2023 Laborers' Conference- Session 3 Psalm 110: The Last Enemy is Death

The Christian Response to Death and Christ’s Victory Over the Grave

Hey, yo, welcome, welcome to the Laborers' Conference. This is the Chicano Knox, aka Jesse, and I got the homie Dan with me.

What's up, man?

Hey, man, tell everybody where you're from and where can they find you real quick.

Oh, I'm from Oneonta, New York, and you can find me on Facebook, YouTube. Me and Rob do the Truth and Love podcast.

Yeah, that's about it.

Yeah, and so this is day two of the podcast, not just the podcast, but the conference, and what you call it, Claude Ramsey is gonna go ahead and kick off the conference, and real quick, before he starts, before we go into his message today.

And his message is gonna be about the last enemy is death. And you can't really talk about Jesus' kingship, Jesus' authority, without talking about this one issue of death. And death is the real thing, you know, as a whole world, we just experienced something called, you know, COVID -19, and, you know, a lot of people lost their lives, and every day people lose their lives.

And, you know, death is a real thing, and there is a Christian response to death. There is a theology and an explanation for it. And you can't really talk about Jesus without talking about death. And I think it's a great way to start off the conference to talk about the Christian response to death.

So real quick, I don't wanna steal too much thunder from Claude. Dan, what is, you think, the big issue with death other than everybody feels it?

The big issue with death is because we have sin. Sin causes death, and that causes us to all have issues and troubles from illness, disease, heartache, all the different sort of crimes that are committed in the world, violence, and all that.

It's all stemmed from sin, which leads to death, which is why it's so incredible that Jesus himself on the cross died and then got back up. And not, once again, not to steal too much from, well, no, Claude's gonna be talking about here in just a few minutes, but seeing Christ have victory over death is what gives us our hope, knowing that once dead, not always dead, because Christ has risen again.

You think he's started already?

Let's go ahead and see if we can.

I believe they are.

Here's the music.

Let's see.

I think they're still warming up.

All right.

Give it another few minutes.

So if you guys can, please go ahead and subscribe to the Laborers Podcast on YouTube. Go on YouTube if you're on your phone and type in the Laborers Podcast, and you would see us. And very much appreciate it that you guys would just subscribe, hit the like button, go ahead and share it with your friends and family.

Any support that you guys could give us would be tremendously appreciated. For all of this, it's just an attempt that we're trying to do to get out there, to get the word out there, especially about Jesus.

Things like this takes effort, takes time, takes energy, takes money, resources, and all that stuff. So we want to continue this. We want to expand this and continue doing this in the future. And we cannot do that if people are not catching wind of this and liking, subscribing is part of, I guess, your participation is to jump on board by supporting this.

And we need more conferences like this, you know?

What do you think?

Yeah, absolutely. One of the cool things about this particular conference is that the folks who are here are all part of local churches somewhere. They're all doing their own thing under the authority of their elders in their local church.

So we're not just a group of guys with no authority or anything. We're coming together as Christ Church together to encourage the church to build one another up. And that's one of the reasons why this is so important, why we're trying to do things the way that we are.

That way we can provide an extra resource to be a benefit and a blessing to the churches all across the world, which is crazy to think about since we all just started in our basements and computers and fancy microphones where I haven't really dealt with before.

Yeah, it's a little different, huh? So tell us about the resurrection real quick. How does the resurrection story narrative in Christianity is an answer to death? How is the resurrection the answer for death?

The resurrection is the answer for death because of what Christ has done. And here's what I mean by that. I'm really basically just rephrasing your question. The resurrection means that what was once dead is then alive, which here's what it means.

Christ entered death sinlessly so that way he can defeat death. So that way when we enter into a physical death, we don't have to stay there because Christ has adopted us as brothers, brought us into relationship with the father and brought us into the family of God.

And one of the things that's a benefit and inheritance of the family of God is righteous and eternal life. So that we can receive life as family members of God Almighty in heaven. Christ is our brother and God is our father.

Death affects everything, huh? Like the one man, Adam, disobeys him and his wife and then death just comes into the cosmos and then it wrecks everything. It destroys relationships, it destroys creations, dying.

