Psalm 110:1

Could we look together in Psalm 110, Psalm 110. I want to think with you about the significance of what it says here in verse 1. The Lord said unto my Lord sit thou at my right hand until I make thine enemies thy footstool. Now first of all we have two who are called Lord.

Now there's two different words in the original language. One is the the name that has been put into English as Jehovah or more commonly now as Yahweh. It is a name of God that is his exclusive name.

The name that distinguishes him from all other claimed gods. That name of Jehovah and every time you have your in the King James Bible Lord in all capitalized letters it is this special title that means simply the eternal one. The one who is eternal.

The one who is everlasting. The one who always was, who is, who always will be. And so it should be obvious to us that if he is this eternal one that he's relevant to us.

He was there when you were born. He is there every moment of your life. The day you die he is there.

He is the one who decides eternal destiny. The eternal. But then he says the eternal said to my Lord.

So who is this talking about? It's interesting that the Lord Jesus challenged his audience one day with that question. What do you think of the Christ? Whose son is he? Well he said well he's the son of David. They knew that the promised Messiah was to come of the lineage of David.

So he was the son of David. So he says well how then did David in spirit call him Lord? Saying the Lord said unto my Lord sit thou at my right hand. If he's his son how is he his Lord? Now I've been a boy growing up in a family with a father.

Then I became a father with two boys. Now I'm a grandfather with a number of grandchildren. And my dad never called me Lord.

And I've never called my sons Lord. So how is David talking to someone who is his descendant, his son? How is he his Lord? That's the big question the Lord was challenging the audience with. And of course the answer is because he's the Son of God.

I'm going to read a few more verses here but I want you to read you think as we go from here to the New Testament about this question. What does it mean that he is seated at the right hand of God? And until, until. Verse two says the Lord shall send the rod of thy strength out of Zion.

Rule thou. So you know, one is in the present, one is going to be in the future. Rule thou in the midst of thine enemies.

Thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power. In the beauties of holiness from the womb of the morning thou hast the due of thy youth. The Lord has sworn and will not repent.

Thou art a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek. Now that's a very significant declaration. We'll find that again in the book of Hebrews.

And then verse five says the Lord at thy right hand shall strike through kings in the day of his wrath. He shall judge among the nations. He shall fill the places with dead bodies.

He shall wound the heads over many countries. He shall drink of the brook in the way. Therefore shall he lift up the head.

Now my brother who has just spoken has, has been appealing to you to hear what God says. To recognize God's speaking. So let's go into the New Testament to the book of Hebrews chapter 1. Hebrews chapter 1 and we'll find this distinctly stated.

Hebrews 1 and verse 1. God who at sundry times and in diverse what manners or different ways spoke in time past unto the fathers by the prophets has in these last days spoken unto us by his son whom he has appointed heir of all things by whom also he made the worlds who being the brightness of his glory and the express image of his person and upholding all things by the word of his power when he had by himself purged our sins sat down on the right hand of the majesty on high and then it says being made so much better than the angels. Verse 13 says but to which of the angels said he at any time sit on my right hand until I make thine enemies thy footstool. Now let's think back in history.

The words that we read from Psalm 110 would have been given somewhere in the range of a 3,000 years ago. 3,000 years ago. And when the writer to the Hebrews is writing after the death and resurrection of Christ he's referring back to something that had happened in his time in his generation which we would now say is about 2,000 years ago.

Something happened. Something happened in this world that is going to change and determine the course of history. The future of the world.

And that event that happened was the crucifixion of the Lord Jesus Christ. The crucifixion of the Son of God. So what Psalm 110 prophetically looking forward a thousand years or more was looking at a moment when a work at Calvary would be accomplished and his son would be raised out from the dead and God would receive him up into heaven.

And he'd say sit here. Sit right here. But that's not the end of the story.

Sit here until. Until I make your enemies your footstool. So I want you just to think.

I want you to get the big picture. Each of us has our own little life. Our own little things that are important to us.

What seems important or relevant. But we are in a world that is going to be surrounded by this big picture. So what does it mean then? Sit on my right hand until I make your enemies your footstool.

In the first place it means there's a finished work. This is what the book of Hebrews brings so powerfully to our minds. He's sitting because he has accomplished a work.

Hebrews uses this expression I think four times at least. He sat down. And this is what it says.

When he had by himself purged our sins he sat down on the right hand of the majesty on high. And so Christ today if I could possibly get you to have your attention focused. To pull the veil back what is invisible to us today but declared to be real.

There is a man sitting in heaven at the right hand of God and he's sitting there because he has accomplished the purification of sin. He has made the sacrifice that can take away the sin of the world. And that can take away your sin and fit you for the presence of God.

So it testifies to a finished work. But that until also testifies to unfinished business. Now I have never had to go through this kind of experience of watching one of my children be tortured and have to stand there and not do anything to stop it.

I couldn't imagine watching my son being beat up by somebody else and just standing there letting it happen. God watched the world. The leaders of the Jewish people, the leaders of the nations gather together and torture and abuse his son and impale him to a cross and mock him.

Mock his claim to be God's son. Mock the honor that is his to be the king over God's universe forever. God has unfinished business with this world.

And one day, one day, God is going to no longer say sit. He's going to say rule. Rule in the midst of your enemies and the Lord Jesus Christ is going to return into this very same world and he is going to bring the judgment of God upon this world and establish his rule.

Are you ready for this? Where are you in this picture? Today you can look into heaven and you can see someone at God's right hand who died for you, who paid the price to cover your sin. And Hebrews chapter 1 brings us this wonderful emphasis. God, he says, he spoke in times past, different ways, different times, to our fathers through the prophets.

