So this morning, of course, we will be in Psalm 145.
And I would encourage you, as I do every week, I would encourage
you to turn to Psalm 145 and it is found verse 14, which is
where we'll be, is found on page 525.
If you're using one of our Bibles, someone told me last
week, they said, oh, I might have to start bringing my Bible
because I keep asking people to turn to different sections and
scriptures. So which is awesome.
That made me so happy to hear. I'll check in with her later,
the later after the service to see if she brought her Bible.
But yeah, always, I always encourage you to bring your
bring your Bibles with you on Sunday mornings because we will
be in them and we'll be in a couple of different passages
this morning that you'll be turning to Psalm 1:45.
If you're able to, would you please stand as we read Psalm
145, starting at verse 14. The Lord upholds all who are
falling and raises up all who are bowed down.
The eyes of all look to you, and you give them their food.
In due season You open your hand.
You satisfy the desire of every living thing.
The Lord is righteous in all His ways and kind in all His works.
The Lord is near to all who call on Him, to all who call on Him.
In truth, He fulfills the desire of those who fear Him.
He also hears their cry and saves them.
The Lord preserves all who love Him, but all the wicked He will
destroy. My mouth will speak the praise
of the Lord, and let all flesh bless His holy name forever and
ever. Amen.
You may be seated. So the last couple weeks we've
been in this Psalm, we've devoted a bit of time to
examining what does it mean to praise God?
All the different words that David used for praising God and
the different ways that we can do that.
And then part of what we praise God for is his great working.
That was our focus in the first Week, 2 weeks ago, and the many
ways that he had worked in the past, from the exodus to his
involvement in our in our own lives.
We even spent some time last week in Exodus 34 examining the
character of the king and that he is gracious and compassionate
and slow to anger and abounding and steadfast love.
He's a good king and He offers his protection to us, but he
also has expectations of us. So this morning we'll pick up
with God's provision. Now as we do that, we see that
part of how God provides is by lifting up the broken.
He lifts up the broken. Verse 14 said the Lord upholds
all who are falling and raises up all who are about down.
You know, as one pours through the pages of Scripture,
something interesting emerges. Humans finding themselves at the
end of the rope, completely beat down and destroyed, wanting
nothing more to do with this earthly life and discouragement
rather than death. Discouragement has become the
great equalizer because all of the heroes of the faith, they
all experience discouragement at some point in their lives.
Let's focus on one particular person for a moment.
Job. Job was considered the noblest
man in the entire world, but after all the trials that he had
experienced, he wrote. And it's there on the screen for
you. Has not man a hard service on
earth? And are not his days like the
days of a hired hand? Like a slave who longs for the
shadow, and like a hired hand who looks for his wages?
So I am allotted Months of emptiness and nights of misery
are apportioned to me. When I lie down, I say, When
shall I arise? But the night is long, and I am
full of tossing till the dawn. My flesh is clothed with worms
and dirt. My skin hardens, then breaks out
afresh. My days are swifter than a
weaver's shuttle and come to their end without hope.
Remembering that my life is a breath, my eye will never again
see God, I want to pause for a moment.
Sometimes people think that we have to act like we have it all
together. But when you look at Scripture,
clearly joke doesn't have it all together right here, right?
And David, when you read all through the Psalms, there's so
many places where life is certainly not going his way.
So we can take the trials, the struggles in life, and we can
bring those to God. God's a big boy, right?
God can handle it. So Job had lost his property,
his family. He'd lost even his health.
The only thing he didn't lose was his wife.
And well, she wasn't too good. She actually only made the
situation worse. So he was completely discouraged
and he had lost all hope. And after a lot of going back
and forth and, and talking with God and talking with his friends
who were pretty worthless, Job 1925 through 27.
Job says this. And this is one of my favorite
passages in Scripture. For I know that my Redeemer
lives, and at the last he will stand upon the earth after my
skin has been thus destroyed. Yet in my flesh I shall see God,
whom I shall see for myself, and then my eyes shall behold, and
not another. My heart faints within me.
Job's hope within. A God who stands outside of
time, a Redeemer who values Job's life and offers him
something more than just an earthly experience.
This was Job's hope. Not.
It wasn't simply wishful thinking, but it was full belief
that seeing God someday would become an actual reality, not
just hoping for something. So all of us have known
discouragements in our lives, some of us more than others, as
some personalities are more prone to deeper bouts of
discouragement and depression. However, the text this morning,
this verse doesn't simply have discouragement in mind.
Oppression is also in view here. See, when it says those who are
bowed down, it's not just referring to someone who has
fallen on hard times. They're in a season of maybe bad
luck. Things just aren't going their
way. No, that's not what's in view
here. No, this person has been brought
down by someone else. The actions of another person
has served to bring this person down and to discourage them.
