“Bring an offering and come into His courts.

Worship the LORD in holy attire;

Tremble before Him, all the earth.” Psalm 96:8b-9 (NASB)

In Psalm 96, the psalmist presents to us images that foreshadow the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. The purpose of this article is to see how this brief passage presents Jesus and His gospel.

In the second half of verse 8, we read that we are to “bring an offering and come into His (the LORD’s) courts.” The ‘offering’ here is speaking of an acceptable sacrifice that is our required “admission ticket” into the LORD’s courts. We are allowed into the LORD’s courts only if we bring with us an acceptable offering. Here, then, the gospel is foretold, for the only acceptable offering that anyone can bring to the LORD is the offering that Jesus Christ gave on the cross. If you will bring Christ’s death on the cross as your own offering, and if you will confess Christ as Lord, then you will be allowed into the Lord’s courts because of the imputed righteousness of Christ. The blood of Christ, then, is the offering we bring.

Verse 9 of this psalm presents for us two groups of people. One group worships the LORD is holy attire and the other group trembles before the LORD.

The first group is to “worship the LORD in holy attire.” What is this “holy attire?” And who are those who wear this “holy attire?” Here again we encounter the threads of the gospel, for from the Bible we know that no one is righteous and, therefore, no one is worthy to wear holy attire. If, then, there are those who do wear holy attire, it is only because they have been dressed in this holy attire by the Lord. But first, what is “holy attire?”

In Isaiah 61:10 we read that the LORD “has clothed me with garments of salvation, He has wrapped me with a robe of righteousness.” This is holy attire, the garments of salvation and the LORD’s robe of righteousness.

In Luke 15:22, in the parable of the lost son, the father in the story, who represents God the Father, welcomes his repentant son home and clothes him with the best robe. This is a picture of what happens when any sinner repents (Luke 15:7, 10). This is holy attire, the robe of repentance.

In Revelation 6:11, the martyrs underneath the altar are each given a white robe by the Lord and are told to wait a little longer. This white robe is holy attire, given by the Lord because of their faithfulness even unto death (Rev. 2:10).

In Zechariah 3:1-5 there is a crystal-clear picture of what happens when the Lord takes away our sin. Joshua the high priest is standing before the LORD in filthy garments. The angel of the LORD commands that the filthy garments be removed, and pure vestments be put on, because He has removed Joshua’s iniquity. The sinner’s iniquity is removed, and he is clothed with clean vestments. This is holy attire.

In Revelation 7:9 there is “a great multitude which no one could count from every nation . . . clothed in white robes.” The worshipers of Jesus are gathered before the throne of the Lamb at the end of the age to praise the Lord forever and they are clothed in white robes. This is holy attire. And who are these so clothed? These are the ones who “have washed their robes and have made them white in the blood of the Lamb (7:14).” And what are they doing? They are worshiping the Lord in holy attire. In this life, the followers of Jesus who have been spiritually dressed in the holy attire of righteousness will worship the Lord, but even more significantly, on the day of judgment and into eternity they will continue to worship the Lord in holy attire.

But there is a second group in view in the second half of Psalm 96:9, and these “Tremble before Him (the LORD), all the earth.” And who are these that tremble before the LORD? These are all those who have not been wrapped with a robe of righteousness and who have not washed their robes in the blood of the Lamb. And why do they tremble before the LORD? They tremble before the LORD because they await His terrifying judgment. Having rejected the LORD in their earthly life, they now await the just recompense of the Lord’s eternal and irrevocable condemnation.

In this brief passage, then, two groups are displayed, with two dramatically different destinies. One group eternally worshiping the Lord in the splendor of holiness, and the other group eternally separated from God in the torment of the lake of fire. And what is the distinction between these two groups? Christ! Christ is the One who divides mankind into these two groups. In Luke 12:51-53, the Lord Jesus Christ declares that He has come to bring division on the earth. All the earth will be divided on the basis of how each person relates to the Lord Jesus. He is the One who separates the sheep from the goats (Matthew 25:31ff). That means there are those who worship and all the rest tremble. Jesus Himself declared, “He who is not with Me is against Me, and he who does not gather with Me scatters (Matthew 12:30).” Every single person either worships the Lord in holy attire or they await the final judgment with trembling.