You know, there's death everywhere now. And then with one man, Jesus, dying on the cross, doing that sacrificial act as a priest, as a king, you know, dying to make a people for himself, to create that access, you know, to bridge that gap and say, with one man, you know, Christ Jesus comes that reconciliation between God and man.

Now it's possible. So death is like, Jesus is the solution for that, for that answer, for that question. What about death? How do you think other religions answer death? Like I met somebody at the conference talking about reincarnation and I never thought about this, but reincarnation is kind of like a, like a very tempting, provocative thought for a human, for people.

Because it's like, I get to come back and live and get a second chance at life again.

Right, yeah, if I screwed up the first time, I get a second go around at it.

Yeah, so it's like, it's very tempting because it's like, okay, well, it kind of doesn't really matter what I do then. Right, I'm looking forward to coming back. And even if I don't remember my old life, the thought of coming back again to participate in life and do it all over again, kind of takes the weight off consequences, the judgment and, you know, things like that.

So I thought of it as, that's very tempting to, that's like a pop-up, that's very tempting to like believe that.

It can be, but it neglects one big thing that when we die, our sins don't just get wiped away to try over again. We have to answer for what we've done.

It takes away justice.

Right, it takes away justice because it just makes everything arbitrary, mystical. It's like a, it gives things absolutely no meaning. So why try to do better? It doesn't matter anyway.

Yeah, so I thought about that yesterday when I was talking to somebody about that and I was like, dang, yeah, that does take away the responsibility, you know, the justice, doesn't it? Is Claude starting it?

Go ahead, Claude.

Let's take a look, guys.

Let's see.

Why? Let's go ahead and see. Put us on the small screen, side by side.

Believe it's time to get ready to start some music.

Let us act like we've done this before.

Switch it up.

You can probably just unmute it and then play it.

So we wanna, again, issue our thanks to Vertical Life Church for hosting this event, for bringing us all in, for being so gracious of a host and as a church for helping put this on. This isn't something we had really envisioned for so long and then it's staring us in the eyes.

So there's that. We have a order form on the back table for Labor's Conference t-shirts like Mr. Big John's wearing right now. We didn't have enough for everybody, but we've got an order form back there if you would like to get one, reserve a size and quantity.

And so those are, we're gonna be doing that throughout the day today. And then while you're back there, there is a resource table that we've provided some books on various topics concerning the gospel.

Those are free to take, free to read, free to share. We've got about 23 copies left of John Owen's The Morification of Sin, courtesy of Rochester Book and Bible and Easley. They were gracious to donate those to us.

And there's quite a few over there. I just know about the one because I brought it. We'll be taking up a love offering a little bit later starting in the next session when Brother Dan comes up to preach, we will be taking up a love offering for the expenses of the conference, for feeding the future ministry of the Truth and Love Network.

We would invite you to prayerfully consider partnering with us on that one. And without further ado, let us pray before we get started. And Brother Collado will be preaching on Psalm 110 this morning.

Father God, we are grateful for all that you are and all that you do. And we are grateful that you have blessed us with this opportunity to gather, to hear, to sharpen, to exhort one another, to provoke one another in the gospel in every facet of life, not just the easy ones.

And Lord, as we gather this time throughout this day, would you sharpen our minds, not according to what the speaker says, but according to who you are. Let us hear you. Let us hear your words. Let us be exhorted.

Let us be convicted. Let us be humbled by you. In Christ's name, amen.

He came from glory,.

Took on flesh to save us. He's weighed upon the cross for our redemption. The hope for all.

The power of your name. Yeah, the power of your name. We have power over sickness, disease, over hell, over the grave. Lord, we thank you for the hope that we have in Jesus Christ. And we praise you for the work that you have done in us, that you do through us, Lord.

And we ask that you would bless this time, brother, as he brings a message this morning. And Lord, I pray for those in this room that I thank you that they're here, but I thank you, Lord, that they've come to hear.

And if there are those here or online who don't know you, who don't know Jesus as their savior, that your name would have power in their lives today. Lord, work in us as well. In Jesus' name, we pray.

You can be seated.

Psalm 110 and the Lordship of Christ

Well, good morning. Good morning, brother. So glad you're here this morning. Thankful that you're here on a foggy, sleepy morning, okay? And that you are smiling. Are you smiling?

