You know, when you read the book of Ecclesiastes, the writer looks around the world and is very frustrated at a number of realities. And when I listen to the psalmist here in Psalm 49, it makes me think about the writer of Ecclesiastes, the writer of Ecclesiastes, who looks around at the different realms of life and he says, can you believe that this happens? And then there's this over here. Isn't that aggravating? The writer here of the Psalms in Psalm 49, the sons of Korah, seems to indicate the following truth, that one of the things that might frustrate the believer in the earthly life we're in is watching the wicked prosper. And one of the things that would frustrate us under the sun is when unrighteous people end up in places of influence and power. It may seem like there are people who hate what is right, and yet they seem to come out ahead. by evading their consequences, by amassing fortunes even. One of the things that can frustrate us then is seeing the wicked thrive. And it might even make you ask some questions like, could there be really any consequence for sin given that these things take place? Would I be better off doing what they do and how they do it? If the wicked seem to thrive, and my goodness, I would like to thrive, could becoming like them really be that bad? Well, we need to know how to think about what we see around us and how to answer these questions that I've posed this morning. Psalm 49 is gonna help us here. Psalm 49 is gonna help us be wise. This psalm has sometimes been called a wisdom psalm. And I think that's because the content of it overlaps with the kinds of things you read in the book of Proverbs and the kinds of things you read in the book of Ecclesiastes. He begins in verses one to four, with a call for everyone to listen. And the one calling for everyone to listen are these sons of Korah, writing to the choir master for the corporate worship of the living God, calling everyone to pay attention. This is actually the last of the Psalms in book two of these sons of Korah. Psalm 49 here is the end of the row for a stretch of Psalms that began in Psalm 42, the very beginning of Book 2. So from Psalms 42 to 49, we've been seeing these sons of Korah. We remind ourselves one final time this morning that they were appointed by David. The sons of Korah descended from an ancient rebel, But Korah in Numbers, his immediate children, separated from him. While he was wicked and perished, they did not. They sided with Moses and to follow the Lord. And many generations later, they have descendants that are psalm writers. These lyricists, these composers are serving the people of God and stirring their hearts with wisdom. Now, these sons of Korah have been writing a number of things in themes and subjects. In Psalms 42 to 43, there was this lament individually of great sorrow and brokenness, where travails and turmoil were washing over the psalmist. And he was so laid low and his soul was downcast. In Psalm 44, there was this remarkable corporate lament. It's not just individuals who suffer, but even collectively, the Israelites knew what it was to be a righteous sufferer, to be oppressed and persecuted. And Psalm 45 was a celebration of Israel's king, ultimately the promised king, because the answer to our suffering, both individually and collectively, both in this life that we are partaking individually and that ours before us and after us, these generations have endured. The answer is the Psalm 45 King, the one who has arrived in Christ Jesus to take for himself a bride who is the church. In Psalm 46, he calls the nations to be still and to know that he is God. And in Psalm 47, they're told to clap their hands and to worship and respond. In Psalm 48, they might They might conspire against the people of God. They might come against his great city. But God protects his people, the church, and the new Jerusalem where his people shall dwell is forever secure in Christ. These sons of Korah have been very honest about the sufferings of this life, but also of the great hope we have, the great power of God and his greatness in all the earth. And so in their string of Psalms, we come to Psalm 49, where they call everyone to listen. In verses one to four, they say, hear this all peoples, give ear all inhabitants of the world. That's how we know they're talking to everybody. That language is so clear, so explicit. And they're wanting them to hear, to stop what they're doing and to pay attention. And you might have a situation where you're in a crowded place and you're talking to the people near you to pay attention, but you probably didn't try to get the attention of everybody in the entire area unless the circumstances warranted it. And here, this psalmist has such important news, such major wisdom to impart, that he wants everybody everywhere and no matter their station in life either. In verse two, they might be socially low or socially high. No matter their economic status, whether they are rich or poor, no matter their political standing or their social station, they need to listen. And that means the psalmist is talking to everybody. He's talking to all of us. What's he gonna give? Why should everybody stop what they're doing and listen to this guy? Because he says, in verse three, my mouth shall speak wisdom. Oh, well then I need to hear that, because there's a lot of speech that's unwise going in and out of people's ears all the time. So if this guy says, hey, everybody, listen up, my mouth is gonna speak wisdom, it's