David cries out in Psalm 16:1, “Preserve me, O God.” Save me. Keep me. Hold on to me. Don’t let go of me. I wonder if you pray that way. If you don’t pray that way, you are not thinking clearly. We need God to keep us every day, all day. You cannot do this without him. You can’t remain a believer without God’s preserving grace. Keep me. Hold me. Preserve me. Now, what is he asking God to preserve him from? That’s going to come. We’ll see it in just a moment.

Psalm 16:2: “I say to the Lord, ‘You are my Lord; I have no good apart from you.’” You are my Lord, and you are my good. That is, as my Lord you govern all the good that comes to me, and you are the good that comes to me. I have other lords, I have other authorities in my life that I have to come to terms with, but none of those lords, none of those authorities, comes close to your authority. You are my Lord. You are the authority over all other authorities. If there’s another authority, it gets its authority from you. You are my Lord.

And you are my good. I have other goods in my life. But if I taste none of God in any good that this world offers, it’s not good. It is not good if there’s none of you as the Good in it. “I have no good apart from you.” If I taste nothing of you in any good that this world offers, it is not good. You are my Lord, and you are my good.

Psalm 16:3: “As for the saints in the land, they are the excellent ones, in whom is all my delight.” Lord, the reason I began with verse 2 by saying, “I have no good apart from you,” is so that when I say, “All my delight is in your holy people,” you would not think me an idolater. You alone are my greatest good, my greatest delight. And when I look around the world and see people who delight in you above all else, they are my delight because you are their delight. I’m not speaking double-talk between verses 2 and 3. I’m not contradicting myself. What delights me about your people is that you are their delight. You are my good, and I have no good apart from you. If there’s none of you in this people, I want nothing of this people.

Quest Over, Battle Begun

Psalm 16:4: “The sorrows of those who run after another god shall multiply; their drink offerings of blood I will not pour out or take their names on my lips.” What happens if we choose another god besides the true God — another ultimate good, another Lord, another delight, another treasure? What happens is multiplied sorrows. “The sorrows of those who run after another god shall multiply.” David has already found his good; he’s already found his delight; he’s already found his treasure. He’s not on a search anymore. Are you? David’s quest is over. Is yours? It’s over. I have found him. I have found my Good. I have found my Lord. I have found my delight. I have found my treasure. It’s over. I’m not running anymore after anything else. There’s nothing but trouble there. “I have no good apart from you.” The Lord is my good. I’m not shopping around. My quest is over.

So, he responds to temptation — and you will have it this afternoon and tomorrow; you will have the temptation, “Here’s another god; here’s another good; here’s another delight; here’s another treasure.” David’s response is, “I won’t even drink it. I won’t even take their name on my lips.” “Their drink offerings of blood I will not pour out. I will not even take their names on my lips.” These alternative gods, these alternative delights, these alternative goods — I’m not going to touch them. I’m not even going to get close or talk about them. I have found the all-satisfying treasure. Why would I choose multiplied sorrows?

I think verse 4 is what David was asking to be preserved from in verse 1. When he said, “Preserve me, O God,” what’s he asking to be preserved from? And the answer is verse 4. “Preserve me, O God.” I take refuge in you. I’m flying to you as my good. I’m flying to you as my treasure. I’m flying to you as my delight. I am flying to you. Preserve me from being drawn away to these other gods. Preserve me from failing to be satisfied in you this morning.

“This is the battle of the Christian life: to have God as our good, to have God as our delight.”

I wonder if you pray like that. I wonder if you fight like that. That is just about all I do. This is the battle of the Christian life: to have God as our good, to have God as our delight, to have God as our treasure. And the world is saying, “No, I’m better!” So what else is there to do but fight? Verse 4 is what he’s pleading. “Preserve me, O God.” Don’t let me be drawn away to these other gods.

Psalm 90:14 is on my lips just about every morning. “Satisfy me in the morning with your steadfast love!” Is that your steady prayer? “Your steadfast love is better than life” (Psalm 63:3). Oh, don’t let me be more satisfied with anything else than with you. That’s the battle. Verse 1 cries out for preservation; verse 4 states the danger.

