Rejoicing at God's Word

6/16/24

Listen to Lesson Audio:

---

Sermon Transcript

Good morning. I love Psalm 119. And I think one reason I love that particular Psalm is that because I think it better than any other shows King David rejoicing at God’s Word. We know that David was a man after God’s own heart. And when we read Psalm 119, we see David’s heart. We see his great love and delight for God and his great love and delight for the Word of God. David loved God with all his heart and David loved the Word of God with all of his heart.

And King David was not afraid to show it. When he returned the Ark of the Covenant to Jerusalem, here’s what he did. 2 Samuel 6:14, “And David danced before the Lord with all his might.” I think we can safely say that King David was never bored by God, or by the worship of God, or by the word of God. Instead, we’re told that King David danced. And I love what C.S. Lewis wrote about that dance of King David. He said, “The most valuable thing the Psalms do for me is to express that same delight in God which made David dance.”

David delighted in God and in the Word of God. David rejoiced in God and in the Word of God. Does that describe us? Or do we sometimes share that attitude that Malachi would write about much later, Malachi 1:13, “But you say, ‘What a weariness this is,’ and you snort at it, says the Lord of hosts.” Delight or weariness? Rejoicing or snorting? Well, I think we all rejoice in the Word of God here today, but we need to guard against ever reaching that sad state that we see there in the book of Malachi.

And perhaps the best way to guard against reaching that sad state and that attitude is to look at why we rejoice in God and in the Word of God, and why we delight in the Word of God. And I think Psalm 119 helps us answer that question when it comes to the Word of God. Psalm 119:162, we heard it just a moment ago. “I rejoice at your word like one who finds great spoil, great treasure.” David rejoiced at God’s word because of the great treasures he found in God’s word. And here is our question for today. What treasures did King David find? What treasures can we find? What treasures does God’s word give us today?

That’s our topic. And I think we’re gonna see that God’s word gives us 10, at least 10 treasures.

Number one, God’s word gives us wisdom, wisdom. Now we could talk for a while about the difference between knowledge and wisdom, but I think we already know that. I think we all already know the difference between the two. As someone famously said, “Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit. Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.” God’s word gives knowledge to anyone who reads it. But whether the Bible also gives wisdom to that person depends upon what that person does with that knowledge. Matthew 7:24, “Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock.”

Knowledge comes from hearing. Wisdom comes from hearing and doing. But, and this point is crucial, before we can have that wisdom, we must first have that knowledge. Before we can do the word, we must know the word. Why are you here today? Why are you a Christian? How do you know about God, the things of God, what God wants us to do? How do we know those things? You know, even if we didn’t have our Bible, we would still know there is a God. We would still know about the power of God. We would still know about the divinity of God. That’s what Paul tells us in Romans 1:20. But that’s just about all we would know. Absent our Bibles, we would know nothing about Jesus or about his kingdom or how we got here, why we are here or where we’re going. We wouldn’t know those things absent our Bibles. The word of God gives us knowledge about God. And when we believe and obey what we learn in the Bible, the word of God gives us wisdom, that wisdom from above that is first pure, then peaceable, then gentle, open to reason, full of mercy and good fruits, impartial and sincere, James 3:17. That wisdom is a gift from God’s word.

Number two, God’s word gives us power. “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me.” Let me ask you, is that the dumbest thing anyone’s ever said? (laughing) - Words can never hurt me. Has that ever been anyone’s experience? It’s certainly the exact opposite of what the Bible tells us about words. Proverbs 12:18, “rash words are like sword for us.” Proverbs 18:21, “death and life are in the power of the tongue.” Our words are powerful. Our words can do great things. Our words can do terrible things. And the ripples from our words extend much further than the ripples from our sticks and from our stones. And if our words are powerful, just how powerful are the words of Almighty God? 2 Peter 3:5-7, “for they deliberately overlook this fact that the heavens existed long ago and the earth was formed out of the water and through water by the word of God. And that by means of these, the world that then existed was deluged with water and perish, but by the same word, the heavens and earth that now exist are stored up for fire.”

The entire universe was created by the word of God. That same universe will someday be dissolved by the word of God. God’s word is powerful. And you know what? It had better be powerful, because we are at war and our weapon is the word of God. Second Corinthians 10:4-5, “For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but have divine power to destroy strongholds. We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God.” Ephesians 6:17, “Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God.” It’s our weapon. There is great power in the word of God. 1 Corinthians 1:18, “For the word of the cross, the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved, it is the power of God.” If we ever feel powerless in this world, it is a sure sign that we are not treating the word of God as we are intended to. We are not using it as we are intended to. God’s word is powerful and that great power is a gift from God’s word.

