WEBVTT 00:00:00.160 --> 00:00:14.880 If you have your copy of God's word, if you'd turn to Psalm 130 as we continue going through the Psalms in our summer series before we get back to Revelation later after, probably after Labor Day. 00:00:16.480 --> 00:00:30.800 So Psalm 130, Martin Luther counted this psalm among what he called the Pauline Psalms, Psalms so saturated with the gospel of grace that the Apostle Paul himself might have just written them. 00:00:31.199 --> 00:00:37.840 Luther said of it, the Psalm teaches that the forgiveness of sins is granted without merit. 00:00:38.880 --> 00:00:50.079 So, in fact, what we see from Martin Luther is that the entire seed of the Reformation can come out of Psalm 130 in and of itself. 00:00:50.240 --> 00:01:05.439 So let's read Psalm 130, and you will definitely hear what spurred our reformers to reform the church in this idea of forgiveness without merit. 00:01:05.760 --> 00:01:13.840 So Psalm 130, beginning in verse 1, a song of ascent, out of the depths I cry to you, O Lord, O Lord, hear my voice. 00:01:14.079 --> 00:01:17.840 Let your ears be attentive to the voice of my pleas for mercy. 00:01:18.000 --> 00:01:22.239 If you, O Lord, should mark iniquities, O Lord, who could stand? 00:01:22.560 --> 00:01:26.319 But with you there is forgiveness, that you may be feared. 00:01:26.560 --> 00:01:30.560 I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in his word I hope. 00:01:30.799 --> 00:01:36.400 My soul waits for the Lord more than watchmen for the morning, more than watchmen for the morning. 00:01:36.640 --> 00:01:48.319 O Israel, hope in the Lord, for with the Lord there is steadfast love, and with him is plentiful redemption, and he will redeem Israel from all his iniquities. 00:01:48.879 --> 00:01:57.040 Now I want to begin by asking you a question, and I ask you to be honest with yourself before God as you answer it. 00:01:57.280 --> 00:02:00.400 The question is, have you been in the depths? 00:02:00.879 --> 00:02:05.040 I do not mean have you ever had a bad week or have you had a bad day? 00:02:05.359 --> 00:02:07.519 Have you ever been disappointed? 00:02:07.840 --> 00:02:10.000 I do not mean have you ever felt powerless? 00:02:10.159 --> 00:02:18.719 Have you ever been in a situation where you felt powerless by physical limitations, by health, by your situation financially? 00:02:18.960 --> 00:02:21.439 I do not mean in that sense. 00:02:21.680 --> 00:02:22.879 I mean this. 00:02:23.360 --> 00:02:41.759 Have you ever come to a place where you looked at yourself, really looked inside your heart, and saw your sin for what it is, and felt yourself sinking under the weight of the sin and knew that no efforts could pull you out. 00:02:41.919 --> 00:02:46.319 Because, brothers and sisters, that's the reality of who we are. 00:02:46.879 --> 00:03:02.719 That we can feel under the weight of so many other things that press on us: health, financial situations, uh physical limitations, job limitations, whatever it is, you can you can just go down the list. 00:03:02.960 --> 00:03:09.759 We can realistically feel the pressure from those, and yet so many times we don't feel the pressure from sin. 00:03:10.000 --> 00:03:16.960 And in reality, all of those things do not have the eternal impact that the reality of the weight of sin does. 00:03:17.280 --> 00:03:25.840 We should feel the presence and the weight and the burden of sin in our lives more than any other burden that we carry. 00:03:26.240 --> 00:03:50.400 So when we think about sinking under the weight of sin and know that no efforts of our own can pull us out, have we been confronted with the reality of sin and the gravity of its consequences that we feel the dire, urgent, immediate need for Christ in our lives? 00:03:50.560 --> 00:04:01.360 Now, I would say, first of all, if you've never been there, uh I say this with all tenderness, you may never have truly understood the gospel. 00:04:01.759 --> 00:04:14.639 For the gospel is not just good advice for people who are doing well and uh can continue on their pathway with this little addition, like a fuel additive to help with the fuel cleaners. 00:04:14.719 --> 00:04:19.120 You know, sometimes you can put the fuel additive that helps the gasoline work better. 00:04:19.279 --> 00:04:23.120 Like I've got the gasoline in my life, I'm doing pretty good. 00:04:23.360 --> 00:04:32.079 I can just add Jesus, a little Jesus in as a fuel additive, and it's gonna help the gasoline that I provide work a little bit better. 00:04:32.240 --> 00:04:34.480 You don't you don't have any gasoline. 00:04:34.639 --> 00:04:39.519 You don't have anything to contribute that you may be saved. 00:04:41.120 --> 00:04:44.399 The gospel is good news for people who are drowning. 00:04:44.639 --> 00:04:47.600 The gospel is good news for people that have nothing. 