Book of Psalms - Psa. 7, Vs. 6-17 (11/20/2022)

Park Meadows Church

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we tend, or at least I tend to believe that this psalm may not be concerning Shammah because he's not really in that mindset.

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In this psalm, he's like, No, I'm righteous. God has made me righteous, and I'm ready for Him to judge.

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That's not really the mindset we see Saul in when he's dealing with Shammah, though he does deal kindly with Shammah.

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Even when he comes back, he shows him mercy. However, when he's running from Saul, David is in great standing with the

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Lord. He hasn't done some sins that cause him to doubt his standing with the

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Lord. And so when we read the way this psalm is written, it seems as though David feels like,

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No, I'm doing great. I'm doing right, and yet something's not working. Well, that must have been the feeling.

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If you imagine that he was anointed king, but he doesn't get to go sit on the throne.

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He's anointed king, and he has to go and run from the usurper king for a long time, right?

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And so the feelings and the doubt doesn't seem to come from a place of,

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Oh, I have sinned, and I'm not sure about my standing with God. David's at like a high with God.

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His relationship with God has been really great. And now he's asking the Lord, Be the judge.

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Come on, do your thing. And so it seems to feel the way at least many of us would feel when we feel like we're doing well, and we are following God, and we keep expecting him to do something and to move and to make life better for us and to fix our problems and to be our king and our judge.

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And it almost seems as if he's just taking his time. That's kind of the feelings that we get from this psalm.

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So we saw David appeal to the Lord from this place of,

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No, I'm ready. Come on, do your thing. But he also appeals in a way like, If you don't hurry up and do something,

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I'm going to be rend. I'm going to be torn apart because my enemy is like a lion.

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And we remember when looking back at David in the cave,

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Saul came in. David cuts a piece of his robe off, even feels bad for doing that, even though he wouldn't harm

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Saul. He even feels a little bit bad for just cutting a piece of his robe off. And he runs out to Saul, throws himself at Saul's mercy and says,

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Let the Lord judge between you and me. And we see

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David doing something that many of us wouldn't do when we feel like we're in the right and someone else is in the wrong.

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When we feel like we're in the right and someone else is in the wrong, we tend to think, All right, I'm going to pray for you.

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And I'm going to just hope the Lord lets you come around, opens your eyes and makes you see how wrong you are.

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And that's how we tend to be. David doesn't do that. He throws himself at the mercy of the person he knows is in the wrong and says,

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I'm not your judge. You're not my judge. The Lord will judge between us. And I think that's so incredible.

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And we see Saul at that point, we discussed this last week, we see him at that point go,

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I know you're going to be king. Just remember me and don't cut me off from the land when that happens.

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And Saul leaves. This is a really phenomenal interaction between these two because Saul could finally kill him right there, which he's been trying to do and he doesn't do it.

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So this is the prayer that David is saying concerning someone who is slandering him.

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It may be one of Saul's close relatives causing

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Saul to think he needs to go and kill David. It may be that. We don't know for certain, but we do know this.

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We do know that there is someone slandering David. David knows he's in the right.

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And he feels like God should be doing something about this. And it's as if God's just taking his time.

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And I think we've all been in a situation like that before where we feel like we're doing what we're supposed to.

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Why do we have to keep struggling? So we see David appeal to the Lord and we got down through verse five last week.

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Where David kind of ends this appeal with, if I have done wrong, let the enemy persecute me, right?

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Let him tread down my life upon the earth and lay mine honor in the dust. And then he uses this word

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Salah, which the exact meaning of the word isn't known, but we've discussed this word in the past that it brings punctuation to whatever was said.

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And it brings an added feeling and that feeling can be a little bit different depending on what was said before.

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So when you read it in its context, Salah can mean a multitude of things. It's almost like the music getting louder, like a crescendo or like a musical pause for effect, right?

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Salah brings focus to whatever was just said.

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So when you see this word here, you can imagine that it's as if David is saying, let the enemy persecute my soul, right?

