Well, it is a delight to be here
with you all again. I've looked forward to this for
some time since Brother Harding called and asked me to come preach. And I will say all day long I
have hoped that Brother Roland would be here and read scripture
and lead us in prayer. I always get such a blessing.
And Roland, I appreciate that. Tonight was no exception. Thank
you. If you would, open your Bibles
to Psalm 96. Psalm 96. I titled the message, Sing a
New Song. Now, help us to understand the
meaning and theme of this psalm. We'll understand when it was
written. David wrote this psalm when the Lord enabled David to
bring back the ark to Jerusalem. Remember, the Philistines had
stolen it, and now the Lord had enabled David to bring the ark
back to Jerusalem. You can read about that in 1
Chronicles chapter 16. So this is what was on David's
mind. This is what inspired him to write this psalm. So the subject
of the psalm is singing the praises of God, our Redeemer, who redeemed
his people in the picture of the blood that was sprinkled
upon the mercy seat. This is what was on David's heart
and mind at this time. But you know, this is not just
a psalm for the nation Israel. This is a missionary psalm. It
calls on people from all nations, everywhere, to sing and worship
the Lord. Sing unto the Lord and to worship
him. You know, the church is to preach the gospel to the lost. If we don't, who will? The church
is to preach the gospel to the lost. GOD GIVES US AN OPPORTUNITY. DAVID SAYS SING UNTO THE LORD
ALL THE EARTH. LET ALL OF GOD'S CREATURES WORSHIP
HIM AND SING HIS PRAISE, AND THAT INCLUDES YOU AND ME, NO
MATTER WHAT ANYBODY ELSE IS DOING. WE'RE TO WORSHIP THE LORD. VERSE
1, DAVID SAYS SING UNTO THE LORD A NEW SONG. SING UNTO THE LORD
ALL THE EARTH. NOW WHEN HE SAYS SING UNTO THE
LORD A NEW SONG, THAT SOUNDS A LITTLE BIT STRANGE TO US, DOESN'T
IT? BECAUSE THE ONLY SONG WE HAVE TO SING IS THE OLD, OLD
SONG OF REDEMPTION IN OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST. WE DON'T HAVE ANY
NEW SUBJECTS TO SING. WE HAVE NO NEW SUBJECTS TO PREACH
BECAUSE WE DON'T HAVE ANY NEW REVELATIONS. THE ONLY SUBJECT
WE HAVE TO PREACH, THE ONLY SUBJECT WE HAVE TO SING IS CHRIST AND
HIM CRUCIFIED. THAT'S OUR ONLY SUBJECT. Believers
don't have any new lyrics to sing. When David says sing a
new song, he's not saying sing new lyrics, because we don't
have any new lyrics to sing, because we have no revelations.
But as we grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus
Christ, we can sing those same glories with a new and a deeper
understanding, can't we? Look in Revelation chapter 14.
The only people who can sing this song are believers. Everybody,
I mean, David tells all creation to sing this song, but actually
the only people who can sing this song are believers. Revelation
14, verse 3, and they sung, as it were, a
new song before the throne and before the four beasts and the
elders, and no man could learn that song 144,000. 144,000 represent all of God's people,
everyone redeemed in the blood of the Lamb. The only people,
no man could learn that song but the 144,000 which were redeemed
from the earth. Only believers can sing this
new song because only believers have been given a new heart.
See this song is sung from the heart and only believers have
been given a new heart to sing a new song. We sing this song
new in this sense. We sing a song of grace from
new motives. No longer do we worship God trying
to earn something from Him. It's thanksgiving and praise,
true worship. Only believers have a new heart
that never tires of hearing and singing the old, old song of
redemption in Christ Jesus. The word David uses here, new,
means fresh. Sing it fresh. We sing about
our Savior with fresh thankfulness, with fresh thankfulness for His
salvation, with fresh thankfulness for the forgiveness of our sin.
The blood of Christ our Savior is fresh and it's powerful to
save. It's fresh every day to cleanse
us from all of our sin. And since we're forgiven and
we're cleansed every day, our praise is fresh every day, isn't
it? And you know, only the gospel of Christ can be new and fresh
every morning. Everything else you grow weary
of the more you hear it. Only the gospel of Christ is
fresh every day, new every day. His mercies are new every morning. His grace is new, sufficient
for every changing day. Aren't we glad? That's a good
subject to sing. Isn't that a good reason to sing?
