In this sermon, Pastor Chuck Smith focuses on Psalm 112, which is an acrostic Psalm that praises the righteous man who fears the Lord and delights in His commandments. Pastor Chuck emphasizes the importance of righteousness and how it leads to blessings and favor from God. He highlights Jesus as the perfect example of righteousness, always doing what pleases the Father. The sermon also emphasizes the generosity and discretion of a good man, who lends and guides his affairs wisely. The righteous may face temporary trials, but they will ultimately be remembered and not be moved forever.

Oh, let the Son of God enfold you With His Spirit and His love Let Him fill your heart and satisfy your soul Oh, let Him have the things that hold you And His Spirit like a dove Will descend upon your life and make you whole Welcome to The Word for Today Featuring the Bible teaching of Pastor Chuck Smith Of Calvary Chapel, Costa Mesa, California Pastor Chuck is currently leading us on a verse-by-verse venture Through the entire Bible We'll be focusing our attention on The blessing of righteousness As we turn in our Bibles to the 112th Psalm Beginning in verse 1 And now with today's message Here's Pastor Chuck Smith Psalm 112 is a companion psalm to Psalm 111 Both of these psalms are known as acrostic psalms That is, each phrase in each of the psalms Begins with a successive letter of the Hebrew alphabet And so, if you were reading this in Hebrew Each sentence begins with a successive letter The first sentence begins with Aleph The second with Beth The third with Gimel The fourth with Deleth And so on through the Hebrew alphabet And they would do that to aid in memorization It's like the streets in Corona Del Mar They're named after flowers But they're in alphabetical order So you have Acacia, Begonia, Carnation, Dahlia And so it's easier to remember the streets in Corona Del Mar Because they're named after flowers in alphabetical order So these psalms, each sentence After a succeeding letter of the Hebrew alphabet And they are companion psalms The 111th psalm Is a psalm that extols the works of the Lord And he speaks of the works of the Lord are great They are honorable and glorious They are to be remembered The works of his hands are verity and judgment And he ends the psalm by declaring The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom A good understanding have all of they that do his commandments So the reverence of the Lord and doing of his commandments Is how the psalm ends, psalm 111 Psalm 112 is the companion psalm And it takes off where psalm 111 stops In that psalm 112 now Talks about that man who fears the Lord And obeys his commands So it talks about the works of the Lord, how awesome they are And how that because of God and his awesome works He is to be reverenced by man He is to be held in great awe, wonder, reverential fear Now getting into chapter 12 It talks about that man who has learned What it is to stand in awe and reverence of God That man who has committed himself to obeying God Doing his commandments So psalm 112 begins with praise the Lord Blessed is the man that feareth the Lord And delighteth greatly in his commandments So you see the tie with the previous psalm We're gonna talk about now that man That was mentioned in the last verse of the previous psalm The man who has come to wisdom for the fear of the Lord The reverence of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom And good understanding Those that delight and those that do his commandments So that is God's blessed man Now psalm 112 through psalm 118 Are called the Hallel Psalms As we mentioned Hallel is praise And so they are psalms of praise And these five psalms Or six psalms Are the psalms that are sung during Passover And on the first day of the Passover feast They begin the Passover meal with psalm 112 and 113 At the end of the Passover meal they sing Psalm 114 through psalm 116 Those are the Hallel Psalms I said through 18 but actually it's through 16 Are the Hallel Psalms Now as we get to psalm 114, 115 and 116 These were sung at the end as I said of the Passover feast And we read in Matthew's Gospel That when Jesus celebrated the Passover feast After the meal they sang the psalm Before they went out to the Mount of Olives So when we get to psalm 114, 115 and 116 Just sort of close your eyes And imagine that you're sitting in the corner of the room Listening to Jesus and his disciples As they sang those psalms at the end of the Passover dinner Before going out to the Garden of Gethsemane How I would have loved to have heard Jesus sing I will one day but I would imagine that he has a very Powerful, fabulous voice The voice of the Lord Thundereth, you know, breaketh the cedars in Lebanon So praise ye the Lord Or in the Hebrew, Hallelujah Blessed is the man And the word blessed we've pointed out in the Hebrew is literally Oh how happy is the man That fears the Lord That delights greatly in his commandments David began the first psalm with the words Blessed is the man Or how happy is the man Who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly But he goes on down to say But whose delight is in the law of the Lord And in his law doth he meditate day and night Hear the blessed man who delights greatly In God's commandments Now it describes conditions and things That will transpire, that will come to pass In and for this man First of all his seed, his children Shall