3. The Sifting of the Reprobate Tares Psalm 50:16-23

Text: “But unto the wicked God saith, What hast thou to do to declare My statutes, or that thou shouldest take My Covenant in thy mouth?  Seeing thou hatest instruction, and castest My Words behind thee?

Psalm 50:16-17. 

Good morning, evangelistic Christian!  Having been Divinely enlightened by God the Holy Spirit, as to the doom that awaits all unbelievers; all adherents to false religion – all, in fact, who know not that true Eternal Salvation can only be found in the Person of Christ Jesus, and in His fully finished Atonement Sacrifice at Calvary’s Cross – you and I have a heavy heart of compassion for those that are currently in a state of non-regeneracy, all currently balancing on the edge of a bottomless, Christ-rejecter’s abyss.

Thus, we are deeply compelled to preach/teach the true Gospel message of Salvation in Christ, that the elect of God might hear, receive faith in the hearing, and, by God’s grace, be brought out of darkness and into the Light of Christ.

“Neither is there Salvation in any other: for there is none other name under Heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved.”  (Acts 4:12)

“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)

However, one thing must be kept very clear in our own minds, sincere evangelistic Christian: there are some, God’s selected people, that will hear and receive the Gospel of Christ Jesus, Crucified for our sins and be saved, but there are many more others that will not hear, and certainly never receive, Salvation in the Gospel message we preach/teach.  This is merely a fact of Scripture.  Hell will eventually be full of those who rejected Christ Jesus.

Reprobate (rejected by God) tares can never ever grow to be Spiritual fruit. 

“And He (the Lord God) said, Go, and tell this people, Hear ye indeed, but understand not; and see ye indeed, but perceive not.  Make the heart (inner being) of this people (reprobates) fat, and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes; lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and convert, and be healed.”  (Isaiah 6:9-10)

“But unto the wicked (rejected of God) God saith, What hast thou to do to declare My statutes, or that thou shouldest take My Covenant in thy mouth?  Seeing thou hatest instruction, and castest My Words behind thee.”  (Psalm 50:16-17)

Verse 16.  “But unto the wicked God saith, What hast thou to do to declare My statutes? You violate openly My moral law, and yet are great sticklers for My ceremonial commands! What have you to do with them?  What interest can you have in them?  Do you dare to teach My law to others and profane it yourselves?  What impudence, what blasphemy is this!  You count up your holy days, you contend for rituals, you fight for externals, and yet the weightier matters of the law ye despise!  Ye blind guides, ye strain out gnats and swallow camels; your hypocrisy is written on your foreheads and manifest to all.”  (C.H. Spurgeon, Treasury of David, page 233)

On this Easter Sunday as I am writing this piece, I am totally frustrated.  I see so very many people; people that profess to be Protestant Christian believers; yet seem to actually know little about God’s way of Salvation; sound Bible doctrine; and increasingly run headlong into fellowship with the gross religious errors of Rome.  Professing Protestant, protest now!  Evangelical Pastors, get back to obeying Bible doctrine, and touch not the unclean thing!

“The Wicked. By whom are meant, not openly profane sinners; but men under a profession of religion, and indeed who were teachers of others, as appears from the following expostulations with them: the Scribes, Pharisees, and doctors among the Jews, are designed, and so Kimchi interprets it of their wise men, who learnt and taught the law, but did not act according to it.”  (John Gill 1697-1771)

Verse 16. “Or that thou shouldest take My Covenant in thy mouth.  How many Protestant Ministers, that have been ordained to office under the Westminster Confession of Faith, and vowed to uphold it – now, in this apostate 21^st Century, not only desire to recognise Roman Catholicism as Christian, but run headlong to involve themselves, and their church groups, in ecumenical fellowship gatherings with Rome and its gross darkness!  The Lord God’s instructions on this matter are very clear:

“And what concord hath Christ with Belial?  Or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel?  And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols?  For ye are the temple of the Living God; as God hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people.  WHEREFORE (a Divine conclusion) come ye out from among them (the wheat from the tares), and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; 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 6:15-18)

“We need the grace of the doctrines as much as the doctrines of grace, and without it an apostle is but a Judas, and a fair-spoken professor is an errant enemy of the Cross of Christ.” (C.H. Spurgeon, Treasury of David, page 233)

Professing Christians today despise Scriptural instruction, and quickly alienate Bible-believing Preachers/Teachers who are proficient in God’s Word and in doctrinal purity.

“For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; and they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned into fables.”  (2 Timothy 4:3-4)

The author is convinced that these times, here prophesied by Paul to Timothy, have arrived.  We are currently seeing with our own eyes, ‘The Great Falling Away’ from faith. “...Nevertheless when the Son of man cometh, shall He find faith on earth?” (Luke 18:8)

In part two of this exposition of Psalm 50: we learned that God’s elect people are being sifted for soundness of faith in Christ.  In this section, three, of the exposition we can clearly recognise the sifting of the reprobate tares – that increasing multitude of false professors, who will in fact, make up the spurious religious body called The Scarlet Woman in the book of Revelation, when the end comes.  (Revelation 17:1-18)   Christian, take note!

Thought: “...To him that ordereth his conversation (entire life/beliefs) aright will I show the Salvation of God.” (Psalm 50:23)   “...Thy Word is truth.” (John 17:17