Book of Psalms - Psa. 24, vv. 1-10

Pull up we'll be in psalm chapter 24 today And I'm gonna try my best to get through this whole chapter.

There is a lot There's a lot here and I typically only get through two or three verses

But I really want to get through the whole thing today because There is a singular message

That just has the coolest ending I think And so I want to get through Psalm 24

We've been for those of y 'all are joining us for the first time we have been going through the Psalms just verse by verse starting with Psalm chapter 1 and We've been doing this for a long time now over a year a couple of years at this point.

I think the gentleman that was Teaching This and started this before me got through the first chapter and then the

Lord took him home And that was brother Bill and brother Bill Nichols it was an elder in our church and He died in his in his chair with his

Sunday school lesson in his hand. She's pretty cool. But um it fell to me and to my brother

Ben to kind of take over the duties for a little bit and it has been a tall order trying to to do this, but it has been a true blessing

To me But man, it's gonna happen so, all right, here we go

Starting in verse 1 Psalm 24 verse 1

Now this is a psalm That is written for a very special occasion.

What is this occasion? Well verse 7 and 9 Tell us so we'll skip on down to verse 7 and 9 and we'll come back to this here in a second lift up your heads

Oh ye gates and be ye lift up ye everlasting doors and the king of glory Shall come in you'll notice that verse 9 says exactly the same thing lift up your heads

Oh ye gates even lift them up ye everlasting doors and the king of glory shall come in Who is this guest the king of glory?

What do you guys think? Who is it? It's just God right now, it's

Jesus who is the Son of God He thought it not robbery to consider himself equal with God.

He is a part of the triune being of God But when this psalm was written it was written at a time in the

Old Testament when Israel was inviting the

Ark of the Covenant in so this is when the Ark of the Covenant is coming in is the it is

The physical representation of the presence of God with his people and so that's why this is being

Being written by David you can read that That story if you'll flip over to 2nd

Samuel 6 With me real quick 2nd

Samuel 6 Or 1st Chronicles 15 you can read it in either one.

I'm going to paraphrase for sake of time, but David sends his men out.

They're going to come and bring the Ark and if you'll remember They decide to do it in their own way.

They're gonna make this process a little more convenient and So they put the

Ark on wheels, which they're not supposed to do They're supposed to carry the Ark by hand and when they don't do it

God's way something pretty bad happens One of the wheels one of the wheels

Topples just a bit the Ark starts to fall and with all good intention

One of the men puts his hand on the Ark in order to keep it from falling

He is instantly struck dead Says that the anger of the Lord was kindled against them and the man just fell as dead

This saddens David This at this point David says man

What have we done? What have I done? The Ark ends up being put in The house of Obed -Edom and And The house of Obed -Edom it resides there and his house just receives tons of blessing from the presence of the

Lord and Finally after some time David goes, you know what it belongs with us

Gotta go get it and he goes and he gets it and does it the right way and he brings it in So after a time of mourning and after a time of repentance

David gets right with God and He invites the presence of the Lord into Israel and that is what's happening here.

So this is like a celebratory Psalm but it's not just celebratory it shows us something that's really important We're gonna see that as we go through it

It's gonna teach us a lot because it's basically divided into three parts. It shows us a description of the

Lord it shows us a description of his people and Then it describes the arrival of the

King All right. So a psalm of David flip on back over to Psalm chapter 24

This is a psalm of David The earth is the

Lord's in the fullness thereof The world and they that dwell therein

What is the Lord's? the earth all its fullness

God is the owner of all things When Jesus came to earth to begin his ministry and established his church

It was commonly thought that only the Jews belonged to God and Israel alone was his land

That's God's people. That's God's land. But what does that mean for the rest of the world?

Oh, they're not God's people. Those are not God's lands Now this is when Jesus comes to earth to start his ministry several like many many many many many years after this psalm was written so Israel's understanding of God Has already started to wane a bit because they go.

