"The Path of Life" (Salter) | Psalm 16

Fellowship Hall

06.14.2026

Transcript

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Preserve me, O God, for in you I take refuge. I say to the Lord, You are my Lord. I have no good apart from you. As for the saints in the land, they are the excellent ones, in whom is all my delight. 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. The Lord is my chosen portion and my cup. You hold my lot. The lines have fallen from me in pleasant places. Indeed, I have a beautiful inheritance. I bless the Lord who gives me counsel. In the night also my heart instructs me. I have set the Lord always before me because he is at my right hand. I shall not be shaken. Therefore, my heart is glad, and my whole being rejoices. My flesh also dwells secure. For you will not abandon my soul to shield, or let your holy one see corruption. You make known to me the path of life. In your presence there is fullness of joy. At your right hand are pleasures forevermore. This is the word of the Lord. Please be seated.

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We're in week two of Summer in the Psalms, and if you haven't picked up a reading plan for the summer, I encourage you to do that. We have a reading plan for reading the Psalms this summer, five days a week, so you have a couple of days to catch up. And it's a great way you'll hear one of the Psalms preached on that you read during the week. So it's not too late to start this, and you can start on week three and grab week one and two later. So pick one of those up. Excited to study this psalm with us this morning? Let me pray for us. Father, we do ask that you would come and speak through your word by your spirit to your people. This is your work. This is not the work of any human. This is the work of the Lord. To speak to his people. And so we ask you to do it now. That we would be the beneficiaries of the work, that our faith, our repentance, our obedience would all increase because we've been here and we've heard you. Pray this in your name. Amen. So if you've listened to me preach before, you know that my favorite book is Count of Monte Cristo. And that book, Edmund Dantes, has everything. He's 19 years old. He's about to be made captain of his ship. He's engaged to the most beautiful woman in Marseille. He's loved by nearly everyone he knows. And then in the space of a single evening, it's all gone. False accusation, arrest, he's confined to a prison cut into a rock in the middle of the sea where men are sent not to be punished, but to be forgotten. He spends 14 years there. In that rock cell, Dante finds a refuge. And it's not really in the prison, it's something inside of it. It's a man who tells him about a treasure. He takes shelter in a single consuming purpose to find the treasure of Monte Cristo, and then to use it to destroy the men who destroyed him. That whole purpose becomes his hiding place. It gets him out of bed in the dark. It gives him a reason to learn, to plan, to wait, and for 14 years he wakes up running to the same altar. Someday the treasure. Someday the vengeance. Eventually he escapes and finds the treasure. It's real. It's vast. And he then uses it methodically to destroy every one who wronged him. But vengeance does not stay inside the lines he drew for it. His plot against the prosecutor, Villafort, reaches its end, and the poison that he set loose in that household claims someone he never intended, Villafort's little boy. The count stands over the body of a dead child. And the author tells us what happened inside of him. He felt that he had passed beyond the bounds of vengeance, and that he could no longer say, My God is for me. He got everything he lived for. And it could not keep him. His refuge turned out to be no refuge at all. And that is not just the story about a fictional Frenchman, it is the story of the human heart. When life turns on us, and it will turn on all of us, we run somewhere. Some of us run to work. Some of us run to bank accounts, relationships, a bottle, a screen. Everybody takes refuge in something when life turns on us. So here's the question this morning for all of us. Where do you run? Where do you run for refuge when life turns? Not where you say you run. I want to know where you actually run. Think about that this morning. When you're in trouble, when life gets hard, when you're out of control, where do you run? Psalm 16 opens with a man answering that question: preserve me, O God, for in you I take refuge. One refuge by David chosen. Every other rival refused. And the whole rest of that Psalm after 1 is all the reasons he's made that choice. This morning we'll discover that it's only when the Lord is our refuge and portion that we can release what we've been grasping, we can rest where we've been planted, and we can rejoice in what's coming. First, release what we've been grasping. The act of release is seen in verses 1 through 2. Verse 1, preserve me, O God, for in you I take refuge. You see, if we're to release our grasp for false refuge, it must start with a cry. It must start with a plea. Verse 1 is a prayer for help. And it tells us David is in some kind of trouble. We don't know what. But he is crying out to God, preserve me, O God, for in you I take shelter. He names his shelter before he names anything wrong. He names his hiding place. He asks this once. He never asks again in the rest of the Psalm. The other ten verses are not request. They are the reasons for why he is running here. And release of all the false refuges begins right here with a cry that has already decided where to run. And then the plea becomes a pledge in verse 2. I say to the Lord, you are my Lord, and I have no good apart from you. To call God your Lord is to confess that you belong to him. And one who belongs to God can trust then that his needs are God's concern. The second line of verse 2 is actually sharper than it sounds. Apart from you is the language of the very first commandment. No other gods beside me. He's making a pledge of loyalty, having made a plea. David is promising this. I am not going to look over God's shoulder for some good that God cannot give. God is simply the best thing I have. He is the reason for anything good at all. So releasing false refuges starts with two things. It's a cry and a pledge that I'm not going to go shopping anywhere else. I'm going to hide right here. What's at stake with that decision? Verse 3, you find delight. As for the saints in the land, they are the excellent ones in whom is all my delight. You see, in verse 3, David's loyalty shows up in what he loves. The saints in the land, in whom is my delight? You see, a heart that is satisfied and fixed on God delights in what he loves. And so he delights in the people of God. He has joy. He has, as he'll say, fullness of joy. But what's the contrast of verse 4? The sorrows of those who run after other gods shall multiply. He doesn't say their pleasures multiply. False gods always advertise pleasure and only deliver sorrow. And they deliver it in an installment plan. More next week, more next month, more next year, more what? More sorrow. That's why he doesn't turn anywhere else but to God. If you want to see verse 4 in Living Color, you should read a book I just finished. It's hard. It's called Everybody Loses by Danny Funt, a reporter. It's essentially journalistic reporting of Psalm 16.4, an inside look at the problem and the rise of sports gambling. Everybody loses. The entire book is a display of the multiplication of sorrows when you chase after something false that cannot deliver. He tells the story of a man in Connecticut who lost $100,000 in a single year on a betting app. He wasn't wealthy. He was a server at the Cheesecake Factory. You know what the company did? The gambling company did? They didn't reward. Rather than slow him down, rather than say this is getting out of hand, you know what they did? They gave him VIP status. That's what they do. They wine and dine you, they take you to games. Why? Because the job of a VIP host is simple. The biggest, keep the biggest losers betting. Build their hope and multiply their sorrows. One former executive put it, they're selling that you can win and you can't. That's what every false God does. It tells you this is it. This is the thing you've wanted. This is the place to hide. Over promises, under delivers, and right on schedule, your sorrows will multiply. So, this is what I'd like to ask us this morning as we think about releasing what we grasp for that's false. When your sorrow multiplies due to chasing false refuge, listen to it. Don't numb it. Don't outrun it. Don't pour another drink at the altar. No. The sadness is trying to tell you something. It is a messenger. It is pointing you back to verse 2. You are my Lord. I have no good apart from you. Let me ask it plainly. What are you chasing right now? Because some part of you believes that if you get it, it will finally make you feel secure and satisfied. What are you after? Where are you running? The sorrows of those who chase after false gods multiply. But apart from God we have no good, and that is where delight is. David then continues, only when the Lord is our refuge and portion can we rest where we've been planted. Verses five through seven. You see, we're planted by his providence. Look at verses five and six. The Lord is my chosen portion and my cup you hold my lot. The lines have fallen for me in pleasant places. Indeed, I have a beautiful inheritance. Look at all those words that David stacks up. Portion, cup, lot, lines, inheritance. These are the words of the Old Testament when it comes to land, inheriting land. In the book of Joshua, when Israel came into the promised land, each family received what? A portion of ground, an inheritance, measured off by what? Lines. It was assigned to them. David takes that whole vocabulary and lands it in God and says, You're my portion, you're my lot. You have made the lines fall for me in pleasant places. And there was one particular tribe, the Levites, they were given no land at all. Why? Because in the Old Testament, God told the Levites, I'm your portion, I'm your inheritance. In other words, Levites, you're going to live off me instead of off land. And David says, that's what I'm going to do. I'm going to claim him as my only one. My only portion. My only lot. And David, by saying, the lines have fallen for me in pleasant places. Indeed, I have a beautiful inheritance. Just remember, he's not denying painful providence. The psalm began, he's in trouble. You know what he's doing, though? He's confessing a trustworthy providence. He's not denying a painful providence. He's confessing a trustworthy providence that the one who assigned our lot is good. Now let's be honest about how hard that is. Some of us look at the lines that have fallen for us, the stunning diagnosis, the failed marriage, the stalled career, the wayward child. And pleasant places is not the phrase that comes to mind. How do you move from resenting your lot to receiving it? Jim Cofield, who many of us know, a counselor and friend and professor of mine, put it this way. Christian maturity is learning to love the story that God is writing with your life. That's worth hearing again. Christian maturity is learning to love the story God is telling with your life. It doesn't mean you love every chapter. Some chapters hurt to read, to live in. But it's loving the story. That you can trust the one who's writing it. The Heidelberg Catechism says something very similar, and it's what a comfort. It asks how the knowledge of God's providence helps us. And it says we can be patient when things go against us, thankful when things go well, and for the future, we can have good confidence in our faithful God and Father that nothing in creation will separate us from his love. You see that? How do you go from resenting your lot to receiving it? It's that belief that I am planted by God and He is good in His providence. And that makes me patient and thankful and confident. And the reason we can say that is what the catechism says at the end of that answer. All creatures are so completely in God's hand that without his will they can neither move nor be moved. Isn't that amazing? So if you're planted and you see who planted you and that he's good, how do you stay rooted where you're planted? Verse 7, rooted in his counsel. I bless the Lord who gives me counsel. In the night also my heart instructs me. You see, if we're to sustain life where we're planted, we must root ourselves in his counsel. What holds us in our place is his good word. And his counsel is not advice. It's the kind of instruction that searches you, it's the kind of instruction that teaches you to face what is true, and it keeps you from following what is false. Where does this counsel come from? Now be careful because you could read this and say it comes from the heart. He says, in the night also my heart instructs me. You say, right there, see, that's what the culture says. Follow your heart. That's not the point. The counsel doesn't come originally from the heart. David's heart instructs him in the night because it is the source, not because it's the source of truth, but because his heart has been schooled in the Word of God. So that when he lays down at night, with all the pressures and all the worries and all the anxieties, what does his heart do? His heart roots him. His heart roots him in the counsel, in the counsel of God. You know, when you're in a bind, a dilemma, and somebody gives you counsel that you don't think you can trust, and you mull that over, man, it keeps you up all night. Lesser loyalties will leave you restless. Only God gives rest. You see, when the Lord is your refuge and portion, you can release what you grasp, that false thing, and you can rest where you've been planted by a good God who's given you his word. Here's something we're sitting with as we apply this point. And this is just a proposal. Maybe our restlessness is not due to our circumstances at all. Could it be due to a lack of attentiveness to his word? Could your restlessness be? Could my restlessness be? Because I haven't schooled my heart in the word in the day, so then in the night I can rest. Rest where we've been planted by a good God and root ourselves in his word. And then he says, only when the Lord is our refuge and portion can we in verse 8 through 11 rejoice in what is coming. What is coming? Here's what's coming a security that cannot be shaken. He writes in verse 8, I've set the Lord always before me. Because he is at my right hand, I shall not be shaken. Verse 8 tells you how to build the trust of verse 2. You are my Lord, I have no good apart from you. How do you get there? How do you stay there? Here's what you do you set the Lord. Lord always before you. That's the whole secret. It's a discipline. David doesn't stare at his circumstances and try to talk himself into liking them. He stares at his God. He stares at the word. You keep your eyes on your current chapter, I promise you, you will end up in despair. But you keep your eyes on the author of the bigger story, and you'll endure with joy. You see, we can hold steady through chapters we would have never written for ourselves because we know him. And we will not be shaken. And he says in verse 9, in light of that, my heart is glad, my whole being rejoices, my flesh dwells secure. Do you hear that? Because the Lord is his portion, his counsel, his stay. His whole being rejoices. Did you see that? Heart, whole being, flesh. All of him. He's resting and rejoicing in the midst of trouble. And then verse 10. The ground for his gladness on what's coming. For you will not abandon my soul to Sheol or let your holy one see corruption. I want you to watch. David is grounding his gladness in a hope of life beyond the grave, that God will not abandon his people in death. But there seems to be a problem with the verse. David's writing it. And Peter names the problem at Pentecost in Acts 2. The problem is David died. The problem is his tomb's there for everyone to see. I want you to listen. To Peter preach the risen Christ from Acts 2. I told the group this week from our sermon discussion, when the New Testament clearly interprets an Old Testament passage, a preacher is so happy. Because I am coming with authority. Watch what Peter does. He's preaching. He says, God raised him up, speaking of Jesus. And he says, For David says concerning him. Now who's David talking about in Psalm 16? According to Peter preaching at Pentecost, Peter says, David's talking about Jesus. Here's what he says: I saw the Lord always before me. He is at my right hand that I may not be shaken. Therefore my heart was glad and my tongue rejoiced. My flesh also will dwell in hope. For you will not abandon my soul to Hades, or let your holy one see corruption. You have made known to me the path of life. You will make me full of gladness with your presence. That's Peter preaching Psalm 16 on Pentecost. And here's his interpretation. 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, he, David, foresaw and spoke about the resurrection of the Christ. That he was not abandoned to Hades, nor did his Jesus flesh see corruption. This Jesus raised up, of that we are all witnesses. Being therefore exalted at the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, he has poured out this that you yourselves are seeing and hearing. So let all the house, Israel, therefore, know for certain that God has made him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified. There's your Pentecost sermon. There it is. That is incredible. That makes me so hopeful that Jesus really is risen from the dead. You know the guy who preached this? Denied him three times and ran off. He saw him. He saw the fulfillment of Psalm 16. The words of Psalm 16 are not ultimately about David. They're about Jesus who went into the grave and did not stay. No decay in his body. The empty tomb is the proof that this is real, that we have something coming. You want to see somebody trusting the ending that Christ has won? Go listen to the interview with Ben Sass. Man, listen to three different ones. Two months ago, former Senator Ben Sass gave an interview he never wanted to give. In December, doctors found stage four pancreatic cancer. They gave him three to four months. It has now spread to his lungs, his liver, his blood vessels. He has five cancers. He's 54. He has a 14-year-old son and two daughters that he says I'll never walk down the aisle. And when Ross Dalton of the New York Times asked him about dying, Ben Sass said, to live as Christ and to die as gain, I believe in the resurrection. And I believe in the restoration of this world. And so I do not feel great fear about my death. After death, no more tears. By the end of this interview, the one crying was the journalist. Not the dying man. Verse 8, that's it. Because he is at my right hand, I shall not be shaken. Ben Sass can say it for the same reason David could. Psalm 16, 10 is not a wish. It is a truth proclaimed by Peter that Christ is risen and in him we will rise. That's what's coming. That's what's coming. A joy that never ends. Easter morning is why a man with five cancers and his rotting flesh on his very face can smile and rejoice. Because verse 11's coming. You make known to me the path of life. In your presence there is fullness of joy. At your right hand are pleasures forever more. Listen to the joy. Watch the Ben Sass interviews. He laughs. He says this. He said, I hate cancer. And I'm grateful for it. Because it broke the lie that I was the center of everything and would be around forever. Here. How can you have that kind of joy? Very simply put. Christ fulfilled Psalm 16, 10. And that gives us joy on this thing called the path of life, as David calls it. I want to ask you this morning as you think about the path of life. You make known to me the path of life. Which path are you on? The culture sells a path that promises life and delivers death. God's path is life because it runs straight through the grave and the empty tomb and comes out on the other side in fullness of joy. So as we close, contrast the beginning. Edmund Dantes, he got his treasure, and he found nothing. He was empty. Ben Sass. He's losing everything. And he's found fullness of joy. That's the difference a refuge that is trustworthy makes. The refuge of the one true God, our risen Savior. He is the only one worth running to. So run to Him for refuge. Let's pray. Thank you, Lord, so much for Acts 2 helping us understand this psalm and its conclusion. The hope of the resurrection is such an incredible fullness of joy and hope in the face of trouble. Thank you. Thank you. You are alive. You will return. And we will rise in you. Lord, when we are struggling with the lines that you've placed in our life, would you help us to set you before us that we may see you and know your providence is trustworthy? You are trustworthy. You are good. Root us in your counsel. And help us follow our sorrows when we run to false refuge. Help us follow our sorrows all the way back to the only refuge who gives us delight. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.