Find Your Life, Joy and Pleasure In Christ Alone

Isaiah 55:1-3 and John 7:37-38

The Old Testament scripture reading this morning is found in Isaiah 55, you're reading verses one through three. Come everyone who thirsts, come to the waters, and he who has no money, come buy and eat.

Come buy wine and milk without money and without price. Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which it does not satisfy? Listen diligently to me and eat what is good, and delight yourselves in rich food.

Incline your ear and come to me, hear that your soul may live, and I will make with you an everlasting covenant, my steadfast, sure love for David. New Testament scripture reading this morning is found in John chapter seven, we're reading verses 37 and 38.

On the last day of the feast, the great day, Jesus stood up and cried out, if anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.

Now this he said about the spirit whom those who believed in him were to receive, for as yet the spirit had not been given because Jesus was not yet glorified. You may be seated.

Good morning.

Thank you for your singing. If you'd open up your Bibles to Psalm 16 please, Psalm 16. It is nice to be back worshiping with the church family. I was able to preach Psalm 16 to New City Fellowship in Marion.

I had a good time with my family worshiping with them, but it's good to be back. Psalm 16, the victim of David, preserve me, O God, for in you I take refuge. I say to the Lord, you are my Lord, I have no good apart from you.

As for the saints in the land, they are the excellent ones in whom is all my delight. But the sorrows of those who run after another God shall multiply. Their drink offerings of blood I will not pour out or take their names on my lips.

The Lord is my chosen portion and my cup, you hold my lot. The lions have fallen for me in pleasant places, indeed, I have a beautiful inheritance. I bless the Lord who gives me counsel, and the night also my heart instructs me.

I have set the Lord always before me because he is at my right hand, I shall not be shaken. Therefore, my heart is glad and my whole being rejoices. My flesh also dwells secure. For you will not abandon my soul to shield or let your Holy One see corruption.

You make known to me the path of life. In your presence, there is fullness of joy. At your right hand are pleasures forevermore. God in heaven, I thank you for your word that's opened up for us to behold.

We are a people in need of you, God. And we know that our greatest need is found in Jesus Christ and it's through him that we have all the riches of pleasure and joy and life. So let us not be deceived by Satan into thinking that we can find fulfillment in anything else.

Let us not be tempted or swayed by our temptations to sin, but let us rather see Jesus Christ as crucified and raised up for our life. And so let this be a time in which we encourage one another to love and good works, empowered by grace, empowered by our Lord Jesus Christ who came to put an end to sin.

And we do indeed praise you, God, for the celebration of life. We praise you, Lord, for the current events, for being one step closer to the scourge of abortion, the great sin of abortion to be abolished in the land.

Oh God, I pray that you would work in our leaders, work in their hearts, cause them to make righteous laws that uphold life. And so we praise you, Lord, that Jesus Christ is the author of life. And so let us look to him even in this moment as we have your word opened up to us.

In Jesus' name, amen. You make known to me the path of life. In your presence there is fullness of joy. At your right hand are pleasures forevermore. Surely this is a very happy psalm. This is an encouraging psalm.

This is something that is universally within all of our hearts. Every single one of you I know before me right now, you desire life, joy, and pleasure. It is a universal desire. They are good things to meditate on.

It's things that we are all groping for, wanting to have pleasures in this life. And you see, there's very two different beings who claims to give it in two different ways. There's two different avenues that promise this universal desire within our hearts for pleasure and joy in life.

And that is God and Satan. Satan, and really you are either enslaved to the lies of one or are living in the freedom of the other. Satan is called the father of lies because his kingdom is made up of deception.

His whole kingdom is one of deception. And a key component of that deception is that to have joy and pleasure in your life is to follow your own desires, and that is to follow God to give up life and give up happy pleasure.

Indeed, his deception is that in order to have pleasure in this life, you must turn away from God and rather follow your own desires. And this will give you pleasure in this life. This is a great deception, that to follow God is to give up your pleasures.

And I could see that in a lot of different ways, why that could be such an easy thing to believe. Because oftentimes Christians can think that to have a pleasurable life, to seek pleasure is actually a very sinful thing of itself.