Oh, that's God's people and this is God's land Therefore the rest is not

God's people and the rest is not God's land Yet David generations before Christ's arrival wrote this psalm and he proclaimed that all lands were

God's and All people belong to him not just the richest mines and the fullest orchards

Not just the cattle's upon a thousand hills not the largest lakes or the fertile fields

We're not talking about the biggest mountains nor the smallest of the microcosms in the universe

No, what is his? the earth and all its fullness it's all the mines and all the orchards and all the cattle's and all the fields and All the hills in every lake in every mountain in every microcosm.

It all belongs to the Lord Now you might say like Israel did

But God does have a chosen people. He does have his people The elect the chosen the predestined children of God and It is true that there is a specific people

That will that he will call that he will save But as it turns out all people

Both the goats and the sheep belong to God They are all here for his glory

Now does this mean that everyone's going to heaven? No but everyone plays a part in the work in creation and plan of God even

Satan Unknowingly to him does the will of God Look look at Job Satan was gonna go and he was going to attack

Job. He had to first ask permission from God to do it He can do nothing

Without permission from the father and you say well, hold on now.

Wait a minute. Does that mean God? Put Job through all of that stuff.

Yes, it's a hard truth. But yes God put in fact it was God's idea

Satan didn't come and say hey, can I go and attack Job? That's not how he asked for permission first God says to Satan.

Have you considered my servant Job? Whoa Why would

God do that? Have you considered but like hey Satan check this guy out?

So when we read that the earth is the Lord's in all the fullness thereof

There is nothing left out of that all of it belongs to God Even the

Prince of the power of the air the one who has usurped authority on earth Old Beelzebub He belongs to God he's not gonna go to heaven he's not gonna be saved he's not gonna be regenerated he's not going to be

Experiencing God's mercy the scripture tells us that God created vessels for honor

That's us, but he also created vessels for dishonor All people are made by him

We know this because Scripture tells us that there is nothing that is made that is not made by him

What does that exclude nothing Everything's made by God Even Lucifer who was originally created as an angel of light and All things come from him for the purpose of good

God put man in the garden knowing man would sin Why did he do it? Because all of it is designed to teach us more about God And how do you teach people about an infinite love without a need for an infinite love?

You got to have the need for someone to really understand it like this infinite love which is an agape

Oh love a sacrificing love Requires sacrifice to show it

There would be no need for sacrifice if not for sin verse 2 for he

Hath founded it upon the seas and established it upon the floods

This is why God is the owner of all things it's why he is Because he is the founder and some of you came from a trade way of it.

We were all there this weekend, right? Who's the founder of trade way David Mitchell guess what?

He's the owner of trade way because he's the founder of trade way This is telling us right after the fact that God is the owner of all things

It's telling us why cuz he found it all things But then it shows us how crazy impossible it is to found what he founded

Because he didn't just found the earth and all the fullness thereof he founded it upon the seas

It means he created a foundation upon the water

Think about that for a second We think it's a great idea to build a foundation on a rock and it may be

I Recently built a house Our our soil is mostly sand

You know what the builders told me that is the perfect soil for building and I said what?

But I thought the I thought the wise man built his house upon a rock and the foolish man built his house upon the sand

They said well, we're gonna put the rock in the sand. Oh The foundation

I got you What's interesting about that is that it is a picture of what

God does here because what's more Tumultuous than sand water

And yet God can lay a foundation on water and he

Establishes it that means he makes it stable on this floods Now when you think of flooding, do you think of stability?

no, we've been getting a whole lot of rain here in Texas a whole lot and Things aren't too stable.

In fact currently Laying over my driveway is my favorite tree.

It did not break it just uprooted from the sand because it became so heavy from the water and so it just went

Really sad about that. I'm hoping some that we're gonna see if we can get someone to hoist it back up because it's alive

See if we can hoist it back up and maybe prop it up and see if it'll stay but it's a big tree So, I don't know we'll see

One of the few elms we have too and it grew right over our our driveway so you could drive under the pretty tree

Can't drive under it now. You gotta drive around it But God makes stable upon the floods

That's incredible water flows it flows over under through around It does not stand strong it bends it shapes it molds

We read in Genesis chapter 1 verse 2 the earth was without form and void and darkness was upon the face of the deep and the

Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters and God said this is verse 6 skipping down a bit in Genesis 1 and God said let there be a firmament in The midst of the waters and let it divide the waters from the waters

God brought form from the formless Water shapes to an immovable object.

