Amen and amen. Well, if you would, please take your Bibles in hand and turn with me to Psalm 119 one last time. Come to the final letter of the Hebrew alphabet and the final meditation of the psalmists upon God's amazing Word. Verse 169. With the Word of God open, let's pray together. Father, truly the law of the Lord is perfect, restoring the soul. The testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple. The precepts of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart. And the fear of the Lord is clean, enduring forever. The judgments of the Lord are true. They are righteous altogether. They are more to be desired than gold. Yes, than much fine gold. Sweeter also than honey. and the drippings of the honeycomb. And we come this evening, Father, and we ask You to bless us, to send Your Holy Spirit into our hearts, to fill us up with Your fullness, to instruct us from Your Word, and to revive, O God, and quicken our flagging spirits, that we might feel a sense of Your power and of Your presence, and that Your Mercies, O God, would keep us kept. Deliver us, Father, from the world and the flesh and the devil, especially the enemy within, O Lord. We're dogged constantly by our wandering ways, so prone to slip back. much more than to press on and push forward. As we pray, Lord, this encouragement from Your Word this evening will be a blessing to all of our hearts, and that You will show Yourself to be, as You are, the sinner's friend. In Christ's name, amen. This is the Word of God. Please listen carefully. Let my cry come before You, O Lord. Give me understanding according to Your Word. Let my plea come before you. Deliver me according to your word. My lips pour forth praise, for you teach me your statutes. My tongue will sing of your word, for all your commandments are right. Let your hand be ready to help me, for I have chosen your precepts. I long for your salvation, O Lord, and your law is my delight. Let my soul live and praise you, and let your rules help me. I've gone astray like a lost sheep. Seek your servant, for I do not forget your commandments. Amen. The grass withers and the flower falls off, but the Word of God endures forever. Well, Psalm 119 ends with a note of blessed realism. We've seen the psalmist at the top of his game, the top of his spiritual game, throughout the many stanzas of this psalm. We've heard him say things like, with my whole heart I seek you. Let me not wander from your command. My whole heart seeking God. He says in verse 11, I've stored up your word in my heart that I might not sin against you. Verse 14, In the way of your testimonies I delight as much as in all riches. Verse 20, My soul is consumed with longing for your rules at all times. He's a man who's passionate for God and passionate for God's Word. Verse 24, Your testimonies are my delight. They are my counselors. Verse 30, I have chosen the way of faithfulness. I set your rules before me. Verse 32, I will run in the way of your commandments when you enlarge my heart. Verse 44, I will keep your commandment, your law, continually, forever and ever. Verse 54, your statutes have been my songs in the house of my sojourning. Verse 60, I hasten and do not delay to keep your commandments. Verse 67, before I was afflicted, I went astray, but now I keep your word. We've all had those experiences where we think, yes, God's brought me back. He's restored me. He's reconnected me to him. And we think, I'll never sin again. I'll never fall back again. I'll never fall back into the old paths or slip back again, we think to ourselves. The law of your mouth is better to me than thousands of gold and silver pieces, verse 72. If your law had not been my delight, I would have perished in my affliction." Verse 92, oh, how I love your law. It is my meditation all the day. Verse 97, verse 103, how sweet are your words to my taste, sweeter than honey to my mouth. 111, your testimonies are my heritage forever, for they are the joy of my heart. 113, I hate the double-minded, but I love your law. Verse 129, your testimonies are wonderful, therefore my soul keeps them. Verse 145, with my whole heart I cry, answer me, O Lord, I will keep your statutes. Verse 159, consider how I love your precepts. Give me life according to your steadfast love. Verse 162, I rejoice at your word like one who finds great spoil. And then almost the previous verses from the ones we read, my soul keeps your testimonies. I love them exceedingly. Those verses tell the story of a man on the top of the spiritual game, a man who's alive with the life of God and full of God's Word and full of joy. And it's where we all want to be, isn't it? It's the good that we want to do. Yet in this final verse, we find Him where we so often find ourselves, at the end of our tether, betrayed by our own wandering heart, far away from God, and lost and undone. I have gone astray like a lost sheep. Seek your servant. I do not forget your commandments." It reminds me of that verse we referred to, I think, this morning in the early service in the prayer of confession, and so often in my prayers of confession in Isaiah 53. All we like sheep have gone astray. We have turned each one to his own way. and the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all. All we like sheep have gone astray, the totality, the universality of waywardness. We've all done it. We're all wayward, and yet the particularity, we have turned everyone his own way. There are as many ways of wandering as there are sheep in this