I just want to say before I begin, once again, how much of a blessing it is to be able to preach to you. I am not ordained. I am not a pastor. I am but an intern. And it really is, I'm thankful for Dr. Campbell's trust in me to give me these opportunities to learn, but also to preach God's word. So thank you, Dr. Campbell. We sang earlier in our service, O Come, O Come, Emmanuel, this famous song, and the center of it is this name of God, Emmanuel, God with us, God with us. And the presence of God is something that is longed for all throughout the Bible. Man had it at the beginning in the garden, but they lost it. We long to be in God's presence as Christians, to dwell with God. But what should come to your mind when we ask this question, can the Lord truly abide with sinners? Can God really be in the presence of those who are unlike him? Let me read a couple passages real quick, just to get the sense in our mind. Psalm 711, God is a righteous judge and a God who feels indignation every day. Or Habakkuk chapter 1 verse 13, the prophet says this of God, you who are of purer eyes than to see evil, and you cannot look at wrong. Lastly, Psalm 5 verse 4, for you are a God who, you are not a God who delights in wickedness. Evil may not dwell with you. You see this tension. Our God is holy. We should make us wonder, Lord, how could you possibly dwell with man? How could a holy God possibly be in our presence? And that is the exact point of Psalm 15 this morning. What is expected of the person who wishes to dwell with God? It will teach us those expectations. It would also show us how we fall short and ultimately point us to our Savior, the perfect man of God. So I invite you in your Bibles, please open to Psalm 15. as we read it before we explain the word of the Lord. Psalm 15. A Psalm of David. O Lord, who shall sojourn in your tent? Who shall dwell on your holy hill? He who walks blamelessly and does what is right and speaks truth in his heart, who does not slander with his tongue and does no evil to his neighbor, nor takes up a reproach against his friend, in whose eyes a vile person is despised, but who honors those who fear the Lord, who swears to his own hurt and does not change, who does not put out his money at interest and does not take a bribe against the innocent. He who does these things shall never be moved. Pray with me. Heavenly Father, we thank you for your word. Truly we believe that the grass withers, The flower fades, but the word of our Lord abides forever. Please teach us this day, Lord. Please open our hearts. Give us ears to hear and eyes to see what you have written here for our benefit. And I pray this all in the name of Jesus. Amen. So as I said in the introduction, this Psalm starts off with a bold question by David, a bold question. He wants to know, What does it take to dwell in God's presence? What are the expectations? And that's why he starts with this question. Oh Lord, who shall sojourn? Who will dwell in your tent? Who will live on your holy hill? So remember, as we see in this introduction, this is a psalm of David. And when David was alive, the temple wasn't yet built. So he's most likely talking about the tabernacle here. The word tabernacle and tent are often interchangeable, so he's talking about the tabernacle. And for the word Holy Hill, he's speaking about Mount Zion, the mountain in Jerusalem where the tabernacle was when David brought it in as a king and where his son Solomon would eventually build the temple. And this is important for us to grasp because for the people back then, the tabernacle was the very symbol of God's presence among them. The people of Israel would look at this tent and think to themselves, surely God is in our midst. Maybe a good way to think about it is the way you think about church. You come here to hear God's Word spoken, to have the Lord's Supper, to dwell with God's people, and it's often in God's house that you equate God's presence. It was like that for the tabernacle in a lot of ways. And perhaps David is asking this question about the priests, who it was their job to go into the tabernacle, or perhaps he's just talking in general. What does it take to be in your presence, God? What do you expect of man? Either way, this is a powerful question, and it's one that we all need to think about. What does it take to dwell with the living, holy God? And where does David go to answer this question? He goes to God's law. He goes to the reflection of God's character. Nothing in this psalm that we are gonna read is new. You can find everything here all throughout the Bible. But it is a short poetic compilation of what is expected of the person who wants to dwell in God's presence. Now for those of you who are listening really well while I was reading, you might be thinking to yourself, Why doesn't the psalm talk about, you know, going to church, believing in God in your heart, having faith? It doesn't talk about that. And actually, it jumps straight to, how do you treat your fellow person? This is important to notice because we really can split the law of God into two categories. And we see this in the Ten Commandments. You have the first table of the law, the first four commandments which deal with your relationship with God. Then you have the last six