That Christians are supposed to be stone-faced, sober-minded, sober in everything to the degree that we have no desire for anything that is pleasurable or joyful or happy. Instead, we should always be somber.

And really, you hear that saying, don't judge a book by its cover. I believe that you should, because when I'm looking for a good theological treatise on something and I see the author, the theologian, has a big smile on his face on the cover, I'm not gonna read that.

When I see that they spent all their time on the cover to make some fanciful display of whatever, I know that what's in it is gonna be bankrupt, okay? And so I judge a book by its cover. I want the cover to have the theologian have the biggest somber frown on his face, because then I know he's dealing with sin.

You know, that's the guy who's dealing with sin right there. Jonathan Edwards, I open up his book, his face scares me. It does, and now it gets me ready, right? The brevity of man is too deep to be smiling all the time.

But you know, obviously those are jokes, and there's a sense in which we can think that there's something holy about not pursuing pleasure and joy and happiness and laughter, right? And again, Satan is there in his deception, in his kingdom to say, if you want pleasure, have it now in this moment, follow your sin, follow your own desires, and you'll have it, right?

And to follow God and his law and his commandments is surely a good way to have the opposite of pleasure. From Eve eating the forbidden fruit because it was desirable, to people wanting to use their day off today for what they fancy instead of worshiping God, to you putting up with sin in your life because it's just too pleasurable to get rid of.

The deception that pleasure is found in disobedience to God is a strong one from Satan that we face every day. And I think that is why Psalm 16 here is so needed for us this morning to meditate upon. Instead of believing the lie that pleasure is found in our self-centered, disobedient desires, Psalm 16 gives you the truth.

In Psalm 16, 11, you make known to me the path of life. In your presence, there is fullness of joy. At your right hand are pleasures forevermore. Where is pleasure found? In the presence of our God. The happy pleasure that we all universally seek, every one of us is found in the happy presence of God.

And it says so right there. However, again, that opposing worldview, remember we went through Psalm 14, I don't even know how long ago it was, but it was talking about the atheist, it's talking about the one who does not acknowledge God.

Remember how they seek pleasure in Psalm 14, three, it says they have all turned aside. This describes the strategy of the unbeliever to find pleasure, that they have turned aside to their own way, and it's by this way I shall have pleasure.

This is the deception of Satan. But your question, if you're a believer, as it should be as a believer, needs to be Psalm 15, one, which is what? Psalm 15, one, O Lord, who shall sojourn in your tent?

Who shall dwell on your holy hill? What is that? That's the very presence of God. O Lord, who shall be in your presence? Because that's where my pleasure is found. That is the question of the believer.

We have ignored or we have denied the lies of Satan that pleasure is found in the lack of presence of God in our own desires, and we have said, who shall sojourn with our God? This is where pleasure is found.

And the answer is, who shall sojourn there? Who should be in the presence of God? I think the answer is found in, again, Psalm 16, 11. You make known to me the path of life. See, not only is pleasure found in the presence of God, but he makes known the path to that presence to him.

The path of life is the path to the presence of the Lord. That is where your pleasure is found. This should be the pursuit of your life, is to seek the Lord in all your ways. Because to do anything else, to go wayward, is a sure recipe for your death.

Therefore, you need to be mindful of the lies and set your heart upon the truth found here in Psalm 16. What is the path of life that leads to joy and pleasure? Well, let us find out by looking at this psalm.

And so, going to the very beginning of this psalm, the path to enjoy the presence of God of life begins with proper confession, or your inability found in the ability of God. You need to know that the path of life, of happy pleasure, is, as we see here in Psalms 16, one through two, your inability and the ability of God.

Look at Psalms 16, one and two. Preserve me, O God, for in you I take refuge. I say to the Lord, you are my Lord. I have no good apart from you. Do you notice that? It is layer after layer of I am not able.

You are not able. Preserve me, right? That's the notion of keep me safe because of myself, I'm in danger. I take refuge in you because God is able. I have a little bit of good. No, I have no good. Completely unable are we.