This is why rivers flow Water begins to conform to the things

That God establishes so like if you ever I grew up swimming in a river grew up in San Marcos, Texas I Love the river.

I love it and it's it's fun to watch the water flow and it's so powerful water is powerful and Yet when it meets an immovable object

It is directed and it flows in in a certain direction The San Marcos River starts in San Marcos with natural springs and it flows and its directions change with whatever

Objects are in the way, but it flows all the way to the coast or the Gulf of Mexico and You say well, what about a flood that doesn't necessarily flow form

Go around it destroys immovable objects doesn't it it topples

That's because when water shapes or conforms

There is direction But when water does not conform there is destruction

There's a reason why I'm telling you this and I'm gonna bring up a quote from a very famous martial artist

I did martial arts growing up. And so here's a quote from a famous martial artist named

Bruce Lee. You may have heard of him He says empty your mind be formless

Shapeless like water if you put water in a cup it becomes the cup

You put water into a bottle it becomes the bottle You put it in a teapot and it becomes the teapot

Now water can flow or it can crash Be water my friend now

If we are water, we have the opportunity to flow and conform or we have the opportunity to crash we can have direction or destruction

Romans 8 29 Before we go there. I want you to think about this for a second if we were water

We are 95 % water. Our bodies are made up of like 95 % water, which is interesting to me

And it is also interesting to me that we were made to be conformed to the image of Christ Romans 8 29 for whom he did foreknow.

He also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of the stuff his son

That he might be the firstborn among many brethren. See if you conform to Jesus you will have

Direction, but if you decide not to conform and to try to form others in your image

There will be destruction in your life You'll be like a flood instead of a river So God who owns all things and can make stable upon the chaos of the waters

He is the immovable object that we as water must conform to verse 3

Who shall ascend now? We've just described described God as the owner of all things the maker of all things the immovable object that all things should conform to Now we're going to describe

God's people but it starts with a question who shall ascend into the hill of the Lord or Who shall stand in his holy place?

Who can do it who can climb that mountain to be with God? Man has a natural tendency to desire ascension.

We just want to we want to ascend and we look at as at ascension as the reward for our unbendable resolve to not conform to the thing

That we ascend above So we go like I'm going to be tougher and stronger than the thing in front of me and I'm going to ascend above it

And we think of ourselves as this is how you ascend by our strength by our resolve

Especially men. That's how we want to do it accidentally

Hit a button. It made my thing scroll. Hold on one sec We say things like I didn't let the workout break me

Ascend it above it. I didn't conform or bend to my opponent. So I beat him

Isn't it interesting that we think ascension is about being tougher than the other guy or smarter than the other guy stronger

Faster we think of rigidity. We think of strength. We think of resolve. That's how we reach ascension

But look at who gets to ascend to the most high First four

Here's who ascends he that hath clean hands and a pure heart

Who hath not lifted up his soul unto vanity nor sworn deceitfully?

What does that mean? What sounds like? Oh, well, I've got to work really hard to have the clean hands and the pure heart and I've got to be very careful not to lift up my soul and vanity.

So it kind of feels like oh That's what I have to do But our righteousness is filthy rags.

We can't have clean hands can't have a pure heart Clean hands and a pure heart the man that will ascend will not only do good clean hands, but he will be good pure heart and if you've got to have both

You're in trouble and the way you have to have both is that you can't be lifting your soul unto vanity

Nor swearing deceitfully. So what does it mean to lift up your soul to vanity? Well vanity is all about self -promotion

It's all about like what can I get for me? It's self -serving It vaunted itself.

It's the opposite of love. It's working all things together for your own good

This is quite the opposite of what God does because he works all things together for the good of those who love the

Lord and Are called according to his purpose. So he is working all things together for someone else

Not for himself Notice how he works things for you

It's a selfless work and we are supposed to imitate that work, which means we're supposed to work things together for someone other than us so Lifting up your soul and vanity is doing something for yourself

We'll get to that a little bit more of that in a second nor sworn deceitfully. What does that mean? Deceit is all about self -reliance

You tell a lie to get yourself out of trouble you make a promise to help others to be seen as good and you do that in the moment and Then when the time comes you make up excuses to wiggle out of it

Right because you made the promise because you wanted to look good It's self -reliance.