00:04:47.839 --> 00:04:59.120 The gospel is good news for people who are enemies with God and cannot overcome him, cannot defeat him, cannot satisfy him. 00:05:00.000 --> 00:05:09.279 The gospel is good news for those who urgently need Christ to have right standing with God. 00:05:09.759 --> 00:05:16.319 And this psalm is a psalm of hope that is a rope thrown out to a drowning man. 00:05:17.759 --> 00:05:34.000 And so I'd I would encourage you, if you don't, if you haven't been there in that situation where you felt the weight of your sin and your need for Christ, my encouragement to you this morning is to read this psalm and listen to the sermon and come to faith in Christ and see Christ. 00:05:34.160 --> 00:05:37.759 And if you are in Christ, this is our weekly calibration. 00:05:38.000 --> 00:05:38.959 Your reminder. 00:05:39.199 --> 00:05:44.000 Sin is bad, sin is deadly, sin will weigh you down. 00:05:44.079 --> 00:05:46.240 But we have our remedy in Christ. 00:05:46.480 --> 00:05:49.519 Continue every day to run to Christ. 00:05:49.680 --> 00:05:54.959 Now we're going to walk through this psalm in our typical pattern of the Psalms to the three horizons. 00:05:55.120 --> 00:05:59.759 Uh, first, the historical horizon, what does it mean for the original readers and audience? 00:05:59.920 --> 00:06:03.759 The second, the Christological horizon, how does it connect us to Christ? 00:06:03.920 --> 00:06:09.759 And then third, the congregational horizon, what it means for us as the church, what it demands of us today. 00:06:09.920 --> 00:06:14.639 What does Psalm 130 mean for us as the church sitting here today? 00:06:15.120 --> 00:06:20.160 So, firstly, the historical horizon, a pilgrim's cry from the depths. 00:06:21.040 --> 00:06:24.160 So we notice the superscription, a song of ascent. 00:06:24.639 --> 00:06:30.560 Psalm 130 is the 11th of 15 such songs, Psalm 120 through 134. 00:06:30.800 --> 00:06:33.439 It's considered the song book of the pilgrim. 00:06:33.680 --> 00:06:38.959 Three times a year, faithful Israelites went up to Jerusalem for the great feast. 00:06:39.120 --> 00:06:46.319 And no matter where you came from, you would go up, up to the hill country, up to Zion, up to the house of the Lord. 00:06:46.480 --> 00:06:58.000 And these 15 Psalms trace that journey, and the songs of ascent trace not merely just a geographical climb up to Jerusalem, but also a spiritual one. 00:06:58.319 --> 00:07:04.399 The movement of a needy people toward the presence of a holy God. 00:07:04.560 --> 00:07:22.000 So as we're physically going up in elevation to Jerusalem, we are also spiritually going to a place where we can be with a holy God and participate in the feast that He has commanded us to participate in in the Old Testament. 00:07:22.399 --> 00:07:26.800 But notice, where does the pilgrim song begin? 00:07:27.839 --> 00:07:34.000 Not on the heights, not at the gates of Jerusalem, not halfway up. 00:07:34.639 --> 00:07:37.839 The pilgrim's song begins in the depths. 00:07:38.160 --> 00:07:42.639 He says, Out of the depths I cry to you, O Lord. 00:07:42.879 --> 00:07:44.480 Now, what are these depths? 00:07:44.720 --> 00:07:52.399 Now we've talked about this imagery before in Scripture, especially in the Old Testament, the depths often refer to deep waters. 00:07:52.800 --> 00:07:57.120 And water in the Old Testament oftentimes refers to chaos. 00:07:57.519 --> 00:08:04.879 And so what we see here out of the depths, we see a place of chaos, of drowning, of death itself. 00:08:05.120 --> 00:08:09.759 Psalm 69, I have come into deep waters and the flood sweeps over me. 00:08:10.000 --> 00:08:17.360 We have this idea of just being stranded in the middle of a tumultuous ocean that you just have no hope. 00:08:17.519 --> 00:08:19.519 You have no hope of overcoming that. 00:08:19.759 --> 00:08:26.639 When Jonah was cast into the sea, he cried, out of the belly of Sheol, I cried, and the deep surrounded me. 00:08:26.800 --> 00:08:31.519 And Jonah's prayer from the fish's belly is this psalm lived out. 00:08:31.759 --> 00:08:36.399 I mean, imagine Jonah's situation and connect this psalm with it. 00:08:36.639 --> 00:08:45.840 The depths, they're a place where you cannot touch the bottom, but yet the waters close in over your head, where you cannot save yourself. 00:08:46.559 --> 00:09:02.960 The depths are a place of drastic insufficiency, where you come to the realization that that which you need saving from, you possess not the power or the ability to do so yourself. 00:09:03.279 --> 00:09:07.519 And so, left to your own devices, you will drown and you will die. 00:09:08.240 --> 00:09:13.519 And notice verse 3 tells us precisely what has plunged this man into the deep. 00:09:13.679 --> 00:09:26.399 It is not his circumstances, it's not his enemies, it's not his mortgage, it's not his finances, it's not his health, it's none of those things that we could all list off that give us stress. 00:09:26.720 --> 00:09:32.080 What he says has put me in the depths is his iniquities. 00:09:32.240 --> 00:09:38.799 It is my sins against God, and that alone that has given me to the depths. 00:09:39.039 --> 00:09:44.799 If you, O Lord, should mark iniquities, O Lord, who could stand? 00:09:45.840 --> 00:09:47.440 So we have a diagnosis. 00:09:47.600 --> 00:09:49.519 If you should mark iniquities. 