I'd like to turn with me then to Psalm 119 and we'll continue our study here in this wonderful Psalm. Psalm about the excellency of the word of God and how It affects every area of our lives and how it is a blessing to us in every area of our lives. And that's how the psalm starts. Let me remind you, blessed are the undefiled in the way who walk in the law of the Lord. Blessed are those who keep his testimonies. who seek him with the whole heart. That's how the psalm starts, and that's what the psalm is out to prove and to show us, that the Word of God is truly a blessing to us, a blessing to each and every one of the Lord's people, helping us to walk aright helping us to know his will and to know his commandments and his testimonies and to be able to live them out in our lives and live them to the glory of God. Showing us the blessings that are contained there to help us and to encourage us and to lift us up. and to strengthen us and embolden us in our service for the Lord Jesus Christ, to be what we should be for Him in this fallen and hostile world. And we've seen that the psalmist has already shown us that if we are to cleanse our ways, if we are to keep holy unto our Lord and to live that life that is seeking to be holy before our Lord, then we must seek to live it according to God's word. And we must be serious about it, applying the word of God in our lives and seeking to, in every way, to understand how God would have us to live. Then we saw that if we are seeking to live a holy life, then there will be times when we are cast down, when we are tried in this world and we need the Lord's help. And there is the Word of God lifting us up and encouraging us to carry on walking with Him and serving Him. Then we saw that the word of God is a blessing to those who are tried and tested in their faith. Because we live in this world, it's full of things that, because of our flesh, we are weak to. We have been weak to before we've come to know the Lord. And we are weak to because our flesh is fallen and desires those things of the world. And it's a continual battle. as Paul tells us, against the flesh, the spirit against the flesh within us, to stay faithful and focused upon the Lord and true to our Lord. The Word of God is that, that means that God uses to keep us focused and to keep us true to Him and to show us that those things that are above are far more precious and more wonderful than the things that we have in this world. And they are the things, the treasures in heaven, that we have in heaven that we should be living for. And now the psalmist turns to the next important issue for the young believer, and for all believers, and that is having and maintaining a witness for the Lord Jesus Christ. Because here we are, we're seeking to live before the world, our Christian faith, and we're seeking to be what we should be for the Lord Jesus Christ. But here on earth, we're left here on earth, not only to live out that Christian life, but to be his witnesses, to be his ambassadors, to take that gospel and to declare it to all. That is our commission, isn't it? To go into all the world and make disciples of all nations. to bring them to the Lord Jesus Christ so that they will have a testimony for the Lord Jesus Christ and be able to be baptized in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Teaching them all things that the Lord has shown us in his words so that they can grow to the glory and honor of our God and our Savior. So that's what this next section is about. It's about witnessing and what we need for witness. and there are a number of things. The first one is that we need our God and we need to seek our God. That is the starting point in all witness. Whether we are a young Christian launching out for the first time seeking to witness for the Lord Jesus Christ or whether we're a mature Christian coming to a children's group or to a young person's group or to an adult group and witnessing to them and telling them, or whether we're just witnessing in our own lives every day when we get up, every day when we set out on that journey of life for that day, we are his witnesses and we should want to be his witnesses. And how do we start? Every aspect of our witness, how do we start it? with the Lord. That's where we start. All witness with the Lord, because He is the one that we need. So look at verse 41. He says, let your mercies come also to me, O Lord. You see, he's seeking the Lord. He is beseeching the Lord for the Lord's help. He needs to know the mercies of the Lord. He needs to know the salvation of the Lord so that he can be a witness. And then in verse 43 he says, And take not the word of truth utterly out of my mouth. So he is praying to the Lord that he will be able to maintain that witness and the Lord would grant him a witness in this evil world. Whereas, in verses 45 to 48, we find it changes. He's prayed to the Lord, he's sought the Lord, now we see his determination to be a witness. and his desire to be a witness. Look at the change, it says, and I will, he says, and I will walk at liberty. Verse 46, and I will speak of your testimonies. And verse 47, and I will delight myself in your commandments. And verse 48, my hands also, I will lift up to your commandments. You see? You see, there is a determination there, isn't there? A commitment on the part of this saint to be a witness for the Lord Jesus Christ and to proclaim his God before the people and to show the world their need of the Lord Jesus Christ. So