Drinking the Cup

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Instagram and YouTube. We hope you enjoy this

sermon. God bless. Okay, we're in Psalm 75. This

will be the last one for this year, and then

we will pick it up again next year. One of the

things that Christians stand up and confess,

and one of the things that we as a church stand

up and confess week in, week out, is that Jesus

is returning to judge the living and the dead.

And I would guess that there are those of you

here this morning who may not buy into the whole

Jesus is God, conquering the cross, Satan's sin

and death, risen from the dead, all that kind

of stuff, or all the rest of Christianity. And

as soon as I said, yeah, Jesus coming to judge,

this is what you're thinking. Yeah, this is one

of the reasons. This is one of the reasons why

Christianity is not me. So unappealing. Right

there, the clip of your faith, that poor kind

of, this is creed of Christianity, judgment,

no thanks. And maybe for a Christian, the whole

judgment of God thing is also maybe off -putting

you, maybe recalls here in memory times where

judgment has been present, rendered on you. Maybe

Jesus is showing up as a judge on the great day

of the Lord. Maybe evokes in you those memories

of the nightmares when you showed up to class

with no pants on. Or maybe one of the ones that

I've had these past 15 years since I've been

an ordained pastor, showing up to worship. and

nobody else comes. Or worse, showing up and having

no idea what I'm talking about. And you all know

that I have no idea what I'm talking about. And

like one by one, you'll leave. I tell you, I've

had that nightmare more than a few times. Truth

is, the judgment of God doesn't elicit the warmest

feelings, many of us. And we're telling this

song, Psalm 75, that it's of Asaph. And as Jed

said a couple of weeks back, most of these songs

in this third book of the Psalms, they're related

to worshiping God in the temple, the God of worship

of God's people. This one, it says, is to the

choir, and then at the end, at that little title,

it says it's a song. Everybody's supposed to

sing this one together. And this one is sung

to one of my favorite tunes, Do Not Destroy.

There are other songs that have titles to them,

tunes that they're supposed to be sung to. Psalm

80, in five songs from now, is supposed to be

sung according to the lilies. Psalm 88 is according

to Mahalath -Leonov, which I am fairly certain

is an Elvish tune from Middle Earth. Mahalath

-Leonov. I don't know. Anyway, this one's Do

Not Destroy, which is, as I said before, almost

certainly a heavy metal screamo tune. Do not

destroy. At the very least, I was waiting and

asking that this was all about judgments, and

the tune was Do Not Destroy. But here's the thing.

As much as the pushback that we give, from the

emotional pushback in the very least, and sometimes

intellectual pushback to that, to the doctrine

of judgment of God. Did you notice this song

celebrates? Celebrates. If you have that Bible

open still, Psalm 75, you can look down with

me at verse one, and this is how it reads. We

give thanks, for your name is near. We recount

your wondrous deed. When God comes near, when

the day of the Lord happens, which, by the way,

does have an ultimate day of the Lord, the coming

judgment, and the return of Christ, but the day

of the Lord is something that happens throughout

them. There are different days of the Lord in

the Bible, but when God comes close, they give

thanks. When we think of God Christ Himself coming

near, judging, the living and the dead, we give

thanks. And I know, my guess is some of you are

like, I don't know, I don't normally do that.

That's not a general impulse when I think of

that. And so today I want us to look at this

text and I want to suggest a few reasons why

it's white, give thanks. the context of the judgment

of God. Okay, so the first reason that I think

you go on to give thanks for the judgment of

God, listen, he did not want evil. You don't

want evil. The other day, a couple days ago,

I was with my kids, I was away from home, and

our little dog Teddy is barking like crazy and

leases upstairs, and Teddy hasn't normally just

barked that crazy. You've been to our house,

many of you, and you know that he barks, but

not like... And he's doing that kind of thing.

And so Melissa goes downstairs and she looks

out the window and literally looked directly

in front of our house, right? Like we've got

a little tiny front porch and then there's three

stairs and this right here at the front stairs,

there's two guys getting arrested. Which, I don't

know what they're getting arrested for. People

sometimes get arrested and it finds out that

they didn't know what they were being arrested

for. That's all true. But let me tell you, it

is unsettling. to have somebody arrested dying

quickly in front of your house. Ryan, we desire

safe neighborhoods, right? You desire safe neighborhoods.

