Psalm 36 - Fearing God and Discovering Evil

Podcast Transcript (Auto-Transcribed by Apple Podcasts)

Hello, and you are back on Tabernacle Talk. It is the start of a brand new week, and I'm excited to be in God's Word, kind of heading out the last few Psalms in Book One of Psalms.

And then we've got a brand new study that we're going to be doing after we complete Book One of Psalms. And I've really, really enjoyed this time. We did, I think, 48 episodes in the Book of Acts, and then we'll have done 41 episodes in Psalms.

And I've just really been kind of blown away from my own heart and life, how I've seen God continuing to just work in me, bring things to mind. It's been an encouragement to me.

And I hope that the time that we've spent in God's Word will have been an encouragement to you. I don't say that seeing what God's done in me, I'm not saying that as in, oh, man, God's just bringing me great new insights.

No, no, no, anything that I have said on here, I have said in echoing the truths that I've been privileged to hear throughout my whole life through both the Word of God, people preaching the Word of God.

I've tried to throw as many of those things y'all's way as I can with some of the resources that I often go to to when I have questions where I check. And so as we continue to move forward, I'll keep throwing those y'all's way.

And today we are in Psalm 36. This is an interesting Psalm. And the inscription says this, for the choir director, a Psalm of David, you always servant.

So we've seen a lot of ones that have for the choir director. We've seen a lot of ones that say a Psalm of David. This is kind of the first one I think that I've seen that says you always servant or the Lord's servant.

And here's what he says. He says, an oracle within my heart concerning the transgression of the wicked person. Dread of God has no effect on him.

There is no dread or fear or reverential awe of God before his eyes. For with his flattering opinion of himself, he does not discover and hate his iniquity. The words from his mouth are malicious and deceptive.

He has stopped acting wisely and doing good. Even on his bed, he makes malicious plans. He sets himself on a path that is not good and he does not reject evil.

Yahweh, your faithful love reaches to heaven. Your faithfulness to the clouds. Your righteousness is like the highest mountains.

Your judgments like the deepest sea. Yahweh, you preserve people and animals. How priceless your faithful love is, God.

People take refuge in the shadow of your wings. They are filled from the abundance of your house. You let them drink from your refreshing stream.

For the wellspring of life is with you. By means of your light, we see light. Spread your faithful love over those who know you and your righteousness over the upright in heart.

Do not let the foot of the arrogant come near me or the hand of the wicked drive me away. There, the evildoers have fallen. They have been thrown down and cannot rise.

So here kind of an interesting portion that we go through and want to start off with kind of that first paragraph where he says, An oracle within my heart concerning the transgression of the wicked person. So here we get kind of the inscription.

This is David as he's thinking about the sins of a wicked person. So not necessarily all of the wicked. He says, here, here's what wickedness looks like.

Here's how that fall looks like in the life of one person. He says this starting off, Dread of God has no effect on him.

This phrase here is who God is, God's justice, God's holiness, God's righteousness, God's, I think I already said God's justice, has no swaying effect on this person. This person says, I am just fine.

God is either completely fine with how I'm living my life or God's not going to do anything. And when we get to the point where we think that we are exempt from God's actions, we are in a very, very, very dangerous place.

Turning over to Hebrews chapter 12, because I wanted to read this verse. He says this, the writer, in Hebrews 12 and verse number 4, In struggling against sin, you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood.

So here he's talking to some of these believers. He's saying, you've been going through some persecutions, but it hasn't come yet to the point of you all being beaten or killed for your faith.

So he's going on, he's going to talk to them some about persecution. And he says, and you have forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as children.

He says, my child, do not take the Lord's discipline lightly or lose heart when you are reproved by him. For the Lord disciplines the one he loves and punishes every child that he receives. He says, endure suffering as discipline.

God is dealing with you as children. For what child is there that a father does not discipline? But if you are without discipline, which I'll receive, then you are illegitimate children and not real children.

Furthermore, we had human fathers discipline us and we respected them. Shouldn't we submit even more to the father of spirits and live?

For they disciplined us for a short time based on what seemed good to them, but he does it for our benefit so that we can share his holiness. No discipline seems enjoyable at the time but painful.

Later on, however, it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.

