A Study in Psalms - Psalm 5

Tonight we're going to look at Psalm 5.

And if you just want to know real quickly the the 10 Psalms

we're going to look at this year, Psalms 5.

Next week we're going to look at a big one.

Psalm 27, Psalm 44, Psalm 53, Psalm 65, Psalm 79, Psalm 86,

Psalm 87, Psalm 1O2, and Psalm 116.

Because I know some of you asked me, but why study the Psalms?

Why study the Psalms? Well, there are five books of

poetry in the Bible. And it's quite interesting here

at Christ Community Church that last year Lance finished the

book of Job on Wednesday nights. And in Psalms, we've done almost

50 to 60 of the Psalms. And then Proverbs, rarely as a

sermon ever preached in this church where the pastor doesn't

mention 123 or 4 Proverbs. And Lance actually has 24

messages on Proverbs that you're interested in than that.

And then we just finished Ecclesiastes, so the only book

left is Song of Solomon. And I've only been married 22

years, so I'll leave that one to Lance to do someday.

But there's not just poetry in the five books that we call the

poetry books. Poetry's all throughout the

Bible and begins the first poem is in Exodus 15 with the Song of

Moses. And then Deuteronomy, there's

also Deuteronomy 32, there's another Song of Moses, and then

you have the song of Deborah and Barack in Judges 5.

And you've got that beautiful poem of Hannah's prayer in First

Samuel 2. You've got David's song of

deliverance in Second Samuel 22. Habakkuk chapter 3 is a

Habakkuk 3 · chapter mention

wonderful prayer. And then you go to the New

Testament. It has poetry right away.

In Luke you have you have the magnificent Mary's prayer and

then you have Zachariah's prophecy in chapter 1 all the

way to Revelation. In Revelation there are 7 hymns.

One of them is Revelation 15, three to four.

So God's word is filled with poetry.

God likes poetry, so should we, right?

Who else likes poetry? Jesus.

Jesus quotes from the book of Psalms more than any other book

in the Old Testament. Jesus began as earthly ministry

and when he cleansed the temple in John chapter 2, verse 17, his

John 2:17

disciples remember that it was written zeal for your house will

consume me. That's a quote from Psalm 69,

Psalms 69:9

verse 9. And then Jesus entered his

earthly ministry when he hung on the cross and in Luke 23 verse

Luke 23:46

46, he said, Father, into your hands I commit my spirit.

And that's a quote from Psalm 31, verse 5.

Psalms 31:5

I have a lot of background on Psalms I want to give you, but

I'll spread it out over the 10 weeks.

So tonight I just want to give you 5 keywords from Psalms.

OK, 5 keywords. The book of Psalms may aptly be

summarized by these 5 words #1 praise.

The word praise is used 134 times in Psalms, 13 times alone.

In the last one, in Psalms 150, the psalmist worships extols

with a heartfelt gratitude, thanking the sovereign God of

Israel for his Person, His Word, His mighty works in regard to

both creation, redemption. The second word would be

prophecy. The psalmist often writes about

the coming Messiah, foretelling his zeal, suffering, death,

resurrection, ascension. His high priestly work, and the

coming millennial Kingdom. Example would be Psalm 22.

The third word would be pain. The psalmist describes in

graphic fashion about his personal doubts, his fears, his

pain, and his problems. And I think This is why we can

relate to the Psalms, because we have pain like he does.

The fourth word after praise, prophecy, pain is petition.

The psalmist offers up many requests.

He cries out for relief, for forgiveness, reassurance,

direction, protection, and strength.

And we'll see that in tonight's Psalm, Psalm 5.

And lastly, poetry. The psalmist pens his words in a

poetic fashion meant to be sung. You all know Psalm 42 as the

deer pants for the streams of water.

Beautiful poetry. It's Hebrew poetry that we've

translated in English, but it's still very beautiful.

So those are 5 keywords in the book of Psalms.

If you have your Bibles, when you open to the Psalm #5 you

notice there is a superscription at the top of it.

And about 114 of the psalms have these.

And this one says to the choir master for the flutes, a Psalm

of David. So this would have been sung in

the Temple and apparently accompanied by a flute or a

choir. And David is the author of this

Psalm. And David wrote at least half of

the psalms. We'll talk more about that in

another week, but let's look at this Psalm.

In case you're wondering what type of Psalm this is, it's a

lament Psalm, an individual lament Psalm.

Let's look at Psalm 5. Give here to my words, O Lord,

Consider my groaning. Give attention to the sound of

my cry, my King and my God, For to you do I pray.

O Lord, in the morning you hear my voice.

In the morning I prepare a sacrifice for you and watch.

For you are not a God who delights and wickedness.

Evil may not dwell with you. The boastful shall not stand

before your eyes. You hate all evil doers.

You destroy those who speak lies.

The Lord abhors bloodthirsty and deceitful man.

But I, through the abundance of Your steadfast love, will enter

your house. I will bow down towards Your

holy temple in the fear of You. Leave me, O Lord, in Your

righteousness. Because of My enemies, make Your

way straight before Me. For there is no truth in their

mouth. Their inmost self is

destruction. Their throat is an open grave.

