In the waiting of King David, he decided that he was going to bring the ark of the covenant back, where it had lain, ignored, a curious theorem, and he would bring it back to Jerusalem. The ark, as you know, was a testimony to the covenant that God had made with His people, covenant that He had made with David. And it was not only so, but a symbol of God's presence with His people. So David gathered 30,000 people to go and get the ark of the covenant, to be a part of this untelage that would bring the ark back to Jerusalem, but along the way, the oxen that was pulling the ark stumbled, and one of the attenders through the ark named Aza, raised up with His hand to keep the ark from falling on the ground. And God's response to that absolutely terrified the people, it not only terrified them, but shocked them. He struck Aza dead right there. In 2 Samuel 6, verse 7 says, the anger of the Lord was aroused against Aza, and God struck him there for his error, and he died there by the ark of God. David's response, the God's response was first anger, and then it was fear. David actually asked in 2 Samuel 6, verse 9, he says, now can the ark of the Lord ever come to me? I mean, that's David, and his fall pattern no doubt was, you know, sure, Aza had broken God's law, and he had, certainly he was not clean, he was ceremonially unclean when he touched the ark, and no doubt his motives were not 100% sure, he probably had some coronal motives in what he did, but still all the man was trying to do was to protect the ark of the covenant, and he was trying to prevent embarrassment to God's earthly throne. And God sliced him dead for doing that, and that's why David is asking, how can I ever have the ark of the covenant with me in Jerusalem, and so he actually left the ark there in Obedean? He finds out, Obedean is actually blessed for having the ark, and David says, I want the blessing, so he goes to get the ark from Obedean and bring it back. But we know from reading Psalm 15 that that event had an incredible impact on David, because in Psalm 15 this question, how can the ark of the Lord ever come to me is inverted in the first verse, first verses, Lord, who made well in your sanctuary, who made live on your holy hill? David is asking who can really have fellowship with you, God, who can really worship you, who can live faithfully in the presence of its holy Almighty Jehovah? That kind of man abides with the Almighty, it's a great question, it's a question that we all need to ask, the healthy question, who can really sit on God's holy hill and worship him, being the God that he is. And the song breaks down very easily in the three sections, if you'll notice the outline, you have David's question in the first verse, and then you have David's, and then you have God's answer in the next really three and a half verses, and then this great comment that is made to the righteous, before we delve into the outline of one of look, one second aside, is look at two dangers that are brought out in this song, two dangers that are very easily, we easily succumb to these dangers when we worship. In fact, these are two dangers to which Israel has to come in their worship, that's why David brings it up. But these are things that we need to conquer, these are things that we need to overcome, if we're really going to worship God in this place, or even in your own private life, your own private worship. The first thing you might got both of these down to the outside of the word introduction, but the first is externalism, and the second is hypocrisy. Externalism is worship that doesn't come from the heart. It's worship that actually comes from what we might say is our outer shell, it's worship that we are simply outwardly going through the motions, it's the idea that I come to church and I'm there in the sanctuary, I'm seeing all the people, I listen to the sermon, I make my way through the order of worship, but that's really it, there's no heart in externalism. Another great danger is that of hypocrisy, hypocrisy is living in a different way than I profess, it's when what I profess is different than what is actually in my inner life, what I'm saying I believe is not true in my heart, and you can see that in the way it comes out, it manifests itself out of my heart, and you see it in my lifestyle, my lifestyle is different than that which I profess to believe, and again we all fall prey to these dangers and worship ministers, I think especially to externalism, choir members, I would think, I want to speak to every choir member here, but they would know that a great, it's hard, it's hard to lead worship, it's hard to be in a position where you've got to stay one step ahead of everybody else at the same time, keep your mind focused on where we are in the worship service, that really takes work, it takes training, again it's very hard to do, I remember about 17 years ago, when I was one of my summers with Al time, the camp minister was named Billy Dixon, he was the RUF minister at Valhae then at the time, but he's now pastor in the PCA, but I mean I was going to lead worship at the camp, and it was the greatest advice, and I think about probably every place when I lead worship here, or in my ministry now, is that you have got to get, as you prepare for worship, you have to get to the place where you are already where you want the people to be, you have to prepare yourself so that when you're praying or leading him, introducing him, you're still, your whole purpose is to bring them along, bring them where you've already been, but my point in saying