If you would this morning, go to Psalm 11. Psalm 11. While you're turning, just by way of context and remembrance, the book of Psalms is 150 individual songs. And they were songs sung by the Jews. And Psalms is divided into five different books or scrolls, if you will, in the first book. is Psalm 1 through 41. And as we've seen so clearly, the theme of this book of the Psalms is human suffering and the need for divine deliverance. We need God to deliver us, don't we? Not only from sin, but self and temptation and everything in between. And up to this point, just about every Psalm that we've looked at would fit into the category of what is known as a Psalm of lament. But today in Psalm 11, we're going to see a psalm of confidence. And it was funny because as we were singing that psalm, Leah leaned over me and talked about how graphic that was. And then Scott was like, wow, that was graphic. And you know, that's what the psalm calls for. We're going to read it straight out of the Word of God here in just a minute. And just like I told the Sunday school class, You know, we're going through the attributes of God. And this morning we looked at the love of God or His omnibenevolence. He's an all-loving God. But we also looked at the holiness of God that includes His justice and His wrath and the fact that God is going to judge sinners and that He will cast the lost into the lake of fire for all of eternity. It's one of the clearest doctrines in the Bible. There's no way to skirt around that. And a lot of people look at that and by the way, God's omnibenevolence, the fact that He is all-loving, not only does that mean that He is the source of true love, but it also means that God is incapable of doing that which is unloving. Have you ever thought about that? Because sometimes we go through trials or we see tragedies in the world and we think, you know, how could a loving God allow that to happen? But He is incapable of doing that which is unloving and He is only capable of doing that which is loving. So how can you reconcile that type of a loving God with a God that will cast people into the lake of fire? How does that work? And it's because we have to understand the concept of justice and love. It is not loving to be unjust. God is a righteous judge and He must punish sin. In the illustration that I gave to the Sunday school class, is what about somebody like Adolf Hitler? Where do you think he is today? I've actually been witnessing to people on the street and just sharing the gospel with people. I've actually met people, talked to people, that at first they say, I don't believe in hell because I believe in a loving God. And I've asked them, What about Adolf Hitler? And I've even had one young lady, her whole face changed, and she said, oh, he's definitely burning in hell. And I said, wait a second. I thought you didn't believe in hell. She said, well, there's probably one for him. Do you see what happened? I stroked that sense of justice within her heart. And she recognized the fact that somebody like Adolf Hitler who killed millions of people, even millions of children. He does not just get to die and go to sleep and take a dirt nap. There's got to be some justice for that. And we have that innate sense of justice and we understand that. But here's the thing. as obnoxious as we find the sins of somebody like Adolf Hitler. If we can recognize that kind of injustice and that kind of wickedness through our tainted sinful lenses, can you imagine how a thrice holy God sees our sin? He's not going to sweep it under the rug. But thank God that not only is He so just and so holy He has to punish sin, But He is so loving that He sent His Son, Jesus Christ, to die on our sins and take the punishment for us. And He promised to forgive us and to cleanse us if we would just repent and put our faith and trust in Him. And so I want to say that because, listen, we are going to get to some psalms, you know, even some imprecatory psalms where the psalmist prays for the wrath of God to pour down on his enemies. We see a hint of that, but I'm going to tell you something. Psalm 11 is very G-rated. compared to some of the things we're going to see. But I just kind of want to set that foundation to understand that even the justice and wrath of God is loving, because He's not going to let criminals walk off scot-free. He's a just God, and that's loving. And so in Psalm 11, in this Psalm of Confidence, just to give you a 30,000 foot view, The language here seems to allude to a sneak attack. There seems to be a coup within David's administration as an attempt to overthrow his rule. And the first few verses indicate that the conspirators threatened David and encouraged him and his followers to flee like a bird to the mountains. This is not good, solid counsel. This is a threat. If you know what's good for you, you'll flee like a bird to the mountains. That's what they're saying. That is the counsel that is being given to David by these conspirators. But the psalmists ask a very important question during the time of this wicked assault, and that is, if the foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do? And that's what we're going to look at this morning most specifically. So with that context in mind, let's read the Word of God together, Psalm 11. It says, In the Lord put I my trust. How say you