Christ-Centered Thanks #1

If you are disheartened if you are disillusioned. If you are discouraged, you need to come back to these fundamental things that are revealed in the Old Testament and we are going to see hearts full of Christ centered banks for the goodness of God to us in his son.

The only benefit of placing our faith in Christ is the forgiveness of sin that would be more than enough reason to be incredibly thankful.

But God didn't stop there. Hello, welcome back to the pulpit with Don Greene, founding pastor of truth Community Church in Cincinnati, Ohio. I feel right today is Don continues in his series titled Christ till Thanksgiving will show us that our heavenly father accomplished far more than we may even realize by sending his son to die on the cross for our sin. Stay with his friend because today's lesson is going to increase your level of gratitude exponentially. Let's discover more from our teacher.

As we join them now for part one of a message called Christ centered here on the pulpit.

I just want to kind of start in the New Testament focus to make a couple of statements New Testament preaching is Christ centered preaching and there's no avoiding that. And I can't imagine why anyone would want to. The apostle Paul said we preach Christ crucified. First Corinthians 1.

Few verses later he said I determined to know nothing of among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.

Then later in second Corinthians.

He said we do not preach ourselves, but Christ Jesus as Lord and so Paul makes it plain that a New Testament preacher, a New Testament pastor is one who is focused on the Lord Jesus Christ and one of the ways to measure a man's ministry and to know whether he is a man to follow or not is to listen to a number of his sermons over the course of time and have your ear tuned for that emphasis on Christ and that will be a basic measure of discernment for many. But as we think about the New Testament as we think about proclaiming Christ.

It's important to remember this that centuries before the coming of Christ. The writers of the Psalms laid a prosthetic foundation for his life and ministry.

Jesus himself said this when he said in Luke 24 all things which are written about me in the law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.

And so the Old Testament was anticipating Christ from the very beginning, the Old Testament was laying the foundation. There is a continuity between the old and new Testaments relating to the person of Christ that should never be mess and it's important understand it's a topic for an entire message or series of messages that the character of God, the attributes of God are the same in the Old Testament and in the New Testament is not that the Old Testament God was a God of wrath. In the New Testament God. By contrast, was a God of love, no, these are eternal attributes of the one true God, and there could not be any change between the old and the new Testaments about that now long as we contemplate this prosthetic foundation of of the prophets, and of the Psalms in particular wanted to remind you also of a passage that is in Peter's letter first Peter chapter 1 verse 10 where he says this, that, as to this salvation, the prophets who prophesied of the grace that would come to you made careful searches and inquiries seeking to know what person or time the Spirit of Christ within them was indicating as he predicted the sufferings of Christ and the glories to follow. As these men wrote in Old Testament times. They knew that there was something about the coming Messiah that was being revealed through them and they long to know it and they studied what their own writings were seeking to understand it better. But it goes on Peter goes on to say in verse 12 it was revealed to them that they were not serving themselves.

In other words, the endgame was not the prophets and the psalmist themselves, but you those of you in the New Testament era in these things which now have been announced to you through those who preach the gospel to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven things into which angels long to look, I hope that you and I trust that you have a sense of great privilege as you open a Bible and as you as you hear the word of God taught because there were countless people better than us.

In Old Testament times who wanted to know and hear the things that we that we teach and that we speak about with each other and it was not given to them. Angels long to look into the things of which we have free and abundant access.

In the Scriptures, and in and in the preached word, and so this is a great privilege that we have and in the privilege of gathering around the person of Jesus Christ.

The privilege of gathering around the written word of God is something that we should never take for granted and it is something to which everything else in our lives is subordinate by way of importance and privilege. You know, we have things the prophets wanted to know we have things that angels long to look into and Scripture says that God reserve the blessing for those of us who were living in the aftermath of the first advent of Christ. What a privilege we have now with all of that said and it gives us a good perspective as we come back to Psalm 118 Psalm 118 is a very important part of that Old Testament foundation that was laid for the coming of Christ. And so, let's turn to Psalm 118 and read it yet again as this is our final message on the Egyptian Hollowell Psalms 113 through 118 celebrating the goodness of God and giving thanks to him because of the mercy that he shows to disheartened and and small people, so to speak. He is good to those who come to him in repentant faith and he was good to the nation of Israel.

In Old Testament times.

This is just to who God is. He's just good to his people. God is just good to his people and because we are slow to believe that because our hearts are hard, and because we tend to view God through the lens of our circumstances, rather than our circumstances through the lens of the goodness of God. We tend to lose sight of this. And so we need to come back to this again and again and again. And if you are disheartened if you are disillusioned. If you are discouraged, you need to come back to these fundamental things that are revealed in the Old Testament and we are going to see were fulfilled in the Old Testament unto the end onto the goal that we would walk out with our hearts full of Christ centered, thanks for the goodness of God to us in his son. Psalm 118 verse one. Give thanks to the Lord for he is good for his lovingkindness is everlasting. O let Israel say his lovingkindness is everlasting. O let the house of Aaron say his lovingkindness is everlasting. O let those who fear the Lord say his lovingkindness is everlasting from my distress I called upon the Lord, the Lord answered me and set me in a large place. The Lord is for me. I will not fear what can man do to me.

