are trophies in light of that old rugged cross. They are, as Paul said, skubalon. They are rubbish. This evening I invite you to turn in your Bibles to Psalm 119. Last week I gave a brief introduction, and now we're going to look at the first stanza, the Aleph stanza. Some of you probably have in your Bibles either just the spelled out letter of the alphabet Aleph, or you actually have the Hebrew character. It is the first character in the Hebrew alphabet and we're going to consider that stanza that begins with that character in every line throughout that stanza. So let's give our attention to the reading of Psalm 119. We're going to read verses 1 through 8. Psalm 119, 1 through 8. Blessed are those whose way is blameless, who walk in the law of the Lord. Blessed are those who keep his testimonies, who seek him with their whole heart, who also do no wrong, but walk in his ways. You have commanded your precepts to be kept diligently. Oh, that my ways may be steadfast in keeping your statutes. Then I shall not be put to shame, having my eyes fixed on all your commandments. I will praise you with an upright heart when I learn your righteous rules. I will keep your statutes. Do not forsake me utterly. That's Father reading of God's word. Well, I don't know if you've noticed, but it is something that is characteristic of our culture in these days, that for many people, the most important thing for them is to be happy. Have you ever noticed that? You often see it in movies, you know, there's this really emotionally charged conversation between two friends, and they obviously have a disagreement with each other. But at the end, one friend turns to the other and says, no matter what you think, no matter where we're at, all I want, and the most important thing, is that you be happy. And I think many of us look at that and we kind of think, you know, what would Martin Luther say about that? Well, he would probably, you know, shout some obscenities in German and, you know, start cussing and this, that, and the other thing because he thinks, you know, the most important thing is not to be happy, but to glorify God. I want to talk about that tonight, and I want to give another example. Many of you remember this, but some years ago, Gloria Osteen, I think that's her name, is that Joel Osteen's wife's name, Gloria Osteen? Who knows, I want to know, who knows the, I think it is. She was in a worship service and she said, I don't know why she was preaching, but she said, God wants us all to be happy. And the blogosphere in the Reform world, the Reform ghetto just went absolutely nuts. They were throwing her under the bus saying, I can't believe she said that, yada, yada, yada. Well, before you throw her under the bus, I want you to come back to the first two lines in Psalm 119. And instead of reading the word blessed, I'm going to read what it actually means. Here it is. Happy are those whose way is blameless, who walk in the law of the Lord. Happy are those who keep his testimonies, who seek him with their whole heart. The word in Hebrew, ashrei, it's a very interesting word. It means happy, but see, Hebrew has this funny way of emphasizing things. You see, in Hebrew, there's this incredible lack of adjectives. They just don't have a lot of adjectives to describe and explain things. So one of the ways that they really intensify things, one of the ways that they emphasize things, is they take a word or description or whatever and they make it plural. And that's what asherah is. Asherah is actually in the plural. And instead of saying they are exceedingly happy, what it does is it takes happy and it magnifies it by putting it into the plural. In fact, in Hebrew there's this thing called the inergic noon, and it's just this character that you put at the end of the word that adds energy to that particular thing. Well, that's what we have here. The psalmist, in two different lines, is saying, oh, the happinesses, if that's a word, of those who walk in the law of the Lord. This word happy was translated by the translators of the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Old Testament, and they used the word makarios. And that is actually the word that Jesus uses in the Sermon on the Mount, in that sermon that we're all familiar with, the Beatitudes, where he says, blessed, blessed, blessed. Makarioi, blessed are those who. So I would submit to you this evening that the question should not be, does God want us to be happy? I think that that's a no-brainer. Of course God wants us to be happy. I think rather the question should be, what does God mean by happy, right? That's the question we should ask ourselves. There's the definition of culture of what it means to be happy, and then there's the definition that we have here embedded in this whole psalm of what it means to be happy. So tonight and next time we get together to talk about Psalm 119, I want to do that. I want to recover happy. I want to recover happy from the clutches of the world and think about it the way that the Bible thinks about it. The fact of the matter is that Psalm 119 begins with these two blessednesses, And it's not only the main idea of the first stanza, one through eight, it's also really kind of the theme of the whole