Number three, God’s word gives us truth. Truth. Now that statement is certainly true, but we can make an even stronger statement than that because God’s word is truth. John 17:17. Yes, it seems today that the truth is in short supply. But you know what? Supply exceeds the demand. If people today want to find the truth, all they need to do is open up and read the Word of God. And whether people today want to hear the truth or not, they can all know it. And they all need it. John 8:32, “You will know the truth. will set you free.” Now, that verse is a very common slogan in educational institutions. In fact, I can testify that right there on the University of Texas campus, it’s emblazoned in big letters on the main building, “Fruits shall set you free.” But whenever I see verse 32 carved in stone, I always wish they’d started with verse 31. So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in him, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” If all you read was verse 32, you might come up with the false notion that that truth that sets you free is the wisdom of man. It is not. It is the word of God. Verse 31, “Truth today, it seems, has become very flexible. Truth is whatever I say it is, and everyone can have their own truth. That is not truth. Truth doesn’t care what we think about it. We can agree with it, we can disagree with it. Truth remains the truth.” Romans 3:4. And we have the truth. We have it. We should thank God for that every time we pray. God has given us the truth. And that great gift of truth is a gift from God’s word.

Number four, God’s word gives us delight, delight. We talked earlier about King David’s delight in God’s word. Psalm 119:77, "Let your mercy come to me that I may live “for your law is my delight.” Yes, David delighted in the law of God. Do we? Yes, I’m a lawyer. But I’ll be the first to admit that delighting in the law just doesn’t seem like a natural thing to do. But David did, why? David delighted in the law, not because of what it was, but because of who gave it, 'cause where it came from. “The law in which David delighted was the law of God, for your law is my delight,” he said. David loved the law because David loved God. David delighted in the law of God because David delighted in God. Psalm 119:111, “Your testimonies are my heritage forever, for they are the joy of my heart,” he wrote.

Now, here’s a question for us. What do we delight? Now there are likely many answers to that question. But is the Bible on our list? Do we delight in the Word of God? What does it mean to delight in something? I think we all know the answer to that question because we all have things in which we delight. We all know what that means. It means we’re deeply interested in that thing. Not just on the surface, but we want to know all about it. It means that we love to be with others who feel the same way about that thing. It means that we talk about that thing every time we have an opportunity to do so, and maybe sometimes when we don’t have an opportunity to do so. It means we spend a lot of time thinking about that thing. It means we’re excited by it. It means we find great enjoyment in it. It means that maybe we’re even a little bit obsessed by it. Is that how I feel about the Word of God? That’s how King David felt. Is that how I feel? Do I need to know everything in the Bible to be pleasing to God? Clearly no. Do I need to want to know everything about the Bible to be pleasing to God? Now, that’s a different question, isn’t it?

I think the problem with the lighting in the law of God is that we usually see that as a command, “Thou shalt delight.” But I don’t really think it’s a command. I think our delight in the law of God is a gift. I think it’s a gift. Our topic today is what the Bible gives us and I think one of the things the Bible gives us is delight, delight. David enjoyed that great gift from God’s Word. Do we? You know, I think we all know some people who have just enough religion to make themselves miserable. But we also know that Christians should be the most joyous people on earth. So how do we explain that disconnect? That the people who should be the most joyous are sometimes joyless. The answer I think is that those who lack joy also lack the word of God. John 1:4, “And we are writing this thing so that our joy may be complete.” Psalm 16:11, “You make known to me the path of life, and your presence is fullness of joy, your right hand are pleasures forevermore.” Our delight in the Word of God is a gift, a gift from the Word of God.

Number five, God’s Word gives us Comfort. Comfort. You know, I know that many of us here today have experienced the pain, the great pain, of losing someone very close to us. Let me ask a question. What would that experience have been like if we did not have our Bible? We know that King David experienced such losses in his own life, even the loss of a child. How did King David survive those great losses? Psalm 119:92, “If your law had not been my delight, I would have perished in my affliction.” You know, I suspect that many of us here today have been right there with King David, right there with him. If the Word of God had not been our delight, we would have perished in our affliction. But we did not perish. Yes, we mourned, but we did not mourn as someone who has no hope. Instead we were comforted by the promises and by the blessed assurances that we find in the Word of God. 2 Corinthians 1:3-4, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies, the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort which we ourselves are comforted by God.” God comforts us today through His Word. And as we just read, that same Word allows us and comfort others. That comfort is a gift from the word of God.

