Revelation 22 — Carl Armerding

Now, before we turn to the book of Psalms, I'd like for you please to turn to a passage in the epistle to the Ephesians, chapter 4, chapter 5, I should say, Ephesians, chapter 5. Whenever I have a microphone like this before me, I tend to count on it, but if you don't hear me, I'll try to raise my voice a little higher.

Everybody hear me now? Thank you. So, the fifth chapter of Ephesians, in verse 18, be not drunk with wine where it is excess, but be filled with spirit and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord, giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Psalm 103 and the Call to Worship

Now, this morning, I want to take a psalm which I believe will fill the very thing that we're exhorted to do here, and so we'll turn please to Psalm 103 in Psalms and Hymns and Spiritual Songs, and here we find the psalmist doing exactly that.

He says, Bless the Lord, O my soul, in talking to himself in this psalm, and all that is within me, and bless his holy name. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits, who forgiveth all my iniquities, who redeemeth all my diseases, who redeemeth my life from destruction, kindness, and tenderness in each war-partner.

There is something about this book of the Psalms which I'd like to mention before we go into meditation itself, and that is the fact that the book of the Psalms is divided up into five sections. Both of each one of them, we have an authority.

I know some people think that it's Dr. Spokane that made this division, because that's the only place I've ever noticed it, but the fact of the matter is that the Holy Spirit made these divisions for us, and if you look carefully, we find at the close of Psalm 41, there's the Doctology, then Psalm 72, Psalm 89, and again Psalm 106, and then, of course, the Closing Psalms in itself, a great Doctology, and we believe that these five books, these five sections answer to the first five books in the Bible.

In other words, this is referred to sometimes as the Pentateuchal structure of the Psalms. The word Pentateuchal being taken from the name which is usually assigned to the first five books of the Bible, called Pentateuch.

Sections resemble a person. In those first 41 Psalms, we get things that answer quite nicely to the book of Genesis, and certainly in the second book, that which answers to the book of Exodus. In the third section, we get things that answer to the book of Zedekiah.

Psalm 103 as a Psalm of Praise

The Psalm that we're going to look at this morning is found in the fourth section, which answers to the book of Numbers. Now, as one reads the book of Numbers, we may painfully aware of the fact that God's people do not always praise.

There seems to be a great deal of murmuring, complaining, and so on. But, here is the Psalm which comes in the fourth book, and there's not one word of complaining. There's not even a word of prairie.

This is a Psalm which is praised from start to finish. This expression with which the Psalm opens up, Bless the Lord, is simply a way of saying, Worship the Lord. This tells us immediately where true worship has to come from.

Worship is not something that we make up in our brains. It's the overflow of a heart, as it has been defined, the overflow of a heart that has no request to make. We're going to see the reasons for this worship here.

Very briefly, we're going to call attention to at least five great reasons to make the soul sing like this, making melody in our hearts to the Lord. He has bestowed upon us. And, actually, you'll notice that the first benefit is where we all began when we got to know him as our personal, royal, and savior.

For it says here in verse three, Who forgiveth all thine iniquity. In that word, iniquity, you have perhaps the strongest word in the language for our sins. I know sometimes we try to tone this down, as though the sins which we commit were nothing more than mistakes.

I remember when I was on my way to the mission field for the first time, early and more late than 1911, early 1912, before the steamer arrived in Central America, and I had been witnessing on the ship, and a lady came to me.

She said, I understand you're going to the mission field. I said, yeah. She said, oh, I'm so interested. I said, thank you. I hope you'll pray for us. She said, you know, my father was a minister. My father had some rather interesting definitions of biblical terms.

I began to get frustrated. I wondered what this was going on. My father never mentioned the term. He was always just referred to them as errors or mistakes. And, she said, I rather like that. It didn't hurt them.

Translation, it ought to fit in some of the text in which we find the word sins. So, I quoted a few of the well-known texts. I found mistakes. It is very plain, outspoken. It doesn't go any further than admission.

This word iniquity is a strong word, but it hits the nail right on the head. It means out of equity. The things that you know are not right, things that you do in spite of the fact that you know that they're wrong.

And, here, the psalmist is using a strong word in the language. He wants to talk about God's wonderful, forgiving grace. And, notice that he doesn't leave out anything. He says, who forgives all my iniquities.

And, I take it that this enables me, allows me to say, all my iniquities, that when the Lord Jesus Christ died on earth, he died for all of my sins, all of my iniquities, he's made a complete job of them.