And someone will say, but I can't sing. I don't have a good singing
voice. I have an illustration for you. A couple weeks ago, my wife Janet
and I were able to spend a weekend with Chris and Vicki Cunningham.
Chris, the pastor down at College Grove, Tennessee. And we were
in his living room one evening talking, and he told us on the
day they got married, as Vicki walked down the aisle, Chris
stood at the end of that aisle playing his guitar, singing a
love song to her. And she told me she got down
that aisle that day, and she looked at him, she said, do you
mean those words? He said, every word. And that
bird reached and got his guitar and right there in his living
room, me and Janet started singing that song to her again. And buddy,
it's like me and Janet weren't in the room. She just looked
at him, just melted as he sang that song to her. Now that song was new. It was
fresh because their love, while it's an old love, has grown deeper
and stronger through the years. He sung it to her fresh. And
I looked at that and I thought, buddy, I got to pick up my game
here now. Oh, boy. I can't sing. But I do sing Alabama love songs
to my dear wife. But I only do it when Alabama's
turned up on the stereo, because I sound better when Randy Owen's
singing. I sound better if I can kind
of be along with him. And I said all that to say this, it doesn't
matter if you can't sing well. You can amen what somebody else
is saying, can't you? We can sing out to the Lord in
thanksgiving and praise. We've got good reason. Those
who believe, those who've been redeemed in the blood of Christ,
we've got good reason. Let me give you something I got
from Brother Henry. This will help you. He said, the Lord doesn't
hear the cracking of my voice. He hears the breaking of my heart.
Now we can sing with a broken heart, can't we? A heart broken
over sin, a heart broken at God's grace, His unmerited favor to
a sinner like me. If you can sing this song from
a broken heart, it's beautiful to God. It's beautiful. Our song,
our new song is beautiful as long as the subject of our song
is the Lord Jesus Christ, our Redeemer. That's the subject
of this psalm. This is what was going on at
the ark being brought back to Jerusalem. This is what was going
on when David wrote this psalm. And I want to give you three
reasons to sing a new song unto the Lord. AND NUMBER ONE, WE'VE
ALREADY COVERED IT. WE SING A NEW SONG OF SALVATION
IN THE LORD JESUS CHRIST, BECAUSE CHRIST HAS SAVED US BY HIS SACRIFICE. VERSE 2 SAYS, SING UNTO THE LORD,
BLESS HIS NAME, SHOW FORTH HIS SALVATION FROM DAY TO DAY. NOW,
DAVID SAYS, SING UNTO THE LORD AND BLESS HIS NAME. BLESS HIS
NAME, BECAUSE SALVATION IS IN THE NAME OF THE LORD JESUS CHRIST. PETER SAID, NEITHER IS THERE
SALVATION IN ANY OTHER, FOR THERE IS NONE OTHER NAME, NO OTHER
NAME, UNDER HEAVEN, GIVEN AMONG MEN, WHEREBY WE MUST BE SAVED. THE NAME OF THE LORD, SALVATION
IS IN HIS NAME, BECAUSE THE NAME OF THE LORD DESCRIBES HIS GLORIOUS
CHARACTER. The greatest glory of God is
seen in how He saves sinners by His sovereign mercy. I know
that's so, because God said so. David calls it his salvation. This is his salvation. It's God's
salvation. It's the salvation that God purposed.
It's the salvation that God purchased. And it's the salvation that God
applies. Remember when Moses asked the
Lord, after Moses had seen everything he'd seen in Egypt, after he'd
seen the Lord divide the Red Sea and bring three million people
through on dry ground, after he'd seen the Lord bring that
Red Sea back together and destroy the mightiest army on earth,
Moses had the audacity to say, Lord, show me your glory. You
know why he said that? Because he knew he hadn't seen
it yet. And God said, all right, I'll show you my glory. Moses,
I'm going to pass by you and proclaim unto you the name of
the Lord. I'm going to declare unto you,
I'll have mercy on whom I will have mercy. I'll be gracious
to whom I will be gracious. That's God's greatest glory,
showing mercy to sinners. And it disturbs me, people take
that passage and they somehow want to make it that God's greatest
glory, that there's some glory in this, that God would pass
by somebody. Any honest person can understand
why the holy God would pass by a sinner like me. Any honest
person. Now, if we're not being honest,
maybe you can't understand that. But if we're being honest, we
can understand why a holy God would pass by a wretch like me.