What we have seen, then, is that the psalmist in Psalm 96 presents the gospel in poetic form. Bring to the Lord the acceptable offering of the blood of Christ, then worship the Lord in the holy attire of His imputed righteousness.

SDG       rmb       7/20/2019

Jesus borrowed the grave of Joseph of Arimethea, used it for three days and then gave it back to Joseph just as empty as it had been before He used it.

Because that is the case, in all likelihood Joseph of Arimethea was buried in the grave that Jesus vacated. After all, it was Joseph’s grave. One reason why we have no real idea where Jesus had been temporarily buried after His crucifixion is because, when joseph died, his body occupied that grave and this lost all its uniqueness.

But also realize that the early church, after Easter morning, never once so much as glanced back to the empty tomb in Jerusalem, but rather charged out to the ends of the earth with the gospel of the glorious resurrection of King Jesus. Jesus had risen from the dead and had conquered the grave and now, for His disciples, death has lost its ability to threaten. Just as Jesus Christ temporarily occupied a grave and then was gloriously resurrected, so all those who have died in Christ will temporarily occupy a grave and then will be gloriously resurrected at Christ’s return. Jesus Christ has conquered every grave, not just the grave of Joseph of Arimethea. Now the grave of every follower of Jesus is temporarily occupied by a saint who has fallen asleep, but on that day, when the Rider on the white horse appears from heaven (Revelation 19:11-16) with a deafening shout and with a trumpet blast, all these graves will surrender their occupants in the resurrection of the righteous. And so we await the day when the dead in Christ shall rise and we shall be quickly changed and all those in Christ will meet their Savior face to face at last.

Soli Deo Gloria        rmb        7/16/2019

Some of those who sincerely follow the Lord Jesus Christ have difficulty in understanding the Bible’s clear instruction on God’s unconditional election of His chosen ones to salvation. For those believers, I offer this story of a sculptor and a stone as an illustration.

THE SCULPTOR AND THE STONE

The day had finally arrived for the unveiling of the sculptor’s grand project. For two whole years he had been working on this one sculpture, this one piece that had required his highest skills to be focused intently throughout its creation. As the date of the unveiling had approached, the buzz of interest had steadily increased to a fever pitch. Now the day was here and the veiled masterpiece had been painstakingly moved from the secret sanctuary of the sculptor’s studio to the plaza where it would be permanently displayed. The plaza itself was made up of hundr4eds of flat, rectangular stone pavers and at the borders of the plaza were plain stone benches and spaces filled with smooth pebbles and small stones. Ironically, the pavers and the benches and the pebbles were made of the same type of stone as the sculptor’s masterpiece.

But to understand this more fully, we need to go back two years to the day when the master sculptor had gone to the quarry. Most days at the quarry were fairly routine. The morning was spent cutting huge blocks of stone from the quarry walls and then transporting them down to the processing factory. In the processing factory, these huge blocks of stone were sawn and cut into plain, rectangular pavers or into parts for stone benches or they were shattered and thrown into a massive tumbler to produce smooth pebbles or small stones. Day followed day in this manner, with carving and cutting and tumbling. But that day was different, that day when the sculptor visited the quarry. He arrived just as the last of the huge stone blocks had been delivered from the quarry, but before the processing of the stone had begun. He had asked to see the manager of the quarry, and when the manager appeared, the sculptor explained his business to him.

“I am starting a sculpting project and am in need of a block of stone. I would like to examine your current inventory of stone blocks and choose the one that I think will best suit my purposes. How many blocks do you have available?”

The two men walked down the line of stone blocks, counting out loud as they went. There were eleven blocks.

The sculptor said to the manager, “Since you work with these blocks of stone all the time and I don’t, I need your advice. Which one would you recommend as the stone for my masterpiece?”