commandments, which deal with your relationship with your neighbor. How do you treat your fellow human being? And I believe this psalm kind of skips ahead of those first four, on the one hand, because it's assumed. And on the second hand, when talking about those four, it can often be misunderstood or lead to pride. Just think of it. Think of the question, am I loving God with all of my heart and all of my strength and all of my might? That's a hard question to answer. It really is. However, am I loving my neighbor as myself? It's a lot more readily discernible. You can see that in other people very quickly. So I believe that's why this psalm is mostly talking about the second table of the law. of how we relate with our neighbors. It's as if God is asking the question, do you think that you love me? Love my people. Do you really think you love God? Love my sheep. And so in verses two through the first part of five, we see the expectations of God, of what it means, what it will take for a person to dwell in his presence. I mentioned this a couple weeks ago in Psalm 1, but in Hebrew poetry, you have to realize they didn't rhyme in the way that we do. And when they write poetry, they didn't have meter in the way that we do. Rather, Hebrew poetry rhymes thematically. So one line will say something, and then the second line will follow it up and say the same thing in different words. And so what we'll see here in this Psalm is that there's six couplets. Six duos, things that complement each other, teaching us what it means to love our neighbor as we love ourselves. So we're going to focus on these six topics, and conveniently, they all start with P. A little bit of a stretch on some of them, but just go with it. So six areas of life. Posture, ponderings, people, prestige, promises, and property. I'll say them all again so you don't have to write them down. Now, so let's look at the first one. What's God expect? Look at verse two. He who walks blamelessly and does what is right. Posture. What is this person's general posture towards the world? How does this person conduct himself or herself? It says that they should walk blamelessly. It means that no attack from outside really can stick on this person. I really think this idea of walking blamelessly is very connected to how Paul describes elders and deacons. He says they must be above reproach. Nothing really sticks on them, no attack. And this word blameless, it carries the meaning of someone who is whole, a complete person. They have integrity. As an example of this, I grew up in a church. We had a very large youth group, sometimes upwards to 60 people. And I was with these people all through middle school and high school. And I learned a lot about what the word integrity means through interacting with those people. Because several members of my youth group, to be honest, they were a different person in youth group than they were on, say, Thursday. They were a different person on Sunday than I saw them interacting with all of their other friends throughout the week. They talked different. They acted different. They had different sets of morality. That's what David's getting at. To be a whole person is, you're not different based upon your crowd. You're the same person. Not only is this person, is their walk blameless, but this passage says that they do what is right. They do righteousness. This person, not only can they not be attacked, but they're doing what is right at the same time. This person doesn't just avoid wrong, he actively does good things. I think a great biblical example of this is the person of Joseph, the whole complete man of integrity. Just think of it. Essentially, he was doing the same great work for God while he was with his brothers. while he was under Potiphar, his slave master, while he was in the dungeon, and while he was serving Pharaoh. In all of these different spheres of his life, Joseph was complete. He was blameless. He did righteousness. So it should make us think about ourselves. What is your posture in the world? How do you interact with those around you? Do you act differently, morally speaking, depending on which crowd you're with? What about when no one's around and only the Lord is watching you? Are your actions the same? God is blameless, so you must be like Him if you wish to dwell with Him. So let's look at the second one, ponderings. Let me read the last part of verse 2 going into verse 3. This person speaks truth in his heart and does not slander with his tongue. Notice how both of these have to do with speech, ultimately. And yet, it's interesting that the first one begins in the inner man before proceeding to the outer man. It says, speaks truth in his heart. And in the Hebrew world, the idea of the heart is what we would call the mind, your thinking, your pondering. The central place for thinking and expressing yourself in a sense. And more importantly than just speaking truth outwardly, David starts here with speaking truth inwardly to yourself about people. Jesus says in Matthew chapter 12 verse 34, he says, out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks. Nothing comes out of your mouth that hasn't first been in your heart. It's a scary thing to think about. This means that in order to master your speech, you must