Entering the Gates of Righteousness

This morning we are going to be hopping into Psalm 118 and we are actually going to be jumping right into the middle of it and start in verse 15. I have loved our last few weeks going through the Psalms and I was torn on what I wanted to preach on this morning knowing that it is Palm Sunday, that it is our cross and communion service, but let me just say that this is an incredible Psalm to be in today. To give you a little bit of history on this Psalm, this is one of the most cited Psalms in all of the New Testament. There are upwards of 24 quotations or references to this Psalm in the New Testament and it is the only Psalm that is quoted by all 4 Gospel writers. As Christ comes to Jerusalem for the final time and weeps as He sees the city, He quotes Psalm 118. As we will see this morning, the crowds on Palm Sunday quote Psalm 118. As Jesus tells the parable of the landowner to the Pharisees in Matthew 21, He again uses Psalm 118. All of this in the span of a week. It would seem that this single Psalm was likely the most quoted Psalm during the final week of Jesus’ earthly life and we know what those last few days of His life led up to. So friends, this is a very important Psalm and a very strategic one for us this morning. The Christian life is a life of victory. It is a life of blessing, it is a life that leads to everlasting joy and it is a life of acceptance by God. But the only reason that we have acceptance with God is because Christ was rejected. The only reason our lives can be picked up is because Christ laid His life down. The issue with so many people when it comes to Jesus is that they view Him as an answer to their wants and not the sole thing to meet their greatest need. They view Jesus as a wonder worker, as a great moral example, as a fantastic teacher, maybe even as a prophet, but they have no intention of submitting to Him as king. They have no intention of accepting Him as Savior. What we see on Palm Sunday is a group of people that have no problem accepting aspects of Jesus without submitting to Him totally. We see a group of people that accept Him as a savior from their political woes but not as a savior from their spiritual depravity. In fact, you may be here today admiring certain aspects of Jesus but you don’t really know Him. You don’t know the heights and the depths that He went through. No one that was ever so high has ever been brought as low as our Lord Jesus. No one that was so highly accepted and adored in Heaven has ever been so greatly rejected and despised on Earth. Our big idea for this morning is this: The only way to have acceptance and peace with God is through the fact that Christ was rejected and despised by men. We must not stumble over the stone that so many others have. This cornerstone is the only sure foundation on which we can stand. What I want to do this morning is first show you what is offered in Christ. Some of you may be here this morning and have no idea of the great reward that awaits us as Christians and I believe that we see a glimpse of it in what the Psalmist writes in Psalm 118:15-21. The Christian life as I said, is ultimately a life of victory. This morning I want to show you all that victory and then I’ll show you how we got there and how we can know that we can have it. The cross is a victory. What we will do this morning is look at victory from three ways: 1. A victory shared. 2. A victory secured. 3. A victory savored. Let’s pray and then we will read Psalm 118:15-21.

Psalm 118:15–21 NASB95

The sound of joyful shouting and salvation is in the tents of the righteous; The right hand of the Lord does valiantly. The right hand of the Lord is exalted; The right hand of the Lord does valiantly. I will not die, but live, And tell of the works of the Lord. The Lord has disciplined me severely, But He has not given me over to death. Open to me the gates of righteousness; I shall enter through them, I shall give thanks to the Lord. This is the gate of the Lord; The righteous will enter through it. I shall give thanks to You, for You have answered me, And You have become my salvation.

A Victory Shared (Psalm 118:15-21)

