Let me welcome all of you on behalf of Erskine Theological Seminary and First Presbyterian Church as we jointly put on these lectures in the spring and fall, and this one in particular, the B.B. Warfield series of lectures. There is a book over here, Counterfeit Miracles, written by B.B. Warfield. It's one of the most important books, perhaps, of the twentieth century on that particular topic. And just extraordinary to think that those lectures were actually given in the auditorium of First Presbyterian Church on behalf of what was then Columbia Theological Seminary over a century or so ago. And we're very pleased and thrilled and delighted to have a dear friend of this congregation, Dr. Bob Godfrey, with us here tonight. He was here, of course, just a few months ago for one of our Thornwell lectures. I think, Dr. Godfrey, you've been here almost every year. for quite a while. Dr. Godfrey is a very close friend, of course, of Sinclair Ferguson and myself, and this time he's come alone, which we're very sad about because his wife, Mary Ellen, has just flown to Philadelphia to greet Their fifth grandchild, who was born just a few weeks ago, and Dr. Godfrey has not seen. So the sacrifice of going to see your fifth grandchild or coming to First Presbyterian Church, we get that our hearts are strangely warmed at the very thought of it. Dr. Godfrey has just retired as the president of Westminster Seminary in California. I believe you may now have a title of president Amoritis, as somebody introduced him recently. Congratulations on that. And he, of course, is also a fellow of Ligonier Ministries and a prolific author. And his very latest book published by Ligonier Reformation Trust, Learning to Love the Psalms, which is the topic that he's going to be addressing us today and again tomorrow. And do look carefully at the bulletin that's on your table because there are lectures tomorrow noon at lunch and also tomorrow evening when Dr. Godfrey will continue on this theme of the Psalms and Christian experience. No doubt we'll touch on the Psalms at the time of the Reformation. But this book, Learning to Love the Psalms, we're selling it at almost a steal of a price at $10. This is Dr. Godfrey's retirement fund, so you will not be allowed to leave until you show proof of purchase of at least one volume. And there are some books, other books by Dr. Godfrey over here on the table. Well, I'm absolutely thrilled and delighted to have you back here at First Presbyterian. Imagine we've got Dr. Godfrey this week and Sinclair Ferguson next week, so you are spoiled with riches over the next week or ten days. But before you begin to speak, let's pray together. Heavenly Father, we thank you. Thank you for all of your mercies to us in the gospel. Pray tonight for Mary Ellen Godfrey for traveling mercies as she's made her way to Philadelphia for the birth of this little baby. And pray that this covenant child too will know the sweet blessings of the gospel. And pray for ourselves tonight as we once again thank you for the Psalms. and how they speak to us in every area and every experience of our lives. And pray for your blessing that here this evening we might know something of your presence. and something of that sweetness of being drawn once again to our Savior's embrace and the assurance of pardon and forgiveness of sins that is to be found by faith alone in Christ, alone apart from the works of the law. So hear us, we pray we ask this in Jesus' name. Amen. Dr. Godfrey. Well, it is indeed always a delight for me to be back here with you. It brings back a number of memories when I hear that Sinclair is coming next week. He and I met, I think, in the mid-1980s at the Pensacola Theological Institute. He was rather recently come from Scotland to the United States. And I was immediately impressed because we had a question and answer session and the question was to the speakers, how does your family spend the Sabbath? And all of us sort of burbled out answers and they came to Sinclair and he said, I do not speak about my family in public. I thought, how great. No American could get away with that, but that was a wonderful answer. We became immediate friends. I still burble and he's still wise, so you're getting the better part next week. But there are ironies here that you're doing B.B. Warfield's counterfeit miracles book. So they can see you. I'll need a box for them to see. Did you turn it on? Oh, I didn't turn it on. Do I have to start the whole thing over? No, they heard it. All right. All right, that'll keep you awake. That's good. What you missed was I was talking about when I first met Sinclair Ferguson. It has nothing to do with the talk tonight. I was just saying it is ironic that the book of B.B. Warfield's On Counterfeit Miracles is being also sold. Probably he's getting a bigger royalty than I am. because I am really a church historian, so I'm here under completely false pretenses to talk about the Psalms. That won't stop me, but it's fair warning. We have somebody who really knows something about the Psalms here, more than one, I think, so I feel a little bit fraudulent, but it's okay. What I do know a lot about is counterfeit miracles in the 20th century as performed by Amy Semple McPherson. So, if you want a really interesting lecture, get the minister to invite me back to lecture on