to my soul? Flee as a bird to your mountain. For lo, the wicked bend their bow. They make ready their arrow upon the string. They may privily shoot the upright in heart. If the foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do? The Lord is in His holy temple. The Lord's throne is in heaven. His eyes behold, His eyelids try the children of men. The Lord trieth the righteous, but the wicked in Him that loveth violence His soul hateth. Upon the wicked He shall rain snares, fire and brimstone, and an horrible tempest. This shall be the portion of their cup. For the righteous Lord loveth righteousness. His countenance doth behold the upright. Heavenly Father, we love you. We're so thankful for salvation in Jesus Christ. We come to you in His name. Lord, I just ask forgiveness where I failed You, Lord, in my thoughts or my attitudes. Lord, that You would just fill me with Your Holy Spirit. God, that preaching would be clear and powerful. And Lord, that the Word of God would just take root in our hearts by Your Holy Spirit. Lord, if there's somebody that's lost in their sin today, God, I pray that they would seek the salvation that only comes through faith in Jesus Christ and His death, burial, and resurrection. Lord, for those that may feel like the psalmist today, they feel like they're in a trial, maybe they feel betrayed. Who knows what the situation is, Lord? I have no idea the burdens that everybody walked in with this morning, but you know, and I'm thankful that you're a refuge for us in time of trouble. Lord, would you just hide me behind the shadow of the cross and that Christ will be magnified both here and in Tremont. It's in Christ's name I pray these things, amen. So we're looking at the thought this morning. If the foundations be destroyed. Now, that really is what we're dealing with and that's a question I think we all need to wrestle with. But when it talks about the foundations here, I think it speaks of God's order within a society. In this case, Israel. And if the wicked, the thought here is if the wicked can overthrow the godly king that the Lord has placed in power, what in the world can any of us do? If they have that kind of power that they can unseat God's leader and God's king that he's placed on the throne, then what can the righteous do? And I think that can certainly be applied to any society and certainly our society. The foundations, I would say, are under attack like never before, wouldn't you say? I mean, every foundation that God has set forth, the nuclear family. It is true that God created male and female, created He them. And that He created marriage for one man and one woman. That's God's plan. It's His creation. It's His created order. The nuclear family is under attack. I think the justice system is under attack. Because if you don't have a healthy sense of what wrong is, you're never going to get anything right. Our education system is under attack. A nation without borders is no nation at all. We're seeing that. I mean, we could just go on down the list. The foundations are being destroyed. And I don't think we've seen anything like what's coming down the pipe. I'm not a gloom and doom guy, but I don't have my head stuck in the sand either. There's no way that we can keep going the way we're going as a country and expect everything to be the same way that it's always been. It's just not possible. All nations shall be turned into hell that forget God. We just recently read that. So what can the righteous do? Well, here's what we have to get. This Psalm provides a contrast between two different refuges. And when tragedy strikes, now I know this may sound a little bit funny, but I think it's a great way to remember it. But when tragedy strikes, we're either gonna run away or we're gonna run to Yahweh. We're gonna run away Are we going to run to Yahweh? You say, well that's goofy, but you won't forget it, will you? So I've only got two points this morning. But you know not to get excited about that. The first point is what I just mentioned, and that is running away. Seeking refuge from anything and anyone besides God when tragedy strikes. Look at verse 1. In the Lord put I my trust. How say you to my soul? Flee as a bird to your mountain. For lo, the wicked bend their bow, and they make ready their arrow upon the string, that they may privily shoot at the upright in heart. You know, as I read this text, There is an incredible... I'm always amazed by the unity of the world system. I am amazed by the unity of the enemies of God and specifically here, the unity of the wicked. Now let me say this, we learned this last week. The wicked are those that don't know Christ. You're still in your sins. And the righteous are the ones who know Christ in the forgiveness of their sins. That is the only real difference between those two groups. I want to reiterate that. But there's an amazing unity among the wicked in this passage. Notice the rhetorical language here in verse 2. There is, even though the wicked are plural, there's obviously more than one here. They share one bow, one arrow, and one string with the single purpose of destroying the righteous and their foundations. Think about that for a minute. It's a group of people with one purpose, one string, one bow, one arrow. And by the way, it also says, that they're attacking in the darkness, which