“Honestly,” replied the manager, “these eleven blocks are all pretty much alike, as far as I can tell. There is nothing remarkable about any of them. The fact that they are all basically the same is why we send them all through the factory to make pavers or pebbles. I have never thought of any of these huge blocks of stone as a sculptor’s future masterpiece. So, anyway, I think that any one of them is as good as another. I would just choose one and ignore the rest.”

The sculptor nodded his head and continued to scrutinize the blocks. Then he suddenly ran his hand over a feature in one of the stone blocks and looked very carefully at this feature. “This is curious. What is this? It looks like a flaw in this stone.”

“Oh, yes, that is definitely a flaw in the stone,” replied the manager. “Every stone block in the quarry has some flaw, whether significant and obvious or relatively minor and internal. Not one of them is perfect; they are just different degrees of imperfect. That’s why these
stones are used for pavers and pretty pebbles, but not really used for sculpting masterpieces. Unfortunately.”

“I see,” said the sculptor, thoughtfully. Yet again he walked down the blocks of stone, now running his hands over them as his eyes examined them one last time. Now he stops at one, looks it up and down, slowly nodding his head. A smile begins to spread across his face. “Yes! Yes, this is the one that I choose. How much for this one?”

The manager frowned. “Sir, that one you selected is one of the poorest of the lot. There are others with fewer flaws.”

“That may be, but I choose this one. How much?”

The manager winced to himself as he named a price four times what the best stone in the quarry would have cost. “Okay,” he thought to himself, “if he wants that stone block, it will cost him. Let’s see if he will pay the price!”

Without hesitation the sculptor accepted the price. “That price will be paid in full. Please talk to this young man.” He gestured to his right. “He has my full authority to pay the price.”

The quarry manager glanced in the direction that the sculptor had indicated and noticed for the first time a young man who had been in the background until then. There was nothing particularly noticeable about him, just a sort of plain young man, but he did seem pleasant enough. He stepped forward out of the shadows, paid the required price in full, and then quietly stood some distance away to wait for the sculptor to complete the transaction.

“Thank you, sir,” the sculptor said to the quarry manager. “We have chosen our stone and concluded the purchase. We will arrange for moving the block from here to my studio. Is there anything else you need?”

The quarry manager paused because he felt that his next question was a bit too personal and thus a bit inappropriate, but his curiosity was overwhelming him. “I do have one more question,” he said. “Who is the young man?”

As he walked away, the sculptor said over his shoulder, “Oh, that was my son.”

All that had taken place two years ago, and now that quarried stone block that had been chosen by the sculptor so long ago had been transformed by the sculptor’s chisel into his latest masterpiece, and the rest had been turned into pavers and pebbles which people walk on. But the difference was not in the block of stone, but it was in the choice of the sculptor. How did the sculptor choose? By nothing other than the sculptor’s pleasure. All the blocks of stone were destined to become pavers and pebbles, but the chosen block became exquisite art in the sculptor’s hand. And all the praise goes to the sculptor, for he is the one who chose the block of stone and he is the one who formed it into a masterpiece.

In the same way, all men and women are destined for destruction because of their sin. “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” “There is none righteous, not even one.” “The heart is deceitful above all else, and desperately wicked; who can understand it?” “Every intent of the thoughts of his heart were only evil continually.” But because of His mercy, God has chosen some of these before the foundation of the world for salvation. In time, those who are chosen are called by the gospel to salvation, and, because they are chosen, their hearts are quickened and they come to repentance and faith. The rest hurtle on to destruction, perhaps hearing the gospel, but never responding, and finally “sudden destruction comes upon them like labor pains upon a woman with child and they will not escape (1 Thess. 5:3).”

“Who are you, O man, who answers back to God? The thing molded will not say to the molder, ‘Why did you make me this way,’ will it? Or does not the potter have a right over the clay to make from the same lump one vessel for honor and another for dishonor (Romans 9:20-21)?”

