We turn our attention then to God's word that we've just read. And I'd like especially for us to be thinking of what it says to us here at the end of the psalm when he says, for I am a sojourner with you. a guest like all my fathers. A sojourner with you, a guest like all my fathers." There in verse 12. The psalm tells of distress. The psalmist is facing difficulty. and trouble, adversity, and he's crying out to God that he would hear his crying, that he would deliver him from his transgressions, that he would deliver him from his enemies, his foes, those who have made opposition against him. And in that, he thinks of himself and is seeking God's help and also reflecting upon himself too, thinking about himself, what has he been brought to think of in terms of himself and his own life. O Lord, verse four, make me know my end and what is the measure of my days. Let me know how fleeting I am. There is wisdom in understanding what we are before the holiness of God. And there's wisdom found with God's word as to what we are when we remembered that we are here only for a time, and a time has been given for us to hear God's word and to receive God's word. God has given his word, God has given the gospel, and it is given for this time and for this age, and it's given to us in this world, but The offer of peace in Jesus Christ is not one that God holds out to all forever, but it's an offer to be received, and Christ is to be received in this life, that we be saved, that we be delivered of our transgressions. Because we have sinned against God, we have broken his law. Yet he has been merciful to us and he has provided day after day and he has supplied our needs and he has supplied even above our material needs and how he has supplied abundantly in that way. He's even supplied for a greater need for us which is a spiritual need. in his provision of the Lord Jesus Christ and his going to the cross and his laying down his life for us that we no longer be left to perish, but that we be given eternal life through the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. And with that grace of Christ, we are invited to receive Christ, invited to believe in him, invited to follow him, invited to listen to him, invited to come to his table. And all of these are from God, all of these invitations, all of these commands that he has for us to love the Lord Jesus Christ and to follow him and to bring us out from time into eternity, to bring us from being a mere passing fleeting life to living before him forever. And when we come before the majesty of God and his God, makes himself known to us, then it comes to mind how small we are, how little we are, how great he is, how holy he is, how imperfect we are. And yet, at the same time with that and with that, there's something of amazement, isn't there, that Given the majesty and the holiness of God, and given what we are like, we are sinful and impure in our hearts, yet God has given this day. And he has supplied every need for us this day. And he has done this through our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. And so with these things, as the psalmist is thinking about God and about his situation, and he's thinking about himself, he's thinking about his place before God, and here he describes who he is before God in verse 12. I am a sojourner with you, a guest like all my fathers. This psalm was written by David. And David was the king. The king wasn't one to speak about himself as a sojourner in Israel. You're familiar with the Old Testament and the times in the course of the wilderness and then also in Israel when God gave his word to Moses and then as he gave his word to the prophets and how they often spoke of the sojourners. And the sojourners were the strangers, the people who came from the outside of Israel, not the ones who belonged to the 12 tribes, but ones who came from afar and who were passing through, not citizens. not having the equal rights or privileges that were given by birth to the people of Israel, but people who were passing through and people who were vulnerable because they didn't have the same rights. But God often spoke in the Old Testament of the way that Israel was to care for the sojourners. And even tomorrow morning, God willing, when we come to the the fourth commandment and it speaks of remembering the Sabbath and that to impress the matter of it's not just yourself that refrains from the work of the six days and to remember the Sabbath but also for sons and daughters and servants and maidservants and sojourners as well are mentioned in the commandment. So sojourners were those who were passing through. It's not the kind of thing you'd expect the king to say. So what is it that leads the king to speak of himself as a sojourner? It's when he is thinking of himself with respect to his heavenly father and the holy God that while being king in Israel, he was yet a sojourner, a recognition of his own mortality, a recognition of who he is in this world, and it's a humble recognition, as we're brought to truth and we're brought to reality, we're humbled in this matter. And so you see how differently the king speaks about himself from how he might speak of himself, not exalting himself, not making himself to be greater in the eyes of the people, not inflating his ego, but I'm a sojourner in God's world. And that is the case for the psalmist. So it is our case also that we are sojourners, we are passing through. I am a sojourner. It's a lovely thing also that what we have here in this description of being a sojourner, because as he speaks about this in verse 12, He goes on to color in the picture for us here of a sojourner before God. He is a guest before God, a guest. Now, as I was reading the psalm recently, thought this would be a good passage for us tonight to be thinking of this. As David speaks about being a guest in God's world, so also that is the case for ourselves too, that we are his guests. It's a helpful way to think about ourselves before God. It's a way that God impresses upon us to think about ourselves before him. Jesus