When this happens, some may find themselves that they experience
a particularly hard time of depression.
So David knew this as a reality, as King Saul had, had made David
enemy #1 for more than a decade, he'd been enemy number one of
King Saul in spite of not doing anything wrong.
He was Saul's enemy. But David knew that God was the
lifter of his spirit, and he was continually going to God during
that season when he's on the run, fearing for his life.
So God upholds in raises up those who are broken and bowed
down. Next we see that God provides.
Verse 15 tells us that God provides the eyes of all look to
you and you give them their food in due season.
The providing of food that this verse speaks of is something
that is part of what we call in theological circles, common
grace. Now, common grace is
distinguished from saving grace. Saving grace is the grace that
that God imparts to those who would place their faith in Him.
That is what saving grace is. The common grace is the grace of
God-given to all people in the world.
This grace is given to people regardless of whether or not
they actually believe in Him. God has always shown His common
grace to everyone everywhere through all of history.
Everyone has been a recipient of His common grace.
So verse 9 from last week spoke to this common grace.
It said the Lord is good to all and His mercy is over all that
he has made. Also, when the Sermon on the
Mount, Jesus Speaking of the Father, he said he makes his
sunrise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just
and the unjust. So God's goodness is on
everyone. The air we breathe is God's
goodness. Waking up to each new morning is
God's goodness and bringing in the harvest.
This food is God's goodness, His common grace to all.
Now notice that the verse says in due season.
In due season means that God's going to bring this about in the
right time. He knows the right time for
everything. He knows when someone's at the
end and they can't take it anymore.
He knows when we're about to be destroyed and we need to be
lifted up. God knows everything and
provides for each person in His time a new job, financial
resources, food, a career change to becoming a lead pastor, all
all of these. God performs in His perfect
timing. You might think that you have
the right timing figured out. I thought I had it all figured
out. God had other plans, but God
will work His will in the right season.
It might take longer than you want, or it might even be sooner
than you want. God's timing is perfect.
So we've received God's common grace.
But then verse 16 takes it a step farther.
You open your hand. You satisfy the desire of every
living thing. He satisfies our desires.
God is generous and He provides for His people in a bountiful
manner. He isn't stingy and He isn't
tight fisted. For 60 years now, literally 60
years, Mick Jagger has been singing those famous lyrics.
I can't get no satisfaction because I try and I try and I
try and I try. The double negative aside,
Jagger has clearly been looking for satisfaction in the wrong
places. The 17th century scientist,
mathematician and philosopher Blaise Pascal is said to have
authored the notion of the God shaped hole that exists inside
of each person. Now this is the concept that
there's something inside of us, inside each person that longs
for something bigger than us, the unmoved mover, the immutable
and infinite God of this world. Now the translations of his
French texts don't exactly yield the words God shaped whole, but
the concept is there in his writings.
In Section 7 on morality and doctrine, Pascal writes.
What is it then, that this desire and this inability to
proclaim to us? But there was once in man a true
happiness, of which there now remain to him only the mark and
empty trace of this happiness, which he in vain tries to fill
from all his surroundings, seeking from things absence the
help he does not obtain in things presence.
But these are all inadequate, because the infinite abyss can
only be filled by an infinite and immutable object, that is to
say, only by God Himself. Let me repeat that these are all
all these things that we try to fill our lives with, all these
things that we try to satisfy our lives with, They're all
inadequate because the infinite abyss can only be filled by an
infinite and immutable object, that is to say, only by God
himself. True satisfaction is only found
in God. All other attempts to find it
elsewhere will just leave you in the same place as Mick Jagger
not being able to find satisfaction.
God's fulfilling our desires and providing for us is a reflection
of His good character. So next we briefly look at God's
righteous ways, verse 17. The Lord is righteous in all His
ways and kind in all His works. Now, if you're like me, then
perhaps you've misunderstood the meaning of the word
righteousness. For years I have the notion that
righteousness was more or less just a synonym for the word
holiness. I'm not sure what caused me to
realize this, but after examining the Word more deeply,
I began to understand that righteousness is really about
justice. Righteousness is about God's
justice, His in his dealings with us and our justice in
dealing with other people, doing right by them.
So in light of that, allow me to offer to you the Pastor Drew
paraphrase of verse 17. God is just in his dealings with
us and loving in all his deeds. Now perhaps that verse might
strike you a little bit when you think of it in those terms.
Does God's justice mesh with God's love and mercy and
compassion? How?
How do these these things go together?
Well, here's the great paradox. Mercy and justice meet in God.
