So, if you would please turn in your Bibles this evening to Psalm 130, again these Psalms of Ascents are very near the middle of your Bible, page 658 in the Pew Bible, Psalm 130. We're making our way through the Psalms of Ascents, Psalms that Israel sang as they answered the Lord's call to gather together for worship, to worship as a body, to worship corporately. And they assembled on a mountain in a city and at a temple that could be touched with human hands. Hebrews 12 tells us that we, who through faith have come to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, have come to a heavenly Mount Zion, a heavenly Jerusalem, and an assembly of the firstborn enrolled in heaven. And all this and more we have come to already. So that as we worship this evening, we really do worship in the company of the saints who've gone before. and to the angels who are around His throne. That is a spiritual reality that our eyes cannot see, our ears cannot hear. By faith our hearts can understand that we have been brought into the Holy of Holies tonight together to worship and to hear from our Lord and to sing to Him and to pray to Him. We've not entered into the fullness. We have to wait for Jesus to come back for that before we'll enter that fullness body and spirit. But in the meantime, and we make our way to that heavenly home, we are pilgrims in this land, a land not our own. That's what these psalms have been teaching us and showing us. And we sing these songs of ascents, as we just sang. That's a song for us along the way. But this psalm, 130, is not only a song of ascents, it's also one of what is known as the penitential psalms, the song of penitence, of repentance and faith. that lead us in godly sorrow that produces repentance. And as we read it tonight, I want you to hear the double focus here. This has a twin focus, one that's very explicit that we want to make sure we catch, and one that's implicit that drives the whole unfolding of what the psalmist has to say to us. The explicit focus is on God. He's mentioned by name or by title eight times in eight verses. You're going to hear reference to him all through these eight verses. in two ways. When you read your Bible, sometimes we go so fast. The Lord and the Lord. You're going to see that word eight times, but different spellings. Sometimes with all small caps. That's the name of the Lord, Yahweh. The creator of the universe, who made covenant, the covenant of grace with Abraham, who entered into the Sinai covenant with Moses, Yahweh, the Lord. And also Lord with lowercase, which is the word for Adonai, or Master. the one we serve, the one who's sovereign, who has authority over all that he's made and all of his subjects. And so we take them together. The focus is on the sovereign Lord in this psalm. And the implicit focus, the implied focus, the unexpressed focus, is the faith of the psalmist. It's the gift of God. It's not by works. It's not something that he conjured up. It's the gift that God has given him. And while the word faith is never mentioned in this psalm, it produces everything that the psalmist says and does. This psalm is permeated by the expression of faith in the Sovereign Lord. By faith, the psalmist believes and trusts that the Lord God will listen. And so he prays in verses 1 and 2. He trusts that the Lord God will forgive. And so he confesses in verses 3 and 4. He believes that the Lord God will draw near. And so he waits in verses 5 and 6. And he trusts that the Lord God will redeem. So he urges us to share in his hope in verses 7 and 8. So hear now and receive Psalm 130 that urges you and me to hope in the Lord who listens, who forgives, who draws near, and who redeems. Hear now the word of God, a song of ascents. Out of the depths I cry to you, O Lord. O Lord, hear my voice. Let your ears be attentive to the voice of my pleas for mercy. If you, O Lord, should mark iniquities, O Lord, who could stand? But with you there is forgiveness that you may be feared. I wait for the Lord. My soul waits, and in His word I hope. My soul waits for the Lord more than watchman for the morning, more than watchman for the morning. O Israel, hope in the Lord. For with the Lord there is steadfast love. And with Him is plentiful redemption. And He will redeem Israel from all His iniquities. So ends the reading of God's Word this evening. Well, the psalmist opens in verses 1 and 2 to lead us by faith to hope in the Lord who listens. Now, we need to know that hearing and listening are not the same thing. Perhaps your parents told you this, children. Hearing recognizes a noise in the room. Listening pays attention, knows what it means, and acts on it. That's what the psalmist would have us see is the Lord listens to His people. It begins with the psalmist in the depths, in deep trouble. He's feeling as though he's been cast overboard into a stormy sea and he's in over his head or that he's been caught up in some quicksand and he can find no footing. We all have a sense of that feeling at one time or another in life, that feeling of sinking helplessness. That's where the psalmist begins. And he is unable to save