"Use Me Here, Where I am, I'm not gonna pray anymore that You'll change Your plans.
Despite my fear, I place my life in Your hands. The future can wait, tomorrow might be too late,
So Jesus use me here."
-Chorus from the song, "Use Me Here" By Everydodyduck
"By faith Abraham, when he was called, obeyed by going out to a place which he was to receive for an inheritance; and he went out, not knowing where he was going."
-Hebrews 11:8
Anticipating the moment the airplane landing gear touched ground at DFW Airport in TX, I cringed as the doldrums of reality entered their next stage. "Lord, why did you bring me back here?" When I sat in O'Hare Airport in Chicago I kept asking God not to let me get on that plane. A girl on my sister floor happened to walk up to sit at that same gate for the next flight out to WA where she was from. We chatted a bit. I found it funny that God didn't send me directly home, but instead got me a connecting flight into Kansas City, MO before heading home to TX in good time. The airlines were overbooked and it seemed impossible for a standby flier like me to get home during the Christmas season. It was difficult to pray for a flight home that day with such mixed emotions.
I'm not sure what else there is to say about where my heart is. Praying the Lord would open and close doors, that He would prepare me in any way necessary for what's next if something is lacking in me, that He would grant the patience and contentment I need. I've agreed not to work until after Christmas. Needed a break.
I put my Christmas money to good use. Got a few Christmas gifts for friends. Got a used computer desk to replace the old one that was more convenient, comfortable, and my style. Got a cheap slim swivel desk chair. Got a webcam to keep up with my friends from school via skype. Got a curtain for my window (dark blue). Got new sheets and pillowcases (dark blue... and they feel like pajamas!). Got the best wireless adapter Best Buy could offer for the internet (tired of bad connection problems! no more!). While re-decorating my room and settling in, I've been spending time with my sister. There's a park in walking distance from my house with a public basketball goal and pavement. We played some basketball, went to a dollar movie, and did some shopping since I've been back. My friend Lindsey invited me to a church dinner with her parents. It was so funny that her pastor thought we were a couple. I laughed out loud when I realized what he was implying. She corrected him before I could. She even took her family and my sister and I to see the new Narnia movie. I enjoyed it.
I'm trying to be as optimistic as I can and by God's grace I'm doin alright. I get to attend the Church Christmas Eve service, which in years past I've always worked. I anticipate a meeting with my pastor soon to talk about how I can best help serve at church until the Lord does something else in my life. I think the primary need is teaching and teachers from what I've seen. While I found a basketball goal I also looked back into the city Recreation Center. It's $40 a year for residents. If nothing opens up int he next month or two I'm thinking of buying a membership. I realized I actually gained 20 lbs. this past semester! At the funeral I was also reminded about the toll age takes on the human body. Trying to watch my health and eating habits better.
Praying and trying to trust the Lord will do great things. Not easy.
Wednesday, December 22, 2010
Tuesday, December 7, 2010
Revelation 16:8-9: The Reality of The End of The World
On November 13, 2009 the movie "2012" was released in theaters. The movie's premise was based on the prediction from the Mayan calendar that the world would end on December 21, 2012 and that it would be destroyed by a catastrophic worldwide flood. Since just before the release of this movie and after it... along with a History channel documentary, teenagers and inquisitive minds across America have wondered if the Mayans are right. Will the world end in 2012? If you watch the movie you'll notice that the world was destroyed by a flood and mankind survived only on modern day forms of Noah's Ark found in the Bible. While many cultures have a flood story, it was interesting to see that they used Noah's Ark as the model for mankind's only hope. But what DID God say in story of the great flood of Genesis? He said He would never again destroy the world with a flood, in fact that's why we were given the rainbow... to remind us of that promise. What was the source behind the Mayan calendar? Astrology. The Mayans made predictions based on the stars. But again, what does God say about this? Isaiah 47:13-15 says, “You are wearied with your many counsels; let them stand forth and save you, those who divide the heavens, who gaze at the stars, who at the new moons make known what shall come upon you. Behold, they are like stubble; the