Amy Semple McPherson, because I am the world's greatest living reformed expert on Amy Semple McPherson. The competition is not intense, but R.C. Sproul took me on once with that. It was pathetic. I crushed him. But he does know more about Katherine Kuhlman. A Pittsburgh girl. That's right. Yeah. Who slayed R.C. Sproul in the spirit. That's true. Get him to talk about that. Or I'll talk about it when I come back. But anyway. Our topic for tonight, before I close in prayer, is the Psalms and sanctification. The Psalms and sanctification. As we know, sanctification is a process in the Christian life by which, by God's grace, seek to and do in fact become more holy, more separated from the world, more Christ-like. And in this Reformation season, it's good to remember that while we need to uphold the doctrine of justification, we need to be insistent about the doctrine of justification. We have to recognize how easy it is to get the doctrine of justification wrong. I was just reading Martin Luther, who said, of all the gospel writers, John clearly teaches justification most clearly. And then he said, if John could not succeed in keeping the church straight on justification, what chance do the rest of us have? So it's a constant battle to understand the biblical doctrine of justification. So it's right that we celebrate that at Reformation celebrations, but it's just as right to celebrate our reformed commitment to sanctification, to that process of the Christian life where we seek to become more Christ-like. The Reformation critiqued the Roman church as much for its teaching on sanctification as on justification. because just as the Roman church had made up works as the means to justification, so the Roman church had made up all sorts of ceremonies, activities, prayers, requirements necessary for sanctification without any biblical foundation at all. And Luther spoke very passionately about that. He said, everywhere I look, I see monks in cowls and tonchers on their heads and fasting all night and saying rosary beads and lighting candles and making pilgrimages to see relics. None of this taught by God, none of this pleasing to God. If you want to make progress in sanctification, Luther said, it's simple, love your neighbor. Luther could often go to the sort of heart of things. He was a hearty fellow. So I think it is very much appropriate that we should pause and think a little bit about sanctification with a Reformation confidence that it is the word of God that sanctifies us. By the power of the Holy Spirit, of course, but it's the Spirit working through the word. Sanctify us in the truth, Jesus prayed. Your word is truth. And so we could turn to really any part of the scriptures to seek and to find instruction on sanctification, on that process of becoming more holy. But I think the Psalms are a good place to look, and since that's what I've prepared for tonight, that's where we'll look. Your minister tried to get me to say which psalm I was going to speak on and he thought he knew. And I think I'm going to surprise him because I want to speak on Psalm 107. I thought I would try to find a psalm that wasn't immediately very well known to everybody. Now, in a group like this, probably there are many people who know Psalm 107 well, but on the off chance there are a few, like Mr. Thomas, who don't. What? I want to read a few verses from Psalm 107, but I want first of all to suggest that what we're going to do here is look at three elements that we're going to find in Psalm 107, each of which I think is crucial to the process of sanctification for us as the people of God. And that is that the Psalms encourage us to change the way we think, to change the way we feel and to change the way we live. And I'm not approaching those in any particular order. I'm not trying to suggest that until you get your thinking entirely straight, you can't improve your feeling. These things are mutually interdependent. We need to work at them all at the same time. But since we can't talk about them all at the same time We're going to take them in that order that we need to be changing the way we think The way we feel and the way we live and that the Psalms will help us in that Think for example of Psalm 16 verse 11 You have made known to me That affects our thinking, doesn't it? Something that's been made known to us changes the way we think. You have made known to me the path of life. That's how we're gonna live. Our thinking is gonna influence our living. In your presence, there is fullness of joy. That's how we feel. At your right hand are pleasures forevermore. These things are all interconnected. The more we know the Lord, the more we will rejoice in Him. The more we will take pleasure in Him, the more we will delight in Him. The more we delight in Him, the more we want to know Him. And the more we know him and delight in him, the more we will want to live for him. And in that sense, I think the Psalms do have perhaps a unique role for us as reformed Christians in America. Because America is a land filled to overflowing with denominations. You may not have noticed this. And denominations in America tend to end up reflecting a certain economic, social, and educational level. Do you remember that great scene? where it's in that movie, A River Runs Through It. I know you're too pious to go to