4/28/24:
Psalm 19:7-14 Devotional:
7 The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul: the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple. 8 The statutes of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart: the commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes. 9 The fear of the Lord is clean, enduring for ever: the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether. 10 More to be desired are they than gold, yea, than much fine gold: sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb. 11 Moreover by them is thy servant warned: and in keeping of them there is great reward. 12 Who can understand his errors? cleanse thou me from secret faults. 13 Keep back thy servant also from presumptuous sins; let them not have dominion over me: so shall I be upright, and made clean from much wickedness. 14 Let the words of my mouth, and the meditation of my heart, be acceptable in thy sight, O Lord, my strength, and my redeemer.

We saw before this Psalm as a sermon to the church showing forth and declaring dumb creatures as holding the office of witnessing to men the majesty and glory of God leaving them with no excuse for their pretence of atheism. We saw also the universal language with which the heavens speak, confuting even the most barbarous of nations, leaving them dumb and speechless, without justification for their accursed idolatry. Now we reach the second half of the Psalm which completes it and shows us that knowledge which is useful and effectual unto eternal life, even the knowledge of the law and gospel, which is what is understood by “the law of the Lord”. As Calvin says upon the first Psalm, “When David here speaks of the law, it ought not to be understood as if the other parts of Scripture should be excluded, but rather, since the whole of Scripture is nothing else than an exposition of the law, under it as the head is comprehended the whole body.” And here we see that David means to magnify the law as the chief instrument and means by which God quickens His people and draws them to Himself, attributing to the law the office of conversion. And this is an essential point of Christian doctrine all but forgotten in today’s apostate church, wherein the more base and ignorant hold up signs on the streets, calling “sinners” to repent, which is not the word, nor the word preached, and those in more learned circles justify them as if they by their ignorance and inability to minister they are doing God service. Moreover they establish ordinances of their own with which they deceive the multitude into thinking they are erudite men of God while they spit on the true ordinances which God hath singularly commanded in His word. But David here does not say that debates with athiests or shepherd conferences convert the soul but the law of God. And we see in the book of Acts the manner in which it is properly dispensed, that is in the church on the Christian Sabbath. (Acts 20:7) Therefore we conclude that as it is the office of the law to convert men to God, so that is designated in scripture as the chief means to that end, and all other ordiancnes pretending to that end are stinking abomination in the sight of God, as He says in the law, “to the law and the testimony, if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them” and again, “What thing soever I command you, observe to do it: thou shalt not add thereto, nor diminish from it.” and again it is recorded for our admonition, “Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, took either of them his censer, and put fire therein, and put incense thereon, and offered strange fire before the Lord, which he commanded them not. And there went out fire from the Lord, and devoured them, and they died before the Lord. Then Moses said unto Aaron, This is it that the Lord spake, saying, I will be sanctified in them that come nigh me, and before all the people I will be glorified. And Aaron held his peace.” Therefore if we are to hold to the divinely established ordinances of God, we must abolish the legitimacy and necessity of all else besides, else we offend God by a strange offering. As the law is given the office to quicken and convert, so we are to cleave to that as our refuge and hope, even as David in this Psalm, in Psalm 1 also, and in Psalm 119. We also see in this verse the wretched and abominable guiltiness of those who will not turn to God being exposed to more peculiar manifestations of His glory. For David means to show that as the law is a more profound revelation of God’s glory than even the heavens, decked and arrayed with magnificent splendor, so those who continue in their sins while under the ministry of the law (or the word of God in general) are worthy of worse punishment than those who profess atheism under the ministry of the heavens. And our Lord Christ also repeates this point to the unbelieving Jews in His time saying, “Woe unto thee, Chorazin! woe unto thee, Bethsaida! for if the mighty works, which were done in you, had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. But I say unto you, It shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon at the day of judgment, than for you.” So saith the true ministers of the gospel unto all those who remain dead and lifeless under the ministry of the gospel. The heavens and earth will cry out for recompense against such traitors and blasphemous infidels. It will be eternally ill for those outside the law. but a thousand times more woe will be upon him who heard the message of salvation and paid no heed to it, who were exhorted with vehement cries to run from the wrath to come and did not run. This especially David aims at when he follows the testimony of the heavens with that of the law, and this Calvin also proves in his comments.