be mighty upon the earth The generation of the upright Shall be blessed The posterity of the upright man Those children that follow him shall be blessed In another psalm it talks about The blessedness of serving God and Committing yourself to him and It says that you will see You know your children's children The blessings upon your children's children And surely It is such a thrill To see my children's children Loving the Lord, serving the Lord Following after the Lord Singing praises to the Lord Just a great delight The posterity, the generation of the upright Shall be blessed Wealth and riches shall be in his house Psalm 1 declares Concerning that man who delights in the law of the Lord That he shall be like a tree That's planted by the rivers of water Bringing forth fruit in his season His leaf also shall not wither And whatsoever he does shall prosper Wealth and riches shall be in his house And his righteousness Endureth forever Because our righteousness really Is that which God has Accounted to us through our faith in Jesus Christ Unto the upright That is that upright man Verse 2 That is blessed There ariseth light in the darkness Jesus Christ is indeed that light He said I am the light Of the world And there are so many scriptures That relate to Jesus Christ As the light And the contrast Between light and darkness The kingdom of God Versus the kingdom of Satan And thus That light in the darkness He is gracious How glorious And how gracious Is Jesus Christ We think of what a gracious person he was A bruised reed shall he not break He was just so tender Towards people in need He was so gracious towards sinners It's just a beautiful example for us The graciousness of Jesus He is full of compassion And again All through the gospels We read over and over How Jesus was moved with compassion Towards people Towards individuals who were going through deep sorrow Towards individuals who had great infirmities Towards the multitudes Who were like sheep without a shepherd Without someone to truly guide them They lived in a day of religious confusion They lived in a day of religious hypocrisy When the religious leaders were corrupt When they had made the house of God a den of thieves When there was all kinds of confusion in the minds of the people Because of the corrupted religious leaders Who were really just seeking to enrich themselves By making a prey of the people And thus the people were without any real spiritual guidance They were like sheep without a shepherd And when Jesus came along They recognized the genuineness of Jesus They just pressed upon him And so many times we read that the crowd was pressing upon him so much That he didn't even have time to eat He didn't have time to sleep The needs of the people were so great And he was moved with compassion towards them He wasn't angry or irritated that they would interrupt him But always his heart was compassionate towards those in need And then he is righteous What can you say? He said, I do always those things that please the Father You can't improve on that He said, if you have seen me, you have seen the Father He was a perfect example of what God is He's righteous Now coming back to the good man The man who fears the Lord The man who does and delights in his commandments A good man shows favor and lendeth And he will guide his affairs with discretion He is generous and yet he is discreet Surely he shall not be moved forever The righteous shall be held in everlasting remembrance Now the righteous may be moved for a time All of us go through problems and trials Where we are moved but not moved forever We go through the trials but we come out We don't stay in the slough of despond But we come out like the dear old sister Who was testifying of the tremendous trials That she was going through And she just didn't know if she was going to be able to make it And she cried out to the Lord in desperation And said, Lord, you must help me I just can't handle anymore It's gone beyond my ability to cope And so she said, just guide me, Lord, in the scriptures And she opened up her Bible, closed her eyes And put her verse down on a scripture And she looked at it and it was Luke 2-1 And so she was sharing And God led me to Luke 2-1 And oh, how blessed I am, how happy I am God has given me glorious victory Well, the pastor knew that Luke 2-1 said And it came to pass in those days That a decree went out from Caesar Augustus That all the world should be taxed And he wondered, what in the world Could that scripture do for this poor woman In her desperate condition And so when she was finished with her testimony He said, sister, I'm just a little confused You said the Lord led you to Luke 2-1 And it brought you such tremendous blessing Tell me, how is it that Luke 2-1 spoke to you In this your hour of great trial and burden She said, well, pastor, it says And it came to pass It didn't come to stay, brother It came to pass You may be going through some trials But they've come to pass They haven't come to stay The righteous will not be moved forever But shall be held in everlasting remembrance And this verse speaks to me He shall not be afraid of evil tidings For his heart is fixed Trusting in the Lord Through life we are destined to receive evil tidings Tidings of a loved one who has died Maybe been killed in an accident Tidings of financial setbacks Tidings that your wife just had an accident And it was all her fault And