seems to speak of deception. This is the MO of the wicked as well. But there's always been an amazing unity among this world and its wicked. I've often mentioned the fact that the Jews and Romans hated each other. They couldn't get along. They couldn't agree about anything. They were always fighting. But on crucifixion day, they came together and put aside their differences and held hands and sang kumbaya as they crucified the Son of God. I think about the Pharisees and the Sadducees. They couldn't agree about anything. They hated each other. And yet, they came together to kill Jesus. They came together to murder Jesus Christ. By the way, the world is going to do it again at the end of the millennial kingdom. Christ is going to come to this world and He's going to rule and reign for a thousand years over this world. And I find it interesting. During that thousand years, Satan is going to be tossed into the bottomless pit so he can't deceive the nations during that time. And yet at the end of the thousand years when he's released and he's allowed to deceive the nations again, I've always found it interesting. The Bible says that he has to go to the four corners of the world to get all of his rebels together. And it almost seems as if, even during the peaceful reign of Christ, during that thousand years, that sinners are going to try to get as far away from Jerusalem as they can. They're going to do it again. They're going to try to kill him again, try to dethrone him, but they're going to be sadly disappointed. I think about it. An illustration, this was from years ago, but I still remember it. It had to have been before same-sex marriage was legalized in 2015, but I remember a news story in which they were talking about states that had voted to make homosexual marriage illegal. And the news story was talking about how homophobic and how hateful that was and how wrong that was and all that. And the very next story, They were talking about some Islamic groups in the Middle East that had done some good charity work or done this and that and something else and they were just bragging on them so much and I'm thinking, are you kidding? Do you know what they do to homosexuals over there? How can you praise this group and turn around and praise the group that kills them? But you know why? It's because it comes from the same spirit. and they're all united against Christ, all of them. I don't care what label they wear. And so, it can be intimidating sometimes to recognize that we don't live in a neutral world. I hope you realize that. We don't live in a neutral world. The entire world system is against Christ and against His people, and in this text, against His King. And the thing is, if the question still remains here, If the foundations be destroyed, what can the righteous do? Because here's the thing, we have been greatly shielded in this country for the most part. I mean, these last almost 300 years or so, this has been a rare experiment within human history in which we really, for the most part, have been free and we've certainly been free of religious persecution and things of that nature. The rest of the world doesn't know hardly anything about that. You know what would happen to us if we tried to do what we're doing this morning in China? You know what would happen? We would all be in cuffs and in prison by the time, before we even got done with the sermon. And that's if we were lucky. We don't really, I don't think, understand the depth of the truth that's being spoken here. But here's the thing, if we run away, That can mean that we physically try to run away from our problems and undesirable situations. We get that. However, I found that running away can also mean that we may stay physically, but we check out. We run away mentally and emotionally. We're just checked out. People have numbed themselves out. Maybe they go through a hard time or a tragedy, and they just check out for lack of a better term. You know, just like we can run to God in a spiritual sense, I believe that people can run away in a spiritual sense. And even the language here talks about the flight of a bird. Let me ask you this. Have you ever been going through a horrible situation in your life? Maybe just a heart-wrenching trial, you couldn't even think about anything else, your heart is broken, and you're just going through the valley. And I don't know if you've done this, I've actually done this. And I thought about this text and there's another psalm that brings this out later. But it's like you go outside and the sun is shining and the birds are singing as if nothing wrong has happened. Have you ever had that experience? And it's like what you're feeling on the inside is totally different from what you're seeing on the outside. The world continues on in spite of your pain. And the birds continue on because they're not consumed with the issues of this life. They're not consumed with our trials. And just like David says in a later psalm, how he would like to be like one of those birds. Just for a little while, maybe swap places and we could just be one of those birds and just be carefree and not even worry about our problems. Wouldn't that be nice sometimes? See, we can, in our mind, we can check out spiritually. I see a lot of Christians who have done this very thing mentally and emotionally. I'm