Our Lord and Lot

Psalm 16:5: “The Lord is my chosen portion and my cup; you hold my lot.” I think verse 5 is virtually identical to verse 2, which says, “I say to the Lord, ‘You are my Lord; I have no good apart from you.’” I think “You hold my lot” (verse 5) corresponds to, “You are my Lord” (verse 2). And “The Lord is my chosen portion and my cup” (verse 5) corresponds to, “I have no good apart from you” (verse 2). Think about it for a moment and see if you agree that those are similar.

What does it mean that the Lord holds David’s lot? In the next verse, David refers to his “inheritance.” “I have a beautiful inheritance” (verse 6). Inheritances were often distributed by lot among family members and among tribes (Numbers 26:56; 33:54; 36:2; Joshua 14:2). It’s like drawing straws. And David says, “God holds my lot.” Jeremiah 13:25 says, “This is your lot, the portion I have measured out to you, declares the Lord.” We still have the phrase “my lot in life.” When you say that, you don’t mean, “I have an acre.” You mean your situation, your circumstance.

That’s what God holds. “You decide my fortune. You set my circumstances. You decide my place, my times, my inheritance. You govern my life.” Which is the same as saying in verse 2, “You are my Lord.” That’s what it means to be Lord of my life. You govern my life. You hold my lot. You allot my inheritance. I’m in your hands. And “[You are] my chosen portion and my cup”(verse 5) corresponds to “You are my good” (verse 2).

Then Psalm 16:6 simply spells out the nature of David’s “lot.” What is his lot? “The lines have fallen for me in pleasant places; indeed, I have a beautiful inheritance.” The lines, the borders of my life that God has given me, are beautiful. My future with God, my inheritance, is a beautiful inheritance.

Now let’s step back from verses 1–6 and ask, What’s the main thing David is saying in these verses? I think the answer is, in the words of verse 2: you are my Lord, and you are my good. Or, in the words of verse 5: God holds my lot, and God is my lot. God decides my fortune, and God is my fortune. God allots my inheritance, and God is my inheritance. God governs my life. God is my life.

He says it in verses 2 and 3: he’s my Lord; he’s my good. Verses 5 and 6 state it another way: he is my lot; he holds my cup and my portion. And in the middle is this: Don’t go after another god! How could you choose another god? That’s the way these verses are structured. So, “preserve me, O God.” Please preserve me from that insane choice of going after other gods when he’s my Lord and my good. He’s my lot-holder and my lot itself. So preserve me, O God. You have shown so much of yourself to me, don’t let me become insane. Sin is insane, you know. That’s the point of verse 4. Multiplied sorrows — why would you go there? And people go there every day.

Counsel in the Night

When he turns now in Psalm 16:7 and says, “I bless the Lord who gives me counsel; in the night also my heart instructs me,” I think he is saying, “God, by his counsel, is the one who has shown me all this about himself. I didn’t think this up. God has come to me by his counsel and made plain to me that he is my Lord, he is my good, he holds my lot, and he is my portion. God is the one who, night and day, has shown me these things.” I think that’s the point of verse 7. He’s the one who has shown me all this. And at night, as I am lying there, in my spirit, from deep inside of me, as if from my kidneys and my heart, there well up these truths: God holds my life. God is my life.

I wonder, Christian — child of God, son of God, daughter of God — what your heart says to you at night. And if you’re a child of God, one of the things that your heart says to you at three o’clock is, “God is my life. God holds my life.” I didn’t make my heart beat for the last three hours. You don’t make your heart beat. God does. He holds you in being. And if you have a mustard seed of faith at three o’clock in the morning, God gave it to you. God sustains you. God preserves you. That’s what the child of God says from his kidneys (kidneys is the Hebrew word behind heart) — meaning, it comes from deep inside of you. “God is my good. God is my life. God is my portion, God holds me in his hand while I’m sleeping.” That’s what the child of God says at night. And that’s from God. It is his counsel doing that. He does that for you.

And then he gives the positive counterpart to Psalm 16:1. In other words, verse 1 is the negative: “O God, don’t let anything take you away from me as my portion, my good, my lot, my beautiful inheritance. Don’t let anything replace you.” But the positive counterpart in Psalm 16:7 is, “Oh, I bless you that you are answering that prayer. Here I am at three o’clock, and I’m still a believer. I’m still loving you and trusting you and clinging to you with my fingernails. You have answered verse 1, and I’m blessing you that you’re still my God.” That’s what God makes known by his counsel.

