We're back in the book of Psalms. We're looking at the Psalms of Ascent, and today we're going to look at the prayer of mercy and how important it is to pray for God's mercy in our life. It's one of those things I don't think we do enough of. If you were to say to me, Pastor, you have one prayer, and make it a short one, it would simply be, Lord, have mercy on me a sinner. Now we as Americans maybe don't like that as our primary prayer, but I'm going to show you in this message just how important it is to acknowledge both of those things. You all know you're sinners, right? You all know you need a lot of mercy, don't you? The mercy of God is something that it's hard to quantify. But in the Old Testament, when God set up His throne here on earth, He called it, do you all remember what he called it, his throne? He called it a mercy seat. And there they would come before the mercy seat, and they would ask for mercy. You say, well, Pastor, that's the Old Testament. We don't have to come before God with all these cries of mercy. Well, yeah, you do. The mercy seat hasn't changed. The Bible says in the book of Hebrews this. And it's all about humility before his throne. It says, let us then with confidence draw near to what? His throne of grace, or His throne of mercy. That we may receive what? What is the primary thing we want from God? Here it is, mercy. The mercy of God. That we might find grace, that is to say His divine favor, His enabling, in what? Our times of need. If you were in a time of need, the thing you need above all things is mercy. Now you say, I want to be more specific about my request. Really? You don't think God knows what it is you need? All he wants out of your mouth is mercy. Have mercy in this situation on me. So as we look at this ascent to God's presence, the psalmist at Psalm 123, 1, "'To you I lift up my eyes, O you who are enthroned in the heavens.'" This is the way he starts his cry for mercy. Do you know what it means when we acknowledge that God is in heaven or that he is enthroned in heaven? You know what we're declaring. In the Lord's Prayer we declare it. God is enthroned in heaven, is seeing God as he is for what he is. And it's your acknowledgment that God is in heaven, our Father in heaven. When we pray those prayers, it is very specific. You need to know why you're saying that the Father is in heaven. In the book of Ecclesiastes, it says, when you draw near to the house of God, draw near to what? To listen, and then it goes on to say, for God is in heaven and you are on earth. What? Let your words be few. You have an understanding that as you're coming before God, you don't need to get into a lot of details here. Your words should be few. Matter of fact, you should be coming before the throne of God to what? To listen. Most of our prayers is us talking about a lot of stuff that God's up to. Yeah, I know. So Jesus reprimands those people in the Sermon on the Mount. He says, listen, when you pray, do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do, for they think that they're going to be hurt for their many words. Do not be like them. What should we be like? We should be like people who know that our Father in heaven already knows. Doesn't need a big explanation. The words can be few because God is in heaven and God is looking down on all of us. And he knows. And the other acknowledgement is found in places like Psalm 115.10. God is in heaven and does all that he pleases. Or Psalm 103.19. God has established his throne in heaven and his kingdom rules over all. What does this mean? Very simple. When we say God is in heaven, or we say He's enthroned in heaven, what we're saying is, He is all-knowing. When I come before Him, He knows everything. I don't have to be telling Him a lot of things. And yes, because He's in heaven, He is all-powerful, and He does what He pleases. So, in the Lord's Prayer, we start off with the acknowledgement that God is all-knowing and God is all-powerful. We're making that statement as if we are aware. And then we say His name is hallowed. We've already praised Him because we've said He is all-powerful and He's all-knowing. That is the same as hallowing His name. We're saying, you're not like us. It's uncommon. It's separate. It's undefiled. You are not like us. We are on earth. You're in heaven. But God wants us to come before Him with the right attitude seeing him the way he is, but also seeing ourselves the way we are. There's a lot of self-awareness in the Psalm of Ascent, and here's another one. This is 123 2a. As the eyes of a maidservant to the hands of her mistress, so our eyes look to our God till he has mercy upon us. or the other part of this, behold, the eyes of the servant look to the hands of their master. It's interesting. As I was studying this out, I was reading rabbis, and I was also reading a lot of commentaries from the Puritans. It was interesting. The rabbis had one position, and the Puritans had another, and they're both