The Lord Himself is sovereign over His universe and over everything in it, including all of mankind. The Lord has the Creator’s right to rule His creation as He sees fit (Psalm 115:3) and He will have mercy on whom He desires, and He will harden whom He desires (Romans 9:18). If all have sinned (Romans 3:23), then all have earned hell’s condemnation and they are without excuse (Romans 1:20; 2:1). But since God is rich in mercy (Ephesians 2:4), and since He desires to give His Son a ransomed Kingdom of redeemed worshipers (Revelation 7:9; Isaiah 53:12), then He has chosen some sinners before the foundation of the world (Ephesians 1:4-6) who will believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and who will thus be justly justified (Romans 3:26).

“O, the depth of the riches, both of the wisdom and the knowledge of God (Romans 11:33).” As a master sculptor selects a flawed stone block and then fashions it into a masterpiece, so the Lord graciously chooses some of the condemned to spend eternity at the master’s table as His adopted children (2 Samuel 9 and Mephibosheth).

The Lord God is, indeed, sovereign in His unconditional election.

SDG       rmb       7/11/2019

As I was carefully considering the second chapter of Genesis, I spent a long time thinking about Genesis 2:17 and its implications:

“. . . but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it you shall surely die.”

The LORD God issues a commandment to man, the creature, and man the creature disobeys the commandment. This led me to consider another question.

QUESTION #2: How many of the LORD God’s commandments did Adam disobey?

ANSWER #2: Adam disobeyed ALL of God’s commands.

COMMENTARY: What does this show us? What this shows us is that, even before the Fall, man was a rebel. Man the creature is a lawbreaker. Why do I say that? What is my evidence? Well, let us consider Adam and his actions.

In Genesis 2, the LORD God planted a garden and in the garden was “every tree that is pleasing to the sight and good for food (2:9).” The LORD God even placed the tree of life in the garden. The LORD God told the man that he could “eat freely” from any tree in the garden (2:16), but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil he shall not eat (2:17). So, the LORD God gave to Adam complete freedom to eat of all the delightful trees of the garden except one. And to help Adam to be highly motivated in his obedience, the LORD God warned Adam in the most strident and sober words that there would be disastrous and fatal consequences if he disobeyed. One the one hand, there would be an abundance to eat and ongoing fellowship with the LORD God if Adam obeyed, and on the other hand there would be death if he disobeyed. Absolutely everything was stacked in Adam’s favor.

But it turns out that as soon as Adam had a commandment to disobey, he fell into disobedience. The LORD God gave Adam one commandment and Adam broke it. Adam explicitly and specifically disobeyed the only commandment that he had received. Adam was a rebel, and he only needed a command that he could disobey to display his rebellion.

Romans 5:20 says, “The Law came in that the transgression would increase.” What this means is that the more laws there are, the more opportunities there are to violate the Law. For the rebel, a commandment is another opportunity to transgress.

Romans 7:5 says, “When we were in the flesh, the sinful passions that were aroused by the Law were at work in the members of our body to bear fruit for death.” Translation? When we were unsaved, the moral Law of God operated as a goad to incite us to sin. When our flesh heard a moral prohibition, transgression of the prohibition became the flesh’s ambition.

So what can change this wretched situation? How can I ever be set free from the body of this death (Romans 7:24)? How can we be set free from our slavery to the flesh and our slavery to sin? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord (Romans 7:25)! If the Son will make you free, you shall be free, indeed (John 8:36). Jesus Christ has set us free from the Law of sin and of death (Romans 8:2).

SDG       rmb       7/10/2019

As I was carefully considering the second chapter of Genesis, I spent a long time thinking about Genesis 2:17 and its implications:

“. . . but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it you shall surely die.”

The LORD God issues a commandment to man, the creature. OBSERVE:

• Man is obligated to obey all God’s commands;
• Our God is a God who issues commands and God’s commands MUST be obeyed
• Disobedience to God’s commands results in death
• God has authority over man and man is subject to God.

QUESTION #1: How many times did Adam sin before he was condemned?

ANSWER #1: Adam sinned one time and, as a result, he was condemned.

Comment: Note that the first time Adam sinned, he was condemned. Adam’s first sin made him a sinner. And this is the same for you and me. The first time that we violate any one of God’s commandments, we earn His condemnation.