talking about saved people. I've seen wives that have checked out on their husband. I've seen husbands check out on their wives. I've seen parents that just totally checked out on their kids and vice versa. I've seen pastors check out on their churches. I've seen Christians that seem for a time to even check out on God. People that just kind of numb themselves out because they don't want to feel anything bad. But here's the problem. When you go through a major trial, or you go through some type of trauma or tragedy, and you kind of make that decision, maybe even subconsciously, to shove that stuff down, I'm going to numb myself out so I don't feel any of the bad. The problem with that is, you numb yourself out to the good as well. It's a package deal. You can't just take the bad. And when you numb yourself to the bad things, you also numb yourself to the good things. And so many people go through a major heartache and problems, they just shut down mentally and emotionally. They may come to church, they may shake your hand and smile, and just like good Baptists, how are you doing? Well, I'm blessed and highly favored. And on the inside, you're absolutely dying. Listen, I know Baptist folks. I know better than that. It would be almost impossible to get a room with this many people and have nobody have any problems. I'm just not that naive. But we do that because we feel like that's our Christian duty. But it's really not. And so we need to be careful about that. I would say too, sometimes I've seen, even decades go by, and although that person will smile and nod when they greet you, they're dying because they haven't gotten past the event that may have taken place decades ago. They've never gotten past it. They've suppressed it, they've pushed it down, but they've never dealt with it. We were, Lee and I were trying to counsel a young lady that she knew growing up. When we were over in Mississippi, just a past abusive situation, and the young lady said, I know that I need to work through it, but I don't want to right now. I don't want to do that. But you're never going to get better. I don't care. But you're going to have to deal with this burden. I don't care. I don't want to do the hard work of recovery. It kills me to hear things like that. But at least she was honest about it. Suppressing it. Push it down, but never dealing with it. This is a form of running away. It's taking refuge in something other than God. It's running away internally. There's a dear friend of mine. He's with the Lord now. His name was Ernie Perham. And his ministry for the most part was to the home and family. He did a lot of different family conferences. He adopted several children with special needs. He told a story that I've never forgotten that fits right here. And he said that he grew up on a farm in Kentucky. And one of his chores was he had to take the trash out to the dumpster. And you know, we've been again, we've been so spoiled. You know, here, we just walked to the end of the driveway, right. But there, the garbage didn't pick up at individual houses, they picked up at certain checkpoints. Well the checkpoint for him was like two mile walk through a mountain road and he had to walk two miles in one direction to take out the trash. And he said that one year it was just a particularly bad winter, it was snow everywhere and he just got tired of making that two mile walk, four miles round trip in the snow, uphill both ways I'm sure. So he came up with this great idea They had a big barn, like a feed barn, behind the house. It was about 100, 200 yards away from the house. He thought, you know what? He said, Dad doesn't go in there much. He said, I'll just throw the bags in there, and then when spring comes and everything thaws out, I can take them all and he won't even know. Well, he did that for about a month, two months, and man, it just began to stink. And he said he began to notice something in the house. He said they had never had rats But he said, all of a sudden they're having rats and it's not just one or two. And his dad's not a stupid man. And he knows something's up. So he goes out to the barn and he opens the door and I mean trash bags just falling everywhere, rats going everywhere. And he got caught, he got found out. But the moral of that story is that's how our hearts are sometimes. We store the garbage and the trash away and we say we'll deal with it later and we never do. And it festers. And it gets worse. And it causes all kinds of problems. Time does not heal all wounds. Is that you today? Are you running away from your past? You need to allow God to heal you. and help you to get past your past. Don't run away. Because I can promise you there is peace and joy waiting on the other side of the battlefield and He's going to be the one to fight the battle for you. Listen, anytime that we have to deal with that kind of stuff, it's difficult, it's hard, it's hard work. But it's always worth it. It's always rewarding. When troubles come our way, listen, don't run away. run to Yahweh, and that's what we're fixing to talk about. See, the first thing we talked about is taking refuge in something other than God. By the way, that's what the enemy wants you to do. That's what the enemy says here. Hey, if you had any sense, if you knew what was good for you, if you knew what was coming, you would