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If I'm wrong, let him take it, let him tread down my life upon the earth and lay my honor in the dust.

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And then go, I just said that. It's like, that's whoa.

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That's what the Salah brings is this feeling of, wow, I am committed now because I just said that.

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It's as if he's thrown himself off a cliff and said, all right, God, I'm completely in your hands now.

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And so that's the feeling that Salah brings. It brings like, whoa, this is important.

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And I hope I just did the right thing, you know? And so we're going to get into verse six now where it says,

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Arise, O Lord, in thine anger, lift up thyself because of the rage of mine enemies, and awake for me to the judgment that thou hast commanded.

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Now what we're about to see, now that David has appealed to the

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Lord, we're about to see David switching gears.

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Now we're going to see him saying, okay, it's happening.

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It's as if I've made my case and now here it comes.

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And so that's what we're going to be studying today. I hope we get through all of it. We'll see. But let's have a quick word of prayer before we get into that.

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Heavenly Father, thank you so much for your word. Thank you that it is truth. And thank you that we can hold ourselves up to it and say, is this the way that we live?

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Is this the way we feel? Maybe we feel a little bit like David did in this Psalm sometimes.

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And I think what's beautiful about your servant, David, is that he always comes around to the right settlement, the right judgment and the right actions in his own life.

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So we can hold ourselves up to your servant and say, okay, when he was feeling this way, what did he do?

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And then we can do the same and we will be like David, people after your own heart. So help us to do that,

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Father, in Jesus name we pray. Amen. Okay. So arise, O Lord, in thine anger, lift up thyself because of the rage of mine enemies and awake for me to the judgment that thou hast commanded.

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Now, these are pretty bold requests from David. Here's why they're bold.

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It has almost a passive aggressive phraseology to them. What do

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I mean by that? I don't mean that he's being disrespectful or anything like that. He's asking the

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Lord to rise up as if the Lord's laying down on the job. He is asking the

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Lord to get active as if he's being passive.

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You can only apply that to God in a very limited sense because God does not have to rest, right?

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We see the Lord rest, take a rest from creation and Genesis.

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We see him rest from his works. So we do know that the Lord can and does rest.

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And so David must be thinking at this moment, that's the state God is in right now.

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Like he should be judging and right now he's taking a break. But it's not really like a disrespectful tone.

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It's like, okay, are you in rest mode? I need you in judge mode. You see, you're in the wrong mode, please.

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So it's almost like you're laying down, get up, get up, do this thing for me.

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And it says, awake as if the Lord is sleeping. Awake for me to the judgment that thou hast commanded.

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All right, so do what you say. You say you're going to be a judge, stop sleeping on the job for me.

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Maybe I'm wrong, but it seems like you're in sleep mode and it's judge mode time.

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Verse seven, so shall the congregation of the people compass thee about for their sakes, therefore return thou on high.

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When you read this, it almost sounds like what David is saying is everyone's going to be around you when you do this.

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They're going to compass you about like this is going to be a good thing. That's how it sounds almost. But think of what

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David is saying. He's saying, you seem like you're sleeping. You seem like you're not doing judge mode like I want.

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Everybody else is kind of feeling this way. Everyone's going to come around.

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What I love about this Psalm is that now that I've had kids, it reminds me of the way kids operate.

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And David is doing like a kid would do. Like the others want this too, dad, right?

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This isn't just me. That's what he's saying when he says that the congregation of people will compass thee about.

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They all have problems too. They need judgment too. And we know that's what he's saying because the very next part of that says for their sake, therefore return thou on high.

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What does he mean return thou on high? Obviously God is always on high, right? So he's not really saying you are not on high.

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What he's saying is it's time to ascend to the judgment throne again, get back up on the throne, get out of bed, back up on the throne for me.

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And so that's God or that's David telling

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God, I'm not the only one who needs judgment here. This is not me coming alone to you.

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Everybody needs this. So come on. Okay.