So yes, the people of Israel, they held on to this reality. God has spoken to us. We are the custodians of God's truth to the world.

And yet when God sent his final message to them, his own son among them, they rejected him. They cast him out and destroyed him. And he says, God has spoken.

At the end of this time period, God has spoken to us in his son. And by the way, he has appointed him the heir of all things. So the future belongs to Christ.

This beloved son, this son that God loves. God has conferred upon him everything. Everything belongs to him.

And so your future, your hope for any good in the future depends on you becoming connected to Christ. If you have Christ, you have salvation, you have eternal life, you have an inheritance in God's kingdom. You have a future.

God is restraining his wrath. You know, I was debating today, which I should speak from, the verses that I have read or John chapter 3. Because really the whole question again revolves around these two things. God loves you.

God loves his son. God loves you, but he hates your sin. And God must judge sin.

You have put God, I have put God in a dilemma. He genuinely loves us. He loves us more than our mother or father.

He loves us more than our husband or wife. He wills our joy, our blessing, but we have sinned against him. And God in his holiness, his justice, he must deal with sin.

That's the background of Psalm 110. There is a day when God must say, enough is enough. Time for judgment to flow.

God has resolved this dilemma of his love and his justice by providing his beloved son to take your place in judgment. To give himself for you. You know, I was only eight years old when I was saved.

One of the things I remember, this is just a reference to our brother talking about how after you're saved, it's all so simple. I think it was the day after I was saved. I told somebody that I could have been saved years ago.

Profound statement from an eight-year-old. But I knew then that what I had longed for, for as long as I could remember, I longed to be saved. I never remember being indifferent or feeling hostility towards Christ or the gospel.

In many ways, I didn't know how to trust or believe. I didn't know how to do this. But finally, what came through to me was one of the prophets, Isaiah 53.

He was wounded for our transgressions. He was bruised for our iniquities. And it just came simply into my heart and mind.

He was wounded for me. And God is satisfied. And as I grasped that, I rested on it.

I entrusted myself to him in that moment. And that's really what salvation is all about, is in acknowledging that God, in his deep love for us, was not willing to just let us perish without seeking to rescue us. And he sent his own son.

And this son, who is the owner of everything, the son through whom he made the worlds, the son who is the creator of everything, this one who is today upholding, sustaining life. He is sustaining the universe as it exists today. He is sustaining you in your existence.

He is upholding all things by the expression of his power. And then it says, when he had, by himself, provided the purification of sin. You know, I know I have sinned.

I know I have been dishonored and defiled within my own being through sin. But the God who is pure and holy and righteous, he has provided his own son to cleanse away my transgressions, my sins. I have rested in this.

And I joy in this today. And I am willing to face the future with this confidence. God's son, the one who is at God's right hand today, he's there for me.

He died for me here in this world. Now he is in the presence of God. In Hebrews chapter 9, and I should just read a couple of these verses, Hebrews chapter 9, it says in verse 24, Christ has not entered into the holy places made with hands, that is on earth, which are the figures or pictures of the true or the real, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us.

It gives me tremendous confidence today to know that there's somebody that God has given the place at his right hand, who died for my sins, who has entered into the presence of the eternal God as that final eternal priest, a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek, the one who will never be replaced, who will never die, and you'll have to find somebody else to help you in your relationship to God. God's own son, his eternal son, the one who is my savior, he is the one who brings me into the presence of God. And I also joy in this fact that we have mentioned briefly in looking through 1st Thessalonians, he's our deliverer, he's our deliverer, our rescuer from this coming wrath.

But please do not become complacent. You may have heard the gospel spoken to you for as long as you can remember, there's a day coming when it will not be spoken anymore. When the offer of forgiveness, the offer of the removal of all your guilt before God is not going to be presented, but instead the Lord Jesus, the very same one who in all his compassion to us, yielded himself to die for us, he's going to come in all the wrath, the fury of God's vengeance upon wickedness in this world.

Sit thou at my right hand until. Hebrews chapter 10 verse 11 says this, every priest stands daily ministering and offering oftentimes the same sacrifices which can never take away sins, but this man after he had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down on the right hand of God from henceforth, from now on, expecting, waiting, anticipating till his enemies be made his footstool. There is a day coming when God is going to answer the challenge of the world against him and against his son.

When the Lord Jesus was here in this world, he was representing God to the world. He was reaching out to the world as God's hands in compassion, and God knows that the rejection of his son at Calvary was the rejection of himself. This enmity shown towards Christ is enemy towards God, and one day after God has shown for these 2,000 years, this anger, this wrath against sin, against the rebellion of the world, against the crucifixion of his son, has been held back, and instead through his son and his death, God is offering to you forgiveness until, until.

Will you come to terms with God today? Will you acknowledge his son? This is what God expects of you, what God demands of you. Honor my son. Receive my son.

Acknowledge him as the one who died on your behalf, and I will receive you into heaven. Our Father, we bow before thee. We are deeply grateful for the Word of God being able to be spoken in our hearing.

Some of us have listened to it from infancy. Some of us have become very complacent, and it seems that it will always be there for us if and when we choose to receive it. But we would pray that thou might open each one's understanding today to acknowledge that this is a time of grace.

This is a time of God showing mercy and seeking reconciliation, but there is a moment when grace will be replaced with judgment, and this same one who came in such grace will come in glory, bearing the vengeance of God upon human wickedness, and the kingdom of God will be established. The earth will be subjected. Our Father, we thank thee for each one that has received him in a time of grace, who has listened to the voice of God and is willing to come to Christ.

We beseech thee for thy gracious blessing in our Savior's worthy name. Amen.