just leave your throne and flee like a bird to the mountain. That's what the enemy says. But that's not what God says. That's taking refuge in something, another mountain besides God is what that is. But the second refuge is running to God Himself. Look at verse 4. Verse 4, the Lord is in His holy temple. The Lord's throne is in heaven. His eyes behold, His eyelids try the children of men. The Lord trieth the righteous, but the wicked in Him that loveth violence His soul hateth." Now that's a judicious hatred. That's the kind of hatred that a good judge has for a criminal. Verse 6, upon the wicked he shall rain snares, that's hot coals, fire and brimstone, and a horrible tempest. This shall be the portion of their cup. For the righteous Lord loveth righteousness. His countenance doth behold the upright. And so we saw last week that the whole attitude of the psalmist began to change when he got his mind off of his problems. and got his mind on to the Lord. How there was that shift. The whole atmosphere changed. Well, we see it here again. David's not intimidated by these people. I love how in verse 1, he says, How say you to my soul? He's like, who are you talking to? Do you not know who my God is? Do you not know who my King is? You might think you can dethrone me, but you're not going to dethrone Him. And in this text that we just read, we see a great description of so many things about God. We see here that the Lord is holy. We see that He's on His throne. That He sees everything. That He's actually the one that tries the righteous. He's over our trials. we find that He will judge the wicked, that He will vindicate the righteous. So in other words, no matter what happens in this life, God and His people win, and the wicked lose. Isn't that a good truth? Ultimately, it all comes back to the opening line of this psalm, and we have to get this. I think it's the most important line in this psalm, and that is the opening words. In the Lord put I my trust. And that's really what it comes back to in every situation in life. The things that eat at our heart. The things that keep us tossing and turning at night that rob us of sleep. Do we really trust God? That's the question. Do we really trust Him? Is the problem with Him and what He's actually doing and not doing and who He is? Or is the problem in here? I'll go ahead and tell you where it is. It's right here. It's in the person that you look at in the mirror every day. The problem's here. Sometimes we struggle just to trust Him. Trusting Him doesn't mean that everything is going to turn out the way that you want it to. You know, our trust in God is not a way to manipulate God. I hope you understand that. I've heard a lot of people say, you know, even with Leah's health, well, you know, if you just trusted God enough, If you just had enough faith, God will heal her. Really? Where's that in the Bible? Because if the apostles are still around and they still have that kind of power, it was always up to them. It was always up to them. And so our trust is not a way to manipulate God. Our trust is a way to have peace with God and in God, even when things don't go the way that we want them to. We're not supposed to do God's job for Him. The point is we can trust the Lord with our pain now and perfection later. Listen to these invitations. We don't have to turn here. But I'm just going to give you some Scriptures. I encourage you to jot them down and go look at them in your own time. But listen to these invitations for His children to come to Him in time of need. This is our God here. Hebrews 4. Verses 14-16 says, Seeing then that we have a great high priest that is passed into the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our profession. For we have not a high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need. 1 Peter 5, verses 6 and 7. Humble yourselves therefore unto the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time, casting all your care upon Him, for He careth for you. That term cast, for lack of a better illustration, it's kind of like when you go fishing and you cast your lure out. You're throwing it down. You're casting it down at the feet of Jesus. He says, cast your cares upon Him, for He cares for you. Philippians 4 verses 6 and 7, Be careful, or be anxious for nothing. But in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known unto God. And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. 2 Corinthians chapter 1 verses 3 through 5, Blessed be God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort. who comforted us in all of our tribulations, that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God. For as the sufferings of Christ abound in us, so our consolation also aboundeth by Christ. These verses give us strength for today. That He loves us. He cares about us. He gives us an open invitation to come to Him with our burdens. He loves us. He feels for us and with us. But also, we have verses that give us hope for tomorrow. 