fire consumes them; they cannot deliver themselves from the power of the flame. No coal for warming oneself is this, no fire to sit before! Such to you are those with whom you have labored, who have done business with you from your youth; they wander about, each in his own direction; there is no one to save you." Maybe 2012 isn't the answer. But if it's not, what is? When will the world end? When will all the crazy people with signs that say, "THE END IS NEAR" ever be right? This is the question we ask. But is it the right question? I'm convinced the question is not WHEN the end will come, but WHAT will you do in the light of the fact that the end is certainly coming? THAT MUCH is a reality. The end will come. What I wanna do today is give you just a glimpse into the end of the world found in the Bible. Please prepare yourself though, because this is where the fun and games end. Turn with me if you would to the last book of the Bible, Revelation... Chapter 16, v.8-9. (REPEAT) (READ)
Now I need to catch you up to this point... God tells us a day will come when Jesus Christ takes His people from this earth to heaven. We call this the "rapture." We know this will happen because 1 Thess. 1:10 tells us, "...to wait for His Son from heaven, whom He raised from the dead, that is Jesus, who rescues us from the wrath to come." 1 Thess. 4:16-17 also says,"For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we shall always be with the Lord." You may or may not have heard of the Left Behind movies. They were produced by Christians and they've tried to dramatize what this event may look like if it happened in our day. I suggest you check them out. This event is what essentially begins the chain of major events that lead to the end. It will happen on a day when the world doesn't expect it. We know this because Jesus Himself has even said in Matt. 24:36, "But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father alone."
After this rapture a 7 year period of trial the Bible calls the "Tribulation" will come. During this Tribulation there will be a span of judgments on the earth and those left in it. The world will be hit with plagues, famine, judgments on the earth and water supply, and whole fractions of the world population will be wiped out. These judgments come in the form of
(1) 7 Seals on a scroll that are broken
(2) 7 Trumpets that are sounded, and...
(3) finally in the second half of the Tribulation... 7 Bowls that are poured out.
Of these bowls, 3 of them are directed at the earth and animals and 4 of them are directed at people. 2 of those 4 are specifically against the worshipers of the beast (who is often called an evil world ruler or the "Antichrist"). God tells us his worshipers will not be saved. The 4th Bowl judgment here in v.8-9 and it's recipients are of those other 2 who have sinned, but aren't directly specified as being worshipers of the beast.
SO... picture the scene with me: The doors of the temple begin to open as the world squints their eyes in frightful anticipation of what's in store for them. Smoke pours out of the doorway. 7 men step out onto the smoke like a blanket. The men are dressed in gold and white. Their appearance of perfection and purity bring conviction to the eyes of those who see them. They're each given golden bowls that match their perfection, the contents of which are shrouded in horrific secrecy. A loud voice thunders from the temple and says in 16:1, "Go and pour out on the earth the seven bowls of the wrath of God." The FIRST bowl is poured out on the worshipers of the beast and became a malignant sore on their skin. The SECOND bowl is poured out on the sea and it's turned to blood. Every living creature in it does. The THIRD bowl is poured out upon the rivers and springs, turning them also to blood. But now the FOURTH bowl... this is what we're looking at this morning. Why this one you ask? Because the language of this judgment communicates a warning that none of the other bowl judgments can do as clearly as this one does. So let's look at it. I want you to see....
**GO SLOWLY
FIRST, that The Justice and Wrath of God are real. (v.8-9a)
Now, one of the earlier judgments actually darkened a third of the sun, but the sun was still hot enough to do what's happening in this scene. The surface of the sun is about 20 times hotter than the earth. Usually it's just 25% of the sun's radiation that makes it's way to the earth. Here the heat of the sun that people have so often enjoyed throughout their lifetime is now against them. The sun's radiation penetrates the normal balance and brings fire upon mankind. Fire has been a basic weapon of judgment throughout this book. When Christ comes to judge his eyes are "like blazing fire" (1:14, 2:18), three of the trumpet judgments involved fire (8:7, 8; 9:17-18), and the ultimate fate of those who reject Christ will be the "lake of fire."
