Open—Bill Prost
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Well, I very much hesitate to speak again, but I trust it'll be of the Lord.
We had brought before us rather vividly this morning the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ, and we sung together in one verse of a hymn we had this morning. Lord, what is man? Tis he who died, and all thy nature glorified. And it brought before ME3 Scriptures that bring before us.
That question What is man?
We'll have to be brief because of the time factor, but turn to Job Chapter 7 for the first one.
And I believe, at least I speak for myself, that we can all relate to this job. Chapter 7.
We don't have time to go into the history of Job, but I think most if not all of us are familiar with what happened to him.
Then what do we read here concerning Job's reaction to it in the 7th chapter?
Verse. It's hard to know where to start, but let's start right with the question in verse 17, Job 7 and verse 17. What is man, that thou should us magnify him, and that thou should have set thine heart upon him, and that thou shouldst visit him every morning and try him every moment? How long will thou not depart from me, nor let me alone, till I swallow down my spittle?
He really means death there, I believe.
Verse 20 I have sinned, what shall I do unto thee?
And it should read. I think you'll see it this way in the J&D translation. What shall I do unto thee, O thou observer of men? Why hast thou set me as a mark against thee, so that I am a burden to myself?
Have you ever felt that way? Life is not fair and you have heard it from unbelievers. But if we're honest with ourselves, we as believers can react the same way, can't we? Lord, what did I do to deserve this? Why are you picking on me? That may sound a bit irreverent, but if we don't say it out loud, at least we sometimes think it up here.
Why are you picking on me?
Man incomplete.
And Job didn't realize that God had blessing in view for him.
When the Lord allows difficulties and problems even in the lives of natural men.
It is in order that they may realize their need of a savior.
God can use even this war in the Ukraine to bring souls to Christ, and I am sure he is.
He can use the hardships in this world.
Now let's not be too hard on Joe Job was a good man and even God himself paid tribute to him. And it's quite something that when the Lord held Job up as an example of goodness, Satan doesn't come back and say, oh, but did you see what he did back then or did what he did here or there? No, Satan doesn't argue with the Lord about Job's goodness. He proceeds to give him why he thought.
There were good reasons for Jobs, good character, but he doesn't argue with the Lord.
That says a lot for Job's character, but here he complaints.
Well, let's turn over now to the 144th Psalm.
This is a step upward.
Psalm 144.
What do we have here?
Verse 3.
Lord, what is man that thou takest knowledge of him, or the Son of man that thou makest account of him? Man is like to vanity, his days are as a shadow that passeth away, and so on.
This is one step upward, man in repentance.
If we see the context here, we realize that prophetically, it brings before us.
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The godly ones of the nation of Israel, particularly the godly remnant, who have gone through that awful tribulation period that lies ahead of them at this point and have suffered immensely, Yes, at the hand of God, but to what end? In order to bring them to repentance?
Without wanting to point the finger, Israel is pretty proud today of its military and its intelligence.
Every country in the world fears the Mossad, Israel's intelligence, one of the best in the world.
And they've proven their ability, no doubt, of course, with a good deal of help from the United States, to hold their enemies at Bay, even though they usually outnumbered numerically 100 to one.
But there's a day coming when God is going to allow awful judgment to overtake them to such a degree. The Scripture tells us, and the Lord Jesus said it himself, that nothing before or after will be anything like it. And it will bring them to the point that they realize that Lord what is man, they think they can defend themselves. And you and I can learn from this.
Because if we're honest with ourselves again.
I speak for myself. How often we want to do things in our own strength and in our own way. How often we want to grab hold of things. I know how to do it. I can fix this.
And sometimes there is real ability in a natural way to fix the problem.
But how many times have you discovered? And so have I.
That if we think that God is going to allow everything to go smoothly in our personal life, in our work life, in our family life.
And shall I say it, in our assembly life we find out that as fast as one problem goes away.
Another one comes along.
Why? Why is that? Oh, because the Lord wants you and me to walk and continual dependence. And here we find Israel at the point where they have to say look at verse 11, rid me and deliver me from the hand of strange children whose mouth speaketh vanity and their right hand is a right hand of falsehood. And then they proceed to ask for that wonderful millennial blessing that.
Lord is willing and ready to give them, but they have to recognize.
That they can't get it in human energy, They can't get it in their own strength.
When they crucified their Messiah, they thought they could somehow attain to God's righteousness as Cornell was bringing before us. They thought they could have the Kingdom of God in their own strength. And what did their own natural hearts do? They got rid of the very one who was prepared and ready to bring the Kingdom of God.
Right into their midst.
But that Kingdom of God could only be theirs through the finished work of Christ on the cross.
And they ought to have known that from the Old Testament. That's why the Lord Jesus says to Nicodemus, art thou a master in Israel and knowest not these things? In other words, Nicodemus, have you never read Isaiah 53? Don't you remember what it says in Ezekiel 36 and a few other scriptures that you need a new heart before you can enter into these things, That you need to be born again?
But then we go back to the 8th Psalm.
And this is the one that we get in Hebrews chapter 2, repeated in the New Testament. The only one of these verses that the Spirit of God repeats in the New Testament, Psalm 8.
And verse four, what is man that thou art mindful of him, and the Son of man that thou visitest him?
Sounds very much like Psalm 144, but quite different because Psalm 144 is man in his weakness and recognizing it. Psalm 8 is man in Christ.
What is a man, that thou art mindful of him, and the Son of Man that thou visitest him? For thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned him with glory and honour. Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thy hands. Thou hast put all things under his feet, all sheep and ox, and, yeah, and the beasts of the field, the fowl of the air, and the fish of the sea, and whatsoever passes through the paths of the Seas.
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Oh Lord, it could read. O Jehovah, our Lord, how?
Excellent is thy name in all the earth. This is an occasion, I believe, which is referred to in the first chapter of first Peter, where those who wrote in the Old Testament found that the Spirit of God carried their pens and their thoughts far beyond their own experience.
They were speaking about Christ. They were speaking far beyond their own experience.
This is a Psalm of David. But did David ever have dominion over all the beasts of the field, and the fowls of the air, and the fish in the sea, and all that?
No, no, not at all. No, this refers to Christ.
And that's what God wants you and me to be occupied with. What is man that thou art mindful of him? Ah, the Lord Jesus Christ became a man, or the Son of Man that thou visitest him. As Son of Man, he inherits all things. As Son of Man, he takes his rightful place. As Son of Man, he comes in power and glory.
And as we read this morning, this world rejected him and said that's blasphemy, we won't have that.
But he will come.
And all the world will cringe before him. All the world will be compelled to bow before him. Where were you and I be?
If we know Him as our Savior, we will be with Him, that blessed One who remains a man for all eternity, in order to bring out that Kingdom of God which will be eternal. It will go right on into the eternal state, the moral character of God Himself, which characterizes those who recognize and own the rightful King in that day. It will not be a Kingdom.
That is only related to a few. It will extend itself over this whole universe for all eternity. And that Blessed One, that one about whom we have been reading in Psalm, will be the center of it all.