Psalm 2 - 2007.06.30

"He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh: the Lord shall have them in derision." —Psalm 2:4

In outline, this Psalm reveals the Rebellion of man (v.1-3), the Reaction of God (v.4-6), the Regent of glory ( v.7-9), and the Recommendation of grace (v.10-12.) It is most impressive, and worthy of careful and profound meditation. However, in keeping with our objective, to take a "nugget" of truth and reflect upon it, we will confine our remarks primarily to this fourth verse and what it suggests.

We must first, however, note the reference to man's rebellion. Observe that the heathen are those who are in defiance of God. We are popularly inclined to identify the "heathen" as primitives in far away and undeveloped lands, or other cultures. The dictionary definition is more in agreement with the scriptures: Heathen = "a person who does not believe in the God of the Bible…" Thus understood, we are surrounded by heathen; educated or uneducated, cultured or unsophisticated, wealthy or poor, etc. Many are simply indifferent to God, but many others are in open rebellion against Him, defiant of His person and His principles. Our chapter indicates that the rage and rebellion of the heathen embraces both the multitudes of mankind—"the people," and their superiors—"the kings of the earth," and "the rulers." Man's defiance of God is evident, in other words, in our sophisticated institutions and in the marketplace, as well as the "dens of iniquity" in society, and is directed against both God and "His anointed," i.e., Christ. Antichristian trends in our own contemporary society confirm that.

Man's rebellion, in this or any other age, is no surprise to God, nor is it unsettling to Him. Consider what our text implies with respect to God's tranquillity in the face of man's intransigency. First in order is God's position. He "sits in the heavens," both literally and figuratively out of man's reach. The rebels may, indeed, attack with some appearance of success the people of God here, but they can mount no successful attack against God. His fortress is impregnable, and His counsel will stand forever.
Then there is implied God's perception: "He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh… " There are those among the heathen whose attitude is that God does not see, or hear, or is not concerned with man and his folly. The fact is just the opposite; "Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in His sight: but all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of Him with Whom we have to do. (cf. Heb. 4:12-13)."
Nothing escapes His vision, and nothing takes Him by surprise.

And His reaction to it all? He will "laugh." Such is His power that He has no need to address the rebellion of the race with anxiety or fear. God laughs, not the laughter of amusement, but of power and authority. Consider the little child who becomes angered with his father and attacks him, grasping his legs and venting his anger in a spirit of rebellion. His father, tall and strong, looks down upon the tiny tyrant and laughs, unshaken by the situation. So is the Father of Glory unfazed by attacks of puny man.

But, when God laughs, let man beware! "The Lord shall have them in derision." There is an interesting parallel in the first chapter of Proverbs; "Because I have called, and ye refused; I have stretched out my hand, and no man regarded; But ye have set at nought all my counsel, and would none of my reproof: I also will laugh at your calamity; I will mock when your fear cometh; When your fear cometh as desolation, and your destruction cometh as a whirlwind; when distress and anguish cometh upon you. Then shall they call upon me, but I will not answer; they shall seek me early, but they shall not find me: For that they hated knowledge, and did not choose the fear of the LORD [Prov. 1:24-29]." The laughter of God, as portrayed in scripture, is the precursor of judgment. "For the turning away of the simple shall slay them, and the prosperity of fools shall destroy them [Prov. 1:32]." And here, "The Lord shall have them in derision."

Yet, in both passages God extends His grace to the ungodly. "Be wise now therefore, O ye kings: be instructed, ye judges of the earth. Serve the Lord with fear, and rejoice with trembling. Kiss the Son, lest He be angry, and ye perish from the way, when His wrath is kindled but a little. Blessed are all they that put their trust in Him [Ps. 1:10-12]," and, "Whoso hearkeneth unto Me shall dwell safely, and shall be quiet from the fear of evil [Prov. 1:33]." When God laughs, let man beware!
For our good,

"Pastor" Frasier

Psalm 1 - 2007.06.23

"Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful. But his delight is in the law of the LORD; and in his law doth he meditate day and night." —Psalm 1:1-2

Psalm 1, short and to the point, could be entitled, "The Song of the Blessed Man." It marks his distinction in v.1; his delight in v.2; his development in v.3, and implies his destiny in v.4-6. Our purpose today is to share some thoughts arising especially from the first two verses.