Yes.

Amen, amen. I'm gonna invite brother Claude Ramsey up. Claude has a podcast called the Here I Stand Theology Podcast. He's also the pastor of Reformation Church. A lot of people has been asking us, in Knoxville, Tennessee, by the way.

I don't know if you guys realize this, those watching online and those that are here, how far some people have actually traveled to be here. So Dan's come from upstate New York. They drove, the kids were doing good, so they drove pretty much all night, right?

The night, just right on through. So he come from upstate New York. Jesse's probably the farthest away. He in Santiago. They came from Colorado Springs, Colorado. Jeremy from South Carolina, North Carolina, border right there.

What's the name of the town?

Jeremy.

Myrtle Beach, okay. He comes from Myrtle Beach. He's suffering for Jesus at Myrtle Beach, right? And so, and then again, Claude coming in with a couple brothers from Reformata Church from Knoxville, Tennessee.

Claude is a guy that when you meet him, you fall in love with him. He's a brother that's an encourager, strongly convicted with theology, but also knows how to use theology and conviction to encourage, to navigate with love through hard things, and a man full of grace and wisdom.

That's what I think about you, Claude, when I first met you. I said, man, this is a dude full of grace and full of wisdom, and I'm very thankful for that. So real quick, after every session, there will be a breakout session, okay?

Today, Tyler will be leading a breakout session here right after service, and we'll do that right up front here for this first one. We may move to the classroom right over there, but for our first one, we'll just meet right in here, and those will be recorded for the sake of those who can't attend or for some folks back home, okay?

Jeremy's breakout session will be right over at First Baptist Church. First Baptist Church is allowing us to host some stuff, and so we'll navigate over there. If you guys wanna go there with Jeremy, wanna carpool, you can do that.

So Jeremy, would you stand and just give us a quick, like, 30-second synopsis of your breakout session, just so folks can know? Amen, amen. Anybody need some help with patience in life? Amen, all right.

And then, Tyler, would you please do the same? Would you please just give us a quick overview? Very good, and again, Tyler has worked very hard to acquire those books back there. The resource table, anything on that resource table is free, and so we had a couple folks grab, like, an armful of stuff the other night, and we're thankful for that.

Please help yourself. That's to equip you, so please do that, and especially the mortification of sin. That's a great resource that we've been supported with. Let's pray, and let's pray over Brother Claude.

Come ahead, Brother. Father, thank you so much for this morning. We pray for our brothers. He stands to deliver this message that's gonna glorify you, Christ, that's gonna raise you high. We thank you for that, and so we pray that you would anoint him even as we read to open up this whole weekend in Isaiah chapter six.

We pray that you would cleanse his lips, purify his heart, make clear his mind this one objective to lift you high, Jesus, for you are our audience of one today. Whether we're singing or preaching, it's all for your glory, all for your honor, and then we know from that we get great good.

We get strengthened. We get sanctified. We are edified, so blessing that today, we pray. We bless this our brother in Jesus' name. Amen, amen. Come ahead, Brother.

If you would, this morning, please turn to Psalm 110 and stand with us. If you would, to honor the reading of God's holy word. These are the words of the living God. The Lord says to my Lord, sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool.

The Lord sends forth from Zion your mighty scepter. Rule in the midst of your enemies. Your people will offer themselves freely on the day of your power and holy garment from the womb of the morning, the dew of your youth will be yours.

The Lord has sworn and will not change his mind. You are a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek. The Lord is at your right hand. He will shatter kings on the day of his wrath. He will execute judgment among the nations.

Filling them with corpses. He will shatter chiefs over the wide earth. He will drink from the brook by the way. Therefore, he will lift up his head. If we could, let's pray one more time. Lord, as I come before you once again, I wanna thank you and I wanna praise you for assurance of faith and the witness of your Holy Spirit to the truth of your word.

And Lord, my desire today is nothing else but this. Show us Christ in your word. God, today only you are able to do what is the work that is necessary to be done. And so what I would ask you is this, Lord, as we look at your word today, draw back the veil in a sense, Lord.