who taught with the parable of the landowner and the tenants. The landowner is the one who owns the land. It's his land. The tenants are the ones who are there temporarily And it's God who is the landowner. God is the one who owns all that there is. And all others are tenants. But you see how this is kind of lost when life is lived without any thought for God. And then people begin to think of themselves as the owners of what there is. But even if they are owners of land, owners of property, owners of possessions, then we understand from God's word, we're not the primary owners, but God is the owner, and he has given what he has on loan to us, and that he requires account for all that he has provided. It all belongs to him. all that we have will pass out of our hands. Because we're not here forever. We are here for a time only. We are in God's world. We are on his earth. We are on land that he has made. Even taking a step. When we take a step, we pass from one piece of land that God has made and put our feet on another piece that he has made. All is all his. And this I submit to you is a helpful way for us also to be thinking of ourselves. We are not the owners, we are sojourners. We are pilgrims passing through, we are guests in his house. God has given us our lives and he has given this world and he has made us his guests. And when we think of ourselves as being guests in his world, It reminds us all always that it's his world and that it belongs to him. And that he is always surveying his world, he's always knowing of what's happening in the world. And we do not live apart from him. In him we live and breathe and have our being. We are his guests. in this world. He has given us our lives. He has given us our bodies. He has given us all that we have. All that we have is his and belongs to him. And he has made us his guests. Now guests have privileges. If you think of having guests stay at your home, then your guests have privileges of having the doors of your home opened to them. You give them access to your home. You give them liberty in your home. They have privileges in your home and they have responsibilities also in your home. You hope that they will leave your home as they found it. You hope that your home is not going to be turned over with your guests having been there There's a privilege of being a guest. There's a responsibility of being guests as well. And as that is the case in personal circumstances, it's also the case before our great God that we have privileges. We have immense privileges of being his guests. The world he has made that we enjoy. perhaps had the opportunity to enjoy something of it today with the brightness of the day. And he has made us guests and has given us the privileges of what he has made. For us as Christians, he has given us even greater privileges in that he has given us a privilege of knowing Jesus Christ, of receiving Him as our Savior, the privilege of having Christ give Himself and His blood for us, the privilege of Christ going to the cross and dying for us, the privilege of Christ having risen up from the dead for us, so that His death means my death and his life means my life. And his life which is without end is a privilege to be joined to in faith because it means your life is without end too. Whoever believes in him, he gave the right to have eternal life. And we've responsibilities, responsibilities then, responsibilities in the world that God has made and what we do, that we serve him faithfully, that we obey him, that we seek to do what is right, what is appropriate. responsibility of believing in Jesus Christ, responsibility of coming to the one who's invited us to come and who has made us guests in his world. He has called us to be guests in his church, and he's called us to come and have our meal with him that he has invited us to his table so that our father, as he has called us to be his children, he hasn't set up a house where he's said, well, you can live in my house, but I'm not going to meet with you. I'm not going to dine with you." No, he's built his house so that he would meet with us and that we would meet with him and that we would hear from him. We would hear his word and that he would grant us his table as well, that he would provide the bread and the wine and the communion of the Lord Jesus Christ. He has made us guests at his table. He has invited us. And our being at his table is because of his invitation. It's not because of anything that we've done or achieved. It's not because of any standard that we've met. It's because of his invitation. This is impressed upon us when we read here of being his guests. That we're at his table because he's invited us, being guests. A guest is at a table because the guest has been invited to the table. If you have a guest in your home, it's because you've invited them into your home. If they're at your table, it's because you've invited them at your table. It's not because of something else. It's not because of something they've done or not done. It's because you've invited them. And it's the same with our Father in heaven who has invited us to the table with his Son, Jesus Christ. He has built this magnificent house with this world, temporary though it is, and then he has given his Son for the world. And as he's given his son for the world, he's called us to come. Now I want to sit and I want to have you at my table. I want for you to experience communion with my son, Jesus Christ. I want for you to come to my house and to come and to eat and to drink, be provided for, to be nourished in your bodies, to be nourished in your souls. As he has made us his guests, it is because of his abundant benevolent love and kindness to us in the Lord Jesus Christ. That he has invited us to, made us guests and invited us to his table. And for those of us who have accepted Christ as our Savior and have accepted his invitation to his table. Again, yes, we accept his invitation, but we also acknowledge it's because he has worked in us to accept his invitation, that he has brought us to himself, that he has