Psalms chapter 5, I think there's a reason why when
you look at someone's Bible, the Psalms seems to be pages
that's more worn than the other part of the Scriptures. I think
it's because David experienced things that you and I experience.
good theology in the Psalms, but there's good experience too.
And that's what you and I are often concerned about, is experience. We love David because he experienced
what we experienced. And here he's talking about prayer. I want us to begin to look at
this Psalms this morning, and then I want to finish it this
afternoon. But I want to begin by reading
this prayer that David prayed, and it's amazing. Give ear to
my words, O Lord. Consider my meditation, my groaning,
my sighing. Hearken unto the voice of my
cry, my King and my God. For unto you will I pray. My
voice shall you hear in the morning, O Lord. In the morning will I
direct my prayer unto you, and will look up. For you are not
a God that has pleasure in wickedness, neither shall evil dwell with
you. The foolish shall not stand in
your sight. You hate all workers of iniquity. You shall destroy them that speak
falsehood, lying, The Lord will abhor the bloody and deceitful
man. But as for me, I will come into
your house in the multitude of your mercy. And in your fear
will I worship towards your holy temple. Lead me, O Lord, in your
righteousness because of my enemies. Make your way straight before
my face, for there is no faithfulness in their mouth. Their inward
part is very wickedness. Their throat is an open sepulcher. They flatter with their tongue.
Destroy thou them, O God! Let them fall by their own counsels. Cast them out in the multitude
of their own transgressions, for they have rebelled against
You. But let all those that put their trust in You rejoice. Let
them never shout for joy. Because you defend them, let
them also that love your name be joyful in you. For you, Lord,
will bless the righteous with favor. Will you compass him as
with a shield? Prayer. That's what I want us
to consider this morning. And it's obvious here that he's
praying to the one that he called, My King. My King. And my God, isn't it amazing
that you and I, when we pray, we pray to the King? Isn't that
a thought? Prayer to the King. And what
David does here in verses 1 through 3, he gives us different aspects
of our prayer. What is prayer made up of? Well,
he tells us here in verse 1 that it's made up of words. Give ear,
O Lord, to my words, something that's spoken audibly, something
that's intelligent, words that's put together before the Lord.
We're told to pray with the understanding, aren't we? Pray with the spirit
and pray with the understanding. You and I read many prayers in
the Bible. Regular Christians like us prayed. The prophets prayed. The apostles
prayed. They wrote those prayers down.
And without exception, all of those prayers can be understood. A child can read them and know
what those prayers are about. They are made up of words, of
sentences. When we pray, you and I should
consider words carefully. We should pray intelligently. We should pray with the understanding.
When we give thanks, when we praise the Lord, when we make
requests of the Lord, we should do it deliberately. We should
know why we are praising Him. We should know what our request
is. Our prayer should be with words
that can be understood. Why is this important to pray
like this? Because we want the Lord to hear
our words. Lord, you'll hear to my words."
When we give thanks unto the Lord, I want to know that He
knows what I'm thanking Him for. When I praise Him, I want Him
to know why I'm praising Him. I want it to be obvious. When
I exalt Him and extol Him and lift Him up, I want to know the
meaning of why I'm praising Him. I want Him to hear it just as
it comes from my mouth. When the apostles went to prayer,
boy, their prayer was so intelligent. They worshiped Him. They praised
Him. They honored Him. Oh, Lord, Thou
art God that made the heavens and the earth and the sea and
all that in them is. Why did they pray that way? We
want God to know that we know why we're praising Him and why
we're honoring Him. I tell you, words mean something,
don't they? Our words mean something to us. And we know they mean something
to Him. When you and I make requests,
we want to speak to the Lord as a child would speak to his
father. We want to ask Him plainly. and
lovingly to grant our requests according to His own will. We want to know what we ask. We want to know exactly what
we ask. Give ear, Lord, to my words. To my words. Prayer is prayed
with words, isn't it? Pray with the understanding.
