for my own sake, For my own sake, I have blotted out
your transgressions and will not remember your sins. God said,
I'm not going to remember your sins. I blotted them out and
it's for my own sake that I've done so. And so, beloved, we
must recognize the fact that God, this is from the heart of
God. Now, let me talk to you a little
bit about the grace of God. Now, beloved, if there was ever
a man who I think and believe, my own self, that believed wholly
in the grace of God, it was David. I believe that David believed
in the grace of God. Now listen to me. You either
believe in the grace of God or you're a legalist. Would you
permit me, if I can find out, What the Word of God has to say
about the grace of God, would you permit me, would you allow
me to live in the light of what the scriptures teach about the
grace of God? Would you allow me to do that?
Well, beloved, I think that we need to study, we need to think,
we need to meditate upon what the Word of God says that we
can understand the truth of grace. I do not want to miss what the
Word of God says as to the source and cause of all blessing. I do not want to walk in spiritual
ignorance in this world and be bogged down in legalism. I don't want to walk around with
a bunch of mental attitude sins that keeps me down in the dumps
all my life. I want to believe in the grace
of God. Now let me give you this definition
of grace. Grace is all that God is free
to do for the elect, for his people, for those that he purposed
to do it. Grace is all that God is free
to do for his people on the basis of the cross of our Lord Jesus
Christ. Now then, we have mentioned briefly
that David had not yet that Solomon had not yet been brought into
the world. Now, in speaking of the grace of God, David was a
sinner. You're a sinner. I'm a sinner.
All of us are born in sin. Every one of us have an Adamic
nature. We have a sinful nature. Every one of us come forth, the
Bible says, into this world speaking lies from our mother's womb.
We're all sinners. All have sinned and come short
of the glory of God. Now, when a man is born again,
when he becomes a child of God through faith in Christ Jesus,
The Bible says that he's made a new creation. He's a new creature
in Christ. Now, when a man becomes a new
creature in the Lord Jesus Christ, it does not mean that that old
nature, that old sin nature that was passed on to us by our parents
was eradicated out of our souls, because it was not. It remains
with us and when we become new creatures in Christ and we're
in the Lord Jesus we have the old nature and then we have the
new nature which has been created in us which is the living Lord
Jesus Christ in the person of the Holy Spirit dwelling in our
souls. God's people have two natures. Now, King David, he's a good
example, I believe, of this. We take note of the fact that
God having known that David would fall into terrible sin, that
David would commit adultery with Bathsheba and he would also commit
murder by proxy. He would have her husband killed
on the battlefield. God knew all of this even when
he pronounced all of the blessings that we read of in 2 Samuel chapter
7 this morning. God knew that this would happen.
But yet we find that David fell into this sin And when Nathan,
the same prophet that we've been referring to this morning, who
was speaking to David of what God said he was going to do for
his house, Nathan came back to David and told David a story
that convinced him and revealed to him the sin that he had committed. It took about a year before this
come to pass. And David said in verse 13 of
the book of 2 Samuel chapter 12, he said, I have sinned against
the Lord. And Nathan said unto David, the
Lord also hath put away thy sin, thou shalt not die. The Lord
said, well, or Nathan said, the Lord hath told me that he's put
away your sin. The Lord's put it away. Now,
the reason that God put away Nathan's sin is because of the
cross of the Lord Jesus Christ. You say, well, the cross had
not occurred as yet. Well, that's true, but there
was a cross in the heart of God from the foundation of the world.
Don't ever forget that Jesus Christ was the Lamb slain from
the foundation of the world. There was a cross in God's heart.
God knew about the cross and David knew about the cross. And
the sins of David had been judged or would be judged at the cross. In the mind of God, they were
already judged. And blessed is the man to whom
the Lord will not impute sin. This sin here could not damn
David's soul. It could not send him to hell.
And David said, when he confessed it, Nathan said, when David confessed
and said, I've sinned against the Lord, then Nathan says, the
Lord has put away your sin, you will not die. In the Old Testament,
the sin of adultery was deserving of death. And those that committed
the sin of adultery, they were stoned to death. But David was
told here, thou shalt not die, the Lord's put away your sin.