They flatter with their tongue. Make them bear their guilt.

O God, let them fall by their own counsels.

Because of the abundance of their transgressions, cast them

out, for they have rebelled against you.

But let all who take refuge in you rejoice.

Let them ever sing for joy and spread your protection over

them, that those who love your name may exult in you.

For you. Bless the righteous, O Lord,

you, cover him with favor as with a shield.

Let us pray. Father in heaven, we thank you

tonight that we can look at Psalm #5.

Father, I pray tonight that you would just challenge us,

encourage us, motivate us to talk to you more and more and

more in Jesus name, Amen. You know, it's almost a cliche

when the pastor of church, any church, admonishes the

congregation to read their Bibles or pray more.

There is a lot of books on prayer.

One of my favorite is Valley of the Vision.

Tim will often read this before on Sunday.

It's a prayer book by the Puritans if you want to get it.

It's a great book that they write out their prayers and you

can actually pray them. I got a new book this week,

Handbook for Praying for Scripture by William Warner.

But prayer books are a dime a dozen.

There are lots of prayer books, but Pastor Lance said something

many years ago that prayer is more caught than taught.

Last night we had just a few people at our Tuesday night

prayer meeting and I listened to the ladies who pray and I

learned how to pray better because they make it so simple.

It's almost as if God is there and they're talking to him face

to face. So I hope tonight when you hear

that we're talking about prayer, you won't think.

Oh no, another passage about prayer.

Listen to what JC Rile said. He said prayer is the mightiest

engine that God has placed in our hands.

It's the best weapon to use in every difficulty and the surest

remedy in every trouble. It is the key that unlocks the

treasury of promises and the hand that draws forth grace and

help in time of need. Show me a growing Christian, a

going forward Christian, a flourishing Christian and sure

am I He is one that speaks often with the Lord.

He tells Jesus everything. So let me ask you, are you a

growing Christian, a going forward Christian and a

flourishing Christian? How's your prayer life?

You know, the real question isn't how's your prayer life,

but the real question is how's your relationship with your

heavenly Father. You know, I was thinking

recently as a, as I was preparing this, about the actor

Gene Hackman and his wife died a few months ago.

Do you remember that? And I don't know exactly if it

was 7 days or 10 days or two weeks, but it was a long time

before they discover the bodies. And yet I believe he has grown

up children. So it's sad that none of those

children checked in on their parents or at least had one of

those things that if they fell, they could, you know, call

emergency. So I don't know if it's too much

to speculate, but that leads me to believe there was a

relationship problem, and that's not right.

It's a sad situation that nobody checked on them and their bodies

lay there for so long. That's a bad example of an

earthly relationship. That's not right.

Let me give you a good example. When Ping, Tessa and I would

come home from Myanmar or Thailand, when we were on the

mission field, we would come home and we would stay at the

House of Ray and Joanne Cruz. And every night at 7:00, I knew

it was 7:00 because Ray would scream at the top of his lungs,

usually sitting in his Barca lounger.

I love you, mom. And he knew because Joanne was

upstairs on the phone talking to her mother in Boise, ID.

So we knew it was 7:00. Every night at 7:00, they would

check in with their mom. That's how it's supposed to be

in an earthly relationship. We should not have a problem

with our parents here on earth. We should be checking in on them

and have a great relationship with them, but how much more we

who call ourselves Christians, we shouldn't have a relationship

problem with our heavenly Father.

So my prayer tonight is you'll be a growing Christian, a going

forward Christian, and a flourishing Christian and speak

often with the Lord. We have an outline, which I hope

you have. Every once in a while there's a

Psalm that's difficult to outline, and this is one of them

because it's interesting that the psalmist verses 1 to 3, it's

a prayer, but then in verses 4 to 6, he's talks about the

wicked. He just switches subjects and

then in verses 780 switches back about God.

And then in verse 9 to 10, he switches back to talking about

the wicked, and then he finishes it with the prayer in 11 to 12.

So I spent a lot of time trying to perfect this and I don't know

if I ever was actually satisfied with this prayer.

But your outline .1 is the psalmist request verses 1 to

3.2, the relationship of God to the wicked in verses 4 to 6, the

purpose of the psalmist in verse 7-8, the rejection of the wicked

in nine to 10, and the prayer of the psalmist in verses 11 to 12.

Let's look at point #1 the psalmist request verses one to

three and you have five points there.

Sub points, prayer, plea, person, period, and promise.

Let's start with prayers. He says in verse one, Give ear

to my words. O Lord, consider my groaning and

give attention to the sound of my cry.

Notice there are three types of prayers right there in verse 1.

He says words, He says groanings, and he says cry or

crying. First off, he says words, and

that's what we pray most often is with words.

We express ourselves to God by speaking words in the human

language. It's just an open dialogue to

God. I mentioned the women of CCC who

pray last night. It's just a simple prayer.

Prayer is not some technological big words expose that some

people think it is. It's just simple language, like

you're talking to God face to face.

We speak. God hears and it says his ears

inclined to us. We don't speak into space.