Know what you are praying about. And then he says this, give ear. Give ear, O Lord. The Lord has
an ear, doesn't He? He's always had ears to hear. He's a God who hears. Peter says His eyes are over
the righteous and His ears are opened unto their cry. God has ears. He hears the prayers
of His people. Give ear, O Lord. This means
two things when we read this passage here. First of all, it
means that there is a felt need on our part. Why does David say,
Give ear, Lord? Give ear to my words, because
he has a need to be heard. He is just not praying to be
praying for prayer's sake. But he has this felt need. He
said in another place, O Lord, bow down your ear and hear me,
for I am poor and needy. I tell you, when the Lord saves
a person, when the Lord gives us Christ in our hearts, when
He begins a work of grace in us We reconcile to Him. He's our Father. There is some
needs in us that can only be satisfied before His throne and
in His presence. If you're here this morning and
the Lord's given you life, you've got a need to worship Him. And you want Him to bow down
His ear and hear you in your worship. You've got a need to
praise Him. Did you ever feel like you're
just bubbling over? To find the words that are adequate
to adore Him and exalt Him, to lift Him up. Let everything that
hath breath praise the Lord. And you find this need in your
heart to worship Him in prayer. And you want Him to hear you.
And when you make requests, when you ask requests, you say, Lord,
bow down Your ear and hear me because I have a need. How important
is it in our own hearts that we feel a need for Him to hear
us? Old David did. David said, Lord,
give me Your ear. Bow down at Your ear. I wonder
how important it was for that thief on the cross to be heard
when he said, Lord, remember me. I tell you, it was essential,
wasn't it? publican that stood there in
the temple with all the guilt upon his conscience? How important
was it for the Lord to hear him when he said, God, be merciful
to me, the sinner? That meant everything, didn't
it? Bow down your ear, Lord. It's essential that you hear
me. Poor Stephen was being stoned, and the last words he spoke was,
Lord Jesus, receive my spirit. I tell you, we want the Lord
to hear us, don't we? Bow down your ear. We have a
felt need. That's one of the reasons that
we come to the Lord in prayer. I tell you, we have a need. We
have a need of Him, His presence, to let us worship Him, to be
heard of Him. Oh, Lord, give ear to us. Hear us. But when David says,
You give ear to my words, O Lord, it means something else. It shows
the respect and reverence that we have for Him who we pray to. You don't. If you were going
to talk, if you had the opportunity to talk to someone that was famous,
an honorable person, how would you approach them? Would you
just rush into their presence and start blurting out words?
You'd never do that, would you? What would you say? Sir, could
I have your attention? When we go to the court of law,
you don't just stand up and start talking to the judge, do you?
You say, Your Honor, may I speak? Your Honor, may I address the
court? That's what David is saying here.
He realizes who the Lord is. And he said, Lord, I beg Your
pardon. Lord, would You allow me to speak. Lord, would You hear. You're
so honorable. You're the King. And then he
begins to address the Lord. Lord, hear my prayer. Everywhere in the Old and the
New Testament, you and I are encouraged to pray. Pray without
ceasing. Don't lose heart. We have a mediator
between us and God. We have blood to wash us. We
have a Spirit to uphold us and help us. Pray always. Come into the Lord's presence.
Draw near to God and He'll draw near to you. But we're to remember
this, aren't we? Who we're praying to. Oh, He's
God. He's honorable. He's the Lord.
Therefore, we come with apologies. We come bowing with reverence.
Oh, Lord, give me your attention. So what's prayer made up of? First of all, it's made up of
words. It's made up of words. Lord,
hear my words. But here's another aspect of
prayer. Prayer can also be this. It's
not just word, but he says in verse 1, Lord, consider my meditations. And this word here, one of the
meanings of this word is groanings, my sighings. It's something that
can't be put into words. Here's an aspect of prayer that
you can't form with your lips. It's the meditations. It's the
groanings of your heart. Psalms 19 and 4, David said,
left the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart. Yes, I want my words to be accepted. Yes, we want the Lord to hear.
But there are the groanings of our hearts, the sighing of our
spirits. We want Him to hear those too,
don't we? It was said of the children of Israel that they
sighed by reason of their bondage, and the Lord heard their groans. He heard the groans. Hannah,
that dear mother of Samuel, wanted a child so desperately, but when
she prayed, no words came out of her mouth. She spake in her
soul, in her spirit. And you know something? The Lord
heard her sighing. I wonder sometimes in the ears
of the Lord if the groans of some poor soul doesn't bombard
the gates of heaven. I wonder sometimes if the sighing
of a poor saint isn't as Niagara Falls for its loudness into the
ears of the Lord of South. Groanings that is undistinguished
even by you. groanings and signs in the soul
that's heard by nobody. David said, Lord, consider that. My groanings. And the Scripture
says the Spirit of God, the Spirit of God's own Son, makes intercessions
for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. Prayer is made up
of that. It's made up of it. And David
says here, Lord, consider my groanings. This word consider
means to separate, to distinguish, to understand. We can't even
understand it sometimes. It's a desire, just a sudden
desire that comes into our heart, and we can't express it. There
it is. It's a groaning, it's a sigh,
and it's a need. It's a request that we can't
make with our lips. And the Lord can distinguish
that groaning. He can understand that sighing.