Now before we dive too far into these verses, it’s important to note that there is not a 100% agreement among commentators as to when this Psalm was written or who it was the wrote it. Some commentators say that the language is very similar to that of Moses and that he wrote it shortly after the Exodus. Some say that it was written by David, as many of the Psalms were. Some even say that it was written following the Jewish return from exile as we see in books like Nehemiah and Ezra. Historically though, this Psalm was used by the Jewish community at the time of celebrating the Passover. So it is very possible that Moses, after looking back on the faithfulness of God and the deliverance of the Jewish people and the Passover event, would have felt led to write this Psalm of Thanksgiving to the Lord. Regardless of which earthly author wrote it or the immediate context that was surrounding it, we know that the author is ultimately the Holy Spirit and that it is included in our Bibles for a reason. Knowing that this was a common Psalm to be sung at Passover, it works perfectly as we gather on Palm Sunday because Jesus and His disciples came into Jerusalem as the Passover was about to begin. As we go through these verses, it would be wise for us to keep the image of the passover, the image of the Exodus before us because that is one of the common threads that goes throughout all of Scripture. That first passover, that first exodus out of Egypt was a picture of a greater passover and a greater exodus that would come through Jesus Christ. As we look at these verses, we see and we can hear shouts of victory. Just prior to the verses that we read, the Psalmist writes of this great war that is before him. He says that all of the nations have surrounded him, that they were like a swarm of bees buzzing around him, but despite all of the pressure, the Lord rescued Him. Not only did the Lord rescue him from his trouble, he completely conquered over his enemies. Now from this singular rescue comes a shared salvation and celebration. There is so much that we could look at in detail within these verses but I want to point out just a few incredibly important things and it all connects to the Christian life.

God gives joy to His people

The first thing that I want you to notice is that God gives joy to His people. Verse 15 said that the sound of joyful shouting and salvation is in the tents of the righteous. Well who are the righteous? True righteousness needs to be given. You cannot make yourself righteous. You can act righteously but to be righteous, God must first give you righteousness. Paul says in 2 Corinthians 5:21 “He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” If you were to look at Genesis 15 in the Lord’s promise to Abraham, you would see in verse 6 that Abraham believed in the Lord and it was counted to him as righteousness. The gift of faith was given to Abraham, he believed and it was counted to him as righteousness. Just as God is the giver of righteousness, He is the giver of joy. It is entirely possible for the Christian to experience joy regardless of the situation that they are in. The joy of the Christian is not dependent on what is present in their lives, it is entirely dependent on the never-leaving presence of God in their lives! David in Psalm 16:11 says, “You will make known to me the path of life; In Your presence is fullness of joy; In Your right hand there are pleasures forever.” True and lasting joy can only be obtained as a gift from God. John Calvin in his commentary on the Psalms said, “David testifies that true and solid joy in which the minds of men may rest will never be found anywhere else but in God; and that, therefore, none but the faithful, who are contented with His grace alone, can be truly and perfectly happy.” So the Christian life is a life of joy.

God gives life to His people

The second thing that I want you to notice is that God gives life to His people. Psalm 118:17 “I will not die, but live, And tell of the works of the Lord.” Where does that confidence come from? The only one that can save from death is the only one that can give life. God, at any moment, can decide to save. He is the great sustainer of life and as you have heard me say before, the day of our deaths serve only to make us better. Death is nothing more for the Christian than the tool that God uses to hasten us into glory. Now is the Psalmist talking about resurrection in these verses or is he talking about his physical life being saved from the troubles and war that he had mentioned earlier? Even if he only is talking about his physical life and not eternal life, we can still see this verse as something that points beyond physical existence into the spiritual and eternal because the truth of the resurrection stands firm. Christians will not die forever but will live. Paul goes as far as referring to the death of Christians as nothing more than sleep. Paul in 1 Thessalonians 4:13–14 “But we do not want you to be uninformed, brethren, about those who are asleep, so that you will not grieve as do the rest who have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so God will bring with Him those who have fallen asleep in Jesus.” Why is death considered sleep? Because when you lie in the grave as a Christian, all your physical body is doing is waiting until the alarm clock of Heaven tells you that it is time to wake up. The moment the Christian dies, the soul goes to be in the presence of Christ forever but the promise of Scripture is that just as Christ’s physical body was raised, our physical bodies will be raised from the dead when Christ returns for the Church. We as Christians have the promise of Christ that we will be with Him forever. Jesus prays in John 17:24 “Father, I desire that they also, whom You have given Me, be with Me where I am, so that they may see My glory which You have given Me, for You loved Me before the foundation of the world.” The Christian, with full confidence can say, “I will not die, but live. I’ll go to sleep, but that sleep will not be forever.” D.L. Moody once said, “Some day you will read in the papers that D. L. Moody is dead. Don’t you believe a word of it! At that moment I shall be more alive than I am now. I shall have gone up higher, that is all; gone out of this old clay tenement into a house that is immortal, a body that death cannot touch, that sin cannot taint, a body like unto His own glorious body.” That is a sure promise, a sure gift that God gives to His people.