APPLICATION:
As you read this I imagine many things are going through your head. God wouldn't do that! He's a God of love! He's not harsh like that and if that's who God is, then He's no God I want to believe in! If that's you today, I want you to think about how you came to that conviction. How did your perception of God develop? And why is it the way it is today? If I were to ask you how you felt about rape, the answer would be obvious wouldn't it? If I were to ask you how you felt about child pornography... same thing, right? You see we have a concept of justice built within us. We have a knowledge of right and wrong. That comes from God. We are made in His image and therefore we are a reflection of His justice. God is not only infinite love, but He's also infinite justice. God is not some Divine Teddy Bear in heaven waiting for us to cuddle with him. The angels sing to Him in Revelation, "holy! holy! holy! is the LORD God ALMIGHTY." So you may ask why God would do this, but you may also ask, why does it have to be so severe?! It would be too easy for me and unhelpful to you if I just said, "They sinned."
The question isn't just about their sins, it's about who they were against. If you lie to a child there is little consequence. If you lie to a friend you could damage or lose that friendship. If you lie to your husband or wife you'll be sleeping on the couch. If you lie to the government there are legal and financial ramifications, but... if when you lie, your lie is against the God who says "You shall not lie" your problem is not horizontal it's vertical. When you sin against an eternal holy God it only makes sense that the punishment would be consistent with who you've sinned against.
If you still feel this is wrong and unfair... I want you to see that as you continue to reject God and all the warnings He's given us in the 65 books of the Bible leading up to this one... as you do that, you are the same as recipients of this judgment. You see, what makes this scene so horrific is that the sun could have consumed these people without them feeling a thing. it was hot enough to do that. But it didn't... because they were still... able... to respond to God. How did they respond to God? That brings us to the 2nd half of v.9. Not only do we see that The Justice and Wrath of God are real, but also...
SECOND, that The Rebellion of Man is real. (v.9b)
As they felt the heat of the wrath of God on their backs...
They weren't doubting if God existed.
They weren't questioning whether Jesus really walked on water or if the tide was just low.
They weren't wondering why there were so many religions in the world.
They weren't asking about the origin of evil.
They weren't trying to defend Evolution.
These things didn't seem to matter anymore, did they? There was no more time to be a skeptic. All their objections were thrown to the fire. What mattered now is that their lives were slipping away from them and they were powerless to stop it. What were their last words? What would you say in such a situation? What could you say? What would be worth saying? Well, with their dying breath they chose to blaspheme God. The text says they blasphemed "the name of God" and this is commonly used as a synonym for God as a whole.
APPLICATION:
"Blasphemy"
To blaspheme is to take God's name in vain. When you do something in vain you remove the content or value from what's being done. But isn't it interesting that we take God's name in vain. We don't take Adolf Hitler's name in vain. We don't take the President's name in vain. But we use God's name is if it were just another cuss word. At community college one day I found myself getting gas across the street. A woman next to me had returned to her car with a fountain drink that had to be less than a dollar. As she tried to shut the door the lid of the drink lost it's grip and she spilled some. She threw out a cuss word in frustration. But her situation escalated as she tried to solve the problem and only made it worse. She lost control of the drink and it busted all over the pavement. At that point she felt it necessary to take God's name in vain... over a fountain drink! Now I imagine the people in our text weren't new to blaspheming God. We're not told this, but we do know this wasn't their first sin. God is in the midst of judging them. And yet their reaction is not one of pleading for mercy, but instead it comes most natural to them to curse God in blasphemy. We're not given a list of their sins as we are sometimes with others in Revelation, but we do know their primary sin was their rejection of God's grace. If they would have received God's grace years ago they would have been taken up to heaven before all this happened.
CONCLUSION:
But what's the point of this 4th Bowl Judgment? Why was it given to us? Was it given to teach us about what would happen at the end of the world as we know it? Yes, the Bible is clear and specific about the major events that will happen and gives us a detailed account of that. But this judgment communicates a clearer warning to us than the others. Notice the 5th bowl judgment says the people also blasphemed and didn't repent. The 7th bowl judgment just says they blasphemed. But the 4th judgment says they blasphemed "the name of the God who has the power over these plagues."