first master your thoughts. And which is the even more scary thing is that the Lord sees it all. Acts chapter 15, one of the apostles calls God the heart knower. He's the one who sees through the veils of matter and he can understand and he knows all of the ponderings of your mind. And I think this means that the person who wishes to dwell with God must think the best of others, fight for charity, build one another up in his mind. It's like what Paul says in that famous chapter of Corinthians, the love chapter. He says, love bears all things. It hopes all things. It hopes the best of people. And not only does this person have a heart that thinks truth, it leads to true words as well. It says that this person does not slander with his tongue. You might be thinking, what is slander? It's not really a word that we use nowadays very often. Probably a good way to think about it is slander is speaking about what is false or intentionally tearing someone down. I think we could even say slandering is making bold claims about people in their heart when you really don't know, when you really don't have the facts. For instance, gossip is an example of slander. Proverbs 10, 18 says about this, it says, he who conceals hatred, his lying lips, and he who spreads slander is a fool. Also Proverbs 16, 28, a perverse man spreads strife and a slanderer separates intimate friends. These verses lean us towards asking the questions, what are the ponderings of your heart before God? Just because it doesn't lead to speech doesn't mean God doesn't see it. God sees them all. How do you speak with people, especially when that person you're speaking about is not around? How do you speak about other people when they're not around? And friends, we need to watch this in our church. Almost every story of disunity in a church or a church split or discipline issues begins with an unbridled tongue, begins with someone who's not in control of their speech. So we need to watch this as a church. Our heavenly father only speaks truth. So if you want to dwell with him, you must be like him. Number three, look at the end of verse three, it's where we begin this subject of people. General interactions with people are in mind here. How does this person who wishes to dwell with God interact with other human beings? It starts off, it says, he does not take up a reproach against his neighbor. Sorry, it starts with, he does no evil to his neighbor, and then he does not take a reproach against his friend. And the natural question from this is, who's your neighbor? Who is this talking about? And in essence, your neighbor is everyone around you. We could even go as far as saying everyone in Anderson. Do you remember when Jesus gives the parable of the Good Samaritan? The question that starts that parable is this Pharisee who's wanting to justify himself. He says, well, who is my neighbor? Who am I supposed to love? And as you go through the story, Jesus says, The one who proved to be his neighbor was the one who showed mercy. So in essence, your neighbor is anyone who you are able to show mercy to, anyone that God puts within your life and has a need. So this person who seeks to dwell with God does not do evil to any of his neighbors. I think to do evil, it's a general term. We could understand it as this person doesn't seek their harm. He seeks the welfare of others. He doesn't want people to fail. He doesn't rejoice when bad things happen to others. He mourns with those who mourns, and he rejoices with those who rejoice. He has a care for others. And notice the other side of this subject of people. It says that this person does not take up a reproach against his friend. Talk about another word that probably isn't used too much in our vocabulary, the word Reproach. It basically means an insult or a revilement. Anything that brings someone down needlessly. So let me try to explain this. To not take up a reproach means that one is zealous to protect the good name of other people. Zealous to protect the good name. Be that someone in your class, your family, your friends, your church. This person is so loving of his friends that he will do whatever he can to protect their good name, especially when they're not around. I think a good question to ask is, do I care about others' reputation more than I care about mine? Do I care about others' reputation more than I care about mine, or as much as I care about mine? I think that's what it's getting at. I don't know if any of you have ever been in the situation when you know that other people are talking about you behind your back, perhaps in family or in a workplace or even in church sometimes. It's a terrible feeling. And yet, I don't know if you've been in this situation. If you knew that in that moment that your name was being reproached by others, that a friend of yours was going to bat for you when you weren't even there. It's hard to beat that feeling of knowing that a friend had your back when you weren't there to defend yourself. I think that's what this is getting at. This person who wishes to dwell with God refuses to take up reproaches of people who aren't even present. He fights for the good name of others. The Lord does no evil to his friends, and his goals are always good. If you wish to be in his presence, you