Psalm 66 - 2008.10.25

"Come and hear, all ye that fear God, and I will declare what he hath done for my soul." — Ps. 66:16

It is in the nature of some to speak little of themselves, and that is not a bad thing. However, it is a good thing to give voice to a testimony that brings glory to God. That was David's intention here, and for today I will make it mine. Let me tell you "what He hath done for my soul."

The Psalmist, in fact touches only lightly, here, on the Lord's mercies to him, but elsewhere he enlarges on the subject. He declares, for example, "I waited patiently for the LORD; and he inclined unto me, and heard my cry. He brought me up also out of an horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings. And he hath put a new song in my mouth, even praise unto our God: many shall see it, and fear, and shall trust in the LORD [Ps. 40:1-3]." Translated into a New Testament context, the "miry clay" is surely the quicksand of sin, and the rock is none other than the Lord Jesus Christ. In His wonderful grace the Lord revealed my awful plight to me at an early age, before the clay had hardened and the soul become indifferent to His invitation. Who cannot but praise Him for His redemption and the gracious revelation of His Holy Spirit to a needy soul! "I was lost, but Jesus found me, found the sheep that went astray." He saved my soul!

Then, for the sixty-seven years since the day of my conversion, He has sustained me. The journey is marred with many a failure, but His mercies have been "new every morning," and He has remained true to His word, "If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness [IJohn 1:9]." "Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it, Prone to leave the God I love; Here's my heart, O take and seal it, seal it for Thy courts above." He has sustained my soul.

Moreover, He keeps my soul. How precious to the struggling saint are the promises of the Savior. "I will never leave thee , nor forsake thee [Heb. 13:5b]." and again, to those who have trusted Him is the assurance, "My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me: And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand. My Father, which gave them me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of my Father's hand. I and my Father are one [John 10:27-30]." There the believer rests secure between the the under girding hand of the Father and the overshadowing hand of the Savior. One can possess the confidence of the apostle, "…I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day [II Tim. 1:12]." "He will keep me till the river Rolls its waters at my feet; then He'll bear me safely over Where the loved ones I shall meet." He secures my soul.

And in the interim, He satisfies my soul. In a world of vanity and uncertainty, how wonderful that He has made Himself the sufficiency for my soul. How well the Savior promises, "I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst [John 6:35]." And again, "Whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life [John 4:14]." "Like a river glorious Is God's perfect peace, Over all victorious In its bright increase; Perfect, yet it floweth Fuller every day; Perfect, yet it groweth Deeper all the way. Stayed upon Jehovah Hearts are fully blest, Finding, as He promised, Perfect peace and rest." He is the satisfaction of my soul.

"Sing forth the honour of His name: make His praise glorious!" (Ps.66:1)

"Filled with His goodness, lost in His love",

"Pastor" Frasier

Psalm 65 - 2008.18.10

"O thou that hearest prayer, unto thee shall all flesh come." — Ps. 65:2

Let us consider first today the person addressed: "O Thou that hearest prayer." Clearly, it is the true and living God who is addressed. How He stands in contrast to the "gods many and lords many" of the heathen. Of them the scripture says, "The idols of the heathen are silver and gold, the work of men's hands. They have mouths, but they speak not; eyes have they, but they see not; They have ears, but they hear not; neither is there any breath in their mouths. They that make them are like unto them: so is every one that trusteth in them [Ps. 135:15-18]." What futility, what folly to address prayer to gods that cannot hear! And how thankful ought the Christian be that we have a God who not only can hear, but who delights in the prayers of His saints, and finds them a fragrance in His nostrils (See Rev. 5:8b) "The eyes of the LORD are upon the righteous, and his ears are open unto their cry [Ps. 34:15]," the Holy Spirit assures us in the Old Testament, and in the New, the writer to the Hebrews encourages, on the ground of the atoning work of our wonderful Lord, "Let us…come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need [Heb. 4:16]." And indeed, the Lord Himself said, "Men ought always to pray, and not to faint [Luke 18:1]."