that first of all, though, he starts with seeking God's help. He wants God's help. He knows he needs God's help. He cannot do this work without God. So he lays himself before his God and he beseeches his help and his blessing in this work. Let your mercies come also to me, O Lord, your salvation according to your word. And take not the word of truth utterly out of my mouth, for I have hoped in your ordinances. Why does he start there then? Because this is a work of God. Primarily, it is a work of God. Isn't it? God is the one who must deal with people's hearts. God is the one, the only one, who can open the doors of people's hearts. If he opens, no man can shut. But if he shuts, no man can open. And therefore if God does not go before us, opening the hearts of those people that we are brought to, to be witnesses to, whether they're the young people, whether they're the Sunday school children, whether they're our family and friends, whether they're the people sitting in the congregation, If he does not open their hearts, they are a closed book to us. They are closed to the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ, and no matter how powerful our messages are, and no matter how well-reasoned they are, and no matter how many arguments we have and can knock down and destroy that they have, it will be to nothing. to no avail. It will not go anywhere, it will not penetrate their hearts, it will not move them to seek the Lord Jesus Christ and to be saved. Now I'm not saying we will know when God is doing that, because people can appear to be very hard, like Paul, kicking against the pricks or the goads of God, But he was kicking, you see. God had started to move him. God had started to stir him. God had started to speak to him. God had started to open that door. And there was nothing that Paul could do, no matter how hard he tried, to close that door on his God and on his Savior. So we may not know that God is doing it, but God must do it. All our work and all our service is useless for him. He must deal with the minds of people so that they are receptive to the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. The Spirit of God must start to work in their minds, or else they will not understand it because it's spiritually discerned. Even the simplest aspects of the Gospel, spiritually discerned. Their minds will be a closed book to them. They will not be able to use their minds and use their intelligence to understand what is plainly laid before them in the gospel. Unless God is dealing with their minds and helping them to receive the gospel, illuminating them and giving them understanding, he needs to turn them from sin. They love sin, they desire sin, they want sin more than anything else. He must start to turn them away from sin, and start to see the terrible nature of sin before they will ever seek Him, and want Him as a Saviour, and want Him as a Lord, because that's what Jesus Christ came to do, to save sinners from their sins. And unless they see their sin, and unless they see the consequences of their sin, they are never going to turn, are they? So we need our God, don't we? We need our God, and that's why we need to pray to him. And that's why we need to seek him. We need our God to give us those opportunities every single day. I mean, we can force ourselves upon people, but we will only antagonize people. But if God gives us an opportunity that we can take, that is an opening that is granted to those people to hear the gospel of life. Now again friends, there are lots of excuses we can make by claiming that we haven't had opportunities when in fact we have had opportunities but we haven't been ready for them or we haven't been looking for them or we haven't been prepared to take them. An opportunity can be just a small crack in the door, just a small opening, just a glimmer of light, Just an opportunity, a small opportunity that we can take and sometimes the smallest of opportunity turns into the greatest opportunity to proclaim the Lord Jesus Christ. So we need to pray to the Lord that he will give us opportunities and we need to pray to the Lord that we will be ready to take those opportunities. ready with the word of God, ready with grace and love for people, ready with boldness, ready with concern for their souls, ready to honour our God and our Saviour above anything that people think of us and will say of us, ready to bring the gospel to those people that need the gospel. We need to be fit for the Lord's use. We need to be those people that the Lord Jesus Christ will want to use and want to bless. So in all these ways, in every aspect of our witness for the Lord Jesus Christ, what do we need? First and foremost, we need our God and we need his help. And we need his blessing upon our work, don't we? We need to seek his face. That's why we need to start every day with a prayer, not only for our help and for our sustenance and for our blessing, but for those opportunities to be witnesses for the Lord Jesus Christ. Those open doors to be open to us so that we can speak for the Lord Jesus Christ. We need to start every new venture in our life with a prayer to God that God would use us as an instrument of grace and mercy. When we're going to the hospital, pray that we'll be a witness there. We may have an opportunity to speak to somebody that we're sitting next to, or a doctor, and say a few words about being a Christian and our faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. We need to pray for those