God lovingly disciplines HIs people

A third thing that God gives to His people is loving discipline. Psalm 118:18 says, “The Lord has disciplined me severely, But He has not given me over to death.” Now you might hear that and think, “How is that a loving gift from God?” I think that when we think of discipline that we tend to think of it as a negative. How on earth then can discipline from God be a positive for the Christian? It’s because He disciplines with love and the discipline that He gives to His people is not a death sentence. Hebrews 12:5-11 says:

Hebrews 12:5–11 NASB95

and you have forgotten the exhortation which is addressed to you as sons, “My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord, Nor faint when you are reproved by Him; For those whom the Lord loves He disciplines, And He scourges every son whom He receives.” It is for discipline that you endure; God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom his father does not discipline? But if you are without discipline, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. Furthermore, we had earthly fathers to discipline us, and we respected them; shall we not much rather be subject to the Father of spirits, and live? For they disciplined us for a short time as seemed best to them, but He disciplines us for our good, so that we may share His holiness. All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterwards it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness.

Loving discipline from the Lord is not a sign of rejection but is a sign that we have been adopted as His sons and daughters. God disciplines us to correct us. He disciplines us ultimately for righteousness sake. If you are a parent, you probably know that most children don’t enjoy discipline. But why do you do it? Hopefully it isn’t just to squash them down but hopefully it is done because you want to warn them against a behavior that could harm them. In fact, it would be unloving of you if you allowed your child to keep doing something that could ultimately cause them harm. God in His love disciplines His people to prove evidence of our adoption and also so that we would share in His holiness. What a blessing that the God of perfect holiness loves us enough so that we could share in that holiness!

God answers His people

Finally, God answers His people. Psalm 118:21 “I shall give thanks to You, for You have answered me, And You have become my salvation.” God hears the prayers of every Christian and God answers the prayers of every Christian. Tim Keller used to say, “God always answers your prayers in precisely the way you want them to be answered if you knew everything he knew.” How can we be sure of this? It’s because we as Christians have an advocate before God the Father. We as Christians have a mediator between God and man: the Lord Jesus Christ. God has not turned His back on His people. God has not ignored the cries of His people. He hears and knows. Friends do you understand that as a Christian that the God of all creation hears you and knows you? All of this that we have just talked about: this victory that is given to God’s people which is made up of joy, life, discipline, and answering, how does this all happen? How is this victory secured? Let’s look now at Psalm 118:22-29. The Psalmist writes:

A Victory Secured (Psalm 118:22-29)

Psalm 118:22–29 NASB95

The stone which the builders rejected Has become the chief corner stone. This is the Lord’s doing; It is marvelous in our eyes. This is the day which the Lord has made; Let us rejoice and be glad in it. O Lord, do save, we beseech You; O Lord, we beseech You, do send prosperity! Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord; We have blessed you from the house of the Lord. The Lord is God, and He has given us light; Bind the festival sacrifice with cords to the horns of the altar. You are my God, and I give thanks to You; You are my God, I extol You. Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good; For His lovingkindness is everlasting.