Let us bear in mind, however, that if it is foolish to cry to a god that cannot hear, it is no less foolish to call upon the true God under circumstances in which He will not hear. "If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me [Ps. 66:18]." The prophet Isaiah echoes this when he declares to wayward Israel, "Your iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid His face from you, that He will not hear [Isa. 59:2]." There is no greater privilege on earth than that of prayer to the God who hears and answers prayer, and we are invited to come boldly to His throne. We are not, however, to come brazenly. As there is a protocol for approaching the throne of an earthly king, so is there for approaching the throne of the King of kings. We must come first "dressed in His righteousness alone,"our sins forgiven and washed away in His blood. The Savior alone can open the door that sin has barricaded against us.

For those who come qualified by His grace, however, the promises are rich and rewarding. He waits to hear and grant us forgiveness on an ongoing basis (I John 1:9); He will afford us wisdom (Jas. 1:5); He offers, as noted above, "grace to help in time of need," (Heb. 4:16); our daily bread (Luke 11:3); and so much more. The Savior put it this way: "And I say unto you, Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you. For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened [Luke 11:9-10]." What a cornucopia of blessing is the privilege of prayer!

There remains another thought in our text; "To Thee shall all flesh come." The commentators are inclined to see here the scope of prayer as extended to "all men," that is, without respect to origin, status or gender. Indeed when established on the ground of His grace, "whosoever will may come." The poor has as much access as the rich, the handicapped as well as the able, the young as well as the old, etc. No one is excluded from the throne who is by His grace a child of the King.

But, another application is possible. All men, irrespective of their condition or interest (or disinterest) shall, indeed come before Him; the redeemed into His favor, the unregenerate to His judgment. There will be no escaping this assembly. "And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life; and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works. And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire [Rev. 20:12-15]." Then some will pray, who never prayed before—but it will be too late.

Don't wait! If you have never prayed for His pardon for sin and the gift of eternal life, "behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of salvation [II Cor. 6:2]!"

With eternity in view,

"Pastor" Frasier

Psalm 64 - 2008.10.11

"The righteous shall be glad in the Lord, and shall trust in Him; and all the upright in heart shall glory." — Ps. 64:10

A respected professor of mine was in the habit of saying, "It's not how you start that matters most, but how you finish." That truth is illustrated in this Psalm. As is often the case, David begins on a note of anxiety (v.1), but ends on a note of assurance. More importantly, the first six verses of the psalm are focused on the aspirations of "the workers of iniquity" (v.1) but God is introduced in v. 7 and our text is the triumphant climax of His response to those workers of iniquity. It was Shakespeare, I believe, who said, "All's well that ends well," and God's word assures us that all will end well for those who belong to Him.

That is a comforting thought for troublous times or troubled lives. God will have the last word.

Our text affords the key to enjoying the promise of God's ultimate victory. It is "the righteous" who may now, and then, be glad in the Lord. With this before us, it behooves us to note that the New Testament disqualifies all of us, by nature, from traversing this highway, for it is written, "There is none righteous, no not one [Rom. 3:10]." But a few verses further along we are introduced to the Glorious Alternative of God's grace in the passage which begins, "But now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested… even the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe… For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God; being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus [Rom. 3:21-24ff]."

Now you may be tempted to say, why reiterate that; it is but basic Christianity. And that is precisely the reason for reiterating it; this is the bedrock of hope, and so fundamental that we may be tempted to take it for granted. This is the only ground which beneath our feet will not give way, and we should wake to joy and gratitude for it every day. Because of this glorious gospel, Christ has become our righteousness (See I Cor. 1:30), "Even as David also describeth the blessedness of the man, unto whom God imputeth righteousness without works [Rom. 4:6]." "For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation [Rom. 10:10]." "For [God} hath made [Christ] to be sin for us…that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him [II Cor. 5:21]."