must be like him. Number four, look at the beginning of verse four with me. Talks about prestige. Who is prestigious in your eyes? Who do you see as honorable? Who do you give respect to? Notice how it begins, it says, in whose eyes a vile person is despised. This vile person is someone who both disrespects people but also rejects God. Basically a non-Christian. And what is this verse saying? This is strong language. It's saying, in whose eyes a vile person is despised. What this is saying that for those who wish to be in God's presence, they need to view people the way God views them. So because we value God so highly and we love Him, when we see people in life who do not honor Him, it must burden us. It must sadden us. And in a sense, we should despise them. We should look down on them. Now, let me caveat, that doesn't mean that we hate unbelievers with every ounce of our being. That is not what I'm saying. But I am saying that we must recognize the foolishness of those who do not love God. And we need to go further than that and realize, I don't want to live my life like them. It's like the beginning of the first Psalm. Many of you know it by heart. Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked, nor stand in the way of sinners, nor sit in the seat of scoffers, but his delight is in the law of the Lord. And friends, you can't avoid those paths if you don't know the difference between a scoffer and a righteous man. That's what this verse is saying. There are many successful people in the world whom we should not honor as moral examples. I think a good biblical illustration of this is, do you remember why John the Baptist was put in prison? Why he was jailed and eventually beheaded? Because he called out the king on his sin. He said, Herod, just because you're the king doesn't mean you're above the law. It means that you should not be sleeping with your brother's wife. And because of that, he was put in jail and eventually killed. In John's mind, the fact that Herod was the king did not change anything about him. He treated him based on his relationship with God and his morals. And he was punished for that, which is a hard truth. But notice, look at the other side of this parallelism, this couplet. This person not only despises the vile person, they also honors the one who fears the Lord. Honors the one who fears the Lord. This means that the ideal person who wishes to come into God's presence shows honors to those who honor God. Christians, believers, he loves God's people with a peculiar and unique love. This means showing time and love and care towards those who are marked by spiritual humility. I think it really means loving a church, uniting yourself to a body of believers. And one thing, I think I've grown in this a lot because of this church. Dr. Campbell, one of the hallmarks of his preaching is the history. How often have you been here in a sermon and Dr. Campbell pulls from a great person who lived 700 years ago that you've never heard about? Those are the people who are worthy of living your life like, worthy of admiring and modeling yourself like because we aren't the first Christians in existence. And we need to remember, who should I admire? The people who had great faith. The Lord flawlessly renders to each person his due, the righteous and the wicked. And if you wish to be in his presence, you must be like him. You must be like him. Number five, promises. Look at the end of verse four. This ideal person keeps his word and never wavers. Says, who swears to his own hurt and does not change. That is a hard verse. Who swears to his own hurt. Literally, this word means taking an oath. A legally binding agreement. And you might not think that you do that that much, but actually this is very common in everyday life. Buying a car. Signing a lease, paying a mortgage, marriage is a covenant oath, a vow. Military service, for those of you who are students in college, your AU student policy is in some ways an oath. Joining a church, there's a reason we have membership vows. These are part of everyday society. But this command also applies to your everyday promises. Remember, Jesus says, let your yes be yes and your no be no. When someone hears your word, they should trust it. And yet, and we have all been here, there comes a time in your commitments when it's not easy. There comes a time in every covenant, in every commitment, when all of a sudden you see the darker side of things that you didn't think that you would see. The ideal person of God follows his word even when it costs him, even when it hurts. That's what this passage means when it says, he swears to his own hurt. We don't make promises because we're strong, we make promises because we're weak. We understand we're human. And if it was up to my strength to uphold this agreement flawlessly, probably wouldn't happen. Hence, a promise or a covenant. And I think this is so much application to every single one of you. This is commanding people who wish to dwell with God to keep their word, to keep their promises. I think this means if you're in a business transaction, fight to keep your end of the deal. Don't run away from it when it gets sour. Honor the duties that you've signed on to when you start a job. Fight for your marriage. Fight for your