Isn't that amazing? I think probably the believer
prays just about all the time. They talk about, let's get the
prayer back in school. You can't keep prayer out of
school for believers. If somebody stops him from crying
out with his mouth, he's crying out with his heart. And you know something? The Lord
hears it. He understands it. He separates
that. Oh, Lord, consider. Consider. And here's something else about
prayer. He tells us this in verse 2. Hearken unto the voice of
my cry, my King and my God. Here he says something else.
Here's another aspect of prayer. And this word, to cry, means
to call out. It means to cry aloud. David
said, At evening and morning and noon will I pray and cry
aloud, and the Lord shall hear the voice of my cry. There are many aspects of prayer,
isn't there? Here, it's calling out. Oh, John
Warburton, if you've ever read a good biography, if you want
to read an honest man, read John Warburton's biography on the
mercies of the covenant God. And that man said sometimes if
he couldn't get away from the crowd, if he didn't have a field
to go out into or woods to hide away into, he said, I think I
would explode. And he would go out in the field
or the woods and get down on his knees and he would begin
to cry out to the Lord. That's what David said he did.
He cried aloud. And you think I'm preaching loud.
I bet you he cried out twice the loudness with which I'm preaching.
Remember Paul and Silas at midnight? They sang and they prayed to
God and the prisoners heard them. They were way back in the back
part of that dungeon. I imagine they were crying out
and singing. Amazing grace how sweet the sound. To cry out. Did you ever do that? I mean, you've got to be alone.
You don't want anybody else hearing you when you pray like this.
You're just crying out. Crying out. Oh, I cried with
my voice unto the Lord. I want you to look at somebody
else that prayed like this. Look over in Hebrews chapter
5. I want you to hold Psalms 5. And look over in Hebrews chapter
5. One of the most amazing things
to me is when the Son of God came down from heaven in our
humanity and became a praying man. And he often talked about
crying. A lot of his psalms is about
Jesus Christ, the Son of God, in our humanity, praying to his
Father in heaven. He became a praying man. And
he tells us here in Hebrews chapter 5, in verse 6 and 7, how he often
prayed. Look in verse 6, Hebrews 5. He said also in another place,
You are a priest forever. This is what the Father said
to Jesus, His Son. You are a priest forever after
the order of Melchizedek. And here he is speaking of the
Lord Jesus. how he prayed in the days of
his flesh, who in the days of his flesh, when he had offered
up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears
unto him that was able to save him from death, and was heard
in that he feared." It was often said of our Lord that he went
into a solitary place to pray. Sometimes He went up into the
mountains to pray. He would get up long before daylight
and go pray. He often resorted to the Garden
of Gethsemane to pray. Why did He want to get along?
Because He cried out. He cried out to His Father. Can
you imagine the Son of God in our humanity? And here He is
crying out to His Father. What an amazing thing that is. That's what was amazing about
the Garden of Gethsemane, how He cried out there and wept. He cried out with tears. That's
the amazing thing that those apostles used to stone throw
away, slept while He cried out. It showed how tired and sorrowful
they were that they could sleep with His voice being lifted up
to heaven. crying out with tears, My Father,
if there be any other way, let this cup pass from Me. And He
hollered that with a loud voice and tears running down His face. And upon the cross, oh, how He
cried out there. The Bible says He lifted up His
voice loudly. He cried out with a loud voice,
My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken He called out. He cried. And the Bible said
He was heard and that He feared. I tell you, it wasn't because
He feared man. There was no man He feared. And
He never feared devils. They trembled in His presence,
but they never made Him afraid. He feared no nature. He feared
no storms or anything else. But I tell you what He feared.
He feared that cup of sin. He feared that cup of judgment.
That's what made him afraid. And what did he do? He cried
out. Just like David, he cried out.
And the Bible says God saved him. They buried him, but God
preserved his body, and God raised him, exalted him at his right
hand and said, My son, sit here, you're a priest forever. You'll
never suffer again. He cried out. He cried out. Oh Lord, I cry unto Thee with
my voice. Sometimes we have to get along,
don't we? I'm going to cry loud. I'm going to cry loud. Look back here in my text again
in verse 3. Look in Psalms chapter 5 in verse
3. David mentions something else
here in verse 3. Once I looked at this and began
to study on it, I thought, well, I never looked at prayer hardly
in this light before. But He said, My voice shalt thou
hear in the morning, O Lord, in the morning. That's a good
time to begin your day, isn't it? Good way to begin your day,
in the morning. Don't rise up and jump out of
bed and run off to work. Don't begin your day with work.