He's put it away. Now, the point that I want to
make, the Bible says in 1 John 1 and 9, it says that if we confess
our sin, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sin and to
cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Here in 2 Samuel 12 and 13, David
acknowledges his sin. We're told in 1 John 1 and 9
that if we confess, the word there is acknowledge, if we acknowledge
our sin, if we confess or acknowledge our sin, then God is faithful
and just. Faithful means that we can count
on God to do exactly what he said he would do. And that is
he would forgive that sin. We confess the sin, God forgives
it and God puts it away. And he's just. He's just on the
basis of the fact that the sin was judged. All of the sins of
God's elect was judged on the cross in the person, in the body
of the Lord Jesus Christ. And so God being just can forgive
that sin and not charge that sin to the believer because it
was charged to our substitute. He was made to be sin for us. He knew no sin, but that we might
be made the righteousness of God in Him, all of our sin was
charged to Jesus Christ. And God judged Him for David's
sin. Now that does not mean that David
was not disciplined, because he was. But nevertheless the
grace of God don't you see God was able to do all these things
for David God was able his heart was free to do all of these great
things to pour out upon David and upon his household all of
these great blessings because of the cross of the Lord Jesus
Christ God is and that's what grace means Grace is all that
God is free to do for the elect on the basis of the cross of
Christ. God's hands are not tied. God's
great heart can just give and give and give to an unworthy
sinner because of the cross. of our Lord Jesus Christ. Another
thing I want you to understand is that grace depends on who
and what God is. Grace always depends on who and
what God is on His essence. Never on who and what man is. Grace depends upon the character
of God. always upon the character of
God. You saw that clearly in Isaiah when I read about the
people of God and what kind of people they were. And you saw
clearly that God said, for my own sake, I'm going to blot out
your sin. They was recipient of a great blessing, but it was
due to the character of God. Now, listen, this business of
legalism, I mentioned it a while ago, I said you either are a
believer in the grace of God or you're a legalist and religion
reeks with legalism and most people in the world are receiving
in a non-meritorious way what God has provided and God gets
the credit for it and God gets the glory for it. Now that's
what grace is. God, listen, doing the work and
man receiving the benefits from God in a non-meritorious way. Man in no way merits what God
gives to him and God gets all the glory. Now that's the grace
of God. Now listen, legalism, hear me
out, legalism is a man doing the work And God, theoretically,
is supposed to bless man for what man does and man gets the
credit or the glory. Now did you get that? That's
what legalism is. If any man ever walks up and
tells you that God causes it to rain more on his crop than
he does on somebody else's crop because of who he is and because
of what he's done, that man is a legalist. That's what he is.
He's a legalist. They're some of the worst reprobates
in this world that receive the blessings of God every day of
their lives and it has nothing at all to do with them. If a man, listen, if a man doing
the work, God blesses him because of what he does, That man will
get the credit and he'll get the glory for that. Now listen,
you have to face this because you're going to face it all your
life and you're going to face it at every turn of the road.
This idea that man is the cause of what God does. That God does
what he does because man is who he is and because man does what
he does. Now, let me give you some implications
of what we're trying to say here this morning before we go on
here, and I must hurry, the time is really getting away. Let me
say that God Almighty has a perfect purpose, a perfect plan, known
unto God are all of His works from the beginning of the world.
Now, a perfect plan can only come from a perfect God. A perfect
God, He must have a perfect plan or purpose. He must have. God knows what He's doing. And
everything God does, He does on purpose. And that's one thing
you need to learn. God has a will. He has a will
of His own. And He has a purpose. And He's
bringing to pass that purpose. Now if man can do anything in
the purpose of God that is meritorious, the plan ceases to be perfect. The plan is as strong as its
weakest link or the chain is as strong as its weakest link.
If man has a part in the plan of God, the plan is no longer
perfect because God is omnipotent and man is a sinner. Man is weak. God is omnipotent. If man is the weakest link in
the plan, God as some people tell us then the plan of God
is doomed doomed to failure now grace further grace excludes
human good Now you listen carefully to what I'm saying or you're
never going to understand the grace of God. Grace excludes
human good. Isaiah 64 and 6 says, but we're
all as unclean things and all our righteousness, not our sins,
all of our human good is as a minstrel cloth in the eyes of God. It's as filthy rags in the sight
of God. Now there, listen to me, the
same nature that brings forth evil brings forth human good. Any unbeliever can produce human
good. Any unbeliever can do that which
people term to be good. And we see it often out here
in the world. Unbelievers, people that have no faith in God, do
good things. But there is no place, now hear
me, there is no place in the plan of God for human good. For good that springs out of
the old nature. Because good and bad both come
from this old damning nature. Now, the fruit of the Spirit
is another thing. All together, but listen to these
verses 2nd Timothy 1 in verse 9 who has saved us Paul said
and called us Not according to our works not according to human
good Not according to human merit but according to his own purpose
and grace which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world
began And so God's purpose excludes human good. God's grace excludes
human good. Now it is impossible, there's
another verse I'd like to mention, that's Titus 3 and verse 5, where
the scripture says, not by works of righteousness which we have
done, but according to his mercy. He saved us by the washing of
regeneration and the renewal brought about by the Holy Ghost.