00:09:49.679 --> 00:09:53.759 Now the word mark means to keep a record, to keep account. 00:09:54.080 --> 00:09:57.039 As a creditor, he keeps a ledger of debts. 00:09:57.679 --> 00:10:08.080 The psalm imagines God as a bookkeeper writing down every sin, every lie, every lust, every proud thought, every unkind word, every duty left undone. 00:10:08.480 --> 00:10:15.120 And then he asks the questions that we should ask of our own hearts this morning about this. 00:10:15.519 --> 00:10:17.200 Oh Lord, who could stand? 00:10:18.320 --> 00:10:21.200 Who can stand before God with a ledger? 00:10:22.000 --> 00:10:25.279 Who can stand before God in sin? 00:10:26.559 --> 00:10:27.519 No one. 00:10:27.840 --> 00:10:28.720 None can. 00:10:29.759 --> 00:10:41.279 Not David, the man after God's own heart, an adulterer and a murderer, not Abraham, who twice gave away his wife to save his own skin? 00:10:41.840 --> 00:10:46.320 Not Moses, who stroke the who struck the rock in anger and was barred from the land? 00:10:46.559 --> 00:10:51.679 Not Peter, who denied Christ three times, not Paul, the chief of sinners? 00:10:52.000 --> 00:10:55.120 The question is rhetorical, and the answer is no one. 00:10:55.919 --> 00:10:58.480 None is righteous, no, not one. 00:11:00.399 --> 00:11:05.919 Ancient Israel understood something that our generation has forgotten. 00:11:06.799 --> 00:11:13.200 The deepest human problem is not the circumstances that you find yourself in. 00:11:13.519 --> 00:11:16.879 The deepest human problem is not psychological. 00:11:18.399 --> 00:11:19.759 It's not political. 00:11:20.559 --> 00:11:22.240 It's not economic. 00:11:24.000 --> 00:11:33.200 The deepest human problem is that we are guilty before a holy God, and the ledger is full, and we cannot pay. 00:11:35.840 --> 00:11:38.720 But in verse four, we see a turn. 00:11:40.559 --> 00:11:43.360 But with you, there's forgiveness. 00:11:45.679 --> 00:11:49.440 We see that word in scripture so many times, the word but. 00:11:50.080 --> 00:11:54.080 We see this presentation of a diagnosis of a problem. 00:11:55.919 --> 00:12:04.480 You can't satisfy God, you stand before Him in sin, you have transgressions, or you're dead in your sin. 00:12:06.240 --> 00:12:07.039 But God. 00:12:26.480 --> 00:12:28.720 The scene shifts towards God. 00:12:29.120 --> 00:12:35.600 Now there's an action item, and it's on God's to-do list, and it's saving his people. 00:12:36.480 --> 00:12:39.519 The pilgrim does not climb out of the depths by his own effort. 00:12:39.679 --> 00:12:42.320 He does not say, But I will do better. 00:12:42.639 --> 00:12:44.559 I will do better, God. 00:12:45.039 --> 00:12:48.480 He says, But with you there is forgiveness. 00:12:48.720 --> 00:12:51.759 Now, forgiveness is not something that God owes. 00:12:52.159 --> 00:12:55.440 God could still be God and not forgive a single one of us. 00:12:55.600 --> 00:12:58.080 And he would not be a lesser God. 00:12:58.720 --> 00:13:00.159 He owes us nothing. 00:13:00.399 --> 00:13:05.440 It would have taken away nothing for him, from him, to not forgive a single one. 00:13:05.759 --> 00:13:33.279 God in his uh in his um abilities and in his right, when Adam and Eve fell, he could have said, Fall and enjoy the consequences of your fall, O all of humanity, and sent every single last one of us to what we deserve in hell, and he would have been no lesser a God because of it. 00:13:33.600 --> 00:13:38.480 This is not something that God is obligated to do. 00:13:38.720 --> 00:13:45.440 This is what he does out of his covenant steadfast love that he made with his people. 00:13:46.559 --> 00:13:50.000 It is something that God has, forgiveness. 00:13:50.240 --> 00:13:54.159 It dwells with him, it belongs to his very character. 00:13:54.240 --> 00:14:01.440 It flows out of the steadfast covenant love with his people, held out to all who cry for mercy. 00:14:02.000 --> 00:14:12.960 And then a phrase that sometimes we think of as a weird phrase in the Bible that you may be feared. 00:14:14.480 --> 00:14:18.559 You know, we would think that it should say that you may be loved. 00:14:18.799 --> 00:14:19.679 Let me fit good. 00:14:19.759 --> 00:14:22.080 You know, you forgive me, so I'm gonna love you. 00:14:22.480 --> 00:14:31.200 I remember when I was um when I was a kid, there was a brand of shirts that was that was in style, the no fear shirts. 00:14:31.279 --> 00:14:32.720 You know, they had like a no fear. 00:14:32.960 --> 00:14:34.639 It was like kind of a macho shirt. 00:14:34.720 --> 00:14:35.679 Some of us had them. 00:14:35.919 --> 00:14:46.960 And so um, you know, the cool thing in the 90s was the uh Christian t-shirt company, and we would get um a little catalog in the mail. 00:14:47.039 --> 00:14:57.919 This was like pre-internet, and uh like once a year, my mom would let my uh brothers and me pick out some cool Christian shirts, especially like when school season was coming around. 00:14:58.000 --> 00:15:07.360 And so we could get like two or three Christian t-shirts to wear, and we'd circle them on the catalog, you know, fill out the paper, she'd write a check and mail it in, and you get the shirts. 