6. An Eternal Change of Fathers! Psalm 45:10-17

Text: “Hearken, O daughters, and consider, and incline thine ear; forget also thine own people, and thy father’s house; so shall the King greatly desire thy beauty: for He is thy Lord; and worship thou Him.”

Psalm 45:10-11.

          “Ye are of your father the Devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do.  He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him.  When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it.” 

John 8:44.

Good morning, adopted child of God our Father!  Once you and I had a father who was thrown out of Heaven for his sin and pride - Satan, the Devil, ‘...that old Serpent...’.   Now, all we who are born again of the Spirit of God, redeemed by the precious, sinless, Blood of Christ Jesus – are adopted into the family of God by grace through faith in Christ.  Hallelujah!   What an adoption!  What a Saviour!  What a Father we have!

Verse 10.  “Hearken, O daughters, and consider, and incline thine ear."  Conviction of our sins comes by the hearing of the ear, leading to the conviction of the heart; leading to the repentance of the soul; leading to the Salvation of all who have been elected to be saved, from before the world began.  Hearing brings the means of God’s grace to sinners such as we.  We hear the Word of God, and like the dry bones in Ezekiel’s vision – we receive Eternal life and stand up upon Spiritual feet as soldiers in the army of the Living Lord God.  (Ezekiel 37:1-10)

“For whosoever shall call upon the Name of the Lord shall be saved.  How then shall they call on Him in Whom they have not believed?  And how shall they believe in Him of Whom they have not heard?  And how shall they hear without a preacher?  And how shall they preach, except they be sent?  As it is written, How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the Gospel of peace, and bring glad tidings of good things!...So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God.”  (Romans 8:13-17)

Verse 10. “...Forget also thine own people (the world), and thy father’s house."  Christ Jesus told the Pharisees (John 8:44) that they were ‘...of their father the Devil...’, and that they were doing ‘...the lusts of their father...’.  In other words, they were natural born sinners, living in a fallen world, and living like the Devil in disobedience to the Lord God.  They needed to repent from their sins, cry out to the Lord God in repentance, and be adopted into the Spiritual family of God, through faith in the one time Sacrifice of Atonement that would be made by the Lord Jesus at Golgotha’s Cross.

“...Forgetting those things which are behind (the world, the flesh, the Devil), and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.”  (Philippians 3:13-14)

Verse 10. “...So shall the King greatly desire thy beauty."  Our Eternal Heavenly Father has loved us, ‘His people’, from before the very foundations of the world He created.  In Eternity, before any of us ever existed, our Eternal Father loved us and ‘greatly desired’ us as His elect children.  Nearly impossible for natural minds like ours to comprehend – yet true never the less.  God’s love for us, His adopted children in Christ, is love everlasting.

“The Lord hath appeared of old unto me, saying, Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love: therefore (a conclusion) with lovingkindness have I drawn thee (into Himself).”  (Jeremiah 31:3)

Verses 12 to 17 of Psalm 45 can be viewed as an insight into what our Father’s Heaven is going to be like.  It reads like an account of things/people we will encounter within the Heavenly Realms!  Praise God for such illustrations of Spiritual things, the depths of which our tiny mortal minds can only speculate!  Hallelujah!  Thanks be to God for the indescribable blessings He has prepared for us in His Heaven!

“But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love Him.  But God hath revealed them unto us (adopted sons/daughters in Christ) by His Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God.”  (1 Corinthians 2:9-10)

5. Adoption: a change of family - in God    (Galatians 4:1-7)

“...And I will receive you, and will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be My SONS and DAUGHTERS, saith the Lord Almighty.”   (2 Corinthians 6:17-18) (John 1:12)

Definition of the term:  Adoption is an act of God’s free grace whereby believers (i.e. those born again of the Spirit of God) are received into the number of (i.e. or family of) God; and have a right LAWFULLY to all the privileges of the sons and daughters of God.  (Romans 8:14-17)

We thus cease to be sin-enslaved children of Devilish disobedience to God; and are ADOPTED into God’s family - through God’s grace, and Christ’s Victory Atonement for us at the Cross of Calvary. (John 8:44) (Ephesians 2:1-3) (Romans 8:4-18) (Ephesians 2:13-22) (Galatians 4:5-6) (Hebrews 4:14-16)