of Psalm 119. Very much in the same way that Psalm 1 is the theme of the whole Psalter. Blessed is the man. That's how Psalm 1 begins. Blessed is the man who walks in the law of the Lord. Blessed is the man who walks in the way of the Lord. So, the fact of the matter is that Psalm 119 tells us what the happy man or woman does. And the first two statements, as I said, are going to unpack that. And I pray that as we consider this definition, happiness would be something that for us, listen to me, is more attainable. Okay, it's more attainable, it's something that's more attractive to us, and it will help us stave off depression and help us lift our countenance as we look to the Lord. So I'm gonna submit to you that Psalm 118 gives us six contours of happiness. I'm just gonna talk about one tonight, okay? I'm just going to talk about one, and here it is. The first contour of happiness according to the Word of God is this. Happiness is marked by a long obedience in the same direction. Let me say that again. Happiness is marked by a long obedience in the same direction. Look at verses one and three. Now what I want you to see here is that there is an unashamed connection that the psalmist makes between obedience and happiness. Now, I'm gonna qualify that, okay, because that's what I do, I qualify things, but I wanna say this, I'm not gonna qualify it too much. You wanna know why? I think one of the beauties of preaching and teaching and declaring and heralding is this, that something doesn't die of a thousand qualifications. I think if you qualify it so much, people at the end of the day are like, this is qualification 997, and I've even forgotten what it is that we're qualifying. I don't even know what we're talking about anymore. I think there's a beauty of just dropping something in your lap and saying, by the way, the authority of the Word of God says that this is the case. Blessed is the man who walks in the law of the Lord. Blessed is the man and the woman who is obedient. There is blessing in obedience. And we can always go to Job, and we can always go to Kohelet, the book of Ecclesiastes, we can always go to Habakkuk, and we could find all these exceptions, right? But I think we need to remember one thing. All of those exceptions are just that. They're exceptions. There is a general rule that the Lord, if I could put it this way reverently, has kind of baked into life, and it is this, that there are blessings attached to obedience, and the foremost of those blessings is happiness, and we'll find out in a moment why. So Psalm 119 is very simply putting on display the joy and the happiness of lifestyle obedience. Lifestyle obedience as opposed to what? Occasional obedience. Obedience when the right people are watching. Obedience when it bodes well for me. Obedience when it's going to get me a promotion. Obedience when I'm trying to make a good impression on a girl who's a Christian and I want to marry her. Obedience that is occasional. No. Psalm 119, the heartbeat of it is lifestyle obedience and the happiness that accompanies it. So let's cinch this down for a moment. Let's cinch down this idea that there is a connection between obedience and happiness. First off, what do we mean by happy? Well, I've already talked a little bit about how the Hebrews intensify it, but let me just say this. He who walks in the law of the Lord, listen, is not merely happy because he is obedient, okay? As if obedience is the end of it, all right? "'He who walks in the law of the Lord is happy "'because such obedience is what he's made for.'" I mentioned this in the sermon this morning, but I want you to turn very briefly to Ephesians 2, verse 10, and I'm gonna be very brief. But this is a passage that one of my pastors back in San Diego would always quote. It was like his favorite text. And the reason why is because it really does get to the heartbeat of obedience. Ephesians chapter two, verse 10 says this, Paul. He says, for we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them. You know, you can turn back to Psalm 119. Now, you know what's interesting about this is, you know, folk in the Reformed tradition, they love to talk about election. They love to talk about predestination. They love to talk about how we were predestined before the foundation of the world to be saved, to be justified, and all of that is true, and we say hallelujah and amen. But you know what else we were predestined before the foundation of the world to do? To walk in obedience. You know, it is often said that the Lutherans like to shout justification and whisper sanctification. Well, you know what, I think Psalm 119, the psalmist there, if it's Daniel, if I'm right about that, he wants to shout both of them, and he wants to shout them on top of the roof for everybody to hear. You wanna know why? Because he intrinsically understands, like we should even more so than the psalmist, we being members of the new covenant, that the double benefit of the covenant of Christ is that he justifies us and he sanctifies us. He justifies us and He sanctifies us. People get into these theological wars about, well, you know, how much sanctification should we see because, you know, God has promised that He would justify us, but I don't