You're you are relying on yourself to look good to others and That's just another form of swearing deceitfully.

These are devices people employ to direct their own paths to take

To take ownership of how their life will turn out Now I don't want to discredit the fact that we do have responsibility

But look at what we have the responsibility to do. It's gonna show us here in a second. We are commanded in all our ways to acknowledge him and He will direct our paths which means

The people who don't do that. They see themselves as the teapot not the water. They don't conform and If they don't conform they don't get direction

They get destruction How do we achieve clean hands in a pure heart?

We get a a glimpse of how to do that in first John 1 9 if we confess our sins

He is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.

Oh So I confess my sins and I achieve the clean hands and pure heart not quite see confessing my sins doesn't make me clean

Jesus makes me clean see confess your sins and he is faithful and just To forgive us and cleanse us

So we think confessing makes me clean. No confessing Makes me conform

That's it. It is confessing is just an agreeing with God that what you did was wrong

You are now conforming He does the cleaning We can't make our hands clean no matter how much good you do it won't happen, but you conform to the immovable object of Christ be water

Right, and then he does the cleaning if any man be in Christ See Christ is the teapot

If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature Old things pass away

Behold all things become new something changes we conform verse 5 he shall receive the blessing from the

Lord and Righteousness from the God of his salvation now, there's something interesting

Sounds to me like you have to have clean hands and a pure heart to receive righteousness But how do

I do righteousness to get righteousness? thing is as I Don't do righteousness to get righteousness first John 2 29 says if you know that he is righteous

You know that everyone that doeth righteousness is born of him

So I do righteousness Because I have righteousness and I have righteousness

Because I have Jesus Who gave it to me? It can only be achieved after it is received the only way you can achieve righteousness and do righteousness and Practice righteousness is

God has put his righteousness on you and you are just conforming it to it See, it doesn't say he that hath made his hands clean and his heart pure It says he who hath clean hands and a pure heart

He gave us the clean hands and the pure heart those are things we receive from Jesus when we have a true conversion when

God touches our heart and causes a change in our life

When he causes us to truly cry out and ask for forgiveness and sincerely submit and conform to him

That's when we get the clean hands and the pure heart Says who hath not lifted up his soul unto vanity nor sworn deceitfully see it's not a fake conversion for show

There is the heathen That will reject God and his promises. There are people like that out there.

I know some I'm even related to some I'm praying for them They reject

God and his promises that's a pretty bad heathen, isn't it? You know, it may be worse The heathen that will reject

God but desire his promises So he will say the words and he will lift up his soul and attempt to make gain for himself

Instead of losing his life that he may gain it. He attempts to save his life through his own actions.

No, I prayed the prayer I'm doing the things and so now

I'm saved because I said the words This is why you can have two people pray the same prayer and one will spend eternity with Christ and the other will spend eternity from Christ This is why some people pray the prayer and they look like they didn't change.

I Was talking about people some people like that with some of our students this weekend this one lady heard

David talking about priest Destination she said it just bothers me though this idea because I have

I Have some people that I know that they they believe in Predestination like brother

David does and and they believe that they're just predestined to go to heaven and they pray to prayer

But I look at their lives and there's nothing that's changed and I said, well that's simple They may be predestined in a way that they're not aware of They think they're predestined and they all they are they all are we all are predestined

It's just some are vessels for honor. Some are vessels for dishonor So we pray for those people

That the Lord will open their eyes and see that without works their faith is dead

Because God gives the one a pure heart and clean hands that man receives righteousness from the

God of his salvation and the other one believes himself righteous of his own actions and his own behavior

And he becomes his own Savior This is self -promotion it is lifting a soul up in vanity and This man will quote

Swear his life to Jesus With no intention of losing his life to Jesus he swears deceitfully

He tries to save it for himself And he swears deceitfully verse 6

This now we're talking about the man who has the clean heart or the clean hands and the pure heart

This is the generation those with clean hands and pure hearts

This is the generation of them that seek him These are God's true people

The ones that don't lift up their souls in vanity. They don't take on the name of Christ in vain to run with the crowd that That looks good.