That's not hard to understand. What is great glory is that that
holy God would show mercy to anyone. Now that's glory. And that, He only shows His mercy
to the undeserving. Now that's glory. God's greatest
glory is the salvation of sinners through the sacrifice of His
Son, our substitute, the Lord Jesus Christ. And if God the
Holy Spirit will show you Christ, if He'll show you Christ in the
Word, if He'll show you Christ in the Gospel, so that you see
Christ with eyes of faith, you will see all of the glory of
God. Because it's all in one place,
it's all in one person, the Lord Jesus Christ. And if you see
Him, you'll see God's glory. I know that God's glory is seen
in creation. How can anybody look at creation
and not see something about the glory of God? Absolutely, creation,
we see God's glory, but not as clearly as we see it in the salvation
of sinners. Yes, God's glory is seen in providence, how He
rules all the events of history. How God rules and delivers His
people from trouble and trial, right at the very point we think
there's no hope. Have you ever been there and
you think there's no hope? And then God delivers you. He provides
a way out. Without question, there's some
of God's glory there. But that glory is not as great
as God's glory in saving sinners. I know God's blessings come to
His people in many forms. God gives us health. He gives
us families and jobs and food and clothes. He gives us friends
that we're so thankful for. This time of fellowship, I'm
so thankful for that. Aren't you? We ought to be thankful
for all those things. We'd have none of them if God
didn't give them to us. Everything we have has come from God's hand.
That's a blessing. But the greatest blessing God
gives is the salvation of our souls. That's a blessing we must
have. I cannot live without the righteousness
of Christ. I cannot live without eternal
life. I cannot live without the forgiveness of my sin. I cannot
live without peace with God. That's God's greatest blessing
that he gives his people. Then by all means, let's tell
the world about it. Verse three, David says, declare
his glory among the heathen, his wonders among all people.
Now let's tell the heathen about God's salvation. Let's tell them
about his glory in salvation. Now I know we support missionaries,
but you know, you don't have to learn a foreign language and
go to a foreign land to preach the gospel to the heathen. The
heathen are right here, right here, right here in Pikeville.
The heathen are gathered right here tonight. You don't have
to go far to look for the heathen. What a blessing that God sent
his gospel to Pikeville, Kentucky. Have you ever thought about that?
How many cities are there in this state? I mean, not just
the country, just the state, this county. How many cities?
And God sent His gospel here. God's called out a people here. God sent an under shepherd to
feed His people here. Oh, I hope we never take that
for granted. God help us to never take that blessing for granted.
And when we preach the gospel to the heathen, let's be sure
we declare it as a glorious thing, a wonderful thing. The salvation
of a sinner is a wonder. I mean, it's a wonder. It's so
wonderful, it cannot be understood by the greatest human minds.
Can't be understood. It can only be believed by God-given
faith. That's how wonderful it is. And
I hope we never start to think of the gospel It's just this
cut and dried thing that tells us the technical details of how
it is that God saves a sinner. The gospel is glorious. I mean glorious. And it should
cause us, when it's preached right, the gospel should cause
us to just wonder. Would God do that for somebody
like me? There was a young woman a number
of years ago who, she lived in a different city. She had no
place to worship in her town. And she began listening to me
preach on sermon audio. And she would call frequently,
per day frequently. And I would answer her questions
the best that I could. And then suddenly, there were
no more phone calls. It's silent. And right at the
time I'd given up, thinking, well, God's not going to do anything
here, she called again. And she said, I've been listening
to you now for a while. I've been listening to some other
preachers on sermon. All good, solid preachers. And
she asked me, she said, have you heard of this Todd Niebuhr
fellow? I said, yeah, I know him. I've heard of him. She'd
been listening to good preaching. And she said, this is what I've
come to. She said, right from the very
beginning when I was listening. I knew God's God, that God's
holy, that he does as he will, he saves whom he will, that he
chose a people to save, because that's his right as God. She
said, anybody can read the Bible and see that. I understand that.