himself and so he cries out for help. But not help, help, anybody help. He cries out to the Lord for help. Out of the depths I cry to you, O Lord. This is a cry of faith. He knows that there's no mortal that can save him from his trouble. Only the sovereign Lord could save him who created the heaven and the earth and saved his people Israel. And so he cries to the Lord. Israel in their history had been born of the depths. When Moses gives a business card summary of the life of Israel in Numbers chapter 20, it's very clear, and we hear it in the psalm. It says, we cried to the Lord. He heard our voice and sent an angel and brought us out of Egypt. That's all of Exodus right there. That's the thinking, that's the belief, that's the confidence that the psalmist had. And by faith, when Solomon dedicated the temple, the temple at which this psalmist is praying, he prayed, oh my God, let your eyes be opened and your ears attentive to the prayers of this place. And so the psalmist comes with that kind of confidence. The Lord is the Lord who listens and acts to save. The Lord is the one who gives attention to the prayers of this place. And there he is in the temple. Crying to the Lord who listens and hears and pays attention and answers the prayers of His people. O Lord, hear my voice. Let Your ears be attentive to the voice of my pleas. He's utterly helpless. Utterly dependent. His cry is loud and clear. His pleas are for mercy. For deliverance and a rescue from trouble. From misery. He's begging the Sovereign Lord to show compassion by diving into His circumstances, to dive into His trouble and to save Him, to bring relief. And the question is relief from what? Sometimes when we read the Psalms and we have this kind of general announcement of trouble, we, and sometimes it's appropriate, we want to fill in the blank with our trouble today. It's a right response. But in this particular psalm, the psalmist has something particular in mind. It's not the circumstances of his life and it's not other people around him that are causing him distress. From what follows in verses 3 through 8, we find that his mind is on his sin. His trouble is his sin. For he'll turn in verses 3 and 8 to talk about iniquity. About forgiveness in verse 4. About redemption. In verses 7 and 8. As John Owen said, it is sin alone from which forgiveness is a deliverance. And that's the focal point of this psalm, is the sin that's troubling the psalmist. Now many of us have difficulty, or may have difficulty relating to this kind of weight of pressure from sin. Pastor Gordon's been highlighting that the last few weeks and it's an appropriate thing to highlight because we are strong people or so we see ourselves. We're often preoccupied by troubles related to difficult circumstances out there or by difficult people out there. Acutely aware of their sins against us but painfully unaware of our sins against God and other people. If we're honest, that's how we live. That's how I often live. It saddens me. It frustrates me, but it's the way it is in this life. How often do we pray with David from Psalm 139? Search me, O God, and know my heart. Try me and know my thoughts. See if there is any grievous way within me. And lead me in the way everlasting. Sometimes we do grasp the weight of our sin. and some of us more than others. Some so acutely that they're paralyzed. They don't know what to say. They don't know how to act. They just don't know what to do. So the question is when you do, where can you turn for help? There's no help. There's no deliverance. You can be found by looking inside to sort it out for yourself, to gain a handle on your sin, to somehow rise above and win the day. There's no deliverance found by looking to others. Everyone else is a sinner just like you. They can't save you from your sin. The psalmist shows us and tells us the way by crying out to the Lord and pleading for mercy. And the Lord will hear and pay attention and answer according to His mercies which the scriptures tell us are new every morning. By faith we can see that, we're to see that. By faith we're to know that we can bring this to the Lord. The Lord will hear. And He'll respond with grace and mercy. How can we be sure? The psalmist wants us to be sure. And he goes on to confess in verses 3 and 4, which lead by faith to hope in the Lord who forgives. The Lord to whom we are instructed and led to cry is the Lord who forgives. The psalmist feels the eternal weight of his problem. The Lord is holy, holy, holy, and he, the psalmist, is not. And so we ask in verse 3, if you, O Lord, should mark iniquities, if you should keep a ledger, if you should store our sins away in a safe deposit box and bring charges against us on the last day. Lord, if you were to do that, who could stand? It's not that he doesn't know the answer. He does, but he wants us to answer the question. Not with what we might think or feel about how it should be or how we want it to be, but how the Lord says it is. Paul sums up what the Lord says in Romans 3. He says, All are under sin As it is written, none is righteous, no, not one. No one understands, no one seeks