Fullness of Joy, Forever

Now let’s jump out of order for a minute. While we’re on verse 7 (which is about God, by his counsel, informing David’s mind of these glorious things), let’s jump to the next verse about God “making known,” and that’s Psalm 16:11. Verse 11 continues the thought of what God makes known to David — that is, his “counsel.” And verse 11 is as good as it can get. “You make known to me the path of life; in your presence there is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore.”

In verse 7, the Lord makes known by his counsel these things that we’ve been opening in verses 1–6. And in verse 11, that reaches its climax. This is as high as it gets, or as deep as it gets, or as wide as it gets. When you read Psalm 16:11, don’t you want to say, “Well, no wonder in Psalm 16:2 David says, ‘I have no good apart from you’? No wonder Psalm 16:3 says, ‘I delight in God’s people because they delight in you.’ No wonder in Psalm 16:5–6 he says, ‘God is my chosen portion and my cup.’” Where else could you find “fullness of joy” and “pleasures forevermore”?

“Nobody anywhere in the world can offer you anything better than Psalm 16:11.”

Is there anything fuller than full? No. Is anything longer than forever? No. This is no rocket science. This is just glory! Nobody anywhere in the world can offer you anything better than Psalm 16:11. Because nothing is even conceivably better than verse 11. Nothing is fuller than full or longer than forever. “Fullness” means completely satisfying. And “forevermore” means those pleasures never stop.

I remember when I was 9 years old. We had a spiral staircase that went up to our roof. And I would lie up there and look at the stars, and I would be scared of eternity because it seemed boring. It’s going to get old. It’s going to be boring. And then you grow up and you read verse 11, which says it’s not going to get boring. God is God!

When it says “pleasures forevermore,” it doesn’t mean they feel good for about a thousand years and then don’t feel good anymore. If you think that God is incapable of making you happy forever, you don’t know God. Infinite is infinite. He is infinitely full. That means there is no way to exhaust the kindness that he intends to show you. Verse 11 is as good as it gets. And that is part of the counsel that God has made known to David. “You make known to me the path of life.” God’s gift of life is the gift of himself. His presence, his right hand, his life — this is God. “At my right hand are pleasures forevermore” — joy that is full.

God Before and Beside

Now if that’s true, and it is, David does what any reasonable person would do. Psalm 16:8: “I have set the Lord always before me; because he is at my right hand, I shall not be shaken” — shaken from my delight in God, shaken from my faith, shaken from my cherishing God in all things.

“If you think that God is incapable of making you happy forever, you don’t know God.”

“Before” and “at [the] right hand.” What does that mean? God is non-spatial. He is spirit. He doesn’t have dimensions, so you can’t locate him in space. These are metaphors. So what are these metaphors trying to say? “Before” means he’s not behind, where I can’t see him. I keep him right out there as my good and my delight and my cup and my portion and my inheritance. That’s what he is all day long to me. Those other things aren’t my inheritance. You are. He is always visible, by his word, in your mind, preaching to you the reality of who God is. “At my right hand” means close. And it’s the right hand, not the left hand, which is the honored, close place. As you walk through the day, he’s before you. I see him. I’m keeping him conscious in my mind. And he’s honored and cherished and loved in the place of honor at my right hand.

That’s the way you go through your days. That’s the way you live the Christian life. You’re going to get up tomorrow morning, and you’re going to put him right there before you by his word. You’re going to reach out and take him and keep him right there in the treasured, cherished, honored position of your right hand, and you move through life. That’s the way you live if you know verse 11, if you know verses 1–6. And when you live like that, with God before you and at your right hand, it is the answer to the prayer, “Preserve me” (verse 1). If God starts to fade away and out there is a new car, or some relationship, or some treasure, something that is starting to be more precious to you than God, verse 1 is not being answered. The cry is, “Keep yourself ever before me, ever in view, ever cherished.”

Incorruptible Son

Now we come to Psalm 16:9. With this confidence that he’s never going to be shaken, he says, “Therefore my heart is glad, and my whole being rejoices; my flesh also dwells secure.” So in this life, there is gladness, and there is rejoicing that is very great at times, and that’s a foretaste of the everlasting pleasures of verse 11.