She said, right from the beginning, I knew I was a sinner. She said,
I can read the Bible. And she kind of laughed. She
said, I look at myself. That's not hard to understand. Anybody
can see I'm a sinner. She said, right from the very
beginning, from the very first message I heard you preach, I
understood that the Lord Jesus Christ is the Savior of sinners.
He came into the world to save sinners. Anybody can read the
Bible and see that's so, that's plain. She said, here's what I can't
understand. Here's the thing that's been puzzling me this
whole time I've listened to you preach. How could God Do something
so wonderful for somebody like me. She said, I believe he's revealed
that to me. And she said, I have to be baptized. I said, you're right, you do.
Anybody believes that must confess the Lord in baptism. The salvation
of a sinner is a wonder. It's a wonder. If I don't wonder
how God could save me, I missed it. I missed it. Now, please
don't misunderstand me. We must have sound doctrine. Our goal is not to exactly try
to amaze people. We've got to have right, true
doctrine. God will never save anybody with
a lie. He'll only ever use the truth.
But that truth must be preached as a glorious truth that causes
awe and wonder. And if not, we haven't preached
it right. How could it not just, we'd be
awestruck to hear that God would save a sinner like me by sacrificing
his darling son in my place. That has to cause us with awe. And if it doesn't, nothing will.
Nothing will. There isn't a better reason to
sing praises to our Savior than salvation in Him. That's the
theme of all of our praise. And we can't sing that song unless
we know Him. So somebody needs preaching to
us, don't they? All right, here's the second thing. We sing of
Christ, our Savior, because it's right. Verse four. For the Lord
is great and greatly to be praised. He is to be feared above all
gods. You know, it's simply right for
us to sing this new song because the Lord is great and he is greatly
to be praised. No matter what he does with me,
he deserves my praise. God is to be worshiped in a time
when we're in trouble and trial and we're heartbroken. It's only
right at that time we worship the Lord. And God is to be worshipped
when we're happy and we're rejoicing. It's only right that we worship
Him at that time. God is to be worshipped when
a baby's born into our family. It's only right, isn't it, that
we worship God. And God is to be worshipped when
a loved one dies, too, because the Lord gave life and He's the
one that took it. Blessed be the name of the Lord. It's only
right that we worship Him. God is to be worshipped when
nothing special is going on. It's only right that we worship
God because of who He is. David tells us here God's to
be praised because there's no idol like Him. God's the creator. Verse 5, for all the gods of
the nations are idols, but the Lord made the heavens. Now, God
created everything. And since He created it, it's
His right to rule over everything. That's exactly what He does.
He rules over everything that happens, everything. And God's
people love that. We love to sing the praises of
our Creator and our King. And God rules everything for
this purpose. He rules everything for this
purpose, for His glory. And what's His glory? TO GUARANTEE
THE SALVATION OF HIS PEOPLE. THAT'S GOD'S GREATEST GLORY.
I LOVE TO SING ABOUT THAT, DON'T YOU? OH, THAT MAKES MY HEART
THRILLED. NO, IDOL CAN DO SUCH A THING.
IDOLS NEED OUR HELP, DON'T THEY? IDOL CAN'T DO ANYTHING UNLESS
YOU LET HIM. YOU'VE GOT TO LET HIM SAVE YOU. YOU'VE GOT TO ACCEPT
HIM BEFORE HE CAN SAVE YOU. HE WON'T CROSS YOUR WILL. HE
NEEDS YOUR HELP. Our God doesn't. No, He does
as He will and none can stay His hand. They're saying to Him,
what doest thou? Brother Earl Wooten made this statement to
me one time. He said, I'm thankful that God
does as He wills because He told me I will. Lord, if you will,
you can make me whole." And he said, I will. Aren't you glad
he does as he wills? Oh, that makes my heart sing. Look at verse six. David says,
honor and majesty are before him. Strength and beauty are
in his sanctuary. Give unto the Lord, O ye kindreds
of the people. Give unto the Lord glory and
strength. Now, you know David's not saying
here that we can do something to give God honor, majesty. What David is saying here is
ascribe all honor and majesty to God. You say it all belongs
to Him. And say it, sing it thankfully. God's people rejoice that God
has put His honor at stake in the salvation of His people.