right. The Puritans, in looking at this verse of Scripture, people like Spurgeon and others, said, well, this has a lot to do with ancient times in which a servant came before their master and looked for hand signals. The psalmist is saying, I'm looking at your hands. I'm trying to gauge what you want me to do by your hands. And you all know that a lot can happen by hands, right? Sign languages, of course, it's all the hands. But if I go like this, that means one thing, right? If I go like this, it means another thing. If I go like that, that means another thing. So we can easily be directed by hand signals. So most of the Puritan writers said, well, this is them looking to their master for instruction, for direction. Maid servants looking to their mistress. Same thing. I'm just watching you to see what you want, and I'm going to do whatever you want. And of course, we see this in Jesus. The humble attitude of Jesus. What did he say in John 5, 19? Jesus said to them, truly, truly, I say to you, the son can do nothing of his own accord. Listen to how he puts it. He says this, for whatever the father does, that the son does also. Jesus is watching his father, looking for what the father is doing, and he imitates that, follows those hand signals. It's important for you to understand that Jesus had the mind of a servant. And we're told to have the same kind of mind. Philippians says, have this mind among yourselves, which was also in Christ Jesus, who, though he existed in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but he emptied himself, taking on the form of what? Of a servant. Modern Christianity likes this idea of coming before God and just commanding him to do what we want. Man, that's scary. Jesus looked to his father for his father's initiative. But as I said, the rabbis also looked at the hands of God, not as giving orders, but as giving provision. And the more I studied the Old Testament and looked at references in the book of Psalms, I think this is probably more biblical. The psalmist is looking at the hands, not for orders, but he's looking for provisions. Psalm 145, the Lord upholds all who are falling and raises up all who are bowed down. There's this idea that people are falling before him or bowing down before him. It says, the eyes of all who look to you, you will give them food in due season. You open your hand and you satisfy the desire of every living thing. In other words, we look to heaven for God's hand to give us exactly what we need, his provisions. And in the case of the psalmist, what they're asking for is mercy. Our eyes look to God, to his hands, asking him to release from his hands mercy. Our eyes look to our Lord, our God, till he had mercy upon us. The cry was, have mercy upon us, O Lord, have mercy upon us. Notice the repetition three times, mercy, mercy, mercy. I want mercy. This reminds me of Jesus teaching on prayer. And he says, listen, don't be like this. Don't pray this way. Remember what he says? There was two people went up to pray. The tax collector. They both went to the temple. They both were seeking God. They both were coming to pray. The reason why he uses a Pharisee and a tax collector is because if there was a law of averages, the average adherence to the law, the Pharisee would be way up there. He was the one who followed the law. He was the one who did what the Bible says. He was the one who memorized the Bible. The tax collector, on the other hand, was the person farthest away from adherence to the law. He might be greedy. He might be an adulterer. So Jesus puts these two men in parallel, and we know how the Pharisee prayed. He thanked God that he wasn't like other men. And by the way, I see a lot of this in modern evangelicalism. You know, come before God and just confess who you are before him. I am what the Bible says I am. Just confess who you are. If that doesn't involve me saying I'm a sinner, I better be careful of that. Because the Pharisee prayed, and he said, I thank God that I'm not like other men. And then he started listing a bunch of sins that he did not commit. And then he says all the things that he did to be righteous. You think God's going to hear this prayer? Somebody coming boldly before him to confess who they are, if they don't include this. And then the other man just simply beat his chest, and he simply said this. There it is. God be merciful to me, a what? A sinner. That's the prayer that God hears. How do I know that? Because Jesus said it. He said, I tell you, the man went to his home justified. He went home with a stamp of God. He went home with the blessings of God. And then he says this, everyone who exalts himself will be humbled. That kind of praying is pride. But saying that you're a sinner, according to Jesus, is humbling yourself. Do we still need to humble ourselves? What do you think? Jesus says, if you will humble yourself this way, see your sin, acknowledge your sin, the Father will exalt you. Pharisee problem, he