The Lord is for me. Among those who help me. Therefore I will look with satisfaction on those who hate me, it is better to take refuge in the Lord than to trust in man, it is better to take refuge in the Lord than to trust in princes all nation surrounded me in the name of the Lord.

I will surely cut them off. They surrounded me.

Yes, they surrounded me in the name of the Lord. I will surely cut them off. They surrounded me like bees. They were extinguished as a fire of thorns in the name of the Lord. I will surely cut them off. You pushed me violently so that I was falling with the Lord helped me. The Lord is my strength and song, and he is become my salvation. 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 is 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. The stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone. 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. Oh Lord, do save, we beseech you, oh 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 is given a slight 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 and as a prefatory statement what you and I should understand as New Testament believers in Christ is that Jesus Christ is our primary reason for giving thanks to the Lord and that will be evident as we go through the New Testament usage of of this song but are our reason for giving thanks to the Lord is because he is sent his son in order to be our our Savior, our master to redeem us from sin. The goodness of God is seen and expressed preeminently in the Lord Jesus Christ, not in our material circumstances not in our physical health for the coming and going of people in our lives. The preeminent expression of why we give thanks to the Lord why he is good is seen supremely in Christ, and it is in Christ, where the loyal love of God is everlastingly on display for us and so this song brings into focus the entire point of our spiritual existence. The entire focus of our of our prayers of our aspirations of our affections are all failed in their all fulfilled in Christ and in Christ alone. He is transcendent to the believing heart and everything else is is secondary. By comparison, and so were looking at Christ centered. Thanks.

As a result of with the way that will see the New Testament uses the song as we go through it here today so we saw it last time that this song is preeminently a call to Thanksgiving. The opening verse in the closing verse are all a call to give thanks to the Lord Israel, the nation of Israel did old thanks to the Lord because of the kindness that he had shown to them and delivering them from Egypt and establishing them in the land and protecting them from their enemies, giving them temple worship is a picture of the coming of the coming Messiah, and the sacrifice that he would make. And so as we saw last time Israel from the perspective of an Old Testament saint had all the reason that they needed to give great thanks to to their God today now, and I mean today in 2021 and today in the New Testament era.

We give thanks to the Lord for Christ centered reasons Christ is ever preeminently and the focus of our of the reason that we give thanks. Let me just pause for little pastoral word to you here if if you're struggling with being grateful here if you're if you find yourself in a spiral of ingratitude in a negative perception on life. Let me encourage you to just honestly before the Lord humbly before the Lord, without giving any answered anybody in the room around you. It is almost certainly the case that somehow somewhere along the line you've lost Christ as the central focus of your heart affections. You've been distracted away from your focus on Christ because I ask you, how could we look at Christ crucified. How can we look at Christ buried how can we look at Christ resurrected. How could we look at Christ ascended in heaven interceding for us at the right hand of the father. How can we look at Christ and know that he's coming again for his people.

How can we look at Christ and know that that we are one day going to see him face-to-face and be made like him because we will see him just as he is, how can we look at Christ and know that our eternal destination is wrapped up in Christ, and that there will be an there will be an eternal blessedness without end that is ours. And when we been there 10,000 years will have no less days to sing his praise than when we first began how I ask you, could anyone have those things that belong to that and know them to be true and to to possess them by faith and and not have a fundamental disposition toward life and toward God. That is one of of giving thanks. I realize this convicts us all.

But the word of God convicts us in the word of God is a war wounds us and with our shortcomings and with our ingratitude. It wounds us in order to heal us. It wounds us in order to make us better, it's, it's the surgeon's scalpel taking out the cancer from your heart and replacing it with healthy flesh that is that is beating and throbbing with gratitude and in a look that's just a better way to live and it's certainly a a way of living that is more pleasing to the Lord. First Thessalonians chapter 5 verse 18 says in everything give thanks, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus. And so an ungrateful heart, a complaining bitter grumbling heart is not a minor matter that can just be dismissed because circumstances are not to our liking, no way a heart that has fallen into a pattern of grumbling and discontent is a heart that is in need of some serious repentance because Christ is worthy of our praise worthy of our thanks worthy worthy of honor and gratitude for all that is done for us all that he is in his person and his majestic work all of the riches that he has stored up for us. You know there's just no other reason, and there's no other responses right and proper than to be grateful to him and I think that that is is unavoidable and the fact that we live short of that glory is no reason not to embrace it into aspire into and to look to live in a better spirit of that going forward. So with those things said Psalm 118 plays a surprisingly large role in the New Testament is quoted in at least 12 different New Testament passages. As we said for many weeks now.