know about, no, He's promised that He would sanctify us as well. In fact, right here, Paul said, before time began, He prepared works that we should walk in them. So here's what I want to say. I think this is what the psalmist is saying. Why is it that we are happy when we walk in obedience? Why is it? Well, why is it that any tool that you use for the purpose in which it was used is most happy when it is used that way? Because that's what it was made for. I grew up for many years of my life on an almond ranch where my grandfather was an almond rancher. He was a very bright man, but he dropped out of school in sixth grade and he took this 20 acres of almonds and walnuts and this guy was able to fabricate things in his shop. that big companies wanted patents for. They wanted to buy it off of him because he just was brilliant and he knew how to put things together and make things. And whenever I would work with him, I'd always get stressed out because he'd be like, all right, Josh, I want you to tighten that screw. Well, I'd reach for the Crescent wrench, okay? And I'd start to, and he's like, Josh, what are you doing? Don't use the Crescent wrench. Use the right tool for the right job. Never forget those words, my grandpa. And he's right. Because with crescent wrench, what happens if you turn too hard? What happens? Somebody tell me. It loosens, right? But if you get the right tool for the right nut and the right job, it's like butter, or at least it should be, right? And that's how it is with us. We were made for this. We were made to walk in obedience to the Lord. That's why whenever we talk about the relationship of justification and sanctification, whenever we talk about things like, well, should a Christian have good works? I'm just like, are we in the kindergarten room right now? Like, why are we talking about this? I mean, these are just elementary things. Like, you wanna know the relationship between justification and sanctification? Here's the answer. Union with Christ. If you are united with Christ through faith, then you have His justification and you have His sanctification. He wants you to walk in sanctification after Him in conformity to Him. He's given you the spirit to be able to do it. He's given you the forensic declaration of justification to be able to be in reality what He has called you to be. And no, you're not going to do it perfectly, but it is the prevailing disposition of your life. So this is what it means to be happy in a nutshell. What does it mean to be happy? Walk in the law of the Lord. Why is obedience to the law of the Lord what makes us happy? Among other things, I want to add that, because we, because we were made for this, okay? And chocolate, I guess, all right. Now, what's the irony of this? When the world talks about happy, what do they typically mean? This is open. When the world talks about being happy, what are they typically talking about? Follow your heart, the American dream, that could be a good thing or a bad thing. Do whatever you want, right. your feelings, yeah, what you feel, okay, no matter where that takes you, right? And that's typically the problem. What's interesting is that happy has pretty much trumped almost every conceivable objectivity in the world, so it's trumped science, right? I mean, I've had conversations that many of you know with my cousin who's transgender, he's undergone the operation. And he's like, Josh, this is how I feel, it's natural, it's who I am, I've always felt this way. I'm like, natural? I mean, the surgery that you're talking about, there's nothing natural about that. What's natural is what you were given that you're now taking away through that surgery, okay? The fact of the matter is, is happy is used as a lever to undo so many of the things that God made us to be. The fact of the matter and the irony in it is that sin tells us if you do this, you'll be happy. If you eat of this fruit, you'll be happy. If you go with this woman, the adulterous woman, you'll be happy. If you drink this bottle, you'll be happy. If you take these drugs, you'll be happy. If you lie on your taxes, you'll be happy. And guess what? It always lies to us, always. The world, the flesh, and the devil, they are good at lying, are they not? That's all they do is they lie. They say, you're gonna be happy, and you get intoxicated for a moment, and then the next day, you're not happy. Mid adultery, next day, you're not happy, okay? And he's been doing this for thousands and thousands and thousands of years. That's why Satan is called the what? The father of lies. But what happens, we think, and I always talk about this, we always think, well this time, it's gonna be what? It's going to be different this time. Maybe He's actually telling the truth this time. When has that worked out well for you? No, sin doesn't make us happy. A clear conscience makes us happy, right? A clear conscience makes us happy, a clear conscience that allows us to sleep at night. The reason why many people drink alcohol on a regular basis, and by the way, you know I have no problem with alcohol, neither did Jesus, okay? But the reason why people use it to medicate is because they're actually trying to get away from what? from a guilty conscience. They're