for God. All have turned aside, together they have become worthless. No one does good, not even one. Sin is the problem. The problem for the psalmist and for everyone, you and me included. And if the Lord should mark our iniquities. No one would stand. We'd be undone. The Lord said this to Moses. You remember from Exodus 34. The Lord appeared to Moses and Moses wanted to see his glory and the Lord said, no, I'm not going to show you my glory but I'll give you a peek and he put him in the cleft of the rock which we know is Christ to protect him and he went by and he revealed to him his justice. He said, I will by no means clear the guilty but he also revealed that he's merciful and gracious abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness forgiving forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin see the Lord alone is the solution to our problem it's not just that he has the solution he is the solution and so the psalmist continues in verse 4 but with you Lord there is forgiveness right now it lasts forever no matter who we are where we are or what we have done we don't need to go through life people of God wondering whether we are or are not forgiven as if it depends on us or our efforts he keeps no record of wrongs but the Lord there is forgiveness. Ask Him for it. Trust Him to grant it. Not because you deserve it, but because you are utterly dependent on His grace and mercy. And He will give it. How many times have you heard from this pulpit the promise from 1 John 1 that if we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. That confidence is to be ours. It's the confidence that the psalmist had and it's what he wants us to have in mind when we approach the Lord and we cry out because of our sins. Now, sinners that we are, some of us, over the course of the history of the church, some of us, some of the time, want to misuse this free gift of God's grace as a license to sin. Hey, this is a good deal. If I ask, He forgives. If I ask, He forgives. What shall we say then? Are we to continue to sin so that grace may abound? Are we to sin because we're not under law but under grace? That question's been asked before, Romans 6. It's a question we ask in our own hearts when we want to do what we want to do. But the answer is, by no means. By no means. True repentance that receives true forgiveness does not entertain that way of thinking. Because the Lord's forgiveness, the psalmist shows us, is not an end in itself. It's not an end in itself. It's not something that we go get to have forgiveness. It's not something that God gives that we might be forgiven. It's given to serve a greater end. It's a means to an end. The chief end of man. We're not Presbyterian here, but you might know that. It's to glorify God and enjoy Him forever. Or as the psalmist says, it's the fear of the Lord. So listen. In verse 4. With you there is forgiveness. That's the means. That you may be feared. That's the end. That's why the Lord grants forgiveness to his people. And we might fear him. What's that mean? It doesn't mean we go grovel and hide in terror of him. The scripture tells us that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. It's the opening to wisdom. It's the way that frees us to rightly revere almighty God, our Father in heaven, and hallow his name. Hallowed be thy name. So forgiveness opens the way for us to step into the fear of the Lord, the wisdom of hearing him, heeding him, following him, loving him, hallowing his name. Spurgeon helpfully translated this verse this way. It says, there's forgiveness with you that you may be loved and worship and serve. And so in all of Paul's epistles, he gives us the good news about who Jesus is and what He's done and who we are in Him by faith. And then he turns to what? How it is we are to live. The fear of the Lord. To live for His glory. To live to enjoy Him. That's what forgiveness is for. Now just as we did tonight, nearly every week we confess the Apostles' Creed. Which includes the confession that I believe the forgiveness of sins. when you say it? Do you believe it? Are you asking God for it daily? Because Lord knows we're sinners every day. But we can do that by faith. We're called to do that by faith. And we need to know that when the Lord forgives sin, He reconciles sinners to Himself. He brings us back into closeness, nearness to Him. That He may dwell with us and we with Him. And so in verses 5 and 6, the psalmist leads us by faith to hope in the Lord who draws near. Who draws near to His people. Now in Old Testament Israel, the Lord dwelled in the temple among His people. He drew near and brought them near through the sacrifices and the ceremonies of the priests. That's what all of those sacrifices and ceremonies were about. We're about reconciling sinners to a holy God, bringing them near that He might come near to them and they might enjoy fellowship. It's in the company of God's people, gathered in worship that the psalmist has pleaded for mercy. He's confessed his sins. He's trusted in the Lord to forgive. And now in verse 5 he tells us how he waits for the Lord to draw near. In the temple