We speak into the ears of God using words.

Matthew 66 says that when when you pray, go into your room,

shut the door and pray to your heavenly Father who is in secret

and your father was in secret will reward you.

The second one is groanings. Now it could be translated

meditations or sign. David is asking God to pay

attention to his unspoken words or his groanings of the heart.

There are times I'm sure you relate, when we just don't know.

Have the words to express what we want to say to God, yet we're

still praying. Example in Romans 823 it says,

And not only creation, but we ourselves, who have the first

fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for

the adoption of sons, the redemption of our bodies.

We can pour out our thoughts to God.

We can groan when we encounter sin and brokenness.

We groan when we face bodily sickness, weakness, and death.

We groan when relationships are strained or broken.

Or do we see those we who we love are struggling?

We ache for an end of pain. We long to be made whole and set

free. We're groaning for the day we'll

see when we shine in God's glory as he intended.

The third type of prayer is crying.

And sometimes we are in such distress that our prayers are

just a desperate cry for God. Help us.

Psalms 3417 says the righteous cry and Yahweh hears them and He

delivers them out of all their trouble.

A good example would be Hannah. You remember Hannah in First

1 Samuel 1 · chapter mention

Samuel chapter 1? She couldn't have a baby and the

other wife, Pannell was making fun of her, constantly mocking

her and she's at the temple. And it says in First Samuel 110

she was deeply distressed and prayed to the Lord and wept

bitterly. In fact, she was weeping so much

that the high priest, Eli, thought she was drunk and tried

to admonish her. So those are three types of

prayers. Let's look at the Pleno.

OK, notice the words here in my translation, the ESV, it says

give. We're still in verse one.

Consider and give. If you're using the NESP

tonight, it says listen, give, listen.

When was the last time you talked to God like that?

It's like wrestling with God, like an arm wrestle with God. 3

Imperatives demanding action from God.

This is not a normal prayer, but an urgent, serious prayer in an

attempt to gain a hearing with God Almighty.

It carries the same idea as the persistent widow in Luke 18 that

was banging on the door of the unjust judge again and again.

The point here is that we are to be persistent in prayer even if

for reasons unknown to us, the answer from God is delayed.

God will not refuse to act forever.

God hears our prayers and you notice in verses the first 3

verses we have the use of the word my five times.

My favorite verse in all the Bible about prayer and when I

often use is Hebrews chapter 4 verses 15 to 16.

Hebrews 4:15–16

And that says we do not have a high priest.

That's Jesus Christ who is unable to sympathize us with our

weaknesses. Jesus knows what we've walked

because he's walking our shoes. He knows our our sorrows, our

heartaches, our troubles. It continues saying, but one who

in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without

sin. And then verse 16 of Hebrews 4

says, let us then with confidence draw near to the

throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to

help us in time of need. The veil was torn from top to

bottom. We have direct access to God

will never be put on hold. There's no answering machine in

heaven. It's just a wonderful, wonderful

verse misplaced. The third thing is the person,

and this is really important. He says for to you do I pray the

last part of verse 2, my King and my God, for to you do I pray

who's the you? Well, we know it's Yahweh five

times. In Psalm 5 we have the use of

Yahweh and Lance talked about it I think last Sunday.

It's used 6519 times in the Old Testament.

The first time was in Genesis when the day the Lord Lord God

made the earth. But here in verse 2 we have an

interesting saying. Yahweh is also called my King

and my God. We know He's our God, but he

uses the word King because God rules and God reigns.

This is used three times in Psalms, Psalms 5 Here that

wonderful chapter in Psalms 84 three and in Psalms 1 and 41451

it just says I will extol you my God and King.

There is only one true God and He alone is who we are to pray

to. There are no verses in the Bible

to pray to anyone else except God.

You know, we are seeing a very stark increase in Mary ology.

And that's because the Pope who just recently died has

propagated Mary ology. And I've seen online that

Catholic theologians are debating, arguing, trying to

defend, defend the veneration of the worship of Mary.

In fact, as I was driving to work this morning listening to

KFI radio, they were taking a poll about which of the the

Who's your favorite patron that you pray to?

And people were calling in saying oh, Francis of Assisi or,

or Apostle Paul. So do the Catholics worship

Mary? Well, I've got 8 questions for

our Catholic friends and I didn't write this but I I got it

from another commentator. Catholics, they sing hymns to

Mary and Luke chapter 4, verse 8 says that we are to worship the

Luke 4:8

Lord our God and Him only #2 they still believe she's a

virgin. And yet my Bible in Matthew 1355

tells us clearly that Mary had other children.

They bow down and kiss her statues.

Jonah 28 warns against paying any regard to other idols, and

they pray to her and ask for intercession.

And first Timothy 25 says there is one God and one mediator

between God and man, and that that mediator is Christ Jesus.

They believe she is sinless #6 Romans 323 says all have sinned

and fall short of the glory of God.

They call her the queen of the universe.

And Luke 147 Mary herself speaks, says that my spirit

rejoices in God my Savior. They believe that she converts

Sinner. And Acts 412 says salvation is

found in no one else. There's no other name given

under heaven by which men must be saved.