trying to get away from the fact that they're not walking in the law of the Lord, and they don't like the guilt, they don't like the condemnation, and so they medicate. And it's not just alcohol. It could be drugs. It's not just alcohol and drugs. It could be what? It could be entertainment, right? I mean, there have been many times in my life when I have just, I want to hit the escape button. And so it is Netflix or Amazon Prime or in certain seasons of certain men's life, pornography, but it's just escape. I want to, I just want to get away from it all. We're trying to get away from the guilty conscience that keeps plaguing us. but obedience gives a clear conscience and abiding joy. And you know what else is interesting about this is if I'm right that Daniel wrote this, one who was in exile in Babylon, or not Daniel, but maybe Shadrach, Meshach, or Abednego, but if either way it's an exile, he's writing about being happy in one of the most unhappy circumstances that you could imagine, right? Think about that for a second. He has literally been taken against His will into captivity. He's forced into a position where He doesn't want to be in a time that He doesn't want to serve. And what does this tell us? He's still able to say, blessed is the man who walks in the law of the Lord, and it is His meditation day and night. You can take a portable happiness with you wherever you go. a portable happiness that I walk in the law of the Lord. If that means I'm in a place and in a time and in a season where circumstances are fair and they kind of accent and compliment that happiness that comes with it, great. But if not, that's okay. I can do with or without it because I don't need that. Obedience to the Lord is what I was created for. Have you ever experienced that? I mean, things are just crazy, right? Things are absolutely crazy, and you get to that point where maybe you don't say it, but you're definitely thinking it. Like, if one more bad thing happens, I'm just gonna snap. And then you get a phone call, and you're like, oh, what's gonna happen? I'm on the precipice here. You get the phone call, it's another bad thing. And you hang it up, and you're like, I'm still here. Like, I haven't turned into a pumpkin yet. And then, you know, what do you do? Well, it's in moments like that that I have escaped, and maybe you've escaped, but it's not to drugs, it's not to alcohol, it's not to entertainment, it's not to social media. You escape in prayer, right? You escape in prayer, and you say, Lord, I don't know what you're doing, but come hell or high water, I'm going to be obedient to you. Help me be obedient to you. I believe, help my unbelief. I wanna be faithful, help my unfaithfulness. I wanna be obedient, help my disobedience to turn into obedience. See, happiness is not necessarily equated with comfort. I mean, Peter said this in 1 Peter 3, 14, if you suffer for righteousness' sake, happy are you. Isn't that interesting? If you suffer, happy are you. Tell the world that. Tell the world that. Oh, here we go, some of this irrational Christian rhetoric. It's that irrational Christian rhetoric that gets me through the day, that gets me through the week, and it's gonna get me through this life. Happy is the man who walks in the law of the Lord. What does it mean to walk? Well, this is what's very, very important for us to remember. We've talked about happy. What does it mean to walk? It does not mean perfection. It means the prevailing disposition of your life. It means the prevailing disposition of your life. I was told this by my professors when I was training in seminary, and I found it to be true. Every congregation's a little different, but they said, men, there's gonna be people in your congregation who are gonna have incredibly sensitive consciences. and they're going to fixate over one failure, one mishap, and they're going to think that they lost their salvation. And what you need to remind them of is grace. And what you need to remind them of is that what grace does in the life of a true believer is it fosters and cultivates the prevailing disposition of obedience. but not perfection. And we need to keep that in mind. When you are considering assurance, things like assurance, you need not ask the question, have I sinned this week? I mean, we're all going to hell if that's the case. You need to ask the question, what is the prevailing disposition of my life? What is the overall trajectory of my life? And when I have sinned, what is my attitude toward that? Do I care? Am I broken over it? Do I want to seek forgiveness? That's the question that we should ask. So it's not the perfection of our life, but the direction. Now, what is meant by law? Who walks in the law of the Lord? Well, a few things here. Number one, for the psalmist, it was the Mosaic law. There's no doubt about that. It was the Mosaic law. He was thinking about the Mosaic law. When we read this psalm, we should look at it through new covenant lenses, okay? And when we look at it through New Covenant lenses, we can say that the law of God, let's say the Ten Commandments, as refracted through the lens of Christ, as refracted through the personal work of Christ, the Ten Commandments as they come to us, not from the hand