like, okay, hold on. What wise thing is he going to impart? The meditation of my heart shall be understanding. He's talking here about the overflow of what he's been thinking on. The spirit of God has stirred his heart and he's been reflecting. He's been meditating and he's gonna tell you what's been on the inside of his heart. The meditation of his heart shall produce understanding if we will listen. So he says, give ear, pay attention, all peoples of the earth, rich and poor, low and high. I've got wisdom from my mouth. And he says in verse four, I'm gonna incline my ear to a proverb and solve my riddle to the music of the lyre. So the imagery of listening and speaking, the imagery of meditation in the heart and producing understanding and solving a riddle, he's using this language to say, there are some things that might perplex you. Let's think about that. And what he wants to isolate is one of the many things that might make us scratch our heads under the sun. And that particular subject is the prosperity of the wicked. And so this proverb or this riddle that he's going to solve and incline his ear toward and give us understanding about, he says, I'm going to solve it to the music of the lyre, which pictures this musical setting. So he's going to he's going to reflect on this, but there's a lyrical musical quality to it. And of course, we're reading a song. And the psalm, being not a paragraph or a narrative, here is a series of very carefully, artfully composed lines. And so set to the music, the composition enjoyed, led by the choir master for the Israelites, is to guide the people to hear and reflect on this wisdom. So it's this call for everybody to pay attention, and in verses five to 12, he's going to speak about the inevitability of death, which is one of the reasons he sounds so much like the writer of Ecclesiastes. A dominant theme of the book of Ecclesiastes is that death is coming, and there's no thing you can do, no station in life you can acquire, no particular power you can muster that can overcome death. We shall die. The inevitability of death is part of his reflection in verses 5 to 12. So he starts out with this question. Why should I fear in times of trouble when the iniquity of those who cheat me surrounds me, those who trust in their wealth and boast of the abundance of their riches? So he's raising this question, and he wants us to reflect on how he might answer it. He doesn't answer it immediately, but he raises the question to get down the track a bit, and he's going to say, one of the reasons I ought not fear in times of trouble, so he's raising this question in order to tell you why you shouldn't, is because the wicked are not invincible. They think they are. They think their great power, and they think their many possessions, and they think their vast riches grants them security, but God laughs at their foolishness. And he says in verse 5, these times of trouble seem to have been produced by sinners who surround the psalmist. So he's in a situation of injustice. People have surrounded him, their iniquity and even against him, cheating that he has been on the receiving end of. He has times of trouble he's experiencing. He's being sinned against. Who are these people? What are they like? Well, we can isolate their trust. In verse 6, these sinners who've surrounded the psalmist, who have cheated him, who have acted unjustly toward him, their trust is in their wealth. And as long as they love their money above all, they can't love their neighbor well. As long as they love their riches and prioritize that above all things, they're not going to treat others the way they ought to be treated, because the treatment of neighbor just gets in the way from getting more stuff. They trust in their wealth. In verse six, they boast in the abundance of their riches. They pat themselves on the back with how much they have. They go to bed at night and wake up in the morning thinking about all that they are acquiring. And they just dream about getting more. So this psalmist is part of those who would suffer in an earthly sense from people who have arrived at a particular financial or economic or social standing where they don't care about others. They just care about what they have. Their trust is in their wealth and they boast in their riches. This seems to be the perplexity he's starting to raise up. that there are prospering wicked people. Now, he is not targeting wealth per se. Notice why we know we can identify these as ungodly and wicked people. In verse 6, they don't merely have wealth, their trust is in their wealth. They don't merely possess riches. They boast in the abundance of their riches. Their boast is not in God. Their trust is not in the Most High, the living God over all things. Therefore, we can rightly say these are the wicked, who in their iniquity, and in their cheating, and in their injustice, have caused times of trouble for the godly. And yet the inevitability of death is not even something the mighty wicked can subvert. He says in verse seven, truly no man can ransom another or give to God the price of his life. Now why would somebody want to offer something in regard to their life in order to spare themselves from death? That's what we want to make explicit here. This is what's going through the text. They see that their life would be on the line and they might imagine that because of what they have, no one can touch them. They're above it all. They are invincible. And he says, truly, which is a way of saying