The immediate impact of the first verse is the evidence that sin is progressive. "Walk, stand, sit." What begins as a casual encounter, left unchecked leads to a settled relationship. Those who take their moral cue from the ungodly are presently found in companionship with sinners, and finally become allies with those fools who contemptuously declare, "There is no God" (Cf. Ps. 14:1).

The ungodly are those who are indifferent to God; sinners are those who are disobedient to God; the scornful are those who are defiant of God. The implied warning here is to those who would know the blessedness of the Lord, that they separate themselves from all that characterizes "the way of the ungodly." In today's world, we are tempted to say, that is extremely difficult. The fact is that it has always been difficult. There is "nothing new under the sun," and the world has always been at hand. The believer in every age from the first until now has been obliged to recognize the world for what it is, and to resist its influences and its philosophy. Those who desire the blessing of the Lord are counseled to immerse themselves in the Word of God, "the law of the Lord." God's word alone affords us direction for our walk and defense in our warfare.

Many years ago the Chinese Christian Watchman Nee did studies in the epistle to the Ephesians which were later published in book form under a title that is an interesting parallel to the key words in our text: "Sit, Walk, Stand." It is a study in spiritual victory, the "way of the righteous."

The first order is a settled relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ: "sit." Since "all have sinned and come short of the glory of God," we all begin life in the "way of the ungodly." In order to be released from that bondage, we must know the Lord Jesus Christ as savior in a real and personal way. Religion will not do; relationship is essential, and when by faith we enter into that relationship, receiving Jesus Christ as savior and Lord, we are by God "raised up together, and made [to] sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus [Eph. 1:6]." This implies a fixed and settled relationship, "abiding in Christ."

Thus SITuated in Christ, the believer is to learn to walk in Him. In part we are instructed, "This I say therefore, and testify in the Lord, that ye walk not as other gentiles walk, in the vanity of their mind, Having the understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart… [Eph. 4:17,18ff]," but that we "walk worthy of the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God [Col. 1:10]." It should go without saying that this requires meditation on the Word of God.

Finally, as Nee points out, we need to stand against the adversary of our souls whose aim is to draw us back into compromise and/or conformity to this present evil world. We are admonished, "Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might. Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. Wherefore take unto you the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand [Eph. 6:10-13]."

The sad fact is that the majority of professing Christians in our day are trying to live "blended" lives, and it is impossible to tell to which category they belong; the righteous or the ungodly. That will not work; the trend will inevitably be downhill, as our text implies. May God give us grace to sit, walk, stand in Christ alone, delighting and meditating in His law "day and night."

For God's glory,

"Pastor" Frasier

…on the theme of LOVE - 2007.06.16

"… but the greatest of these is charity (Love.)" — I Cor. 13:12

If we are to take this thirteenth chapter of I Corinthians at face value, then we must acknowledge the fact that the unique Love of God, inherently His, and ours by grace, is, as Henry Drummond put it in his dissertation in 1891, "The Greatest Thing in the World." To know this truth, and appropriate by faith this Love, reflecting it back to God and bestowing it upon our fellows, especially our fellow-believers, is worth more in the sight of God than any other gift or grace touched upon in scripture.

It is, as we have noted, the hallmark of true discipleship, and the essence of Jesus' "new commandment" (John 13:34,35) and, it is the proof of our relationship with the Living God (cf. I John 4:7-8, 20-21.) Omit this Love, and Christianity is just another religion; affirm it, and the Christian faith becomes a manifestation of life linked with the eternal God, itself unique.

Having thus said, it is important that we understand that the Love here outlined is not ours, cannot be conjured up from within, is altogether supernatural. It is the consequence of a real and enduring fellowship with the God who is love. A few days ago this truth was brought home to my own heart in a wonderful way by C. H. Spurgeon's "Morning and Evening" meditation for the morning of June 11. Since it so well suits the occasion, and I cannot hope to improve upon it, I am reproduce it here verbatim:

"We love Him because He first loved us." — I John 4:19

There is no light in the planet but that which proceedeth from the sun; and there is no true love to Jesus in the heart but that which cometh from the Lord Jesus himself. From this overflowing fountain of the infinite love of God, all our love to God must spring. This must ever be a great and certain truth, that we love Him for no other reason than because He first loved us. Our love to Him is the fair offspring of His love to us. Cold admiration, when studying the works of God, anyone may have, but the warmth of love can only be kindled in the heart by God's Spirit. How great the wonder that such as we should ever have been brought to love Jesus at all! How marvellous that when we had rebelled against Him, He should, by a display of such amazing love, seek to draw us back. No! never should we have had a grain of love toward God unless it had been sown in us by the sweet seed of His love to us. Love, then, has for its parent the love of God shed abroad in the heart: but after it is thus divinely born, it must be divinely nourished. Love is an exotic; it is not a plant which will flourish naturally in human soil, it must be watered from above. Love to Jesus is a flower of a delicate nature, and if it received no nourishment but that which could be drawn from the rock of our hearts it would soon wither. As love comes from heaven, so it must feed on heavenly bread. It cannot exist in the wilderness unless it be fed by manna from on high. Love must feed on love. The very soul and life of our love to God is His love to us.

I love thee, Lord, but with no love of mine,
For I have none to give;
I love thee, Lord; but all the love is thine,
For by thy love I live.
I am as nothing, and rejoice to be
Emptied, and lost, and swallowed up in thee.

The subject is so vast, and so far beyond us as far as definition is concerned, that no man can do justice to it, no one more than "touch the hem of [its] garment." To consider it, even with our limited faculties, is to be humbled beyond words. Therefore we make no apology for how poorly and inadequately we have treated it, and can only pray that in some way, by God's infinite and peculiar grace, we may have whetted somewhere an appetite to meditate further and more deeply on this supernal truth, and its bearing on our professed claim to identification with the God who IS Love.

For His glory and our good,

"Pastor" Frasier

…on the theme of LOVE - 2007.06.09

"And now abideth faith, hope, charity [Love], these three; but the greatest of these is charity [Love]. " — I Cor. 13:12

Some years ago I was made aware of a company that manufactured rope. Their three stranded rope was distinguished by the fact that one of the three strands included a continuous stripe of red and blue, which set it apart from the other strands, and was the brand-mark of their product. As the apostle, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, concludes his remarks on this unique Love of God which is to be the hallmark of the Christian, he sets before us a threefold cord which for 'now' links the believer and God: Faith, hope and Love, and Love is the strand which marks the cord as exclusively His.

Faith is foundational to Christian experience. Of God it is said that "without faith it is impossible to please Him [Heb. 11:6]." Faith is the ground of our salvation, for it is written, "By grace are ye saved through faith … not of works, lest any man should boast [Eph. 2:8,9]." (Faith, of course, requires an object, and the object of saving faith is the person and work of our Lord Jesus Christ. (See, e.g., Romans 3:21-26)) Faith initiates us into the family of God; "For ye are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus [Gal. 3:26]." Faith is fundamental to the believer's walk; "We walk by faith, and not by sight [II Cor. 5:7]," and "… the just shall live by faith [Rom. 1:17, e.g.]." And, it is faith that will carry us forward to the desired goal; the apostle Peter assures us of the appearing of Jesus Christ "Whom having not seen ye love; in Whom, though now ye see Him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory: Receiving the end of your faith, even the salvation of your souls [I Pet. 1:8,9]."

Faith, then, "abides." And it is faith that initiates and sustains hope. Hope, in our common use of the term is associated with uncertainty. If we hope that it will not rain, we mean we are apprehensive that it may. If we say we hope we'll get new ice skates for Christmas, it means we are not sure we will. That is not the way "hope" is used in the New Testament. The "hope that is in Christ Jesus" is not called hope because it is uncertain, but because it is unseen. The Holy Spirit explains that for us through the apostle Paul's remark in Romans 8:24: "For we are saved by hope: but hope that is seen is not hope: for what a man seeth, why doth he yet hope for? But if we hope for that we see not, then do we with patience wait for it." Indeed, hope is defined as "an anchor for the soul, both sure and stedfast [Heb. 619]." And, both faith and hope are linked by the apostle Peter in a great passage, "Forasmuch as ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold, from your vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers; But with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot: Who verily was foreordained before the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these last times for you, Who by him do believe in God, that raised him up from the dead, and gave him glory; that your faith and hope might be in God [I Peter 1:18-21]."