Right now in this life, your joy is seldom full. You need to learn how to live with this. You need to learn how to fight for this. We live in an embattled state. Your body is going to die if Jesus doesn’t come back first, and your faith is going to be embattled to the last day. Just before he died, Paul said, “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the course, I have kept the faith” (2 Timothy 4:7). Right to the end, I don’t ever expect it to go away. I’m an old man, and I expect to fight on until I breathe no more. There will be no coasting. You coast, you die. So we will fight on. And yet, in this life, in verse 9, “My heart is glad, and my whole being rejoices; my flesh also dwells secure.” In other words, his confidence is building to the point where he says, “Not even death is going to interrupt my joy. My flesh will dwell secure.”

We want to say, “Come on, David, you’re not God. You will die. They will put you in a hole. You will rot. Your flesh will decay in the ground. What are you talking about?” Then David gives the jaw-dropping explanation in Psalm 16:10. Death is not going to have the last word here. “For you [O God] will not abandon my soul to Sheol [the place of the dead], or let your holy one see [not even see!] corruption.” But David, there’s a pit waiting for you. Every person who dies is thrown into this pit, and in that pit you decay. You see corruption.

And right at this point, the apostle Peter (in Acts 2) and the apostle Paul (in Acts 13) read verse 10, and they say, “This is the Messiah. This is Jesus Christ, whose flesh did not see corruption.” How did they see that? Listen to Peter in Acts 2:29–32. I’m going to take it in two stages. What Peter says is amazing. Because he doesn’t just say, “This is Jesus”; he says why he thinks this is Jesus. He has just quoted Psalm 16:8–10. Now he explains for the Jewish crowd whom he wants to persuade that Jesus is the Messiah:

Brothers, I may say to you with confidence about the patriarch David that he both died and was buried, and his tomb is with us to this day. Being therefore a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him that he would set one of his descendants on his throne . . .

Stop there. What’s he saying? Why is he telling us this? What’s he referring to? How is this helping us grasp how he saw Jesus in verse 10? David knows something. What does he know? He knows God took an oath and swore something to him. He’s referring to 1 Chronicles 17:11–12, where God says to David, “When your days are fulfilled to walk with your fathers, I will raise up your offspring after you, one of your own sons, . . . and I will establish his throne forever.” David knows this. He knows he is not the Messiah. “I am David, and a son of David is coming. God told me this. And the difference between me and him is that he reigns forever. I don’t — I decay. He will not see corruption. He’s bigger, better, longer than I am.” So as David is writing Psalm 16:10, he’s conscious that all of his glorious experience of God is a prefiguration. He’s a forerunner who is pointing to the one who is going to be so much more. He’s aware of this, and as he writes he is being caught up into tremendous confidence.

It’s the Advent season. It’s Christmas. And you know the beautiful Christmas words of Gabriel to Mary: “[This child] will be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end” (Luke 1:32–33). David knew this about his son. He didn’t know when; he didn’t know who; he didn’t know how. He just knew, “He’s coming, and he’s going to be infinitely greater than I am. And if I am to be rescued from death” — which verse 11 certainly signifies (my pleasures at God’s right hand are forever; death will not end my relationship with God) — “what could be greater?” What could be greater is he never even sees corruption.

That’s the second half of Psalm 16:10. And that’s what Peter and Paul saw. They saw David on the wings of the Spirit of prophecy reach the apex of his own hope and go beyond it. And they said, “That’s the Messiah.” And so, Peter finishes his explanation of Psalm 16:10 (in Acts 2:31–32), “[David] foresaw and spoke about the resurrection of the Christ, that he was not abandoned to Hades, nor did his flesh see corruption.” David spoke about the Messiah when he said, “He won’t even see corruption.” Peter keeps going: “This Jesus God raised up, and of that we all are witnesses.”

So, Peter is not just saying, “It’s Jesus.” He’s explaining how he drew down that conviction from what he knows that David knows about the son of David from the promise God had made to him. David, like all true prophets, is being carried along by the Holy Spirit. His spirit is rising with the joyful confidence that God will preserve him. God is his Lord. God is his delight. God is his portion and his inheritance. God will give him pleasures forever. And death itself will not be the last word. God will not abandon him to Sheol. At this point, the Spirit of prophecy takes over and says, “And your son is going to be greater than all that. He will not even see corruption.”