God would lose all of His honor and all of His glory if one of
His elect, just one of them, perishes. God would lose all
of His glory. And this is what David's telling
us here. He's not going to let that happen. So you ascribe unto
Him all honor and strength and majesty. It all belongs to God.
God has all power. And He uses that omnipotent power
to save and to call and to keep His people. They can never perish
because you know where they're kept? In the right hand of His
power. And who's the right hand of His
power? The Lord Jesus Christ. They're kept safe in Christ.
They've always been safe in Christ. Before time began, the Father
chose a people. And you know what He did with
those people? He put them in His Son. And they've been safe
there ever since. Never a doubt of their salvation.
And you know what? This is not a one-way street.
God doesn't use His power to hold anybody against His will.
Remember, He preached one day, and all His disciples left Him.
They said, it's a hard saying, who can hear it? Now, there were
12 left, but you know what the Lord did? He didn't turn to them
12 and say, now you better stay here, I'm gonna get you. He said,
will you also go away? The door's open, you're free
to go. And Peter said, Lord, to whom shall we go? You have
the words of eternal life. We believe and are sure Thou
art the Christ, the Son of the living God. We're not going anywhere. See, this is a two-way street. God uses His power to make His
people willing in the day of His power. Makes us willing. Makes us willing to submit to
Him, to submit to His righteousness. Makes us willing to bow to Him.
makes us willing to bow at His feet, begging for mercy. Oh, they won't leave God and
God will never forsake them. He keeps them by His power. Now
look at verse 8. Give unto the Lord the glory
due unto His name. Bring an offering and come into
His courts. Now give God the glory due unto His name by bringing
an offering. I believe something, the Lord's
giving me something here that'll help you. This word offering,
it means what you think it means. It means a donation or a gift. God is worshiped by our giving. Giving is an important part of
worship. And I've never met God's people anywhere that do not give
generously. They all do, and you know, we
should, shouldn't we? We ought to. Everything we have,
God's given us, we ought to give. But this is talking about more
than just the giving of our money. You think about it. If we're
gonna give an offering that gives God the glory due unto His name,
have you ever given God anything that is worthy of Him? Of course
not. I mean, how could we? If we gave
God everything that we own, it's just giving back to Him what
He's already given us. So that's not, our giving is not gonna
do anything that's worthy of His name. But there's another
meaning for this word offering. It's sacrifice. Now, here's the
way we give the Lord the glory due under His name. It's just
one way. It's by coming to God through the blood offering, through
the sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ. The way we give God the
glory due under His matchless name is by declaring God's greatest
glory is the salvation of sinners through the sacrifice of Christ.
And that sacrifice, saved God's people. It didn't give them a
chance to be saved. It didn't give them some opportunity.
That sacrifice saved His people by putting their sin away forever.
Christ did not die to give somebody a chance to be saved if they
would decide to accept Him. If that were so, Where is God's
glory? Where is Christ's glory in His
sacrifice upon the cross if all He was doing was giving people
a chance to be saved if they would decide to accept Him? If millions of people still die
and go to hell anyway, where's the glory in that? There's none. But God receives the glory due
unto His name. WHEN WE DECLARE THE SOVEREIGN,
SUCCESSFUL, VICTORIOUS SAVIOR, THE LORD JESUS CHRIST WHO DID
EXACTLY WHAT HE CAME TO DO. HE SAVED HIS PEOPLE FROM THEIR
SIN. HE PUT THEIR SIN AWAY BY HIS
BLOOD AND BY HIS DEATH HE PURCHASED ETERNAL LIFE FOR THOSE PEOPLE.