Adoption: Adoption ensures us that we believers are thereafter PITIED; PROTECTED, AND PROVIDED FOR - by our Heavenly Father.   (Psalm 103:13-14) (Proverbs 14:26) (Matthew 6:30-34) (1 Peter 5:7) 

Of course, it also means we are often CHASTENED when we stray, as a loving Father would chasten His own beloved children. What grace!  What Fatherly love! (1 John 1:8-10)   (Revelation 3:19) (Hebrews 12:5-14)

Adoption: Adoption means that we are NEVER cast off from the family of God!           (John 6:37) (Lamentations 3:31-33)

We are rather SEALED, by the Sovereign Spirit unto the day of full redemption of the body as well as the soul and the spirit. (Romans 8:18-25) (1 Corinthians 15:51) (1 John 3:2) (Ephesians 4:30) (Ephesians 2:10-14) (Daniel 6:16-17)

Thought: We are sealed; safe; and forever secure - in Christ Jesus.  Hallelujah!  What Eternal security we have in our Saviour!   What an Eternal change of fathers!

5. The Cost of Christ’s Sweet Holiness Psalm 45:8-10

Text: “All Thy garments smell of myrrh, and aloes, and cassia, out of the ivory palaces, whereby they have made Thee glad."

Psalm 45:8.

Good morning, sweet, clean-smelling Christian!  You and I smell sweet in God’s nostrils for one reason only, we bear the marks of the Living Lord Jesus Christ within our hearts; a smell of His perfect Holiness, put to our account by grace through faith, is the only thing that smells good to a Lord God of wrath against sin.  Praise God for Christ’s Holy scent upon us!

“As obedient children, not fashioning yourselves according to the former lusts in your ignorance: but as He which hath called you is Holy, so be ye Holy in all manner of conversation (entire lifestyle); because it is written, Be ye Holy; for I am Holy.”  (1 Peter 1:14-16)

Holiness is the outer expression of inner righteousness:  If we have Christ’s own perfect righteousness imputed, put to our account, by faith in His one-time Sacrifice for all our sins – then we must seek at all times to TRY to manifest His Holiness in our daily lives continually.  Others cannot see our inner righteousness, but they can certainly see our outer Holiness if being faithfully practiced before their very eyes.

Even our imperfect attempt at living Holy lives, is clearly seen and understood by the world of the unsaved, as a sign of what the Living Lord God has done in the Christian’s heart.  As one once said to me, ‘You cannot be saved and not know it.  And you cannot be saved and not show it.’  You can therefore ‘show’ a world of unsaved souls that you and I have Christ’s inner righteousness, by the Holiness we seek to practice outwardly before them.

“Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit.  A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit.  Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire.  Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them.”  (Matthew 7:18-20)

 “...Man looketh on the outward appearance, but the Lord looketh on the heart.”  (1 Samuel 16:7b)

The Alabaster Box: Think for a moment about the characteristics which went to make up a vessel such as the alabaster box featured in the Matthew 26:6-13 Bible passage; for, time spent in such Scriptural meditations proves profitable to every Christian’s faith.  (Psalm 119:105)

Alabaster is a substance which is made up of gypsum, calcium sulphate, from which plaster of Paris is created, often to cast a splint around broken bones.

It is mixed with water, moulded to a particular shape and, when dried hard, it can appear as a starling white, translucent, vessel of fragile vulnerability.  Alabaster, therefore, is a perfect TYPE of the Christian’s character and has so very much in common with our frail human nature.

We of the Christian faith are also made up of vulnerable constituents: we are Eternally secure, yet so easily broken; we appear startling white in outer behaviour and morals; yet our hearts are so often filled with carnal corruptions; we desire to be ever flowing with Christlikeness, yet so often are found dry and seemingly ready to crack.  Food for thought, what?

“But we have this treasure (Christ Jesus) in earthen vessels (alabaster boxes?), that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us.”     (2 Corinthians 4:7)

The alabaster box featured in the suggested Scripture-reading was filled with precious ointment called spikenard, or pure nard, which was left in its liquid form.  The spikenard is the plant, a fragrant Indian herb; the nard is the perfumed ointment prepared from this plant.  Precious perfume indeed. 