that is that actually that's a very hard thing to do, to do that and actually be worshiping at the same time. His prophecy is also very easy, I guess, to commit in worship, we gather for worship, I say almost every Lord's day morning, let us now prepare to worship the living God, and when I say that, that's as if to say, we all agree, we're entering the presence now, the living God, and we talk about how we rejoice in His mighty rule, and yet in His very kind rule, and yet the way that I treat my family, or the way I treat my wife, the way I treat my children, the way I'm treating that person at work with me, it goes against the very things that I'm saying I believe in worship, it does not reflect the truth of the fact that I really believe that this is the living God and whose presence I am, the one who knows my heart, hypocrisy destroys the soul, it really does, hypocrisy crushes worship, I can't come to worship and not be right with fancy, it is, especially, that's a question that shouldn't be, especially the minister, but it's true, especially for myself, it's miserable to think that I don't, if I don't get myself right with her before I stand here, because you just, you feel so dirty, you know how hypocritical you are, that's the idea here, what kind of person can really be the guest of the Almighty, that's what David is contemplating, who on the face of the earth is worthy to actually worship the living God, the modern church really treats questions like that very lightly, we're almost casual about even, you might even ask yourself, even as I say those words, who is really worthy? You know as you're attitude, you know, how long is this sermon going to last, how long we're going to be here, I'm kind of tired, I'm thinking about tomorrow, you know, it's because if that truth for you, the modern church has lost a sense of the holiness of God, we have lost a sense of this relationship that we must have with the character of this Almighty, Jehovah God, in whose presence we are, worshiping, again very light, very casual, but not David, he uses words like sanctuary and holy hill, sanctuary meaning tabernacle or camp of the Almighty, you remember what God said to Moses, as Moses approached the burning bush, he said, do not come any closer, take off the sandals, your sandals for the place where you are standing is holy ground, remember the description, this was alluded to in Hebrews 12, but the description of the mountain when God descended on the mountain was preparing Moses to receive the law, there was lightning and there was thunder and this dark thick cloud descended on the mountain, there was the sound of the loud trumpet blast and everybody was trembling, everybody was afraid and then came this great warning from God in Exodus 19, it says, go down and warn the people, let's say break through the gays of the Lord and many of them perish. And let the priests who come near the Lord sanctified themselves, let the Lord break out against them. That's what I was told by the Old Testament counterparts, so that was we read earlier in the New Testament, but you say the point, for the God-fearing is reliant to actually dwell, to actually stand on the hill of God called Zion and worship him. That was a grave matter in consecration, holiness and being set apart, purest, separation from everything that was sinful, everything that was unquaint. That was the condition upon fellowship with God because to a thin God in worship would cost you your life, and that's why again we read the New Testament packages so that you can't sit here and say, but that's just Old Testament stuff. That's the Old Testament, God, that's the way he dealt with them then. Now we're under grace. You know, that's not true, that's the reality of, again, of the same God yesterday, today and forever, and that which we read from Hebrews 12 and 1 Corinthians 11, the seriousness of approaching the Lord's table even the grave warnings that are ours to prepare ourselves and not take it unworldly. The reason being Jehovah cannot and Jehovah will not have fellowship with the unholy. And that's why David asked earnestly, Lord, who made well in your sanctuary, who made live on your holy hill? In ancient world the ritualistic worshipper would go to one of these places of worship of some unknown God and he would go to the priest and say, you know, what's the condition upon entrance to worship your God and the priest would say, he would come and say, well, you've got to do this ritual and you've got to do this ritual over here if you're going to come and worship our God. But you can say, that's not true for Jehovah, that's not what David said. David didn't even mention rituals. He didn't mention anything necessary that you have to go through this or go through that. He didn't even talk about it being a person of prayer, a person of faith. What you're going to find is we go through each of these phrases in the next verses is that what David's talking about, the man who dwells on God's holy hill has everything to do with moral character, particularly, especially as you deal with other people. He's talking about a man or woman of integrity. If you're going to dwell in the sanctuary, you've got to be like the sanctuary. If you're going to live on the holy hill, you've got to be holy like the hill. Again, that's the man of integrity. It's a woman of integrity, the kind of man who dwells with the Almighty. Look at verse 6. He talks first about his character. His character is true. Verse 6 says, he who walks up rightly, or your translation may say, with integrity. It's a