And for our New Testament reading, let’s turn to the book of Romans, chapter three, to that familiar place where that psalm was quoted by the apostle, Romans three, and the passage we’ll read will be verses nine through 22, just the beginning of verse 22. Romans 3, 9-22a.
Listen to this. This is the very word of God. What then? Are we Jews any better off? No, not at all. For we have already charged that all, both Jews and Greeks, are under sin. As it is written, none is righteous. No, not one. No one understands. No one seeks for God. All have turned aside. Together they have become worthless. No one does good, not even one.
Their throat is an open grave. They use their tongues to deceive. The venom of asps is under their lips. Their mouth is full of curses and bitterness. Their feet are swift to shed blood. In their paths are ruin and misery. In the way of peace they have not known. There is no fear of God before their eyes.
Now we know that whatever the law says, it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped and the whole world may be held accountable to God. For by works of the law, no human being will be justified in his sight, since through the law comes knowledge of sin. But now, the righteousness of God has been manifested, apart from the law, although the law and the prophets bear witness to it, the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. And then for our Old Testament reading and the text for this evening’s sermon, please turn with me to Psalm 53 in your Bibles. Psalm 53, and that’s on page 546 in the Pew Bible. To the choir master, according to Mahalath, the Mascule of David.
The fool says in his heart, there is no God. They are corrupt, doing abominable iniquity. There is none who does good. God looks down from heaven on the children of man to see if there are any who understand, who seek after God. They have all fallen away. Together they have become corrupt. There’s none who does good, not even one. Have those who work evil no knowledge? Who eat up my people as they eat bread and do not call upon God? There they are in great terror where there is no terror. For God scatters the bones of him who encamps against you. You put them to shame, for God has rejected them.
Oh, that salvation for Israel would come out of Zion. When God restores the fortunes of his people, let Jacob rejoice, let Israel be glad. That’s the reading of God’s word. Let’s pray together that he would speak to us through his word. Lord, now we pray for the illumination of your Holy Spirit. He himself breathed out these words, and so as they have been read and as they are expounded tonight, we pray that he would minister to us. We pray, O God, that you’d teach us the depths of meaning hidden in the songs of Zion, enlighten our minds, open our eyes that we might behold wondrous things out of your word, out of your law. We pray this for the honor and the glory of Christ Jesus, our Savior. Amen.
I was looking through past records and bulletins, and I was reminded that I preached here just this past June from Psalm 14. Psalm 14 happens to be mostly a word-for-word repetition, or excuse me, Psalm 53 is mostly a word-for-word repetition of Psalm 14. So, those two Psalms are nearly identical, which also inclined me to be a little bit tempted to do something different than just preach through Psalm 53. But when God repeats himself, we should sit up and pay attention, shouldn’t we? There are differences between the two. A few slight variations between Psalm 14 and Psalm 53 here.
When we began going through Book Two of the Psalms together, I mentioned the fact that there is this difference between the two in the sense that Book One of the Psalms very heavily uses the memorial name of God, the one we sometimes pronounce as Yahweh.
It’s the one where in your Bibles you see the word Lord in all capital letters. That’s the memorial name that God communicated to Moses on Mount Sinai. in the burning bush. And that name for God is used very extensively in Book One, and just very rarely in Book Two. And then Elohim, which we translate God is used much more extensively in Book Two, and not nearly as much in Book One.
And that difference is reflected in the difference between Psalm 14 and Psalm 53. Both of the Psalms, Again, they’re very closely identical. Both were written by David, but at different points in his life. So, Psalm 14 was probably written earlier in David’s life. Psalm 53 was probably written sometime later, perhaps during his wilderness years, before he was actually anointed king and began to reign. over Israel. We don’t know for sure.
But what is interesting is although there was quite some time of separation in years between the composition of these two songs, you notice that David as the human writer didn’t change at all in his assessment of human nature. His evaluation of his diagnosis, we could say, of man’s moral condition did not improve with time, in other words.
And so we could almost say that in Psalm 53, Holy Scripture itself, the Holy Spirit, the living author of this Psalm, the Holy Spirit kind of doubles down on his indictment of fallen humanity. were reminded, even in the very opening words of both of these psalms that man would like to think that there is no God. He wants to believe there’s no God because that makes him comfortable. If there’s no God, then he can more easily deaden or muzzle the voice of his guilty conscience. So man would like to think that there’s no God, but at the same time, man would like to think of himself as good.
And what this Psalm teaches us is that man, thinking both of those things, is wrong on both counts. There is a God, and man is not good. This Psalm teaches us that the entire human race is sinful, rebellious, and corrupt, but God saves a remnant for himself. I’ll say that again. The entire human race is sinful, rebellious, and corrupt, but God saves a remnant for himself. Here are my three points, and it’s all ours tonight, okay? Point number one, reprimand for the rebellious. Reprimand for the rebellious. Number two, redemption for a remnant. And number three, rejoicing in restoration. I’ll remind you of those other two as we go along.