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The Lord shall judge the people. This is verse eight. Oh, but I wanted to say one more thing.

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I think it's interesting that David says for their sakes, therefore return thou on high.

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He wants this for himself. But for whatever reason,

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David feels like God's not moving for me. So maybe not for me, do it for everyone else.

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You see, like if you're not doing it for me, you've got a lot of people who need this. So do it for them.

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At least get up for their sakes. Judge for their sakes. And what's beautiful about that is how it ties into verse eight.

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The Lord shall judge the people. So it's like, okay, it's as if he's saying it's happening.

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I imagine now that when you read commentary from people like Spurgeon, this is what they conclude.

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That at this point, David sees God rising up and ascending to the judgment seat.

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As if in his mind while he's praying this, it's like, okay, I know God's hearing me and I know that he's taking action.

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So the Lord shall judge the people. It's as if David sees him ascending and he turns around like, it's happening, guys.

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The Lord is going to judge the people as if he's sounding the trumpet. Here it comes, judgment.

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And watch what he says next. Judge me, O Lord, according to my righteousness and according to mine integrity that is in me.

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Do we have any righteousness or integrity within ourselves? Not in and of ourselves.

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That comes from the Lord. And then David knows this. David knows that the righteousness he has is completely because of God.

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But it's interesting that he sees God ascending to the throne of judgment.

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And he's like, yes, here we go. And then the very first thing he does is he steps in front of everybody.

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Remember, he was like, do this for their sake. He steps in front of everybody. He's like, me first. This reminds me so much of my kids.

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And it's almost always around candy, by the way. It is. It's like Sam and Abby, they want candy.

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So can they have some candy? Yeah, they can have some candy. How about me? Can I have some candy too?

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That's how they like to come about it. Sam said he didn't get any candy yesterday, Mommy. So don't you think he should have some?

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Okay, yeah, he can have some. Well, can I have some too? I've had that conversation with my kids so many times.

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It's like, do it for their sake, but me first. You see? And that's what we're seeing with David here.

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So it's like, the Lord shall judge the people. Me first. Judge me, O Lord, according to my righteousness and according to mine integrity that is in me.

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And then, almost as if, now that he sees

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God standing up, it's as if he has this moment of doubt. Like, wait a minute, are you actually going to do it?

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It's as if he's saying, wait, wait, wait. Are you coming? Please, because watch what he says in verse 9.

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Oh, let the wickedness of the wicked come to an end, but establish the just. For the righteous

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God trieth the hearts and reigns. This word, oh, like, come on.

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Oh, let the wickedness of the wicked come to an end. For me, it's the picture of my kids come to me, they want candy.

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Can I have some too? Sure. Okay, let's go. And it's like, are you coming to get us the candy,

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Dad? Like, I'm walking, it's in there. Come on, let's go. And that's how this verse feels.

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It feels as if David is saying, yes, it's happening.

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Judge me first. But then all of a sudden, oh, come on. Let the wickedness, like, be judged.

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Like, let it come to an end and establish the just. It's an added plea of do what

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I ask. Why would he feel the need to plea it again if he already sees

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God standing up and going to the judgment seat? He has to see action, so he's seeing action, but it's almost like you're doing it, but you're not doing it fast enough.

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How many times have we felt that in our lives? It feels like you're, you know,

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I can kind of see things are happening. It feels like maybe God's working in this situation, but we're still not where I want to be.

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That's how it feels a lot of times. Like, okay, this is, I can start to see the signs because sometimes we'll start praying for a situation and it feels like nothing has happened.

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It feels like things are getting worse and worse and worse. And we begin to purify ourselves in our walk, okay?

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Things are getting worse and I'm not right with God. We begin to look inwardly and say, I need to be more right with God.

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Remember Psalm 23? David writes that Psalm and everything seems great in the first part of that Psalm.

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The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. He makes me to lie down in green pastures. He leadeth me beside the still waters.