supplied for every need for us, every need outwardly and inwardly, every need for body and for soul. And he has worked in us by his spirit to give us the will and to accept the invitation and to come and to eat and to drink as guests at his table. There are many, sadly, who turn away the invitation. Many, sadly, turn away the invitation. And it's been, it has been that way over the course of all time that many have turned away the invitation. It's hard to, if we find it difficult that people turn away the invitation, Consider also that the Lord Jesus himself invited people to come, in body, physically before them, and they did not come. And he spoke of this. He spoke about it in the Gospels. He spoke about those who were invited to the master's table, but they turned the invitation down They said that they had other things to do. If we look to the parable of the great banquet, it's in Luke chapter 14. And feel free to turn there if you will and to Look with me there to what Jesus said. Look at chapter 14. It's from verse number 12. He said also to the man who'd invited him, when you give a dinner or a banquet, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, lest they also invite you in return and you be repaid. But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you'll be blessed because they cannot repay you, for you'll be repaid at the resurrection of the just. When one of those who reclined at table with him heard these things, he said to him, blessed is everyone who will eat bread in the kingdom of God. But he said to him, a man once gave a great banquet and invited many. And at the time for the banquet, he sent his servant to say to those who had been invited, come, for everything is now ready. But they all alike began to make excuses. The first said to him, I've bought a field and I must go out and see it. Please have me excused. And another said, I've bought five yoke of oxen and I go to examine them. Please have me excused. Another said, I've married a wife and therefore I cannot come. There are many who have been invited But they have said they have other things to do than to come to the table of our father and to be guests at his table. Jesus also spoke about it in Matthew chapter 22. And if I read From there, the things that were said in response. Matthew chapter 22. He said, among the responses they got were these. They paid no attention and went off One to his farm, another to his business, while the rest seized his servants, treated them shamefully, and killed them. Many have said they have other things to do, we might say, but there for the grace of God go I. It's because of his kindness that he not only invited us, but he has worked in us to accept his invitation and to come to the table. And when we come and we sit at the table of our Lord, we come to our Father's table, the thought must come to us, isn't it, Why would I have gone anywhere else? But the sinful nature thinks that way, to go somewhere else, to excuse oneself, to keep away. But our Father has worked in us, and as he's worked in us, he's shown to us that it's because of his abundant mercy and love and kindness to us that he would have us to come, and as we come in faith, we come, we receive from him, and we enjoy him, and we enjoy what we receive from him, and we're glad that we're there. We're glad that we're there, and there's no other table we'd rather be at. than at his table. He impresses his presence and his love and his kindness to us in the Lord Jesus Christ. It's a lovely thing, isn't it, to be together at the table. We are to be together at the table. The table's not something that we understand it's not something which is that we go to our own places and have the Lord's Supper. We come together, we meet together, we sit together at the Lord's table. There is a very exclusive hotel in the Highlands where I have heard that when it's dinner time, everyone comes to sit at the same table. and the meal is served to everybody there who's staying at the hotel. Well, if that's what happens at one of the top hotels in the country, one of the top hotels in the Highlands, there's something even greater happening when Christian brothers and sisters are sitting together and spiritually communing with our Lord Jesus Christ, guests at his table. We are sojourners and guests before him. Now, when Jesus spoke about those that had refused the invitation and had given excuses for not coming, In both of those parables that Jesus told, there was a response from the master and who sent out his servants and Luke's gospel. The master said to the servant, go out to the highways and hedges and compel people to come in that my house may be filled. And then in Matthew's gospel, he said, go therefore to the main roads and invite to the wedding feast as many as you find. And those servants went out into the roads and gathered all whom they found. It's very noticeable what it says then. Who did they find and who came in? He tells us who came in. Both bad and good. That's what it says. Both bad and good. And the bad and the good are to be compelled to come in. You see, we were saying earlier that the matter, the fundamental matter is that we are his guests. And we are his guests because he invited us. It's not because of anything that we've done or not done or any standard that we've attained in life or anything else. And so it's also for others to, And the master was so upset and angry at the excuses that people were giving for keeping from his feast that he said, go out and bring in everybody, the bad and the good. It doesn't matter. What does matter then? Because surely something must matter. his table. Surely something must matter for the guests. It's hard to think, isn't it, that guests could be invited into a royal house and be told, look, it doesn't matter. There has to be something that matters, doesn't there, in the royal house. Well, what is it that matters in the royal house? What is it that matters at the table? What is it that matters for our master in inviting us to be his guests? Jesus speaks about it when he continues in