00:15:07.440 --> 00:15:11.759 And one of the shirts um was fear God. 00:15:12.000 --> 00:15:14.799 And I remember as a kid seeing that, and you kind of don't understand. 00:15:14.879 --> 00:15:16.080 What do you mean, fear God? 00:15:16.240 --> 00:15:22.159 I don't understand, you know, he's my savior, he's he's Jesus, he loves us. 00:15:22.480 --> 00:15:29.120 I don't, I don't, and so that can be hard for us to kind of fully wrap our minds around what does it mean to fear God? 00:15:29.279 --> 00:15:42.480 Why would the psalmist say, but with you there is forgiveness, and in that forgiveness, I'm now being delivered from that which I know is to be feared, standing before God in my iniquities. 00:15:42.720 --> 00:15:47.840 And so now, if I have forgiveness, I don't have to stand before God in my iniquities. 00:15:48.080 --> 00:15:52.879 I stand before God with the blood of Christ, counted righteous, so I'm not going to hell. 00:15:53.039 --> 00:15:54.720 Hell's something I should fear. 00:15:54.879 --> 00:15:56.080 I fear hell. 00:15:56.320 --> 00:16:03.840 Why does it say that you may be feared in reference to God? 00:16:05.440 --> 00:16:06.879 Here's why. 00:16:07.519 --> 00:16:12.720 Because grace does not make God small. 00:16:13.919 --> 00:16:17.120 Grace makes God great. 00:16:18.559 --> 00:16:26.159 The man who has been forgiven much does not treat God casually. 00:16:26.720 --> 00:16:29.200 He stands in awe of who God is. 00:16:30.080 --> 00:16:33.919 Cheap pardon breeds contempt. 00:16:34.960 --> 00:16:39.279 Costly mercy breeds reverence. 00:16:39.919 --> 00:16:48.480 This is why we as believers have to remember what it's like to be drowning in the depths. 00:16:48.879 --> 00:16:52.960 So we remember the amount of forgiveness that we have. 00:16:53.039 --> 00:16:57.200 It is very costly for God to forgive us. 00:16:57.919 --> 00:17:14.720 When you know that the holy God, who could justly damn you, has instead freely forgiven you, you do not swagger into his presence, you fall on your face in awe and wonder of who he is. 00:17:15.039 --> 00:17:22.720 Proverbs 9 10 tells us the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. 00:17:23.599 --> 00:17:25.359 So, what's the posture? 00:17:26.000 --> 00:17:28.000 What does this forgiven pilgrim do? 00:17:28.160 --> 00:17:31.680 Well, in verses 5 and 6, it says, He waits. 00:17:31.839 --> 00:17:35.920 I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in his word I hope. 00:17:36.079 --> 00:17:41.759 My soul waits for the Lord more than watchman for the morning, more than watchman for the morning. 00:17:42.000 --> 00:17:43.440 Repeats that phrase. 00:17:43.680 --> 00:17:48.319 Picture the watchman on the walls of Jerusalem in the last hour of the night. 00:17:48.559 --> 00:17:54.079 It's cold, it's dark, every shadow they see could be an enemy. 00:17:54.400 --> 00:18:00.000 But the watchman is not anxious about whether or not morning will come. 00:18:01.200 --> 00:18:04.960 The watchman has never seen a night that did not end. 00:18:06.880 --> 00:18:09.359 His waiting is a certain waiting. 00:18:09.599 --> 00:18:11.759 My shift will come to an end. 00:18:11.839 --> 00:18:13.519 The sun will rise. 00:18:16.400 --> 00:18:18.799 He strains at night for sure. 00:18:19.119 --> 00:18:21.599 He's anxious about what he sees, sure. 00:18:22.480 --> 00:18:25.279 But he's eager for the sun to come. 00:18:26.400 --> 00:18:40.640 Now, the repetition of saying this frame is twice this phrase twice is the psalmist is saying, My hope in God is more certain than the rising of the sun. 00:18:41.519 --> 00:18:45.519 None of you questioned that the sun was going to rise this morning. 00:18:45.680 --> 00:18:46.960 We knew it would. 00:18:47.200 --> 00:18:56.880 Every single one of us in this room, every day we've been alive, the sun has risen every single morning, a hundred percent dependable. 00:18:57.119 --> 00:18:59.759 We haven't had a morning that it hasn't risen. 00:19:00.640 --> 00:19:08.880 What the psalmist is saying is you our hope in God is infinitely more certain than the rising of the sun. 00:19:12.160 --> 00:19:14.799 And what does that word hope rest? 00:19:19.119 --> 00:19:21.920 Waits for the Lord, in his word. 00:19:24.720 --> 00:19:26.400 Not in his feelings. 00:19:27.920 --> 00:19:33.599 He's not hoping in the Lord based on his feelings, not based on his circumstances. 00:19:34.240 --> 00:19:39.200 His hope rests completely in the word of God and in his promises. 00:19:40.400 --> 00:19:44.799 And then in verse 7 and 8, the pilgrim turns from his own soul to the whole assembly. 00:19:44.960 --> 00:19:53.519 We've kind of seen this several times in other psalms where there's the congregational horizon naturally comes at the end of the psalm. 00:19:53.839 --> 00:19:56.880 And he says, O Israel, hope in the Lord. 00:19:57.200 --> 00:20:02.240 Personal deliverance immediately turns into a public proclamation. 00:20:02.400 --> 00:20:14.480 And he anchors that call in two great words: steadfast love, the covenant love of God, his Hesed love that has sworn an oath and cannot quit, and the word plentiful redemption. 