Psalm 118 was likely the last song that Christ himself saying before his death when he left with the disciples as they closed up the. The last Passover. The first Lord's supper and so there's there's much about this song. That is, that is just throbbing waiting to be explained to us about about the person of Christ. So we asked this question, what does this song teach us about our Lord in light of the way that it is used in the New Testament. The New Testament makes it very plain that this song is preeminently about the Lord Jesus Christ and and that's just in keeping with what Christ said what I quoted earlier. Luke 24. Everything about me and this is written in the Psalms must be fulfilled.

So what does this song teach us about our Lord were going to see three different insights into our Lord that contribute to our thanks for him, as we bounce from passages in the Psalms and in Psalm 118 and then see how they're used in the New Testament and will just take these in sequence as they appear in in the Psalm itself.

First of all we see this, we see that Christ is the cornerstone Christ is the cornerstone if you're taking notes that's that's the first heading. Jesus Christ is the cornerstone in Psalm 118 speaks about uses that illustration to 2.2 the Lord Jesus Christ.

Look at verse 22 Psalm 118, the stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone. This is the Lord's doing. It is marvelous in our eyes.

The cornerstone as we said last week was the most important stone in the entire building.

It set the lines in the balance for the entire building that was constructed around it and what we find. As we look to the New Testament, is that that picture is used to describe the Lord Jesus Christ and his his rule and his role in the church. It is in Christ, that all things in the church hold together.

It is in Christ that everything about your salvation holds together. Were it not for Christ. None of us would be saved and if you think about it in in pre-internal through chronological to post eternity, or our future eternity matters. You see how much all of this holds together Scripture tells us that it was it that we were chosen in Christ before the foundation of the world before the beginning of time. In Christ we were chosen by God to receive salvation during the course of time step into time step into 2000 years ago and it was Christ who offered himself at the cross as the substitutionary penal sacrifice for our sins, he suffered the penalty on our behalf. 2000 years before you and I were ever even born.

That's pretty remarkable to think about how much this was placed to motion before we ever existed, and then you think back if you're a Christian and you think back to the moment of your salvation you were you were saved as God worked in your heart and produced in you. Faith in Christ for your salvation, your conversion, your justification is premised on the fact that you put your faith alone in Christ alone. Now as we continue on in the Christian life.

It is the spirit of Christ working out sanctification in us, conforming us to the image of Christ, making us more and more like our Savior. Over the course of time and then when either when the Lord returns or when we die and enter into his presence. We die and were absent from the body and work and were home with the Lord. So there is this there is this bright Royal ribbon that that is woven from eternity throughout all of time and into into eternity future all wrapped around the glory and the work in the person of Christ that we benefit from.

So he is the cornerstone to our salvation individually and as a result, he is the cornerstone for the church as well and we see Jesus in the New Testament. Applying this passage to himself in response to the Pharisees of suppress this thought a couple of times already and I'm just going to say this to you young men that are on the front end of your life.

Or maybe you're a little older in your 20s or early 30s. I want you to seriously consider whether it wouldn't be worthwhile for you to give the rest of your life aiming to be able to be in a position to preach the glories of Christ.

That is a great call in an aspiration and it is worthwhile of your attention to seek the Lord and to see whether that is something that he would have you do. It's not enough for us as a church just to have one or two or three guys are preaching Christ and then you know the next generation doesn't have anything like that. One of the goals is that there would be another generation of men coming up afterwords saying that's what I want to give my life to as well and it's a lifelong pursuit. It's a lifelong devotion of study and prayer and and seeking after Christ and doing the hard work to come to things. It's all I'm saying is a young man.

It's a worthwhile object for you to consider and to see if the Lord wouldn't grant that to you to preach Christ is is an amazing thing to be able to do and whether you give your life to it, or whether you just seriously serve and allay capacity in a church in a Christ centered way. Christ is the cornerstone Christ is that Royal ribbon that runs through all of time for the benefit of his of his people and we need to we need to be thinking about giving ourselves over the proclamation of his glory with whatever breath whatever strength, whatever resources the Lord gives to that's just the way it is.

That's done green with the first half of a message called Christ centered. Thanks here on the truth pulpit. Don will bring you part two on our next broadcast, if you'd like to hear this message again nor like to share it with a friend or loved one.

Just go to the truth. Pulpit.com. While you're there you'll find all of Don's teaching along with other helpful study resources.

That's the truth. Pulpit.com. We trust today's time in God's word has been an encouragement to hope you'll join us next time right here on the truth pulpit done green