Calvin, “The law of the Lord” Here the second part of the psalm commences. After having shown that the creatures, although they do not speak, nevertheless serve as instructors to all mankind, and teach all men so clearly that there is a God, as to render them inexcusable, the Psalmist now turns towards the Jews, to whom God had communicated a fuller knowledge of himself by means of his word. While the heavens bear witness concerning God, their testimony does not lead men so far as that thereby they learn truly to fear him, and acquire a well-grounded knowledge of him; it serves only to render them inexcusable. It is doubtless true, that if we were not very dull and stupid, the signatures and proofs of Deity which are to be found on the theater of the world, are abundant enough to incite us to acknowledge and reverence God; but as, although surrounded with so clear a light, we are nevertheless blind, this splendid representation of the glory of God, without the aid of the word, would profit us nothing, although it should be to us as a loud and distinct proclamation sounding in our ears. Accordingly, God vouchsafes to those whom he has determined to call to salvation special grace, just as in ancient times, while he gave to all men without exception evidences of his existence in his works, he communicated to the children of Abraham alone his Law, thereby to furnish them with a more certain and intimate knowledge of his majesty. Whence it follows, that the Jews are bound by a double tie to serve God. As the Gentiles, to whom God has spoken only by the dumb creatures, have no excuse for their ignorance, how much less is their stupidity to be endured who neglect to hear the voice which proceeds from his own sacred mouth? The end, therefore, which David here has in view, is to excite the Jews, whom God had bound to himself by a more sacred bond, to yield obedience to him with a more prompt and cheerful affection. Farther, under the term law, he not only means the rule of living righteously, or the Ten Commandments, but he also comprehends the covenant by which God had distinguished that people from the rest of the world, and the whole doctrine of Moses, the parts of which he afterwards enumerates under the terms testimonies, statutes, and other names. These titles and commendations by which he exalts the dignity and excellence of the Law would not agree with the Ten Commandments alone, unless there were, at the same time, joined to them a free adoption and the promises which depend upon it; and, in short, the whole body of doctrine of which true religion and godliness consists.

Matthew Poole, The law of the Lord, i.e. the doctrine delivered by God to his church, whether by Moses or by other prophets, and holy men of God after him; for the title of law is given not only to the ten commandments, or the moral law, as it is Romans 2:23,Romans 2:25,Romans 2:27; Romans 3:31, but also to the whole word of God, as Psalms 1:2; Psalms 119:70 &c.; Jeremiah 8:8; Malachi 2:6; to the Psalms, as John 10:34; John 15:25, compared with Psalms 82:6; Psalms 35:19; and to the writings of the prophets, 1 Corinthians 14:21, compared with Isaiah 28:11; yea, even to the gospel itself, as Isaiah 2:3; Isaiah 42:4; Isaiah 5:4,Isaiah 5:7; Romans 3:27; Galatians 2:21. And in this general sense it must be here understood, because the effects here following do not flow from one, but from all the parts of it, precepts, and counsels, and threatenings, and promises, and God’s gracious covenant made with man therein revealed. Having discoursed hitherto of the glory of God shining forth in and demonstrated by the visible heavens, and the heavenly bodies, he now proceeds to another demonstration of God’s glory, which he compares with and prefers before the former; which he doth partly, to prevent that excessive admiration of the splendour and beauty of the sun and stars, by the contemplation whereof the heathens were brought to adore them, an error which the Israelites were not free from the danger of, Deuteronomy 4:19; partly, to make the Israelites sensible of their singular obligations to God, who, besides that common light and influence of the heavenly bodies, had given them a peculiar and a more necessary and beneficial light; and partly, to awaken and provoke the Gentiles (into whose hands these Psalms might come) to the study and love of God’s law, by representing those excellent advantages which they no less than the Jews might obtain by it.

Opening Prayer.

Lesson 17. The Substance of the Doctrine of Christ. Part 7. Mortification and Holiness of life.


Intro.
A passionate discourse, not a dead letter. “Would parents but begin betimes, and labour to affect the hearts of their children with the great matters of everlasting life, and to acquaint them with the substance of the doctrine of Christ…”

IX. Mortification and Holiness of life.
Heb. 12:14, Rom. 8:5-9. Exp.
1. Regeneration is new life.
Eph. 2:1 2. Christians are characterized by upright behavior. 1 Cor. 6:9-11
Sanctification is the proof and mark of interest in Christ. Rom. 8:7-9
i. Inward sincerity / Outward hypocrisy. Eph. 6:5-8
ii. Denial of self / self justification. Luke 16:15
iii. Hatred of sin / bondage to sin. (Watson Repentance)
iv. Patience in adversity / complaining at God. 1Pet.1:6-9, 4:12,13
v. Contentment with life / coveting after other’s goods. Heb. 13:5 Conclusion.

3. A conclusion drawn from both passages.
If any man be not sanctified and practice daily mortification, he does not belong to Christ.

4. An exhortation to flee from the wrath to come.
i. Christians are commanded to run as if running a race.
ii. They are exhorted to flee from evil.
iii. To pursue righteousness.
iv. By faith, repentance, a life of purity and separation from iniquity.

Closing Prayer.

YouTube Audio: https://youtu.be/wgzwvf7YyFw