to the book of Psalms, and our text this evening is Psalm 6. This portion of God's holy word is another Psalm teaching us about crying to the Lord, running to our great God, for help and mercy. And tonight, Psalm 6. Please give careful attention as we hear the word of God. To the choir master with string instruments according to the Sheminith. A Psalm of David. O Lord, rebuke me not in your anger, nor discipline me in your wrath. Be gracious to me, O Lord, for I am languishing. Heal me, O Lord, for my bones are troubled. My soul also is greatly troubled, but you, O Lord, how long? Turn, O Lord, deliver my life. Save me for the sake of your steadfast love. For in death there is no remembrance of you. In Sheol, who will give you praise? I'm weary with my moaning. Every night I flood my bed with tears. I drench my couch with my weeping. My eye wastes away because of grief. It grows weak because of all my foes. Depart from me, all you workers of evil, for the Lord has heard the sound of my weeping. The Lord has heard my plea. The Lord accepts my prayer. All my enemies shall be ashamed and greatly troubled. They shall turn back and be put to shame in a moment. Thus ends the reading of God's very Word. Let's pray. Father, thank you for your Word. We pray that you would come by your Spirit now and teach us better how to think and live and to pray. How to cry to you. In Jesus we pray. Amen. This Psalm is another psalm that records for us David crying to the Lord. And why has God recorded these? Well, it's not just to teach us about David, but it is through him to instruct us. that we would look to the Lord Jesus and we would be those who cry to God when we are in distress. Verse 1 of this psalm teaches us that the focus of this cry is to the Lord who loves his children. Now that may sound strange. But David begins this psalm acknowledging that God Almighty loves His children enough to correct us and discipline us. But David is keenly aware of how deserving he is of God's displeasure and in that context cries to God that he would do what he has already promised and revealed of himself to be gracious and merciful even in his correction. Oh Lord, rebuke me not in your anger, nor discipline me in your wrath. The Lord in a number of places in Holy Scripture gives us the precious promises that because we are the Lords in Christ Jesus, we are those who are loved of God. Turn with me to Proverbs chapter 3. Proverbs chapter 3. And here is a passage of scripture where the Lord reveals that those whom He loves, He disciplines and corrects. Look down in verse 11. My son, do not despise the Lord's discipline or be weary of His reproof. for the Lord reproves him whom he loves, as a father the son in whom he delights." And so here we see in the book of Proverbs, Solomon who had been taught by his dad, and who was Solomon's earthly father? Well, it was none other than King David. And here we have now Solomon's testimony of one of the things that his earthly father had taught him of his heavenly father. that those who are God's children are loved. And that our God loves us so much that when we would begin to veer off the path of loving and serving and following the living God, the Lord will correct us. He will put forth His powerful mighty hand to draw us back unto Himself. Over in the book of Hebrews, chapter 12, we have a passage that expands on this glorious truth and reminds us that it is an expression of God's incredible love. And so the Lord reveals to us in this psalm that those who are God's children, when we are in distress, the Lord is loving us. He is teaching us. We see in Hebrews chapter 12 verse 1, Therefore since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, referring to all those men and women that have been referenced in Hebrews chapter 11, men and women of faith who love the Christ, Since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and sin which clings so closely and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith. And then it describes who this Jesus is. Who, for the joy that was set before him, endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God. First of all, the Lord would direct us to the Lord Jesus to remind us that's how much our God loves us that he did not withhold his own Son. And secondly, the Lord puts this forth to remind us of the example of Jesus. That as Jesus trusted His Father even in the face of the horrible sorrow and difficulty of Him going to the cross, yet the Father had made promises to Him and was with Him, and so it is with every child of God who is trusting in Jesus. Even in the face of difficulties and persecutions, if we are trusting in Jesus, God has blessings in store for us. And so verse 3, Consider him who endured from sinners such hostility against himself, so that you may not grow weary or faint-hearted. In your struggle against sin, you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood. And have you forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as sons? My son, and here we have our text now in Proverbs 3. 