“I am the Vine, ye are the branches; he that abideth in Me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit; for without Me (Christ Jesus) ye can do nothing.”  (John 15:1-11)

The Christian is maligned by the world due to his/her still possessing all the traits of a fallen human nature.  Yet, by God’s grace, we are filled with the Spirit of God and thus we can also manifest all the precious and Holy fruits of God the Holy Spirit. Hallelujah! Glory to the Lamb! (Galatians 5:22-23)

Mark’s account of the alabaster box reveals the fact that the box had first to be broken before the precious ointment inside could be used to serve the Master.  (Mark 14:3) 

Christian’s too must often be ‘broken’, abused, and maligned by the unsaved world, before the fruits of the Spirit pour forth and are manifested to the greater glory of the Lord Jesus.  (Hebrews 11:6; 31-40) (Psalm 30:5b)

The world sees through much of our translucent weaknesses and finds fault to malign.  Praise God, He looks right through all our outer weaknesses to the true motives of our Christian hearts and blesses us according to our motivation, rather than the limitations of what we actually achieve!  The motives God has given us are rewarded when we try our best to act upon them for Christ’s glory.  Now, that is good news for ‘alabaster box’ Christians such as we.

If Christ’s righteousness is genuinely within the regenerate Christian – God’s true Holiness will shine out and be witnessed by a world that lives in perpetual darkness and sin. 

“Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in Heaven.”  (Matthew 5:16)

Verse 9.  “All Thy garments smell of myrrh, and aloes, and cassia out of the ivory palaces...  Christ was an Alabaster Box filled with Righteousness and Holiness.  When Sacrificed on Golgotha’s Cross for the redemption of sinners, His pure Righteousness was poured out upon a world that was, and still is, sick with gross sin.  When we, by faith, partake of Christ’s Salvation grace, we too begin to conform to His image, and reveal His Holiness unto other lost souls.  We smell sweet in order to draw sinners to Christ’s Cross, that they too might find faith to believe and receive the Eternal Salvation Christ alone can give.  (Acts 4:12)

Thought:  When shattered by life’s cruel blows, let Christ’s love and hope pour forth abundantly.  Who knows if some poor lost soul might, by God’s grace, find life anew.

4. The Everlasting Throne of God Psalm 45:7

Text:  “Thy throne, O God, is forever and ever: the sceptre of Thy Kingdom is a right sceptre.  Thy lovest righteousness, and hatest wickedness: therefore God, Thy God, hath anointed Thee with the oil of gladness above Thy fellows.”

Psalm 45:7-8.

Good morning, everlasting subject of King Jesus!  There is only one thing that makes you and I ‘everlasting subjects of King Jesus’ – the fact that Christ’s Kingdom is an everlasting Kingdom, and that He is our everlasting King.  Hallelujah!  What simple, yet profound, logic!  If the Bible makes sense, never permit anyone to make a nonsense of it!  Amen.

“Thy Word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path.”  (Psalm 119:105)

We are granted faith by God to truly receive and believe the Word He has breathed (inspired) into it for our instruction in every aspect of our belief and practice as ‘His people’, Christians.  If He does not impart that gift of genuine Bible-believing faith – souls will not believe or receive Salvation in Christ Jesus alone, and through His once-for-all-time Atonement Sacrifice for our sins – made at Calvary’s Cross over 2000 years ago.  Fact.

God only grants/imparts His gift of faith to ‘His people’ that He has ordained from before the foundation of the world to receive it.  We receive this great gift when we hear the good news of Salvation, the Gospel story, of the Lord Jesus Christ.  We believe, and we are saved for time and for Eternity.  God’s Kingdom, as I have already stated, is an everlasting Kingdom, and we who are Spiritually regenerated (Born Again) are Christ’s everlasting subjects.  Oh, the joy of knowing that we are in fact saved, secure in Christ Jesus!  Glory...

Quis Separabit:  “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?  Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?...Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him that loved us.  For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature (including our sinful selves!), shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 8:35-39)

For this reason, we are correctly, and Biblically defined, as ‘everlasting subjects of King Jesus’.  Praise God that we have learned this truth!  Praise God that this truth has made us, ‘His people’, truly free!