Show us your glory. Let us know your holiness. How great and how awesome and how mighty that you are. And in seeing that, we will inevitably recognize how little and weak and small we are. Lord, today God, through the preaching of the gospel, save the lost.

Please, Lord, take hearts of stone out of the people who would hear this today and give them hearts of flesh that they can respond to you. Oh God, that today might be the day that the lost are saved and let today be the day, God, that the downcast, the cold, the nearly dried up would be refreshed and would be revived.

Lord, continue what you began on Thursday. Work according to your will and to you and you alone. Be the glory, honor, and praise. For it's in Jesus' name that I ask you these things, Lord. Amen. Never think that you have knowledge enough or that you study the word more fully, but that God safeguards our humility by keeping us in continual dependence upon him for teaching and for revelations of himself from the word.

He never in this world brings any soul to the utmost of what is from the word to be made out and discovered. Plain language, we do not know it all, but we do know what we have been given. And thanks be unto God, Augustine said this, just as there are shallows in scripture where a lamb may wade, so there are depths in scripture where an elephant may swim, depths which the most learned and the most godly have yet to plumb.

All Christians, therefore, should approach the study of scripture knowing that we know but little and we must long to learn more and we must ever look to God himself to open unto us his word. I am a big dummy because I asked to preach on this text.

After having asked to preach on it and beginning to pray and to try to prepare, I realized that I am absolutely inadequate. Nevertheless, I'm going to do my best to glorify the Lord today and to give you the word of God.

If you're taking notes today, there will only be two parts in this sermon which should make note-taking quite simple for you. Part one will be an exposition of the text here and part two will be an exhortation and an encouragement for you to look unto the Lord and be saved.

Number one, beginning with our exposition of the text, let's establish this fact that this is the psalmist David that we are reading here. I say that because there are some skeptics, thank you so much, brother, there are some skeptics who would argue and disprove that this is David but the scriptures teach us the very plain truth in the Old Testament that by the mouth of two or three witnesses that every word will be established.

Well, here we have David speaking God's inspired word and in the New Testament, we have the apostle Peter affirming that it is David speaking in his inspired word when he quotes David in the great Pentecost sermon.

The great Pentecost sermon we hear David referred to as being quoted here in this text and as a third witness, and so we need it anymore, we have the greatest of witnesses, we have it in the inscripturated word of God.

So this is David speaking here. Now, what do we see in this text? Beginning in verse one, there are a number of things that we see. First of all here, we see the father and the son. In this, we see the doctrine of the Trinity set forth in theological terminology.

Thus, there's another big theological term that we see which is the doctrine of inseparable operations. So simply define the doctrine of inseparable operations affirms that the triune persons act as a single agent externally while internally their operations are divided.

Again, let me break that down in plain terms. In plain terms, where one person of the Godhead is at work, they are all at work. They do not act individually, but they are all at work. So we see the father and we see the son.

Charles Spurgeon says this, so David was a firm believer in the unity of the Godhead, he yet spiritually discerns the two persons, the father and the son. He distinguishes between them and perceives that in the second, he has a peculiar interest, for he calls him my Lord.

The psalmist David here, in what is beautiful and what is amazing here, I think it's so very important for us here. This is almost an anticipatory exclamation by the psalmist David as he's been led in on a divine conversation.

The conversation between the father and the son. We have this here in the text. And it looks forward and it kind of echoes the New Testament where in the New Testament, you remember, as John proclaimed the gospel so clearly to us last night, how Jesus died, Jesus cried, it is finished, bowed his head, gave up the ghost, was taken down from the grave, but the good part is that on the third day, he arose from the grave.

Now, the scripture tells us this. The scripture tells us that he appeared to a few of the disciples at one time and Thomas, doubting Thomas wasn't there, the disciples told their brother about it. Thomas just shrugged them off.

He said, unless I see him with my eyes, unless I am able to put my fingers in the scars in his hand and in the hole in his side, I will not believe. But the scripture goes on to tell us that Jesus appeared to Thomas.

Thomas was a big talker. But when he saw the Lord, the Lord said, Thomas, here are my hands and here is my side. And all Thomas could do was fall down and declare, my Lord and my God. The words that are used here in verse 1, if you'll notice in your own Bible, in your text, you'll see the first usage, capital L, capital O, capital R, capital D.