compared himself, his holiness to other people. He graded himself by saying, I'm better than other people. Is that the way you're going to grade yourself? Who do we compare ourselves to in the presence of God? God! I don't look around and say, I'm better than you! I look at heaven and say, oh my goodness! The holiness of God! I am undone! Woe is me! He didn't judge himself, but he did judge other people. The tax collector did the exact opposite. He compared himself to the holiness of God. That is all he saw. He did not see any people. There was no grading on, I seem to be better than most. You want to be humble? Have a revelation of the holiness of God and you will be humble. You want to be proud? Just keep comparing yourself to other people. A lot of ministers struggle with that. Let me give it to you out of Isaiah. So you can see the heart of God, which hasn't changed. This is Isaiah 66. It's a very important verse of scripture. Listen, God is saying, heaven is my throne, the earth is my footstool. What is the house that you're going to build for me? What is the place of my rest? All these things my hands have made, so all these things came to be, declares the Lord. Forget about making a house for me, doesn't mean anything. But then God goes on to say what he cares about. He says, to this one I will look. And the word look means to have regard. Some translations even use the word esteem. God looks at these people and he says, this is what it's all about. I look to these people. I regard these people. I pay attention to these people. Who are these people? Those who are humble, those who are contrite, and those who tremble at my word. Humility, contrition. I'm sorry for my sins, and I tremble at his word. Jesus preached an interesting message. And by the way, this is very similar to obviously how the tax collector prayed. He just simply confessed who he was, and he was contrite and humble and trembled. People often miss this, but Jesus, in the Sermon on the Mount, he told people how to be blessed. You know how people walk around going, I'm blessed. I'm blessed. I think they're just saying that. Because Jesus told everyone, you want to be blessed? You want to be blessed? Here's how you're blessed. Blessed are what? The poor in spirit. I'm going to put a blessing upon everyone who is poor, that is to say, has a poverty, a sense of their own needfulness in their spirit. You want to be blessed? Mourn. And by the way, this is the godly sorrow that is spoken about here in Isaiah too. Isaiah and the beginning of the Beatitudes are parallels. Contrite, humble, and one more thing, you have to be meek. If you will be these three things, poor in spirit, you'll mourn, you'll be meek. Guess what? Heaven is open to you. You shall be comforted, you will inherit the earth. All begins with this type of mindset. Coming before God, asking for mercy as a sinner. Humility, poverty, contrition, reverence. It's not a popular message. A lot of people are seduced by American Christianity. Let me give you somebody who's not American Christianity. Oswald Chambers. How many people in here read Oswald Chambers? This devotional is perhaps the best devotional ever written, and he didn't write it. His wife actually just took a bunch of his notes and put it together. My Aunt Messua's Heist, written over 100 years ago. Chambers is sort of like pondering this. Why does God want us to come before him with this, like we're sinners? Like always, God, have mercy. Why do we have to continually come before him this way? Here's what Chambers says. What our Lord wants us to present to Him is not our goodness, our honesty, or our efforts to do better, but real solid sin. God wants us to present to Him not our goodness, but our sinfulness. Why? Listen. Actually, that is all He can take from us, and what He gives us in exchange for our sins is real solid righteousness. You come and you confess your sins to me. You lay before me your broken contrite hum. I'm gonna take all that sin and I'm just gonna pour out to you blessing and righteousness. He goes on to say, we must surrender all pretense that we are anything and give up our claims that even being worthy of God's consideration. Some people call this worm theology. Yeah, I'm not worthy of God's consideration. Let me just say this, if you beat yourself up spiritually, you're closer to heaven than the person who doesn't. Most men that are extremely godly, when they get to the end of their life, The biggest thing that they do is question their salvation. You say, the more godly you get, the more you question your salvation. And the only reason they do that is because they can see the holiness of God and they see their sinfulness. It's so magnified that they wonder. And they all come around to knowing that the grace of God can cover all of their sins. But most of us live in ignorance to just how far from heaven we are in our own selves. Humility produces contempt and scorn from proud people. The proud who would