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Special Delivery
Presenter: Larry Kirkpatrick
Location: Mentone Seventh-day Adventist Church, Mentone, California, USA
Publication: GreatControversy.org 2005-06-26 03:30Z
Type: Sermon
URL: http://www.greatcontroversy.org/gco/ser/kir-specialdelivery.php
I have seen the wicked in great power, and spreading himself like a green bay tree. Yet he passed away, and, lo, he was not: yea, I sought him, but he could not be found. Mark the perfect man, and behold the upright: for the end of that man is peace. But the transgressors shall be destroyed together: the end of the wicked shall be cut off. But the salvation of the righteous is of the LORD: He is their strength in the time of trouble. And the LORD shall help them, and deliver them: He shall deliver them from the wicked, and save them, because they trust in Him (Psalm 37:35-40).
We live in a world where evil seems only relentlessly to expand. Everywhere, it seems, new ways of being immoral are being discovered. The triumph of evil appears inevitable. In our homes, schools, neighborhoods, evil in every form is seen. Some forms are very subtle, others, very obvious. All of it has an effect.
How do you live in a world where your own moral concerns are quaintly dismissed by those around you? Since our concerns will only be vindicated later, why even express them now?
But the Psalmist has a lesson for us. Wickedness is but temporary; peace is enduring. The apparent triumph of evil is just that—apparent. There is no explanation for evil. Could it be explained, it could also be justified. But there is no justification for sinning. What we see, seeming so enduring, is not.
The futility of sin and sinning was well captured in the classic lines,
Out, out, brief candle!
Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more: it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.
Life, this short life, that is, comes and passes quickly. We paint in haste; the colors dry quickly. The man or woman who lives fast and hard for passing pleasures and soda pop bubbles receives only those. An hour on the stage and then one is gone. For the wicked, the life is only a tale of losing eternity out of the reckoning. No matter how much sound he makes, the unrepentant sinner soon disappears; he leaves behind him only a testimony against himself.
But the Psalmist calls our attention to another one. “Mark the perfect man,” he intones. Look, says he, at the one who lives uprightly, the one whose life expresses justice and righteousness. Right now you see the wicked seeming to prosper. But when his raid on life is over, when his abuse of the world is ended, where will he be? He will be gone. But the one who copied Jesus’ character, who lived as a Christian, who settled only for the presence of Christ in him (Colossians 1:27-29), he will remain standing.
He not only remains standing; he lives out his days in this present probation, in peace. His likely is not fame and fortune; he seeks not any hour of fame, or as so often today, 15 minutes of infamy.
He tries to be a good son. And fails. But keeps on trying. He tries to be a good husband. And fails. But keeps on trying. He tries to be a good parent. And fails. But he keeps on trying. And the winner, most times, is the looser who just tried only one more time.
The righteous one has something that the wicked does not. He is not living in his own strength. Christ lives in Him. So he succedes at last.
The salvation of the righteous is of the LORD: He is their strength in the time of trouble.
Do any here imagine that the end of all things is not closer than when we first believed? ( Romans 13:11). Prophecy tells us there are stern times ahead. Just ahead. A “time of trouble” is coming. But our salvation will not be of ourselves; it will be of the Lord. He will be our strength in that time.
The promise is, “And the LORD shall help them, and deliver them: He shall deliver them from the wicked, and save them, because they trust in Him.” All this, and we must understand how to trust Him when we come to that day. And we will better understand how to trust Him then if we better understand how to trust Him now. But are we growing in that knowledge day by day? Are we really?
God has promised us in Isaiah 53:11 that “He shall see of the travail of His soul, and shall be satisfied: by His knowledge shall My Righteous Servant justify many; for He shall bear their iniquities.” Jesus would come and suffer for the fallen race, even to be hung in the sky, to die a death signifying apparently nothing but a fool’s errand or a mad man’s fancy. But as He hung suspended between heaven and earth, and all seemed the perfect gloom of ultimate defeat, He saw also what His death would purchase. He would transform many. He would deliver them.
His delivery of us is a special delivery. He is the only one who can provide it. His is the only name given under heaven whereby men may be made whole. Today we share the special gratitude that only those who know in their life special delivery can know. The Carpenter is still working. And we are still learning to trust Him. And that is exactly the way it should be. One day soon, as we round the last bend in the end-time road, we will come face to face with the one we have trusted. Then we will know that in the final measure, heaven was cheap enough—for us. But the cost was Jesus’ piercing. All praise be to Him. He came for you. He came for me. He is Jesus Christ, Savior and Lord of Seventh-day Adventists. GCO
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