So there's the one end where we know if we are Christians, there will be times when we undergo either from the Lord discipline that would bring us back into faithful obedience to him or it might be through suffering and just kind of the disciplines

of life that bring us closer to God, but that God can discipline us in that way. Then if we go a couple of pages back in Hebrews 10, we can see that there is something to be in reverential awe and holy fear with our God.

Verse number 26, so this is after he encourages the people.

Verse number 24, he says, let us watch out for one another to provoke love and good works, not neglecting to gather together as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging each other and all the more as you see the day approaching.

So here he's encouraging them, stay firm in your faith, encourage one another, meet together, gather together as the church.

And then he says this in verse number 26, for if we deliberately go on sinning after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a terrifying expectation of judgment and the fury of a fire about to consume

the adversaries. Anyone who disregarded the law of Moses died without mercy based on the testimony of two or three witnesses.

How much worse punishment do you think one will deserve who has trampled on the Son of God, who has regarded as profane the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified and who has insulted the Spirit of Grace?

For we know of the one who has said, Vengeance belongs to me, I will repay. And again, the Lord will judge his people. It is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of a living God.

So scripture talks about the fact that God can judge us. And sometimes he judges us because we are his children and he loves us. But the ultimate judgment, if you will, isn't an immediate thing in our life that causes us to turn back to God.

The worst judgment is if we are left to our own devices without God, that we don't bother with him at all.

And when we get to the end of our life, the greatest fear, the greatest terror that there could ever be would be that God would say, depart from me, I never knew you. Here, he's not saying, depart from me, you didn't do enough.

He didn't say, depart from me, you didn't give enough. He doesn't say, depart from me, you missed the bar in some way. It is knowing God that is the central aspect of our Christianity.

And here, the person that has no dread, no fear of God, that says, I'm not going to do what God says, I'm not going to turn back to God when I fail, that person is in terrible danger for their soul.

And we'll continue, he says, dread of God has no effect on it. For with his flattering opinion of himself, if we have a high estimation of ourselves, we're going to have a low estimation of God, because God doesn't agree with us.

And if we're always right, and if every action I take, if every attitude that I have, if every word that I say, if every choice that I make is always perfect, then I know when God agrees with me that I'm going to ignore him, I'm going to push him to

the side. But we need to be those that don't have a flattering opinion of ourselves, but a flattering opinion of God. Continuing in verse number two, for with his flattering opinion of himself, he does not discover and hate his iniquity.

This is great, great line here. This should be our continual prayer to the Lord. God, help me to discover my iniquity, discover my sin, discover where I'm falling short, and God help me to hate it.

Because our natural bent is to love our sin, to love our iniquity, to love how we respond and how we react to people and how we ignore people and how we please ourselves in defiance of God's word.

And for us, we need to discover and hate our iniquity. How do we discover our iniquity? Well, you can do it by asking someone else, hey, what are my flaws?

What are my character flaws? What are the ways in which I don't do right by people? What are the ways in which I am not following God's word?

That's one way. You got to have a close relationship with a person for them to be able to tell you some of those things. They will be honest with you, particularly if they actually do have something to say.

The other way that you can do this is obviously through prayer, the same prayer that David prays in Psalm 139. Search me, O God, and know my heart.

Try me and know my thoughts and see if there is any wicked way in me and lead me in the everlasting way. So we can pray, but then we can dive into God's word.

The next sections of scripture that we're going to be in, I'm not going to spoil anything right now, I've got three sections of scripture that I'm actually debating on what next week is going to hold for Tabernacle Talk.

And so all three of those deal with in various ways God's laws for our life, how we deal with people, how we interact with people, how we treat people.

The Book of Acts doesn't necessarily do a bunch of those things other than don't lie and then looking at some of the Jerusalem Council things, don't commit sexual immorality, don't worship idols, those sorts of things. Don't be greedy.

Some of those things are brought out, but all three of the possible next sections of scripture that we're going to be going over go over what does God expect from me? What is right standing with God and man look like from what the Bible says?

And so we're going to be going over some of those. So we can go to God's Word and that's how we can discover what iniquity is. We go, oh, I didn't realize that that was a sin.

I didn't realize that I wasn't supposed to say that or do that or do this thing. So discover and hate our iniquity. He says the words from his mouth are malicious and deceptive.

He has stopped acting wisely and doing good. Here there's two kind of pairs of things. Number one, he says the words from his mouth are malicious and deceptive.