This is very important... now don't we know God has the power and authority over these plagues? If you've read the book of Revelation all the way up to this point and you don't think God has power and authority over all this... you've been reading with your eyes closed. But why was this written. Would it help those who were being judged at all? No! They also know God has the power over these judgments. It's happening before their very eyes! We also read these people didn't "repent so as to give Him glory." But again we have to ask, did they repent? Would they have repented? No! God doesn't judge those who repent and are saved! Again... this wouldn't help these people to know... that their repentance would give save them and give God glory. I believe they already knew it. It has been preached for a long time. That's why I say this passage was given as a clear warning. A warning to those who are now rejecting God's offer of grace. And that warning is this...
BIG IDEA:
In light of the reality of the end, you must respond to God's grace while you still can. We aren't to be concerned with WHEN the end will come, but rather WHAT we will do because the end is coming!
The Bible doesn't speculate about when the end will happen. It just tells us clearly what the end will look like. The question is... how will you respond to it? This is the question of the 4th Bowl Judgment and ultimately the question of the entire book of Revelation. Have you ever taken God's name in vain? Have you made a god to suit yourself? A god that's only a god of love and not justice? If you have, that god is an idol... no better than a lifeless statue. If you've done these things as I did once, then you deserve the justice of God in a literal Hell, a lake of fire.
But there's hope... Rev. 7:16 tells us something about those who receive God's offer of grace and enter into heaven with Him, "They shall hunger no more, neither thirst anymore; the sun shall not strike them, nor any scorching heat." You see 2,000 years ago Jesus Christ came to this earth the FIRST time so that He could die on that cross, take your sin upon Himself and rise from the dead. God says you must turn your back on sin and put your trust in Him. So I say to you today, please don't wait to find out if these verses are talking about you. We don't know who these people are. Their names aren't given to us. May that wake you up today.
There will be people up front to talk to you about these things as the service closes. Please bring us any questions you may have. Let's pray...
Now I need to catch you up to this point... God tells us a day will come when Jesus Christ takes His people from this earth to heaven. We call this the "rapture." We know this will happen because 1 Thess. 1:10 tells us, "...to wait for His Son from heaven, whom He raised from the dead, that is Jesus, who rescues us from the wrath to come." 1 Thess. 4:16-17 also says,"For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we shall always be with the Lord." You may or may not have heard of the Left Behind movies. They were produced by Christians and they've tried to dramatize what this event may look like if it happened in our day. I suggest you check them out. This event is what essentially begins the chain of major events that lead to the end. It will happen on a day when the world doesn't expect it. We know this because Jesus Himself has even said in Matt. 24:36, "But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father alone."
After this rapture a 7 year period of trial the Bible calls the "Tribulation" will come. During this Tribulation there will be a span of judgments on the earth and those left in it. The world will be hit with plagues, famine, judgments on the earth and water supply, and whole fractions of the world population will be wiped out. These judgments come in the form of
(1) 7 Seals on a scroll that are broken
(2) 7 Trumpets that are sounded, and...
(3) finally in the second half of the Tribulation... 7 Bowls that are poured out.
Of these bowls, 3 of them are directed at the earth and animals and 4 of them are directed at people. 2 of those 4 are specifically against the worshipers of the beast (who is often called an evil world ruler or the "Antichrist"). God tells us his worshipers will not be saved. The 4th Bowl judgment here in v.8-9 and it's recipients are of those other 2 who have sinned, but aren't directly specified as being worshipers of the beast.
SO... picture the scene with me: The doors of the temple begin to open as the world squints their eyes in frightful anticipation of what's in store for them. Smoke pours out of the doorway. 7 men step out onto the smoke like a blanket. The men are dressed in gold and white. Their appearance of perfection and purity bring conviction to the eyes of those who see them. They're each given golden bowls that match their perfection, the contents of which are shrouded in horrific secrecy. A loud voice thunders from the temple and says in 16:1, "Go and pour out on the earth the seven bowls of the wrath of God." The FIRST bowl is poured out on the worshipers of the beast and became a malignant sore on their skin. The SECOND bowl is poured out on the sea and it's turned to blood. Every living creature in it does. The THIRD bowl is poured out upon the rivers and springs, turning them also to blood. But now the FOURTH bowl... this is what we're looking at this morning. Why this one you ask? Because the language of this judgment communicates a warning that none of the other bowl judgments can do as clearly as this one does. So let's look at it. I want you to see....