of Moses, but from the hand of Christ, which very simply means as they come filtered through the teaching of the New Testament, okay, so pretty much all the commandments are gonna be roughly the same except for that fourth commandment, right? The Saturday is moved to Sunday, and there's less strictness on Sunday than there is on Saturday, but on the whole, it's the law of God refracted through the lens of Christ. But even then, you have to go a step further and say, but does this law come to me as the first use of the law? What is the first use of the law? Think of the first use of the law as a mirror, a mirror that shows you for exactly who you are and also shows to you God in His holiness. If that's what the law is, then we're all condemned, and that's what the first law is meant to do. The first use of the law is meant to drive us outside of ourselves. But the third use of the law, think of it as a map. It's a guide, okay? If the first use is a mirror, the third use is a map. And the map is given only to spirit-filled believers. The map is given only to the regenerate. It's given to those who are truly believers, and it says, this is how God calls you to live. And instead of being broken over it, you delight in it, just as the psalmist does here. And you say, this is something that I want to do, and God is showing me how we can please Him, not for my justification, but for and in my sanctification. When we talk about things like, well, you know, faith and law, how do they work together? Paul said it in Romans 3.31, I love it. You don't need to turn there, but he says, do we then overthrow the law by this faith? By no means, on the contrary, we uphold the law, and that's what true Christians do. True Christians are not antinomians that are not trying to obey the law. True Christians are those who are striving to keep the law and love the law, and like the psalmist say, it is their meditation day and night. So Jonathan Edwards says about the law, or about happiness I should say, he says, So when you think of the law tonight, I want you to think of Jesus' words. These are words that I always come back to when I'm kind of wrestling with my motivation. Why do I want to keep the law? What am I looking for in the keeping of the law? And Jesus says in John 14, 15, if you love me, you will keep my commandments. If you love me, You will keep my commandments. You know, you can shoot through and cut through all the malaise of this, you know, marrow of modern divinity stuff where you're talking about, you know, justification and sanctification, how do they work and what should be the... If you love me, you will keep my commandments. And just ask yourself, do I love Jesus? Yes, I love Jesus. I love Jesus. I love Jesus for everything that He's done for me. keep my commandments. That's what he says. If you love me, keep my commandments. He says in John 13, 17, if you know these things, blessed are you if you do them. I think there's a lot of us in here tonight that know many things about the Bible, right? And I'll just end with this, but one of the most common experiences I have in the counseling room and discipling room is this. I've literally had people that I've counseled that they haven't quite told me, but their body language said everything. They were like literally offended that I told them something so simple. I read them a Bible verse and I say, hey, let's talk about this principle that comes out of the Bible. And they're like, well, everybody knows that. I know that. What are you telling, do you think I'm stupid? And I just like, are you doing it? Are you doing it? You see, so often our big minds get in the way of our hearts and our hands, and we don't realize that what we know has not dropped down to our heart at least in that moment. Maybe it sounded in the past, maybe it's going to do it in the future, but right now, in this moment, I'm not loving my wife as Christ loves the church. I'm not making the sacrifice. I'm not putting the needs of others before myself. Okay, I'm not doing, so I can know that, but I'm not doing it. And Jesus says once again, if you know these things, blessed are you, happy, happy are you if you do them. These are the words of Jesus. So it's fair to say that ultimate happiness, ultimate, is found in the perfect obedience to the law. We can say that. And there's one sense in which Psalm 119 is only true of one man, and that is Jesus Christ, because he gave absolute and complete surrender and obedience to God in his obedience of the law, and now through faith, your identity is in him. So even tonight, in all this talk of the law, we still, After all this law keeping and talking, come to Jesus through faith and we're reminded in that faith and in that union that we can find gratitude to give obedience to God for what Christ has done for us and to delight in that very obedience. Let's pray. Father God, we do thank you for this law. We pray that it would be our meditation day and night, and we pray that you, by your Spirit, would help us to do it for your honor and your glory, we pray in Christ's name, amen. All right, we are gonna do some prayer now, and I just have a few, and then I wanna turn it over to you. Number one, we don't have either Pastor Jim or Ken