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 chastens every son whom he receives. And so here's the commentary, verse 7. It is for discipline that you endure. It is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons. For what son is there whom his father does not discipline? If you are left without discipline, in which all have participated, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. Besides this, we have had earthly fathers who disciplined us, and we respected them. Shall we not much more be subject to the Father of spirits and live? For they disciplined us for a short time, as it seemed best to them. But He disciplines us for our good, that we may share His holiness. For the moment, all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant. But later, it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it. Therefore lift up drooping hands and strengthen your weak knees and make straight paths for your feet, so that what is lame may not be put out of joint, but rather be healed." And so that's how this Psalm 6 begins. The David of Scripture who had been so close to the Lord and yet who stumbled so badly. We don't know the particular occasion of this psalm, but we know David was in great distress, both body and soul. And we'll look at that more here in just a moment. But he begins this psalm saying, Lord, your hand is heavy upon me. Lord, you are correcting me and I am pleading with you that you would remember I am your little child and that you would not discipline me like the pagans disciplined their children. in anger and in wrath. But Lord, you would be faithful to your promises to discipline me for my good, to discipline me so that I would be corrected and learn to trust and follow you. Oh Lord, rebuke me not in your anger, nor discipline me in your wrath. David is not asking, don't correct me. He's just saying, Lord, your hand that is heavy upon me, if you were to give me what I deserve, I would be cast into the very pits of hell. But oh Lord, how I thank you that you love me enough to convict me of sin. to put your hand upon me so that I would run to you and confess my sin. Turn with me to Psalm 32. And here is the Psalm where we see David revealing to us, testifying of the Lord's correction. And we do see that the Lord didn't just pour forth His justice upon David, but that the Lord in His fatherly love put His mighty sovereign hand upon David to convict him of sin, to crush his heart, so that he would grieve over his sin, turning to the Christ and find relief and forgiveness and restored joy. Look at Psalm 32. A mascal of David, blessed is the one. Now the word blessed is one of these Bible terms and blessed can also literally be translated happy. Now it's not the world's kind of happy, it's God's kind of happy. But David said, how happy in Jesus is the one whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Blessed is the man against whom the Lord counts no iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no deceit. For when I kept silent, my bones wasted away. Through my groaning all day long, for day and night your hand was heavy upon me. My strength was dried up as with the fever heat of summer. I acknowledged my sin to you. And how did that come about? God put his hand on David. The Lord corrected David. Yes, in His almighty power, but in His incredible gentleness. I acknowledged my sin to you, and I did not cover my iniquity. I said, I will confess my transgressions to the Lord, and you forgave the iniquity of my sin. Psalm 51 is another Psalm where David recounts for us the hand of God upon him, leading him to confess his sin in the mighty grace of the Lord Jesus Christ. And the Lord forgave David. The Lord restored the joy of his salvation. as we see here in Psalm 51. into Bathsheba. Have mercy on me, O God. According to your steadfast love, according to your abundant mercy, blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin, for I know my transgressions and my sin is ever before me. Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight. so that you may be justified in your words and blameless in your judgment. Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me. Behold, you delight in truth and the inward being, and you teach me wisdom in the secret heart. Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean. Wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow. Let me hear joy and gladness. Let the bones that you have broken rejoice. David had experienced the hand of the Father's displeasure upon him. And he says, Lord, I'm crying to you for mercy. Let the bones that you've broken rejoice. Hide your face from my sins. Blot out all my iniquities. Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away from your presence, and take not your Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and uphold me with a willing spirit. Then I will teach transgressors your ways, and sinners will return to you. Deliver me from blood guiltiness, O God. O God of my salvation, and my tongue will sing aloud of your righteousness. O Lord, open my lips, and my mouth will declare your praise. For you will not delight in sacrifice, or I would give it. You will not be pleased with a burnt offering. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit, a broken and a contrite heart, O God, you will not despise. And so back to our text in Psalm 6. This Psalm begins, O Lord, rebuke me not in your anger. nor discipline me in your wrath. Be gracious to me, O Lord, for I am languishing. Heal me, O Lord, for my bones are troubled. My soul also is greatly troubled. But you, O Lord, how long? Turn, O Lord. Deliver my life. Save me for the sake of your steadfast love. David is not asking to be free from correction. He is just saying, Lord, I'm begging that your fatherly hand would be upon me and that you would rescue me in mercy. You would forgive my sin, be gracious to me. And so when we're in trouble, you remember the commentary that we read in Hebrews 12 verse 7. It is for discipline that you have to endure. Whenever we face difficulties, one of the things God is doing is He is teaching me. He is teaching you as His little children to trust in Him more, to trust in Him better. There may be other things. There may be specific sins that he is bringing to the forefront for us to repent of, as was in David's case, or as in Job's case, there were no specific sins that Job was guilty of that the Lord was chastening him because of. Job's friends were wrong. in applying the truth that God does chasten for sin. That's true. But they were wrong in applying that to Job. But God was disciplining his servant Job. The Lord was teaching Job how much he needed the Christ. God was reminding Job of the goodness of God and the holiness of God and the sovereignty of his God. And that God did not answer to him that he was God. And at the end of the book of Job, Job repents of ever having demanded that God come and give him an accounting for all of the difficulties he had been through, the horrors and the sorrows that he had experienced. And Job says, Lord, you don't have to answer to me. You are God. I just give myself to you. And so we desire and pray when we face difficulties that the Lord would be putting his fatherly, gracious, loving hand upon us. And David puts it in the negative, O Lord, rebuke me not in your anger, nor discipline me in your wrath. And then he says, Be gracious, be gracious to me, O Lord, for I am languishing. Heal me, O Lord, for my bones are troubled. My soul also is greatly troubled. But you, O Lord, heal all. Turn, O Lord, deliver my life. Save me for the sake of your steadfast love. And that word steadfast love, we've looked at it a number of times in the Psalms. It's the word that we see, for example, at the end of Psalm 23, surely goodness and mercy, God's everlasting love, his mercy, will follow me all the days of my life. It is the Hebrew word chesed. It is a powerful word. It is a word that points us to God giving his own son to die for us. Well, we see David then describing in verses 5 through 7 how God's hand was heavy upon him. And David says, Lord, if you don't come and rescue and give me relief, Here is what I have. For in death there is no remembrance of you, and Sheol, who will give you praise? Now he's talking from the standpoint of his physical existence here on earth. David and the prophets of old and God's people even in the Old Testament understood that when you die, your soul either goes to heaven if you love the Christ or your soul goes to hell immediately upon death. And we could look at a number of passages of scripture in the book of Daniel as well as the Psalms that teach that glorious truth. But David is describing here, Lord, I desire to live more in this life. And Lord, when I die, this mouth is not going to praise you anymore this side of that great day when you come again and raise the dead. Lord, for in death there is no remembrance in you, in she old, who will give you praise? David says, Lord, I'm at the point where unless you come and deliver me, I have no future. But praise God, God's people, even the enemy of death is defeated. Even the enemy of death, death is still an enemy for God's people. And so we are like the Apostle Paul in Philippians chapter 1, for to me to live is Christ and to die is gain. I'm pressed between the two. To depart and be with Christ is better, but to remain on in the body is what I desire for your sake. And I am confident that God will leave me here at least a little while longer for usefulness. That's what David is describing here. Lord, here's my condition. Unless you come and rescue me, my time of serving you here on this earth is just about over. We don't know the circumstances, the particular circumstances of why David was praying this, but he was faced with even death itself. And when we are in horrible straits, we also are those who need to remember that our life is in God's hands and he has numbered our days And he calls upon us to give him honor and praise each day that he would gift to us. In verse six, David said, I am weary with my moaning. Every night I flood my bed with tears. I drench my couch with my weeping. My eye wastes away because of grief. It grows weak because of all my foes. David was in great distress. When you go to bed weeping and you get up in the morning and you go, oh Lord, unless you deliver me, I have no hope. Indeed, David's condition was severe. And what did he do? He cried to the Lord. He said, Lord, I want you to teach me. I'm begging you, the sovereign, to be gracious to me, to heal me, to save me, to deliver me. And