Hamilton Baptist Sermons
28/7/24 Pm Psalm 110 - Simon Turner
But as Simon brings this short scenes in the Sam's Den end, we're going to read tonight, Sam 110. Perhaps you'd like to turn to it at the moment. Just seven verses, but packed with awesome truth and power. And one of these verses we've already read from Hebrews chapter 1. And you can spot it as we hear Sam 110 together. The Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool. The Lord sends forth from Zion your mighty scepter, rule in the midst of your enemies. Your people will offer themselves freely on the day of your power. In holy garments from the womb of the morning, the Jew of your youth will be yours. The Lord has sworn and will not change his mind. You are a priest forever after the order of mukazadek. The Lord is at your right hand. He will shatter kings in the day of his wrath. He will execute judgment among the nations, filling them with corpses. He will shatter chiefs over the wide earth. He will drink from the brook by the way, therefore he will lift up his head. This is the Word of God, and we thank him for it. Good evening, folks. It's a joy to be back in the sounds with you again this evening. We have been just so well prepared in singing these carefully chosen hymns that have truly focused our hearts on the great truth, that Jesus Christ is Lord. He is king, he is above all and overall. And we come to this fourth in this four-part series, Life Truths in the Psalms. And many people love the book of Psalms because of the poetic nature of the words that we find in here. The word "salm" itself probably indicates the plucking of a string or the singing of songs. And we find great delight in these Psalms because they seem to just touch every part of life. And they are so helpful to us, they are so instructive, and they just underpin so much of what we need to know as we follow the Lord Jesus Christ. So please turn back to Psalm 110 as we consider these seven verses together this evening under the title of true authority. Now that word "authority" at today and in our world seems to be a dirty word. It has been marred by the abuse, the corruption, the misrepresentation of those who wield authority. And so often, as a result, we shy away from institutions, people, and decisions that exercise authority over us. We have witnessed political leaders who have held power for gain. Perhaps we sadly have experienced employers who have mistreated their workforce. And tragically, we have even seen authority abused in the church that has damaged the reputation and the reach of the gospel. And it's so easy to paint this picture of bad authority. And we ask ourselves the question, well, what is the solution to bad authority? Is the solution no authority? Well, that can't be the case surely, because that would be to take the pendulum and swing it from one extreme to the other. And in the middle of those extreme six, Psalm 110, a Psalm that tells us and shows us and paints as a picture of true authority, authority that is not rooted in corruption, not rooted in self-interest. This is authority that is divine. This is authority that is exercised perfectly by the Lord who Himself is perfect in every way. And so with this in mind, let us turn to this royal Psalm, this Messianic Psalm. And this sits towards the end of the Book of Psalms. But it sits like a beacon flashing out as the great truth that Jesus Christ reigns, such is the strength of this Psalm that it is used frequently in the New Testament. In fact, it's the most quoted Psalm in the whole of the New Testament. So if you were to turn to the New Testament and see a quotation from the Psalms, you would be well advised to say, well, surely, that must be from Psalm 110, because you're most likely to be right than if you were to say it was any other Psalm. Indeed, the Book of Hebrews, we could even describe the Book of Hebrews as something of a sermon on Psalm 110. Let me tell you, if you want a better sermon in the row, be better, sermons in Psalm 110 and tonight. Then go to Hebrews and read what it has to say as it expounds the great truth of the majesty, the mind, the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ. And in scripture, this Psalm is just simply titled the Psalm of David. It's an understated title to what is the most magnificent Psalm. Luther says that this Psalm is the crown of all Psalms. Were they to be overlaid with precious jewels? And here we have this man with whom he had become so familiar through the Psalms that he has written. David, David the boy from Bethlehem, David the boy who was a shepherd, David the boy who was anointed king, but yet had to flee from the king of the day to preserve his life. And then David, this king who went through the ups and downs of the nation of Israel. David, this man who would be looped back a poem in scripture and in Jewish tradition as the greatest king that Israel had known. And at some undetermined point in David's life, he has sat down and he has composed this Psalm, a Psalm that is supreme in his majesty and its strength and its supreme in its certainty of the final victory that God is going to have over all of his enemies. But who is David speaking of in this Psalm? Is David looking back into history? Is he looking forwards into the future? Well, we can immediately rule out that David is speaking of himself. He's not talking of himself. We have two lords. We have the lord and we have my lord. David is always referring to one of these two other lords, but who are they? Now, I don't like doing this, but we do need just a little bit of help from Hebrew. I'm not fluent in Hebrew. I don't know much Hebrew, but the word lord is used twice in our English Bible here. And yet it's two different ones in Hebrew. The first one that we find in verse one, the lord, and you might have it in lowercase capitals in your Bible. The first one here is the name Yahweh. And that speaks of the god of the covenant. This is the god who met Moses at the burning bush in Exodus 3. And then we have the second lord at the end of that first clause there in the second word for lord here is the word add on, which is very closely related to a word you might be familiar with, add an eye. And this so often can speak about a respected person, but