marriage. One of the most beautiful covenants that can be made in the world. And then also honor your church. The day will come when the newness and the flashiness of joining a church, it wears away. And those are the moments when your commitment matters the most, because it pushes you to love when you don't feel like it, to honor when you don't feel like it. Not only does this person swear to his own hurt, says that he does not change. Does not change. Speaking of a person who does not waver in his mind, this kind of a person is slow to make a commitment, but once he says yes, he's all in. He's all in. So friends, do you honor your word? Do you seek to be the person whose loyalty to commitments mirrors the very character of God? Our God swore oaths to people himself, to Abraham, and he has never backed out, even when that cost him his son. And if you wish to dwell with God, you must be like him. Number five, property. This last characteristic has to do with someone who, sorry, number six, who handles their finances well. Finances, property, I needed a 6P. Show me some grace. It says, who does not put out his money at interest? For those of you who have a King James Bible, it might even say usury there. Another old word that we don't use very often. This is a difficult phrase on the surface, because you might read it and think, We have a lot of interest in our world. Everyone here who has a mortgage, right? There's a lot of interest in this world. So is this Psalm telling Christians that all interest is evil? No, I don't think it is. And let me explain. Let's see what the rest of the Old Testament has to say about this. God wanted his people, particularly in the family of Israel, to interact with their fellow brothers and sisters, fellow Israelites, with a certain level of trust and love. Let me read for you Leviticus chapter 25 verses 35 to 36. Note this part. Take no interest from him. Usury. or profit, but fear your God. You shall not lend to him your money at interest, nor give him your food for profit. They were commanded to never charge interest between loans in the family of God. So if we were to apply this today, I think it best applies to the church, the true spiritual Israel. Just imagine with me, if within the church, every single merciful donation came with interest and the expectation you're going to get it back. It'll fall apart. All of church would fall apart. God wants interactions between the family of God, between the needy and the wealthy, to be marked by love and mercy that is not present in the outside world as much. Where the person who is needy recognizes that he's owed nothing, and the person who has wealth recognizes that God demands mercy of him. I think Paul practiced this as well. When he visited churches asking them to give to other needy churches, he never wanted to make them do it. He always wanted people to give from their hearts and not from compulsion. Because he recognized the importance of cultivating mercy and not simply just obligation. So another important verse to think about, Deuteronomy 2320. speaking to Old Testament Israel, says, you may charge a foreigner interest. So interestingly, there's this distinction. You can charge interest to the person who's outside the land of Israel, but not the person inside the land of Israel. This is why I think God's not outlawing the practice of interest, because even Israel was allowed to deal, to deal in ways that would make them profit with the surrounding nations. I think to apply it to our day and age, this would be like any Christian business owner interacting with any non-Christian business owner and making a modest profit. I think that is a great application. What God doesn't want is that he doesn't want profit to be exorbitant or the winner is always the rich man and the loser is always the poor man. That's what God does not want. I think John Calvin said this is a tough topic and he has a good quote on this. He says, let us then remember that all bargains in which the one party unrighteously tries to make gain by the loss of the other party, whatever name may be given to them are here condemned. Unrighteous gain is what's being condemned here. The ideal man who wishes to be in God's presence must handle his finances, his property with mercy and with truth. He doesn't just do that, he also refuses to take a bribe against the innocent. It's always a mark of true justice, not taking bribes. I think this is something that we take for granted here in America, not saying there's no bribes here. There's very few. One time I was able to visit a missionary that my family supports in Malawi. And the one thing that astounded me above anything else is that bribes amongst the government there is common practice. The person who gets justice is the person who pays the most money at every level of the government. Like, I'd ask this missionary, like, well, why isn't the power on? Oh, well, because the government official over this hasn't been paid. Well, why did this legal case not go in the way of justice? Because someone came in and had a huge wad of cash. And it was crazy. Makes me thankful for the country we live in, but bribes take other forms as well. In James chapter 2, there's a very revealing story where James says, suppose a rich man comes