Sermons on Psalms 36:1

… 53, verse 13, from Psalm 5.9, Psalm 140, verse 3, verse 14, from Psalm 10, verse 7, verses 15 and 16 from Isaiah 59, 7 and 8, and verse 18 from Psalm 36, verse 1. So, Paul has amassed together, likely from some previous study, but he may be reciting them from memory. We know at the very end of the book that he has a scribe who's writing this down. I'd sure like to think that Paul had some notes, but he's Paul, so maybe he just was doing this all, but this is likely the sort of thing that he taught in different contexts. Remember, he had been a teacher for many years. He had given these kinds of instructions. And this is likely the list of Scriptures that he used in other settings to convince the Jews about the universality of sin. So, that's the first thing. These nine verses are drawn from Scripture. Here's the second observation. There is nothing as comprehensive as this list in the rest of the New Testament. …

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The neglect of the duty of prayer seems to be inconsistent with supreme love to God also upon another account, and that is, that it is against the will of God so plainly revealed.—True love to God seeks to please him in every thing, and universally to conform to his will. 3. Your thus restraining prayer before God is not only inconsistent with the love, but also with the fear, of God. It is an argument that you cast off fear, as is manifest by that text, Job xv. 4. “Yea, thou easiest off fear, and restrainest prayer before God.” While you thus live in the transgression of so plain a command of God, you evidently show, that there is no fear of God before your eyes. Psal. xxxvi. 1. “The transgression of the wicked saith within my heart, that there is no fear of God before his eyes.” 4. Consider how living in such a neglect is consistent with leading a holy life. We are abundantly instructed in Scripture, that true Christians do lead a holy life; that without holiness no man shall see the Lord, Heb. xii. 14. and that every one that hath this hope in him, purifieth himself, even’ as Christ is pure, 1 John iii. 3. In Prov. xvi. 17. it is said, The highway of the upright is to depart from evil, i. e. the common beaten road in which all the godly travel. To the like purpose is Isa. xxxv. 8. “A highway shall be there, and a way, and it shall be called the way of holiness; the unclean shall not pass over it, but it shall be for those:” i. e. those redeemed persons spoken of in the foregoing verses. It is spoken of in Rom. viii. 1. as the character of all believers, that they walk not after the flesh, but after the spirit. …

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For he flattereth himself in his own eyes, until his iniquity be found to be hateful. In the foregoing verse., David says, “The transgression of the wicked saith within my heart, that there is no fear of God before his eyes:” that is, when he saw that the wicked went on in sin, in an allowed way of wickedness, it convinced him, that they were not afraid of those terrible judgments, and of that wrath, with which God hath threatened sinners. If the sinner were afraid of these, he could never go on so securely in sin, as he doth. It was a strange thing that men, who enjoyed such light as they did in the land of Israel, who read and heard those many awful threatenings which were written in the book of the law, should not be afraid to go on in sin. But saith the psalmist, They flatter themselves in their own eyes: they have something or other which they make a foundation of encouragement, whereby they persuade themselves that they shall escape those judgments; and that makes them put far away the evil day. …

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