Not by any works of righteousness which we have done. Human good
grace excludes human good now Let me further because these
are things that are included in what we have here this morning
Let me make this statement that it is impossible for the elect
of God To get outside of God's grace It is impossible for the
elect of God to get outside of God's purpose of grace now Let
me say that God both blesses and disciplines David in grace. Both blesses him and disciplines
him in grace. God both blesses and disciplines
all of his children in grace. Now, there are areas of human
pride that reject the grace of God. There are areas, I don't
want to get involved in all the areas of human pride that reject
the grace of God, but there are one, and I must mention this
one this morning because of the nature of our message. The pride
of a professing believer who rejects the doctrine of eternal
security. Now imagine, if you will, Here's
an individual that professes to be saved, professes to know
the Lord, professes to have his sins forgiven, and he professes
to be a child of God. But yet that individual has the
nerve, has the gall, has the audacity to think that he can
commit a sin that is greater than the purpose of God. That he can commit some sin in
this world that would be so great that God Almighty could not forgive
it, that God Almighty could not deal with it, that God Almighty
could not put it away, that God could not judge the sin in a
substitute and pay for it. Now see how ridiculous this is. If a man believes that here he
is saved, he commits a sin like David did, commits adultery and
murder by proxy, and he believes that God's going to have to send
him to hell so he can pay for that sin to ever satisfy the
justice of God. Well, how on earth, I mean, why
can he not see that God could send a substitute to hell for
him? and charge that very sin to his
substitute and the substitute pay a price which the law demands
and he be set free but what a substitute did. Why can he believe that?
Well my friend, it's because he is confused in his soul as
to the true nature of the grace of God. There is no sin. Now
hear me and this is tough. But you've got to believe what
the Word of God teaches. There is no sin that a man can
commit that is greater than the purpose of God. No sin. You are not greater than the
purpose of God yourself. So how could you do it? God has
fixed it so that no man can thwart his purpose, no man can sabotage
his plan or his purpose. Now, you cannot commit any sin
by which you may fall from grace or by which you may lose your
salvation. You can't do it. There's no way
that you can do it, not if God has saved you and included you
in his purpose and plan. If a professing believer does
not believe in eternal security, it is only because he's full
of pride clear up to the top of his thick skull if he doesn't
believe that salvation is entirely provided for in the purpose and
program of God Almighty and this pride thinks that my sin is greater
than God's grace and that my sin is greater than God's purpose
now beloved I said all of this in order that you might have
an understanding that of what we're trying to say when we're
saying that the cause of all good, spiritual good, the cause
of all spiritual blessing, the cause of all God's goodness to
man is the heart of God. David hit it right square on
the nail. He hit it right square. He hit
a perfect bullseye when he said here in verse 21, for thy word's
sake and according to thine own heart hast thou done all these
great things. Right out of your heart. It wasn't
because of who I am. Well, I want us to talk a little
bit about this. Now, Let me, if I can, focus
just a little bit on what David said here. Now, God did great
things for David. Nobody's going to minimize that. He did great things for David,
but not because of David's own greatness. I want you to see
that. Look in verse 8 and 9. Look at
it clearly here, back in 2 Samuel chapter 7. Now therefore, so
shalt thou say unto my servant David, This is the Lord speaking
to Nathan. Thus saith the Lord of hosts,
I took thee from the sheep coat, from following the sheep, to
be ruler over my people over Israel. And I was with thee whithersoever
thou wittest, and have cut off all thine enemies out of thy
sight, and have made thee, I have made thee a great name, likened
to the name of the great men that are in the earth. Who gets
the glory for that? David was a great man, and he
had a great name. Who gets the glory for it? God
said, I made you. I made you. I was with you every
place you went. I cut off your enemies and I
took you from the sheepfold. You was nothing when I got a
hold of you, God says. And I'm the one that made you
great. I'm the one that done all of this. Now David said,
Lord, you know your servant. That's another thing. You see
David, he wasn't blind about this. David didn't have this
idea that he was something. that he was not, or that he was
something above other men in and of himself, that there was
something about him that was just special. No, he didn't have
it either. He said, Lord, you know, what
can I say? He said, what can David say more unto thee? What
can I say to you, Lord? Can I somewhere or another parade
out before you something that you're not aware of about me
that would make you feel more that you've made an investment
here that's a good investment? David said, Lord, what more can
I say? I can't say anything more. You know me. You know who I am. You know what I am. You know
all about me. As I said earlier, from the top
of his head to the sole of his foot, David was knowing to God.
Downsettings, uprisings, thoughts. David said, God even knows my
thoughts are far off. He knows it. I'm not going to
put anything over on God, neither are you. You might as well just
admit what you are. You're clay in the potter's hand.