surely, truly, truly, I say to you, Truly no man can ransom another or give to God the price of his life. You can never possess enough to suffice in order to overcome death. You might say from an earthly perspective, well, there's this particular medication and this particular surgery and this particular dietary regimen and all the rest, but my friends, don't you realize that the inevitability of death is what we're talking about? We're not saying someone who is trying to steward their life well in an earthly sense, whether they're rich or poor. We're talking about the reality that there comes a day when we shall die. Our days are numbered. And our breaths are in the hand of the Lord. And you cannot offer to God a ransom to purchase your life. You can't give to God the price for your life or ransom another's life. In verse eight, it explains why. For the ransom of their life is costly and can never suffice. Which means you will always lack what is necessary to secure your own immortality. You cannot do it. You cannot do it. And the wicked, whose boast is in their riches and whose trust is in their wealth, they in their delusion, because it is that, it is a delusion, seem to think that their life is impenetrable. And they dwell in a kind of mighty fortress that none can bring low. The reason they would want to give a ransom for their life or offer to God a price for their own life is in verse 9, that he should live on forever and never see the pit. See, what they want to do is whatever they can not to die. They are afraid of death. and they're convinced that if they can become powerful enough, mighty enough, and even in the eyes of others, rise above and beyond it all, it can distract them and even delude them into thinking of immortality. They believe they should live on forever and never see the pit. That language of the pit is another way of talking about the grave, another way of talking about death. So they don't wanna die, that's why they wanna ransom another's life and give to God a price of their own. But see, truly, he says, no man can ransom another or give to God the price of his life. And I think that's explained in verse 10. For he sees that even the wise die, the fool and the stupid alike must perish and leave their wealth to others. He's talking about the inevitability of death. from verses 5 to 12. So as we near the end of this section, he's drawing attention to what you can notice if you have eyes to see and ears to hear and to shatter our delusions about physical immortality in this life. He says, don't you see that the wisest still die? So that the graveyards are full of the fool and the wise, the unrighteous and the righteous. And if the fools have accrued all of this wealth, you know what? They left it behind. They must leave their wealth to others. So the fool does not endure. They think by possessing their wealth, they may endure, but the wealth is gonna outlast them. The wealth is gonna go to someone else. The fool and the stupid alike must perish, and it's reminding us of the truth of Genesis 3, that we have come from the dust, and to dust we shall return. And though man work by the sweat of his brow and toil, and maybe even accrue great riches, he's going to die. No matter what he gets, he will not spare his own life. He cannot ransom himself or another. No man can. In verse 11, he says, their graves are their homes forever. He's talking about how their earthly life comes to an end. That's the point. They can't ransom themselves out. Their graves are their home. This is not a denial of any afterlife. I think he instead envisions, in chapter 49 actually, a judgment of the Lord, a vindication of the righteous. So this here is a statement from an earthly perspective. Their earthly life ends. They have no cost to pay, no price tag to meet. their graves are their homes forever. They're dwelling places to all generations, though they called lands by their own names. And the end of verse 11 brings into this whole equation here their supposed sense of enduring legacy and name. They're gonna say, well, of all that I've got, of all that I own, of all that I possess, I'm gonna name things after me because my name is gonna endure. And he says, yeah, they did that. They named lands after their own names. They called this and that, and they died. They still died. They left it all. They perished. It seems that their calling lands by their own names corresponds to this sense of wanting to make a name for themselves that endures, a kind of reaching toward immortality. Their graves, however, become their home forever. Man in his pomp will not remain. That word pomp is meant to come across negatively. The idea of pomp has to do here with some sort of accompanying or circumstantial supplementary greatness from the world's perspective. It's pomp and circumstance. It's supposed glitter and shine that someone looks at and says, maybe with covetousness and envy, jealousy, marveling at, look at them, look at how great, look at how much. And he says, man, in all of this pomp, he won't remain. He won't remain. He's like the beasts that perish. Is man an animal? No, that's not what this verse is saying. Verse 12 doesn't call man an animal, but he has something in common like the beasts, and that is he's going to die. And saying that like the beasts, he shall die is similar to the writer of Ecclesiastes, reflecting on the inevitability of death. In verses 5 to 12 then, he has wanted everybody to pay attention. Everybody in the world, rich and poor, high