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He restores my soul. He leadeth me down the paths of righteousness for his namesake.

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And the very next part is, yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil.

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And he goes from talking about God in the third person to talking with God in the first person.

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I will fear no evil for thou art with me. Thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me. See, when God brings us through valleys and he brings us through turmoil and brings us through unrest, the whole point of it is to get us more focused on him.

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It's to get us to go, oh yeah, God is great. We, as Christians, we know that.

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And we'll start talking about him like we're, we love everything he's done for us. And we'll talk about him in the third person, like God gave me this blessing.

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God gave me that blessing. He's done so many wonderful things. But then he begins to lead us down a path of righteousness.

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See that word, righteousness? For his namesake, it gets us more focused on him. And so we see that playing out with David here.

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And so now as he's going through that path and he's seeing God stand up and he's like, yes, it's going to happen.

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Judge me first. Next, he's like, are you coming? Faster, faster.

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I love how focused he is. He's so incredibly focused on what is

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God doing, that even though he sees God doing what he's hoping for, he is focused on, is he doing it as fast as I want him to do?

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It's, it's really cool because we, we see that it's in relation to something that's bothering

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David. We see that David's got problems and he wants those problems fixed.

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But instead of going, oh, the problems are getting worse. Oh, I really can't stand these people who are slandering me or anything like that.

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He's like, okay, God's moving. Here it comes. Yes, faster.

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Come on. He's just completely focused on God doing his thing. And then he's like, all right, we're getting a play by play of what

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God's doing for him. A righteous

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God would try the hearts and reins. That's the next part of that verse, verse nine, for the righteous

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God trieth the hearts and reins. This, this word for reins means inward parts, right?

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Like, like the guts of a man. So God, God will trieth our inward parts.

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And so how important would you say it is that we are made new?

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If that is how God looks at us, he doesn't see the outside actions as much as the inside motivations for those actions.

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That's what God is going after. Like, okay. Yeah. You tied to church. Yeah. You prayed in front of some people.

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You told some people that you loved them and that you cared for them. You made them feel like they are, are loved by you.

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That's cool. But were you doing it for selfish gain? Were you doing it to increase your status?

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Were you doing it so that you'd have a better reputation? Or were you doing it because you have a sacrificial love for me and for them?

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He tries the inward parts, the parts that we don't even tend to focus on when we're doing those things.

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Sometimes at least, and I'll say this, I'm speaking for myself here. Like I was trained as a kid to act a certain way and to treat others a certain way.

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And at some point in my life, I took that and I ran with it. And I decided I'm going to be Mr. Nice Guy.

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And if I'm truly honest with you guys, there are times when that's kind of been the thing.

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I am becoming known as Mr. Nice Guy. You see, that didn't really have much to do with me loving the

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Lord or even loving other people. It's like, look at me. I'm getting a good reputation. And I have to remember that.

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And I have to keep myself in check for that. Because if it becomes about that, then it's emptiness.

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It's vanity. So the Lord is going to try my inward parts.

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He's going to say, what is your motivation? Why are you acting the way you are? Why do you try to look like a

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Christian when you come in contact with other Christians? And what most people would say, when you get out in the world, you look more like the world.

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I'm not even going to say that with you guys because I know that I'm preaching the choir here, right? Here's what it looks like for us.

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Why do you look like a Christian around other Christians? And maybe in front of the rest of the world. But when you're by yourself, your thoughts aren't with the

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Lord and with his people. Because that's really where we tend to mess up the most,

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I would think. Because many of us probably have a reputation to uphold.

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A reputation with our fellow brothers and sisters. A reputation outside of our church family with the world.

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Oh, they're a Christian. And we don't want to bring slanderous accusations against our

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God by being caught in sin. We struggle with secret sin. We struggle with the stuff on the inside.

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The guts. And that's what God's going to try. So it's a pretty bold statement for David to say,

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Judge me first. According to my righteousness that is within me.