When you see that in the Old or the New Testament, this is the Old Testament signification of the name of God. So when you read capital Lord, you can understand this as being Yahweh, the eternal, self-existent God.

The God who is before all things and will be when all things are said and done. He is God. In the second use, you see the Lord, Yahweh, said to my Lord, capital L, small o-r-d. This is the Hebrew term Adonai or Adonai, however you want to pronounce that.

I'm with John. When you're country, nothing comes out right. But this word signifies master. So Yahweh, David is saying, Yahweh said to my Lord. David is referring to Jesus as Lord. By the way, again, as I mentioned yesterday, that's the title of the message.

These men were gracious to let me change it from the last enemy that shall be destroyed is death to Jesus is Lord. So as we continue to move through this, I love how Charles Spurgeon went on to say this, how condescending on Jehovah's part to permit a mortal ear to hear and a human pen to record his sacred converse with his co-equal son.

And Spurgeon closed and he said this, how greatly should we prize the revelation of this private and solemn discourse with the son herein, which has been made public for the refreshing of his people. We read in the book of Romans in the New Testament that these things, these things that we have in the word of God were written before time.

For what purpose?

So that they were written before time so that we through patience and through the comfort of the scriptures might have hope. The word of God is our hope. So we see the Father and the Son. We see the doctrine of the Trinity.

We see the doctrine of inseparable operations. Still in verse one, what do we see next? We see the doctrine of God himself. The doctrine of God himself. In 2 Timothy chapter 3 verse 16 and verse 17, the apostle Paul writes to young Timothy and he reminds Timothy what the word of God is.

All scripture, he says, all scripture is breathed out by God, inspired by God and is profitable. Profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness so that the man of God may be perfect, so that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly furnished unto every good work.

And when it comes to God, when it comes to the character, to the nature of God in our world, in the church world, there are those who profess to know God. There are many who say, I know who God is. God is like this.

There's a big mistake. God is not like anything. God is unlike anything that we know, can fathom, or even imagine. God is completely other. There we have another doctrine, the doctrine of the aseity of God, that God is completely other than us.

Nevertheless, there are people in our world today who profess to know God, and they say this, they have the right to believe God to be a certain way, and they have a right to assume that God possesses certain characteristics that are they themselves uncharacteristic of what the Bible says about God, about the character and about the nature of God.

Now, there's a one-word definition for what I just told you, and that one-word definition is called idolatry. When you make a god in your own image, whether it's intentional or unintentional, it is idolatry.

And we are called not to have any other gods other than the Lord God Almighty. So, in other words, people have a god of their own making. I'm going to make a very bold statement here, and I don't mind being quoted, but don't misquote me.

But what I'm going to say here is a strong statement. We do not, you nor I, we do not have the authority or the liberty to think freely about who God is. We don't have the authority or the liberty to think freely about who God is.

Now, in the Westminster Catechism, question three and four, it gives us a very good, in question and answer form, gives us a very good pattern to shape our thoughts here. Question three in the Westminster Catechism states this.

What do the Scriptures principally teach? The answer, the Scriptures principally teach what man is to believe concerning God and what God requires of man. Question four, what is God? The answer, God is a spirit.

He is infinite. He is eternal. He is unchangeable in His being. He is wisdom. He is power. He is holiness. He is justice. He is goodness. He is truth. Who God is, His character, His nature is unchangeable.

And how He works and how He does things, He does according to the counsel of His own will, so on and so forth. So contrary to what some of the popular prosperity preachers say, God never consults them.

He'll never consult you or I. He'll never, as intelligent as Tyler is, He'll never consult Tyler. Because guess what? Tyler's knowledge is minute compared to the knowledge of God. So what we see next in this passage, still in verse 1, we see the decree of God.

The decree of God. Now what is a decree? The decrees of God are declarations or pronouncements that He has made in working out His plans in various ages. It is what God has said and determined to do. What God has said and determined to do.

Moving forward, still in verse 1, what doctrine do we see? The sovereignty of God. We see the sovereignty of God. God is described in the scriptures as all-powerful and all-knowing. God is outside of time.