God is both merciful and God is both just.
Neither quality is exclusive, but rather are two sides of the
same coin. God is at once perfectly just
and absolutely tender and compassionate at the same time.
Now David didn't have the fully fleshed out under the standing
of the Messiah that that we have.
He he had what's was in his scriptures, which was parts of
the Old Testament. So he didn't fully understand
what the Messiah would be. But but God's justice demands
that that sin is punished. Now, this has not changed.
Sin has always been punished all the way from the Garden all the
way up to today. Sin has to be punished.
However, God's mercy and compassion offered forgiveness
to us through the sacrifice and finished work of Jesus Christ on
the cross. So that is how both justice and
compassion are demonstrated in our God.
Moving on to verse 18, as we look at God's deliverance, the
Lord is near to all who call on him, to all who call on him.
In truth, God is near. He's near to us.
And being near to us means that when we call on Him, He's
attentive to us. God isn't like our daughter
Arya. If she's reading a book and you
say her name, in all likelihood she is not going to respond.
She doesn't even hear you speaking to her.
Even when you use her name, she won't even hear you because she
is so absorbed in that book. She is not attentive to anything
else going on around her. It's really amazing.
I don't know how she does it, but God, when we call out to
him, he's near to us and he's attentive to us when we call.
Now I've referred to God's transcendence a few times over
the last couple weeks. Mean that God is so great and
beyond this world that we can't possibly know everything there
is to know about him. So this is true.
But I also said a couple weeks ago that God is imminent.
He's close to us like a friend. God is near to us, and He is
completely. Accessible.
He hasn't locked himself away in some safe house in heaven.
No, he's near. Also, to say that God's near
means he's present with those who sincerely seek him.
Now, it's possible you've heard the question and rather trite
statement. Are you far from God?
Well, guess who moved? The obvious implied answer being
that God didn't move. You did.
However, it's a disservice to stop there so we can then
continue with another fairly forward response.
God is only a prayer away. This isn't just a trite
statement, it's truth. If you seek Him, then you will
find Him. He's right there.
The writer of Hebrews tells us that whoever would draw near to
God must believe that he exists, and He rewards those who seek
Him. Seeking after Him isn't
something that that you will do in vain.
If you were earnestly seeking after Him and Scripture says you
will find Him. Now consider for a moment what
would happen if you wanted to approach an earthly king or a
president. You can't simply go to the
King's place of residence, which right now is Clarence House, I
believe is what it's called. You can't go to the King's place
of residence and and say I want to meet with the king, just as
you can't go to the White House and say I would like to meet
with the president. Try as you might, as much as you
might want to gain an audience with either of these two men,
you're probably going to be unsuccessful in your attempts.
You will not gain an audience with these men.
But if we earnestly, truthfully desire to see God, if we really
desire to be near Him, then we will receive that reward and
we'll find ourselves in close proximity to our key.
Verse 19. He fulfills the desire of those
who fear Him. He also hears their cry and
saves them. God listens.
He's a God who listens. He doesn't turn a deaf ear.
As I said, he's attentive to the cries of his people.
When we cry out to him in trouble, God hears us and has
compassion on us. He'll bandage our wounds.
He'll pick us up and be our rescue.
He brings deliverance to his people.
So David experienced this in his life.
God was there as David's deliverance all through his life
and God was listening to him. Now this was obviously the case
during the 1st 10 to 15 years after Samuel had an anointed
David as king and during which time David was on the run for
his life. But then David had become king,
and there was his own personal exile.
He'd been exiled from Jerusalem because his rebellious son
Absalom had usurped the throne. And so again David found himself
in a place where he was fearing for his life.
And through it all, David continually cried out to a God
and expressed worship to him at every season.
This was in spite of the constant threats on his life.
In the midst of these things, David knew God listens.
And that's how he can say God hears their cry and saves
because David had experienced it in his own life.
And then he goes on to say, God hears your cry and saves.
Those who worship Him in reverent fear will be delivered
when they cry out. Last week we talked about living
in the Kingdom and I referenced one Monty Python movie.
So now hopefully every every time you see that movie or hear
about it, you will think about what it's like to live in God's
Kingdom. So we talked about living in the
Kingdom and, and the fact that we can expect certain things
when we live in the Kingdom. We know that there will be
expectations placed on us, but then we also know that there are
benefits to life in the Kingdom of God.
We have His protection as God preserves the righteous.
He preserves the righteous, but He also destroys the wicked.
Verse 20 said He preserves all who love him, but all the wicked
he will destroy. He keeps watch over and He
guards all who love him. It's easy for us to miss what
this means since we're not so versed in the nuances of being a
Pagan deity. You see, Pagan gods didn't
demand love from their subjects. They demanded loyalty for sure.