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Why are his inward guts righteousness? Because God made them that way. No other reason.

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That's the operation of Jesus Christ on the cross. And because of that, we are able to endure a judgment that we see a little bit more clearly over the next couple of verses.

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Watch how intense the judgment gets. Okay, so he says, okay,

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I'm upright. Let the wickedness come to an end.

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And establish the just. Establish the righteous and do so by judging the inward parts.

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But then he says, but my defense, my defenses of God, which saveth the upright in heart.

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So now it's like, okay, it's happening. He's finally judging. Yes. Judge me first.

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But I've got God on my side. You know, like. This is a big scary thing.

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Yeah, I know I'm being judged. But God is my defense. God judges the righteous.

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And God is angry with the wicked every day. If he turn not, he will wet his sword.

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He has bent his bow and made it ready. He has also prepared for him the instruments of death.

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He ordained his arrows against the persecutors. I want you to see one word in there that's actually really scary.

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It's not the word death. Although that's pretty scary too.

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It's not the fact that God is preparing instruments of death for these people. That's kind of scary. It's not so much that he is ordaining his arrows.

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All of this stuff is kind of scary. But the reason it's scary is because of the word is.

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And God is angry with the wicked every day.

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Not that he can be. Not that he sometimes is and sometimes isn't.

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He always is. And he's angry with them every day. Think about a person who's not been made righteous.

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Someone who has not been regenerated and their inward parts are not made righteous and good and clean by the

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Lord. That person has the creator of the universe angry with them every single day.

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So they wake up in the morning and they feel like my life's going all right.

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I'm excelling in business or I'm excelling in relationships.

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Or I'm excelling in status. My finances are increasing.

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Even when all the great stuff that we see happening to people who don't seem to love the

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Lord. When all of that is occurring, they have this terrible dreadful curse on them that the

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God of the universe is angry with them. So what does that anger look like?

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He sees their sin. And if you want to know what that anger looks like, look at Jesus on the cross.

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When Jesus was hanging on the cross, beaten and bloodied and bruised, having a difficult time breathing, a crown of thorn on his head.

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There he is. He's hanging on the cross. His own mother can hardly recognize him.

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And the scripture tells us that it pleased the Father to bruise the Son. So not only does

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God get angry at sin, he takes pleasure in demolishing it.

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So there's Jesus hanging on the cross. And all the sins of the world are hiding behind the

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Father's beloved child. As if to say, he can't get us here.

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He loves Jesus too much. Here we are. Let's hide here.

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And Jesus, knowing this, hanging on the cross, we don't see him say this in scripture.

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But this essentially is what happens. It's as if Jesus is hanging on the cross and says,

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God, here they are. Father, they're right here behind me. Come and get them.

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And the Father, in all his wrath, blows through the Son to demolish the sin.

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I mean, if you want goosebumps, think of the bravery that Jesus had to face head -on the wrath of an angry

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God and to feel that wrath going right through him to demolish the sin.

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And the pleasure that it gave the Father to demolish that sin.

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He is waiting to demolish sin. If you think about David going, why aren't you moving?

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Judge this. Come on. If you think about the fact that God, more so than David wants it,

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God wants it. More so than David wants it, God wants it.

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So when David is going, you're sleeping on the job. You're not active.

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You're passive. Come on. And then when he finally sees God move, he's like, but you're not moving fast enough.

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He has to realize that the Father wants this judgment more than he does.

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So what is it that's causing him to seem to move so slowly? It's mercy.

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It's long -suffering. Spurgeon says that as much as we want the

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Lord, because this is the cry of the entire congregation, of all the righteous, of all of God's people, it's like, when is

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God going to make this world right? We see things getting worse. We see laws being broken with no repercussion.

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We see doubt in what was otherwise a good election process for our country.

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We see evil being called good and good being called evil.

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We see cancel culture. And we go, when is God going to move?

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He despises this. Emily shared a picture of some quarters.