But, he said, it is finished. Is there a soul in the room crying again and again that even in the naughtiest practice, where we can almost assume that we have 100 victims, occasionally, for a meeting with the commandments of our Lord, who until that moment had never yet confessed the Lord Jesus Christ, his first and sacred.

It may be that you're here this morning, my friend, a child of Christian parents, maybe a Christian, maybe a parent yourself, or a Christian wife or husband, as the case may be, if the Holy Spirit of God would speak to you this morning, and ask you, have you had this blessing, who forgives all my iniquities?

And then again, what does he mean by the word forgiving? What does this word mean? Does it simply mean that God does over-let us forget it? Oh, no. That isn't what it means. The word forgiving, both the original languages of the scripture, means to take away and to put someone else.

And this is exactly what the Lord has done with your sins and mine. He laid on Him the iniquity of us all. Yes, that's the doctrine of substitution, as we sometimes say. He suffered what I deserve. This is the way God forgives.

No wonder the psalmist urged, Bless the Lord, O my soul. Blessing number one. Sometimes I'm asked by women, Have you had the second blessing? I feel like saying, Have you had the first? Do you know what it means to have all your sins?

The Second Benefit: Healing the Soul

The precious blood of Jesus Christ. Now we come to benefit number two here. He says in the end of verse three, Who healeth, I don't know that I could on this second. Because I know that a good many fine Christian people are still suffering a whole lot.

Are you telling me Friends, I learned about this from a dear one who has gone home to glory from my home. 23 years of a life. Suffered with an incurable disease. The doctor said when they discovered it that she wouldn't live for two years.

But she lived 23 years. When I faced the doctor the day she said, Well, there's only one way to explain it. She has the will to live. But she suffered just the same. And very often the question was raised, In which I shall not disclose.

To these very things. But does this scripture speak of that kind of disease? Let's see the opening of this psalm again. The psalmist is not addressing his body. He's addressing his soul. Bless the Lord, O my soul.

It's a soul's iniquity to heal it all by the soul. I'm sick about them, don't you? Not one, none like him. But heal all our soul. Friends, when you and I lose our desire to pray, we lose our desire to read the word of God.

We lose our desire to fellowship with the people of God. Something's wrong. These are symptoms that we need to watch. And the moment we discover them, let's go to him of whom it is said in this psalm to heal it all by, that is, the soul.

You see, mathematically this is so. You know, you and I learned when we went to school that pronouns were nouns that stand for another noun, and so the pronoun vine stands for another noun, and that noun is found in all diseases.

And I might be speaking to some here this morning who've ascended this continent up here to this soul in just that state of soul. A real desire to pray. A real desire to read the word of God. A real desire to be found in your place, the Lord's demonic, the remembrance of the Lord.

The moment you discover it, as I said a little while ago, let's go right to him who can heal all our soul disease. I'm so glad that I was brought up in a home where Saturday night was still observed as a sort of scripture for the Lord's Day, Sunday morning.

So that when your scripture shines shoes on people to go to the meeting on Sunday morning, there was no work to be done there. Nothing unnecessary was done on the Lord's Day. And that wasn't because my father was a legalist.

He wasn't. But he observed rigidly the Lord's Day. We were brought up to it. It was sort of a preparatory search. And then, in my early 40s with age, observing the ways in which the Lord suffered, attending at that time, getting ready for this service.

I would suggest to you, my dear friend, if you have not done so, to sit aside some time, certainly to get ready for the remembrance of the Lord on the Lord's Day. I found it so wonderful to leave it out of his life and memory and his conscience on this Saturday night, to come with a mind that is perfectly free to commune with the Lord and with his people on the Lord's Day morning.

Yes, he heals all our souls today. We learn in Psalm 107 how he does this. Just keep your bookmark here in Psalm 103 and turn over for a moment to Psalm 107. And here you will see how he does this. He sends his word and he heals us.

This is the way of the Lord. This is his medicine for healing us. We come into the presence of the Lord to confess all these things which have disturbed our communion, but to read his word, because this is the medicine that heals me and prepares me for the next day.

The Third Benefit: Redemption and Surrender

So, coming back now to Psalm 103, let's look at benefit number three. This morning, when I was a teacher there years ago, I would get some of us together, largely morning at 7 for the Lord. We had no musical influence in those early days.