AND HE'S GOING TO GIVE THEM FAITH TO BELIEVE HIM THROUGH THE PREACHING
OF THE GOSPEL. HE'S GOING TO SEND THE GOSPEL
TO THEM AND HE'S GOING TO GIVE THEM FAITH TO BELIEVE IT. every last one of them to the
end. They will not go away because
he's gonna keep them. And in the end, when he's wrapped
this whole thing up, he's gonna present every last one of them
thoughtless to the father. He can say, father, here they
are. I and the children whom thou has given me and not one
will be missing, not one. And we give God the glory due
unto his name. When we publicly confess, that
the only way a sinner like me can be saved is in the Lord Jesus
Christ. See, this thing of the gospel,
it's not talking about everybody else. It's talking about how
God could save me. Who we call the heathen, Tom,
they got nothing on me. The glory of God, the way I give
God the glory due unto His name, is saying that I am so sinful,
I am so dead, I am so rebellious, that the only way I could be
saved is if God the Father chose me. He had to choose me, I'd
never choose Him. The Son, God the Son, God's Son
in human flesh had to be made flesh and He had to make me righteous
by obeying the law as my representative. And He had to put my sin away
by dying for me. He had to shed His blood. He
had to become my substitute and die the death that I deserve.
I am so sinful, the only way I could be saved is if the blood
of God paid for my sin. I'm so sinful, it's my only hope.
And I'm so dead that the only way I could have life is if God,
the Holy Spirit, moves in miraculous power and gives me life and faith
in the new birth. That's the only way I could be
saved. And if that's your confession, you're giving God the glory due
in His name. That's the offering we bring. It's the sacrifice
of Christ. Verse 9, David says, Oh, worship
the Lord in the beauty of holiness. Fear before Him all the earth.
Well, how can I worship God in holiness? I've never done anything
holy. It's by worshiping God in Christ. Look over across the page there,
verse 12 of Psalm 97. David says, Rejoice in the Lord,
ye righteous, and give thanks at the remembrance of His holiness,
of His holiness. He is our holiness. We worship
God in holiness by coming to God through the blood offering,
the blood sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ. God is worshiped
in the beauty of holiness when we confess, the only holiness
I have is the Lord Jesus Christ. That's how we worship Him. And
the only way we can sing that song, the only way we can know
the only holiness I have is Christ, is if we know Him. That's the
only way we can sing this song, is if we know Christ. And thirdly,
we sing this new song because Christ is our judge. The Lord
Jesus Christ is our judge. Verse 10, David says, say among
the heathen that the Lord reigneth. The earth also should be established
that it should not be moved. He should judge the people righteously. Now David starts out saying,
say among the heathen, the Lord reigneth. YOU TELL THE HEATHEN,
YOU TELL EVERYONE THAT GOD IS SOVEREIGN AND HE'S SOVEREIGN
IN ALL THINGS. DON'T START OUT LETTING THEM
THINK SOMEHOW MAN HAS A FREE WILL AND YOU CAN DO SOMETHING
TO GET SAVED. AND THEN LATER ON, ONCE YOU THINK
YOU GOT THEM HOOKED, THEN YOU TEACH THEM WHO GOD REALLY IS.
NO, DON'T DO THAT. NOBODY WILL EVER BE SAVED UNTIL
THEY KNOW THE TRUE AND LIVING GOD. THEY'RE NOT GOING TO BE
SAVED BY AN IDOL NAMED JESUS. It's got to be the Lord Jesus
Christ, the true and living God. Nobody's ever going to be saved
by the God of their imagination, so you start out telling them,
the Lord reigneth. The Lord reigneth. God is sovereign
in salvation. God saves whom He will, and He
passes by whom He will. And don't present that like that's
bad news. That's good news. God has established His people
in the Lord Jesus Christ. We're a new creation in Christ
Jesus. Then we can never perish, because
God has established them. He passed by them and said, your
time's a time of love. I've chosen you, I've redeemed
you, and they're established. Now, if you did something to
establish yourself, My friend, you shall surely perish. God
will only accept what God's provided. The only thing that will be established
is what God's done. The house that God has built,
and if He didn't build the house, we're laboring in vain to build
it. Now, God's sovereign. He's going to build and establish
His people. You tell the heathen that. And
then you tell the heathen, that the Lord's coming again to judge
the earth in righteousness. Now, we don't tell anybody that
to scare them, to scare them into making a profession of faith
or anything like that. No, we tell the glorious truth.