man who has consistency between what is in his heart and what's in his life. What is in his heart, again, is not alluded to earlier, what's in his heart is manifest through this man's life. What this man says is one with what he is, and he's not careful about something, and then careless about others. He's very careful about everything. He's very careful about every bringing, every fall captive is the obedience of Christ. Look at the second part of verse 6 says, he works righteousness. In other words, what he does, when he lives his life, conforms to God's standard, God's law. He loves God's law. And you can tell he loves God's law by the way he lives his life. That's his character, and in his words, we might describe as being restrained. The third part of verse 6 says, he speaks the truth in his heart. In other words, his claims are true. He's not a hypocrite. His say is in accordance with his doing. He might say, his lips are in accordance with his life. He's not a liar. He doesn't bear false witness. He doesn't have to twist things in order to get people to think the way he wants them to think. He doesn't lie. It's not only to do not lie to others. He doesn't lie to himself, as it says in his heart. When do we lie to ourselves? We lie to ourselves, and we try to justify our sins. We say something. We do something. We say, well, it's okay. You know, I deserve it. You didn't even get to realize what he's done to me. In that kind of law, we're lying to ourselves. That's not true of this man. Look at verse 3, he who does not backbite. Your translation makes like slander with his tongue. Nor does evil to his neighbor, nor does he take up a reproach against his friend. He doesn't use his tongue to tear down other people. He doesn't try to tear down the reputation of his neighbor or his friend. His tongue is used for construction, you must say, rather than destruction, this word for backbite or slander. It carries a lot of weight. It's very strong word. It means actually that this person does not spy things out. As if to look for something that he can talk about, she can talk about to somebody else. The idea is to find something else, hoping even to find a spindle, hoping to find something juicy so that they can then spread that word abroad. And it really can be something as simple as fault finding. Just looking at someone, you're always looking for something that's fault with them so that they can, you can broadcast it. You don't have to be told, I mean, you know as well as I did, and Montgomery certainly has a share of this. It's a bad thing because it does such damage to people you can ruin people's reputation in one sentence, in one word. Your opinion of another individual thinks about how the power behind it, because when you make that comment, you're going to change that person's opinion of that person that you've talked about. It's very, very dangerous. And we could, if you talk about being alive, we cried that this morning in the past old prayer about being a beacon on a hill, if we would just have integrity with our words. It's just printed church with that integrity and not entertained gossip and not spread slander, not even listen to it. Your friends would only talk that you weren't, I guarantee you. Because then they'd know where you stood. If you just didn't entertain, you just wouldn't listen to it. It's a great light. In fact, some good advice is in the bulletin on the announcement side where it says quote worth quoting. That's a great thing for you to take home and think about from Plummer, William Plummer. Here he's turning there, but I want you to listen to me. Read it later. But it's very good. It's very practical. I want you to love. I'm serious about this because this is kind of hard to understand this quote from St. Augustine. It was said that St. Augustine had this phrase, I'm about to read to you, inscribed over his table. This is what it said, he that does love with bitter speech, the absent to the fame, must surely know that this board, no place is for the same. In other words, Augustine was saying, if you like to talk bad about people when they're not around, then you're not welcome at my table. You can't talk like that in my table. You're not a welcome guest. And do you know that's the same thing God is saying? In this song he's saying, the slanderer is not a welcome guest on my hill to worship me. You can't be a slanderer and worship God. You cannot be someone who has a loose tongue and expect to come in here on Sunday morning, Sunday evening and worship God because you're not welcome in his presence. Strong words, I know. This God's word. Look at his allegiance. His allegiance is clear cut in verse 4 in his eyes. A vile person is despised, but he honored those who fear the Lord. He who swears to his own heart and does not change as a kind of person who keeps his word to the point that when he makes a promise, and then he finds out that that promise is going to cost him something, he still doesn't. He keeps his word. It doesn't matter if it's going to cost him anything, it's his word. He swears to his own heart. That's the allegiance that we find in Shadrach, Nishak, and Abednego. These were the Lord's men that came that day when the king said, you bow down to that to our God or you will die in the flames, you will die in the heat of the furnace. And you know what they said to him? He said, God will spare us. But even if he doesn't, that's what's important. Even if he doesn't, we will not bow down and worship the reason they swore to their own heart. They did not change. That's the kind