00:20:14.799 --> 00:20:19.200 Now, redemption is the paying of a price to set a slave free. 00:20:19.359 --> 00:20:24.160 And it's not a casual redemption, not a barely enough redemption. 00:20:24.240 --> 00:20:26.960 It is a plentiful redemption. 00:20:27.519 --> 00:20:38.000 Redemption with room to spare, redemption that reflects being purchased by the fullness of God in the person of Jesus Christ. 00:20:38.400 --> 00:20:43.359 But notice how the psalm ends, and he will redeem Israel from all his iniquities. 00:20:43.519 --> 00:20:45.200 The psalm says he will. 00:20:45.599 --> 00:20:52.400 Future tense, the Old Testament pilgrim sang this song of redemption that he had not yet seen. 00:20:52.720 --> 00:20:54.720 The price had not yet been paid. 00:20:54.880 --> 00:21:01.680 Every lamb slain on Israel's altar said, Not yet, not yet, not this blood. 00:21:02.000 --> 00:21:08.720 The psalm ends leaning forward, waiting for morning, waiting for the sun to rise. 00:21:08.880 --> 00:21:11.680 It gives us a taste of what's to come. 00:21:11.839 --> 00:21:18.160 There's a much better sequel ahead for the people of God. 00:21:22.960 --> 00:21:30.799 A week ago, Friday, we went with eager anticipation and saw the new Spider-Man movie. 00:21:31.119 --> 00:21:32.799 Spider-Man Brand New Day. 00:21:32.960 --> 00:21:39.440 And I had bought our tickets way in advance because the theaters were selling out fast. 00:21:39.680 --> 00:21:43.519 I think it broke the record for the biggest opening weekend ever. 00:21:45.839 --> 00:21:48.000 And it did not disappoint. 00:21:48.240 --> 00:21:49.599 It was a great movie. 00:21:49.680 --> 00:21:53.119 And it was a great sequel to the last movie. 00:21:53.200 --> 00:21:59.440 And the last movie did a great job of leaving you on this cliffhanger of what's to come. 00:22:00.160 --> 00:22:08.480 And those rascals waited five years to go from the last movie to this one. 00:22:08.880 --> 00:22:19.279 Five long years where we had to sit and wait for what's going to happen in the next Spider-Man movie. 00:22:21.200 --> 00:22:22.000 It was great. 00:22:22.079 --> 00:22:23.200 It was a great sequel. 00:22:24.160 --> 00:22:27.759 Psalm 130 does this much better. 00:22:28.799 --> 00:22:34.799 It leaves you hanging on the hope that's to come for the people in that time. 00:22:36.160 --> 00:22:39.359 There's a better Redeemer coming your way. 00:22:39.680 --> 00:22:47.279 And that brings us to the second horizon, the Christological horizon, the Redeemer who entered the depths. 00:22:48.000 --> 00:22:51.200 And how does this psalm find its home in Jesus Christ? 00:22:51.359 --> 00:22:53.440 We asked that of every psalm. 00:22:54.240 --> 00:22:59.119 For the Psalms were Jesus' songbook, he had them, he sang them, he read them. 00:22:59.839 --> 00:23:03.119 He sang the songs of ascent as he went up to Jerusalem. 00:23:03.200 --> 00:23:05.200 Jesus would have sang this psalm. 00:23:06.480 --> 00:23:12.319 And as he sings this, let's remember where his final ascent to Jerusalem led him. 00:23:13.119 --> 00:23:15.440 The final time that he entered Jerusalem. 00:23:15.680 --> 00:23:16.720 Now think of this. 00:23:16.960 --> 00:23:19.680 Who alone amongst the sons of Adam? 00:23:20.720 --> 00:23:22.400 That sounds very Narnia-ish. 00:23:23.039 --> 00:23:29.920 Sons who among you, who amongst the sons of Adam and the daughters of Eve, could hear this question in verse three? 00:23:30.240 --> 00:23:34.880 If you, O Lord, should mark iniquities, who could stand? 00:23:36.400 --> 00:23:38.480 And answer, I could. 00:23:39.599 --> 00:23:40.559 Only one. 00:23:41.440 --> 00:23:43.599 Only the Lord Jesus Christ. 00:23:43.839 --> 00:23:47.680 He is the only man who lived whose ledger was clean. 00:23:48.240 --> 00:23:51.920 If anyone deserved to see the depths, it was him. 00:23:52.400 --> 00:23:55.519 I mean, deserved never to see the depths, it was him. 00:23:55.839 --> 00:23:58.160 We deserved the depths, Christ didn't. 00:23:58.319 --> 00:24:01.759 And yet, here is the wonder of the gospel. 00:24:02.319 --> 00:24:04.160 Where do we find him? 00:24:05.039 --> 00:24:14.880 Where do we see Jesus, the one, the only one who can say, I can stand rightly before God, and yet where do we find him? 00:24:15.839 --> 00:24:19.039 We find him in the depths. 00:24:20.319 --> 00:24:23.839 He who knew no sin was made sin for us. 00:24:24.079 --> 00:24:41.119 In Gethsemane he began to be sorrowful even unto death, on the cross, the deep waters of divine judgment, the floods that should have closed in over our heads, and all of God's people that was reserved for us instead closed in over his. 00:24:42.000 --> 00:24:46.319 When Jesus cried out, My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? 00:24:46.480 --> 00:24:56.880 That was Psalm 130, verse 1, in its ultimate depth, the sinless son crying out from the depths that were not his but ours. 00:24:57.200 --> 00:25:00.720 He was marked with iniquities, but not his own. 00:25:00.960 --> 00:25:03.279 He was marked with our iniquities. 