Put Christ Before You

So dear South Cities Church, how are you going to embrace the reality of Psalm 16 in view of verse 10? This is my closing counsel to you and my prayer for you as an eleven-day-old church. Let me put it negatively. If David is wrong in verse 10, and he’s not a prefiguration, a forerunner, of a Son of David who would rise from the dead, then you can kiss Psalm 16 goodbye. You can close your Bibles and kiss everything I’ve said goodbye. Because every blessing — God my good, God my Lord, God my delight, God my portion, God my cup, God my inheritance, God my fullness of joy, God my pleasures forevermore — is promised to sinners. David was a sinner — an adulterer, a murderer. So how in the world can he claim these for himself? How can we?

And the answer is that this Son of David purchased them. He died for the sins of Old Testament saints and the sins of New Testaments saints (Romans 3:25–26). David’s sins are covered by the blood of Jesus. My sins and your sins are covered by the blood of Jesus if we trust in him. Therefore, there’s forgiveness in the blood, and there’s a future in the resurrection. And therefore, Psalm 16 is yours because of Christ. Verse 10 is true. He did die; he did rise; his flesh did not see corruption. And therefore, you can bank on these promises.

So what should you do? You should set him always before you. You should keep him at your right hand. And if you do, and if your good pastors do, and if your council of elders does — if they and you keep God in Christ clearly before them as their treasure and good and Lord and cup and inheritance and portion, and God cherished and loved and honored at their right hand, this church will not be moved away from Christ, away from salvation, away from the Bible. It will be strong until he comes.

Resolved, by God’s enabling grace, to persevere in prayer, love, and good deeds in the cause of experiencing ethnic harmony in the church.

As a pastor in Minneapolis for more than two decades, I have found that one of the most helpful biblical teachings regarding ethnic harmony in the church is that Christ has already secured it.

For those who are in Christ, ethnic harmony is our shared destiny. In God’s gracious and wise providence, he has designed the church to be made up of people from all ethnicities, tribes, and tongues. This he actually guaranteed by the death of Christ, who ransomed people for God “from every tribe and language and people and nation” (Revelation 5:9). Therefore, our destiny as believers is to be united in the worship and enjoyment of God with people from every corner of the earth forever. That makes ethnic harmony in the church a certainty.

Divine Gift to Preserve

Ethnic harmony is also a gift to be preserved. I used to believe it was my task to create unity in the church among the ethnically diverse. But that thinking was little more than well-intentioned arrogance and unbelief. Ephesians 4 put me in my place. There, the apostle Paul urges believers “to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace” (Ephesians 4:1–3).

“For those who are in Christ, ethnic harmony is our shared destiny.”

So our task as Christians is not to create unity in the church, but to maintain it. Our calling is to preserve the unity God has already established for us in Christ by living in a manner worthy of the reconciling power of the gospel.

When we, in our passion for ethnic harmony, imagine that we are tasked to create unity in the church, we will inevitably build a pseudo-unity in competition with the unity God has already given us in Christ. Our strategies will devalue the power of our shared union with Christ, thereby destroying true unity in our quest for it.

Any group of unbelievers can unite around a shared ideology. That’s what happens in every social and political subgroup. That’s no big deal. The greater question is whether we, as Christians, will find agreement “in the Lord” (Philippians 4:2) that supersedes our earthly ideological differences and empowers us to diligently love one another.

Not Natural Love

Ethnic harmony calls for more than natural love. As even church history shows, diverse believers living together in unity is not natural. Our sinful nature will work hard against it — even among believers sharing the deep truths of the gospel. This struggle has been with us from the birth of the church, necessitating explicit teaching (such as Ephesians 4:1–7) that calls the church to the challenge of living out the Christ-created unity between Jewish and Gentile Christians.

In our present day, such ethnic divisions persist. Those divisions are entangled in political and ideological differences between believers. Over the past five to six years, further sharp divisions have been exposed. The murder of George Floyd here in 2020 increased the chasm between many evangelical believers.

“Doctrinal conviction is increasingly taking a back seat to ideological conviction.”

In line with the deepening and spreading polarization in our society, Christians have severed relationships — not over differences about Christ, but over differing views of ethnic harmony in the church and justice in the world. Churches have split. Friendships have evaporated. Partnerships have ended. Even Christian families have been divided. One recent study documented that many Christians are now choosing to belong to a church not because of the church’s theology, but because of its ideology. Doctrinal conviction is increasingly taking a back seat to ideological conviction.