And lastly, they believe she hears their prayers.

And Deuteronomy 1811 says that we are not to inquire of the

dead. So do Catholics worship Mary?

Yes, they do and they need to stop.

And those prayers that Catholics are praying are not been

answering because God is a king and he's the one true God and

they're not praying to him if they're praying to Mary.

Let's look at the period sub point number D OK, it says in

the morning, you hear my voice in the morning.

So you've got that repeated phrase which carries the idea

that as soon as it's morning and every morning, the psalmist has

a morning quiet time with God. And I hope that you do.

I, I've used that illustration before. 1 missionary once said

no Bible, no breakfast. I personally like my coffee and

my mug and my Bible. But one author said a resolution

to give God the fittest time of the day for devotional approach,

when the body is rested and the brain untired, when the outlook

is fresh and the world has not yet been pressed in on the

innermost life. And JC Ryle said that we need to

speak to God in the morning before you speak to the world.

And then you need to speak to God at night after you've been

in the world. And I love that quote.

So every one of us needs to get up in the morning and have a

time with the Lord because you're going to go out and face

the enemies of the world. And we need to be prayed up with

the full armor of God and #5 their pointy.

We have the promise. David ends with verse 3 saying I

prepare a sacrifice for you and watch.

The prayer has an expected spirit.

This means that psalmist was praying in faith.

He laid his request before God and expects God to answer.

Now the answer might be yes, the answer might be no.

The answer might be wait. But the word watch here has a

sense of looking with eager expectation.

David has the confidence that his prayers gone in the very

throne room of God and he wasted expectation for God to answer

it. God's character is unchanging,

unwavering, unshifting, unshakable.

So Psalms 5 gives us confidence that God will answer our

prayers, and we are to eagerly watch how the Lord will answer

those prayers and when he does, offer him a sacrifice of praise.

So I hope that when you pray, I hope that you pray with an open

Bible, OK? When you read your Bible, it

ought to cause you to pray, including the Psalms.

When you read a a chapter, what does it say about God and what

do you, what do I learn about reading today?

And then you pray. Are there any attributes

mentioned? If you look at Psalms 86, five,

it talks about grace and mercy and truth.

Is there a sin mentioned that we need to confess?

Does the passage mention kings or rulers or leaders?

Every time I get one of those passages, I know I need to pray

for the current president and the current vice president.

Is there a command you obey? And I could go on and on and on.

But as you read your Bible, the Holy Spirit prompts you to pray

for certain people, certain individuals.

Bible reading and prayer go together.

Don't rush it. Sit quietly and patiently for

the Lord. Some of you may say, well, you

only have one child. I have 2345 and I have work.

But you all have probably heard of the example of Susanna

Wesley. Let me read just a little bit

about her life. Earlier in her life, Susanna

Wesley vowed that she would never spend more time in leisure

entertainment than she did in prayer and Bible study, even

amidst the most complex and busy years of her life as a mother.

Now, she had 19 children. I believe that eight of them

died. So at some point, I know when

she died, nine of them were still alive.

So she has somewhere between 9:00 and 11:00 children.

She's still scheduled 2 hours a day for fellowship with God and

time in His Word, and she adhered to that schedule

faithfully. The challenge for her was

finding a place of privacy in a house filled overflowing with

children. Well, the challenge, I'm sorry.

Mother Wesley's solution to that was to bring her Bible to her

favorite chair and she would throw her apron over her long

head, forming sort of a tent. This became something that ached

into the tent, a meeting that you'd have in the Old Testament

Tabernacle. But every kid, every person in

the household knew, including the domestic helpers, and the

children knew well to respect this signal that when Mom put

her apron over her head, she was studying the Bible, she was

praying, and that she was not to be disturbed except if there was

an emergency. There was privacy in her little

tent. She interceded for her husband

and children, and she plumbed the deep mysteries of God in the

Scriptures. This holy discipline equipped

her with a thorough and profound knowledge of God, and you

probably know that two of her boys changed the world.

Charles would write over 6000 hymns.

Charles Wesley and John Wesley would be the father of

Methodism. So she was a great example to

her children and I hope you parents are examples to your

children. I think one reason we see a

decline in prayer is because parents aren't modeling and

aren't teaching it to their children.

Today, let's move on to paragraph 2, the relationship of

God to the wicked and verses 4 to 6.

We now go from the God who hears our prayers in verses one to

three to the relationship of God to the wicked and verses 4 to 6.

Now in paragraph 2, verses 4 to 6, David says you you three

times Speaking of God and his relationship to the wicked.

David's going to reflect on the sinfulness of man and the fact

that God will not hear the prayers of the ungodly.

So we have 5 sub points there. Types of sin.

You know, we constantly need to be reminded how God views sin

and David helps us here. I think there's seven different

words for sin. He says in verse 4IN wickedness.

In another part of verse four he says evil.

In verse 5 he says the boastful or maybe your Bible says

arrogant. And then he also says evil doers

in verse 5. In verse 6 he says those who

speak lies. And the last part of verse 6 he

says bloodthirsty and deceitful men, different kinds of sins.