00:25:03.680 --> 00:25:08.160 The Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. 00:25:09.759 --> 00:25:15.759 Remember Jonah praying this Psalm's language from the belly of the fish and the depth of the sea. 00:25:16.000 --> 00:25:25.839 And Jesus himself said, As Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. 00:25:26.160 --> 00:25:29.839 Jonah went into the depths for his own sin. 00:25:31.599 --> 00:25:34.160 Christ went into the depths for ours. 00:25:34.799 --> 00:25:38.880 This is why Jesus said, Something greater than Jonah is here. 00:25:42.160 --> 00:25:45.279 And what of the watchman waiting for the morning? 00:25:46.640 --> 00:25:50.160 Well, my friends, on the third day morning came. 00:25:51.200 --> 00:25:57.279 The women went to the tomb very early when the sun had risen and the night of death was over. 00:25:59.200 --> 00:26:08.960 Every watchman on every wall of Israel who ever strained his eyes toward the east was, without knowing it, a picture of what was to come on that first resurrection Sunday morning. 00:26:09.279 --> 00:26:15.839 The resurrection of Jesus Christ is God's sunrise upon the human race. 00:26:16.240 --> 00:26:24.400 The waiting of verse 6, my soul waits for the Lord more than the watchman for the morning. 00:26:24.640 --> 00:26:30.319 The waiting of verse 6 is answered with an empty tomb. 00:26:31.119 --> 00:26:36.160 And now the last verse, he will redeem Israel from all his iniquities. 00:26:38.000 --> 00:26:39.279 He already has. 00:26:53.440 --> 00:27:00.400 In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses according to the riches of his grace. 00:27:00.559 --> 00:27:09.039 There is plentiful redemption of verse 7, the riches of grace lavished upon us. 00:27:10.400 --> 00:27:15.039 Do you see now why verse 4 says that forgiveness leads to fear? 00:27:15.359 --> 00:27:17.599 Come to Calvary and look. 00:27:18.480 --> 00:27:23.440 There is where with you there is forgiveness was purchased. 00:27:24.559 --> 00:27:28.640 Forgiveness is free to us, but it was not cheap to God. 00:27:28.799 --> 00:27:32.480 It cost him the blood of his own son, Jesus Christ. 00:27:32.559 --> 00:27:43.839 And when we see, when we look at the cross and we see our Savior and we see how much our pardon cost, we should never treat sin lightly. 00:27:44.160 --> 00:27:48.160 And we should never treat God casually. 00:27:48.400 --> 00:27:53.200 There is forgiveness with him that he may be feared. 00:27:54.480 --> 00:28:05.759 Colossians 2 says that in the very language of the ledger, God has canceled the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands, nailing it to the cross. 00:28:07.440 --> 00:28:21.519 The book in which God marked iniquities, Christ took it and nailed it to his cross and wrote across it in his own blood, paid in full. 00:28:22.319 --> 00:28:23.119 Tatalisti. 00:28:23.920 --> 00:28:25.279 It is finished. 00:28:28.559 --> 00:28:32.240 Perhaps you know the feeling of paying off a car. 00:28:33.920 --> 00:28:42.319 You finally get that title in the mail, and you get the ledger from the bank, and there's a stamp on it paid in full. 00:28:42.559 --> 00:28:43.759 It feels good. 00:28:44.079 --> 00:28:56.079 Maybe you get it on the house, you've paid off your mortgage, you get that paperwork, you but it belongs to you and the state, because you still have to pay property taxes on it, but we won't. 00:28:57.599 --> 00:28:59.039 Go away, Rabbit. 00:28:59.279 --> 00:29:01.039 It's not the point of this. 00:29:01.599 --> 00:29:05.839 It just feels good when when when you've paid off a debt, doesn't it? 00:29:06.319 --> 00:29:07.599 Any kind of debt. 00:29:08.160 --> 00:29:12.160 And we're just talking about when we're when we talk about paying off a car, these are little. 00:29:12.559 --> 00:29:14.079 These are little bitty things. 00:29:14.319 --> 00:29:20.160 You paid on a car for four, five years, and you get that, and you feel so good about it. 00:29:29.680 --> 00:29:32.720 From Adam to the last. 00:29:33.359 --> 00:29:37.920 And in one fail sweep, he took a ledger. 00:29:38.240 --> 00:29:47.759 And 2,000 years ago, my name was there, my all my sins are there, all of my iniquities for all time were there. 00:29:48.799 --> 00:29:52.319 And he nailed it onto the cross and said, It's done. 00:29:52.559 --> 00:29:53.279 It's finished. 00:29:53.440 --> 00:29:55.039 I'm not even born yet. 00:29:55.359 --> 00:29:56.000 It's done. 00:29:56.160 --> 00:29:59.680 The work is done, paid for in full. 00:30:00.319 --> 00:30:03.839 And when we receive Christ, that's what we get. 00:30:04.000 --> 00:30:04.880 That's what we get. 00:30:05.039 --> 00:30:07.519 We get this ledger that says, You're paid up. 00:30:07.920 --> 00:30:11.440 You have no debt with God. 00:30:13.039 --> 00:30:17.359 You are in good standing with the Heavenly Father. 00:30:19.680 --> 00:30:34.720 When this psalm points us to the gospel, when all of Scripture teaches us the gospel, what we have to understand about Christ Jesus is this Christ Jesus is not part of God. 00:30:34.880 --> 00:30:37.519 You know, the Trinity, it's so difficult to understand. 