Are we treating our earthly ideologies and political convictions as a greater worth, a greater treasure, than the inexpressible grace of our shared kinship in Christ Jesus himself? I pray not.

Supernatural Love Required

Ethnic harmony requires supernatural love. The collapse of love between Christians is a tragic failure. Such divisions among believers are evidence of our sinfulness and unbelief, and they are lost opportunities to display the glory of Christ’s reconciling power. If God has, by the death of his Son, reconciled us to himself while we were enemies (Romans 5:11), we dare not think ethnic harmony will require anything less than the sacrificial love, forbearance, and forgiveness of God that we have received in Christ (Ephesians 4:32–5:1).

The greater the disagreements, the greater the alienation, the greater the challenge of love. And the greater the challenge of love, the greater the opportunity to display the supernatural love and unity that is ours in the gospel of Christ.

Threefold Resolve

Christ has unified us in the gospel, reconciling us to himself and to one another (Ephesians 2:11–22). As the one people of God gathered from every tribe and language and people and nation, we share a common eternal destiny together (Revelation 5:9). Our challenge as brothers and sisters in Christ is to live out our unity with one another, treasuring Christ Jesus our Lord above all.

Toward that end, I offer this threefold resolution on this Martin Luther King Day:

Resolved, by God’s enabling grace, to persevere in prayer, love, and good deeds in the cause of experiencing ethnic harmony in the church.

This resolve expresses my heart’s desire and prayer. Perhaps it expresses yours too. If so, join me in this threefold prayer.

PERSEVERANCE IN PRAYER

Father in heaven, we pray that your kingdom would come and your will would be done on earth as it is in heaven in regard to ethnic harmony in the church and racial justice in the world. Neither secular strategies of anti-racism nor color-blindness will yield lasting solutions for the world or the church. May we give ourselves to persistent prayer for harmony in the church day and night, as Jesus taught us in the parable of the persistent widow (Luke 18:1–8). May we keep on seeking, keep on asking, keep on knocking, believing that you, God, will open the door in answer to our prayers (Matthew 7:7–11).

PERSEVERANCE IN LOVE

Lord Jesus, we pray that we might love one another as you have loved us and thereby advance authentic ethnic harmony in the church. Any “advances” in ethnic diversity or justice without Christlike love will gain nothing (1 Corinthians 13:1–3). There is no path toward Christian harmony in the church that sidesteps the call to love one another, forgive one another, and bear with one another. The path will inevitably demand that we love those who are difficult to love, and even those whom we might view as enemies (Matthew 5:44). Perseverance in loving one another “more and more” is not optional; it’s our calling (1 Thessalonians 4:9–10). Strengthen us to love like this, O God.

PERSEVERANCE IN DOING GOOD

Gracious God, we pray that you might grant us the power and wisdom to persistently do good to one another. Many are tired, saddened, and disillusioned regarding ethnic harmony. May we, enabled by your mercies, not grow weary in doing good (Galatians 6:9–10; 2 Thessalonians 3:13). And when we sense we have been wronged, may we “not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good” (Romans 12:21).

Lift Up Your Head

If you are saddened, take heart. If you are frustrated, don’t give up. If you are discouraged by the divisions in some churches, lift up your head and hope in God. Our future is sure. We will praise and worship our Lord Jesus together in the new creation as a multitude of diverse people, united in Christ Jesus forever and ever.

Resolve with me, then, by God’s enabling grace, to persevere in prayer, love, and good deeds in the cause of ethnic harmony.

Audio Transcript

Welcome back to the podcast. Last Wednesday, we looked at the fact that God makes much of us, his children. He really does make much of us. Why does he make much of us? He makes much of us because he is glorifying himself by redeeming us. In APJ 1772, we looked at that point in detail.

But in that same sermon, we get another point added, a follow up, and one essential to the overall argument Pastor John is making. It’s worth reflecting on here on the podcast, because Pastor John knows that, for many people, to hear that they were saved so that God would glorify himself in us seems to take away some of the luster of that love. Pastor John will directly push back against that point a little later. He’ll answer that question and concern, and show clearly why it’s not less loving for God to love us for himself.