and low, listen to me. We're all going to die. So when he says, listen, I might fear in times of trouble, why should I? This is an earthly season where the rich and all of their supposed worldly greatness and all of their wicked schemes that have given them power and influence, it will not last. They act like it will, but it won't last. So why should I fear in times of trouble? because no matter what the wicked bring against me, their plots shall be in vain. They will face the judgment of the Lord. In verses five to 12, the inevitability of death is made clear. But there's a contrast. Not only are the wicked not going to endure in this earthly life, he is promising a different future for the righteous. In verses 13 to 15, the righteous have a very hopeful future. Here's the hopeful future of the righteous. Verses 13 to 15 says, this is the path of those who have foolish confidence. Yet after them, people approve of their boasts. Like sheep, they're appointed for Sheol. Death shall be their shepherd, and the upright shall rule over them in the morning. Their form shall be consumed in Sheol with no place to dwell. But God will ransom my soul from the power of Sheol, for he will receive me. Verses 13 to 15 is trying to stir within the righteous, why not to fear in times of trouble? Because the wicked are not as strong as they think they are, and though the righteous may seem oppressed and opposed on every side, God shall deliver them. Speaking of this foolish path that the wicked are going on, he says it's a path, in verse 13, of those who have foolish confidence. Why is their confidence foolish? Because their boast is not in God and their trust is not in God. Where's their trust? What made it foolish? It was in riches and their boast was in all that they have. That's why it's a foolish confidence. He's not saying we don't have a confidence in something. We all do. We all trust something, hope in something. But I wonder if your confidence is stupid. I wonder if it's foolish. I wonder if you have an absolute groundless confidence and a hope that will absolutely be in vain. You should hope in the living God instead. You should trust in the living God. You should trust in Christ. You should hope in Him. You should look to the living Christ who gives forgiveness to sinners and who has eternal life for all who call to Him. Apart from Him is a path of foolish confidence. And their trust might not be in riches. It might be in something else. Something else other than God. Still foolish. Still absolutely vain. And yet after them, people approve of their boasts. Oh sure, the crowds who look at the wicked and all of their supposed might and worldly possessions, there are people who come alongside of that and say, that looks great, look at that, they're just doing so awesome. And so there are people who come along who give total approval of and support of and celebration of wickedness. So it's not reliable to just rely on human polling here where the crowds are trending. Here you have people who would willingly, eagerly approve of the confidence that is foolish that these wicked people give. They seem to be on the face of it doing so well. We have to remind ourselves of some things. Because when we see the wicked seeming to thrive and acquiring possessions and influence and power, let us remind ourselves of what the testimony of people who do not know God has been over and over again on public record, that I thought that when I got everything I had wanted, it would be enough. I thought when I made this money or when I received this particular opportunity, I would be satisfied. We need to remember that by the wicked's own account, they have had to face the reality that what they have does not quench their soul's thirst. They're not doing as well as they seem. So when we see the wicked thriving and we say, oh, look at them thrive, we're not seeing the full picture even in that moment, much less the future. Even in that moment, we're not telling the whole truth about the situation. Their soul's thirst is not quenched. How could it be? It's not like some of sin's promises actually do come to pass for some wicked. Sin always fails us. And God's faithfulness and promises always come to pass. It is always right to trust the Lord and always good to remind ourselves of the full story. And those who pursue wealth and power by wicked schemes owe the toll that that takes on the conscience and on the character. When we see the wicked thrive, we have to remind ourselves the kind of people the wicked have become in their pursuit of ungodly gain and wicked wielding of power. Their character and their demeanor, their heart, their conscience, seared and evil. This is not the kind of thriving you and I want. When we look at wickedness and it seems that people are flourishing in their ungodliness, let's tell ourselves the whole story about the unquenchability of earthly things. for the soul, and about the damage and ruin upon the soul, conscience, and heart, and character of the wicked. And oh, what about the harm outside of their hearts and lives, that in their wickedness, the trampling upon neighbor, the acts of unlove and injustice. Here in chapter 48, or sorry, chapter 49, beginning in verse five, he talks about the times of trouble that those who have committed iniquity and cheated have surrounded him with. So when we see people who are wicked, having great riches and great power. Let's not look at that in a reductionistic way and think, oh, man, what a great situation