00:30:37.839 --> 00:30:38.319 Well, we can't. 00:30:38.400 --> 00:30:40.000 We can't fully understand it. 00:30:40.400 --> 00:30:42.960 But Jesus is not a third of God. 00:30:44.079 --> 00:30:48.880 Do you know that Jesus Christ, Scripture calls him the fullness of God? 00:30:50.640 --> 00:30:56.559 The fullness of God in Christ Jesus has been given to us. 00:30:58.640 --> 00:31:04.480 And he is more glorious and radiant than the very Son that lights our day. 00:31:04.720 --> 00:31:09.839 In fact, I would urge you to regularly consider how glorious and radiant Jesus Christ is. 00:31:09.920 --> 00:31:17.920 We should meditate on this regularly, for in so doing, we battle and resist the temptation of so often belittling him. 00:31:18.720 --> 00:31:36.880 For every time that we fail to recognize the radiance and the glory of Jesus Christ in our lives, it is worse, infinitely worse, than ignoring the radiance of the hot sun on a hot summer August day with no clouds. 00:31:37.920 --> 00:31:41.039 Which we all are very familiar with, how that feels. 00:31:42.480 --> 00:31:52.880 It would be like going outside at high noon in August on a cloudless day, and thinking you have to take a candle with you so that you can see. 00:31:54.400 --> 00:32:06.559 You have the relentless power of the sun roasting down on you, booming its light much farther than the eye can see, illuminating the world around you and giving you life. 00:32:06.720 --> 00:32:26.079 Brothers and sisters, when we neglect to remember our forgiveness in Christ and the fullness of God in Christ given to us and appropriately fear and have reverence for our great God, it is like forgetting that the sun is out and thinking that we have to go and operate during the day with no light. 00:32:26.240 --> 00:32:34.559 And so we take a little candle with us, a little candle that can't hold anything in comparison to the sun. 00:32:34.799 --> 00:32:38.079 What is a candle in comparison to the sun? 00:32:38.400 --> 00:32:44.000 And when we neglect to recognize the fullness of Christ in our lives, that's what we do. 00:32:44.720 --> 00:32:52.799 We go out and we depend on ourselves and we ignore the glorious radiance of Christ. 00:32:54.000 --> 00:33:04.640 Christ is the fullness of God, and He is fully capable and plentiful to redeem us from our sins. 00:33:06.880 --> 00:33:16.799 He is capable to bring us out of the depths, and He is capable to cast our sins as far as the East is from the West. 00:33:17.839 --> 00:33:21.519 So, church, remember who you belong to. 00:33:23.039 --> 00:33:31.519 Regularly reflect upon the glorious radiance of Christ and the fullness of God in Him and live your life in the light of Christ. 00:33:31.839 --> 00:33:37.200 Thirdly, the congregational horizon of people who hope in the Lord. 00:33:37.440 --> 00:33:38.960 So, what does this mean for us? 00:33:39.119 --> 00:33:41.440 What does this mean for the church this morning? 00:33:42.160 --> 00:33:45.759 Well, let me press it home in four ways briefly. 00:33:47.039 --> 00:33:50.880 To the Christian, in four different areas of your life. 00:33:50.960 --> 00:33:52.559 Maybe you identify with one of these. 00:33:52.720 --> 00:33:57.119 Maybe all of us have identified with one of these at different times in our lives. 00:33:57.440 --> 00:34:01.119 First, to the Christian in the depths. 00:34:03.279 --> 00:34:05.599 I would urge you this morning to cry out. 00:34:05.839 --> 00:34:07.599 Some of you are in the depths right now. 00:34:07.759 --> 00:34:14.639 Perhaps it is guilt over a sin that you keep returning to, perhaps a darkness of the soul that you cannot explain. 00:34:14.960 --> 00:34:18.320 Learn from this psalm where prayer begins. 00:34:18.960 --> 00:34:21.920 It begins in the depths. 00:34:22.400 --> 00:34:26.559 You do not have to climb out of the pit to pray. 00:34:27.519 --> 00:34:31.039 The pit is precisely where prayer is born. 00:34:31.360 --> 00:34:34.719 Out of the depths I cry to you. 00:34:34.960 --> 00:34:45.920 As Jonah cried out to the Lord from the belly of the well, which he found himself in due to his own rebellion against God, is no different for us. 00:34:46.559 --> 00:34:59.199 If you find yourself in the depths, do not wait till you muster up enough strength to get a little bit closer to God before you start crying out to him and praying to him because it's not going to happen. 00:34:59.440 --> 00:35:08.480 Cry out to the Lord from your struggles, from your place of being in the depths, cry out to God. 00:35:08.960 --> 00:35:28.000 In the 1660s, the great Puritan John Owen, one of my favorites, perhaps the best theologian England ever produced, passed through a season of spiritual darkness so severe that he's, as he later told a friend, he had preached forgiveness to others while scarcely daring to believe it for himself. 00:35:28.320 --> 00:35:34.639 And God brought him through by one verse, this verse in Psalm 130. 00:35:34.960 --> 00:35:38.480 But with you, there is forgiveness. 00:35:39.760 --> 00:35:47.199 Owen wrote an exposition of Psalm 130 that runs to hundreds of pages. 