movies, but Derek Thomas told me about this. Brad Pitt brings, is it Brad Pitt or is it the other one? Anyway, one of the sons comes to his Presbyterian minister to introduce the girl he wants to marry. And being a good Presbyterian minister, the first question he asks this girl is, where do you go to church? And his son says, she's a Baptist. And the father says, a Baptist? That's just a Methodist who can read. So, you see, we have certain assumptions, some of them valid, some of them not valid. I was raised a Methodist, I can read, come on. Where Denominations occupy different places, and Presbyterians, particularly in America, have become a very well-educated group. And education in America often means that you rise economically as well, socially. I mean, we're not Episcopalians. We haven't risen that far, but we are, you know, we are significant. But what's the danger of that? Our religion becomes very cerebral. We maybe have a little trouble with emotions. Now, I myself am not a Presbyterian. I am Dutch Reformed. I have not a drop of Dutch blood. It's a shame and a fault, but there's little you can do about it. Thankfully, I do now have three grandchildren who are a quarter Dutch and a quarter Fris. I don't know if those two things balance each other out, but where am I going with this? I'm completely lost. The Dutch Reformed in America, like the Presbyterians, have a very strong emphasis on education, on the cerebral side of religion. We like books, we like Studies, we like, or pretend to, sermons and lectures, and we want to learn more. We're good at learning. But maybe we're not always so good at feeling, or at least expressing our feeling. I remember there was a young man at our seminary some years ago that had come from a Pentecostal background, and I used to kid him a lot in class. And so he came to our Dutch Reformed Church one Sunday night, and I greeted him warmly, and I said, how does it feel to be in a real church? I misbehave almost everywhere I go. It's not just for you. And he was a great guy, and he smiled, had a twinkle in his eye, and said, well, it's very interesting. Does anybody here feel anything? Well, just then, a Dutch immigrant elder, a dairyman, came up to greet this young man. And so, very unfairly, I turned to this elder, and I said, this young man wants to know if anyone here feels anything. And the elder's eyes immediately filled with tears. And he said, when I sing the Psalms, I'm so moved, and I feel so close to God. I think maybe that's something we need to work on as Reformed and Presbyterian people, that our feelings are as engaged in the knowledge and service of the Lord as our minds are. And that's what I hope the Psalms will, in part, do for you as you study them and as we look at Psalm 107. Just a little bit of it together this evening. Let me just read some selected verses. If you're following along, I'll announce them. I want to read the first three verses. Oh, give thanks to the Lord, for he is good. for his steadfast love endures forever. Let the redeemed of the Lord say so, whom he has redeemed from trouble and gathered in from the lands, from the east and from the west, from the north and from the south. And then skipping down to verse 10. Some sat in darkness and in the shadow of death, prisoners in affliction and in irons. For they had rebelled against the words of God and spurned the counsel of the Most High. So He bowed their hearts down with hard labor. They fell down with none to help. Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble, and He delivered them from their distress. He brought them out of darkness and the shadow of death and burst their bonds apart. Let them thank the Lord for his steadfast love, for his wondrous works to the children of men, for he shatters the doors of bronze and cuts into the bars of iron. And then skipping down to verse 39, When they are diminished and brought low, that is the people of God, when they are diminished and brought low through oppression, evil, and sorrow, he pours contempt on princes and makes them wander in trackless wastes. But he raises up the needy out of affliction and makes their families like flocks. The upright see it and are glad. and all wickedness shuts its mouth. Whoever is wise, let him attend to these things. Let him consider the steadfast love of the Lord. If you would be wise, you need to consider the steadfast love of the Lord. That's how this psalm ends. It's a remarkable psalm. It begins book five of the Psalter. Books three and four have been psalms of a lot of turmoil, a lot of distress, a lot of unanswered questions. The great unanswered question is, will the promises to David fail? Will the promises to Israel fail for we are defeated people? Our king is in exile. Many of our people are in exile. Will we ever be brought back? And book five is answering that. Oh, give thanks to the Lord for he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever. He has gathered in from the lands. Here's the fulfillment of the promise that God would gather his people and preserve his people and protect his people. And so what we're called on to consider to think about, to concentrate on, to reflect on, is first of all, the mercy of the Lord. At least a number of times in this Psalm, the Hebrew word chesed is used. to talk about that steadfast love, that constant