And so the first step to life, right, the first step to find pleasure, true pleasure that's not deception, is to deny yourself, is to acknowledge your own inability wholesale, completely, and to not grab hold of anything that you could call your own.

Remember what Jesus says? To deny yourself, pick up your cross and follow him. So to see that you are completely unable is the first step to your path and the pathway to life. You see, although we know that our minds are fixated on God giving us pleasure of himself, we're on the pathway to pleasure, you need to know that this first step of denying yourself is the total opposite of pleasure.

It is not a pleasurable good feeling to acknowledge that you are completely unable. It is not a good feeling to be in the midst of a storm thinking that everything's gonna crash down on you at any moment because you have no security.

It is not a good feeling to know that of myself, I have no good, I am not able, I am completely bankrupt. You see, this is the very opposite of the feeling of initial pleasure. You see, deception and sin, what Satan says is that you need to have pleasure right in this moment.

And so anything that causes you any kind of distress, like acknowledging that you are unable of yourself, well, you need to look away from that. But you see, the truth, the pathway to life, it's the first step is to acknowledge that I am unable.

And beloved, that is a hard step to truly do. A promise of immediate pleasure, a promise of immediate pleasure will end in sorrow. Anything that we deny the promises of God, to say we'll just have pleasure in the moment and it's always sin, it will always lead you to sorrow.

But God flips it on its head and say, you want pleasure in me, your first step is to deny yourself. And it all is always a very unpleasant task indeed. I think honestly, this gives such meaning to your days of depression and sadness, the days in which you're feeling very low and empty.

What if in those moments, you see that as a great opportunity, right? What if in those moments that you are feeling like I have no good in myself, that there's nothing good for me here, now, what if that's not an opportunity for you to then look upon the one who is able?

What if we saw those opportunities as, this is just an example of how I am broken without something and then it causes you to say, where is that something? Where can I behold the something that will relieve me from this emptiness, from this brokenness, from this inability, and then it causes your eyes to rest upon the one who is able?

What if God has a meaning for those days in which we want so badly to squirm out of and sometimes we'll even sin to get out of them? What if God has a purpose for those things to put your eyes upon him?

What if we looked at them as an opportunity? I think it gives meaning to your depression. I think it gives meaning to your sadness. I think it gives meaning to every single things of life that we experience every day that we try to hide as we go to church and put a smile on our face.

It gives a meaning to everything. In those unpleasant moments of fear, sadness, depression, know that the purpose of it is to make you see your total inability. So that something else happens, right? We're not just negative Nancys here, right?

We want to feel and know and experience inability so that we can experience something better, right? We are seeking pleasure here, so to speak. That is our end here, as we've already said. So our whole desire to see that we are unable to know that is so that we can acknowledge the ability or the ableness of our God.

We cannot know that God is able until we know that we are unable. We cannot experience the power and awesomeness of God and how he is able to do all things until we fully realize just how unable we are.

We cannot experience that without going through the hardship of those feelings. Acknowledge the ability of God. Your inability paves the way to be raptured by God's power. So do not serve your inability, do not serve your depression, do not serve your sadness, but let those things serve you to show you Jesus Christ.

Look at the name, the names David uses to talk about this able God in Psalm 16, one and two. He says, preserve me, O God, and that is El. That's like powerful creator, right? Preserve me, O powerful creator, for in you I take refuge.

I say to the Lord, that's capital L-O-R-D in your text there, that's Yahweh. Yahweh is God's covenant name. God makes covenant with people who are needy, right? He condescends and comes down to us through covenant to give us good things, right?

And so that is his covenant name. I say to Yahweh, you are my Lord, and that denotes his mastery. He's a master over us. And so it's like David is saying here, preserve me, O powerful creator. I desire to take refuge in your covenantal love.

Since I have no good, I therefore submit to you. And it's in this inability of you and inability of God that we find our pleasure, our joy, our life. Or how does that look like for you when you are overcome with worry?

God, I am overcome with worry, but I know that this is to show my inability and to look and find rest in your ability. Whenever you are tempted to use that concern over the things of life that you cannot control, we want to use that in sin and to fall into anxiety, but what if we use that as a yes, God, I know I have no control over my life ultimately, but you do, but you do.