It has the smart business people some people go to church to do business

Just to make connections and promote their business and no, I'm a Christian too.

Yeah, I love the Bible. I love God Here's my card

You know Yeah, call me. Let's do business and I'm not saying it's wrong for Christians to do business with each other

I think that's a great thing. I mean, that's what we do with trade way, right? But we don't lift up our souls in an attempt to look like a

Christian So that we get gain That's not how it works we lose our souls to Christ and we

Gain our life in return This is the generation that seek him

These are the regenerate the regenerate the generation that earnestly

Pursues him and seeks him out the relationship that they desire They search for it because he has put it in their hearts to desire him

We love Christ because he first loved us and then it says

Oh Jacob. It's weird It's a weird way that they write this. This is the generation of them that seek him that seek thy face.

Oh Jacob Salah, that's weird. You think it's a Oh God, right and in some translations

It says Oh God of Jacob and you go. Oh, okay. Well, that's what it means.

It means Oh God of Jacob And yes, that is true because it is talking about God, but the way the King James Version translates.

This is beautiful It says Oh Jacob Why does it do that Because it doesn't depict an infinitely powerful creator of the universe being sought by a people that could never hope to attain him

Not at all Rather it depicts an infinitely power Powerful creator of the universe that condescends to his people and takes on their name

God takes on the name of Jacob There's a passage in Scripture that depicts this perfectly.

It's when Jesus is praying in the garden you see We think of we're supposed to take on the name of Christ and we do

But this is a covenant relationship with us and God and when the

Israelites would do a covenant They would I'm not gonna go through the whole thing but is this big thing where they brought animals and they sacrificed animals and they walked around the animals and they cut their hands and they put their hands together that their blood would intermingle and they tie a rope around their hands to show that they were bound together by this covenant and they would take on each

Other's name like if I had a name I had a covenant with Ernie it'd be my name would become like David Ernie Huber and your name.

What is your last name Ernie Clark Ernie would be Ernie David Clark we would take on each other's names and become covenant brothers

This is a covenant between us and God we take on his name. He takes on ours and There's a passage in Scripture that depicts it

Perfectly and it's when Jesus is praying in the garden John chapter 17 verses 21 through 23 and the glory

This is what he's saying to his father in the glory, which thou hast given me. I Have given them that they may be one even as we are one

I in them and thou in me that they may be perfect in one

You See all of us in one together us one with Christ Christ one with us

The Father one with Christ us one with the Father Covenant and that the world may know that thou hast sent me.

There's the descending down to his people and has loved them as Thou has loved me

What a beautiful Humble servant of a master we serve

And it is unfathomable that he would do this that while he gives us his name he takes on ours

Like that covenant ritual between two men This is what the

God of the universe did with us This is why verse 6 ends with my favorite word in all of Scripture Salah It doesn't have a meaning

It is a musical connotation that brings Inflection to whatever was just said before it like the crescendo in a song like a it can be a dramatic pause

You know Someone says something and there's like a mic drop moment Salah denotes the mic drop

And so this ends this this verse ends with the mic drop

God took on our name Salah It's like just think about that Wow the psalm begins to transition here from talking about who

God is and Who his true believers are to the arrival of the those believers

King? imagine the joyous occasion of the gates being lifted up For the presence of the

King the Ark of the Covenant coming into Israel that is a physical depiction of what happens with us

Lift up your heads verse 7 lift up your heads Oh ye gates and be ye lift up ye everlasting doors and the

King of glory shall come in gates create separation they are a defense they keep things out and None of us are in of ourselves worthy to enter upon the eternal gates of glory

We are shut out We cannot go in But the king descends from his throne and he approaches that separation and the watchers of the gate

They lift their heads and they see him coming They ask themselves who is this king of glory that approaches but wait a minute they know who it is and They say the

Lord strong and mighty You see they know him and yet he is infinitely unknowable

So while they say who he is they ask who is this guy? He is that awesome is that cool

You know what you can you can see someone that's pretty impressive and you go I know him, but man who is this guy?

right I Do that with my kids sometimes my daughter was singing over here and practicing Brought me to tears while I'm trying to do my

Sunday school lesson And I'm going who is this girl? I Know her better than most people in the world know her and I'm like is this

That you've given me to raise God like she's I Can't do this.