He mentions how does God view those sins?

Well, number one, he says in verse 4, God does not delight in

or take pleasure in wickedness. God is repulsed by the evil

wherever He sees it, and we need to be repulsed by it also #2 God

doesn't allow evil to dwell in His presence.

The word dwell there in verse 4 means to sojourn or visit.

It's a picture of a wandering traveler passing through and

living in a tent. God is so incompatible with sin

that he won't Even the most temporary coexistence is utterly

impossible. And you all know the verse of

Habakkuk 113. You who are of pure eyes than to

see evil and cannot look at wrong #3 God doesn't allow the

boastful to stand before him. In first Peter 55 it says God

resists the proud but gives grace to the humble.

You would think of the in the the parable of the the

Samaritan, he, he talks and I think I counted 35 words and yet

the tax collector only says 7 words.

God be mercifully A Sinner. He was the tax collector was

humble. The Pharisee was so proud his

prayer only went to the roof of the temple #4 God hates all evil

doers. The the new legacy standard

Bible, some of you have that new translation says workers of

iniquity. You've heard the false

statement. God hates the sin but loves the

Sinner. That's wrong.

This evil doers in the Psalm are people who sin as a way of life.

They're workers of iniquity. They working at sin every day

and #5 God destroys those who tell lies.

Verse 6. Do you remember that wonderful

chapter in Isaiah 6? We won't turn there tonight.

I'm sure you're familiar with it.

When Isaiah saw God in his glory sitting on the throne, remember

in verse 5, Isaiah cried out, Woe to me, for I am lost.

I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people

of unclean lips, for my eyes have seen the king, the Lord of

hosts. So when the most righteous man

in all of Israel saw God on the throne, he was immediately aware

of the uncleanliness of his lips and the fellow Israelites.

How serious is God about hating lies?

Revelation 2215 says that those who practice lies will be kept

out of heaven. And lastly #6 God abhors

wickedness. That word abhors means to

loathe. You have a repugnance of sin.

It's because many states have abolished the death penalty.

I think the the last time the death penalty was actually

exercised in our state of California was 2006.

So we tend to forget how much God hates the bloodshed.

The 5th commandment is thou shall not kill and Numbers 3531

says the penalty for murder is death.

But notice also how the words grow in intensity.

It says does not take pleasure, hates, destroys and aborts.

You see this list and they grow in increasing increasingly.

God hates it. We see the holiness of God and

we see His hatred of sin. These thoughts are not just born

out of a deep sense of sinfulness of sin.

Our world today does not speak enough of sin and its

consequences. So the world, the church pastors

often soften the message and its compromises.

I wrote this down a long time ago and I don't know the

message, but it's from Pastor Lance and he sold us that sin is

satanic. First John 38 sin is

lawlessness. First John 3-4 sin is a passing

pleasure. Hebrews 1125 sin is deceitful.

Hebrews 313 sin entangles Hebrews 12/1 sin enslaves John

834 sin stings First Corinthians 1556, sin kills Romans 512 and

sin dams First Corinthians 69. It was Paul Washer who said the

mark of a true believer is not sinless perfection, but a new

repugnance for sin, a greater sensitivity to sin of or

vehement zeal to fight against sin, and a humble contrition

because of sin, and lastly A willingness to confess sin.

Number C There God has no pleasure in wickedness, he says,

for you're not a God who delights in wickedness.

You know, the the gods of the nations, the Egyptian gods, the

Roman gods, the Greek gods, they had gods who delighted in blood

and lust and sinful practices. These gods in Greece and Rome

and Egypt found all kinds of pleasure and sinful practice

with their gods. Not so the God and Father, the

Lord Jesus Christ. First, John 15 says God is light

and in Him there is no darkness. Jesus wept over the sins of

Jerusalem in Luke 19 verse 41. The Holy Spirit is grieved over

Luke 19:41

sins in Ephesians 430 and God the Father was sorry that he

made mankind. He says I regret that I have

made mankind in Genesis 6 verse seven.

It was CS Lewis who said we don't hate sin enough to get

upset at the wickedness and the godlessness around us.

We're bombarded as we are by so much evil and violence.

We've gotten accustomed to the darkness.

Next, God does not tolerate wickedness.

He says evil may not dwell with you.

God cannot dwell, cannot and or and cannot tolerate it.

Twice in our Bible, in Isaiah 6 and Revelation, the angels

saying holy, holy, holy, the whole earth, The holy, holy,

holy is the Lord of hosts. The whole earth is full of his

glory. Evil can't dwell with God, and

the same should be true in our personal and spiritual lives.

That's why it's impossible for a genuine believer to continue in

an ongoing lifestyle of sin. First, John 39 says no one born

of God makes it a practice of sinning for God.

Seed abides in him and he cannot keep on sinning because you've

been born of God. It was Spurgeon who said rest

assured, Christ will not live in the pallor, pallor of our hearts

if we entertain the devil in the cellar of our thoughts.