then lastly in this psalm, I want you to notice how David's heart is revived as he cries to God. Even in this psalm, he is stirred to a renewed hope and confidence and boldness. Look at verse 8. He addresses the enemies of God, who perhaps were taunting him, who perhaps were mocking him, even in his abased condition. Depart from me, all you workers of evil, for the Lord has heard the sound of my weeping. We read over in Psalm 51, For you will not delight in sacrifice, or I would give it. You will not be pleased with a burnt offering. The sacrifices of God are what? A broken spirit, a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise. And when we humble ourselves before the Lord, crying to him for mercy, In the name of Jesus Christ, repenting of our sins, the Lord Jesus turns our weeping into joy. That's what we read over in Psalm 126. When I was a little boy and we would visit my grandparents, there was an older lady in that congregation, and at the beginning of their Sunday school time, they would call for favorite a favorite hymn before we would break out into the various classes. And this older lady, many, many times, it was a farming community, just about everybody in that church, the vast majority of the people lived on a farm. And she would ask for bringing in the sheaves. uh bringing in the sheaves bringing in the sheaves we will come rejoicing bringing in the sheaves i can remember singing it and i can remember thinking this is a weird song what is this about And it wasn't until many, many years later that I saw that this wonderful old gospel song, this hymn, was based on Psalm 126. And that the Lord says, when His people repent and sow in weeping, then they bring with them the great harvest of joy. And that's what David now is breaking forth in, renewed hope and confidence. He addresses the enemies of God. He says, depart from me, all you workers of evil, for the Lord has heard the sound of my weeping. As he has humbled himself before the Lord, crying for mercy in the Christ, David is renewed, even though deliverance hasn't physically come yet to him. Yet his heart is rejoicing in the anticipation of all the blessings God has in store for him, both in eternity and temporally. Depart from me, all you workers of evil. David again gives himself anew to the Lord Jesus to stand for the Christ. And he tells the workers of iniquity, I'm not partners with you. I belong to the Christ. For the Lord has heard the sound of my weeping. Verse 9, the Lord has heard my plea. The Lord accepts my prayer. David is one who says, I have a sure hope. I have a glorious future. I will have deliverance. One way or another, whether it's in this life or the life to come, I belong to the living God through his son, the Lord Jesus. and the enemies of God, they will be ashamed and greatly troubled. The Lord tells us in the book of Romans chapter 9, a Christian is one who confesses Jesus is Lord. And in that passage in Romans 10, the Lord says, and everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved. And no one who puts their trust in him will ever be ashamed, will ever be disappointed. And David says, all my enemies shall be ashamed and greatly troubled. They may think they have the world by the tail. But I'm going to continue to trust in the Christ, even though it cost me even my own life. I belong to Jesus. And they will turn back, and they will be put to shame in a moment. But by the grace of God in Christ, I have life. That's how this psalm ends. And so God is teaching us how to cry. God is teaching us that when we're in hard spots, the Lord has put us in his gymnasium on some very vigorous workout machines to teach us to trust in Jesus, to teach us to hate our sin afresh, and to give ourselves to the Lamb of God. Jesus is powerful and mighty. He is full of mercy and love. And the Lord is aware of how weak and frail we are. That if He does not rescue us, we will die and we will perish. He does understand we cannot save ourselves. And so we can trust him. He is a gracious heavenly father. And as we cry to the Lord, the Lord delivers us. And the Lord renews our hearts to have hope and boldness, to set our face, to follow Jesus and to turn against the world. Amen. Let's pray. Father, each of these young people and children here tonight, Lord encourage them that when they are corrected, that they would rejoice that you are loving them and helping them to grow because their mama and daddy loves them so. And Father, all of us is your children, whether we're little children or old gray-haired children. Oh Lord, how we thank you that you love us and you are correcting us and growing us to love you more and better. Oh Lord, thank you for teaching us more tonight from Psalm 6 about how to cry to you. that when we are in distress to remember that you are our gracious Heavenly Father and that you have lessons for us to learn, that Lord you are mindful of the reality of our situation and you care for us and you are with us and that Lord you have work for us to do as long as we have breath to stand for you. And so, Lord, you are worthy to be praised and loved. Write this psalm upon our hearts. Bless now as we sing this paraphrase of Psalm 6. In Christ we pray. Amen.