Some of those difficult times you'll have as a Christian, as a true born again Christian, are those times alone with God as you are denying yourself. Those are the hardest times that you're gonna have.

Those times alone where you are denying your own self, your desires, your own things, you are picking up your cross, you're denying yourself. Times of great depression as you feel the weight of your emptiness, whether it's tied to sin or not, you just feel like I am not able of myself.

Take courage because such sorrow is the trailhead to pleasures found in God. Such sorrow, such times of emotional distraught is the trailhead, is the beginning of this path of life to find that you are complete in God.

Pilgrim's progress. Christian is fresh on the start of his journey to the celestial city. I don't think I've used this before, but now that I think about it, I might have. But he's fresh on the trail to that great city that he's journeying towards and he's with his neighbor, Pliable.

And Christian begins to talk to his neighbor, Pliable, about all the pleasures that are waiting for them.

In this city.

But the first stop in this journey was sorrow. Christian and Pliable fall into what? What did they fall into? The slough des spines, right? This mire, this muddy mess that's supposed to represent our, if I'm not wrong here, sadness and just a very bad situation to be in.

It's not a pleasant circumstance, right? It's a muddy mess on the trail. And they're stuck in it. And here's a quote of the book. At that, at being stuck in this muddy mess they can't get out of, at that, Pliable began to be offended and angrily said to Christian, his fellow, is this the happiness you have told me of all this while?

If we have such ill speed at our first setting out, what may we expect between this and our journey's end? He's like, it's not gonna be pleasurable. If I survive this, you shall possess the brave country alone without me, Christian.

And with that, he gave a desperate struggle or two and got out of the mire on the side of his house and he went on his own way and stopped going to that celestial city. And Christian saw him no more. You see, we want, we think that this is the lie of Satan that in our desire for pleasure, we will receive it and that's all, that becomes our God.

But we know that oftentimes, in order to have pleasure, in order to have God, that first step is to deny self. It is to acknowledge our own inability. It is a time that's a lot of times filled with sadness and not good circumstances.

So look at the times of initial sorrow as an opportunity to realize the pleasures that are found in God. Satan will tell you to find pleasures, to find pleasure, you must take matters into your own hands and it will give you temporary pleasure, but it will be followed by your death.

But God says the pleasure found in him has its soil, roots, and sorrows of this world as you deny yourself, pick up your cross and follow him. And so the first step, acknowledge in this path of life, acknowledge your own inability, but in that, acknowledge the ability that God provides.

So another step along the path of godly pleasure of this path of life is we see in verses three through four, or proper religion, proper religion. Look at verses three through four. As for the saints in the land, they are the excellent ones in whom is all my delight.

The sorrows of those who run after another god shall multiply. Their drink offerings of blood I will not pour out or take their names on my lips. So you see there's that contrast, right? The saints in the land, they are the excellent ones and all my delight is found in them, but the sorrows of those who run after a false god, it's gonna multiply and I am not gonna worship their false god.

And so we see this as a plea. This is a call for proper religion, for proper religion. That whole saying that I love Jesus, but I hate religion. You hear that often. I love Jesus, but I hate religion.

That was coined by Satan himself. A true statement would be I love religion because I love Jesus. Because religion is made up of the saints coming together as they strive towards, in light of the gospel, our dear Lord.

James 1 .27 says, religion that is pure and undefiled before God the Father is this, to visit orphans and widows in their affliction and to keep oneself unstained from the world. And so David here in Psalm 16, three through four is expressing his love for unstained religion, for the saints that have made the confession that I am weak of myself, but God is able, right?

His desire are for the saints who have made that proper confession and his desire is in them. But for the stained religion, those who run after a god of their own making to fit their own pleasures and desires, he says that that end is going to be sorrow and he says I shall not follow that way.

So unstained religion are those who have denied themselves, denied the pleasures that come forth from sin and they grab hold of the confession that in God is found all my ability. But the stained religion is one in which we make up a false god in order to fit our own pleasures that are disobedient to God.