You do not want people in this city, do you?

No, you do not. This spring, Melissa and I were

at a wedding with a good friend in Kentucky,

and the minister who officiated the wedding is

somebody I went to seminary with at Covenant

Seminary. I was talking to him about what he's

doing now. This is now working in the context

of the local church. He works for an organization

that he heads called Christ for Kentucky, which

he says is for the good of the bluegrass, bringing

the gospel to the bluegrass state. And I said,

well, what does that mean you do, right? It felt

nebulous a little bit. And of course, they do

quite a lot of things, but one of the things

that he shared with me that they're doing is

that they are working to eliminate medical debt

in Kentucky. You might notice medical debt is

unbelievably crippling. for so many, it's actually

medical debt is so crippling. What was the number

I read? In Appalachia, one third of the population

has medical debt that is considered crippling

debt. Okay. So what happens is that they're not

able to pay and the health care providers that

are billing them, no, they can't pay. And so

they can get some of their money recouped for

the work they did by selling some of that debt

to creditors. And so they could sell a massively

discounted feed. I want to say it was 0 .5 %

of the actual number, but it might've been 1%,

I forget. And so these collections agencies,

they get all this debt and they can put liens

on their households. They can garnish wages.

And there's all this even what's taking place

in the amount of bankruptcy. It's actually the

number one reason for bankruptcy, personal bankruptcy

is medical debt. And so their organization is

seeking to fight this. And one of the things

that's happening here is that this is simply

an evil thing. Evil thing taking place. And you

want people to stop. And I don't want people

to stop. And thankfully, my friend and others

in Kentucky want people to stop. Look in the

inside cover of the bulletin with me. There's

a quote that I want to read to you. down to the

second one. It says, consider an argument from

the less to the greater. In the human spirit,

he who loves purity and chastity and has no wrath

against impurity and chastity is a moral leper.

He who pities the poor and defences and has no

wrath against the oppressor who crushes the weak

and slays the defenseless but loves them too

is a thief. Divine wrath and divine holiness.

I'm sorry, divine wrath is divine holiness in

activity. You desire the goodness of the world.

You desire for evil to be done away with. That's

part of the reality of the goodness, the celebratory

stuff of God's judgment. You don't want evil.

You want an end to war. We desire and we pray

for peace in the Middle East and all the rest.

Verses four and five, they say this. I say to

the boastful, do not boast. And to the wicked,

do not lift up your horn. Do not lift up your

horn on me, or speak with a haughty net. This

is what God says. To boastful and those who exalt

themselves, haughtiness and pride must come down,

must stop. What I'm suggesting to you is something

that you desire. God say no. This must end. You

want people to stop. You want safe streets. You

want stores where there's no rebelling. You desire

lovely marriages. You did not want predators.

It helped to cause the number one reason. for

personal bankers. God says to this, stop. No

more. There's a time when people say, you know,

what time is it up? No more. Consider this. This

is from Murdoch Cain, the writer who wrote the

insomniac system. There you have God's command

to let his people go by saying, who is God that

I shall be? Nebuchadnezzar endeavored to set

his throne in the kingdom above him, whose throne

and kingdom are forever and ever inherited. Listen

to the adulation of his degenerate admirers.

It is the voice of God, not of man. Coming nearer

to our own time, we have read how Adolf Hitler

gazed at a picture of himself riding proudly

on the white horse. A picture which bore the

brashest title in the beginning was the word.

Then in a voice that deliberately mocked Christ,

the eternal King, he exclaimed, I am providence.

But Campbell says this, but Pharaoh and Zeus

are swept to destruction. Nebuchadnezzar becomes

a companion of the beasts of the field, Herod

was devoured by worms, and Hitler becomes a suicide.

And you may not like the idea that's. You know,

you're impulsed to the idea of the doctrine of

God's judgment. You might not go, oh, that's

nice. I like that. But there's something in you

that says you even must stop. Stop. Let's come

to an end. God says to the Bible, do not transgress.