“And ye shall know the truth (Truth? Christ Jesus?), and the truth shall make you free.”  (John 8:32)

“Jesus saith unto him (Thomas), I am the way, the truth, and the life, no man cometh unto the Father, but by Me.”  (John 14:6)

“Thy throne, O God, is forever and ever: the sceptre of Thy Kingdom is a right sceptre.” (Psalm 45:6)

Verse 6. “Thy throne, O God, is forever and ever.  To whom can this be spoken but our Lord?  The Psalmist cannot restrain his adoration.  His enlightened eyes see in the royal Husband of the church, God, God to be adored, God reigning, God reigning everlastingly.  Blessed sight!  Blind are the eyes that cannot see God in Christ Jesus!”  (C.H. Spurgeon, Treasury of David, page 215)

Verse 6.  “The sceptre of thy Kingdom is a right sceptre.  He is the lawful Monarch of all things that be.  His rule is founded in right, its law is right, its result is right.  Our King is no usurper and no oppressor.  Even when He shall break His enemies with a rod of iron, He will do no man wrong; His vengeance and His grace are both in conformity with justice.

“Hence we trust Him without suspicion; He cannot err; no affliction is too severe, for He sends it; no judgement too harsh, for He ordains it.  O blessed hands of Jesus!  The reigning power is safe with You.  All the just rejoice in the government of the King Who reigns in righteousness.”  (C.H. Spurgeon, Treasury of David, page 215)

Temporal kings, queens, and dictators rule their subjects with mortal and often extremely fallible wisdom.  But our King Jesus, being immortal, and Omnipotent, and Omniscient, and omnipresent Lord God Almighty – rules His subjects with the power of His infallible righteousness, His matchless mercy, and His love.  Hallelujah!  What a Saviour Lord God we serve!

Verse 7. “Thou lovest righteousness, and hatest wickedness.  Many a one loves righteousness but would not be its champion; such a love is not Christ’s love.  Many a one hates iniquity, not for its own sake, but for the sake of its consequences; such a hate is not Christ’s hate.

“To be like Christ, we must love righteousness as He loved and hate wickedness as He hated.  To love and hate as He loves and hates is to be perfect as He is perfect.  The perfection of this love and hate is moral perfection.”  (George Harpur 1862)

Verse 7.  “Therefore God, Thy God, hath anointed Thee with the oil of gladness above Thy fellows.  ‘Therefore’.  He says not ‘wherefore He anointed Thee in order to Thy being God, or King, Or Son, Or Word’; for so He was before, and is forever, as has been shown; but rather, ‘Since Thou art God and King, therefore Thou wast anointed, since none but Thou couldst unite man to the Holy Ghost, Thou the image of the Father, in which we were made in the beginning: for Thine is even the Spirit.’”  (Athanasius of Alexandra 296-373)

Christ’s Kingdom is a Kingdom built without hands, yet it is grounded on the foundation stone of righteousness in Christ Jesus, the Eternal Son of the Living Lord God Jehovah.  Christ’s sceptre, the symbol of His Sovereign and Eternal power and authority, touches ‘His people’ with the blessing of His Sovereign grace – grace given because of God’s Eternal love; the Father’s Eternal election of souls to save; the Spirit’s quickening and keeping power in the lives of all who are redeemed by the sinless and precious Blood of Christ Jesus the Lamb of God.  Praise the Lord for His Sovereign grace to sinners such as we!

Thought: if we have been chosen to receive this Salvation by God’s Sovereign grace – let us not fail Him by keeping the Gospel message of Salvation to ourselves.  Shout it from the rooftops – that other ‘elect’ souls might hear and receive faith to believe and be saved.

 

3. God’s Terrible Majesty! Psalm 45:4-5

Text: “And in Thy majesty ride prosperously because of truth and meekness and righteousness; and Thy right hand (God’s sword hand?) shall teach Thee terrible things.  Thine arrows are sharp in the heart of the king’s enemies; whereby the people fall under Thee.”

Psalm 45:4-5.

Good morning, God-delivered Christian!  Only a most terrible and Holy and majestic Lord God could have ever been powerful enough to free and deliver you and I from our vile and Eternally detested sins.  Only a truly majestic and Holy Lord Jesus could shed His own sinless Blood to make a Sacrifice Eternally adequate to redeem our sinful souls!   Oh the terrible majesty of His excellence and grace!  Praise God for condescending to come from Heaven to save sinful wretches such as we!  Glory to the Lamb Who is worthy of praise!