But before we get there, Pastor John wants to simply dwell on this previously stated fact: if you are God’s blood-bought child, God makes much of you. He does. He really does. In fact, he makes more of you and more of me than we could ever dare imagine. Here’s the biblical proof he was eager to share with his church, and this is what he told them.

So that’s what I meant when I said, “Why does the Bible relentlessly reveal the love of God for us in a way that constantly calls attention to the fact that it is done for his glory?” Because so many people, when they hear that, feel it as not loving. The point of those texts throughout the Bible, where God performs his love for us for his glory, is to show that he loves us in the greatest possible way.

Dwelling on God’s Love

Why? How does that show that it’s a greater love? How is it a greater love when he loves me for his glory than if he just loved me and it all terminated on me? Well, before I answer that question — and I will answer it — let me dwell with you on the truth that evidently some have assumed I denied in asking, “Do you feel more loved by God when he makes much of you, or do you feel more loved by God when he frees you at the cost of his Son to enjoy making much of him forever?”

It’s been assumed by some, “Oh, you don’t think he makes much of us.” Well, that’s a non sequitur; it doesn’t follow from what I said. But I don’t want to defend myself. Some have gotten that idea, and I would like to now fix it and keep fixing it. If I get things imbalanced, I’d like to get them back into balance.

Seven Ways God Makes Much of Us

So here we are trying to help those who heard it that way. The answer is yes, God makes more of you than you could ever imagine. And I will blow you away for the next five minutes. Put your seatbelt on if you have trouble with being made much of by God, because you might leave otherwise. I think I have seven of these, and they will go by quickly.

1. God is pleased with us.

God makes much of us by being pleased with us and commending our lives. Alan Jacobs wrote a great biography of C.S. Lewis, and he says in C.S. Lewis’s biography that the greatest sermon that C.S. Lewis ever preached was called “The Weight of Glory.” That is, believers will one day have a weight of glory that will be so heavy they will imagine, “I don’t know if I can bear this. It’s so good.”

What do you think the weight of glory was in that sermon? It was the words “Well done, good and faithful servant.” And here’s what Lewis said:

To please God . . . to be a real ingredient in the divine happiness . . . to be loved by God, not merely pitied, but delighted in as an artist delights in his work or a father in his son — it seems impossible, a weight or a burden of glory which our thoughts can hardly sustain. But so it is. (39)

And he’s right. That’s number one. God makes much of us by being pleased with us, making us an ingredient in the divine happiness, like an artist with something he painted or like a father with a son.

2. God makes us fellow heirs with Christ.

God makes much of us by making us fellow heirs with his Son, who owns everything. “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth” (Matthew 5:5). I wonder if you believe that. I do. Mine! I don’t need it now, therefore. I don’t need it now. I don’t need to scrounge to get a piece of earth for about fifty years and then maybe lose everything.

I am very happy to belong to King Jesus — to be a fellow heir of Jesus Christ, who owns the universe, and get my globe at death (or maybe at the resurrection). And I won’t mind sharing it with you. And if that’s a problem, he’ll make another globe. In fact, he won’t have to make another globe. They’re out there. So you get Quasar 10, which is probably greener. “The promise to Abraham and his offspring [is] that he would be heir of the world” (Romans 4:13). Are you an heir of Abraham? You indeed are an heir. In Christ, we are Abraham’s offspring, and Abraham was promised the world.

“In Christ, we are Abraham’s offspring, and Abraham was promised the world.”

One more, 1 Corinthians 3:21–22 (this is the best of all, probably): “So let no one boast in men.” He’s trying to help Bethlehem not boast — boast in pastors, boast in elders, boast in buildings, boast in anything. “Let no one boast in men. For [here’s the argument] all things are yours, whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world or life or death or the present or the future — all are yours, and you are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s.” What an argument. These ragtag Corinthians are being told, “Would you stop saying, ‘I’m of Paul,’ ‘I’m of Cephas,’ and realize you own everything?” It’s just a matter of time. A very short time.