Now, David speaks of the religion here, the false god here is that in verse four, as you see the end of it, their drink offerings of blood I will not pour out or take their names on my lips. Now, not many of us even have the opportunity to go to a place where a drink offering of blood is being poured out for a false god.

But people of every age have as their ambition to create false ways of worship to feed their desire to find pleasure outside of the true God. And so do not underestimate the ability of man to create false worships, false ways of doing things that fits their own desires, their own pleasures instead of submitting to the Lord and seeking him.

So let your desire be in the community of people who are striving against disobedient pleasure and are rather seeking the true God of all pleasure. The path of life from confession to true religion then moves on to proper worship and look at verses five through six with me.

David goes on to say, the Lord is my chosen portion and my cup, you hold my lot. The lines have fallen for me in pleasant places. Indeed, I have a beautiful inheritance. So we can see ironically, we see here ironically that David is saying that the life of true pleasure is found not in pursuing it of itself.

And that can be very much a mistake is that we think it is good for all of us universally to want pleasure and to have joy and happiness. But we see the unbeliever makes the mistake that it becomes their God in which that is their pursuit of itself.

But we see the one who is the true worshiper, the one who has made the proper confession, the one who has proper religion, this is the one who makes God his delight and pleasure of itself. God is his pursuit, not pleasure as something separate from him, but God himself.

And we see that in here, there is true worship. When we seek pleasure as a God itself, when we seek happiness or good desires, whatever it may be, that becomes our idol. But we see here in Psalm 16, that in verse five and six, that David is saying that his pursuit was God himself, was God himself.

Look what he says there. He says, my chosen portion. He says, God is my chosen portion. So what he's saying is, of all the things in this world to have, my chosen portion is the Lord himself, right? Of all the things that God has created for us to enjoy.

And how easy is it in our desires to take hold of those things of themselves and it becomes our God, it becomes our pleasure itself. But David says, of all the things in this world, the Lord himself is my chosen portion.

We see this negatively from Jesus when he is tempted. Look at, well, yeah, in Matthew four, turn with me to Matthew four, eight through 10. Turn with me to Matthew four, eight through 10. Jesus is tempted to grab hold of the world outside of God and find his contentment in that.

Look at what the devil tempts Jesus with. Again, the devil took him, in Matthew four, verse eight, again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world.

And their glory.

And he said to him, all these I will give to you, if you will, what, fall down and worship me. But then Jesus said to him, be gone, Satan, for it is written, you shall worship the Lord your God and him only shall you serve.

You see, Jesus is showing the example that his portion was God. And so when he is offered something of the world, or in this case, all the world outside of God, he says, be gone, I don't want that, because without God, anything of the world is vanity.

And it will not lead to actual pleasures, but only vanity, but only sorrow. And so Jesus is showing that when he was offered all the world outside of God, he says, no, God is my portion, God is it, and so I shall not have anything of the world outside of him.

So we see he denies that temptation because Jesus was his portion, or God was his portion. But we see it also, right, this God being our chosen portion and that flowing forth from that is our pleasure.

We see that positively from Paul, and just listen to me, in 1 Corinthians 10, 31, that great statement, so whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God. What does it mean that God is your chosen portion in this life?

What does that mean, that God is your chosen portion? Well, Paul here says it positively. Whatever you do in this life, do all for the glory of God. So then your life becomes one in which you are focused and determined that whatever I have in life, I'm going to use every ounce of that to glorify God.

Because God is my chosen portion, whatever he gives me on this earth, it is my desire, it is my focus to use that to glorify his name. So whenever he's our focus, that is our determination. But when God is not our portion, well then we use the things of this world of itself and we try to find pleasure of itself.

And we see that truly, when God is our portion, all things, the dominant desire of the confessor is I want this to be a day in which I use the world to glorify God. You wake up and the first thought you have as you put your feet down on the floor is whatever God has for me today, I want to use that to honor and glorify God.

This is someone whose portion is the Lord himself. So instead of using the world to find fleeting pleasure, you need to use the world to glorify God. Your God has given you all things in this world to enjoy, to have pleasure in.