they're in. It is not such at all. It is not such at all. We're actually forgetting key pieces of truth to that story that we must preach to ourselves. People will come down this path of foolish confidence. Others will come alongside and approve of their foolish boast. But I want you to listen to verse 14. Like sheep, they are appointed for Sheol. Death shall be their shepherd. A subtle allusion perhaps to Psalm 23, where the righteous say, the Lord is my shepherd. But that's not so for them. We're told here in verse 14, they're appointed for Sheol, which is not just the grave, but even the place of the unrighteous, where judgment and misery, where separation and condemnation are their everlasting portion. You see, they name lands after themselves, but they're appointed for Sheol. They thought they were so great and wielded such power over others, death is going to shepherd them in the end. Death shall be their shepherd, and the upright shall rule over them in the morning, which means that what seems to be the case now, that the seat of the serpent would be opposing the seat of the woman, it will not be that way in the end. The psalm of the unrighteous will sound like this. Death is my shepherd, I shall always have want. It keeps me from green pastures, and it takes me away from still waters, and it destroys my soul. It leads me in paths of unrighteousness for my namesake. Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear and reap evil, for death is with me and before me, with no protection or comfort to give me. There is no peace in the presence of my enemies, and my cup is empty. Judgment and sorrow shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the land of Sheol forever. That's the psalm of the unrighteous. Death shall be their shepherd. and they are appointed for everlasting judgment. But the upright shall rule over them in the morning. It's a contrast between night and day, the morning of resurrection and glory, of vindication and deliverance, that God who loves his people shall deliver his people, and that though the wicked shall go to the grave and the righteous shall go to the grave, the righteous will be raised unto everlasting life and glory. The bodily life of the wicked is not one of everlasting life and glory, but everlasting contempt and shame. It tells us at the end of verse 14, their form shall be consumed in Sheol with no place to dwell. It's this picture of some shadowy, miserable existence. That's not true for the righteous. In verse 15, but God will ransom my soul from the power of Sheol. And we'll tie together in verse 15 here, the language of ransoming with the earlier reference to it in Psalm 49. Didn't we see in Psalm 49, he says in verse seven, no man can ransom another, but God can. No man can, but God can. No man can ransom another, but then in verse 15, God will ransom my soul. So who shall pay the price? Shall man pay the price to ransom his own soul? Man never possesses enough, will never be great enough, will never make enough, will never achieve enough. Man does not have what is necessary to offer in exchange for his soul. But God, God can come through for us. In verse 15, but God will ransom my soul from the power of Sheol, for he will ransom me. If we look at the inevitability of death in verses five to 12, it seems like, my goodness, as powerful as the wicked seem, death is gonna take their life. Death is even more powerful. Indeed. But God is even more powerful than death. As powerful as death seems, as final as the grave appears to be, God will ransom us from the power of Sheol, for He will receive me. He will take me. The language of receiving is to take. It's the same language from the days of Enoch, when God took Enoch. This language of Enoch and Elijah in 2 Kings. So both Genesis 5 and 2 Kings 2 use this language of God receiving us. So even though we shall die, we shall be received in resurrection glory. He will receive us, ransoming us, paying the price. No man can do it. God can do it. God alone can do it. So what's the lesson? The lesson of the psalm is in verses 16 to 20. We've seen the content, the teaching, so by lesson here, I'm talking about the application. He raised a key question in verses five and six. Why should I fear in times of trouble? And he's talked about the inevitability of death and the different future for the righteous and how we shall be ransomed and delivered, how we shall rule over them in the morning, how the people of God shall be vindicated and the wicked brought low. So the application is in verses 16 to 20. He says, be not afraid when a man becomes rich. Don't look at the worldly success of those who don't know God and say, but look at how well they're doing. They're not doing as well as you think. Because spiritually, the most important component beyond and beneath all things that operate in our lives, they are not doing well at all. And not only in their present are they not doing well, their future reaps the misery sown in the present. So you don't need to be afraid when the wicked seem to thrive. You don't need to look at this and then look at your own life and say, well, I should just imitate their... Because look at how you don't need to fear. You don't need to look at your own situation and wonder if God really cares for you. And if he'll really be faithful and really provide, you don't need to fear when the man becomes rich, when the glory of his house increases. For when he dies, he'll carry nothing away. His glory will not go down after him. Though