This sermon is from the Rev. Charles G. Dennison sermon archive, part of the “Psalms” series, and was preached at Grace Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Sewickley, PA, during a worship service on Sunday, January 3, 1988.

but not yourself, because of evildoers, be not envious toward wrongdoers, for they will wither quickly like the grass and fade like the green earth. Trust in the Lord and do good. Dwell in the land and cultivate faithfulness. Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desire of your heart.” Commit your way to the Lord, trust also in Him, and He will do it. And He will bring forth your righteousness as the light and your judgment as the noonday. Rest in the Lord and wait patiently for Him.

Threat not yourself because of Him who prospers in His way, because of the man who carries out wicked schemes. Cease from anger. and forsake wrath. Threat not yourself, it leads only to evildoing, for evildoers will be cut off, but those who wait for the Lord, they will inherit the land. Yet a little while, and the wicked man will be no more, and you will look carefully for his place, and he will not be there, but the humble will inherit the land.” and will delight themselves in abundant prosperity.

The wicked plots against the righteous and gnashes his teeth at him. The Lord laughs at him, for he sees his day is coming. The wicked have drawn the sword and bent their bow to cast down the afflicted and the needy, to slay those who are upright in conduct. their sword will enter their own heart, and their bows will be broken. Better is the little of the righteous than the abundance of many wicked, for the arms of the wicked will be broken, but the Lord sustains the righteous.

The Lord knows the days of the blameless, and their inheritance will be forever. They will not be ashamed in the time of evil, and in the days of famine they will have abundance. But the wicked will perish, and the enemies of the Lord will be like the glory of the pastures. They vanish, like smoke they vanish away. The wicked borrow and does not pay back, but the righteous is gracious and gives. For those blessed by him will inherit the land but those cursed by him will be cut off.

The steps of a man are established by the Lord, and he delights in his way. When he falls, he shall not be hurled headlong, because the Lord is the one who holds his hand. I have been young, and now I am old, yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken or his descendants begging bread. All day long he is gracious and lends, and his descendants are a blessing.

Depart from evil and do good, so you will abide forever. For the Lord loves justice and does not forsake his godly ones. They are preserved forever, but the seed of the wicked will be cut off. The righteous will inherit the land and dwell in it forever.

The mouth of the righteous utters wisdom. and his tongue speaks justice. The law of his God is in his heart. His steps do not slip. The wicked spies upon the righteous and seeks to kill him. The Lord will not leave him in his hand or let him be condemned when he is judged. Wait for the Lord and keep his way, and he will exalt you to inherit the land.

When the wicked are cut off, you will see. I have seen a violent, wicked man spreading himself like a luxuriant tree in its native soil. Then he passed away, and lo, he was no more. I sought for him, but he could not be found. Mark the blameless man, and behold the upright, for the man of peace will have a posterity.

But transgressors will be altogether destroyed. The posterity of the wicked will be cut off. But the salvation of the righteous is from the Lord. He is their strength in time of trouble, and the Lord helps them and delivers them. He delivers them from the wicked and save them because they take refuge in him.

Let us pray together. Father, we are your servants, we have been made to be your servants by your will, your design, your calling. For you have known us from before the foundation of the world, and in time you have made us your own, and that through Christ and by the working of the Spirit in keeping with your grace. We ask, Father, that the assembly of the righteous may be filled full, and that that assembling would be filled full after the manner of the workings of the gospel that you have ordained. Therefore, Lord, we pray that those given to the Church for proclamation would be faithful to your word and to you. and that they would love you above all else, that they would serve you, and Lord, as they do so, may you vindicate them in fulfilling their ministries with the goodness which you have ordained. We pray these things in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Tonight we conclude our messages on Psalm 37. We have worked our way through this psalm, truly a memorable psalm, a wonderful psalm indeed. How it has proven itself fresh to us as we have considered it. We have thought of it in terms of that central problem that we articulated when we first began our consideration of it. We should be aware, well aware, of that problem and tension which exists in this song, and I trust as we read it through one more time, that that tension was apparent to you. There is a general tone to this song. that presents us with a difficulty.