And as a result, we were using a little hymn book called the little flock hymn book. And we had no musical influence. Dr. Chapel was a good musician. He always, as we say here in the Southland, he hoisted the tune.

Occasionally this Scottish lad would get up and in his throat he would say, Brethren, let me arrange it up for you. I want to give you a homemade paraphrase of this taken here in verse four. Instead of reading who redeemed us by life and destruction, let's look this way.

You know, a lot of people have so many dead sides. I suppose I've seen more people die. For ten years, I was honorary captain in sometimes more than once a week. We were called to sit by the dead sides of those who were passing from this life.

It's interesting to hear some of the things they said. You know, last month, old brother, kind of civil worker, how I wish now we could come to the end of life like the Apostle Paul did. And he said, I've kept the faith, but let me just point out to you that this requires some surrender on your part.

Who redeemed us by life, he buys it back and saves it from going to waste. And he tells you and me in the Epistle of Romans how it is done. In the twelfth chapter of Romans we read, and how sweetly the Apostle puts it, he doesn't say I command you, he doesn't say the mercies are the compassions of God that you present, present your body, your body which is your intelligence or reasonable soul to put in your faith in the Lord Jesus Christ as your Savior.

You just surrender this to him. I remember when that first verse struck me the same way I would receive in fellowship. And I said to him, Sam, I said, have you ever read Romans 12 and 1? I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God that you present your bodies a sacrifice wholly accepted from the sons of God which is both reasonable and intelligent service.

He said, I've read it a lot of times. I said, have you ever done it? He said, no, I don't think I have. I said, do you know how it's done? I went to another fellow who likewise was in that same group that night.

I said, Arch, 12 and 1. I said, have you ever done it? No, he said, I don't think I have. I said, do you know how it's done? So I went to his father, dear old brother Arch of Albany. I said, did you tell me how this is done?

He said, I don't know that there's any particular way in which it is done, but I think I know any way in which it is done. I was all ears listening. He said, I would suggest to you that you go to your room with your Bible.

Close the door, lock it if necessary, so you can be interrupted. Open your Bible to that verse, put your finger on it, and say to the Lord, Lord Jesus, I'd like to hear you. He was seventeen, and I had been saved.

I thought, my, this is simple. And I did it exactly as Mr. Cowan told me. Do you know what? And I put my finger on that text and said to the Lord, Lord, I'd like to do this. But I began to realize that in the presentation of my body, this meant my brain, which I think, and sometimes think things that I wish I could forget.

These eyes with which I looked at things, which I wish I had never seen. These ears that took in things which I wish I'd never heard, which says things which I wish I'd never said, things which do things that I wish I'd never done.

It took me to places I wish I'd never gone. And a cold sweat when I went into this tent that I might be able to carry this through, things I'd never be able to do. By presenting this body, which is your reasonable or intelligent service.

My dear friends, many years have passed. More than 60 years since that wonderful contact in that day in my little room. I have never regretted it. I've had many times to confess that I haven't regretted it.

For who could regret giving to Him who gave Himself for us, to give to Him the Spirit who redeemed my life. It is my earnest hope that the Lord carries the cycle of death that so many of my forebears have.

The Fourth Benefit: Lovingkindness and Tender Mercy

This brings us to blessing number four right here in this four verse, the latter part of the verse. Who crowned me with loving kindness and tender mercy. All of these verse are in the present tense. Who forgives, present tense.

Healeth, present tense. Redeemeth, present tense. Crowneth, present tense. This isn't something that waits till you get over yonder. This is something you wear now. A kind of a crown that doesn't weigh heavy on your head.

Isn't it lovely? Loving kindness and tender mercy. Say, well I don't know that I've ever seen anybody wear a crown like that. Well, maybe I dare to use my beloved mother as an example here. Not able to afford to mend it.

The little one was expected next door and the doctor's puggy had broken down with another flea from over there. You see mother gathering a few things together in a bag and going over there and helping to bring this little one into the world.

My dear brother Henry up to whom I made records last night. We were watching her as she came back from this home having performed this errand of mercy and Henry said to me you come isn't mom a queen? And she was.

The queen wearing a crown we have described here. Loving kindness. As I said before it doesn't weigh heavy on your head. Never get a headache from wearing this. And I'll tell you this figure which is swelling is the kind of a crown that may have thrown the heads of most of us if not all of us.