of person that has fellowship with God. And then where it says, despising the vile person, doesn't necessarily mean they just hate every unbeliever. And they live with that person. They might witness to that person. They might live with that person in understanding and with kindness and show that person love. But there are ultimate allegiance and loyalty and commitment and comfort is not with the unbeliever. It's with the believer. That's the person that this man loves and honors. Otherwise, he couldn't truly worship God. And then we notice day that his dealings are honorable in verse five. He does not put out his money at usury for interest, nor did he take a bribe against the innocent in the Mediterranean world. There were two ways you could get money back on a return. You could either charge interest or you could charge a flat fee. There were those who liked to do both. The Bible calls it usury. You notice that the psalms here that really colonists is very practical. We start talking about interest bearing and things like, you begin to see that the psalms in the Bible is not some sort of tie in the sky over spiritualizing my life, but the Bible really gets down to the nitty gritty of my life and tells me how to deal in the business world. I mean, you could say verse five is that nuts and bolts of business ethics right there. And this man does not take advantage of the poor. He does not take advantage. He does not take a bribe against the innocent. And his financial dealings, he always looks out for the person who has less than him, such as the man who has fellowship with God on his holy hill. And then I want you to see the promise that's made to the righteous, but before you can really appreciate this great promise that's made to the righteous, you have to understand that David in this psalm is not describing how a person gets on the hill. Please understand that that even the things that I've been listing for you and talking about, this is not a description of how a person gets into the presence of God. It's not as if David is saying, look, if you want to get on the hill, you've got to clean up your act over here and clean up your act over here, and you've got to do good, you've got to do better, and then you can come and get on the hill. He's talking to people who are already on the hill. This psalm is the people who are religious. These are people who have a relationship with God, and he's saying to them, examine yourself. examine yourself according to this standard, this list of things here in this psalm. If you want to make sure that you're really not fooling yourself and conning yourself into thinking, maybe I'm not a Christian, or you're conning yourself into believing you are, then he's saying, examine yourself here, look at your life. He's not saying, do better and you'll have fellowship with God. Martin Lloyd Jones tells a story when he was preaching a sermon as a young minister, a priest that was all of his hearty felt that he'd really done a good job and he'd really presented the gospel he felt, but there was an older gentleman there, a retired minister. And Martin Lloyd Jones was very interested in his opinion after the sermon, he said, how did I do? And the old retired minister said two words to him, he said, do better. And he wasn't saying to him, you need to do a better job of preaching. What he was saying to him was, your whole message was just do better, and that's not the gospel. And from Martin Lloyd Jones says, from that point forward, he determined that in every sermon he would preach the cross. How does one get into the presence of God? How does one find themselves on the Holy Hill? It's a work of God. You know that, it's a work of the Holy Spirit coming into that person's life, breathing breath, a breath of light into that person's dead soul, giving them faith in Christ. They then put their faith in Christ. They trust and it's called conversion. And they're given a new heart, they become a new creation. And the Holy Spirit then moves into that person's life or continues to work, I should say, continues to work in that person's life, renovating their hearts, you might say. It doesn't mean they're not accepted. They are accepted on the grounds of Christ, but the Holy Spirit is renovating that heart. It's called sanctification. And it's on the grounds of that work of the Holy Spirit that once remains, you might say, on the Holy Hill and has fellowship with the living God. The whole point being, that's the promise made in the last part of the last verse of this song, that from that hill you cannot be moved. You'll never ever fall off the hill. We made His Christians to be asking ourselves again and again, am I simply going through the motions? Have I allowed externalism to be a part of my worship experience? Have I allowed hypocrisy to become a reality in my heart, in my life? Because as I said earlier, both are so killing. Both are spirit-quinging. We talk about loaning the spirit in our heart. Well, here's the standard. Psalm 15 is the standard. It's the pattern for prayer. And so all of us as Christians must ask ourselves, Lord, who made well on your hill? Who may have fellowship with you? And we learn that it's the one who walks in integrity. And may God make all of us men and women of impeccable integrity. Our closing prayer is a prayer that is written for us in the bulletin. And we're going to pray this prayer in unison together. And I would ask Ed at the close of the prayer, let's go immediately into him. 575 soldiers of Christ arise, and you'll notice by going ahead and turn there.