3. God promises to serve us.

God makes much of us by having us sit at table when he returns, and serving us as though he were the slave and we are the masters. This is the parable of the second coming that is the most unbelievable. It’s Luke 12. I’ll just read you Luke 12:37. He’s describing the second coming, and he says, “Truly, I say to you, he will dress himself for service and have [us] recline at table, and he will come and serve [us].” What will it take to make you feel made much of? I used to think until I saw that parable that he did that on the earth: Last Supper, bound a towel, washed their feet — that’s an incarnation action. But now, name above every name, he’s coming on a white horse, sword out of his mouth, slaying his enemies, making everybody serve him at table.

And that’s not what it says. He will never cease to be our servant. We will tremble. We will say what Peter said: “You can’t wash my feet! Get your towel off. Sit down.” And he will say — no, he won’t. I want to say that he’ll say, “Get behind me, Satan.” But I think probably at that point, we will be sanctified enough that we won’t be satanic like Peter was. So there we are, sitting at table shortly, with Jesus serving us.

4. God appoints us to judge angels.

God makes much of us by appointing us to carry out judgment of angels. “Do you not know that we are to judge angels?” (1 Corinthians 6:3). You can take a deep breath and say, “Well, I don’t think I could do that.” You will. You will.

5. God rejoices over us.

God makes much of us by ascribing value to us and rejoicing over us as his treasured possession. Consider two verses.

Matthew 10:29–30: “Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? And not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father? Fear not, therefore; you are of more value than many sparrows.” “I attend to the minutest detail of a sparrow’s life. You don’t compare. You are, I would say, infinitely more valuable than a bird. So don’t worry. I’ve got your back. I won’t let anything happen that’s not for your good. I love you. I value you. You’re coming home. I decided this before the foundation of the world.”

I said there were two verses there. I said, “values you and sings over you, rejoices over you.” This is Zephaniah 3:17: “The Lord your God . . . will rejoice over you with gladness; he will quiet you by his love; he will exult over you with loud singing.” You ever heard God sing? I haven’t. I suppose Jesus sang a hymn when he went out into the garden. When everybody else sang, he didn’t sit there quiet. But when God sings, universes come into being. God’s going to sing, and it’s going to be a sound like you’ve never heard over you, over the blood-bought bride of his Son. He will lead the song at the wedding feast.

6. God will make us shine like the sun.

God makes much of us by giving us a glorious body like Jesus’s resurrection body. “[He] will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body, by the power that enables him even to subject all things to himself” (Philippians 3:21). But here’s the one that has captured me for all the years since I saw it — in the parable in Matthew 13:43: “The righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father.” Remember seeing Jesus in Revelation 1? Hair white like snow, girded with a brass belt of truth, just pillars for legs. And his face, it says, “was like the sun shining” (Revelation 1:16). And John was on his face. So will you.

We would not be able to look at each other in the resurrection unless God had given us new spiritual resurrection eyes. We will be so bright. No more wheelchairs, no more depression, no more fallen countenances, no more discouragement, no more disease, no more alienation — everything new, and your face shining like the sun. So, as C.S. Lewis said, we would be tempted to bow down and worship each other if God hadn’t given us eyes and a heart to know better.

7. God will rule the world through us.

Most amazingly, I think (maybe not), God makes much of us by granting us to sit with Christ on his throne. Revelation 3:21: “The one who conquers, I will grant him to sit with me on my throne, as I also conquered and sat down with my Father on his throne.” I don’t know what to do with that.

“Everywhere the Father extends his rule in the universe, he will do it through you.”

So, I’ll try. Maybe Ephesians 1:23 helps: “[The church] is [Christ’s] body, the fullness of him who fills all in all.” We’re going to sit on the throne of God with Jesus, because the thrones merge. We’re on Jesus’s throne; he sits on the Father’s throne; now we’re all on the same throne. God, the Son, and us sitting on the throne of the universe. If I put those two texts together, I think it means something like this: everywhere the Father extends his rule in the universe, he will do it through you.

God created the world, you, for a reason, and it isn’t to throw you away at the end. It’s so that you would fulfill what he gave you to do in the beginning — namely, to be a governor of the universe: subdue it, multiply, fill it, enjoy it, make something of it. “Now I’ve made you new, I’ll make the world new. Now get about it, and any place I stick my hand to rule, I’m ruling through people.” He’s going through people.

So, let it be known loud and clear: God makes much of us. God makes much of his Son’s bride. God loves his church with a kind of love that will make more of her because he makes much of her for his glory.