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And she was like, when did this happen? And the picture is of an older quarter and a newer quarter. And it just shows difference in the 2022 quarter from like the 1989 or 1995 quarter or something like that.

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And we have flipped Washington's, George Washington's head to face the other way.

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What that does is it takes him from facing the phrase, in God we trust, to facing away from the phrase, in God we trust.

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Even our money shows that we have turned our backs on God as a nation. Was that purposeful?

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I don't know. Probably not. But maybe it was. It was probably purposeful by the enemy.

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But man may not even realize that we're signaling that with our money.

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So we as Christians, we see it and we go, when is God going to fix this? But we have to realize that this is

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God's long suffering. We should be rejoicing in the time he takes because that, from the human perspective, means more people have time to get saved.

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I say from the human perspective because we know that of them that God has given the

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Son, he will lose none. Whoever's going to be saved is going to be saved.

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Jesus won't lose one of them. But from our perspective, within time, it seems like the longer

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God takes, at least the more time people have to come to a saving knowledge of Jesus. So we should be praising the

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Lord for his long suffering. We don't do that. We cry to the

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Lord and we complain to the Lord. And I want you to think about this for a second. In the eyes of man,

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God can do no right. And that does not include, that doesn't mean just in the eyes of the world.

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And it doesn't mean just in the eyes of God's children. It means in all of us. Because when we see

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God taking too long, we say that. We say it's too long, but really it's God's long suffering.

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When the world sees God finally judging and doing what he's just to do, the world calls him evil and hateful.

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So if God moves and does what's just, the world's going to hate him. If God takes his time in doing it, his own people.

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It's strong to say we're going to hate him, but it almost seems that way. We're certainly not trusting and loving him when we're going, you're taking too long,

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God, come on. Our plan isn't the right plan. His plan is the right plan. Does that make sense?

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Okay. If he turned not, this is verse 12.

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If he turned not, he will wet his sword. He hath bent his bow and made it ready.

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He hath also prepared for him the instruments of death. He ordaineth his arrows against the persecutors.

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You see, he's got instruments of death ready for the fight, ready for the kill.

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It's not even going to be a fight. It's just going to be a kill. Have you ever shot a bow and arrow before?

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Has anyone ever done that? I've done it. I'm not too great at it.

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It takes skill to hit something with a bow and arrow. You pull that thing back and your arms start to do this.

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You try to aim, but you've got to use a lot of strength to get the bow back.

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And then you're trying to get it just right.

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And the longer you hold it back, the more you start to wiggle. So I think it's very interesting that it uses arrows as the analogy here.

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Because it does take great strength and it takes great accuracy to hit with arrows and to kill with arrows.

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But that's what the Lord will do. And it will need great accuracy. Why? Because what did

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David say? My defense is of God. Right? So think about this.

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Come on, God. Judge me. Judge us. Judge for their sakes.

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If not for mine, judge for their sakes. Okay, here he comes. The Lord is judging. Here it goes. Judge me first.

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Get in front, right? But now all of a sudden you see God. And he's like, my defense is of God.

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Not me. Not me. We're good. Judge me, but righteousness in here.

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Let's let those arrows go past me, please. Get these other guys. Verse 14.

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Behold, he travaileth with iniquity. Now David is going to summarize what judgment looks like on the wicked from God.

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The wicked is travailing with iniquity. And hath conceived mischief and brought forth falsehood.

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That's verse 14. Verse 15. He made a pit and digged it and has fallen into the ditch which he made.

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You brought this on yourself, evil guys. Those who are persecuting me and slandering me when

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I was in the right. Maybe you're saying evil lies into the ear of Saul, the usurper king.

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And I have no ill will towards him. I've had many opportunities to kill this guy and I won't do it.

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So this is all lies. I'm in the right. I'm being long -suffering like God would be long -suffering.

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I'm being merciful like God's being merciful. Here he comes to judge you.

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Here he comes to hit you with his arrows. And you brought this on yourself. He's been angry with you every day.