How are you doing so far? Have you ever disobeyed ONE of God’s holy commandments?

And the news gets worse! According to Romans 2:5, “Because of your stubbornness and unrepentant heart you are storing up wrath for yourself in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God.” As we sin more, we store up more of God’s wrath against us, and He will pour out that wrath upon us on the day of judgment.

Romans 6:23 says, “For the wages of sin is death.” What we see from all this and many more passages throughout the Bible is that God has a holy hatred of sin and all sin invokes His wrath and merits judgment. DEATH. JUDGMENT. WRATH. CONDEMNATION.

Adam failed to obey the Lord’s commandments and so he fell and was cast out of the garden of Eden and plunged the world into sin. Likewise, we have also violated the Lord’s commands and have rebelled against His holy Law, and we have done that willfully and intentionally. We are obligated to obey God’s commands and we fail to obey, and our rebellion and disobedience merit death. How, then, can anyone escape the terrifying and righteous judgment of the Holy One of Israel? Is there any escape for sinners like us? How can God’s wrath against us be satisfied?

The good news of the gospel is that Jesus Christ, the heaven-sent Son of God, has lived the sinless life that we were obligated to live but could not and on the cross, Jesus Christ has died the death that we deserved and has thus satisfied the wrath of God for all those who place their faith and trust in Him. The Lord God has made “Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him (2 Cor. 5:21).” No matter how rebellious you have been and no matter how good you think you have been, you can find salvation and rescue at the cross. If you will place your faith in the Lord Jesus and bow the knee to Him, He is willing to save you. The Son of God is willing to save anyone who will bow down to him and confess Him as Lord.

Like Adam, you have sinned at least once. Will you escape the wrath of God and come to faith in Jesus?

SDG       rmb       7/9/2019

“Yeah, sometimes you just have to take the long view.”

Chris and I were talking about a recent spiritual conversation of mine with a man from Iran. Chris had been at the gathering where this conversation had taken place and he knew the Iranian man, as well. In fact, Chris had also had spiritual conversations with the man, so he understood my comments. Though Iranian, the man, who we will call Ahmet, confessed that he was not a Muslim. He described himself as “spiritual, but not religious.” In the course of our conversation he had explained that direct contradictions in the Koran are not actually contradictions, because you have to understand the “mystical meaning behind the words.” He also said with all sincerity that someone who pursues Jesus Christ and another person who worships Allah can be on the exact same path, it’s just that “the paths have different labels.” I was describing the difficulty of the dialogue, because Ahmet’s  position was always changing and he would not accept anything as objective. All was subjective. The choice of religions was “whatever works for you,” and Ahmet made the analogy with buying a car. “You buy a car that fits your needs and that car is right for you; but I choose a different car because that is the right car for me and my needs. Religions are like that. You pick the one that is right for you.” Ahmet did acknowledge that, as with selecting an automobile, it would be good to “test drive” a number of religions to be sure that you had the right one, so the person who had “test driven” the most religions would have the best chance of selecting the one that was right for him.

And so it went. “Chris, it was like trying to push against jello. He didn’t believe in any objective truth at all and yet made spectacular claims about things that required immense leaps of faith based on no evidence at all. And he was not bothered by his inconsistencies or his illogic.”

Chris replied, “I know what you mean. It is difficult having discussions with people like that, who are really much more post-modern in their thinking than they are Muslim. You just have to take the long view.”

So what is this “long view?” What did Chris mean by his statement? Here’s what I think he meant. First, when engaged in the evangelistic enterprise, realize that it often requires a lot of seed to be scattered on many fields before there is a harvest. “Taking the long view” means that I will be faithful in sowing the seed over the long haul even if there appears to be no result, confident that the Lord will reap the harvest that He intends to harvest through my efforts.