love, that covenant love of God, which he always preserves. That love which is often translated into Greek in the New Testament as mercy. The mercy of God. We have to think about the mercy of God. What an amazing thing that we have a merciful God. Now, in American religion of our day, the mercy of God is so presumed on no one is surprised that God is merciful. Even when I was in college, long ago and far away, we had a professor who said, the basic religion of America is simple. I like sinning and God likes forgiving, so the world is very well set up. Well, that's not true. I mean, the I like sinning part is true, But God is not an indulgent grandfather. There, there, it's alright. God is holy, and God is just, and God is great, and God is glorious. God is high and lifted up. He is a holiness that cannot be approached by the impure. And so the fact that he is merciful, is a stunning surprise and should be to us. We have to work at considering the steadfast love of the Lord. And I think particularly in the days in which we live, it's intriguing how this phrase repeats in the Old Testament over and over and over. Give thanks to the Lord for he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever. And I think one could say that perhaps the most characteristic way of speaking of God in the Old Testament is that he is good. That he is good and merciful. And I thought recently, see this historical part of me keeps creeping in, how different that is from the religion of Islam that prides itself on the cry God is great. If you summarize your religion with the sentence, God is great, it's not surprising you have a very different religion from one which is summarized with the sentence, God is good. Now, we, particularly as Reformed people, take second place to no one in asserting the greatness of our God. But the greatness of God is not simply an end in itself for us. God uses his greatness to manifest his love and to show that he is a redeeming God. That's what this psalm talks about as it begins, that he is a redeeming God, gathering people to himself despite their sins, overcoming their sins, changing them beyond their sins. And this psalm celebrates that in several categories of people. God has gathered his people who were in exile. He has gathered his people who were afflicted. He has gathered his people who were seafarers. He has gathered his people who were farmers. And he's gathered, the part we read tonight, verses 10 through 16, he has gathered his people who were prisoners. Some were held in prisons. And as I read those verses, one of the things that came to me out of a recent Sunday school class I taught was how applicable these verses are to the life of Samson. Now this isn't only about Samson or in every detail about Samson. But I got interested in Samson and I have to confess realized I didn't know as much about the Samson story as I thought I did. The Samson story is a fascinatingly complex story. Simply from a literary point of view. But even more so from a spiritual point of view. And I got interested in it because I went to the opera. Derek Thomas said, I couldn't go back, ever come back here if I hadn't been to the opera. So I went to see Samson and Delilah. And there were opera notes in the program. Now the San Diego Opera is largely supported by the Jewish community. They give a great deal of money to keep the opera going. You'll be surprised to learn San Diego, left to itself, is not the most cultured place in the country. So we're very thankful that there are groups of people who are willing to commit to this. And the director of the San Diego Opera, being a very clever fellow, asked the chief rabbi of San Diego to write opera notes on Samson. And they were fascinating. Basically he said, Samson's story is never read in a synagogue, either for a regular service or a special service. And, summarizing briefly, he said, that's because this man was a bum. We celebrate the righteous in the synagogue, not gross sinners like Samson. And I thought, Why is Samson held up then as an example of faith in Hebrews? Intriguing. Another window on the difference between rabbinic religion and apostolic religion. The rabbis and the apostles read the Old Testament very differently. And Samson is an excellent example of that. Samson was a bum. The rabbi was right about that. But he was a bum saved by grace in the end of the day. And it led me to study Samson and then to study Judges as a whole. It's a fascinating book, Judges. It's a book that particularly ought to be studied in ladies' Bible studies because it has more terrific women in kind of both meanings of that word of any book in the Bible. Some of the really great women, some of the really terrifying women. Jail with her nail has always been a favorite of mine. But what happens with Samson? Samson is the last in a line, as I count them, of 12 judges in the book of Judges. Judges is not an exhaustive history, it's a series of snapshots. And what you see is that Israel starts out with good judges, and then there's a steady decline. And the decline of the judges is disastrous because the judges were sent to save the people from their decline. And you see decline setting in in the decline and deterioration of the families of the judges. So Gideon, who's sort of a turning point, has an apostate son. And then Jephthah