You see, the psalm seems to be saying that the life of the righteous brings, as its reward, immediate prosperity and vindication. Oh, to be sure, even in keeping with the of the psalm, suffering and opposition do arise, but these are short-lived and limited. In fact, according to the general tone of the psalm, the lot of the righteous is never that of abject poverty. On the other hand, in keeping now with the general tone of this psalm, the life of the wicked, it seems, brings, as its reward, immediate deprivation and recompense. Oh, to be sure, prosperity and good fortune arise for the wicked, but these are short-lived and limited. In fact, the loss of the wicked is never won out from under impending doom.

Now the question is whether or not we feel comfortable with the general tone of the song. Is that, after all, what we conclude when we look at life. Do the righteous immediately prosper? Is there suffering of a brief period, then giving way to God’s vindication? Do the wicked come, as it were, under God’s immediate to be judged of him and deprived of prosperity in this world in deference to the righteous.

Well, our immediate reaction is that, no, that’s not the case at all. It seems that the state of the wicked can be one of indefinite prosperity, and the state of the righteous can be one of indefinite suffering. and deprivation. In fact, as to the longevity of these circumstances, we can even cite other scriptures to establish the point, a point contrary to the general tone of scenes of the 37th Psalm.

Well then, if we conclude that we aren’t comfortable with the general tone of the 37th Psalm, what do we do then with the Psalm? Do we dismiss it? Do we cut it out of our Bibles and throw it away? Do we ignore it? Do we suggest that it was a mistake that this Psalm made its way into the canon of Scripture? Not at all.

It is my hope, before the conclusion of this message this evening, As we make our way through the psalm once more towards its ending, the answers to this problem and difficulty will become abundantly clear to us. Well then, the general tone of the psalm, presenting us with a problem. But we’ve also thought through the psychological and spiritual development of the psalm, and that, as we have seen, is quite profound. So if we are taking something away with the general tone, we are sort of gaining it back through an investigation of the psychological and spiritual development of this particular psalm.

You note, at the beginning of the psalm, the psalmist, we presume David, invades against what is called fretting. Fretting because of evil doings. A fretting which in keeping with the second line of the psalm translates into envy. The wicked, so it seems, Again, bringing the general tone of the psalm into view, the wicked are momentarily prospering, and the temptation arises for the righteous that they in envy will set their hearts upon what the wicked have.

The righteous will want what the wicked possess. We have seen the implications of this. Again, moving along the psychological line, moving along the lines of the spiritual development of the psalm. We have seen that the envy spoken of here drives the righteous towards imitation. Therefore, the spiritual threat is that in fretting about the prosperity of the wicked, and then in envying the wicked, the righteous will end up imitating the wicked in order to gain what they have. That is the plan.

Now this is suggested to us in the opening sentiment of the psalm. But over against that, now, over against that posture of envy, that posture of envy and wicked acquisition is set for us the posture of faith. This is what is commended to us. in deference to a position of envy and wicked desire. Verses three through eleven, as we have suggested, present us with as magnificent a description of faith as we have in the Old Testament.

Faith here is defined in terms of its activity. It’s not defined here in terms of intellectual category, but instead of that, it is defined in terms of its activity, what it does, what faith does. Faith acts in a good fashion. Faith does good. and it waits patiently for the Lord. It rests in him. It stops the voice of complaint, and instead it gives itself to the voice of consent before the Lord. is marvelously described here for us as anywhere in the Old Testament.