But first of all, this Psalm is a clear reprimand for the rebellious. This is one of the classic texts on the doctrine of total depravity. When we were in Psalm 51, I said, I referred to Psalm 51 as a classic text on repentance. This Psalm here, Psalm 53, and its counterpart, Psalm 14, these are these teach so clearly, and support so strongly, our reformed doctrine of total depravity. Because human beings are prone to think very highly of themselves, aren’t they? Aren’t we? Don’t we find ourselves kind of leaning into that? Thinking highly of ourselves.
And so, since even we as God’s people, redeemed people, are prone to think more highly of ourselves than we ought. How much more a fallen man out there who knows nothing of the grace of God, how much more is he going to be prone to think highly of himself? And so, when we are exposed to the Holy Spirit’s assessment of humanity, we find a very different opinion, don’t we? We almost might be inclined at times, and certainly unbelieving readers, were they to read this, I’d be very strongly inclined to say that this is too harsh. This is just overkill, it’s overstatement. But is it? I think not. In fact, I would have to insist not.
Because as negative a review as it is, of the human condition, God repeats it. He gave it already to us in Psalm 14. He says it again. There’s none righteous. They’re all corrupt. And then if we go into the New Testament, we see he says it a third time. And so Spurgeon commenting on this, observes as follows. This accusation, twice made in the Psalms and repeated a third time by the inspired Apostle Paul, is an indictment most solemn and sweeping. But he who makes it cannot err.
He knows what is in man, neither will he lay more to man’s charge than he can prove. In other words, everything in this Psalm, God can lay out the evidence of the truth of all of it. And so, we have, in the opening verse, the theology of a fool. And the theology of the fool is, there is no God.
And I do remember when I preached on Psalm 14 that I used the illustration for for children. Parents teach their children the kind of sounds that animals make. And they ask their little ones, what does a cat say? And the child says, meow. What does a dog say? Woof, woof. What does a cow say? Cows say, moo.
What does a fool say? Fool says, there’s no God. And it’s important for us to understand, when we come to this word fool in the Bible, and particularly in the Old Testament and the Hebrew Scriptures, to refer to someone as a fool is not to say that they’re an idiot. It’s not a reference to someone who’s unintelligent. In fact, I think it’s safe to say that some of the most intelligent people ever to live have been atheists and have said what the fool says. There’s no God. You can think of some, I’m sure. There are some people who are intellectually brilliant, and yet they’re fools because they say there’s no God.
Because wisdom in Scripture, and particularly to the Hebrew mind, wisdom and folly as well, these are moral attributes, not intellectual ones. Christopher Ashe puts it this way. The word for fool, he says, speaks of an aggressively perverse lack of moral or religious sense rather than a lack of intellect. And so the likes of Stephen Hawking, or other well known, famous and brilliant atheists that can are rightly described as fools. IQs off the charts, but morally bankrupt because they say there’s no God.
Fools don’t deny the existence of God because of a lack of evidence. I think it was Bertrand Russell who was asked, you know, suppose for a moment there’s a God, and you die, and you have to appear before him in judgment. He says, why didn’t you believe me? He claimed that he would respond to God by saying, not enough evidence. But fools don’t deny the existence of God because of lack of evidence. They don’t deny the existence of God on scientific grounds. They deny the existence of God because they don’t want to be accountable to him. And so they persuade themselves that he’s not there. The Psalm tells us that man is corrupt. That’s how verse one goes on to speak. It says, they are corrupt, doing abominable iniquity. And we associate that idea of being corrupt or corruption with politicians, usually.
But God’s Word says that it describes us all. There’s none who does good. God knows. He’s checked. Verse two describes God in a Here’s a really big word, kids, okay? Anthropomorphic way. And that’s just a big word that means in order to help us understand something about God, he’s described in a human way, even though he’s not human. He’s not a man. But when we use an anthropomorphism, it’s describing God as doing something that a man does. And so God is, in verse two, described as looking down from heaven on the children of man, or what it literally says, there is the sons of Adam. He looks down from heaven to see if there’s any who understand, if there are any who seek after God.
God is omniscient. He knows everything. And he always knows everything. He never gains knowledge. And so we’re not to take from this, the idea that God wasn’t sure, so he had to look. It’s just describing it to us that way, so that we can think of it in human terms. And I say God is checked. He wasn’t just making a dismissive blanket statement about humanity. He knows. He has seen all of us.
So again, quoting Spurgeon. Spurgeon wrote, those pure heathens and admirable savages that men talk so much of, do not appear to have been visible to the eye of omniscience, since the fact that they live, the fact being that they live nowhere but in the realm of fiction. They aren’t there. They don’t exist.
Scripture speaks this way of God, you know, looking down, It says that just to assure us, to assure you and to assure me that God has all the facts. There’s nothing hidden from him. He hasn’t overlooked anything. And when he looks down, so to speak, what does he see? Verse three says, he sees that all have fallen away. It reads a little bit differently in Psalm 14. It says, all have turned aside. Falling away might be an intensification of that. But that’s what God sees. Everyone has turned aside. Everyone has fallen away.
And this is a collective evaluation that he makes, where verse 3 goes on to say, together they have become corrupt. And that word corrupt there is actually a different Hebrew word than the one used in verse one to say they are corrupt. The word here in verse three, it has to do with like milk going sour, milk curdling. And that’s sort of what’s become of the human race. We’ve spoiled, in other words.
And in order to make sure that we understand that God isn’t just using hyperbole here, He’s not just overstating the case, we see again in verse 3 at the end, there is none who does good, not even one. And then His final reprimand for the rebellious, we find in verse 4, and he speaks of the fact that these workers of evil eat up God’s people as they eat bread, and they don’t call upon God. But then we have to pause and say, hey, wait a minute. There’s no one who’s good, not even one.
But I’m seeing in verse 4 that God’s referring to some people as my people. How does that work? If there’s not one who does good, how is it that God has people? Who can be his people if no one does good? Well, there are those who can be God’s people because he himself provides redemption for a remnant. That’s point number two, redemption for a remnant. And we can gather this from Psalm 53 by thinking through it the way I’ve just described to you. No one does good. No, not even one. But God has people. How can that be? It provides a puzzle for us.
It’s a little bit like the puzzle with which Jesus confronted the religious leaders of his day. You remember how Pharisees and scribes were constantly coming to Jesus, challenging him, asking him questions, not because they were looking for information or knowledge, but because they wanted to catch him in something that he said, especially in Passion Week. Remember that last week of Jesus’ life before he went to the cross? He’s in Jerusalem, where all the religious leaders were concentrated.
And they kept coming after him, trying to ask him questions to trip him up. And they never could, because he answered all of their questions masterfully. They were just befuddled by that. And then it says, after that, no one dared ask him any more questions. And then he turned around and asked them a question.
He said, whose son is the Christ? And the teachers of the law say, he’s David’s son. And Jesus, paraphrasing here a little bit, but he says, well, that’s very interesting, because in Psalm 110, David, speaking in the spirit, says, the Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet. And so, if he’s David’s son, how does he call him Lord?
And they couldn’t put it together. They couldn’t solve the puzzle. They asked him question after question after question, calculated to trap him. And he answered them masterfully in every single case. He comes around with one question and they’re just stumped. Well, there’s sort of a puzzle here in Psalm 53, because there’s no one good. No, not one. And yet God has a people. How does that work? Here’s how it works. God redeems a remnant for himself.
That’s what Paul writes of in Romans. So for instance, in Romans 9, 27, he’s quoting Isaiah and he says, Isaiah cries out concerning Israel, though the number of the sons of Israel be as the sand of the sea, only a remnant of them will be saved. This idea of a remnant of the Lord God.
He has a group that he’s reserved for himself. He saves them. In Romans 11, verse 5, he offers these words of hope and encouragement. He says, so too at the present time, there is a remnant chosen by grace. He’s talking about a remnant from among the Jewish people, most of whom had rejected Christ. But Paul says not all of them have. Some of them have faith. Some of them are part of God’s remnant, and he’s drawing them to himself. And verse five in the Psalm is addressed. It’s speaking to that remnant. It’s speaking to God’s people.
When God says to his remnant, to his people, there they are, speaking of the wicked, there they are in great terror where there is no terror. He’s pointing out to his people the distress of the wicked, And here we have one difference from Psalm 14, because there’s an addition in Psalm 53. Psalm 53 adds that phrase, where there is no terror. So he directs the attention of his people, of his loved ones, to the wicked, and he says, there they are, they’re in great terror, where there is no terror.
Why are they in terror where there is no terror? Well, there’s two possible ways to look at that. It might just reflect that biblical principle that we see in the Proverbs that the wicked flees when no one pursues. So that because of their wickedness, because they’ve rejected the Lord, he can put a fear in their hearts when there’s really nothing immediately for them to fear. Or another way of thinking of it, there they are in great terror where there’s no terror. It might be a foresight, a preview of that suddenness of terror that is going to befall the wicked in the last day. It’ll come upon them when they didn’t see it coming. Either way, they’re in terror where there’s no terror. That’s part of the plight. That’s part of the condition of the wicked who don’t seek God.
And then there’s another difference that we see in Psalm 53, as opposed to Psalm 14. And this is probably the most extensive and significant one. In Psalm 14, the emphasis is upon the remnant’s security under the protection of God. In Psalm 53, what’s highlighted is God’s judgment on the oppressors, and we see that in verse 5.
God scatters the bones of him who encamps against you. That’s encouragement to his people, but he’s talking about what’s going to happen to the wicked. He scatters their bones, and God has rejected them. So that just shows us, it teaches us that God rejects the workers of evil, but he redeems his chosen remnant.
And then when we come to verse six, we come to the substance of our final point, and that’s rejoicing in restoration. Rejoicing in restoration. So anytime that you hear the opening verses of Psalm 53 or of Psalm 14, You might nod and remember and say, oh yeah, this is the one that talks about the wickedness of mankind, and there’s no unrighteous, not even one. So yes, Psalm 53 is known for that. Psalm 53 is known for its unequivocal indictment of human sin. And yet, lo and behold, it concludes with notes of hope, notes of joy. And that can only be attributed to the grace of God. Verse six begins with a prayer, a prayer that’s full of hope.
Oh, that salvation for Israel would come out of Zion. What does it mean by Zion? Zion is where the anointed king reigns. Zion is where the Messiah sits on his throne. And so the coming of Christ in the flesh as our Redeemer fulfills that prayer, that prayer that God’s people have been praying together and singing together ever since the composition of Psalm 14 and Psalm 53. Christ’s coming fulfills it. He came out of Zion, the heavenly Zion, to bring salvation.
And then the psalm, verse six in the whole psalm closes with confidence, closes with rejoicing. Look at how it’s worded too. When God restores the fortunes of his people, not if God restores their fortunes, not may He restore their fortunes, but this confidence that God is going to do it. And so, when God restores the fortunes of His people, then what?
Let Jacob rejoice. Let Israel be glad. And as I think it’s so important to stress continually, when we read in the Psalms, particularly in the Psalms, but even throughout the Old Testament, promises, given to Israel, promises given to Jacob. Those are promises for us.
Those are promises for the church of Jesus Christ, of which Old Testament Israel was a picture, was the church in seed form. So Jacob or Israel, that means God’s true people. So when we have a call to worship from the Psalms and it says something to Israel or to Jacob, it’s for you, because it’s speaking to the remnant of God’s people, God’s remnant in all ages, whether they’re Jew or Gentile, the promises are for you. In this Psalm, which in some respects is among the most bleak, Maybe the most depressing, some people might be inclined to say, with all this talk of sin, yet there’s a promise of restoration, isn’t it? And there’s a call, a call to worship. Let Jacob rejoice, let Israel be glad.
So, Psalm 53 pictures God looking down from heaven on the children of man, as I said, literally what that is in the Hebrews, the sons of Adam. He’s looking down on the sons of Adam. And when he did, what did he see? He saw sin. He saw corruption. He saw iniquity.
Until the Lord Jesus Christ came into the world. When the Lord Jesus Christ came into the world, when he was born in Bethlehem, as he dwelt among us, as he grew in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God, with man, as he became a man, and as he then set forth upon his earthly ministry, when Jesus came into the world, then God saw something different.
Finally, He saw, he looked down from heaven and he saw his beloved son in whom he’s well pleased. Finally, he saw someone who understood. He saw one who sought after God. Finally, he saw one who truly and only did good. We could never have provided what God was looking for, but Christ did. Christ came to be the Redeemer of God’s elect. He accomplished redemption for them. And this psalm calls us all to repentance toward God and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. And then of course, you know, that he bore our sins on the cross, he died, he was buried, he rose again. And Christ has now ascended into heaven.
He’s seated at the right hand of God the Father, and now Christ is looking down from heaven on the children of man. And when he does, brothers and sisters, he’s watching over you in a special way. And when he watches, when he looks down from heaven and sees you, he sees your afflictions, and he cares. He sees your hardships, He sees and He even knows your sorrows. And this one, our Savior, who’s looking down from the right hand of God, looking down on the sons of Adam, the children of man, He has purchased and secured and guaranteed salvation for all the remnant.
And so let us all rejoice. Let us all be glad. Let us pray for His return. Would you pray with me now? Father, we thank you that there is one who did good, one who sought after you, one who’s pleasing in your sight. We thank you for our Savior, Jesus Christ, and we thank you for the redemption that he has accomplished for us. We thank you that he sent forth his spirit to apply that redemption to us. We pray that you’d fill us with that very spirit and that we, with all of your people, all of your true people, might rejoice and be glad. And we pray you to hasten the coming of your kingdom of glory. Come and take us to yourself, O Lord Jesus. We pray this humbly and in your name alone. Amen.