Second, “taking the long view” means that, when engaged in difficult gospel conversations that seem to be going nowhere, you should try to relax and enjoy the conversation. Relax knowing that you do not have to win the argument or make profound points. “Taking the long view” means making sure that, if the gospel message is clear and true to the Scriptures and if you have not compromised the gospel to make it more “successful,” then you can trust that the Lord will use your offering of the gospel exactly as He chooses. What do I lose if my offering of the gospel is rejected or ridiculed or ignored? Nothing. I have wasted nothing in this effort and I have offered a perishing soul salvation in the Lord Jesus Christ.

Third, I think that “taking the long view” means trusting that the Lord is in charge of the day of salvation and that the cynic and the one with circular,  illogical reasoning today may tomorrow see a vision of Jesus and beg you to tell him how he can be saved. So “take the long view” in your evangelism.

One parting thought on this is that “taking the long view” must not morph into complacency and into a gospel with no zeal and no appeal and no urgency. There is a balance required in evangelism that allows you to “take the long view” so that you can avoid excessive disappointment in your evangelism and continue to press on, but that also keeps you alert for a gospel spark in your hearers and keeps you fiery in your appeal and your persuasion. “Taking the long view” can never lapse into passivity and coolness when the eternal destinies of men and women hang in the balance. So, “take the long view” and continue with unashamed vigor to call men and women to faith in the only Savior of sinners, the Lord Jesus Christ.

SDG       rmb       6/17/2019

Psalm 61 is a prayer of David, a prayer in which the shepherd-king seeks the presence and the protection of God. David longs to find refuge in God’s tent forever (61:4) and he pours out his vows before the LORD (61:5). The psalm concludes with verse 8:

So, I will ever sing praises to Your name,

As I perform my vows day after day.

As I meditated on this psalm, I began to see verse 8 as a model plea for every believer. David speaks of the privilege of “ever singing praises” to God and then he tells of our daily duty to “perform our vows.” Herein lie the twin disciplines of the Christian life: the discipline of praise and the discipline of obedience. Surely two of the distinguishing marks of the transformed life of the believer is the ongoing praise to God that is lifted up from joyful lips and the walk of holy obedience to the commandments of God.

First, then, the life of the Christian should be marked by praise. This praise should flow from the Christian regardless of circumstances and irrespective of mood. Praise is commanded by the Scriptures and is modeled by all the godly ones. The Lord has rescued us from our just condemnation and has now raised us up with Christ and has seated us with Him at His table in heaven. Our sins have been separated from us as far as the east is from the west and we have been cleansed by the blood of the Lord Jesus. By the power of the Holy Spirit we have been filled with joy and therefore, we bear the fruit of joy. Our praise for our great God should be loud and long, and it need not be based on what the Lord has done for us, for simply praising the Lord for who He is would last a lifetime. The greatness of His creation and of His holiness and the magnificence of His grace and mercy and power and wisdom and knowledge are worthy of unending praise. So, the life of the believer should be marked by evident praise to the King of kings. “O LORD, open my lips that my mouth may declare Your praise (Psalm 51:15).” “So, I will ever sing praises to Your name.”

But second, the life of the Christian is distinct because of evident obedience. Here David speaks of “vows,” but the vows of the believer are to obey Christ in all that we say and do. When we came to Christ, we vowed to follow Him forever, and so we made an eternal commitment to obedience. Our obedience flows out of a Spirit-wrought hunger and thirst for righteousness. Our greatest desire is to be pleasing to the Lord (2 Corinthians 5:9) and we know that the obedience of those who were once rebels and slaves of sin is a fragrant aroma, well-pleasing to the One who has set us free. And so, our day by day obedience and our faithful pursuit of holiness should shine like a bright light in a dark place so that God would be glorified. Our goal is that our hatred of sin and our love of righteousness would result in rapid rejection of temptation and in steadfastly setting our mind on truth. We “buffet our body and make it our slave” (1 Corinthians 9:27) so that our obedience would be complete (2 Corinthians 10:6). So the believer willfully disciplines himself or herself in order to keep our vow of holiness. “As I perform my vows day after day.”

Therefore, let us, with the psalmist, pursue these twin disciplines of praise and obedience so that we may glorify our great God and Savior.

SDG       rmb       6/15/2019