He is responsible for the creation of everything. And these divine traits set the very minimum boundary for God's sovereign control in the universe. And so that is to say this, that nothing in the universe takes place outside of God's permission.

God's sovereignty itself is a natural consequence of three of His incommunicable attributes which are omniscience, omnipotence, and omnipresence. Still here in verse 1, do you see what I'm saying? There's a vast mine of gold to be drilled, digged, pulled out, and you're still never going to reach the bottom of it.

And it's all who God is. Going forward, verse 1, where the psalmist David declares, the Lord Yahweh says to my Lord, my Adonai, John Albert Bengel in the 18th century said this. He said it was a higher honor to have Christ for his son concerning David than to be a king.

Yet David does not say that Christ is his son but rejoices in this that Christ is his Lord. He is his Adonai. He is his master. And he recognizes that he himself is Christ's servant. Bengel went on to say, they who regard the Messiah only as the son of David regard the lesser part of the conception of him.

A dominion to which David himself is subject shows the heavenly majesty of the king. And when it says the king, in his commentary, he's talking about the Lord. It shows the heavenly majesty of the king and the heavenly character of his kingdom.

Still here in verse 1, notice the next phrase, until. The next phrase, until. Now this is a conjunction. This connects words and phrases. So the Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand until. I make your enemies your footstool, until.

This conjunction right here, it means it can be referred to in terminology as as far as, even to, up to, or while, or as far as. So the Lord said to my Lord, sit here at my right hand until while I make your enemies your footstool.

We're talking about the fact that Jesus Christ is Lord. He's not Lord of some, but he is Lord of all. I'm going to stay within time too. Jonathan. So, verse 2. Verse 2, we see the term mighty scepter used.

The Lord sends forth from Zion your mighty scepter. And he says this, rule in the midst of your enemies, exclamation mark. Not a suggestion, it's a statement of fact, it's a reality. The Lord sends forth from Zion.

I think about that old praise and worship song, right? He came from heaven to earth to show us the way. From the earth to the cross, my debt to pay. From the cross to the grave, from the grave to the sky.

Lord, I lift your name on high, right?

Right?

This is what's taking place here. The Lord sent Christ from Zion's holy hill. And so he says, rule. And he says, send forth Zion from your mighty scepter. Now, this idea of the scepter, we see it throughout the scriptures from the old to the New Testament.

We see this. It's a symbol of power. It's a symbol of authority. And the imagery of the scepter goes all the way back. We can go all the way back and see this to Moses. In Exodus 4, verse 17, as Moses stood before the burning bush, God commanded him to go tell Pharaoh, let my people go.

And what did Moses have? He had a staff in his hand. Now, staff is another word for a scepter. It's a pole. He said, take in your hand this staff with which you shall do the signs. If you jump ahead to Exodus 14, I believe it is.

Yeah, Exodus 14, chapter 13, verse through 18. The scripture tells us, and Moses said to the people, fear not, stand firm and see the salvation of the Lord, which he will work for you today. For the Egyptians whom you see today, you shall never see again.

For the Lord, boy, this is good news. The Lord will fight for you. And you only have to be silent. The Lord said to Moses, why do you cry to me? Tell the people of Israel just to go forward, lift up your staff and stretch out your hand over the sea and divide it that the people of Israel may go through the sea on dry ground.

And I will harden the hearts of the Egyptians so that they shall go in after them. And the Lord said, I will get glory over Pharaoh and all his hosts, his chariots, and his horsemen. And the Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord.

Jesus is Lord. They will know that I am the Lord when? When I have gotten glory over Pharaoh, his chariots, and his horsemen. We see this idea of the scepter, or the staff, or the rod, if you want to call it any of those things you want to call it, moving forward in the book of Numbers, chapter 21, verse 7 and 9.

The people came to Moses and said this, we have sinned for we have spoken against the Lord and against you. And they said, Moses, pray to the Lord that he take away the serpents from us. So Moses prayed for the people and the Lord said to Moses these words, make a fiery serpent and set it on a pole, or on a staff, or on a scepter, and raise it up.

And everyone who is bitten when he sees it, he shall live. So Moses made a bronze serpent, set it on a pole, and if a serpent bit anyone, he would look at the bronze serpent and he would live. What does that have to do with the fact that Jesus is Lord?