Dictionary Definition: Majesty – “(noun) the greatness and glory of God; grandeur; dignity; elevation of manner or style; royal state; a title of Monarchs (His, Her or Your Majesty; Their or Your Majesties); a representation of God (sometimes Christ) enthroned...”  (The Chambers Dictionary, page 969)

Verse 4. “And in Thy majesty ride prosperously because of truth and meekness and righteousness...  God’s majesty is an Almighty all-glorious majesty of Absolute Holiness and Divine Perfection, that cannot be attained by any other being, creature, or inanimate thing.  Were we mere sinful mortals to even glimpse the Face of God the Father – I believe we would burn up in an instant, as one would when exposed to the glare of an unshielded atomic reactor!  God’s Holiness shines brighter than the sun, and burns fiercer than a million fiery stars.

“No man/woman hath seen God (God the Father) at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared Him.”  (John 1:18)

“Not that any man hath seen the Father, save He which is of God (Jesus Christ), He hath seen the Father.”  (John 6:46)

Moses once asked the Lord God, “...I beseech Thee, show me Thy glory (majesty)...”  The Lord answered him, “...I will make all my goodness pass before thee, and I will proclaim the Name of the Lord before thee; and will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy.  And He said, Thou canst not see My Face: for there shall no man see My Face and live...I will put thee in a cleft of a rock (cave), and will cover thee with My hand while I pass by: and I will take away mine hand, and thou shalt see My back parts: but My Face shall not be seen.”  (Exodus 33:18-23)

God’s majesty, His Holiness, His truth, and His absolute righteousness and wrath against all sin – makes Him a consuming fire to sinners who are not covered in the precious Blood of Christ Jesus the Lamb of God.

“Wherefore we receiving a Kingdom which cannot be moved, let us have grace, whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear: for our God is a consuming fire.”  (Hebrews 12:28-29)

“Blessed is he/she whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered (by Christ’s Blood).  Blessed is the man/woman unto whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no guile.”  (Psalm 32:1-2)

The Lord Jesus Christ is unto us, ‘His people’ as a full thickness lead shield that protects us from being utterly and instantly consumed by the pure MAJESTY and Holiness of our Father Lord God.  We are covered by Christ’s Blood, just as a house is covered by fully paid Home Insurance!  Praise God!  In Christ Jesus, we are fully covered against Eternal loss!

“For God (the Father) so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth (believes/trusts and keeps right on believing/trusting) in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”  (John 3:16)

“He that believeth on Him is not condemned: but he/she that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the Name of the Son of God.”  (John 3:18)

Verse 5. “Thine arrows are sharp. God’s arrows of Divine truth are fired from the mouths of His ordained preachers/teachers of Bible truth.  They are fired indiscriminately by the preachers/teachers – but God has Eternally ordained which hearts they pierce with conviction sin.  God’s arrows are sharp because they are honed with His truth.  That is why we have often heard the adage: ‘The truth hurts!’

“And when He (the Spirit of God) is come, He will reprove the world of sin (our sin), and of righteousness (Christ’s Righteousness), and of judgement (God’s final judgement of all who continue on in their sin).”  (John 16:8)

Verse 5. “...In the heart of the King’s enemies. Our Captain aims at men’s hearts rather than their heads, and He hits them, too; point-blank are His shots, and they enter deep into the vital part of man’s nature.  Whether for love or vengeance, Christ never misses sin, and when His arrows stick, they cause a smart not soon forgotten, a wound which only He can heal.  Jesus’ arrows of conviction are sharp in the quiver of His Word and sharp when on the bow of His ministers.”  (C.H. Spurgeon, Treasury of David, page 215)

God’s Sovereign grace is shot out to hit the target He has set in Eternity – the inner circle centre of ‘His people’s' elect hearts.  His Gospel arrows, shot out by faithful men/women whose motivation is to partake in Christ’s great Harvest of precious souls, ALWAYS hit the mark God aims at, in the souls of His elected people.  There is no hiding from His bolts.

“My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me: and I give unto them Eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man (not even ourselves!) pluck them out of My hand.  My Father, Which gave them Me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of My Father’s hand.  I and My Father are One.”  (John 10:27-30)

Verse 5. “...Whereby the people fall under Thee. There is no standing against the Son of God when His bow of might is in His hands.  Terrible will be that hour when His bow shall be made quite naked and bolts of devouring fire shall be hurled upon His adversaries; then shall princes fall and nations perish.”  (C.H. Spurgeon, Treasury of David, page 215)

Thought: When we present God’s truth from His Word.  The Lord Himself shall at all times reveal either His condemning majesty to His enemies, or His matchless, and at all times Sovereign grace to ‘His people’.  Eternal Salvation is of God’s giving alone!