opportunities, don't we? When we're going to the shops, we might meet someone that we know. The last time I took my dog for a walk up at the Scrubs, I met Adiam, and I was able to speak to Adiam. I hadn't seen her for ages, but I was able to speak to her and encourage her to come and hear the gospel of life again. You see, you don't know, do you, friends? That's why we need to pray for these opportunities. Every day could be a blessing, a wonderful opportunity. One person, five people, ten people, who knows? God could give us an opportunity to speak to something. That builder that's coming to our house, that plumber that's coming to our house, who knows what opportunities we'll have? Do you have a leaflet that you can give them? Do you have a booklet you can give them? You see? Something to give them. their opportunities, pray for them. Pray, if you can, possibly pray before every work that you do for the Lord Jesus Christ. Even if it's a short prayer, even if it's just a prayer coming together, a two minute prayer to the Lord, pray. Lay it out before the Lord, show him that you need his help and you need his blessing, that the work is his. And do you know the wonderful thing is? The wonderful thing is that this not only brings God's blessing down upon us, but it prepares our hearts to be His witnesses. It does. As we come before the Lord and as we lay ourselves before the Lord, it has this effect of stirring us and of galvanizing us and emboldening us to go out and be the witnesses for the Lord Jesus Christ. In Acts, when Peter and John come back to the disciples and tell them what has been told them by the chief priests and the scribes and how they were warned not to speak of the Lord Jesus Christ and how the Lord Jesus Christ gave them the boldness to be able to stand up before him, they all came back and they prayed to God And then what happened? They were emboldened. They were emboldened to go out and to be those witnesses for the Lord Jesus Christ. And maybe sometimes we don't have those opportunities and we're not ready for those opportunities because we haven't prepared our souls before our God and sought our God in prayer. Because in the midst of our prayers, he answers us, doesn't he? And he takes us up and he prepares us for the work that is at hand. So pray for it, friends. Seek God. That's where it starts. All our witness, all our testimony, all our work for the Lord starts there. It starts with God himself. Secondly, let's see what the psalmist prays first to his God for before he comes to those bold declarations and confident declarations desiring to be a witness for the Lord Jesus Christ. First of all, he says, verse 41 and verse 42, let your mercies come also to me, O Lord, your salvation according to your word. So shall I have an answer for him who reproaches me. for I trust in your word." So the first thing he prays is this, that God will give him understanding of the gospel so that he can take the gospel to others. So that God will give him understanding of his mercies, understanding of his salvation, so that he will know it. so that he would appreciate it, so that he will understand it, so that he will be able to impart it to those who need to know it themselves. Sometimes our witness actually fails, doesn't it? Right here, right at this spot, that we really don't know the gospel ourselves, and we really do not appreciate the work that God must do to save a soul. The more we understand it, the more we appreciate it, the more we will be able to be effective testimonies and witnesses for the Lord Jesus Christ. That doesn't mean we have to understand a lot, because God can use the simplest things we say to be effective, because it's God who makes it effective, isn't it? So God can use the most simplest things. I mean, Spurgeon, I think, was in the Crystal Palace. before it burnt down when it was first built, and he was asked there to preach there, and he preached before about 50,000 people. But the day before, he was getting ready for it, and he was testing the sounding in there. They didn't have microphones, but he was testing the sounding, how the sound boards would work, and how he would have to project his voice. And he just quoted scripture. He just read out some scripture, And there was a workman working at the back, doing just some sweeping up, just getting ready just for the crowds, for the muck that they'd left beforehand from whatever they were doing beforehand, getting for the crowds that would come and hear Spurgeon. And it so touched his heart and so moved him that he sought the Lord and found the Lord as his savior. You just don't know how the Lord is going to use you, do you? No way do you know. The simplest things can be used. So don't be afraid, if you don't know a lot, to be a testimony for the Lord Jesus Christ. But the more that you know, the more effective you can be, and the more useful you can be to the Lord Jesus Christ. So you need to know the gospel. I think this is where a lot of Christians fall down these days, especially Reformed Christians. They think they know the gospel. but they don't know it. That's why they can so easily give it up and so easily turn to man's way, using man's methods. They don't understand a sovereign God touching hearts sovereignly and drawing his people to himself, bringing them into salvation. The worst of sinners making them the best of saints. They don't understand the gospel of grace. They don't understand the gospel of mercy. How it is a free offer of