Number six, God’s word gives us encouragement. Encouragement. You know, it’s very easy to become discouraged today when we look at the sad state of the world around us. But you know, that discouragement doesn’t always come from outside. Sometimes it comes from inside. Am I making a difference? Am I growing in Christ? Am I making the best use of my blessings and my opportunities? I think we can each ask ourselves those questions. And I suspect that for each of us, sometimes the answer is no. And so we become discouraged. What is the cure for that discouragement? The cure for that discouragement is the Word of God. Romans 15:4, “For whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, that through endurance and through the encouragement of the scriptures, we might have hope.” First Thessalonians 4:18, “Therefore, encourage one another with these words.” You know, we may think we’re not really making a difference. We may think we’re not really making an impact. We may think that we’re just too small to make a difference. And that may at times discourage us. But if we feel that way, then we need to open the Word of God to see how God feels about those efforts. Zechariah 4:10, “For whoever has despised the day of small things shall rejoice.” We may view our actions as small, but God does not. The world may see us as small, but that’s not how God sees us. And when we open the Word of God, what we’re going to find is that God works through the small and insignificant things in this world to do great things. That’s how God works. And that should encourage us. And that encouragement is a gift, a gift from the word of God.

Number seven, God’s word gives us a standard, a standard. Now let me ask a question that may at first seem a little bit in left field, but stick with me on this. How does your cell phone work? I mean, it’s amazing. You can buy it from any vendor. You can go almost anywhere in the world, you turn the thing on, and it works. Now if you forgot to pay for a roaming plan, you’re going to find out the hard way that it works, but it works. Why? Because your cell phone has a standard. It’s a big, huge, complicated document, over a thousand pages long. Yes, I’ve read almost every word and it is riveting. But anyone who makes a cell phone has to get that document and has to follow it step by step if they want that cell phone to work. And they do. And that’s why your cell phone works the way it does.

Now let me switch gears. How many of you have ever attended a worship service of the Lord’s Church in a distant part of the world, or maybe just a distant part of our own country, somewhere a long way off. Did they sing like we do? Did they pray like we do? Did they proclaim the word like we do? Did they partake of the communion service like we do? Did they give like we do? Why? Why did they do those things like we do, even though they’re so far away from us? The answer is the same reason your cell phone worked in that location. A standard, a standard. They followed a standard. Romans 6:17, “But thanks be to God that you who were once slaves of sin have become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed.” 2 Timothy 1:13, “Follow the pattern of sound word.” The Pattern, the standard, it’s the Word of God.

What would things be like if we did not follow that standard? You know, we don’t have to wonder about the answer to that question, all we have to do is turn our TV on on Sunday morning. Most of the religious world today has long ago ceased using the Bible as a standard. Instead they have become their own standard. And you can see the outcome of that choice and what they’re doing. Absent a standard all you will have is confusion. Nothing will work right and that’s true whether we’re talking about cell phones or the worship of God. But we have a standard, we have a pattern, and that unchanging eternal standard is a gift from the Word of God.

Number eight, God’s word gives us stability. Now this may not be a great example considering the weather forecast for this week, but I think we’ve all seen the videos of those houses sliding down the hill in California along with the roadsides and landing in the valley below. Rains come and the houses start sliding. What is it that they lack? Well, what they lack is a firm foundation. What they lack is stability. In those same newspapers and newscasts, you may have also seen news reports of those denominational conferences where the denominational leaders all get together to vote on what they’re gonna believe this year. They vote to allow various practices, and then what happens? Everything starts sliding down that hill. But what is it they lack? What they lack is a firm foundation. What they lack is stability.

Whenever, whenever we pray to God, there is one thing, there is one thing we should always give thanks to God for, and that is that God has given us this unchanging word in a world that seems to be changing constantly. We have something to hold on to that will never change. And we should always thank God that we have something immovable on which to stand and on which to build. Matthew 7:24, “Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock.” Stability, that firm foundation, the gift and the Word of Almighty God.