building this evening. And the man in the pulpit is no more immune to that wandering heart than the men and women in the pew here this evening. We find Him in the psalm where we so often want to be, and yet we also find Him at the end where we so often find ourselves to be, far away from God, betrayed by our own wandering nature. William Plummer is a wonderful old commentator in the psalm, says, lost sheep are always in danger and often in distress. Sin both imperils and embitters life, as a sheep is a silly and helpless thing, and when lost, never find itself. but wanders on till the shepherd seeks it. So the soul of man must be brought back from its errors and miseries by the Lord himself. Lost sheep don't find themselves. Whereas Augustine said, Lord, I can go astray, but I cannot of myself return. I can go astray, I can do that all by myself, I can go astray all day long and often do, but I cannot of myself return. I can wander far from God, but so often it is beyond me to find my way back to God. And it's very encouraging to my soul that this psalmist, the man full of the Holy Spirit to write Scripture, finds himself in that thirsty afternoon, wet, thirsty afternoon realism where he's wandered far away from God. And in him this evening we find a brother. And in one sense you might summarize the whole psalm in those two ideas. Lord, your law is very good. But as for me, I am very bad. That, in a nutshell, sums up this great poetic meditation on Psalm 119. So this evening in this verse, I'm going to kind of wrap up these verses as the testimony of a wandering sheep. What do we learn? The psalmist says, though I wander, God's face is still approachable. Secondly, though I wander, God's Word is still dependable. And thirdly, though I wander, God's hand, God's help is still available. Let's work through that together this evening. First of all, though I wander, God's face is still approachable. And you find that there in the opening two verses. And the verses go together in twos in this last psalm, this last stanza. Notice the repetition of before you, and the Hebrew is literally before your face. Let my cry come before your face, O Lord. Give me understanding according to your word. Let my plea come before your face. Deliver me. according to Your Word. Let my cry come before Your face. Let my plea come before Your face." That's an incredible thing to say to God. Remember, this is the God again and again in the Bible. We have some form of the phrase, no man can see my face and live. This is the holy God of heaven before whom the seraphim hide their faces. You shall not see my face, for no man can see my face and live, God says to Moses. And yet here is the psalmist, a sinner. A wandering sinner, and that last verse carries the idea of complete wandering and perpetual wandering. I have gone astray. It's a perfect tense verb. I have gone astray. It's something I've done in the past and has lingering effects to this day. It's perfect, complete. and perpetual, like a lost sheep. The word lost is continual. I've gone astray. A sheep who continually finds himself lost is the idea. So it's a settled disposition, and it's a continual state. It's waywardness, and yet this man, despite his waywardness and in all of his waywardness, still dares to lift his voice and has a hope and an expectation that his voice will penetrate through the roof of the universe into the throne room of God and come before the face of his heavenly Father. And that is incredible. We hear that so often it can run off our back like water off a duck, but it's some of the most incredible language in all of Scripture, that there is one in heaven who hears our prayers. I love I think this is one of Wesley's hymns, dear refuge of my weary soul. On thee when sorrows rise, on thee when waves of trouble roll, my fainting hope relies. To thee I tell each rising grief, for thy alone canst heal. Thy word can bring a sweet relief for every pain I feel. But oh, when gloomy doubts prevail, and I fear to call thee mine. the springs of comfort seem to fail, and all my hopes decline. Yet gracious God, where shall I flee? Thou art my only trust, and still my soul would cleave to Thee, though prostrate in the dust." Now, you think to yourself, you ever find yourself in that position, with gloomy doubts prevailing over you, and you're fearful to call God mine? You've called your sin, my precious, for so many years, you might think, and you've gone back to the old habits. You've made resolutions never again, and you're back again where you've been time and time again. And the devil's standing there with a herd of demons blocking your way to the throne of God. And the devil goes, do you think God's going to hear your prayers? Catch yourself on, man. God's not going to hear your prayers. God might hear the prayer of Pastor Stewart. You always paint me in virtues colors, you know. You might hear his prayers. You'll hear Mr. Rick Vogel's prayers, the elder. But he'll not hear your prayers, not after all the things you've done. You just go away, you sinner. You can't come into God's presence, you blaggard. And the gloomy doubts prevail over you, and you fear to call God mine. And all the old springs of comfort seem to fail. You go to them, but they're dried up, and all your hopes are declining. And the hymn writer, it's genius. He comes to God in verse 3. And what arguments do you bring to God in those moments? Hast thou not bid me seek thy face? And shall I seek in vain? And can the ear of sovereign grace be deaf when I complain? No, still the ear of sovereign grace attends the mourner's prayer. Oh, may I ever find access to breathe my sorrows there. Thy mercy seat is open still. Here, let my soul retreat. With humble hope, attend thy will and wait beneath thy feet. Thy mercy seat is open still. Here, let my soul retreat. With humble hope, attend thy will and wait beneath thy feet. And it's all found there. Hast thou not bid me seek thy face? And shall I seek in vain? The God who commands you in your waywardness, to seek his face. Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts, and let him return." Actually, turn there with me in Isaiah 55, just a quick second. Look at verse 8 and 9. You've seen these verses again and again and again and again, right? For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declare the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, are my thoughts than your thoughts. And you see those verses often on some kind of picture of the starry heavens, the Milky Way, the cosmos, and the picture is designed to Inspire awe at the greatness of the God who made the universe, and that's all well and good. And then the next verse, for as the rain and the snow come down from heaven and do not return there but water the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out of my mouth. It shall not return to me empty or void. but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and shall succeed in the thing for which I send it." And again, you see that often on a picture of a pulpit or something, or a Bible, to give you hope that God's Word in its generality is true. Now, both those things are true. It is awesome that God made the heavens. His thoughts are way above ours. He runs in the same operating system, if I can say that from this morning, but His thoughts are altogether bigger and grander and greater and beyond us, right? Forever and a day beyond us. And His Word is true, and it always comes back to Him. It never comes back to Him void, but always prospers in the thing for which it's sent, right? But this text isn't dealing with generalities, I tell you. It's dealing with particularities. The particularity of a sinner being called back to God and the promise of an abundant pardon. Verse 6 and 7, the previous verses, seek the Lord while he may be found. Call upon him while he is near. Let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts. Let him return to the Lord, that he may have compassion on him, and to our God, for he will pardon." No, that's not what my Bible says. He will abundantly pardon. And you think to yourself, or the devil says to you, There's no way God's forgiving you, not after all you've done. You might get a dripping tap pardon. We used to have it in my school. There was a drinking fountain, and you'd pull it down, and it didn't spurt out like the happy fountains. It kind of dribbled out at the side. And you'd been playing soccer, real football all lunchtime, and you were thirsty. And it was pretty gross. You had to stick your mouth out and suck, because there wasn't any water coming out of this thing. And you got little drips coming out. It wasn't enough to slake your thirst. It just made the thirst worse. But it was at least a drop of water with a long line of boys drinking. And that's the picture of the devil. The devil will paint God like that, as if there's mercies in dribs and drabs. But no, it comes as a gushing fountain of mercy. And you think, well, if I was God, and that's what the devil will say to you, if I was God, Or even if you were God yourself, you wouldn't have mercy upon you after all you've done. And God is saying, that's exactly right. But you're not God, and the devil certainly isn't. He's not that kind of God, and your thoughts of mercy aren't my thoughts of mercy, for my thoughts of mercy are not your thoughts. Neither are your ways of mercy my ways. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts. My thoughts of mercy, my ways of mercy, and my promise of mercy never returns to me void. When you run to me, God says, with a cry for mercy upon your lips. You will find, despite your wandering, that the face of God is always approachable. How can God have a place for a wandering sinner? Because somewhere, at some particular place and time in human history, there will die a bleeding Savior in your place." And that's the only argument you need. And the number of times you've sinned, the number of times you've wandered, the number of times you've betrayed your resolutions, never again, Lord, have nothing to do with it. You come to God with the pleading His face and the blood of His Son, and you shall not plead in vain. As Wesley says, Jesus, the sinner's friend, to thee, lost and undone, for aid I flee, weary of earth, myself, and sin. Open thine arms and take me in. Pity and save my ruined soul. Tis thou alone canst make me whole. Dark till in me thine image shine. And lost I am till thou art mine. At last I own it cannot be that I should fit myself for thee. Here then to thee I all resign. Thine is the work and only thine. What can I say? Thy grace to move. What can I say to God? To move his grace toward me. Wesley says, Lord, I am sin, but thou art love. I give up every plea beside. Lord, I am lost, but thou hast died. And that's it. The face of God is always approachable for a sinner coming with those sentiments and in that way through Christ. Secondly, Though I wander, God's Word is still dependable. You can't trust yourself. You can't trust