the gospel to needy souls and God using that sovereignly, that free offer to move his people to seek him and to find him. They don't understand the gospel of grace. We need to understand it. And the more that we understand it, the better witnesses we will be. Let your mercies come also to me, O Lord, your salvation according to your word. So shall I have an answer for him who reproaches me, for I trust in your word. You see what the psalmist is praying, don't you? He wants to know the gospel according to the word of God. not according to John Piper, not according to Arminius, not even according to Calvin. He wants to know the gospel according to the word of God. He wants to know the true gospel of grace and mercy. He wants to understand it so that he can impart it to others, so that he can be that effective witness. What does the scripture say? Always have an answer for those who would ask of the faith that is within you. Have an answer for them. So that you can be effective witnesses for the Lord Jesus Christ. Think about the things that they would be asking. Think about the things that they say. Think about the things in the world and the things that they live for. Think about yourself before you became a Christian. Think about it. You bring the word of God to bear on it. So you have an answer of the word, not necessarily what they want to hear, but the answer of the word for anybody who asks you of the faith that is in you. Secondly, what does he say? What does he ask for? He says, verse 43, and take not the word of truth utterly out of my mouth. For I have hoped in your ordinances, so shall I keep your law continually forever and ever. He asks this of the Lord, that the Lord would find him worthy. that the Lord would find him worthy and not take those opportunities from him because he is not fit and worthy to be a channel of blessing and to be used by a holy God to bring the gospel of salvation to his people. You see? Don't take it away from me, he says. Don't deny me these opportunities to be your witnesses and to stand for you. Don't find me unfit, Lord. Look, he says, look what I have done. I have hoped in your ordinances. Those things that you have laid out, those ordinances that we should follow and we should live by, I love them, I've lived by them. That's what I'm going to declare before the people. And I want to keep your laws. Faithful to your laws, and I'm trying to be faithful to your laws. And I want to do that forever. That's a true desire of my heart. I want to be an instrument for you. I want to be to the praise of your glory. I want to be that person that you would use and that you would bless in the salvation of souls. He wants to be a fit instrument for his God. And again, I think sometimes we fail there too, don't we? I think we think sometimes that anything will do, as long as we are there, and as long as we're putting in the time, and as long as we're willing to say something, anything will do. And that's not the case. That's not the case. Obedience is better than sacrifice. Any sacrifice you can make for your God, no matter what that sacrifice is, giving up time with your children, giving up time to come and be at the children's work or be Slaving over the Word of God, it will count for nothing. Nothing. Unless we want to be right with our God. Unless we want to love Him and serve Him and glorify Him. Unless we want to be true to Him. Unless we want to be to the praise of His glory. Remember the first four commandments. They're about our relationship with our God. Only then can we love our neighbor as ourself. And only then does loving our neighbor as ourself count for anything. Only if God comes first. And that's what he is praying. He wants to be that fit instrument. So God will use him, God will take him up, and God will bless him. You couldn't use anything in the temple to worship God with, could you? You couldn't bring any old bowl to catch that blood in. Surely it was just a bowl, wasn't it? No, it wasn't. The bowl that God said could catch that blood of the lamb in was one to his specification. It was a bowl made for the purpose, kept for the purpose, and sanctified for the purpose. And if we want to be, if we want to be an instrument in God's hands, we must be saved for the purpose, kept for the purpose, and sanctified for the purpose. We too must be. That's what God uses for his service and for his glory. So pray, friends. Pray every day that God would make you worthy and God would find you fit to be an instrument in his hands of salvation to souls. Then we come to this man's confidence, this man's desire, this man's determination to be a witness for the Lord Jesus Christ because the two go hand in hand. If you are going to pray to be a witness for the Lord Jesus Christ, you better be ready to be a witness for the Lord Jesus Christ. Because A, your prayer means nothing if you are not. Nothing at all. And B, you might get what you pray for. And if you are not ready, And if you are not prepared, you will lose an opportunity. And you will be found responsible for it. So be ready. Be ready to be used. Want to be used. Desire to be used. Be determined to be that witness for the Lord Jesus Christ. This is what the man says next. This is what the psalmist says. Look at verse 45, he starts here, there are four things he says. I will walk at liberty, for I seek your precepts. What does he mean by at liberty? What does he mean about walking at liberty? What has that got to do with witness for the Lord