the car is total And the premium just expired As Christians, we are not immune from problems From troubles But as Christians, we don't fear evil tidings Because we trust in the Lord And we know that all things are working together for good Because we love God And He's called us according to His purposes And so because of our trust in the Lord Our heart is fixed on Him Not on our circumstances And as a result There's no fear in the day of evil tidings When those evil tidings come We're not destroyed by them We're not devastated Because our heart is fixed We trust in the Lord People are, it seems, constantly aware Of the fact that here in California We live near the San Andres fault line And that we are being warned all the time That we are facing here in California A monumental earthquake It's going to be of a magnitude of somewhere In 8.3 or so, some of them are estimating And we can't really imagine the devastation Of an earthquake of that intensity There are those who have visions of the earthquake And they see in their visions California sloughing off into the Pacific Everything that is west of the San Andres fault line And because of these prophecies They see the giant tidal wave inundating This whole coastal plain And they foresee all of these things, you know And people get frightened And they move from California They go back to the south where they have tornadoes So fearful of earthquakes in California But they say, well, aren't you afraid of a big quake? Surely when that day comes It will be a day of evil tidings As the whole place is shaken But if your trust is in the Lord If your heart is just fixed on Him You really don't fear David said, I will not fear Though the mountains be removed And cast into the midst of the sea Because his trust is in the Lord Put your trust in the Lord Trust in Him at all times, ye people For the Lord will sustain us His heart is established He shall not be afraid Until he sees his desires upon his enemies He has dispersed That is, he has been generous He has given to the poor And again it repeats His righteousness endureth forever And his horn, which is a symbol of power Shall be exalted with honor The wicked shall see it And they will be upset And the wicked will gnash with his teeth And melt away And the desire of the wicked Shall perish Psalm 113, also one of the Hallel Psalms A short little psalm of praise Praise ye the Lord, or Hallelujah Praise, O ye servants of the Lord Praise the name of the Lord And then he goes on to declare Blessed be the name of the Lord From this time forth and forevermore From the rising of the sun Unto the going down of the same The Lord's name is to be praised We'll return with more of our verse-by-verse venture through the Bible in our next lesson as Pastor Chuck Smith continues to guide us through the study of the Psalms and we do hope you'll make plans to join us But right now, I'd like to remind you that if you missed any part of today's message or perhaps you'd like to order a copy for that special friend or loved one you can do so by simply contacting one of our customer service representatives and they'd be more than happy to assist you with the ordering details Simply call 1-800-272-WORD And phone orders can be taken Monday through Friday 8am to 5pm Pacific Time Once again, our toll-free number is 1-800-272-9673 And for your added convenience you can order online anytime when you go to the wordfortoday.org And while you're there, be sure to browse through the additional resources that include Bible studies, commentaries, CDs, DVDs and so much more Once again, that's the word for today online at thewordfortoday.org And for those of you who still prefer to write you can use our mailing address which is The Word for Today P.O. Box 8000 Costa Mesa, California 92628 And be sure to include the call letters of this station with your correspondence And now on behalf of The Word for Today we'd like to thank all of you who share in supporting this ministry with your prayers and financial support And be sure to join us again next time as Pastor Chuck Smith continues his verse-by-verse venture through the Psalms That's right here on the next edition of The Word for Today Now once again Here's Pastor Chuck Smith with today's closing comments May the Lord be with you Give you a good week May you just experience the consciousness of God's presence as He leads and guides you in His path May it be just a week of spiritual growth drawing closer to God in Jesus' name Come along on an exciting adventure as Pastor Chuck reads the story of the Ten Commandments to children God wants us to keep the Ten Commandments but we just can't do it So Jesus came and did it for us Featuring Pastor Bob Coy as the voice of Pharaoh Moses, Moses, Moses No, I will not let God's people go No, no, no Pastor Ken Graves as the voice of God You shall have no other gods before me You shall not make for yourself a carved image Honor your father and your mother And Pastor Poncho Juarez as the voice of Moses Do not be afraid Stand still and see the salvation of the Lord which He will accomplish for you today And so many others To order the story of the Ten Commandments book by Pastor Chuck which comes with the audio CD as a gift Call The Word For Today at 800-272-WORD Or to see a sneak preview of the book visit us online at thewordfortoday.org This program has been sponsored by The Word for Today in Costa Mesa, California