into your church. who's clothed with fine clothes and has a beautiful ring on and all that, and everyone goes and talks to him, but there's a poor man in rags in the corner that everyone ignores. Is that not a bribe, in a sense? Someone comes in with their money and their affluence and, in a sense, buys the attention of everyone. We cannot take bribes. How do you handle your property, the things that God has given to you? Are you marked by mercy and generosity? It's no sin to be wealthy. There are many wealthy, righteous people in the Bible, Question is, how do you handle it? And friends, God is the most infinitely wealthy being ever. And if you wish to be in his presence, you must be like him. Which brings us to the end of this psalm. In the end of verse five, the blessing. These are all high callings. No doubt you're feeling in your heart. These are high callings. But this is what it means to dwell with God. These are his standards. And knowing the difficulty of living the righteous life, he ends this with a promise that says, the one who does these things will never be moved, never be shaken. This is eternal hope. Those are the people who can have confidence in death. The people who do these things are the people who can dwell with God. And yet, if I ended the sermon there, that would be a weighty burden. Paul calls the law a weighty burden. It commands, but it does not give. It demands from you, but it does not provide. There's a beautiful poem I heard one time explaining the difference between the law and the gospel. It says, run, man, run, the law commands, but it gives you neither feet nor hands. A much sweeter call the gospel brings. It bids you fly, and it gives you wings. This is the law of God and it is a burden. If you look to it for salvation alone, you will never find it. If you look to these commands for your eternal hope, you will find only condemnation. Why? Because through the works of the law shall no man be justified in his sight. Even if you fulfill these obligations hourly without any observable flaw, your heart condemns you. Even the best thing that you do, is there not a sense of pride in it? Or even the best thing you do, is there not a sense of you're just doing it to do it? That's not what God wants. God sees that. So let's go back to the beginning of the psalm. Let's view this in another light with me. Look at his questions. Oh Lord, who shall sojourn in your tent? What man can abide on your holy hill? And friends, the answer is no one. Not one of you. Now turn with me to John chapter 1. Turn with me to John chapter 1, and let us view this psalm in light of the good gift of Christ and of Christmas. Specifically, our confession of sin. John chapter 1, verse 14. It says this, and the word became flesh and dwelt among us and we have seen his glory. Glory as of the only son from the father, full of grace and truth. And just a little linguistic nugget for you, this word dwelt among us, it's literally the word he made a tent. He made a tent among humankind. It's as if the Psalm is asking the question, no man can dwell in God's tent, so what does God do? He pitches a tent among men. No man can ascend to God's holy hill, so what does God do? He descends to us and becomes a man. The word became flesh and pitched a tent among us. Can man dwell with God? No, but God became man to fulfill the righteous requirement of the law that God demands of you. This is why there is therefore now no condemnation for those who trust in Jesus, because Jesus had the perfect posture towards other humans. Christ's ponderings were flawless, even in his heart. His interactions with people were without blame. He showed perfect prestige and respect to the one who honors God, and he refused it from the one who hates God. Jesus fulfilled every single one of his promises. and who was more wealthy than Christ, and he gave it all up to save sinful people. Friends, this is why we must study the Psalms, because it teaches us the right perspective on God's law. God's law is beautiful, and we treasure it because it shows us our sins and drives us to the cross. The law tears us down so that we may be exalted in Christ. It's like the psalmist in 119 who says, Lord, how I love your law. Because without the law, would I know Jesus? No. If you believe in Christ, every single one of his righteous acts are yours. And by faith, you can lawfully say on the last day, I have earned the right to the holy hill of God through the blood of Christ. Friends, this is the beauty of Christmas. The law says do, the gospel says done. And one day, God's dwelling place, like Dr. Campbell started the service, will be among men, and all people will look like this, thanks to the work of our Savior, the perfect man of God. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, I thank you. Lord, thank you for your word. Thank you for your law. Lord, it is true that if we wish to abide with you, we must be like you. And yet, if we stare deep within our soul, who is like you? Thank you for giving us Christ. Thank you for sending your son as a baby in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, so that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit. Give us faith, Father. I pray this all in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.