yourself not to wander. You can't trust yourself to do better tomorrow than you did today. You can't trust yourself. But you can trust this book. You can take it to the bank. It's dependable. It will never fail you. Not a jot. not a tittle, not the smallest stroke of a scribe's pen. Let my cry come before Your face, O Lord. Give me understanding. Why? According to Your Word. Let my plea come before Your face. Deliver me. Why? According to Your Word. How do you respond when you wander? Where do you go? What do you say? You don't go to your resolution to try harder and be better. You go back to the Bible, and you mine it for the promises of God, and you bring it before the almighty, sovereign ear of Jehovah, and you say, but Father, you've promised. It's the strongest argument a child can ever bring to their father. But Daddy, you promised. You promised. That's why I'm very careful what promises I make in my household, because that's invincible logic. When you make a promise and your child pleads that promise, you're trapped. Daddy, you've promised. And brothers and sisters, sin can erode your assurance. There's times you'll sin and you'll doubt. Are you a child of God or a child of hell? Child of heaven or child of hell? You'll doubt. You won't know which way is up, which way is down. You'll not know even who you are anymore. You've lived like a practical atheist, like Psalm 14 this morning, and it's corrupted you and destroyed your assurance. It's undermined your assurance, but it can never undermine God's promise. You don't go to the feelings. Do I feel like I'm a child of God? Do I feel God's love? You don't go to those things, because feelings rise and fall in a fallen world. But you go to the utter, absolute dependability upon God's Word. You have dependable promises. How can God have a place for a wandering sinner? Because he has promised to save a praying sinner. Approach my soul the mercy seat, where Jesus answers prayer, there humbly fall before his feet, for none, none can perish there. Thy promise is my only plea. With this I venture nigh. Thy callest burdened souls to thee, and such, O Lord, am I. Bow down beneath a load of sin, By Satan sorely pressed, by war without and fears within, I come to thee for rest. Here's a man who knows your soul. Love hymn writers, they know my soul. Bow down beneath a load of sin, by Satan sorely pressed, by war without and fears within, I come to thee for rest. Be thou my shield and hiding place. that, sheltered near thy side, I may my fierce accuser face, and tell him, I'll try better tomorrow. No. Be thou my shield and hiding place that, sheltered near thy side, I may my fierce accuser face, and tell him, thou hast died. O wondrous love to bleed and die, to bear the cross and shame, that guilty sinners such as I might plead thy gracious name." When you're discouraged, just a side note, one of the best things you can do when you're discouraged, there's something about poetry that's better felt than told. When you're discouraged, spiritual depression, you really feel down, one of the best things you can do is open your hymn book and read the hymns of the faith. Singing's wonderful, but often when we sing, unless you're like David Hawley and you sing very well, You often have to think so much about singing, you forget the words, right? It's amazing when you read a hymn, you'll think, I never knew those words were there. It's really amazing because you so often get distracted and you don't really think about what you're singing. But when you read it to yourself, even the cadence being a bit different, it can come alive to you in a fresh and new way, like hearing an old hymn sung to a different tune. All the psalmist can say here is, I have not kept, I have not forgotten your law, O God. And how different is God from Satan. Satan would say, cursed is the man who only hungers and thirsts after righteousness, for they have not achieved. That would be Satan's beatitude. Cursed is the man who hungers and thirsts for righteousness, for he has not achieved. But the Father says, blessed is the man who hungers and thirsts for righteousness, for they shall be filled. And you say, well, I can't get there, Pastor. My mind is so stupid and obtuse. I go back. to the same old dry watering holes. I'm like the people in Jeremiah's day, that I commit two evils. I forsake God, the fountain of living waters, and I go to a broken cistern that can hold no water. I forsake everything for nothing. I'm stupid, not just sinful. And that's why the psalmist is so wonderful, because the God of the psalmist is able to do brain surgery. Let my cry come before your face, O Lord. Give me understanding. God can actually fiddle with your mind and help you understand a thing or two. My lips will pour forth your praise, for you will teach me your statutes." What a difference a good teacher can make. You've all had bad teachers. I had a bad math teacher when I was in school. Math was a real struggle for me. And one of the reasons was I was a lazy student. That was one of the reasons. But the other reason was I had an awful teacher. Just this wonderful gift of making simple things complicated. It was like, it's like the common core, like the common, the person who designed, I'm convinced the person who designed common core curriculum was, is criminally insane, right. How they, you know, they take like 45 plus 63, and then the answer's like simple, like it just, it's like. Two numbers, but they have all this complicated stuff, 200 minus 