hear a message like this, they have contempt for it. They're scornful of it. They're sitting there going, no, that's not the way it is. Listen, the psalmist says, our soul is exceedingly filled with the scorning of those who are at ease with the contempt of who? The proud. It's the proud people who had contempt for these people who cried out for only the help of heaven. This word contempt is the opposite of praise. They had no praise for people like this. This is totally unimportant to the proud. The idea of scorning is the idea of derision. It's like, these people are idiots for trusting in the mercies of God. Imagine God looking down from heaven at people that are completely and totally sold out to his love and mercy and his hand and making fun of those who hold to this position of complete trust in the goodness and mercy of God. You as a father would look at your children being scorned for something like this and your heart would go out. You remember Jesus at the cross? This is where the religious leaders treated him with contempt and scorn. And here's the way they put it. He saved others, but he can't save himself. He trusted in God, but now look at him. He trusted in God. Let God deliver him now. Don't know that God puts us through stuff where it looks like we are going to fail completely. And people look at us and they're just laughing. But it's not over. This was Friday. Sunday was coming. In your life, there is a sense in which God is taking you through this in which the proud are having contempt for the meek and the humble. But in the end, we win. So laugh all you want. Make as much fun as you want. The psalmist says he's crying out that God would have mercy upon them because they've been filled with contempt. They've been filled with scorn. It's like they live their whole life under this. And God says, just be patient. Just be patient. Just be patient. You ever read the book of Romans? What it tells us is that in the end, God is waiting, loving, kind, compassionate to all the sinful people on the earth. But he's waiting for the day where he will pour out his wrath. But this scripture here in Romans says that he is doing this to make known to us the riches of his glory because we are the vessels of mercy. In the end there's only two types of people, those who receive his mercy and those who receive his wrath. Which one are you? The mercy or the wrath of God is coming. In the book of Psalms, it talks about the nations and the people who plot in vain, the kings of this earth who set themselves up, the rulers who take counsel against the Lord and against his anointed. God is sitting in heaven and he's laughing at their derisions. Listen, this is speaking of a future event. Then he will speak to them in his wrath and fury, and in his fury saying, as for me, I have set a king on Zion, my holy hill. There's coming a day where Jesus is gonna take his throne, and that's the end. He says to his people there in Psalm 2 6, ask of me and I shall give you the heathens for your inheritance, the uttermost parts of the earth for your possession. Again, this is a paraphrase, really, of what Jesus said. The meek, those who totally trust, will inherit the earth. It's just a matter of time. You don't believe this. Sometimes I feel I'm preaching to people that don't really believe this. Your reward is coming. I have no great glee in the destruction of the wicked. I have no great glee in God pouring out his wrath. I pray for God's mercy to be upon all people. But the Bible says that if we endure with him, there is coming a time where we are going to reign on the earth. People often think, oh, when I die I'm going to go to heaven. Kind of. But what the Bible makes a much bigger deal about, if you read it accurately, it's not your life in heaven, it's your life here on earth after Jesus comes back and sets up his throne here on earth. Have you read that? Sometimes people are like, ah, I got on my bucket list, I want to go to Bermuda and sit in the sand and look at the blue water. Well, you wait until Jesus comes back and watch what he does to the Caribbean. And you can sit on those white sandy beaches and look at that blue water for all eternity if you like. Because according to God's word, He creates a new heaven and a new earth and we reign upon that earth. This kingdom is coming. And for those of us who put all of our trust, all of our hope in God and in His mercy, It's going to happen on that day when the seventh angel sounds his trumpet and there'll be a great voice in heaven saying, listen, the kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord and his Christ. And he shall reign forever and ever. And the Bible says, we shall reign with him. Revelation 5.10. For you have made them to be a kingdom of priests, to serve our God, and they will what? Reign upon the earth. Thanks for listening to this message from River Mountain Church. If you'd like some more information, visit our website, rivermountainchurch.org.