has one daughter and destroys his own family. And then Samson has no family. And so even in the family line, you see the decline that is setting in. And Samson's story is told in terms of women, his pious mother, his Philistine wife, the Philistine prostitute, and the Philistine paramour, since we're in a proper southern city. And of course it's that last alliance that proves to be Samson's complete undoing, where Delilah whispers, cajoles, to find out the source of Samson's strength. Perfect illustration of the comment my mother often made as I was growing up, men are such fools. So what happens after he resists telling her the source of his strength? She finally says to him, what does she say to him? She says to him, you have not loved me. with all your heart." Now those of us who are raised on Hallmark cards may not pause on that comment. But those who are raised on Deuteronomy would pause to say, God had said to his people, you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, Samson's willingness to love Delilah with all his heart is apostasy, is betrayal, is a turning away and against the Lord his God. And the punishment he receives for that is terrible. Do you see how that's described there in Psalm 107, or at least alluded to, I think? Some sat in darkness and in the shadow of death. There's Samson in prison, blinded, had his eyes gouged out. For they had rebelled against the words of the Lord and spurned the counsel of the Most High. Remember right at the beginning of the Samson story, his father says to him, can't you find a woman to marry of your own people? No, I've seen a girl amongst the Philistines. I've seen a girl amongst the Philistines. My eyes have been drawn to a girl amongst the Philistines. And judgment will come upon his eyes. or has failed to serve the Lord as he ought to serve. Samson was a bum. The rabbi was right. But then what happens? In that loss, in that blindness and darkness and weakness, his mind turns back to the Lord. And when he's paraded out by the drunken Philistines to entertain them at a celebration of Dagon, and Dagon's triumph over Yahweh, just as the Philistines have triumphed over Israel, and just as their general has triumphed over Samson, Samson begins to pray. So he bowed their hearts down with hard labor. They fell down with none to help. Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble. And he delivered them from their distress. He brought them out of darkness and the shadow of death and burst their bonds apart. Let them thank the Lord for his steadfast love. That's what happens here. Samson turns to the Lord. Now at first glance, the prayer of Samson may seem a very selfish prayer. Vindicate me, Lord. Let me have revenge for my lost eyes. Is Samson just as selfish now as he was before? I don't think so. I don't think so. If he were just as selfish as he was before, he wouldn't make the apostolic list of men of faith. No, I think what he's praying is, Lord, let me be able to perform one more act as judge and savior of your people. I'm not asking that you restore my sight. I'm not asking that you give me freedom. I'm not asking that you restore me to live out my life as a judge. I'm asking just this one thing, Lord, that you will vindicate me and show to these Philistines that I was your judge, that I was your anointed, that I was your servant. And although I used my eyes in many sinful ways, I also used my eyes to serve you and to deliver your people. I don't think this is a selfish prayer. I think this is a prayer that he might have one last opportunity to serve the Lord. And the Lord answered that prayer, didn't he? He killed more Philistines in that last act than in all his life, we're told. And so here, Psalm 107 has picked up and alluded, excuse me, alluded to that story and invites us to consider it and to think about it and to think about how the Lord through all the history of his people has done things like that. Some of them recorded in the Bible, some of them probably unknown to anybody in the world today. And yet the pattern of the Lord, the goodness of the Lord, is that when His people are sinful, they may face some judgment in life, but they will come to repentance, and they'll pray, and the Lord will hear and heal. That's what Psalm 107 is celebrating. Our God is a good God who acts in history to do good things. Now there's a mystery to that. He doesn't operate on our timetable. I think one of the struggles of the Christian life is how often we have advice to God on altering his timetable. It's fascinating that one of the very most repeated questions in the Psalter is, how long? How long do we have to put up with this? How long is this situation going to continue? Because the reality is, we live in a profoundly fallen world. in which there's not only sin and corruption that are deserved individually by people, but there's also misery, all kinds of miseries, where there's no one-to-one correlation between the misery suffered and the guilt incurred. There's a mystery to God's providence. This is why Calvinists have to be careful not to be too cerebral. Because we really can't explain things at many of the miseries of life. We've all seen that, haven't we? Babies with genetic defects. old people with Alzheimer's disease, and all sorts of miseries in between, which make it hard to confess the Lord is