533 plus 655, and then you eventually get this awful convoluted, and you get to the answer, you think, it's like, it's mad. Anyway, madness. But what a difference a good teacher can make. And when you come to the Bible, you have, wandering sinners are taught by the God of heaven. Here's a man wandering constantly, and you can come to God, my lips will pour forth your praise, for you teach me your statutes." That's a great verse to write in front of your Bible every time you come to the Bible, a sticky note. Pray that, Lord, teach me your statutes. You be my teacher this morning. Open my mind, my eyes, help me grasp the truth of your Word. Plummer again says, we can no more praise than we can pray or think are right unless the Lord become our teacher in divine things. We can do nothing unless Christ teach us. Of a dependable teacher and a dependable standard, though our devotion rises and falls, God's standards are always the same. My tongue will sing of your word, for all your commandments are right. They're true, they're straight, they never change. It's a wonderful thing. Though I wonder, God's ear is approachable still, and God's word is still dependable. And lastly, though I wonder, yet God's hand is still available. You see that there in these last verses. Let Your hand be ready to help me, for I've chosen Your precepts. I long for Your salvation, O Lord, and Your law is my delight. Let my soul live and praise You. And let your rules, let your providential rule is the idea. It's mishpat again, the providential rule of God. Let your providential rule help me. Those verses begin and end with the idea of help from God. Isn't it amazing? But you and I can look at the Lord God Almighty in heaven, the one who is slow to anger and great in power, who will by no means leave the guilty unpunished, but repays those who hate him to their faces to destroy them, who will not delay long with him who hates him, but will repay him to his face." That's the justice of God, cannot overlook sin behind the back of Jesus, right? But he's just. Satan sins once and he's cast out forever. And yet we can approach God with all of our burdens, notwithstanding all of our wanderings, and we can say, Lord, my help is in the name of the Lord who made heaven and earth. The limitless power of God is available. In Christ, we have a gracious Savior, that though you and I are very bad, blessed be His name. He is very, very good, and He will help you. His hand will pick you up and carry you. The man carries his son, and He will never abandon you. Can a mother forget the baby at her breast and have no compassion on the child she is born? Though she may forget you, I will never forget you. See, I have engraved you in the palms of my hands. The girl who cuts my hair has her children's birthday. tattooed on her wrist, never forgets them. Kyle has his children's names tattooed on his hands. God has your name indelibly marked, inscribed on his hands. And God said those words, remember, in Isaiah 49, to a people who were quite convinced God had forgotten them, that God had abandoned them, that life wasn't fair. And God says, forget you. Inconceivable. Never. I've gone astray like a lost sheep. Seek your servant, for I do not forget your commandments. This book, Young people and older people, this book's wonderful. The longest psalm in the Bible is an extended poetic meditation upon the wondrous benefits of this book. And the psalmist is far, far away from God, and yet he says, I have not forgotten your law. I can't say I've kept it. But I can't say I've not forgotten it. And again, Plummer, his last words in this psalm are just beautiful. The benefits of the Bible. When he was slumbering, the Word awakened him. When he was dead, the Word quickened him. When he was in danger, the Word preserved him. When he was wounded, The Word healed him. When he was assailed by his foes, the Word armed and defended him. And by this same Word, he was nourished and supported. It was ever well with the psalmist, and it's ever well with all the followers of God, when they do not forget the riches contained In this book, it contains, as one man said, the best way of living, the noblest way of suffering, and the safest way of dying. all contained in this wonderful book of God. May it be your companion every day. May the sun never rise on another day in your life without you taking this book and opening this book and reading this book and hiding it in your heart. It is the Word of the God who made the universe with words. When only a thought would have done And God spoke the world into existence with words to teach you that when He speaks, everything changes and nothing remains the same. We often say as elders, having Jim Van Erden in our session meeting is like catching lightning in a bottle. What would not happen if you took this book, which is God's lightning in a book, and hid it in your heart? Let's pray together. Father, we thank You, Father, for such an encouraging portion to end the psalmist with, that we have a God whose face is approachable and whose word is dependable and whose hand is available for the many needs of wandering sinners. Lord, come, we pray, and deliver us, most of all from ourselves. Give us wisdom to see through our folly. Give us strength to stand against every temptation. And give us courage to bear the good testimony to the Lord Jesus Christ, that we might live lives in which Christ might see of the travail of His soul, and be satisfied. In Christ's name we pray. Amen.