1 Peter chapter 4 verses 12 and 13 says, Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial, which is to try you, as though some strange thing happen unto you. But rejoice inasmuch as ye are partakers of Christ's sufferings, that when his glory shall be revealed, ye may be glad also with exceeding joy. Romans 8 and verse 18 says, For I reckon, and I think Paul had a little bit of redneck in him. He says, For I reckon, that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that shall be revealed in us. The sufferings of this present time not even being worthy to be compared with the glory and splendor of heaven. That's amazing. Because I've seen some pretty bad things in my life. I've been through some pretty bad things in my life. and to know on such a deep personal level the heartache and the pain and everything that comes with that, and you're saying, that's not even worthy to be compared with the glory that will be revealed in us? That's an amazing thought. But we will, let's go to one place and I'll wrap it up. Revelation 21. I do want to turn here. Revelation 21. This is here at the end of all things when the Lord makes everything right. Sometimes these promises here, they almost seem too good to be true if we're in the middle of a trial. But they have to be at the forefront of our thoughts. Revelation 21, this is God allowing John to see into the future. And I saw a new heaven and a new earth. For the first heaven and the first earth were passed away. and there was no more sea. And I, John, saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself shall be with them and be their God. Listen to this. And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes, There shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain, for the former things are passed away. And he that sat upon the throne said, Behold, I make all things new. And he said unto me, Write, for these words are true and faithful. This is not only have we seen strength for today, this gives us hope for tomorrow, and this is what we have to think about. We can't be overwhelmed by our situation and circumstances. This is what gives us hope to fight and get better and to seek refuge in the Lord and not run away from our refuge in God. And let me say this as I come in for a landing here. So many times the worst part of our trial isn't actually the reality of the outcome. So many times the worst part of our trial is our perception of the outcome, is it not? How many times have we tormented ourselves over something? I mean, we go to bed at night thinking about something, and I mean, it was just so real. It was going to be the worst possible scenario. It was going to happen this way, and it wasn't going to happen any other way, and it didn't turn out anything like that, did it? Has anybody else been guilty about that? And we tormented ourselves for absolutely no reason at all. We need to run to God as our refuge. So many times the worst part of our trial is our perception. Our fear of the outcome. And so many times, if Satan can't get us in our actions, he'll try to get us in our reaction. That's what we have to be careful about. I think about it this way, and I shared this story a good while back, but it's so relevant here. I recently read a story about a fishing vessel off the coast of Alaska back in 1981. The ship was called the St. Patrick. And the St. Patrick actually had been found guilty of several violations, one of which their captain went on a vacation and he put somebody in charge that didn't even have a license. They weren't even properly licensed to be a captain. Most of the crew was extremely young, just out of high school. They didn't know a thing about maritime anything. And there was this horrible storm that hit them one night. I mean, just 20 foot plus, it was awful. And they were just rocking back and forth and now the waves are coming up over the deck. The water is coming into the cabin. The water hit the power system and knocked the power out. So now it's dark. And they're panicking. So they get to try to get the lifeboat. The lifeboat blows away because they didn't lower it right. And then that captain, that guy that was subbing in, made the decision to abandon ship. He said, the ship is fixing to go. We're going to go down. We've got to get off the ship. So eleven crew members jump into this icy water and some of them didn't even have their life suits on that's supposed to keep them relatively warm in that icy water. And as it turned out, nine of the eleven crew members died. We know what they found out the next day when the sun came up as they had helicopters out searching for these bodies. They found that the ship had never sank. The ship stayed afloat the whole time. And if they had just stayed on it, they would have survived. And so the moral of that story is, sometimes it's not the situation that kills us, it's our fear of the situation that gets us. And because we don't trust the Lord, because we don't trust the sturdy vessel that we're in, we do something crazy. And we begin to seek refuge in a place that's much more dangerous than where we actually are. Boy, we rob ourselves of so much peace and joy when we just don't trust the Lord. So my question is, where are you taking refuge? From your trials and tribulations? Are you running away from God or are you running to God? Are you letting Him have those deep, dark places in your heart? Are you offering up those broken pieces of your life? Or are you just trying to get through life holding on to everything? It's a miserable existence. But you can trust Him and you can find peace in Him. If the foundations be destroyed, the righteous still have a refuge. But do you know Him today?