he has amassed much, he shall leave everything. There's a person who, there's a story to illustrate the point. A person has died and his family gathers together And they say, all right, well, how much did he leave? And the answer is, well, he left everything. No, not even a number. He left everything. No matter the number, he took nothing. He took nothing. That is true for every single person. He carries nothing away. His glory will not go down after him. reminding the wicked that they ought not be looking at their lives like one tower of Babel project after another, trying to make a great name for themselves and trying to exalt their glory. They shall have no lasting glory. Their glory shall not go after them. They shall go to the grave to be captive and shield under the judgment of God. In verse 18, for though while he lives, he counts himself blessed. Oh, the delusion of the wicked. They look at their life and they wrongly evaluate it. We are not to adopt the perspective of the wicked about their lives. The wicked would describe their lives in various ways that we would want to critique biblically, objectively, truthfully. While he lives, he counts himself blessed. And though you get praise when you do well for yourself. So one of the reasons he no doubt would count himself blessed is from the acclaim and the applause and the covetousness of others around him. He counts himself blessed. Other people think he's blessed. He gets praise for it. But his soul in verse 19 is going to the generation of his fathers who will never again see light. You see the glory of the future resurrection morning and the vindication of God's people is given here an image of light. So the contrast is for the unrighteous. They'll never again see light. It's a way of talking about the misery and the darkness of death and condemnation. And so though they counted themselves blessed, though others praised them for all they had acquired, they shall never again see light. They shall go to the generation of their dead predecessors, those who were like them, and they shall join them. Man, in his pomp, yet without understanding, is like the beast that perish. This is similar, isn't it, to verse 12. There's a small alteration in verse 20 to the wording. Verse 12 says, man in his pomp will not remain. He's like the beast that perish. Verse 20 says, man in his pomp, yet without understanding, is like the beast that perish. It's close enough to see this as a kind of refrain, or as much a repetition as you can notice. even with a small addition here in verse 20, that in his palm, whatever around him seems to be accumulated from a worldly sense without understanding is the problem. The psalmist said, the meditation of my heart in verse three shall be understanding. That means in order to be wise, we need to believe what the psalmist says here about life, about the way things work, about the living God and the danger of boasting in what you have and the importance of hoping in God who shall raise us the upright from the dead, man in his pomp yet without understanding. is like the beast that perish. So the mighty rich and the wicked who accrue power and seem so invincible are anything but that. They shall perish like beasts. The grave shall welcome them. The contrast is what we need to pay attention to as well. Not just a warning to the wicked, but to stir within us the affections proper to a life lived for Christ, a longing for our life to be ransomed from the power of the grave, and that the resurrection glory and embodied life made for us by God shall be received at the resurrection of the dead when Christ returns. In First Corinthians 15, Paul says that Christ is the first fruits of the glorious resurrection and we shall be raised to be like him. He is our ransom. No man can ransom another, but Christ can ransom us all. Christ can do it all. He, at the cost of his own life. So what did he do? Did he make enough money working with Joseph as a carpenter growing up? Did he just happen to have enough funds? Did he make the right deals and strike the... No, it had nothing to do with an economic payment. It had to do with Christ himself as the eternal Son of God. taking to himself a truly human nature. The one who is truly divine and truly human lives without sin and on a cross takes all our shame and sin upon himself. All our folly, all our iniquity, all our unjust actions, all our sinful speech, all our evil thoughts. He takes our sins to himself that we might not perish in the way that matters most. We shall die. Jesus said, I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will not die. And of course, he doesn't mean physically. He means, though we perish, the grave shall not hold us. We have wisdom from God. We have understanding about who God is and what he's done in Christ. Man cannot pay the price, but God can pay the price to ransom us. Christ himself, God made flesh, is our ransom. Jesus himself called it that. Do you remember when he says in Matthew chapter 20 verse 28, the son of man came not to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom. He said he was going to do this. This is his mission. He says, I've come for this to be your ransom. You can't pay the price. I will pay the price. I am the price. I shall lay my life down as a ransom. Paul celebrated this truth. First Timothy two, verse six, he says that Christ gave himself as a ransom for all. Paul believes that a cost was necessary and that Christ himself has paid it. This is the great truth. Let us pray.