would be to draw near with a word of assurance, a word of blessing, a word from the priest who spoke in the name of the Lord. I wait for the Lord. My soul waits and in His word I hope. Here in this verse with two words the psalmist tries to have us capture the essence of this waiting. We see it in the text here as wait and hope. What these are trying to express to us or intended to express to us is that he waits with perseverance and that he waits with expectation. He waits with perseverance not by killing time, not by twiddling his thumbs waiting for the Lord to do something but by actively worshiping the Lord as the Lord has arranged for him to do. I wait for the Lord. My soul waits in worship. And he waits with expectation for the Lord to speak a new word or to confirm to him a word he's already promised. In his word, I hope. In his word, I wait expectantly. And in verse 6, the psalmist lets us know that he waits for and hopes in a sure thing. It's not a vain wish. It's not an empty hope. It's not something that might happen or not happen. It's something that's going to happen. And he's waiting for it. He's not going to miss it. It's more sure than the sun will rise tomorrow. You go to bed every night thinking we're going to see the morning. You go to bed each night thinking and this world's going to be here tomorrow or we're going to be in it. In verse 6, he compares his waiting with that of watchmen for the morning. My soul waits for the Lord. More than watchmen for the morning. More than watchmen for the morning. Now whether those watchmen were soldiers on the city walls or whether they were priests in the temple, watchmen in Israel had to persevere through the dark of night while expecting the dawn of a new day. That's what they did. And with that coming, there were things that they would do, but that's what they were tuned into. They were watching the horizon for the break of a new day. If you've ever worked an all-night shift, you know what it is to persevere through the dark of night. Most of us aren't wired for it. I'm not. But that's the picture he wants us to have, His perseverance through the dark of night, waiting for the dawn to break. And by faith he tells us that he waits for the Lord with more perseverance, more expectation, more certainty that any watchman waits for the morning. That's the purpose of this comparison. Psalm 25, verse 3 assures us that none who waits for the Lord shall be put to shame. None will be disappointed. None will regret the perseverance. none will find their hope was misplaced. For the Lord will draw near to His people, and His word will be fulfilled. That's the testimony of Scripture throughout. The psalmist, an inspired writer, knew by faith that the temple and its worship were but a foretaste, a shadow of the greater reality that was yet to come. All that he did in worship was something looking forward to something greater than what he would ever see. The mercy he desired and for which he pleaded would not be fully enjoyed until the Lord himself would come near. The forgiveness he needed and trusted the Lord to provide would not be fully accomplished until the Lord would come near. And so he waits and he hopes not only for the Lord to draw near in worship where he is right now, but to draw near in person. To come to his people. The psalmist didn't live to see the day when the Lord drew near in Christ Jesus our Lord. He didn't live to see that day. He didn't live to see the day when the Lord came near to enter into our misery. We heard that this morning. To take our sin upon Himself. To suffer the judgment of God against our sins. And to be raised for our justification. And to ascend for our sanctification. All that so that He might gather and prepare a people for when he will draw near again and to bring us to himself to enter into the joy of our master body and soul to live with him forever in the new heavens and the new earth and to cast out all those wicked who will not repent and believe. He had to come. He had to enter in. He had to take our place in order to open the way for us to come to him. He had to draw near. And for all of this, the psalmist waited as we still wait for the Lord Jesus to come again. And in the meantime, verses 7 and 8, the psalmist urges the people of God to join him by faith to hope in the Lord who redeems. Who redeems. To redeem is to buy back. Some of you take your bottles and cans the recycle center to get a nickel. You redeem them. You buy them back. Or you have them buy them back. The psalmist begins, O Israel, hope in the Lord, speaking to the people. Speaking to Israel. He's speaking not only to the national Israel that has gathered there for worship, he's speaking to the universal Israel of God, What Paul called the church in every age, every place. And his message is for everyone who has faith in the Christ. For him, the Christ to come. For us, the Christ who has come. So his message is for you if you're trusting in Jesus Christ to forgive your sins and to relieve you of your ministry. He says, O Israel, hope in the Lord. Hope in the Lord. Wait with persevering expectation for the