Next and lastly, fourthly, God hates wickedness, OK, He says

the boastful can't stand before your eyes.

You hate all evil doers. Here we see condemnation of all

who speak lightly or tolerating sin.

You know, we see it in evangelical circles today.

It's called anatoneism, lovers grace we see in the Catholic

Church where they divide venal sins and mortal sins, and we see

it in today's church in the United States.

It just has no general hatred of sin.

So in verses one to three, David's prayer went into the

very throne room of God. But in verses 4 to 6, the

prayers of the wicked are not. There's a lot of people praying.

You know, every day there's a tragedy.

And if you go on social media, everybody will put out there our

thoughts and prayers are with you.

Who's praying? Because God is not listening to

a lot of those prayers. Psalm 6618 says if I had

cherished iniquity in my heart, the Lord would not have

listened. Proverbs 1529 says the Lord is

far from the wicked, but he hears the prayers of the

righteous. And in John 9, interesting, the

blind man is healed and they're grilling him and they're asking

him about it. And he says in verse 31, we know

that God does not listen to sinners, but if anyone is a

worshipper of God and does his will, God listens to him.

And of course, Isaiah 59 verses one to two, you probably heard

this. Behold, the Lord's hand is not

shortened that it cannot say, or his ear dull that it cannot

hear. That tells us God can hear.

God can hear every prayer if he wants to, of all 8 billion

people on the earth if he wants to.

But verse 2 says, but your iniquities have made a

separation, being you and your God, and your sins have hidden

his face from you so that he does not hear.

Isaiah says God's ear can hear because he's omniscient.

He knows they're praying. The problem is the wickedness of

the one praying. Because of that wickedness, God

does not hear their prayer. What this means is God is not

going to listen to any of those who flout His law.

Now you might ask, there is one prayer of a wicked person can

pray that God will listen to and that's the prayer of repentance.

We have a great example in first Kings chapter 21 verses 17 to 29

1 Kings 21:17–29

of the wicked king Ahab. You remember him absolutely

wicked king, but when the prophet comes to him and he

hears the words of judgment, Ahab repents and puts sackcloth

on the Lord Caesar repentance and declares that his judgment

will not fall on Ahab, but Ahab's descendants.

So you also could consider the the Ninevites in Jonah who

repented and God relented from the disaster that he was going

to bring. God knows and hears all things,

but only the prayer of the wicked, which God will hear is a

prayer of genuine repentance. Now some of you might feel

tonight that God isn't answering your prayers.

You need to examine yourself to see if you're in the faith. 2nd

Corinthians 13, five, and you need to confess your sins first.

John 19 says that if we confess our sins, God is faithful and

just to forgive us our sins. And you cleanse us from all

unrighteousness. Let's move on to point #3 We got

to move quickly. So we saw in verses one to three

the word thought my five times. In verses 4 to 6, we saw the

word you three times and now here in verses 7 and 8 we're

going to see the pronoun I three times giving the purpose of the

psalmist. David says 4 things about God

who hears our prayer. First off, he talks about God's

mercy. In verse 7.

He says bye through the abundance of your steadfast love

will enter your house. The NSB says graciousness.

The new King James Bible says mercy and I like the mercy

translation best. Mercy is God not giving us what

we deserve. Sinners can find acceptance with

God who hears our prayers if they come to Him when they

repent and believe as David had. Only because of God's abundant

mercy are we saved, and it leads us to enter God's house.

As the verse says. It's by the mercy of God alone

that any human can approach God. The tax collector, as I

mentioned before in Luke 18, knew this when he cried out.

God be merciful to me, a Sinner, because we have God's mercy, and

if you have His salvation, it ought to cause you to fear God.

I think in Psalms I see the words about fearing God 19 times

and then in the book of Proverbs I see verses about fearing God

19 times and I know Lance has written a book.

You can buy that book in the the tape library if you want about

fearing the Lord. We give that out of the new

members class. But I was recently got an

article from Virgil Walker, one man I follow on social media and

let me just read you what he talks about the fear of the

Lord. First off, he says many

Christians today are missing one thing, the fear of the Lord.

Why have we lost it and why does it's absent week in the church?

Many think the fear of God is outdated.

Some say God is love, we shouldn't fear him.

Others assume that it's just an Old Testament thing.

But the Bible teaches us that godly fear is essential to

faith, and those without it really don't know him #2 he said

what the fear of the Lord is not.

It's not a cringing terror that drives us away from God.

It's not a serval fear like that of a beaten slave.

It's not an Old Testament concept that's been replaced by

grace. Instead, it's deep reverence,

awe, trembling, joy before a holy God.

He says a low view of God leads to a lowlife #3 He says the fear

of the Lord is in two categories #1 there's a sinful fear like

Adam in the garden hiding from God, or the demons trembling in

James 2 #2 it's a holy fear like Isaiah before God's throne,

which I mentioned in Isaiah 6, or the disciples after Jesus

calmed the storm in Mark chapter 4.

Mark 4 · chapter mention

We believers are called to fear the second way, a holy fear

before God's throne and, and, and look at Jesus, not the

sinful fear like Adam in the garden #4 and I never heard this

before. Jesus feared the Lord.