good and His steadfast love endures forever. That's why we have to meditate on that. That's why we have to fill our minds and our hearts I've known more than one person in our congregation who came to suffer from Alzheimer's. And it was very interesting in those cases. Almost the last memory they could hold on to was psalms they had sung. Somehow music gets in the soul in a way beyond our full understanding. And what a glorious thing in times of weakness and loss to have those very words of God in the mind and in the heart to help us continue to know that God is good. Now you notice that in Psalm 107, It says that God brought them out of darkness and out of the shadow of death. Did God bring Samson out of the shadow of death? Well, one thing God did for Samson is his family came, took his body, and buried him in the land of promise. He wasn't left to be buried with the uncircumcised Philistines. But I think if Samson were explaining how some, this is just slightly presumptuous, but if Samson were explaining how this Psalm applies to him, he might well quote Hebrews 11, 35. Some were tortured refusing to accept release so that they might rise again to a better life. Is Samson delivered from the shadow of death? You betcha. And he will rise to a better life than any deliverance from a Philistine temple could have achieved. That's the kind of thing we need to think about because this world is forever pulling us away from our God and from his goodness and from his mercy and from his importance and from his love and from his presence and from his care. And we need to fill our hearts and minds with that truth and then we can enter in to a deeper feeling of these things. The Psalms are full of emotions that are wonderful. In this little section I read, we hear about people crying and being brought low and being raised up and being filled with gladness, being filled with thanks. And the Psalms balance our feelings for us. I think we're like ping pong balls moving from too much sentimentality to too much stoicism. It's interesting, even the great John Calvin in his commentaries on the Psalms occasionally is just a little nervous about all the emotion in the Psalms. And then he'll pause and say, now these people really did keep their emotions under control. And I'm sure they did. But the passion in the Psalter is a model for us, as well as the truth in the Psalter. And they give us a full range of emotions, don't they? From the greatest highs of joy and thanksgiving and glorying in God to the very deepest lows. I'm always fascinated that Calvin in his commentary on Psalm 22 verse 1, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Calvin said, Jesus takes that question on his lips because he takes our sense of forsakenness into his heart and body. Because which Christian has not many times a day felt forsaken by God? That's a lot of emotion for old John, and he's right. Where is God when we want Him? Why doesn't He act on our time? And what the Psalms are telling us is that if we will meditate on these things and reflect on these things, they'll change our hearts. Psalm 63, I remember you upon my bed and meditate on you in the watches of the night, for you have been my help, and in the shadow of your wings I will sing for joy. And then this change of thinking, and I've spent most of my time on thinking. I've been doing the very thing I said we should not do, but nonetheless, this reflection on thinking and feeling then will lead us to live differently. Christian living is not automatic. And Christian living is not a process that moves steadily without interruption for all of us. Christian living can be very up and down. I particularly like a statement in the Heidelberg Catechism, question 114. where we're told even the holiest of men in this life have only a small beginning of disobedience to which we're called in the law of God. Yet so that with earnest purpose they begin to live, not only according to some, but according to all the commandments of God. I think one of the problems of Christian churches today is there are lots of people who think they've really become quite holy. And we all need a dose both of the humility articulated in the catechism and of the glory of God articulated in the catechism. The holiest of men. That doesn't include most of us. It may include some of us, but it doesn't include most of us. Even the holiest of men have only small beginnings of the obedience to which we're called. And the Psalms will help us by holding up before us this call to know God's word, to understand it, to feel it, and then to live it. You know, the very first Psalm got all of this started. Blessed is the man who, what, lives in a certain way. He doesn't walk where he shouldn't walk. He doesn't sit where he shouldn't sit. He meditates instead on the law of God day and night. And in meditating, he knows the law of God. He's learned the law of God. His thoughts are filled with the law of God. And in the law of God, he delights. Mark Ross, who doesn't know me very well and is always very nice to me, introduced me in Atlanta as a happy Calvinist. Don't know if I can dare tell my Dutch friends that. But anyways, Calvinists ought to be happy because what a God we have, what a Christ we have, what a mercy we have, and what a delight it is to know these things. And so we rejoice today.