There, dear friends, is all the ground of gladness in the Lord. Are you in Him? Is He "in you?" Then are you insulated from all the fiery darts of the wicked and his minions in heaven and in earth. "The body they may kill: God's Truth abideth still, His kingdom is forever." The righteous are those who have found refuge in the God of our salvation by putting their trust in Him, not in man or materialism. The believer will invest his confidence not in Wall Street or Washington, nor in sophisticated weaponry, but in the One Who died for us and rose again.

"All the upright in heart shall glory" when the King comes back. Till then, confronted with the character of this present world we may well pray with the psalmist, "Hear my voice O God, in my prayer: preserve my life from fear of the enemy (v.1)."

Be sure your righteousness is the "righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ." Find your refuge in Him "Who is able to keep that which [we] have committed unto Him against that day," and rejoice in Him here and now in anticipation of that great day when He shall be manifested to reign forever and ever.

With eternity in view,

"Pastor" Frasier

Psalm 63 - 2008.10.04

"Because Thy lovingkindness is better than life, my lips shall praise Thee. Thus will I bless Thee while I live: I will lift up my hands in Thy name" — Ps. 63:3-4

Men delight to talk about "the good life." What constitutes the good life may be a matter of debate, and will differ from one to another. Whatever the judgment may be, the "good life" is of short duration and uncertain. The Holy Spirit instructs us through the apostle James, "Go to now, ye that say, Today or tomorrow we will go into such a city, and continue there a year, and buy and sell and get gain: Whereas ye know not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away [Jas. 4:13-14]."

David has a wiser assessment of life when in verse 1 he declares, "My flesh longeth for Thee in a dry and thirsty land, where no water is." This world is a barren place, and life a burden, when rightly evaluated, if we are disconnected from God. It is from that perspective that he declares, "Thy lovingkindness is better than life." Oh, there may be moments of ecstasy and seasons of gratification in this life, but underlying it all, if we will give attention to it, is the relentless fact, "It is appointed unto man once to die, but after this the judgment [cf. Heb. 9:27]."

God's lovingkindness surpasses all. "It is of the Lord's mercies that we are not consumed." God's lovingkindness has spared us in this life, and provided us with the assurance of life eternal in an arena where "there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain [Rev. 21:4 see also Rev. 22:3 & 5]." God's lovingkindness is better both for what is is, and for what it has to offer. That is the biblical evaluation of the mercy of God, and it should be ours, if we have been assuredly born again.

There follows, as the logical consequence of this glorious discovery, the writer's declaration, "…my lips shall praise Thee. Thus will I bless Thee…" "Praise," the scripture says, "is comely for the upright." Every born again believer, every heaven-born child of God, should be exalting the Name of the Lord of life. And the supreme evidence of His lovingkindness is the sacrifice of His Son on the cross of Calvary where He gave His life a ransom for many. "By Him, therefore let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of our lips giving thanks unto His Name [Heb. 13:15]."

Because His lovingkindness is better than life, our lips should praise Him "in season and out of season." That assessment remains true, whether life in the flesh seems favorable or otherwise. The New Testament injunction is, "In everything give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you [I Thess. 5:18]." Are we obeying His will in letting this poor dying world hear His praise upon our lips from day to day, or does our conversation not go beyond the mundane things of this "present evil world?"

The degree of David's appreciation is amplified by the duration to which he pledges himself: Thus will I bless Thee while I live: I will lift up my hands in Thy Name." It is a promise of lifelong devotion. To him it will not matter what tomorrow holds; his praise will be the same. For the discerning committed Christian, worship is not a Sunday thing; every day is the Lord's day, and every day will we praise him. Some time ago I sat with a believer who is going through a profound and protracted trial. Twice during our brief time of fellowship he said spontaneously, "I love the Lord with all my heart." His praise rose above his plight, and in his affliction, he blessed my heart! And that is how it ought to be.

If you are able to see this world for the "dry and thirsty land" it really is, let your thirst be a thirst for God and find rest, refreshment and rejoicing in Him Who is the "fount of every blessing," under the shadow of His wings. (Read the whole Psalm!) Selah!

With eternity in view,

"Pastor" Frasier