it's also add an eye, a title that is used of god. And I don't think David here can be speaking of a respected person because David is a king and there's no human being that David has to answer to and to call lord. But yet here he speaks of the one who is my lord. And so from the very opening strains of this son, we see that David is given a rare privilege of looking in upon a conversation within the godhead, where the father speaks to the son, where god speaks to his chosen anointed Messiah. And so in these verses, we can learn something of the sovereign authority that god has over all things. We learn about true authority. And so this Sam could be summed up in one little sentence. And it says this, that David declares the sovereign authority of the Messiah King Priest. So let's see what Sam 110 can teach us about true authority. In verses 1 to 3, we see that true authority firstly is powerful. It is powerful. And I think that when we speak of the word authority, we all conjure up in our minds a picture of what authority looks like to us. It would be a stereotype in many shapes and forms. But the images that we have would surely center on the power that a person or an institution has. And David gives us a picture that is powerful. I don't know if you remember in me last year, maybe you watched it, maybe you didn't. But we had the coronation of King Charles. And it was full of splendor. It was full of pomp. It was just jam-packed with ceremony. And it was a wonderful occasion. But yet, as the king was being crowned, we saw that he had to sit in a particular place for this to happen. He was giving certain things to hold that demonstrated that he was the king. And then there was the official proclamation that he was now the reigning monarch of the United Kingdom. And this is what David does in these first three verses. He paints this picture of one who could not be disputed as being the sovereign monarch. He is all of the appearance of powerful authority. But it's an even greater array and spectacular imagery than we saw with King Charles. And David's point in these first three verses is quite clear that God governs the vast machinery of the whole world, as John Calvin put it. And there's why we see that this king has the position of being at the right hand of God. And that's the position of glory. That's the position of honor. That's the place of majesty. And then we see that not only is the king in a great place, but his enemies are under his feet. They are in the disgraceful place of being a fit still. He rests his feet upon them. And they are utterly disabled. They are immobilized. This is the king in verse two who comes out of the center of the world of the day, from Zion that that's Jerusalem. And in David's day, that was very much the place of power and authority. And as he comes out, he's holding that symbol, the scepter that says, I am the king. And so as you look at verses one and two, we see that this is the king who stands in the midst of his enemies. This is the king who is untouched. This is the king who's untroubled. He's the one who has the power. He's the one who is the sovereign. He's the one who has all the authority. And we are given this definitive picture of the power of true authority. A power that is not subject to anything else. A power that is absolute. A power that doesn't even entertain any challenge to get it against it. But a power that defeats each and every enemy that would rear its head against it. And for us, we see that this power is only in one person. This power is in the Lord Jesus Christ. And the New Testament is it pains to tell us time. And again, the Christ sits at the right hand of God, exalted to the most glorious, the most perfect place. And we could ask ourselves the question, what enemies have ever triumphed over the Lord Jesus Christ? So the Jews thought that they'd won. The Romans thought that they'd been successful as Jesus died on the cross. But no, the Lord Jesus Christ trimes over even death. But before we think that this power is just confrontational, we come to verse three. And we see this power for the authority is vested in a king who is a people who love him. We see the taters in our world today. The taters who have a people under them who are subject to them, a people who are actually forced to proclaim their loyalty and love for these leaders, lest they be persecuted. But this king doesn't have to force his people to love him. They love him because they know him. He has a people who are willing in their worship, a people who are subject in their service, and a people who are absolute in their adoration. And David describes these people in a very striking fashion. These are a people who submit to the authority of this king freely. They're not defeated enemies, but willing subjects. And then we're told that they are a people who come in holy garments. Not that one garments, but the garments that this king has given them. Other translations would describe this as being in the beauty of holiness. This king has made them with the appearance of holiness. This king has made them look white and dazzling and clean and perfect. And they come forth from him. They have his power from him. They belong to him. Friends, this is what the Lord Jesus Christ has done for you, what he's done for me. He's brought us to himself to be his willing people. He has transplanted our hearts to make as a people who love him, not hate him. And we see that the power of true authority, that this king, this Lord Jesus has, has made us a people who are pleasing to him. He has redeemed us. He has declared us righteous through his death. He has given us his righteousness. And this king will never grow old. This king will never lose his grip when power. This king will never be weakened by the passing of time. His youth-like strength will always remain. True authority is full of power. But yet, authority is not merely about power. As important as that is, we also see in verse four, that this power, this true authority is preserving. And so often in our world, authority is used for less than beneficial reasons. It can be used to further ideals. It can be wielded to increase wealth. It can even be used to hold back progress in people. But not so with true authority. And