I'm suggesting this statement. You do not want

evil, and this is a reason to celebrate your

judgment of God. Second reason to celebrate it.

is that God is the only truly just judge. One

of the claims against Christianity and one of

the reasons why some people don't believe in

Christian faith is because of the witness of

Christians themselves, and specifically because

they look at Christians and they say, man, those

people are so judgmental. And I have no doubt

that that's the case so often. Christians can

be unbelievably judgmental. That's true. We can

wag our fingers at others. They don't dance,

don't chew, and don't go with girls that do.

Mary, do you remember that one? That's an older

slogan. Christians often associate holiness less

with being with the Holy One, Jesus, and more

with getting her out together and just doing

the right thing. And we do that to ourselves.

So we become incredibly judgmental on ourselves

and incredibly judgmental on others. That's true.

Of course, another claim against Christians and

Christianity and why we don't consider Christ

is that the church is full of hypocrites, which

it is. Part of being a sinner is often being

a hypocrite. And this is why Jesus, when he's

talked to his disciples in the Sermon on the

Mount, he says this, he brings these two things

together. He says, judge not, that you not be

judged, for with the judgment you pronounce,

you will be judged, and the measuring you use

will be measured to you. Why do you see the speck

that's in your brother's eye, but you don't notice

the log that's in your own eye? Because you've

got to be careful in judging. You've got stuff

that you can't see correctly. We don't see well.

Well, how can we say to your brother, let me

take the speck out of your brother's eye, and

there's a log in there. You have a pick. First

take the log out of your brother's eye, and then

you can see clearly to take the speck out of

your brother's eye. Which by the way, he's not

saying it isn't the speck in your brother's eye

that needs to be taken out. There's times where

we actually rightly say, hey, let me talk to

you about this. That's there. But Jesus himself

connects judging and hypocrisy. Right? And when

he does that, he says, it's because we are not

good judges. We do not see well. Care for that

judge. Verses six and seven here in Psalm 75

says, we're not from the east or from the west,

and not from the river. This comes lifting up.

And it's not who executes judgment. He's like,

it's not all those things out there. That's not

the right place to vote the judge to judge. God

who executes judgment putting down one lifting

up another What it's saying chase Nobody else

touches And you desire an end to evil you desire

judgment upon that which is evil in the world

God is the only tree just judge There's the truth,

right? Like I said earlier, it's not too uncommon.

If someone is and that's something they didn't

do, that happens. And we do it to others too,

don't we? Falsely accused in another sometimes.

False accusations. We are bad judges. The Bible

says again and again, God sees clearly. He judges

justly. So verses two and three again. Look down

there. At the same time that I appoint, I will

judge with equity. When the earth thunders and

all its inhabitants, it is I who keeps steady

with its pillars. It says I'm the one that can

judge right. My suggestion to you is that we

actually wrong for a just judge, a good one,

who sees properly, because we hate evil, and

we must acknowledge that we're bad judges. That

case seems like judgment was something that Foxy

and all the rest of Jesus talks about there is

her own mouth But we should give thanks the judgment

of God because we did not And because we need

a just judge Okay third Finally the great reason

why would be a thanks for judgment of God? is

because Christ bears it for you, bears the judgment

of God on your behalf. So maybe you noticed in

the scripture readings that one of the images

that we have in the Bible of God's judgment was

the cup. And one of those actually mentions Egypt

being judged. One of the really significant images

of Egypt Evil in the Bible is Egypt. And think

about it, right? Pharaoh felt threatened by all

these immigrants that had moved down to Egypt.

So he enslaved them. He made them work invariably

hard. He began killing off the little boys. And

if you know the story, judgment comes on Pharaoh

and all the land of Egypt, this evil place, doing

horrible things, God's world to God's people.

And the greatest day of God's judgment in that

story is the Passover. The Passover day brings

together two things. One, there's a just judgment

on you. And the other is there's a great grace

from God. So if you're a father of the people

of God, write it into that story, you'd heard,

you were to take a little lamb, kill it and put

its blood on the lintel on the doorpost there

of your house. And basically you had done that.

If something else had died in your place, taken

the wrath of God before you, you were passed

over. You had life where you deserved judgment.