God is the potter. And the clay has no more, listen,
we have no more power over God. I said it last week. than what
the clay has over the potter. The clay has no power over the
potter, and you have no power over God. There isn't anything,
beloved, that we can do to recommend ourselves unto God. We have nothing. Now, then we said that David
was nothing but a shepherd boy, so God did not choose him because
of his greatness. The one reason for great blessings
and the promises which God gave to this man David was found in
the heart of God. David could not imagine why God
should do such great things for him until this thought entered
his mind. And this is the thought that
entered David's mind. He is a great God. Our God is
a great God. Listen to what he says in verse
22. Wherefore thou art great, O Lord God, for there is none
like thee, neither is there any good beside thee, according to
all that we've heard with our ears. David, when this thought
entered his mind, that the heart of God was full of loving kindness,
that God was gracious, And this explained it to David as to why
that God had given these blessings. It is because of who God is,
not who David is. If you look carefully, you will
see that this principle runs throughout all of the Word of
God concerning all the gifts of God unto His people. You'll see it. Well, you know,
I'm going to have to I've got so much material I'm going to
have to preach some of this next week and leave off some of it. I want to just try to sum up
here and if I can and just close out this because it's quarter
till now and I've already been at this a long time. Let me suggest something to you.
Beings at God's heart is great. And that God does everything
he does because of the greatness of his heart. And not because
of who we are. If the devils were ever to say
to you, what God has promised is too good to be true. What
God has promised is too good to be true. Tell the devil that
it's not so. Tell the devil that it would
be so if God gave only according to the measure of our merit or
if God only gave according to the limit of our understanding
or to the extent of our faith. But the Lord does much better
than that. The scripture says He does exceedingly abundantly
above all that we're able to ask or think. God's heart, not
mine, is the measure of His giving. Not my capacity to receive, but
His capacity to give. Now, I think this is something
that we need to get fixed in our mind and think about it all
this next week. That we can receive only as a
man. That God can give like a God. Like that God that He is. And
you need to keep that in mind. If it's God who's doing the giving,
then I can believe in the greatness of the gift. If it's God that's
doing the giving. There's no wonder to me that
God, listen, and of course now these are some of the things
that I'll cover next week, but you think about the great gift
of the Lord Jesus Christ. Only, listen to me, only God
could have suggested such a thought as I'll give my only begotten,
my best begotten son to die for the sins of these people. Let
me tell you something, if God's doing the giving, I can believe
in the greatness of the gift, be it what it may, for nothing
can be too great, seeing as He has given His own Son. Nothing can be too great for
God to give. Don't be stinted in your desires.
And listen, don't commit the sin that the children of Israel
committed, limiting the Holy One of Israel. As He gives according
to His own heart, then we must ask great things of God. Ask
great things of God from Him, for He said, open your mouth
wide and I'll fill it. And in the East, this was a proverb
that was often fulfilled. in the homes of rich kings, somebody that they invited, they
would say, the king would say, open your mouth wide and I'll
fill it and he would stuff in to the mouth all of the diamonds
and the precious jewels that he could cram into that individual's
mouth. And so the word of God says open
your mouth wide. God said I'll fill it. Just open
it up. You see because it's got nothing
to do with me. If it had something to do with
me and my goodness I'd never get anything from God. But because
of my representative, my substitute, the Lord Jesus Christ, God will
do ten million things for him, and he'll just give, and he'll
give, and he'll give! And we need to believe that!
And we need to operate every day on that basis. Open your
mouth wide! The Lord said, And I will fill
it. I'll fill it. In our prayers,
let us not ask according to the measure of our poor, shriveled
up, our cold, our indifferent, our weak hearts, but let us ask
according to God's great heart that is infinite and full of
grace. Ask according to God's heart.
So the measure of God's goodness, then, is the heart of God. The greatness of God, the cause
of God's goodness is His own heart. Now, I don't know, maybe
some of you came in here this morning and you said, Doc, come
in preacher, feeling pretty good about myself. You know, I've
been doing better. I've really been working on it
and I've been doing better. Now you see, friends, if I would
have got up here this morning and told you that God's gonna
be good to you because you've been good to God, I'd be the
biggest liar on the face of this earth. God Almighty has never
been good to anybody because they've been good to Him. God
is good in spite of men. God's grace. God is free to be
as good as His own heart wills to be toward His elect on the
basis of the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ. now next sunday
morning if God will permit me to do it I'll take up this subject
again because I want to spend a little bit more time on the
measure the measure of God's goodness other words if everything
is measured by the heart of God I better take a look at it I'd
like to see these things that God has given and promised to
give that I think will be a great blessing to us all. Father, in
the name of Jesus, bless your word and bless each one of our
hearts and encourage us with these thoughts. And may our souls
be, our Father, tutored by thy spirit. And may the fruits of
the Holy Spirit be in our lives to your glory and praise. In
Jesus' name, amen.