this is where the major surprise in this Sam hits home now is verse four begins. The opening clause doesn't really say anything we've not heard of before. The Lord has sworn and will not change his mind. We're told here of the absolute nature of God's decisions, of his plans that God is unchanging. Now David, as he writes this, is writing to people that will have heard this already. God is eternal. God is unchanging. Whatever he has fixed in his will shall come to pass. But it's such a comfort to be reminded of it, isn't it? And it serves as well to think on it momentarily that our God doesn't change. This God that David is writing off, all these centuries ago is the same God that we have been singing about and singing to this evening. This God of Moses, this God of David, this God of Peter and Paul is the God that we come and fall before this evening. And that's a security for us. We're not left wondering what God is going to be like today. We're not wondering if he'll change his mind tomorrow. Oh, when we exercise authority, we can be like that. We just perhaps even need to consider how we exercise authority over our children to see that we can be quite changing in how we use that. But God with his children, God with all of creation, is the same forever. Now, the surprise that we find in this Psalm is finding the second half of verse four, where this king, this Messiah, is also declared to be a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek. Now, why is that shocked? Well, in David's day, the king could not be a priest. You couldn't put these two functions together. David's a predecessor king, so he tried it. He tried to be a priest as he was the king, and yet he lost the favor of God because he did that. And then in the days that would follow David, one of David's descendants, King Huziah, he went into the temple and he burned in a sense in a manner that was really only to be carried out by the priests. And God sent his judgment on Huziah, and he was struck with a leprosy. So the king shouldn't be a priest. But David is quite clear here that this king is a priest like Melchizedek. Not like the priests of Israel, not like the priests from the tribe of Levi from the order of Melchizedek. Now, Melchizedek is this shadowy figure that we know very little of. We read of him first in Genesis 14. And then the second mention he gets in scripture is in Psalm 110. In fact, the New Testament mentions him more than the old because the book of Hebrews then has much more to say about Melchizedek than here. But even then we know very little of Melchizedek. But I think that this king who is a priest from the order of Melchizedek is described as this because he's not a priest simply because of where he was born. He's not a priest because of who his father was. He's a priest without beginning and he's a priest without end. He is the perfect priest. Not the Melchizedek was sinless. He was a man like every other man and so sinned, but he doesn't have that beginning and end that we knew of. And we're given this picture of this priestly work of somebody who would come out from Salem and give Abraham a blessing. And this king priests of Psalm 110. Is the one who will reign, but the one who will also represent his people before God. What does a priest do but represent the people to God? He speaks for them. He intercedes for them. His work is a saving work. His work is to ask God to forgive the people. But with this priest, this priest came. There is no tenting of corruption. There's no smearing of his character because of sin this priest is absolutely perfect. And so we see that the true authority of Psalm 110 located in the priest king is an authority that is saving, it's preserving, it's keeping. And this king who is a priest looks after his people. And as we look to the Lord Jesus Christ, we see how he uses his supreme authority to save his people. He uses his authority to deliver his people. That's anyone who is trusted in him. And his salvation is a perfect salvation. It's not tainted by self-interest. But of course, the Lord Jesus Christ went to the cross in the most selfless sacrifice this world has ever experienced the priest of Psalm 110 did not just offer a sacrifice, but the sacrifice he offered himself. And so here's this true authority, this authority that preserves. But let's move on to the final three verses. And as we're building our image of true authority, we come to the final element from this Psalm, now these Psalms are not exhaustive in what they have to say on these subjects, but they are so helpful to us. And in verses five, six and seven, we see that true authority is permanent. David's clear in these closing three verses, that the authority of the divine king is fixed forever. There's no challenges that will come along that will topple it, there are no vagaries that can threaten it, there are no, even no insecurities to undermine it. And just look at the result of this authority. In verse five, we almost have a role reversal here because even though this king is divine in his own right, he is now being supplied by God himself because this Lord is at the Lord's right hand and they have swapped. Yahweh has now at the right hand of Adonai. And this king is supplied by God. And if God is supplying, there can be no depletion of resources. I had a really frightening experience. Well, all things are relative. I had a frightening experience just a couple of months ago where I put my phone onto charge in the evening. My phone runs out of charge very quickly, but it's because it's old like me, but I put it on in the evening and then, I was just saying that we were waking up and thinking, this feels a little bit later than it should. And my phone hadn't charged and so my alarm hadn't gone off and fortunately nobody was late. That was a mercy in itself, but phones run out of charge. All of our devices run out of charge and the truth be told, we run out of charge as well, don't we? The energy can go, not so with this king. The one who is our Lord and our Savior is unlimited in all that he has, he's unlimited in all that he is. So the Lord Jesus Christ is not gonna run out of love for you. He's not gonna find that he's got low levels of mercy for you. He wouldn't find that he's forgotten