Lord to draw near to you. Persevere in worship. Together with all the saints as you come together for worship, persevere in worship, especially when you don't have the zeal to come. Persevere in worship. And wait with expectation in worship for Him to draw near in His law where He shows us His holiness that reveals our sinfulness, our ongoing need for forgiveness and shows us the way He wants us to live as His people. Expect Him to draw near and by His law to work in you. Expect Him to come near in His gospel with the promises and the assurances that forgiveness is yours through faith in Him and that everlasting life is yours and it cannot be taken away. And wait with eager expectation for Him to come with His word of blessing that greets you when you gather here tonight. You were greeted today or this evening by the Lord's greeting. That's His word to you. Expect that word. Receive that word. That's the Lord drawing near to you. And expect His blessing when He sends you out tonight. To persevere in living in a manner worthy of the gospel that you have been called to as you eagerly expect His return to draw near once again on the last day. That's the architecture of the Christian life. Our worship is a micro picture, a microcosm of what it is to live. The psalmist continues in verses 7 and 8 to give us more reason to hope in the Lord because of what is with him, verse 7, and because of what he's promised, verse 8. He just piles on reasons that we can hope in the Lord. Hope in the Lord, for with the Lord there's steadfast love. Covenant love. Love that He's chosen to show you. That He doesn't show everybody. This is what He shows to His people. He has loved you from before the foundation of the world. He has manifest His love by sending His only Son into this world that we might live through Him. He's poured His love into our hearts by His Spirit. And there's nothing in all creation that will be able to separate us from His love in Christ Jesus. With the Lord, there's steadfast love. Hope in the Lord. Hope in the Lord, for with Him is plentiful redemption. Redeem is to buy back. I got ahead of myself a minute ago. And the redemption price for a sinner. For even one. It's the price that no sinner can pay. We can't pay it ourselves and no one can pay it for us. Other than a sinless man. That's the price. For any sinner. For one sinner is the price of a sinless man's life and death. And so Jesus said the Son of Man came into the world to give his life as a ransom. For many, to redeem many. Jesus Christ lived the perfectly obedient life that God requires. And He paid for all our sins and has set us free from the tyranny of the devil. He went to the cross and shed His blood to do that. He paid the price. And by His life and His death and His resurrection, He has accomplished redemption once and for all that is sufficient. to satisfy for the sins of the whole world and as efficient as we heard from the Canons of Dort, effective to redeem completely each and every one the Father has given Him. And so Paul wrote to the saints in Colossae, God has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. Hope in the Lord. With Him there is plentiful redemption. There's room for you. There's sufficiency for you. And if you're trusting in Him, it is effectively and completely and eternally forgiven. And finally, he says, Hope in the Lord, for He will redeem Israel from all His iniquities. He'll redeem Israel, the Israel of God, all the people of God across time and across space, every sin, past, present, and future, He will redeem. That's because the Holy Spirit is active now, here in this world, to apply the redemption that Jesus Christ has accomplished, that the Gospel announces, that's received by faith. He applies it to God's people. and he will continue this work until all the saints are gathered in from every nation, from every tribe, peace, people, and language. And once the fullness of the saints has been gathered in, the end will come, what Paul calls the day of redemption. The day when it's all wrapped up with a bow, and that's it. All that Christ accomplished has been fully applied, And then the end will come when the Lord will draw near once again and forever. Our faith will be sight, our hope will be realized. And we will dwell in the house of the Lord, body and soul, forever. Until that day, people of God, hope in the Lord. Who listens, who forgives, who draws near, and who redeems. Amen? Come, Lord Jesus. Let's pray. Our Father in heaven, we thank you for this word tonight that has revealed your goodness, your grace, your mercy, your forgiveness, your reconciling love for us. We sang it well when we sang that with you, redemption full and free. It's all about what you've done for us. We thank you for the faith to believe it, to receive it, by the power of your spirit to be changed by it, and to be enabled in our hearts, Lord, to be persevering and expectant as we live life in this world. On our way to glory, for sure. as we wait for you to draw near week by week as you meet us in worship and in the end when you meet us in glory. Thank you for this in Jesus' name. Amen.