That's right, Isaiah Chapter 11, verse 2, you look it up.

Isaiah 11:2

It prophesied that the Messiah would be filled with the spirit

of the fear of the Lord. So if Jesus feared the Father,

why don't, why don't we #5 what happens when we don't fear the

Lord? We have casual worship.

We have apathy towards sin. We have a small view of God.

We make foolish decisions. Romans 318 describes the wicked.

It says there is No Fear of the Lord before their eyes.

So without the fear of the Lord, Christianity becomes casual,

shallow and powerless. And number six, he said, here's

the test. Do you, do you fear, really fear

the Lord? He says, do you hate sin and its

consequences? Do you approach God casually or

reverently? Do you obey quickly and

joyfully? Does God's holiness move you to

worship? If these aren't true of you, ask

God to give you a holy fear. So David had a holy fear of God

and we should and never see God's righteousness.

In verse 8 he says lead me, O Lord, in your righteousness

because of my enemies. You know, we've gone verse one

to seven is actually preparing us.

This is the first actual petition in the Psalm.

Lead me. It's the first imperative in the

Psalm. So he and Dave, what is the

petition that God would lead him Not in David's own

righteousness, which he knows is worthlessness, but in God's

righteousness. And lastly, if he's following

God and God's righteousness, he will follow God.

He says that the last part of verse 8, make your way straight

before me. Because of God's mercy, we fear

God. Because of his righteousness, we

follow God. Here we have a prayer of the

righteous man. He appeals to the faithfulness

of God. He wants to be led by God in

God's righteousness, which means according to faithfulness to

those who trust in you. If God should fail him, it would

get occasion for his enemies to mock and blasphemy God.

But God would never fail David, and that would never happen.

Psalms 119105. I'm sure your children know

this. Your word is a lamp into my feet

and a light into my path. Let's look at the last.

I'm sorry, the 4th paragraph, the rejection of the wicked.

So once again David's going to go back to talking about the

wicked in these two verses. Two things there, God's enemies

are wicked and God's enemies are cursed.

Earlier in verse 6, David described the wicked as those

who told lies. Now here in verse 10 he

describes them in terms of their wicked speech.

The words wicked cannot be trusted.

Their words are destructive and those who follow them were

perish. Does this verse sound familiar?

Probably does because it's from Romans.

Apostle Paul will quote this in Romans chapter 3.

Romans 3 · chapter mention

That paragraph, verses 10 to 18 where he gives the summary of

the great sins of the human race.

So Paul got part of that from Psalm 5 verse 9.

Psalms 5:9

God's enemies are wicked. He also says God's enemies are

cursed. Here we have the first

imprecatory verse in the book of Psalms.

Got to the 5th Psalm before we have an imprecatory verse.

You may remember last year we looked at Psalm 58 and Psalm 58

is an entire Psalm dealing with imprecatory prayers.

And they're easier to spot when you read the Psalms you see

here. Let them fall by their own

counsel. He's calling out to God to judge

the wicked. It's a prayer asking God's just

judgment on the wicked. The new NIV says let their

intrigues be their downfall. You know, prayers like this

present a problem for a lot of people.

I hope that if you don't understand a preparatory

prayers, you'll get the message on Psalm 58.

And and you know, God is concerned about those who rebel

Psalms 2 and David's request is for God's condemnation of their

sin and that that they can't justify their sinful behavior.

You know, I mentioned that I pray every day that God would

destroy Hamas, not that Israel is righteous.

Israel is not it's a time of the Gentiles.

But I pray that God would destroy Hamas and I also pray

that God would destroy the five generals in Myanmar who

slaughter and destroy and kill people every day.

I I'm not going to partake of it, but I asked God if it be

your will to do it. That's an imprecatory prayer and

that's what God is praying here that hit David's enemies would

be destroyed. Let's move to the last

paragraph. And this is the final stanza of

our Psalm. And with almost every Psalm,

with the exception of Psalms 88, all the psalms have a joyous

ending or a praise or some adoration at the ending.

And two things. God is our joy and God is our

shield. This is the first of 70

references in Psalms to singing. And why is David singing?

Well, joy is expressed by shouting and singing and he's

doing that because he knows God will hear his prayer.

God will answer his prayer. John 1624 says until now you

have asked for nothing, Ask and you will receive that your joy

may be full. Philippians 14 says Paul says, I

thank my God in all my remembrance of you always, and

every prayer of mine for you all, making my prayer with joy.

There's joy in prayer. There's great joy.

When we finish praying, we say Amen.

Knowing that you've given God your problems, your trials, your

sufferings, your anxieties, it's like saying hear God take it and

there's joy. You know, many years ago when

Christ Community Church was just starting, we had a brother named

Omar here and he taught the first prayer class at Christ

Community Church and he gave us a prayer chart.

And if you took Gil's class last November, you might have got

this chart. You're welcome to come up and

get a copy later. But Omar passed that chart out.

And it's just a chart where you pray for 12 different things, 5

minutes for 12 different things in a circle.