Jesus Christ? Well he says this, at liberty means in a wide place. I am going to walk In confidence he says, I am going to walk at liberty in the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ knowing that I have been commissioned by my God and I have the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ who has all authority in heaven and earth to declare the gospel of grace to all nations. And nobody can take that from me. And nobody can deny that to me. You see, I'm going to walk in that confidence in the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. And I'm going to walk in the confidence of the truth of what I believe and what I know of the Word of God being the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. I will walk at liberty. for I seek your precepts. You see, even the precepts of the word of God must be declared because they are the truth of the word of God. Not just something for us to live up to as Christians or to use as a guideline to help us in our lives, they're for everybody. They are the word of God. The word of God. what God expects us to apply in our hearts and in our lives. So even in those, he will not seek to understand them and to know them, so that he can be confident in his declaration of the word of God to the people. And if we are, unless we are confident in them, then we will not be prepared to be witnesses for the Lord Jesus Christ. We'd be too frightened to speak for the Lord Jesus Christ. Have you had incidents of that in your life, friends? God has given you an opportunity, a glaring opportunity. It's there for the taking, but the words stick in your throat. You can't get them out. because you're too frightened to stand up, too frightened of what your loved ones will say, too frightened of being shut down, too frightened of the consequences of what you will say. And an opportunity goes for honouring your God and glorifying your God and your Saviour. It's gone. You won't have it again. It's gone. No, we must be determined, determined friends, to be confident in the truth of our God. And of course, if we're going to be confident in it, we must be confident in it. And again, this is another reason why so many churches and so many reformed people have turned to the use, and I've said this before haven't we, the use of men's ways. Why have they done that? Why do they use enticing words of man's wisdom? Not only enticing words these days, but enticing ways as well, don't they? All the razzmatazz, the entertainment and the media world must be used to captivate the souls of people and bring them into the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ. Why? Because they have lost confidence in the God of salvation. That he will save his people from their sins. Because they have lost confidence in the gospel of salvation. That is the power of God to salvation to all who shall believe. They've lost confidence in their God. And that's why they've turned to man's ways. What else do they have? when they've lost confidence in the only one who can save us all and redeem us all. Well, they've got to implore men to turn, haven't they? They've got to act like Arminians and be like Arminians. Well, that's what they think. Confidence then. to be witnesses and confidence in the truth of the gospel. Secondly, he says, verse 46, I will speak of your testimonies also before kings and will not be ashamed. Never, ever, ever be ashamed of the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. Never be ashamed of it, friends. I have, in times past, been ashamed of the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. There have been times when I haven't spoken up and I haven't said something because I have been ashamed of the Gospel. Not ashamed of my Saviour per se, but ashamed of the weakness of my case, or so I have perceived it to be. Ashamed of what people say of the Gospel. Shamed of what people say of the word of God. And I haven't spoken up from shame. But the shame has been mine. Always friends, it's been mine. When Cranmer was on trial for his faith, he relented. Some ways you can't blame him. He was facing the stake and being burnt alive at the stake. What man wouldn't fail then if it wasn't for God's grace and strength? He failed. He failed. And he bitterly regretted it the rest of his life until he was called again to stand up for his faith. And then he stood firm, and he was burnt at the stake. And as he was burning, he poked out that hand into the flames so that it should burn, and everybody should see it burn. That hand that signed that recantation of his faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. It's to our shame, isn't it? every single time that we are ashamed of our Lord and Saviour. What does he say? I will speak of your testimonies also before kings and I will not be ashamed. All those things that God testifies to be right and true and just and holy and good All those things that God says are the way of salvation, man's sin, man's degradation, needing a saviour, all of it, he will not be ashamed, even before kings. That's his determination, to stand up and be counted for his Lord and his saviour. Thirdly, I will delight myself in your commandments, which I love. He's determined to live out the word of God. This is very important, friends, if our life complements the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. The people can see that we're living out the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ, they will take note. Even if they