Begin your day with crying aloud to Him. Begin your day with forming
your words before Him. groan Him before the Lord. Begin
it with prayer. And we'll see the advantage of
that here in just a minute. My voice shall you hear in the
morning, O Lord. In the morning will I direct
my prayer unto You, and will look up. This word direct, it
means to set in order or to arrange, to put in a row, set in order,
put in order, or to arrange. And it's often, so often used
in regard to the sacrifices in the temple. You remember when
Abraham was ready to offer Isaac and he put him upon the wood? You know what was said in Genesis
chapter 22 about that wood? Abraham laid the wood in order. That's this word here, the same
word, direct. When the children of Israel were
to put the wood on the altar, it says, the Lord said, put the
wood in order upon the altar, Leviticus chapter 1. And then
they cut the sacrifice in pieces, his head with his leg and his
inwards, and it said they laid the pieces in order upon the
fire. They had those sweet cakes that
they replaced every Sabbath day on the table of showbrand, and
it was said they placed them in order. This word, direct my
prayer, O Lord, I will direct my prayer, it has to do with
a sacrifice. Did you ever think of your prayer
as being a sacrifice? All of those places in the Old
Testament that talk about putting the wood in order and the sacrifice
and the showbread, that all pointed to Jesus Christ. The sacrifice
that He made as a sweet Savior to the Father. And here, the
very same word is used to describe our prayers. I will offer my
prayer. I will order my prayer before
the Lord. A sacrifice. And you know what
the Scripture says? By Him, let us offer the sacrifice
of praise continually. That is the fruit of our lips.
Give Him thanks unto His name. Prayer is a sacrifice to the
Lord. I want you to turn with me, old
Psalms again, and turn to Psalms 141. I want to show you this
is exactly what he says. Look over to your right. I tell you, when you and I go to
God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through our Mediator, we go in
His Name, we approach through His precious blood, the sweet
incense of His intercession is put upon our prayer. And before
our Father in Heaven, it's a sweet-smelling savor. Now, you never dreamed
your prayer was a sweet savor to the Father with you. When
it's coming for you, it's almost contemptible, ain't it? Sometimes
these groans and sighs that you can't even understand, but now
we're told it's a sacrifice to the Lord. Look in Psalm 141 and
look here in verse 2. This is exactly what he tells
us. Lord, I cry unto you. We just read that in Psalms 5,
didn't we? Make haste unto me, give ear unto my voice when I
cry unto thee. Look at this now. Let my prayer
be set forth before you as incense and the lifting up of my hands
as the evening sacrifice. Prayer is sweet incense because
it has the smell, it has the odor, the aroma of Jesus the
Mediator on it. It's accepted because it's washed
in His blood. It's accepted because He Himself
presents it to the Father. Oh, let my prayer be like the
offering of the even sacrifice. Don't that encourage you to pray?
Proverbs chapter 1 or chapter 15 in verse 8 says this, The
sacrifices of the wicked is not abomination to the Lord, but
the prayer of the upright is His delight. He delights in their
prayer. Look back over here in my text
again in chapter 5. I won't keep you but just a minute.
Look in chapter 5 in verse 2. Look who David emphasizes here
that he's praying to. Look how he says in verse 2,
hearken unto the voice of my cry, my King and my God. My King. Now who is the King? Jesus is, isn't He? Jesus is
our King. And that's who we cry to. That's
who we pray to. Who is my God? Who is your God? Jesus is your God, isn't He?
My Lord and my God. He's my King and He's my God. Listen to Revelation 15 and 3.
Jesus is called the King of saints. Just and true are your ways,
thou King of saints. You know why they call people
kings? Because they have a kingdom. They don't call me a king because
I don't have a kingdom. They might call me a king, but
I'm not a king. But Jesus is the king. And Jesus
has a kingdom. And everyone in His kingdom are
saints. You don't become a saint because
you do a miracle. You become a saint because the
Lord has called you and made you a saint by His calling. A
new birth. He puts you into His kingdom.
If you're in His kingdom, you're a saint. And you have a King. And He's over you. He's your King. He's your Head.