So, and I took that to India and I didn't have a wife, I didn't

have a kid, I didn't have anything to do because I was

waiting for my Indian pastor to come.

So I was trying to learn the language.

So I would pray one hour every morning.

That was the most blessed, joyful time of my life.

I was praying for a wife and God answered that prayer quickly.

But I you never felt so close. The more time you pray in

prayer, there's joy. I never felt so close to God.

But today we get busy. But but that's just one example

if you want to look at it, but it's a it was a joyful time.

Do you finish your prayer time with joy?

I hope you do. David did.

And then lastly here he says God is our shield.

God is our shield for you bless the righteous, O Lord, you cover

him as a favor with your shield. Unlike the wicked who God does

not hear their prayer, God does hear the prayer of the righteous

and He gives us mercy and His righteousness when He saved us.

When we pray, if we do it right, we should feel joy.

And one of the reasons we feel joy, as David has said here, is

that God is our shield. God is our shield is mentioned

18 times in the Psalms. Psalm 33 says, but you, O Lord,

are a shield about me, my glory, and the one who lifts up my

head. You know, I was reading my Old

Testament reading this morning and it was in First Samuel 23,

and David is running here. David is running there.

Saul is coming after him. Saul is chasing him here.

David asked if the men of Kela would give him up.

And David inquires of the Lord, and the Lord says they'll give

you up. So Dave is running everywhere.

But then you get to verse 14 and it says David stayed in the

wilderness in the strongholds, and you remain in the Hill

Country in the wilderness of Zip.

And Saul sought him every day. And then it says, but God did

not give him into his hand. And I love that God has a shield

about David and God has a shield about us.

James Boyce says God puts his shield of protection around the

righteous. Therefore the righteous put

their trust in him. You know, at the bottom of your,

your outline, there's a, a model of prayer.

We teach this in our fundamentals of faith class.

Gil teaches us in our prayer class.

And I've been teaching it. My wife is teaching it to the

women in Thailand. It's and maybe it's, you know,

very simple for you, but this is just a model and there's many

different models of prayer. You have the Lord's Prayer in

Matthew 6. There's all kinds of prayer

models out there. There's all kinds of books about

prayer. But if you're not familiar with

this, just re revise it tonight or retell it tonight.

A stands for adoration. Do you begin your prayers with

some adoration or do you begin your prayers with God?

I need this or God help me with this.

We need to spend some time in adoration praising God, and the

easiest way is for his attributes.

I mentioned Psalms 86, five, I think Psalms 868615, at least

there's five attributes. So when I see verses about God's

wrath, God's justice, God's omniscience, God's mercy, God's

grace, it's easy to to give God adoration for those attributes.

But we should begin our prayer with adoration, just a few

minutes. Secondly, confession.

We mentioned first John 19. We need to admit to God our sins

when you be honest and humble and confess those sins before

God. And thirdly, Thanksgiving.

We need to tell God how grateful you are for everything, even in

times of difficulty and trouble. And lastly, supplication.

This should be the last one. Unfortunately, this is what we

spend most of our time doing. We, we make specific requests

and you know, if you just, if you know your prayer time, just

think of the people in Christ Community Church, the widows,

those who've undergone chemotherapy, those who are

going to have operations. Pastor Lance is going to have an

operation on his hip. He's going to have his hip

replaced on May 23rd. So you guys need to start

praying. OK, so May 23rd for that.

But things like that, you just go through the congregation.

A couple weeks ago, I didn't have a Sunday school class to

teach, so I went to the library first service where we have a

team praying and you're welcome to come.

They pray in the library first service, they pray in the

library second service. So I went to the library to pray

and Dave Chapa was leading it and he handed all of us a sticky

note or a cue card and I got 4 names of four people in the

church to pray for, and then everybody got four names.

So I prayed for the four people and I thought that was great.

There's just so much and so many people and so many things we can

pray for. And I could go on and on and on

about that. John Wesley said, give me 100

men who fear nothing but sin and desire nothing but God, and I

care not whether they be clergymen, laymen, they alone

will shake the gates of hell and set up the Kingdom of heaven

upon earth. This quote tells us that there

is power in just a few dedicated people, just a few dedicated

prayer warriors of Christ Community Church can do great

works. Christ Community Church is not a

big church. I'm guessing there's about 100

people here tonight. On Sundays, you know, 3 to 400.

But May God look down upon this church and hear the prayers of

the prayer warriors. And with much prayer, there's

much power, as David says in Psalms 5.

Let's pray. Father, thank you for letting us

look briefly at Psalm 5. And Father, I pray that the

people of Christ Community Church, they don't have to come

to the library and pray. They don't have to come

Wednesday nights at 6:30. They can pray in their quiet

time in the morning. But Father, may you see Christ

Community Church as a powerful, prayerful church.

And Father, may you fill our pews with people.

Fill our people with knowledge. May you help us reach the lost

here in West Covina, Baldwin Park and Irwindale.

May you help us to strengthen families and for children to

obey their parents. Use this church in a mighty way

and we all know it begins with prayer.

We ask this in Jesus name, Amen.