I need you to help me She's too awesome the watchers of the gate

That keep us separated from the father They look up and they see the king of glory coming the

Lord strong and mighty He is the one who is worthy to command the gates

Lift and open he says and let my people in Verse 8 and say it again.

Who is this king of glory? The Lord strong and mighty the Lord mighty in battle who has won the war

This is Jesus He descends from his throne. He makes covenant with his people.

He lives a perfect life for 33 years comes from heaven to earth That's a spiritual sacrifice lives perfectly

Every moment of every day of his whole life That's a mental sacrifice and then the whole thing is culminated on the cross a physical sacrifice and he wins the battle

And the watchers shout again Lift up your heads. Oh ye gates even lift them up the everlasting doors and the king of glory shall come in He's coming in who is the king of glory the

Lord of hosts? He is the king of glory

It's all about Jesus We can't lift up our souls and do anything or look good enough or Try hard enough to gain salvation.

It is as filthy rags. We cannot give ourselves clean hands We can't clean our hands

We don't have the The water to do it we don't have the soap to get them clean

It's like trying to wash mud off with mud. All we can do is

Become like water and conform To the image of Christ Agree with him that what you've done is wrong.

That's it Let him do all the rest

Salvation is the operation of God and when he puts it in your heart

To conform guess what he already started the operation He's already

Turned something on He's enlightened you and caused you to want him

The scripture says Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved

But if you look at how it's written in the in the original language

It actually means who shall up whosoever shall desire to call upon the name of the

Lord shall be saved that desire Only comes from God in the moment. You have that desire.

You are saved all of the cleaning of the hands and the walking in God's righteousness and obeying his commands and doing what we're told and Getting baptized and asking

God to come into your heart and save you that's all just a response To the desire he put in your heart

Like Saul on the road to Damascus He's going to kill Christians and God shown from heaven on him and Saul says

Lord, what would you have me do? He saved he just wants to he wants to do

The will of God in that moment because God put it in his heart to do it in that moment

Saul is saved then God says here's what you do now that you're saved go and get baptized Go do these things.

All right The only reason why Saul said Lord, what would you have me do?

It's because God put it in his heart to say those those words Because he knew what he was gonna do. He's gonna go kill

Christians. That was in his heart till something changed It's all God It's all

Jesus. He is the immovable object. We must conform to him and that is

Psalm 24 Anybody have anything you want to comment on before we pray and dismiss

That cool it's just part of the covenant relationship One of the things

I love when God established that covenant Usually it's between two men two men make an equal commitment

But when God made that commitment, he put Abraham in a deep sleep and God was the one that walked around Those sacrificed animals the father and the son, right?

It was only God Was not dependent on Fallible man

So good, that's so good. So think about this for a second if God made the covenant with Jesus his son and he put

Abraham to sleep and the covenant ritual was Sacrificed animals walk around the animals come to the middle cut your hand mix the blood tie the rope around So you show that you're bound in covenant.

I take on your name you take on my name, right? Jesus was doing that in place of Abraham and And Here's what they would say in this covenant with these mutilated animals behind them

If I don't keep my word to you, may I be like that animal? So when

Jesus makes this covenant as a substitute for Abraham What are you saying is if Abraham?

Doesn't keep this covenant. May I be like this animal?

Which is why he was mutilated on the cross by the wrath of God the punishment that we deserve.

Yeah All right, well shall we pray Heavenly Father we thank you so much for the infinite sacrifice that you made for us

The perfect sacrifice you are the king of glory. We don't deserve your dissension to us

We don't deserve to take on your name or to have you take on ours, but you desired to do that Thank you so far so much father

The song that Matty Grace will sing later today Should make us think of you

Help us to think of you daily help us to conform to you daily Help us to not rely on our own righteousness because it's as filthy rags

But rather father help us to tap into the righteousness that you've put into our hearts Help us to read your word

Understand it and follow it to conform to that righteousness and father in doing so Help us to be an inspiration to others to conform to your righteousness as well