Number nine, God’s Word gives us correction. 2 Timothy 3:16, “all scripture is breathed out by God, it’s profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness.” Now, here’s a tough question. When was the last time I was reproved by something I read in the Bible? When was the last time I was corrected by God’s word? When was the last time I was admonished by the word of Christ? If I can’t think of when that last happened, then I need to ask myself another very tough question. Who is really in charge of me?

Whenever I open God’s word, whenever I open God’s word, I need to look for those things that I’m not doing that I should be doing. I need to look for those things that I’m doing that I should not be doing. And then I need to change my life accordingly. That’s what it means to be reproved by the word of God. That’s what it means to be corrected by the word of God. That’s what it means to be admonished by the word of God. And that is how we grow in Christ. Hebrews 12:5-10. "My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord, "nor be weary when reproved by him. "For the Lord disciplines the one he loves “and chastises every son whom he receives.” Skipping down to verse 10. "He disciplines us for our good “that we may share his holiness.” We grow through that discipline. We grow more like Christ. And that discipline, that reproof, that correction, that admonishment, gives from the Word of God.

Number 10, God’s Word gives us salvation. Yes, we’re saved by Christ, but it is only through the Word of God that we know anything about Christ. Yes, we’re cleansed by the blood of Christ, but it’s only through the Word of God we know about the blood of Christ. Yes, we’re saved when we obey the gospel of Christ, but it is only through the word of God that we know the gospel. The implanted word of God is able to save our souls. James 1:21, "Receive with meekness the implanted word, “which is able to save your souls.” We looked earlier at the power of God’s word. Here we see an example of that great power. Romans 1:16, “I am not ashamed of the gospel for it is power, God, for salvation to everyone who believes, the Jew first, also to the Greek.” It is through God’s word that we become wise for salvation. 2 Timothy 3:15, “It is with the word of God that we are cleansed with the waters of baptism.” Ephesians 5:26, “And it is through the hearing of the word that faith comes.” Romans 10:17. Our salvation is a gift of God’s word.

So what have we seen? We’ve seen 10 reasons why we should rejoice at the word of God. We’ve seen 10 gifts, 10 treasures that we can find in the word of God. But we can’t end there. We need to look at something else that is wonderful about the word of God. And it is this. The word of God was not just written down for us. The word of God was lived for us. John 1:14, “the word became flesh and dwelt among us and we have seen his glory. The glory of the only son from the father full of grace and truth.”

It is impossible to separate the Son of God from the Word of God. It is impossible to love God’s Son and reject God’s Word. Christ is the Word made flesh. We can either love both or we can reject both. John 14:21, “Whoever has my commandments and keep them, he it is who loves me.” What does that mean that Jesus is the Word made flesh? Well one thing it means, one thing it means is that every single gift that we just looked at from the Word of God is also described in the Bible as a gift from the Son of God, every one of them. The gifts of wisdom and power, 1 Corinthians 1:24, “but to those who are called both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.” The gift of truth, John 1:17, “for the law was given through Moses, grace and truth came through Christ Jesus.” Gift of delight, John 15:11, “these things I have spoken to you that my joy may be in you.” The gift of comfort, 2 Corinthians 1:5, “for as we share abundantly in Christ’s sufferings so through Christ We share abundantly in comfort also.” The gift of encouragement, Colossians 2:2, “that their hearts may be encouraged being knit together in love to reach all the riches of the full assurance of Understanding and the knowledge of God’s mystery, which is Christ.” The gift of a standard, Matthew 28:18, “Jesus came and said to them all authority all authority in heaven and earth is given to me.” The gift of stability, Hebrews 13:8, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.” The gift of correction, Revelation 3:19, “those who I love I reprove and discipline So be zealous and repent.” The gift of salvation, Acts 4:12, “There is salvation in no one else There is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.” We have all spiritual blessings in Christ Jesus. All.

Let me end today with a single question. Do you love Jesus? Do you obey Jesus? Yeah, I know that sounds like two questions. But it’s not. It’s not. That’s a single question. Do you love Jesus? Do you obey Jesus? Those two questions will always have the same answer. What is your answer this morning? If you want to enjoy these gifts from the word of God, from the son of God, the word made flesh, then you need to obey the gospel of Christ. You must hear it, you must believe it, You must repent of your sins. You must give the good confession that Jesus is the Son of God. You must be baptized in water for the forgiveness of sins. And you must be faithful unto death. That’s the gospel. That’s the power of God for salvation. Do you love Jesus? Will you obey Jesus? Please come while we stand, while we sing.