And that is only found when you use it all to honor him with it. This is what it means for the Lord to be your portion. Look what it says going on in verse six of Psalm 16. The lines have fallen for me in pleasant places.

The lines have fallen for me in pleasant places. The lines here is like the drawn lines of the boundaries of Israel, okay? Israel had an inheritance from God and he drew a line in the promised land saying this is where your inheritance is, this is what belongs to you.

Well, the one who, the fulfilled promises are the ones in which what is our inheritance line? Where is our line drawn out at? Well, it's not the physical on this earth in which we seek a land of this earth, but the lines that we have encircles the eternal God himself.

Our lines continue on and forth into eternity as it wraps its arms around God himself and all the pleasures that are found in worshiping our God himself. You see, our lines are eternal and it goes on and on and on around the eternal God.

Our lines are forever as it encircles the eternal God, the one of joy and delights, okay? So then, if this is the path of life, right? The path of life is to acknowledge our inability, the ability of God, right?

To acknowledge your inability, seek and know the ability of God and to see that our worship is to be focused on God himself and not on the fleeting pleasures of the world in which you try to grab hold of and get the pleasures.

No, it's God himself. And so then, when that is truly our determination, when that is the way that we live our Christian life, is that I want to use everything for the glory of God's name since he is my portion, then our thinking, our desires, our everything completely changes.

Everything that we look at now in the world completely transforms now. And we look at everything different. And I think we see an example of that with proper instruction or proper motivation, whatever you want to call it, in verses seven through eight of this Psalm.

Look at what David says. I bless the Lord who gives me counsel. In the night, also, my heart instructs me. I have set the Lord always before me. Because he is at my right hand, I shall not be shaken. You see, the Lord is ever set before him.

He is ever his portion, ever his desire, right? And so because that is his presupposition, because that's the way he starts all his thoughts, all his desires, now all his thinking is determined by that great goal.

And so he says in the night, my heart instructs me, instructs me into good things. One of the things I say often is that Disney saying that follow your heart, it's never wrong, I often say that that's garbage.

It's always wrong. It's always in sin, unless it's been regenerated by Christ to desire God himself. And then we have the great, great blessed reality that because my desires are set upon the Lord, now my days are filled with being instructed by that great desire.

Now all that I do is in light of that great desire.

For the Lord.

You see, whenever our desires, we find our pleasures outside of God, our heart instructs us after those vain and fleeting desires, those fleeting things that do never, they never make good on their promises.

And so then we find ourselves decaying into death,.

Further and further and further.

But whenever we have set our eyes upon the Lord being our portion, then we are instructed after that great way of doing things, and we are actually driven into life. You need to know that all of our actions, all the things that we do, they don't come out of a vacuum randomly, but they come from our heart's desire.

They come out of the instruction that our heart provides for us. We see in Matthew 5, 15, 19, for out of the heart comes evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, and slander.

We see in James 1, 14 through 15, we see, but each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire, then desire, when it has conceived, gets birth to sin, and sin, when it is fully grown, brings forth death.

You see, so it is a very disasterly situation. Whenever, since we have our eyes set upon the pleasures of this world, we are instructed after that way, and it leads us ultimately to our death, even as it promises immediate pleasure.

But you see, the one who is on the path of life, the one who is denying self, the one who sees their inability to be able to instruct their own way whenever they set the Lord ever before them as before them as their portion, this is a happy, blessed existence in which we are taught by the word of God, we are directed by him, and we no longer follow our own whims or desires.

A heart driven by immediate pleasure outside the bounds of God is destined for sorrow, but a heart driven by the pursuit of God is destined for security and true pleasure. So do not think that your actions come out of a vacuum.

It always begins with the desires of the heart. And so you need to ask yourself, what does my heart desire? What is my heart instructing me to? What is my heart trying to lead me to? And let it be that your heart is leading you to God, to be your portion, to be your everything.

It is a very pleasurable life to be driven by God being your portion, that your thoughts are dominated and instructed by that great desire. Husbands being instructed in the night on how to lead his family better.