Jesus Christ is the stone which the builders rejected. He was rejected by the religious leaders of His day, as we see in His trial, He was rejected by His kinsmen and by the Gentiles. He was stricken, smitten, and afflicted. Yet this very same Jesus has been highly exalted so at the name of Jesus every knee will bow on Heaven and on earth and under the earth and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father. This stone that was rejected now has the place of preeminence as the chief corner stone. The One that God sends to deliver, the One that God sends to save, has been rejected. The Messiah that the Jews awaited for for centuries is rejected by the one’s that should have been most looking forward to His coming. Yet on this side of the cross, this rejection is wonderful because if Christ was not rejected by the religious leaders of His day, we would not have the cross. We would not have redemption from sins without the death and resurrection of Christ. Looking back at the stone which has been rejected by the builders that has become the chief corner stone, we can look at as something that we can rejoice in. Christ was rejected so that we would be accepted. In verse 24, the Psalmist points to the day that the Lord has made so let us rejoice and be glad in it. That day which he points to is the day of our deliverance. It is the day of the new covenant being brought forth in the death and resurrection of Jesus. As Jesus went through the streets of Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, as He heard the crowds crying “Hosanna to the Son of David”, He knew that He came to die. His life would not be taken, His life would be laid down. The Light of the World came so that you and I would be reconciled to Him. Psalm 118:27 gives us one more key component of what happened to the stone which the builders rejected. Let’s read it one more time: “The Lord is God, and He has given us light; Bind the festival sacrifice with cords to the horns of the altar.” The festival sacrifice, the passover sacrifice was tied to the horns of the altar. As the people come together to celebrate the passover, be it at the time of Moses or be it at another point in Israel’s history, they hardly could have imagined what would soon take place on Calvary’s hill. Derek Kidner writes, “What those who took part in such a ceremony could never have foreseen was that it would one day suddenly enact itself on the road to Jerusalem: unrehearsed, unliturgical, and with explosive force. In that week when God’s realities broke through His symbols and shadows, the horns of the altar became the arms of the cross, and the festival itself found fulfillment in Christ our passover.” This is the day that the Lord has made and this day very well may be the day of your salvation. Your eternal victory is secured not on what you can do but on what Jesus Christ has done. As Jesus goes to the cross, He goes with the purpose of saving. He doesn’t go to simply make salvation possible. He goes to the cross to make salvation certain. Christ’s atoning death doesn’t produce possibilities, it brings forth certainties. Why would God the Father part with His beloved Son for a mere possibility? No, Christ’s death and resurrection completely accomplishes the work of redemption. Christ willingly goes to the cross because He knows that all that the Heavenly Father has given to Him will come. Maybe you are here today and you have not yet come to Christ. Maybe you are here today and you have not yet taken hold of all that Christ offers to you. Don’t wait a second longer. There are a lot of thoughts about Jesus but won’t you accept the grace that is offered to you? James Montgomery Boice said, “You must not stumble at God’s grace in Jesus Christ, as many have, tripping over that stone. You should come to Jesus instead and build your life on that secure foundation.” Don’t trip over that stone. Don’t reject the cornerstone. Build your life on nothing less than Jesus’ blood and His righteousness. Come to Christ where the victory of all Christians is secured.

A Victory Savored (1 Corinthians 11:23-26)

As Christians we have a shared victory, we have a secured victory, and now we can savor that victory and that is what we are going to do this morning as we come and celebrate the Lord’s Supper together. We savor what Christ has done on our behalf. As Christians, when we come together to celebrate the Lord’s Supper we remember and we proclaim that Christ has died, Christ is risen, and Christ will come again. The Son of God’s body is broken and given for all of His disciples. The love of God for you which surpasses all comprehension takes Christ to the cross. What is like this love? What else could compare to this victory? “Could we with ink the ocean fill, and were the skies of parchment made. Were every stalk on earth a quill and every man a scribe by trade. To write the love of God above would drain the ocean dry; nor could the scroll contain the whole, though stretched from sky to sky. O love of God, how rich and pure! How measureless and strong! It shall forevermore endure- the saints’ and angels’ song.” What a Savior! What a Lord! As we come together and take communion, I want you to understand just how important of a moment this is. I want you to recognize that this really does mean something. No, the bread and the juice does not become the literal body of Jesus but we remember that we who were once far off have now been brought near by what Jesus has done. As we come together, we can savor the victory that has been won by Jesus. We can savor the victory from sin and the grave and here in just a moment in our hands will be a visual representation of what Jesus has done. So I invite all Christians now to come around the table and to take the bread and the cup and stay around the table. Don’t eat it just yet, we will take it together. If you are not a Christian, this moment isn’t for you. This is a special moment of remembrance and proclamation for the followers of Christ. Let me pray for us and then I invite you to come and take part in the Lord’s Supper.

Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 11:23-26:

1 Corinthians 11:23–26 NASB95

For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus in the night in which He was betrayed took bread; and when He had given thanks, He broke it and said, “This is My body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of Me.” In the same way He took the cup also after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in My blood; do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me.” For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until He comes.