00:35:47.360 --> 00:35:48.159 Imagine that. 00:35:48.320 --> 00:35:54.400 In these eight verses, John Owen writes a commentary that takes up hundreds of pages. 00:35:54.639 --> 00:36:11.280 And the heart of it is his own testimony that the storm broke, the clouds gave way, when he stopped looking at the greatness of his sin and started looking at the greatness of God's forgiveness. 00:36:13.360 --> 00:36:20.639 And if Psalm 130 could hold John Owen, it is sufficient to hold any and all of us in here. 00:36:21.280 --> 00:36:29.119 Secondly, to the complacent, I would tell you to take the ledger seriously. 00:36:30.159 --> 00:36:34.719 Some of you in this room are not in the depths, and that is your danger. 00:36:35.119 --> 00:36:37.760 You may have never trembled at verse 3. 00:36:38.079 --> 00:36:41.039 You compare yourself to your neighbor, and you come out well enough. 00:36:41.199 --> 00:36:43.920 Well, I'm here, I'm at church. 00:36:44.320 --> 00:36:49.119 More people in Tyler this morning are not at church than are at church. 00:36:50.480 --> 00:36:53.440 I volunteer, I serve, I tithe. 00:36:54.719 --> 00:36:57.039 I'm a pretty good guy. 00:37:04.960 --> 00:37:10.000 Unless you meet the standard of Jesus Christ, you have not arrived. 00:37:10.880 --> 00:37:13.440 God marks iniquities. 00:37:13.679 --> 00:37:18.639 Every idle word the Lord Jesus said will be brought to judgment. 00:37:19.039 --> 00:37:24.880 If you've never asked who could stand, ask it now, while it is still today. 00:37:25.440 --> 00:37:37.199 Because it's better to face the ledger this morning when there's a redeemer to flee to, flee to Christ than at the last day when the books are opened and your chance is shut. 00:37:38.079 --> 00:37:40.159 Thirdly, to the waiting. 00:37:40.960 --> 00:37:42.639 Hope in his word. 00:37:43.679 --> 00:37:50.800 Some of you in this room have prayed and prayed and prayed, and the answer has not come. 00:37:51.119 --> 00:38:01.039 The prodigal son has not come home, the illness has not lifted, the night is long and dark, and the sorrow is deep. 00:38:01.440 --> 00:38:06.639 Hear the psalm, in his word I hope. 00:38:07.760 --> 00:38:12.880 Feelings rise and fall like the tide, the word of God stands fast. 00:38:13.840 --> 00:38:21.840 Wait like the watchman, not because you can see the sun, but because you know the sun's coming. 00:38:22.480 --> 00:38:25.760 You know that God has promised you morning. 00:38:27.360 --> 00:38:32.639 He has never once broken his word, and he will not begin with you. 00:38:33.519 --> 00:38:40.239 This is why we must root our faith in the word of God and not in our feelings. 00:38:40.400 --> 00:38:41.840 Our feelings are fickle. 00:38:42.079 --> 00:38:55.360 And if we base our relationship with God, our thoughts of God, our relationship with God on our feelings, then we are limiting God to our emotional instabilities because we're a messed up group of people. 00:38:55.599 --> 00:38:56.320 We really are. 00:38:56.480 --> 00:38:59.840 Even as the redeemed, we still got issues. 00:39:00.239 --> 00:39:07.679 And if we are limiting God based on how we feel, then we're making God very small. 00:39:08.000 --> 00:39:13.519 We mustn't view God through an emotional lens based on how we feel. 00:39:13.760 --> 00:39:14.960 You know what that's like? 00:39:15.199 --> 00:39:17.519 Do you remember Hall? 00:39:17.679 --> 00:39:20.960 Y'all remember the Forest Festival when it comes to Atlanta every year? 00:39:21.119 --> 00:39:24.719 Maybe you had a fair or carnival that you went through, went to. 00:39:24.880 --> 00:39:26.239 Not as popular as they used to be. 00:39:26.320 --> 00:39:30.639 Back in the, you know, the 90s is the best time to be alive, by the way, if I haven't said that before. 00:39:30.960 --> 00:39:35.360 Back in the 90s, we would go to the Forest Festival every year in this little small town in Atlanta. 00:39:35.440 --> 00:39:41.280 They had all the little carnival rides that were very safe, even though they were set up within 30 minutes. 00:39:41.440 --> 00:39:42.800 You know, what were we thinking? 00:39:42.960 --> 00:39:48.559 But anyway, they would have the fun houses, like the maize houses, and they had them, the trick mirrors in it. 00:39:48.719 --> 00:39:58.639 And you you've all seen these mirrors in these fun houses, and you go, and one makes you really, you know, kind of short and tubby, and the other one makes you really tall and then just distorts you. 00:39:58.800 --> 00:39:59.920 That's what it does. 00:40:00.159 --> 00:40:05.280 When we view God through our emotions, you distort him. 00:40:06.000 --> 00:40:07.119 That's what you do. 00:40:07.360 --> 00:40:12.320 You're viewing God, and you're not going to see the reality of who he is. 00:40:12.480 --> 00:40:17.199 You're just going to see a distortion of what your emotions are going to give you. 00:40:18.960 --> 00:40:27.039 We must consistently calibrate our hearts, our souls, our minds to view God rightly through his word. 00:40:27.599 --> 00:40:29.760 This is why we're here today. 00:40:30.079 --> 00:40:33.199 This is why we come back Wednesday night. 00:40:33.360 --> 00:40:36.639