Christ is coming again to judge the world in righteousness, to
comfort the hearts of God's people, to encourage them, to make them
burst out in praise to sing this song, this new song of Christ
our Redeemer. Now think about that. Christ
is coming again to judge the world. Now I know that gives
us a little, in the back of our minds at least, there's a little
bit of worry about this matter being judged because here we
sit in our sinful flesh. with some idea of our sin, with
some idea of our guilt before God. Some old preacher said,
God doesn't show us all of our sin and all of our guilt, it
drives crazy. But we got some idea of it, don't
we? Well, then what assurance do you have? What comfort do
you have for your soul? None, but the Lord Jesus Christ,
none but him. If Christ is your only hope,
If Christ is your only comfort, then you have a good hope. Christ
died for the sin of his people, and he put their sin away. I
mean, put it away, it's a lion, it doesn't exist, by his precious
blood. Now, this Savior, who suffered
and died to put away the sin of his people, you know what
he said? He said, the Father has put into my hand all judgment. This one who suffered and died
for the sin of his people is the judge. Well, if Christ is our judge,
and we believe Him, we trust Him, we know Him, then nobody
knows better than Him that you're innocent, because He's the one
who made you innocent. I don't see much innocence in
myself, but He does, because He's the one who made me innocent.
If Christ is your judge, nobody knows better than Him that your
sin debt has already been paid because He's the one who paid
it. Now, doesn't that give you comfort? Christ the Savior is
your judge. Then there's no fear in judgment,
is there? No fear at all. So that you can say, even so,
come quickly, Lord Jesus. Come quickly and finish the work
that you started. and take me out of this body
of sin and out of this world of sin. And David ends just like
he began, by telling all creation to rejoice in Christ and to sing
His praises. Verse 11, let the heavens rejoice,
let the earth be glad, let the sea roar in the fullness thereof,
let the field be joyful in all that is therein. Then shall all
the trees of the wood rejoice before the Lord, for He cometh.
For he cometh to judge the earth, he shall judge the world with
righteousness, and his people with his truth." Now, all of
creation sings the praises of God, all of it, from the mountains
to the valleys, and the rivers and the lakes, from the clouds
and the sunshine to the birds and the ants, they all sing the
praises of God. You just look at them, you see
how beautifully God has made them. And the creation that we
see, we think is so beautiful, it marred us in. Yet it's still
beautiful, isn't it? I tell Janet all the time, oh,
I'm getting old. We used to be driving down the
road, taking long car trips with the family, I was a little boy.
And I'd think my dad's just an old man. He'd tell mom, look
at those clouds, aren't those pretty? Look at those mountains,
look at that field and that prairie. I'd think, oh, what in the world,
that's an old person. And I'd do the very same thing. And undeniably,
it's beautiful. But I'm not so sure that's what
David's talking about there. I don't think it is. While it's
beautiful, you know what the Apostle Paul tells us in Romans
8? That the creation, as beautiful as it is, groans and travails
in pain. Waiting for what? Waiting for
Christ to return. Waiting for the manifestation
of the sons of God. God's sons, His children will
be made manifest when He returns. And you know that's what creation
is waiting for. Creation was made subject to
vanity, death, because of Adam's sin. These people that are talking
about these earthquakes out west, I know exactly what that is.
That's creation groaning, waiting for Christ to return. And when
He does, His people are gonna be set free. Set free. Set free from sin. From the presence
of it in our bodies and the presence of it in the world around us.
And when that happens, creation's gonna have what it's been waiting
for for 6,000 years. Creation's gonna be set free
from sin too. When God makes a new heaven and
a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness. and there'll be
no more earthquakes, there'll be no more floods, there'll be
no more having to have a warning on your phone that it's going
to have a severe thunderstorm and rain and might flood, no
more of that. There'll be no more sin, no more
sorrow, no more tears, no more waiting for what we think is
going to be bad news from a doctor's report, no more death, no more
phone calls telling us a dear loved one has passed away, no
more. new heaven and a new earth wherein
dwelleth righteousness and no sin. And that is where God's
people are gonna live for eternity, rejoicing around the throne of
Christ our Savior and singing this new, new song. By God's
grace, I hope we can start singing it now. God taught us some of
the words, hadn't he? I hope we'll sing it. All right,
the Lord bless you.