And that's Jesus. There's another King. One Jesus.
Ain't that what they went preaching? There's another King. Oh, the
Pope. I know what the Pope says. The
pope said he's the head of the church. Don't he say that? Jesus
said, I am. Who are we going to believe?
I'm going to believe Christ, aren't you? There's one head. What does that make the pope?
A liar. He's an usherper. He's a fraud. He's an antichrist. He's against
Christ. He's not the head of anything
unless he's the head of a harlot church. He may be that, but He's
not the head of the saints. Jesus is the King of saints.
Bless His name. That's who we pray to, isn't
it? He's your King. He's your head. And you pray
to Him. Another time this title is used,
as King, it's in Jeremiah chapter 10, in verse 6 and 7. And Jesus
is called there the King of Nations. And listen to how He says it.
There is none like You, O Lord. There is none like You. You are great, and Your name
is great in might. Who would not fear You, O King
of nations? For to You does it appertain,
for as much as among all the wives of the nations, and in
all their kingdoms, there is none like You. I can't begin to grasp myself
and I can't explain to you what it is when you and I go to prayer
and it comes out of our mouth. Oh my King. We look around us today and we
have no idea what's coming in a few years. If you want to see
a sad documentary and an indictment against our country, If you can
find the documentary, Holy Wars, Holy Wars, go watch that documentary
and see what our country is involved in. And see what's getting ready
to come on this world. I mean, we look around us and
we're ready, the world is ready to teeter and fall. All the great
institutions, the powers, and when that does happen, There's
no telling what's going to happen. But here is comfort. Here is
consolation that Jesus is the King over it all. He rules it all. I think I may
be wrong. I hope I'm wrong. But I think
a time is coming. It may not be for all. I may
see it and you may see it, but our kids will probably surely
see it. I don't know I'm no prophet, but I think the church is going
through some awful, awful trials in the days ahead. I think there's
coming a time when she'll lay as dead without any influence
at all, and the wicked are going to say, we've got the victory.
And they'll send gifts one to another, and they'll say, peace
and safety, peace and safety. But then suddenly, the heavens
will roll back. And the King will show His face. And He'll bring everybody up
to heaven. They'll stand in His presence. They'll be there before
His throne, under His authority. And the King shall say, the King
shall say, Come, you blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom
prepared for you. And the King shall say to those
on His left hand, Depart from me, you workers of iniquity. I never knew you. King of nations. Brothers and sisters, imagine
the worst scenario that you can imagine. David said, if the mountains
fled away, And they were cast out into the sea. And there came
this tsunami. And it covered us all. The worst
scenario that you can imagine that will come upon this world
and upon the church. He said, Yet will not we fear. Why? Jesus is King of Nations. That's why. He's King of Nations. I'd be
scared to death if I was here this morning and I didn't know
Him. And I couldn't go to His presence as David said, and oh
my King, my God. I tell you, I'd be scared to
death. But if He's your King, you've got nothing to fear. Fear
no man, fear no circumstances, fear Him. Fear Him. And then this, not oh my King,
but He's my God. My Lord and my God. He's my covenant
God. He's my Savior. Here's the way
the covenant runs. I will be their God. And they
shall be my people. He's my God. He's my God. And we love Him, don't we? We
bow to Him. We believe that He's God. And
God alone. We follow Him. We worship Him. He's my God. And he sums it up
like this in verse 3. And we'll quit here. The last
thing he says is this in verse 3. I will direct my prayer unto
thee, and look at this, and will look up. Oh, that's the advantage
of beginning your day with prayer. Every day when you open your
eyes, the first thing you do is go to your King and your God
in prayer. And look up. Look up. Oh, don't look around, because
you'll see all this confusion and all the fear. Look up. Don't look behind you. Oh, I tell you what, if your
life's like mine, your Christian life like mine, your life behind
you is a mess. It's a mess. I don't want to
be looking back. Don't look back. Look up. Look up. Sometimes you can't
even look out in front of you, can you? Oh, you see what you think is
coming and it's scary. Look up. Look up. Set your affection
on things above, not on things on the earth. Look unto Jesus,
the author and the finisher of our faith. Look unto Me and be
you saved. Don't just look one time and
then start looking around and behind you, in front of you.
Always be looking every morning. Begin your morning with prayer
to your God and your King and look up to Him on His throne,
full of grace and full of truth, full of sovereignty. And then
you can face the day and you can be joyful in your heart.
Because you've looked to Him before you look to any other
man. Prayer. Let us pray.