But then we go on to verses 12 through 20, and here these verses lay bare for us the horrifying realities of the life of evil. Work your way down through those verses, and you see the horrifying realities of the life of evil as it sets itself against the way of righteousness. Injecting itself into these verses is a life that eventually is given over to violence in its opposition to righteousness. But take stock of these verses, because you see, these verses are also related to that with which the psalm began, namely the envying, namely the whole principle of imitation. There is a subtle warning at work in these verses, that the righteous are not to cave in to envy, because of their fretting, because, as we’ve already said, that leads to a life of imitation. A life of imitation of the wicked.

And as the wicked have set themselves against the righteous to act violently against the righteous, then those who have been righteous or imagined themselves to be righteous, they, in imitation of the wicked, become those who also. act violently against the righteous. We have thought these verses through in terms of the supposed righteousness of Israel, significantly during the times of Christ, when in righteousness, so-called righteousness, the freshers and the endears gave way to imitation of wickedness and resorted to the methodology of the wicked, directing their plots and schemes against the righteous one, doing him violence. And so far, to verse 20, now we take up 21 through 31.

What did we find here? It seems that here there is spoken for us a concrete example, very mundane, very simple, with regard to the life of faith in counter-distinction to the life of wickedness. Note the common character of the example, verse 21. The wicked borrows and does not pay back. We have said that this verse, its opening, also its second line, gives us an avenue of entrance into a whole way of life, a whole way of looking at life. A simple illustration, indicative of a mindset. and an attitude of heart and life. Notice the contrast. The wicked devises, plots, schemes to gain and to hoard.

The reason why he will not pay back what he has borrowed is because his whole life is geared toward and committed to the accumulation of the things of this world. He cannot part with it. He will not part with it, because that is the meaning of his life.

And it doesn’t matter whether he’s a capitalist or a communist. is the righteous man who lives by faith. Now note the character of the faith, the quality of the faith. The faith so trusts God that rather than devising and plotting to gain and to hoard, it is busy lending and openly giving away. And it is not threatened by the fact that it does not have. So marvelously does the life of faith assert itself here, that even if misfortune and distress come, even if suffering overtakes the righteous so that the righteous one falls, verse twenty-four, falls into misfortune, into distress, faith itself is maintained in that circumstance. In fact, in that circumstance, in the midst of misfortune, in the midst of distress, faith, true faith, which does not set its heart upon the things of this world, continues to lend and to give away. It might be impoverished because of the opposition, the persecution, the hostility vented against it, but faith continues to be open-handed and magnanimous.

Here, as we said last week, is the exposition of that wisdom that is mentioned in verse Here is the true exposition of that justice, which is spoken of in that same verse, and in the next verse, verse thirty-one, here is the ultimate exposition of the law of God that is written upon the heart. This is the law that is expressed in and through Christ, who, in the midst of his circumstance of misfortune and distress, continues to give of himself, to give himself away. Nothing less than what is recorded here in this psalm is witnessed in its ultimate sense in Christ Jesus our Lord. who, in living the perfect life of faith, persists in doing good, in being gracious, in giving, despite the horrors of the evil directed against him. This one, the Lord Jesus Christ, is not only the fulfillment of the positive things of which we read in this psalm. He in the end, because of his perfection, becomes the source of our fulfillment of these very things.

As well. You may be thinking to yourself, how in the world could I ever respond in a way that is with Christ. When I am the victim of violence, misfortune, and distress, how in the world? Well let me tell you, only through the one who has perfectly lived out the kind of faith that is spoken of here. only through him. He is your hope.

That brings us to the final stanzas of the psalm, verses 32-40. Now it may be said that these last verses don’t do anything to bring us along the way with regard to the psychological and spiritual development that has been worked out or is being worked out in some. There’s nothing new here. It seems to be simply a reiteration of the things that have been said. So why do we have to say them again?

But, as we encounter this restatement, we are confronted once more with the assault of wickedness by the unrighteous upon the righteous. These verses Reiterating as they do, that conflict also marked out well for us the ultimate resolution, the promised end, the promised end for the righteous in prosperity, the promised end for the wicked in oblivion. And that point is now brought home.