Someone else died in your place. One of the great

images in the Bible, the wrath of God on judgment

is that. And listen to how it's described here,

verse eight. For the hand of the Lord, there

is a cup with foam well mixed, and he pours out

from it, and all the wicked of the earth shall

drain it down to the drakes. Thankfully, judgment

of God, think of the battle hand of the repellent,

right, was pouring out the vintage with grapes

of wrath. And there, of course, we must think

of the passage that was read from Luke, Chuck

Redford, there in the garden. Jesus himself is

in anguish before he goes to the cross. Interesting,

actually, what we didn't hear in those few verses

that Chuck Redford, the verse before the verse

after, and it was one of those things that when

I put it in the bulletin, You know afterwards

as a question with that because if you find it

what happens right before the verses that we

heard is that Jesus tells us the cyclists they

pray They think that you follow the temptation

and then the next verse after what we read is

he goes to a cyclist You didn't do it and they

do But the disobedient his own disciples disobeyed

him and therefore they fall into temptation they

participate therefore in the evil world But what

we heard in Shaddik, Jesus praying to the Father,

Jesus says, Father, take this cup from him. Take

this cup from him. Why would he ask that? Why

would Jesus use that kind of image for you? Why

would he say, Father, take this from him? but

because this is the great image of God's judgment

on evil and sin. And what does Jesus say? He

says, yet in our Bible, the worst be done. Because

what Christ does on the cross is he does take

the proper judgment of evil and sin upon himself.

This is the work of Christ upon the cross. the

judgment that we just say deserve, the judgment

that His disciples just say deserve, right there

in the garden, right now in that moment, we then

go in false temptation and participate in the

evil of filling God Himself. Jesus hangs on the

cross, brings the cup of God's wrath. God did

not turn a blind eye to the evil of this world.

He were not. You will not turn a blind eye to

the evil that you have done that I have done.

You will not. But there is a reason to sing and

to celebrate. Sure, there's a reason to sing

and celebrate because evil will be judged. And

that God alone is the just judge. But this song

points us ahead to where judgment and grace come

together across. When this is at the heart of

Christian singing, Jesus paid it all. Jesus bloody

on the cross, bloody lentil, the bloody host,

that God would pass over the just judgment on

me and on him. Christ would take it upon himself.

He knew no sin becomes that we might become the

righteousness of God. Let me end with something

beautiful. I think sort of helps to illustrate

this. So I mentioned this pastor in Kentucky

who's doing this work to eliminate the burden

of medical debt in the bluegrass state. But like

I said, medical debt is most often bought by

creditors who can at least pay some of the amount,

and then they can go after all this money that

creates such havoc in the world. What they said

this organization price for Kentucky is why don't

Christians buy the debt instead of the creditors?

And so they did this test program Last year 2003

surely 2004 and they were able to polish nine

million five hundred thirty nine thousand sixty

nine dollars of debt for thirteen thousand three

hundred eighty six Kentucky and now They are

raising the money currently by the also debt

for seventy five thousand more Kentucky. It is

numbered at approximately one hundred and fifty

million dollars. One hundred and fifty million

dollars. What are they doing? They're saying.

We're going to take it on ourselves. The evil

that is coming down through these through these

evil empires and evil creditors. We're going

to take it that you might have life. It probably

fails in some ways, but what I'm saying is Jesus

is drinking the cup of God's wrath and saying,

I will pay the debt that you might have life.

Judgment of God is not normally something that

we're running out from the streets and saying,

listen to this. But what I'm telling you is that

it is at the heart of Christian Good News. The

judgment of God came down. It was justly to come

on us on Christ in the cross. And He willingly

went there for you, that you would have life.

Let me pray for us. Lord, thank you for the songs.

Thank you that they invite us into. subjects

that we may skirt around, and that this song

points us to our blessed Savior, who submits

the will of the Father in drinking the cup of

bread for us. Lord, we bless you this morning.

God, we do pray. Come, Lord Jesus. Come and judge

the world in your righteousness, in your justice.

Bring your peace. And most of all, we say thank

you for your work on the cross. We bless you,

Lord Jesus. Because we are sinners, we are likely

to decide to defraud the temptation to justify

you so often with our hearts and our lives, and

yet we willingly go to the cross. So we say thank

you, blessed be the Lord Jesus. In the name we

pray. Thank you for listening to Second City

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Thanks again for listening. God bless.