despise us, they will take note of our stand and our firmness for the Lord Jesus Christ. If our life does not complement the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ, they will also take note, but they will despise us. and they will despise the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ as well. Our life must complement our faith. If we say that the Sabbath is the Lord's day, and we don't live that out before our loved ones and our friends, how can we ever expect them to respect anything else we say? How can we expect them to respect the testimony that we have? If our standards do not complement the words that we say, if we are loose in our standards, and we can be loose in our standards in many ways, I remember criticizing my daughters over a program that they were watching on television and saying to them, they should not be watching that television. It was full of wickedness and sin. Do you know what they came back with? A program that I used to watch on television and say, it's just as bad. And do you know, I hadn't thought about it. I hadn't thought about it for a moment. And they took the wind out of my sails and I had to concede that they were right. So I banned both programs. And I never watched that program again. But I should have been on the ball, shouldn't I? I should have recognized it. I should have seen it for what it was. Shouldn't I, friends? So should we. If our standards do not meet our testimony and our witness, we have no witness. We have none. But if they do, then we have a powerful witness for the Lord Jesus Christ. Remember what the Lord Jesus Christ said. He said, you are my witnesses. You. You, not just your words, but your life and your testimony. for the Lord Jesus Christ. Lastly, and we have to cover this very quickly now, the last one is, my hands also I will lift up to your commandments, which I love. I will meditate on your statutes. So here he is lifting up his hands to the Lord's commandments. What does he mean by that? He means two things. One is he will lift up the commandments of God before everybody. You're not ashamed of them. He will lift them up before everybody and say, thus says the Lord. Thus says the Lord. And the second thing he means is he will point to them for everybody. He will show them the way. That is the way that we should go. He will lift up his hands. to your commandments, he says, to the commandments of God, to the word of God, the testimony of God, the commandments of God, the laws of God, whatever they may be, no matter what the world says, no matter what his boss says, no matter what his children say, no matter what his mother and father says, The commandments of God will be what rules his life, and the commandments of God will be his testimony and his witness to the world. He will declare them, and why will he do it? Which I love. Which I love. You will never do it, friends, unless you love it. And you will never do it effectively, friends, Unless you love it. Because people will see through you. They will see through you. They will see the hypocrisy. They will see them in just as words. But if you love them, if you really love them, If you love the testimonies and the commandments and the statutes of God, if you love the word of God, and if you want people to know the word, then they will see that too. They will take note of that. And when you point to them, they will know that you mean it. They will know that it's something to be listened to. something that they should take note of. Even if they reject it, friends, they will take note. Do we love it then, friends? Are we prepared to be the witnesses of the Lord Jesus Christ every day? Do we really want to be those fit instruments in God's hands, or are we too afraid to stand up for the one who gave his all for us? Are we going to be his witnesses over this Christmas period? Take the opportunities that we have at work, with loved ones, with friends. Are we going to stand firm for the Lord Jesus Christ? Because we love the Gospel and because we love our Saviour. Are we friends? That's what the Gospel calls us to. That's what the Word of God calls us to. And that's what the word of God fits us out for, to be faithful witnesses, useful witnesses for the Lord Jesus Christ. That's what our God fits us out for and has called us to, hasn't he? Let's pray. Our gracious God and our loving Heavenly Father, we come into your presence and we do praise and thank you, our God and our Lord, for being such a wonderful God to us. For being, O Lord, a God who sent faithful witnesses to us with the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ, and blessed them, and used them, and empowered their words and their testimony to us, so that we, O Lord, should take note of the gospel and seek you, and find you. Oh, how we thank you, Lord. And we do pray that we may, O Lord, be such a light and such a testimony to, O Lord, our generation and the coming generations, that they may hear, that they may know that there is a Saviour that, O Lord, that they may seek and find you too. O Lord, make us fit, we do pray, and bless us and use us as you will, how you will, when and where you will, for whom you will, we pray. We ask these things in your precious name. Amen. Let's sing our last hymn for the main service, which is hymn number 779. Lord, speak to me that I may speak in living echoes of thy tone, as thou hast sought, so let me seek thy erring children, lost and lone. 779. Oh, say does that star-spangled banner yet wave