The Fifth Benefit: Satisfaction in the Lord

And then this brings me to the final thing here and that is satisfaction. This seems to be the climax of this section here who's satisfied. And you notice that I ordered the reading to conform to other translations.

Mr. Darby tells us in his footnotes that it could be of old age or mouth or even in other translations that one of those words is very versatile in the original. So we're going to use the old age this morning.

I've heard this statement that the devil has no happy old man ever since. So that statement is accurate. The devil has no happy old man. This is a wonderful thing. To grow old in the grace of God which increases with the day.

Friends, if there's one text I love in the Bible it's the one which says in Philippians 4 to rejoice in the Lord and again I say rejoice. The joy of the Lord is the strength. This is the way we give evidence that what he needs is that he really satisfies us.

Really satisfies us. Satisfied to the point where the things of time and sense have little or no appeal. You don't need it. Remember we moved into a home some years ago in Dallas. The neighbor lady came over and said to my wife she said well, you have your stove set up now come on over to my house and get your lunch ready in fact, she said I've got stuff in the refrigerator please come on in.

Please, something hostile's gotta be. You know what I mean? And so I accepted it and went in and I noticed after a while she got into a conversation with Mrs. Arnolding and she said did y 'all play good?

And Simon said no. Did y 'all cook a dinner? Did y 'all play card? Did you play golf? And then my wife had to tell us that we found out a joy in a different way. She said you know we go down to Little Medium down here on 51st to remember the Lord and the Lord's Remembrance where they meet for the preaching of the gospel Sunday night and where they meet for prayer and Bible study.

This woman said you need to send her you need to tell me that you get pleasure out of that? And my wife as we were listening to the conversation said no, we get pleasure because it's a real pleasure. A real pleasure.

Oh, the satisfaction of being with the Lord's people and enjoying the Lord. So now, I'm going to take a minute or two more this morning and look at time enough. I would like to apply a few measurements to this.

Measuring God's Mercy and the Cross

These measurements I've given this right in this psalm itself. I was trained to be an engineer. I wasn't trained to be a preacher. I was trained in mechanical engineering. I was making measurements in a room like this and I wonder how wide it is and how long it is and how high the ceiling is and whether this beam above me is going to break down on me.

That's the measurements that I've given in this psalm. Look at verse 10. Do you see it? It says, He has not judged what is after or according to our sins nor what we wanted as according to our iniquities for as the heaven is high above the earth.

That's the measurement for you. How high is that? Yes, it's been right going up into the beyond the stratosphere, way up there it's been going. They still haven't reached it. As high as the heaven is above the earth so great is his mercy toward them who fear him.

What a measurement that is. There's only one word that fits this and what is it? It's the word infinity. As high as the heaven is. I remember when they were planning that big telescope and my student Dave and I remember saying to my professor of chemistry I said, Dr. Clark what do you think they'll discover when they get that big telescope in place down there at Palomar?

He looked at me with a merry twinkle in his eyes and said, they'll discover how little they know. But he knew from other measurements given us in verse 12 we're as far as the east is from the west so far after we removed our transgression from it.

He said, that can be measured. He decided he might be right because there is a place in this old globe where you couldn't go any further north and there's a place in this old globe where you couldn't go any further south.

But if you're traveling from east to west or west to east you can keep on going even though you reach the same point you still go on. Again, it's infinite, isn't it? And here we have two lines of measurements.

One is perpendicular, the other is horizontal, and you put the two of them together what do you have? You have a cross. This is the measurement of all these lessons we've been talking about. This is the measurement measured by that cross and this Measured by those suffering to him who endured from that cross.

The Everlasting Mercy of the Lord

Oh, how deep God's love must be. Then one more measurement. This is found in the 17th verses, the time measurement. You know, the philosophers were very fond of talking about the space-time continuum.

Here's the time measurement in verse 17, and mercy of the Lord is ever lasting forever. So, you see, wherever you apply these measurements, you have them in infinity. There they are. And whom do we find only?

We find them in one blessed person, in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. How Lord Jesus loves us. So, beloved friends, having looked again at this wonderful inventory of our blessings, our benefits, that we shall go away from this conference not any richer than we came, but more aware of the riches which are ours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was rich, and for our sake he became poor, that we, through his poverty, might be rich.

I'm satisfied that Sir Frank Crosby must continue about this psalm, and she wrote this lovely hymn, number 6, in our hymnal, Jesus, our blessed.