And this loyalty was shown through simple actions like
offerings and sacrifices. But love never entered the
equation in how a Pagan God interacted with its subjects.
There wasn't love from the God for the subjects, and there
wasn't love from the subjects for the God.
But Yahweh. Yahweh is different.
While there are expectations placed on His followers, it's
love that is the basis for that relationship, not coercion.
We don't love God in order to receive His protection.
We love God because He first loved us.
We love Him out of grateful hearts for the salvation that
we've received. And then this is the evidence of
true godliness. Our God's ways are way different
than the ways of the Pagan gods. Go ahead and turn a little to
the left to Psalm 121. This is such an awesome Psalm.
Psalm 121 is a beautiful statement of God's protection
for His people, and I suspect much of this will be familiar to
many of you. I lift up my eyes to the hills.
From where does my help come? My help comes from the Lord who
made heaven and earth. He will not let your foot be
moved, but he who keeps you will not slumber.
Behold, he who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.
The Lord is your keeper. The Lord is your shade on your
right hand. The sun shall not strike you by
day, nor the moon by night. The Lord will keep you from all
evil. He will keep your life.
The Lord will keep your going out and you're coming in from
this time forth and forevermore. This, this is the protection
offered to those who call on him in truth, the protection offered
to those who fear Him, The protection offered to those who
love Him. He fiercely protects His people,
But the wicked don't experience the same benefits since they
don't live under the rule and reign of our God, Psalm 1,
verses 5 through 6 reads. Therefore the wicked will not
stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of
the righteous. For the Lord knows the way of
the righteous, but the way of the wicked will perish.
So these verses beg the question, Who are the wicked?
Is this a word reserved solely for the Hitler's and Pol Pots
and Stalin's of the world, people whose lives are
characterized by evil and Avi and who are obviously wicked?
Or is there a broader category in view here?
Well, I would suggest that this verse is getting at both the
obviously wicked of this world as well as those who are in a
broader category. Generally speaking, we can think
of the wicked as people whose lives are characterized by
rebellion against God. They have complete disdain for
God's ways and God's righteousness.
Instead of living according to His ways, they choose instead to
live in open rebellion against their Creator.
This is a hallmark of their life.
There's no doubt about their level of morality as they are
completely immoral. This is who the wicked are.
Then there's also a broader category though listed as
sinners. And when you come across this,
it might catch your attention because you might stop and
think, what does that mean? I'm a Sinner?
We're all sinners, right? Well, in a technical sense, yes,
we all sin. But that's not what this passage
has in view when Scripture references sinners.
It isn't referring to those who have placed their faith in Jesus
Christ redeeming work on the cross.
No, that's not what's in view when Scripture is talking about
sinners. Scripture it's talking about
people who have not given their life over to Christ and they are
choosing rather to live their own ways to have self on the
throne of their lives rather than King Jesus on the throne of
their lives. So these people and the wicked
will find themselves wanting in the day of judgment.
And as we end it all comes back to where we started.
Verse one said I will extol you my God and King and bless your
name forever and ever. And then to close out the
chapter, David basically says, well, he actually repeats
verbatim part of verse one, and then he uses that Hebrew
parallelism that I talked about, saying the same thing just in a
different way. He says in verse 21, My mouth
will speak the praise of the Lord, and let all flesh bless
his holy name forever and ever. David has made it clear he's
going to praise the Lord his king.
He's going to say great things about God, and then his
encouragement is for everyone, everything to do the same,
everything to praise the Lord and to do that forever.
As we wrap up the short series, I want to leave you with the
summation I came across. So Psalm 145 and life in the
Kingdom of God. I can expect God to act in a way
that's consistent with his nature.
I can expect him to keep his promises.
I can expect God to hold me up when I stumble.
I can expect him to give me what I need when I need it.
I can expect him to be open handed with me and sensitive to
my desires. I can expect Him to do the right
thing, to deal with me and love to be near, to be when I cry.
I can expect God to save me. And God, for His part, can
expect something from me in return.
He can expect praise. We can expect life in the
Kingdom of God. We can expect God to take care
of us and provide for all we need and our proper response to
the God who provides for all we need, our salvation and our
daily sustenance. Our proper response is lives of
praise. Let's bow our heads and close
our eyes. God, we thank You that you are
gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding the
steadfast love. May we never forget that that is
who you are. Yet you are also just and we
give thanks for your justice that took our sins and punish
them on Jesus on that cross, providing the way for us to live
life under your rule and reign. Would you continue to move in
this place and in this time as we sit at your table in Jesus
name, Amen?