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And you're about to reap the consequences. His mischief shall return upon his own head.

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And his violent dealings shall come down upon his own pate. I will praise the

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Lord according to his righteousness. Isn't that interesting that now he's going to put all the focus on God's righteousness.

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When God stands up and he judges, it's a righteous thing. It's not just just.

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It is good. I will praise the Lord according to his righteousness.

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And that righteousness is within me. His righteousness is my righteousness.

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His cleanliness is my cleanliness because he put it there. And we'll sing praise to the name of the

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Lord most high. It's finally happening.

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There's victory. I've been waiting so long. And I knew

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I could get him to do it. He didn't really get him to do it, right? But we play a role.

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God ordained that David would do this. He ordained that David would stand up and plead with him for judgment.

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We should be doing the same thing. But the only way that we will actually get to a point where we boldly stand up for judgment is if we feel clean in the righteousness that God has given us.

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The way we feel clean in the righteousness God has given us, that's positional righteousness, is to act out that positional righteousness and experience sanctification, experiential righteousness.

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When we feel like we are following God's commands, we will be emboldened.

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We will be empowered to stand up and say, judge us.

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We're ready for it. Because in reality, guys, the only thing God sees is the righteousness he put on you.

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He sees the positional righteousness. The only reason why we don't stand up boldly and say, let the

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Lord judge between me and thee to our enemies is because we're not walking in the righteousness that God has put us in.

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It's a problem with us. It's not a problem with God. He's not being slow. He's being long -suffering.

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And we tend to think of long -suffering as being something that he's doing so that from the human perspective, other people can get saved.

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But he's also being long -suffering towards us, waiting for us to get to that point of sanctification where we boldly stand up like David did here and say, judge, we're ready for it.

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It's a scary thing. It always will be. It will be.

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I tend to think, all right, I want God to come back. I want Jesus to descend from heaven.

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I want one foot on the Mount of Olives and one foot in the sea. I want to see it happen. And then there's a flip side of me that goes, maybe just not yet.

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Why not yet? I still have some growing to do. I still have some sanctification to go through.

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I want to feel ready. I want to feel like, no, when God comes back,

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I'm going to be like, ha, I'm clean before the Lord. And if I'm honest,

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I don't feel that quite yet. I have some more seasons to go through where I go longer without sin.

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Where I go longer of saying, no, I am done with the old

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Dave and I am living mostly in the new Dave. I want to be in the new Dave when

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Jesus comes back. And I think what we see in Psalm 7 is what it would look like to be in the new

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Dave or for y 'all, the new self. Because this Dave was boldly standing as if he was the new

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Dave. And so for me, Psalm 7 has been pretty cool because it speaks to me a lot in the way that I feel.

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I feel like David has felt here. There's been a lot of waiting on the

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Lord. And I have always thought of myself as a patient person. Apparently, I'm not patient enough because Lord's teaching me more patience.

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So that is Psalm chapter 7. I hope you've enjoyed it. Are there any thoughts before we close with a word of prayer?

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All right. Well, then let's pray. Heavenly Father, thank you so much for your long suffering.

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Thank you for your mercy. We tend to think that is more about those who have not yet come to a saving knowledge of you.

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So when we try to comfort ourselves about you being a little slow on our timetable, we get some comfort because we think, yeah, other people need to come to know the

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Lord. But really, that is a benefit for them. And we forget that there's a benefit for us as well.

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And that benefit is that we have more time to get closer to you and to be more changed in our sanctification process so that we look like David looked here, ready for judgment.

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And ultimately, David is just a picture of your son, Jesus. He was so ready that he took on all the sins, not just of me, but of everyone else in this room.

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And all the sins of his elect. And he put them all on himself and said,

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Father, come get them. I'll probably never be that bold, but I sure would like to aspire to be.

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So, Father, clean me, cleanse me, make me ready for bigger and better things.

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Please do that for all of us and give us boldness before you. It's in your name we ask these things.