Would you turn with me to the
119th Psalm? Beginning in verse 17, Psalm
119. deal bountifully with thy servant,
that I may live and keep thy word. Open thou mine eyes, that I may
behold wondrous things out of thy law. I am a stranger in the
earth. Hide not thy commandments from
me. My soul breaketh for the longing that it hath unto thy
judgments at all times. Thou hast rebuked the proud that
are cursed, which do err from thy commandments. Remove from
me reproach and contempt, for I have kept thy testimonies.
Princes also did sit and speak against me, but thy servant did
meditate in thy statutes. Thy testimonies also are my delight
and my counselors. Let's pray. Lord, how we thank you for who you are and the revelation of yourself. How we thank you for the gospel
of God, blessed son. And the complete salvation that
we have in him. And the acceptance we have in
that beloved. How we thank you for the forgiveness
of sins. How we thank you for the justifying
righteousness of that dear son. How we thank you for the power
of his precious blood. How we thank you for the fellowship
that you allow us to have in him. Now, Lord, bless us for
Christ's sake. Bless us with your presence.
Bless our hearts. Speak to us, Lord, comfort our
hearts by your spirit with your gospel. Unite our hearts together to
fear thy name. In Christ's name we pray. Amen. Deal bountifully with thy servant. Can't you pray this prayer? Deal
bountifully with me by your grace. John Newton wrote this hymn. He's the one who wrote Amazing
Grace. Come my soul, thy soup prepare. Jesus loves to answer prayer. He himself has bid thee pray,
and therefore will not tell thee nay. Thou art coming to a king,
large petitions with thee bring, for his grace and power are such
that none can ever ask too much. Deal bountifully with me. You know, everything you and
I are going to have from the Lord, we're going to ask for.
He's going to move us to do that, but everything we have, we will
ask for. Bestow your bountiful benefits
upon me. I ask to be justified, to stand
before God without guilt. I ask to be sanctified. I ask
to be holy, to be made holy by his spirit, by his grace. I ask
to be preserved. Lord, keep me. I ask to be found in Christ. Lord, let me be found in your
son. Nowhere else. May I only be seen in him. I ask to know him. I want to know your son so that
he knows me where I'm not just name dropping when I speak his
name. I want to be poor in spirit. I want to mourn over my sin. I want to be meek before you. I want to hunger and thirst after
your righteousness. I want to be pure in heart. I
want to be a peacemaker. I want to be merciful. I want
to be persecuted for righteousness sake. All the things we ask for,
deal bountifully with me. If you don't deal bountifully
with me, I won't live. Notice how he says this. Deal
bountifully with thy servant that I might live. If you don't
deal bountifully with me, I won't live. I'll be dead. I'll be dead in sins. I'll be,
even in my experience, cold-hearted and dead if you do not deal bountifully
and graciously with me. Deal bountifully with thy servant
that I may live and keep thy word. The only way I'm going
to keep his word is if he deals bountifully, graciously. mercifully with me. Can you pray that right now while
you're thinking before the Lord? Lord, deal bountifully with me.
Show yourself to be gracious to me. Show me your mercy. I
am asking for it. You said, ask and you shall receive.
I'm asking, may I receive this great blessing of you dealing
bountifully, graciously with me. Verse 18, open thou mine
eyes that I may behold wondrous things out of your law. Open my eyes and cover my blinded
eyes, reveal yourself to me, open my heart, open my understanding. Don't you love that scripture
where it says, then opened he their understanding, that they
might understand the scriptures. Lord, do that for me. I think
of Lydia, whose heart the Lord opened. Lord, open my heart,
open my understanding that I might behold wondrous things out of
your law. I want to behold the Lamb of
God. Don't you? Everything that is implied in
that, I want to behold the Lamb of God. I can't do that except you open
my eyes. I want to behold these wonderful
things out of your law. And the thing that is, this doesn't
come from education only by revelation. Open my eyes. I'm completely
dependent upon you to open my eyes and open my heart. that
I might behold these wondrous things out of thy law. And you
think of the wondrous things we behold, the character of God,
His holiness, His beauty, His immutability, His righteousness,
His mercy, His grace. Oh, what a glorious God God is. The wonders of God becoming flesh. The wonders of justification.
Actually standing before God is absolutely righteous. And
it's not as if I'm righteous. I am righteous. What a wonder
that is. What a wonder union with Christ
is to be eternally united to him. I mean, I want to behold
these wonders things and they are wonders things, aren't they?