to replenish his strength and all of these things, all of these supplies, remain overflowing as he deals with each one of us. And on top of this truth is the fact that a day is coming when all the other rulers, all the other pretenders to his throne will be smashed into oblivion. As this world heads to a close, the Lord, the King Priest, the Messiah of Psalm 110, will lay waste to every enemy, to every nation, to every ruler, he will smash them. He will execute judgment on the day of his wrath, that day when everything draws to a close. Commentator said, when God strikes, when Christ strikes, he never needs a second blow. In the rest of Scotland, we would maybe put it like this. When God hits you, you stay hit. And that's what comes as God executes his judgment. A judgment that's not localized, a judgment that's not even nationalized, this is a judgment that will be on every tribe, every person, every nation. And the graphic image that we have in verse six is of this King filling up the battlefield with corpses. Now we don't need to take that literally, but it's very much a picture that just simply says, nobody will stand against him. Nobody will be able to shield themselves from his strength. His overwhelming power will be poured out on every enemy and his victory will be absolute, his victory will be complete. This King is going to destroy every world power, whether it's military, economic, diplomatic or even social, every form of rebellion will be crushed by this King. And nobody will find an answer to counter Christ's assault. Friends, if you're in Christ the same thing, this is the King who reigns over you now. This is the authority to which you are obedient. This is the future in which you are utterly, completely, fully, permanently secure. It's all going to happen so quickly that the supply lighters will not be able to keep up with Lord. He's going to have to drink by the brook, and that's just really a picture to tell us that this will happen so fast. It will be inexorable, it will be rapid, he will be beyond where we think he even will be. And we're led to the closing phrase, therefore he will lift up his head verse seven. We often use the phrase head held high to speak of somebody who's been defeated, the've lost, but they can leave with their head held high. Not so with the Lord, his head is lifted up. He is literally heading shoulders above every other authority. He doesn't need to explain a way of defeat or to ameliorate it by saying, "Well, I performed well even though I lost." No, he's victorious, absolutely, completely, certainly, perfectly, utterly, he is victorious. And this tells us that his authority is permanent, it's not transient. It's not a span of dominance like some amazing sports person who eventually is caught up by time. This is eternal authority, true authority is permanent. And so we will never slip out from under Christ's authority and we would never want to. And we can never find ourselves let go by Christ's authority because that would devastate us. We can never discover that we grow tired of Christ's authority because it is that authority that keeps us. It's our joy to be under Christ's headship. It's our very lifeblood to recognize his supreme position. And David's wonderfully composed Sam simply, majestically, exalts God and reminds us of our privilege to recognize his authority. No. Oh, it doesn't look like this world sees anything in the authority of Christ. But that doesn't mean to say that he is not supreme in his authority. And so as we end our summer in the Psalms, we've considered these four vital truths. We've looked at true repentance, her sorrow over sin has driven us to the arms of the Lord Jesus Christ to say this. We've thought about true faith where our lives are lived in the certainty that Christ does hold us. And then last week we looked at true wisdom where we remember the wonder and the goodness of Christ who guides us. And this evening we're concluding by recognizing the wonder and the strength of true authorities, we live under the perfect lordship of Christ Jesus. So maybe we take our steps through our lives with all of our senses at our disposal. Everyone trained on the Lord Jesus Christ who is truth. The quality of true authority is in its goodness and its perfection and its brilliance. And so the same may we come to throw out everything at the feet of the Lord Jesus Christ in worship. Our achievements are nothing before Him. Our position in this world is insignificant before Him. Our possessions are but a drop of water in the ocean before Him. 19th century British theologian, Frederick Farrer, once recounted a conversation that he had held with Queen Victoria and with us, I close. Queen Victoria just sat under a sound on the second coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. And she turned to Dr. Farrer and she said, "Oh, Dr. Farrer, how I wish that the Lord would come during my lifetime." Just imagine the puzzlement felt by the theologian. Here's a monarch willing upon herself an irresistible challenge to her throne. She would no longer be Queen. And Farrer understandably asked Queen Victoria, why? The Queen's reply was, and this is just so wonderful. The Queen's reply was, because I would love to lay my crown at his blessed feet in reverent adoration. My dear friends, that's not just our duty, but that's our privilege. We are to throw our crowns at the feet of our wondrous King Priest now and prepare to do it in the future as well. Let us willingly submit to the King Priest's sovereign authority now. Let's pray. Our Father, how we marvel at your authority and the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ, it is beyond comprehension, it's beyond explanation. How we thank you for descriptions like those given to us by David inspired by the Holy Spirit. And may we marvel and rejoice and celebrate in the authority that Christ has. The authority that is called out of the pit, the authority that will keep us round his feet for eternity. And may we mold our lives, maybe shape everything that we are to simply exalt his authority in every way. We praise the Lord Jesus Christ for his peerless and we pray these things in his wonderful, majestic holy name, the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior.