In the sermon 'The Delight of Kings', Peter Allison delves into Proverbs 16, highlighting the divine role and responsibility of civil authorities as ministers of God's justice. He emphasizes that rulers, akin to the biblical king, are tasked with upholding righteousness and justice, and they must not transgress in judgment. The sermon underscores the idea that Christ rules through these authorities, using them to establish justice on earth. Allison uses various biblical stories, such as those of Uzziah and Nebuchadnezzar, to illustrate transgression against divine authority and the consequences thereof. Furthermore, he draws parallels between ancient and modern governance, suggesting that today's political figures, like congressmen and judges, embody the role of the king in executing divine justice. The sermon concludes with a reflection on Christ's ultimate sovereignty over earthly rulers, affirming that all authority is ultimately under His rule, and His justice will prevail.

Please turn in your Bibles through Proverbs chapter 16. I'd like to read just I'd like to read just the text this morning, the portion that we will be looking at, Lord willing. Proverbs 16, beginning at verse 10, Hear God's word. Divination is on the lips of the king. His mouth must not transgress in judgment.

Honest weights and scales are the Lord's. All the weights in the bag are his work. It is an abomination for kings to commit wickedness, for a throne is established by righteousness. Righteous lips are the delight of kings, and they love him who speaks what is right. As messengers of death is the king's wrath, but a wise man will appease it.

In the light of the King's face is life, and his favour is like a cloud of the latter rain. Thus far, the reading of God's Word this morning, may he add his blessing to it, A word that endures forever. The grass withers and is blown away. The flower of the field perishes. But the word, this word, of our God, endures forever.

Almighty Heavenly Father, You have preserved your word. You have written it down and given it to us, that we might know you, its author, that we might know the truth, for you are truth and your word is truth. And you have given your word to us to teach us, to instruct us in the way in which we should go, to guide us as a lamp to our feet and a light to our path. We have come now to hear your word and we ask that you would speak to us and that your spirit might work through your word as it comes to us, as that you would sanctify and set apart these sinful lips and this vessel of clay to proclaim the riches of your grace through Jesus Christ. Amen.

Where we live in a time when some in the church, some who know Christ, would tell us that politics is dirty. And maybe it's a necessary evil, but it's an evil nonetheless. It's something that Christians should avoid, if at all possible, and stay away from. But our text has a very different view of the king. And by the king Proverbs is speaking, it's referring to the civil authority, the civil authority of the land.

In Solomon's day, Solomon being the author of this book, in Solomon's day the civil authority was concentrated in one man, the king. And he had his ministers, his subordinates, but ultimately they all reported to him. He was the final authority. He was, as we say today, the judge, the jury, and the executioner. He tried the case, he determined the facts, and he carried out the sentence.

It all came from him. In our government, we have one, that authority, that authority of the civil magistrate that God has given is divided into three different branches. And no one of the branches, or at least no one of the branches, wields all the authority of the civil magistrate. We have one branch that is commissioned to make laws, to declare the standard. Another branch that is charged with carrying out that standard of executing the law.

And a third branch that is charged with rendering judgments regarding the law. And in only one of those branches is even that subdivided authority vested in one person. In two of the other branches, in two of the three branches, that authority, even that divided authority, even that subset of the civil authority, is vested in a plurality of people, whether it's nine judges in our Supreme Court or 535 legislators in Congress. But when Proverbs speaks of the King, don't imagine a golden throne and one man sitting there with a crown on his head and a rod in his hand, but rather imagine, think to yourself when Proverbs mentions the word king, think Congress, congressmen, senators, legislators, Supreme Court judges, and a president. Because for us, that is the king.

That is our king, that government. And so their text this morning says that divination is on the lips of the king. The king, the civil government, is a minister of God. When the Bible says that divination is on the lips of the king, or in our case the Supreme Court judges, that's a sobering thought. Talks about a sentence, or it talks about a sentence on the lips, and it talks about a mouth.

Those are both things that are referring to speech. Those are figures that are referring to speech. So it's saying when our Supreme Court judges render a judgment, they are giving a divine sentence. They are giving a sentence from God. They are speaking as God's minister.

Because Christ is ruling through the King. Christ is ruling not just through a mythical, ideal figure in our imagination, but he's ruling through a real person, a flesh and blood person, a bench of nine men in black robes. When they speak, they are speaking a divine sentence. They are speaking as God's minister. The Lord establishes His justice here on earth through these sinful, fallible humans, these human judges.

A divine sentence A divine sentence is in the lips of the King. But God claims ownership of the work of the King, of the work of the civil magistrate. It says in the next verse that honest weights and scales are the Lord's. All the weights in the bag are His work. This is the only verse that doesn't mention king in it, I believe, in our text.

All these verses, but this one speaks, each one speaks of the king, but this one speaks of the work of the king and attributes it to the Lord. Because it's the job of the civil magistrate to establish a standard of measurement, standard of just weights and scales. In fact, there is an entire division in our government that is dedicated to this task. And every time you pump your gas, you probably stare at that little sticker that they put on that pump that says they have looked at it they have checked that pump and they've made sure that it is a just weight and an adjust balance. Proverbs is saying, psalm is saying, this is the Lord's work.

And he's saying in essence that Christ is ruling through this person, this king, this office, this government. Christ is ruling through them. Christ is ruling through them. There's a painting on the Saturday Evening Post, it's actually not Norman Rockwell, it's done by somebody else who probably was just as gifted as him, but it's an old lady, an older lady, very sweet old lady, standing, buying some chicken from the butcher. And in front of them is her chicken on the scale, hanging on the scale, and she's looking up at the balance.

And on the other side of that scale is the butcher. He's put the chicken on the scale, and he's looking up at the balance, as they both look to this scale to determine the weight of that chicken and how much will be paid for the sale of that chicken. The only problem is, the sweet lady as she's looking up as her hand under the scale, lifting it up. But the butcher isn't any better. He's standing back there.

He's got his finger on the scale, pushing it down, as they both look up to the scale. It is the duty of the civil government to put a check on our sinful natures, to first of all establish a just scale, To determine that the scale is just and proper. And to determine that the mechanism of trade, the standards by which we trade, are proper. That they are in fact true. Because that civil magistrate is a minister of the Lord Jesus Christ and it is through his work that Christ rules, that Christ rules over us, that Christ establishes justice and truth in the land.

You see, this is the purpose for which Christ has given his authority. Because remember Jesus told Pilate, all authority in heaven and earth is given to me. He told Pilate, you wouldn't have any authority unless it had been given to you. And the purpose, the reason that Christ has given his authority to the civil magistrate is to render a judgment. Divination is on the lips of the King, verse 10 says, his mouth transgresses not in judgment.

In other words, This minister of God, this civil magistrate, is not being unfaithful. He's not sinning in rendering a judgment. In the Old Testament, this word that is translated transgress, Almost everywhere it's used. It refers to sinning against God, transgressing against God. Most cases explicitly.

There's only one place that this word is used when it doesn't refer to transgressing against God. That's in Numbers 5, in the case of the unfaithful wife, and the trial that was to be given to her if she sinned or transgressed against her husband. But everywhere else, this word is used to transgress against God. But I think there's one example that is particularly helpful in understanding the sense of this passage, at least it was for me, and that is 2 Chronicles chapter 26. It's a story about King Isaiah.

2 Chronicles 26 tells this story. Isaiah was a good king. The Bible says that God says God's evaluation of him was that he was a good king. And this chapter talks about his reign, how he fought against God's enemies, how he defeated them, how he was a brilliant general who was able to build engines of war, cunning engines. It almost reminds you of reading about him, almost reminds you of the 20th century arms races we have built ever increasing clever weapons.

And he made devices, verse 15 says, in Jerusalem, invented by skillful men to shoot arrows and large stones. Devices to shoot arrows and large stones. And his fame spread far and wide, for he was marvelously helped till he became very strong. He was a good king. He used his office wisely to bring God's enemies under him, But he became proud.

His heart was lifted up. And as proper as we saw last week, or I guess it was two weeks ago, before pride comes destruction. He transgressed against the Lord God. There's that word, same word. He transgressed against God.

What did he do? He entered the temple of the Lord to burn incense on the altar of incense. Here he is, God's minister, the king. He's been commissioned by God to render judgments as God's minister, to bring his enemies under him and yet he wanted more authority. And He went into the temple and burned incense.

Asariah the priest went in after him and with him were eighty priests of the Lord, valiant men, the Bible says of them. They withstood King Aziah and they said to him, it is not for you, Isaiah, to burn incense to the Lord. It doesn't belong to your office, King Isaiah. You're the king. You're God's minister to execute God's wrath on those who do evil.

You're the minister to bring judgment. You're not God's minister to burn incense on this altar. They said, that is for the priests, the sons of Aaron, who are consecrated to burn incense. Get out of the sanctuary! This is eighty valiant men who dared to stand up to the King for the sake of truth.

They said, get out, for you have transgressed. The same word there. Isaiah, you have transgressed. You shall have no honor from the wolf." And Isaiah became furious. He had a censer in his hand to burn incense, and while he was angry with the priests, leprosy broke out upon him.

And so they thrust him out of the place and indeed he hurried to get out. It's like the Egyptians couldn't get the Israelites out of their land fast enough when God struck their oldest, their firstborn with death. He hurried to get out because the Lord had struck him. Twice there in that passage, this word transgress is used specifically not of the sin of pride, which brought to his destruction, but of his sin in which he transgressed against the Lord was in taking to himself an office that he did not have, that he had not been given, to taking to himself an authority that he didn't have. He transgressed against God because it didn't pertain to his office to offer incense.

And what Proverbs is saying here is, the King's mouth does not transgress in judgment, because it does pertain to his office to render judgment, even as we will see over life and death. It is within the authority that Christ has given to him. His authority extends even over life and death, as the verses 14 and 15 say. As messenger of death is the king's wrath, but in the light of the king's face is life. The power of physical life and death is in the hand of the King.

It's in his mouth to render a sentence unto life or a sentence unto death. The King is the one who carries out the commission that God gave to Noah at the end of the flood. I think sometimes we were talking this week, sometimes we underestimate the massive scale of change that came upon this earth because of the sin, because of the fault. Weeds and thistles didn't grow before. Poisonous animals and so on didn't exist before.

Killing, you know, We see there are whole TV shows dedicated to filming the wilds of Africa and getting these amazing pictures of lions taking down with prey, gazelles escaping. Just amazing shows of these battles that go on every day for life and death among the animals as to who's going to eat who that day. But all that didn't happen before the fall. The animals weren't killed before the fall. Their blood wasn't shed before the fall.

And they weren't given as food to us before the fall. In fact, they weren't given as food to us until after the flood. But it was also after the flood that God told Noah in Genesis 9 that men, sinful men nonetheless, were to be God's ministers of wrath on those who did evil. He said, God told Noah, I have given you all things even as the greener, but you shall not eat the flesh with its life, that is its blood, because the blood represents life. It's why Christ shed His blood, His life for us.

That's why God killed skins to clothe Adam and Eve, it wasn't that the fig leaves didn't cover them, there was no shedding of blood in their covering. Without the shedding of blood, there is no remission of sin. And so out of respect for that life that is represented in the blood, we are not to eat the blood. But it goes on, God went on, surely for your life blood I will demand a reckoning from the hand of every beast I will require it and from the hand of every man. From the hand of every man's brother I will require the life of man." What's God saying there?

He tells us, whoever sheds man's blood by man his blood shall be shed for in the image of God he made man but as for you be fruitful and multiply and bring forth abundantly on the earth, and multiply in it." God told Noah very clearly here, that whoever among men sheds the blood of men by man, by man's own brother, that man's own brother, his blood must be shed. Because we are made in the image of God And we are not given authority over our own life or anybody else's life. Our life is in God's hands. And if we dare to take that authority into our own hands and to shed the blood of another person, then God says, I require that blood from you. Whether it's a man or a beast, I require that blood for shedding a man's blood.

And so the king, The civil magistrate, in our day, this is the judge, is the minister of God to bring that sentence of death of those who are convicted of the crime of murder. And God gave a number of other crimes that were deserving of death that the civil magistrate must carry out if he is to be a faithful minister of God. You see, in all these ways then, Christ rules through the King. It is how he establishes his justice on this earth. He uses imperfect sinners to carry out his righteousness, just like he uses imperfect sinners to proclaim the riches of His grace.

Vessels of clay. The Scripture says He does that so that the glory might be His. Think about that. Every time there is a sentence given, Even wicked judges very often will give mostly right sentences. Because Christ rules through the King, because His wrath is God's wrath.

He is a minister of God's wrath on those who do evil. Because that is the case, wise people will pacify the wrath of the King. Verse 14, As messengers of death is the King's wrath, but a wise man, A wise man will appease it. One of the ways that we appease the wrath of the king is by respecting their office. It's very tempting to revile the king when they act wickedly.

It's very tempting. Just get on Facebook sometime and see. It's rampant reviling of the King. Even Paul fell into that unknowingly, reviling the high priest for a wicked and unrighteous statement that he made on the floor of the Sanhedrin. But it's very foolish.

Paul repented. He said, I didn't realize, brothers, that that was the high priest. For it is wrong to revile God's anointed. It's foolish to disrespect congressmen, judges, the president. It's foolish.

And it brings, unwisely brings their wrath upon us. If we are faithful as Christians, we probably will bring the wrath of wicked magistrates upon us. We don't need to add to that by unwisely bringing their wrath upon us and reviling them. We might have to disagree with the king, as the Sidi priests had to confront King Azai, a very popular, successful, and powerful king. They did so at great risk to their own life.

We might have to disobey the king as the apostles did when they were commanded not to preach the gospel. We may have to call the king to repent as John the Baptist did when he told Herod that it wasn't lawful for him to have his brother's wife. Brother's wife. How's that for a minister of the gospel confronting the civil magistrate about a matter of what some today might call personal sin? We may have to do any number of these things, but we must always do so with respect.

We see examples of that kind of respectful submission, recognition of the King's authority in Christ himself as he stood before Pilate. He didn't revive Pilate. He didn't accuse him of being unjust, although he was. There are any number of things that he could have complained against, but he didn't. There were the apostles, as they were called before the Sanhedrin.

They were asked questions, and they would carefully avoid those questions. They said, as for whether it's right for us to disobey, you decide that sort of thing. They went on to say, we respectfully say, we must obey God rather than men. Peter said in Acts 4, when the Sanhedrin called them Peter and John, and commanded them not to speak at all or teach in the name of Jesus, they said, Well, whether it's right in the sight of God to listen to you more than to God you judge It's a very polite and respectful way of deflecting the question For we cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard There's no reviling there. There's no calling down threats upon them, or cursing them, cursing the darkness.

Rather there's a respect, there's even a wisdom there, in how they respond. Whether it is right in the sight of God to listen to you more than God, you judge. You can determine that. Here's what we know. That's wisdom, pacifying the wrath of the king.

And when they had threatened him, they let them go for fear of punishing him. We see the same thing in Jonathan when he appeased the wrath of his father against David. David was, or Saul was upset. I don't know what I said. Jonathan appeased the wrath of Saul against his friend David when Saul was seeking to kill him.

Jonathan pointed out, what has he done against you? And by bringing reason and reasoned argument, a peaceful argument to his father. He temporarily appeased the wrath of his father and turned it away from David and allowed David to escape and to live. Jonathan said to his father, don't let the king sin against his servant because he hasn't sinned against you. His works have been very good towards you.

He's supported you. He's fought for you. He's killed your enemies. He has never lifted his hand against you. In fact, the Lord has brought great deliverance from him for all Israel.

And you saw it, and you even rejoiced. Why then? Why then? Are you going to sin against him by shedding this innocent blood? Daniel does the same thing with another wicked king.

Daniel was a youth, maybe not even 20 years of age, when he was taken away captive probably in the first round, in the first captivity, in 606, taken to Babylon as a young lad, we would say, not even out of high school, not at age. And He is put into a school to learn to be an advisor, to be a statesman to the king. The king had a dream and nobody could answer the dream. Nobody could tell him what the dream was and its interpretation. And the King, Nabi Kineza was demanding his wise people to tell him both the dream and the interpretation.

And when nobody could tell him the dream and the interpretation, he was probably trying to be clever, right? He said, if I tell them the dream, they can always come up with some some sort of meaningful interpretation. I mean, that's kind of how astrologists today work. They try and get information out of you as much as they can, and then with a little bit of information about you they can make something up about you that's sort of true. He knew that, so he said, I'm not going to tell you the dream, you tell me the dream and what it means.

And they said, well there's nobody under the heavens that can tell you your dream. The king said, I don't care, you're all going to die if you can't tell me the dream and its interpretation. And so he gave the command to kill all of his wise men. It was a foolish command, but his servants began to do it. The palace guard went out and began killing all the wise men.

And they came to Daniel. Ariok, the captain of the king's guard, went out to kill. He said to Ariok, why is the decree from the king so urgent? And Ariok explained what the king's command was. And Daniel went in and asked the king to give him some time that he might make known, that he might tell the king the interpretation.

The Bible says that with wisdom and counsel, Daniel answered. With wisdom and counsel. And he went to the king and was able to buy a little bit of time, and then he went to his three friends, his brothers, and the Lord, and told them what was happening, that they might seek mercy from the God of heaven concerning this secret. And God revealed to Daniel both the dream and its interpretation, and he told the king both its dream and its interpretation. And the wrath of the king was appeased by the wisdom of Daniel, being able to go and plead for some time for the king.

It requires a measure of humility to honor the king when the king is wicked. That's what the wise do. They appease the wrath of the king. The blessing of respecting the King is to know his favor, like a cloud of the spring rain. And to think in terms of a farmer who has planted his crops, And without the spring rain, they don't sprout.

But with the spring rain, they get a good start. They sprout and come up and get a good jump on bearing fruit in the fall. But the lack of a spring rain can be devastating, can kill the whole entire crop. The favor of the king is like the cloward of the spring rain. So Christ rules through the king, but Christ also rules over the king.

So it's not like we are submitting to some autonomous sovereign wicked person. We are submitting to somebody over whom Christ rules, And we should always remember that. We see that in this text because it says that the standard honest weights and scales are the Lord's. All the weights in the bag are his work. The king cannot say that 16 ounces is one ounce, as they tried to do in our country in the case of gold and silver.

Well, they can say it, but they can't enforce it. Because God rules over the king. They can't make the days longer and the nights shorter. They can't make the wintertime warmer and the summer cooler. They can try, but they can't do these things.

They can't make money by simply saying, this is money, because let this piece of paper be our money, any more than they can say, let this bread become apples, or let there be apples. They cannot do any of these things. Weights and measures are the Lord's. He is the one who determines truth. He is truth.

The standard of a pound, these measurements, this truth, is established by God. The standard of Justice is also instituted by God. The work of the king is often compared to scales, as the king weighs in the balances. God told Belshazzar in the writing on the wall that he had been weighed in the balances and found wanting. So when God says that the work of the balance and the scale and the weights, they're his, he's saying that He holds the standard of truth, the standard of justice that the King uses.

How do we evaluate the morality of a particular policy, a particular action? By what standard? Well we must use the law of God. How do we treat the poor? What is the standard by which we evaluate these kinds of policies of welfare, policies of state, of our interaction with other countries.

We must look to the word of God for our guidance in all these things. Abortion and homosexuality are two big issues for our day. How do we determine what is right and what is wrong? What is loving to these two men who want to get married? What's a loving thing to do?

Well, we can't use our own standard, our own scales, our own weights and measures. We have to look to the Scriptures to use the Lord's standard of weights and measures. Is a mother who murders her baby a murderer who ought to be put to death, as we've seen? Is that the right thing to do, or is she a victim who needs our pity? Well, let's answer that in a minute.

Well, let's answer that a minute. She needs justice from our capacity as ministers of Christ's justice. She is a murderer. By the standard of God's law, if she's put her unborn baby to death, she deserves to die. But as ministers of Christ's mercy, she deserves our pity as well.

She needs our pity. She doesn't deserve it. She needs our pity. She needs us to love her enough to bring her the gospel. Now some might say those are contradictory, but they're not.

She needs both. Because that's what God's law requires. It requires whoever sheds man's blood by man, his blood must be shaked. But it also says that for God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten son, whosoever. And that doesn't mean whosoever accepts homosexuals and murders of mothers who murder their babies.

That means whosoever, including homosexuals, fornicators, and mothers who murder their babies, whosoever believes on him will be saved. For God came not to condemn the world, but that the world through him might have life." So if we are going to be faithful ministers, We need to be faithful in both of these aspects. The standard of justice and morality is instituted by God. And the civil magistrate cannot stop the propagation of the gospel because God rules over him. And we can be assured as his people that the gates of hell even, all the machinations and conspiracies and evil schemes of men like Nero or our own government and they are indeed wicked.

Make no mistake about it. They are really just as wicked as Nero. When you look at all of the millions, thousands of people that have been killed, these kings cannot stop the propagation of the gospel in the advance of the Church of Jesus Christ. We also know that Christ rules over the king because the king's tenure is established by Christ. He is the one who determines how long this king gets to stay in office.

The throne, a throne, Solomon says, is established by righteousness. You see, power is not established by military might. It's not established by votes. It's not established by cunning, like Machiavelli said, or by the realism that he espoused, deception. Security doesn't require deception and intrigue and armed force and murder of one's own people.

That's all things that civil magistrates have practiced in the 20th century. Machiavelli espoused these sorts of things, said they're necessary. We have to be realists. No. No, God says the throne of His ministers is established by righteousness.

And wickedness is an abomination, and doubly so for kings. The kings who defy God are removed from office. Just think of Sennacherib. Cain before Hezekiah, that story is told in two places in scripture. You can read it in 2 Kings 19 or you can read it in Isaiah 37.

Sennacherib came with a very proud and arrogant message against the Lord. Saying, who can deliver you Jerusalem? There is nobody else that's been able to save themselves who are you who is your God that he can deliver you And Hezekiah took his letter and spread it out before the Lord and asked for the Lord's help. And And God said to Sennacherib, Did you not hear long ago how I made it, how from ancient times I formed it? Now I have brought it to pass that you should be, Mr.

Sennacherib, a wicked king, he said that you should be for crushing cities, fortified cities, strengthened cities, reinforced concrete cities, if you will, in today's language, into the heaps of ruins. Therefore their inhabitants had little power. God says, I ordain for you to be the one to crush fortified cities and reduce them to heaps of rubble. Their inhabitants therefore had no power against you. They were dismayed and confounded.

They were as the grass of the field and the green herb. But God said, but I know you're dwelling and you're coming, going in and you're coming out and I know you're rage against me because your rage against me and your tumult has come up to my ears. The Lord says therefore I will put a hook in your nose. I'll put a hook in your nose and I'm going to drag you back from where you came. I'm going to put my bridle in your lips.

I'm going to turn you around and send you packing." He went home. The next night, God sent an angel of death into his camp and destroyed 185, 000 soldiers, wiped out his army. And he went back in shame to Nineveh, and his sons killed him. And he died. Nebuchadnezzar had a very similar experience.

He was also a servant of God. Yes, he was a very wicked king. Nebuchadnezzar was a very cool king, exceedingly cool. God said to Israel, because you haven't heard my words, says Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon, my servant, Nebuchadnezzar God called his servant, I will bring them against this land And against all the nations and will utterly destroy them and make them an astonishment." And he did. He did it through the hand of his servant, Nebuchadnezzar, this wicked, wicked king.

He said, the whole land will be a desolation and an astonishment, and all the nations will serve the King of Babylon for 70 years. But then it will come to pass when 70 years are completed that I will punish the King of Babylon and that nation, the land of the Chaldeans, for their iniquity." for their iniquity. And God said He would make it a perpetual desolation. Perpetual, without end. So we need to remember, particularly when we are faced with wicked civil magistrates who are bringing destruction upon the land, we need to remember they are God's servant too, and Christ rules over them.

Their throne is established by justice, and wickedness is an abomination to the to the Lord and he will remove all wicked kings but lastly there is also a great hope in that Christ is our King. Christ is our King. See all these things that Solomon says about what the King is and what he does. Divination is on the lips of the King, his mouth does not transgress in judgment. Christ is the righteous King.

When he judges, he judges with perfect righteousness. When He brings to pass, there is perfect justice. And you say, what about all these things, these sins that He brings to pass, or these evils that he brings to pass through all these wicked kings. Where is the justice in that? Well, what do we deserve?

All of us, what do we deserve? By God's wrath, everlasting wrath, for all eternity. And so you see, when there is an injustice done unto us, it might be an injustice according to human standards, according to what the outward law requires, but It's not unjust, because we deserve God's wrath. So there is, in that sense, nothing that is ever unjustly done of us. Nothing that we can say, we didn't deserve this.

Christ has given us officers. Ephesians 4 and 1 Corinthians 12 speak about the officers that He has given to us for our own good. He has given to us laws that we might know Him, that we might know the standard of justice, that we might know where peace is, where truth is. He is given to us the censures for our own good. He is our King.

Matthew 18 speaks about this process, the censures that he's given. 1 Corinthians 5 speaks about the censures that the church is to bring on those who transgress. He's done these because He is our King. He's ruling over us. And He is a good King.

And all of His judgments are just and right. And all of His censures and all of His chastenings are for our good, for our blessing. That we might be purged from dead works to serve the living God. He bestows his grace upon us. The civil magistrate, as this text shows, in the New Testament teaches, is for punishing evildoers but also rewarding those who do well.

Well Christ as our King does reward those who do well. Now we have to remember that our works are not of ourselves As our confession said this morning, did you notice that? The very last line. Part of idolatry is attributing the good works that we do to ourselves instead of to God. The good works that we do are what Christ has done in us and through us.

But Revelation 2, verse 10, he tells the church at Smyrna, the devil is about to throw some of you into prison that you may be tested and that you will have tribulation in ten days. Be faithful unto death and I will give you the crown of life. Be faithful and I will reward you. And in Revelation 22 we read the same thing. Behold, I am coming quickly, Christ says, and My reward is with me to give to everyone according to his work.

My reward is with me. God, Christ is a righteous King. And he will reward the work that his Spirit has done through us and in us. But his wrath is also a messenger of death. Paul told the Thessalonians that it is a righteous thing with God, it is a righteous thing with God to repay with tribulation those who trouble you.

And those who give you, and to give you who are troubled rest when the Lord Jesus Christ is rebuilt from heaven with his mighty angels, taking vengeance, inflaming fire, taking vengeance on those who do not know God and who do not obey the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. See, that is both a warning and a promise. There is both a warning and a promise. There is the warning of the reality of Christ, the wrath of Christ our King, His just and righteous wrath against us for our sins, for our wickedness. But there is also the promise that in His countenance is life.

Christ didn't come into this world to condemn this world, but that the world through him might have life, and that we might have everlasting life. The beginning of wisdom is to fear the Lord. Psalm 2 urges us, the kings of the earth, to kiss the Son, to bow down and pay homage to him as the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords, lest you be destroyed in his wrath when his wrath is kindled but a little. Brothers and sisters of the Lord Jesus Christ. Have you bowed before the King of Kings?

Have you kissed the Son? Do you see in his countenance Life or death? I'd like to read Psalm 72. It's a song about Christ's kingship. And as I read it, I'm going to read it quickly because we're out of time, but as I read it, just think about all of the aspects that were brought up in Proverbs 16.

Give the King your judgments, O God, and your righteousness to the king's son. He will judge your people with righteousness and your poor with justice." In this passage, these exact verses are quoted in Hebrews 1 as applying to Jesus Christ. The mountains will bring peace to the people and the hills by righteousness. He will bring justice to the poor of the people. He will save the children of the needy and will break in pieces the oppressor.

They shall fear you as long as the sun and moon endure. Throughout all generations he will come down like rain upon the grass before mowing. Like showers that water the earth, in his days the righteous shall flourish, and abundance of peace until the moon is no more. He shall have dominion also from sea to sea, and from the river to the ends of the earth. Those who dwell in the wilderness will bow before him, and his enemies will lick the dust, the kings of Tarshish and the Isles will bring presents, the kings of Sheba and Seba will offer gifts.

Yes, all the kings will fall down before him. All nations will serve him, For he will deliver the needy when he cries, the poor also, and him who has no helper. He will spare the poor and the needy. He will save the souls of the needy. He will redeem their life from oppression and violence.

A wonderful promise. And precious shall be their blood in his sight. Have you resisted evil to the point of shedding blood? No, I know you haven't because you're still here. But those who have and maybe the Lord will call you to do that one day.

Know that your blood is precious in his sight. He will live and the gold of Sheba will be given to him. Prayer will be made for him continually and daily he shall be praised. There will be an abundance of grain in the earth on top of the mountains, its fruit shall wave like leaven on him, and those of the city shall flourish like the grass of the earth. His name will endure forever, his name shall continue as long as the sun, and men shall be blessed in him, and nations shall call him blessing.

Blessed be the Lord God, the God of Israel, who only does wondrous things, and blessed be his glorious name forever, and let the whole earth be filled with his glory. Amen and amen. Almighty Father in heaven, you are indeed a most glorious king. Your throne is established upon righteousness, for you are the righteous judge of all the earth. And you even now do rule over the kings of the earth.

You are our king. You have subdued our rebel hearts to you. You have given to us officers and laws and censures that we might be led in paths of righteousness for your own name's sake, that we might be brought into greater and greater obedience and submission to your rule. Indeed, you have promised that all the nations of the earth will bow before you and that your throne will be established forever, a kingdom of righteousness, a scepter of truth. We do rejoice this morning that you are our King.

And we ask that you would receive our praise and our adoration as the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords, the one to whom all glory is due, all power and dominion on heaven and earth belongs to you. Through Jesus Christ, our Son, your Son, our Savior, we ask in these things. Amen. We ask these things. Amen.