What you say gives such a huge light into your soul and how you're doing on the inside.

If your words are lying, if your words are conniving, if your words are dragging down people, if your words are always sad or always angry, it can show you what's going on in the inside.

There's a verse that says, out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks, and that's very true. He says the words from his mouth are malicious and deceptive. He has stopped acting wisely and doing good.

So a person that's on a wicked path, they don't care about the consequences of their actions. They don't care what God's word says. They have a flattering, very high opinion of themselves.

They're not discovering and hating iniquity. They're not locating those areas of their life that are against God. And to borrow the phrase from Andy Griffith, from the Andy Griffith Show, nipping it in the bud.

He says he does not discover and hate his iniquity. The words from his mouth are malicious and deceptive, and he has stopped acting wisely and doing good. Here there is a ceasing of doing good actions for others.

Doing good here is not simply something someone does for themselves. Oh yes, I'm very good. Everything I do is for me, and I do very good for me.

Doing good is doing well on behalf of others, doing something for others. He says even on his bed, the time when you should be sleeping, the time when you can take a load off, he says even on his bed he makes malicious plans.

He sets himself on a path that is not good, and he does not reject evil. Evil will come again and again in your life. It came to our Lord during his temptations, and he rejected it every single time, and that's what we're called to do.

Evil will rear its head. There will be that opportunity for you to have that attitude, to say that thing, to follow through on that action. There will come an opportunity for you to accept evil, but you must reject it because of a love for God.

And then he talks a lot about God. He says, Yahweh, your faithful love, your Chasid, that covenant, that loyal love reaches to heaven, your faithfulness to the clouds.

He's saying, God, you have so much love and faithfulness for those that will turn to you. He says, your righteousness is like the highest mountains. You have so much goodness in you that you give to others.

He says, your judgments, your wisdom, your choices, he says, are like the deepest sea. He says, Yahweh, you preserve people and animals that God has kept alive, nature and humans now for thousands and thousands of years.

And what an incredible thing that he has preserved us. And not only that, but he preserves us now into that new resurrection life that we will one day experience, that there will be animals in the new creation.

And you can read about the lion laying down with the lamb, and there's some animal that lays down with a snake, and they're totally fine because everything is good in the new creation.

And God is the one that does that, and very thankful for those truths. He says, how priceless your faithful love is, God. He says, people take refuge in the shadow of your wings.

Here there's an anthropomorphic language that's going on. God doesn't literally have wings. Here he's saying, God, you shelter people.

You encircle them. You keep them safe. He says, they're filled from the abundance of your house.

God is the one that gives us our food. He says, you let them drink from your refreshing stream.

That God gives us every drink we have, he gives us a refreshment of spirit through his word, through his Holy Spirit, through his people, through his body. And he says, for the wellspring of life is with you.

And we can think of Jesus in John 4, where he is that spring that gave the woman at the well living water, that she was consistently coming to the well because she was not only physically thirsty, but she was spiritually thirsty.

She had a life that had gone through incredible difficulty and God gave her new life that sprung up in her. He says, by means of your light, we see light. God is most often talked about in scripture as providing light.

He is a flame. He is a fire. His presence, where God is, there's flames.

There's the, you know, in the story of Exodus, there's the pillar of fire. God shines his light.

He is the light of the world, and he shines his light into our light, and we can see the world for what it truly is in the light of God's word and in the light of his presence.

He says, spread your faithful love over those who know you and your righteousness over the upright in heart. He says, don't let the foot of the arrogant come near me or the hand of the wicked drive me away. He says, there the evildoers have fallen.

They have been thrown down and cannot rise. Evil will have an ending. All of the terrible things now that we wonder, how could this be allowed to happen?

One day it will no longer happen and complete justice will be met out by our holy God. Today will you have a fear of him? Will you turn to him?

Will you say, God, I know how faithful you are. I know how amazing you are. I know you want to shine your light on my path.

And so God, I'm going to, I'm going to fear you. I'm going to realize that you are holy. I'm going to ask for you to show me who I truly am.

I want to discover and hate my iniquity. Hope that you take that today. And tomorrow we are in Psalm 37, which has some wonderful verses that I'm looking forward to studying with you.

Thanks for tuning in. Thank you.