I mean, we're sitting here and think these are glorious, wondrous
things. Open my eyes. that I may behold
wondrous things out of thy law. Verse 19, I'm a stranger in the
earth. You know, I was just thinking
about this. I go into a grocery store or
something like that. And I think I'm a stranger. This
is not my home. These are not my people. I'm
a stranger. I'm not of this world, nor is
any other believer. We're not of this world. We're
strangers here. And you know, when Peter wrote,
he wrote to the strangers, that's the first thing he called believers,
strangers, scattered throughout whatever those places are. Elect,
I love that, that's the next thing he calls them, elect. Don't
you love the way the Bible uses the word elect? You know, people,
the elder to the elect lady. That's the language of the scripture.
And yet people, religious people, don't even acknowledge this.
Strangers. Well, I'll tell you what, strangers
are elect, aren't they? Elect according to the foreknowledge
of God through sanctification of the spirit and belief of the
truth. Elect. Elect. I'm a stranger here. I'm a stranger in the earth.
Every believer is. Hide not thy commandments from
me. In this state, living in a world
which has no knowledge of the living God, hide not your commandments
from me so I will be aware of them, that I'll love them, that
I'll know them, the commandments of the gospel. You know, I love
the way everything the Lord says is a commandment. Everything. Hide not thy commandments from
me. Make yourself known to me. You see, there's nothing in this
world that I'm living in, there's nothing in this world that satisfies
me, nothing. Hide not thy commandments from
me. Verse 20, my soul breaketh. That's strong language. My soul
breaketh. for the longing that it hath
unto thy judgments at all times. Now, don't miss this. How often are you not even thinking
about the Lord? How often do you go through a
day without thinking about the Lord? It's awful, isn't it? It's awful. I don't know how
many times, particularly, and I've got it easier than you all
because I don't go to work the way you all do. I get up, open
the Bible, study, and in that sense, I realize I've got it
easier than you guys. There's no question about that.
But I remember when I did work, I would go all day without even
thinking about the Lord. It would freak me out. And I thought,
I haven't even given Him a thought. How terrible. But yet the psalmist
says, my heart breaks My soul breaks for the longing that hath
unto thy judgments at all times. Now his judgments, it's the cross. That's the cross of the Lord.
How God manifests His judgments on the cross. And at all times,
I only want to be found in the judgments of the cross. At all
times. There's no time when I'm free
from that thought. I simply want to be found in
Christ. I want His precious blood to wash away my sins and my soul
breaks for a longing that is as for that. I want to be found
in Christ. I want the only way God to see me is to see me in
the beloved and the judgments that he accomplished on Calvary's
tree. What judgments, what glorious
judgments on God's part where he punished sin as it should
be punished and yet he justified every believer that Christ died
for. Isn't that glorious? Now my soul
longs for his judgments, his perfect judgments that were accomplished
in the cross at all times. I think this is the exact same
thing as the Lord saying, blessed are they who hunger and thirst
after righteousness. They shall be filled. Let's go on reading verse 21. Thou hast rebuked the proud that
are cursed, which do err from thy commandments. Pride is the most ugly and unreasonable
sin of all sins. And every one of us are filled
with it. It's so offensive. What do you have that you didn't
receive? Who makes you to differ from
somebody else? And proud? When God made you
to differ, if he would have left you to yourself, you'd be in
hell right now. I'd be in hell right now. No, no, no good thing. No commendable thing to God.
And proud? I love the way the psalmist says,
thou hast rebuked the proud, which are cursed, that err, that
go astray from thy commandments, the commandments of thy gospel.
There's no desire for his commandments in the, you know, pride keeps
you from wanting to hear from God. You're satisfied with things
the way they are. The proud, he says, are cursed
under the curse of God, straying from his commandments. Look what
he says in verse 22. Remove. Now let's stop there for just
a second. Remove my sins. Make them to
be gone. You know, the Lord can do that.
He can do that. Only He can do it. Nothing's
too hard for Him. I love this remove. Remove this bad attitude. Remove
these wrong thoughts. Remove this stupid way of looking
at things. Remove it. Make it to be gone. I can't remove it, but you can. And that's what I'm asking the
Lord to do. Remove this from me. Remove it. It's gonna stay
here if you don't take it away. Remove this. Now this is the
prayer of every believer's heart. Remove my sin. Remove it. Cause it not to be. Lift it off
from me. Remove it. With every bad thing
you can think of about yourself, ask the Lord, remove it. Remove
it. I got plenty of things to ask
for him to remove, don't you? Remove, I love that word, remove.