It is, however, the divine intention that faith, generating the sure hope of eternal life, will prompt us to open our hearts to the influences of His Holy Spirit to bring us into conformity to Christ, particularly stimulating His Love in our hearts, both for God and for "one another" as believers. (See Rom. 5:5.) It is that Love which gives evidence to others and assurance to ourselves that our Christian experience is valid. And, let it be noted, this Love that God "is," and which He wills to cultivate in us, is not passive, nor is it merely a good feeling. Rather, it has moral quality. We are instructed, "Let love be without dissimulation. Abhor that which is evil; cleave to that which is good [Rom. 12:9]." A literal rendering of the original would read, "Let Love be un-hypocritical… ," and the clear inference is that if we do not become morally discerning and discriminating, our love is mere pretense.

Faith, then, generates the believer's hope. Hope initiates Love. "And every man that hath this hope (of eternal life in Christ Jesus) purifieth himself, even as He is pure [I Jn. 3:3]." When we see Him face to face, faith will be changed to sight, and hope will be abandoned in fulfillment; but, Love will remain for all eternity. "The greatest of these is Love," for "God is love; and he that dwelleth in Love dwelleth in God [I John 4:16b]."

"May the Love of Jesus fill me, As the waters fill the sea;
Him exalting, self abasing— This is victory." —K.B. Wilkinson

For God's glory and our eternal good,

"Pastor" Frasier

…on the theme of LOVE - 2007.06.02

"For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known. " — I Cor. 13:12

A major aspect of Love is humility. And, humility is a quality sadly lacking in the natural man. Love, in the proper sense of the word, is essentially outgoing, self-renunciating; its counterpoint is pride, which is essentially self-seeking and self-exalting.

In his objective of showing the priority and superiority of Love to all other virtues, the apostle penned the great paragraph that begins at v.18 and runs to the end of the chapter. Here he affirms that Love will endure when all else fails, and is the supreme grace ( v.8, 13). In the process, two things are contrasted, as pointed up in our text for today: "now," and "then." "Now" is the realm of men and things; the world as we know it. "Then" points to a future, both as to time and place, elsewhere called in scripture, "the world to come." Central to "now" is man; central to "then" is God.

While our text speaks essentially in the spiritual realm, it evokes a principle that applies to all aspects of "now." That principle is, no matter what we see, we see but an imperfect vision of reality and, regardless of what we know, be it little or much, our knowledge is fragmentary, partial, inadequate. Should man truly recognize and endorse this principle, it would induce humility and stimulate Love. But, fallen man repudiates the principle, fancying that if we do not know everything today, we will know it "tomorrow." Regardless of man's feverish investigation of all aspects of being, this truth remains, and will remain unaltered until the end of time. We see imperfectly, we know fragmentarily. Much of what we "knew" yesterday is outmoded and repudiated today. Man, however 'advanced,' is "ever learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the Truth [II Tim. 3:7}."

It is the vanity of the human heart that sends us on an endless quest for knowledge that ultimately leads only to confusion. The key that opens the door of knowledge to the chamber of wisdom is God, and God is Love. Man in his vanity and pride sees the handiwork of God, but entirely misses His fingerprints. (Cf. Romans 1:20-22ff!!)

Long ago a wise man asked the rhetorical question, "Canst thou by searching find out God? Canst thou find out the Almighty unto perfection [Job. 11:7]?" The implied answer is self-evident. The prophet later wrote in God's behalf, "For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the LORD. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts [ Isa. 55:8,9]." Neither science, philosophy nor religion will ever come to "the knowledge of the Truth" by reflection or research. Of this the preacher needs to be as mindful as the professor.

The transition from "now" to "then" is accomplished by "faith which worketh by Love [Gal. 5:6]." "Then," and not until then, we will see [Him] "face to face;" "then" we shall know even as (now) we are known— of Him. "Then" we will be like Him, for "it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know (by revelation) that, when He shall appear, we shall be like Him; for we shall see Him as He is [I John 3:2]." And "then," when He is unveiled before us, we will see clearly and coherently all that for "now" "eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that LOVE Him [I Cor. 2:9]." O glorious day!!

Long ago God extended this wonderful invitation, "For thus saith the high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity, whose name is Holy; I dwell in the high and holy place , with him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart of the contrite ones. [Isa. 57:15]." For the present an invisible barrier stands between "now" and "then." God penetrated it supremely in the incarnation; a man penetrates it by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Love is the key to both.

"O love the LORD, all ye his saints: for the LORD preserveth the faithful, and plentifully rewardeth the proud doer." — Psalm 31:23

For God's glory,

"Pastor" Frasier