It is brought home unmistakably and quite vividly. as the psalmist presents us with an illustration in verses thirty-five and thirty-six. For there he compares the wicked man to a magnificent tree, one not only luxuriant, but one that seems destined to remain for a very, very long time well established in the world. But thinking about these verses and the illustration here of the wicked man, compared as he is to that luxuriant tree, the impact of these verses is that the indestructible character of that tree is counter-managed by the person and the work of God, and that quickly, quickly, that tree is destroyed and the place that knew it once knows it no longer. The psalmist pictures himself as one who one day passes by, sees the tree, it’s there unmistakable, but then the next day, seemingly the next day, that quickly he passes that way again and the tree is gone.

Now, I know what you’re thinking. How does this get us out of the problem that we spoke about at the beginning of this message and have spoken about with regard to in the messages that we have given on this psalm thus far? How does this resolve the issue of the apparent prosperity of the wicked, the apparent deprivation of the righteous? The force of this illustration seems to be in line with that problematic consideration of the psalm of the whole. Namely, the brevity of the life, the brevity of the life of the wicked, that the wicked will be judged immediately and their prosperity will be removed and the righteous will be vindicated and they then will flourish. As if one day You saw the wicked prospering, and the very next day they were gone.

Now that seems to be the force of it all, as it has seemed to be the force throughout the psalm as a whole, and certainly there is that legitimate line of interpretation that carries us along through the psalm in keeping with that general tone. But please understand now. that that isn’t the primary force at all. The primary force is that focus upon faith and the activity of the faith that is operative in the righteous.

That’s the point that has been concentrated upon by the psalmist throughout. His intention is to expound that faith, and what does that faith do? Why, it brings the conclusion of the matter into view in such a way that it seems as if all is resolved because of the resolution that faith precedes. Do you remember what is said of faith in Hebrews? Chapter eleven, verse one, let’s take the King James Render. Faith is the substance, the substance of things. Do you understand now what’s going on, even here, before the times of the New Testament, before the appearance of Jesus Christ? Proper definition, proper limits for faith are being asserted. Why, this faith too grabs hold of the substance which belongs to the ultimate blessing of the righteous, and it brings it into present circumstance. And it brings it into present circumstance in such a way that the resolution of things seems immediate. It’s as if, when faith is operative appropriately, the wicked are judged And that conclusively, and the righteous, because of that faith, are immediately vindicated.

Immediately. There is no delay. And that’s how faith works. You see what faith is doing for you. It is bringing the conclusion of the matter into your life, making it and appropriation for you now, so that you live, even in the midst of the tensions of this world, as if that tension is resolved. In the midst of the problem of the prosperity of the wicked, as if that problem is resolved. It is taken care of.

That’s how faith acts. That’s how faith works. Faith reaches into the future and grabs the substance of eternity and pulls it back into the present. Faith touches the last judgment. Your vindication and the recompense of the wicked. and brings that into your immediate circumstance.

Lest you fret. Lest you become envious. Lest you despair. Lest you doubt. Lest you become overcome by fear. Faith lets you taste heaven. Faith lets you taste heaven. In conclusion, the problem disappears, and the tension evaporates. For yes, the wicked will be judged, and the righteous shall be vindicated. And by faith we see that as an immediate reality through Christ our Saviour. Oh Lord, truly it is as if the tree of wickedness flourishes in a day and then we pass by the next and the tree is gone so immediate are these realities to faith that it seems as if the light affliction given us is but for a moment and the eternal weight of glory is breaking out in us as it has upon us in our present circumstance. O Lord, we rejoice in how Jesus Christ, our Savior, has made these things plain so that the character and the object of faith is even clearer to us now than it could have ever been to the writer of the psalm. But how much more the responsibility for us, then, that we not fret, that we do not become envious, that we do not become imitators of the wicked, nor set our hearts upon treasures in this world, but upon those which are above.

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