He says, remove from me reproach and contempt. The reproach and the contempt
of sin. Don't you dread the thought of
bringing reproach on the Lord through your conduct and your
attitude. bring a reproach on the gospel.
So this is a believer. So these are the people of God.
Oh, I don't want to bring reproach on his name or contempt on his
name in any way, and that's why I say remove from me this reproach,
this contempt that comes with my sin. Remove it from me. Cause it to be gone. For I have
kept thy testimonies. Do you know If I'm justified,
I can say that about myself. I have kept his testimonies.
He's pleading this on the justifying work of Christ. I've kept thy
testimonies. If I'm in Christ, I have. It's
what's called justification. It's a perfect standing before
God's holy law. I can say I've kept thy testimonies
in Christ. Every one of them. And that's
our ground for asking these things because of Christ's righteousness.
I've kept thy testimonies. Isn't that glorious? I mean,
he can say that and you can say it too. I've kept thy testimonies
because if Christ kept the testimonies, I did too. I was in him when
he kept them, I kept them. I've kept thy testimonies. Isn't
it glorious to be able to say that in Christ? And that is his
ground. Now he says, Princes, verse 23. Princes also did sit and speak
against me. Now, first of all, you know,
that's the Lord speaking. The princes of this earth, the
great of this world have never had any love for Christ or his
gospel. Princes did speak against, did sit and speak against me.
The world will never love. The world will always speak against
the gospel. They find it offensive. But I
love what Paul said in Galatians chapter one. He said, if I yet
please men, if men were pleased with what
I said, I should not be the servant of Christ. If the world is approving
of what I'm having to say, what you're having to say with regard
to the gospel, you know what that means? We're not servants
of Christ. The world will never approve
of the gospels. Though princes, the great of
this earth, speak against the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ,
how much does that bother us? None. None at all. Princes also did sit and speak
against me, but thy servant did meditate in thy statutes, in
thy word. Don't you love the word of God? I do, you do, if I'm a believer. I love this book that reveals
to me the character of God, that reveals to me who I am, that
reveals to me God's way of salvation through the Lord Jesus Christ.
I love the word of God. You know, when I read this word
and meditate on it, I know God wrote it. I mean, and I'm more
amazed by it now than I've ever been. The glory and the power
of it. I love the word of God because
it reveals the living word, the Lord Jesus Christ. I love the
message of the scripture. I love, I love the Bible. Don't you? I love the Bible. It's God's word. And what you
think and what I think about God himself is seen by what we
think of his word. He says, I will meditate. I will,
I will chew on, I will digest thy word only by his grace. I
realize I won't do it unless he opens my understanding, unless
he opens my heart. But oh, I want to meditate on
his word. That's what we're doing right
now. We're meditating on his word, the word of God. He says in verse 24, Thy testimonies
also are my delight. And notice the language. His
testimonies, what God testifies of. One of my many favorite scriptures
is where Paul said to Timothy, be not ashamed of the testimony
of our Lord. Aren't you glad he testifies?
Be not ashamed of the testimony of our Lord, nor of me, his prisoner,
but be thou a partaker of the afflictions of the gospel." And you know what it says next?
It says, he saved us. This is his testimony. He saved
us, not according to our works. He saved us and he called us.
He saved us and he called us. I love the order of that, don't
you? He saved us. Then he called us. I want you to think of the impact
of that. Before the calling was the saving.
And when he saves, he calls. And when he calls, we respond,
don't we? Lazarus, come forth. I don't
think I'm going to. No, it doesn't work that way
at all. When he calls, we respond. That's why we said, Lord, call
me. Call me. He saved us and he called us.
This is the testimony of the Lord. He saved us and he called
us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to
his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus
before the world began. I delight in that, don't you?
I delight in that. I delight in the testimonies. The testimony of the Lord, what
he bears witness to, he's called the faithful and true witness,
isn't he? Thy testimonies also are my delight
and my counselors. Don't miss this. And my counselors. Now, I am not speaking against
counselors. I'm sure they have the place
where they can help, but they're nothing compared to the Word
of God. The Word of God is my counselor. Well, I'm going to
go talk to a counselor. Well, like I said, I'm sure they
can help in some ways to learn how to deal with things, but
the Word of God is my counselor. It's infinitely above anything
any human being has to say. May God give us the grace to. The word of God is my counselor.
His testimony, this is so sure, so pure, so perfect what God
says. May the Lord give me the grace.
And you the grace to say this with David. Thy testimonies are
also my delight and my counselors." May we hear the wonderful counselor. What a glorious book this book
is that reveals the glorious Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. This is the counsel of God. Amen.