the parable of the wedding feast. The wedding hall was filled with guests. But when the king came in to look at the guests, he saw there a man who had no wedding garment. And he said to him, friend, how did you get in here without a wedding garment? And he was speechless. Then the king said to the attendants, bind him hand and foot and cast him into the outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth for many are called but few are chosen. Now if you think there of what then is Jesus saying, what is it that matters for the guests? You notice it doesn't matter whether one is bad or good because he's invited the bad and the good. What matters is having the wedding garment. Having the garment. Now what is that garment? What is it that the guest must have at the table? To sit at the table for the master to come in and say, I am sitting with you and eating with you, and I'm not putting you out. What is it? If we have for ourselves the fear of what I've done or not done, the good or bad. But he says, what really matters is this. You're in my house, he says. You're guests at my table. And what my guests must have is not the perfect record, or even a good record. But the guests must have the wedding garment. What is the wedding garment? The wedding garment is the clothing of the righteousness of Christ. Which, as one wears that garment, yes, person's works are changed and we are cleansed by the blood of Christ from dead works to now and our consciences are cleansed and washed from our guilt and now enabled to serve God and to live for him. You see there, it's so striking in what Jesus says. It's not the qualification isn't being good or bad. The qualification is the garment. Where do you get the garment from? The garment is from Christ and it's counted to you upon faith in Christ. The righteousness of Christ counted to you. Abraham believed and it was credited to him as righteousness. we are to hear our Father and to hear our Lord as to what is it that he seeks from his guests? What is it that he loves his guests to have and to adorn? It's the wedding garment, the garment of the Lord Jesus Christ, the righteousness of Christ counted to us upon faith. What is it that really turns the stomach of our Father? It's not wearing that garment. It's not having Christ's righteousness. It's not believing in him. So the matter is, as the scriptures always bring us to this matter and we come to it with God's word week by week, the matter is to come in faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. And Wearing this wedding garment, what do we do? We don't make the wedding garment better, do we? We stain the garment with our flesh, our works. But then, wonderfully, the Bible says to us as to who are the ones that God has, who brings to himself, who are, what are the Christian people, what do Christian people do? They are those who wash their robes in the blood of the lamb and make them white. So we receive Christ in faith, we are turning to him, returning to him daily, making it our practice to come in confession to him of our sins. Our robes, which we have stained, are made white by the blood of the Lamb. We are assured in Christ of the perfect righteousness of Christ and that the wedding garment is one that is perfect and pure, the perfect righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ counted to us, which leads us, it exhorts us, it brings us to come to him for the cleansing and forgiveness of our sins. So what we're impressed upon here as we think about being guests at his table is that what matters to God is his son, Jesus Christ, and what matters is having guests at his table when he invites the good and the bad to come. it's impressed upon us that his guests wear the garment, the wedding garment, and are clothed in the righteousness of Christ through faith, that righteousness which is counted to us upon faith in Jesus Christ. So that it's not on the basis of what we have done or not done We might make that the basis of being at the table if we thought of ourselves as being the ones who owned the table. But we are not the owners of the table. He is the owner of the table, and he is expressed to us. This is what I wish, and these are the ones I wish to come, the ones wearing the wedding garment of Jesus Christ. And as we do that, we would say we would have it no other way. Because as we come in faith in Jesus Christ and we examine the garment that he has provided, the righteousness of Christ, And it's like, you know, when you buy something new and, you know, it fits really well and it's new and it's like, well, this is very nice, you know, and we have, we've been given a garment and faith which will never spoil and which will never fade away and is more perfect than any material thing. given to us through the precious blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. Christ's righteousness counted to us through the gift of faith. We are guests at his table. And so then, as we come tomorrow, God willing, and in Christian faith, it is as his guests. We are sojourners, his guests. And as he invites you as his guest, well, when you have guests in your home, you do treat your guests well. And if you have others in your home, you wish to impress upon them, When you've guests, we want to do our best here for our guests. Well, if we do that, and we who are evil, imperfect, sinful, as the Lord Jesus spoke of his own disciples in those terms, and yet still good gifts, then how much more does our Heavenly Father treat his guests well and will he treat you well as you come, receive his invitation, believe in his son, Jesus Christ. Come to him for the wedding garment, if you have not already done so. He does not turn away any who wear the garment of Christ's righteousness. None at all who wear that garment in faith will be turned away. It's those who do not and refuse to that are turned away. But as you come and receive his invitation, as his guests, he welcomes you to provide, to nourish you, to feed you, to be with you as his guests at his table, the table of his son Jesus Christ. Let us pray.