**GO SLOWLY
FIRST, that The Justice and Wrath of God are real. (v.8-9a)
Now, one of the earlier judgments actually darkened a third of the sun, but the sun was still hot enough to do what's happening in this scene. The surface of the sun is about 20 times hotter than the earth. Usually it's just 25% of the sun's radiation that makes it's way to the earth. Here the heat of the sun that people have so often enjoyed throughout their lifetime is now against them. The sun's radiation penetrates the normal balance and brings fire upon mankind. Fire has been a basic weapon of judgment throughout this book. When Christ comes to judge his eyes are "like blazing fire" (1:14, 2:18), three of the trumpet judgments involved fire (8:7, 8; 9:17-18), and the ultimate fate of those who reject Christ will be the "lake of fire."
APPLICATION:
As you read this I imagine many things are going through your head. God wouldn't do that! He's a God of love! He's not harsh like that and if that's who God is, then He's no God I want to believe in! If that's you today, I want you to think about how you came to that conviction. How did your perception of God develop? And why is it the way it is today? If I were to ask you how you felt about rape, the answer would be obvious wouldn't it? If I were to ask you how you felt about child pornography... same thing, right? You see we have a concept of justice built within us. We have a knowledge of right and wrong. That comes from God. We are made in His image and therefore we are a reflection of His justice. God is not only infinite love, but He's also infinite justice. God is not some Divine Teddy Bear in heaven waiting for us to cuddle with him. The angels sing to Him in Revelation, "holy! holy! holy! is the LORD God ALMIGHTY." So you may ask why God would do this, but you may also ask, why does it have to be so severe?! It would be too easy for me and unhelpful to you if I just said, "They sinned."
The question isn't just about their sins, it's about who they were against. If you lie to a child there is little consequence. If you lie to a friend you could damage or lose that friendship. If you lie to your husband or wife you'll be sleeping on the couch. If you lie to the government there are legal and financial ramifications, but... if when you lie, your lie is against the God who says "You shall not lie" your problem is not horizontal it's vertical. When you sin against an eternal holy God it only makes sense that the punishment would be consistent with who you've sinned against.
If you still feel this is wrong and unfair... I want you to see that as you continue to reject God and all the warnings He's given us in the 65 books of the Bible leading up to this one... as you do that, you are the same as recipients of this judgment. You see, what makes this scene so horrific is that the sun could have consumed these people without them feeling a thing. it was hot enough to do that. But it didn't... because they were still... able... to respond to God. How did they respond to God? That brings us to the 2nd half of v.9. Not only do we see that The Justice and Wrath of God are real, but also...
SECOND, that The Rebellion of Man is real. (v.9b)
As they felt the heat of the wrath of God on their backs...
They weren't doubting if God existed.
They weren't questioning whether Jesus really walked on water or if the tide was just low.
They weren't wondering why there were so many religions in the world.
They weren't asking about the origin of evil.
They weren't trying to defend Evolution.
These things didn't seem to matter anymore, did they? There was no more time to be a skeptic. All their objections were thrown to the fire. What mattered now is that their lives were slipping away from them and they were powerless to stop it. What were their last words? What would you say in such a situation? What could you say? What would be worth saying? Well, with their dying breath they chose to blaspheme God. The text says they blasphemed "the name of God" and this is commonly used as a synonym for God as a whole.
APPLICATION:
"Blasphemy"
To blaspheme is to take God's name in vain. When you do something in vain you remove the content or value from what's being done. But isn't it interesting that we take God's name in vain. We don't take Adolf Hitler's name in vain. We don't take the President's name in vain. But we use God's name is if it were just another cuss word. At community college one day I found myself getting gas across the street. A woman next to me had returned to her car with a fountain drink that had to be less than a dollar. As she tried to shut the door the lid of the drink lost it's grip and she spilled some. She threw out a cuss word in frustration. But her situation escalated as she tried to solve the problem and only made it worse. She lost control of the drink and it busted all over the pavement. At that point she felt it necessary to take God's name in vain... over a fountain drink! Now I imagine the people in our text weren't new to blaspheming God. We're not told this, but we do know this wasn't their first sin. God is in the midst of judging them. And yet their reaction is not one of pleading for mercy, but instead it comes most natural to them to curse God in blasphemy. We're not given a list of their sins as we are sometimes with others in Revelation, but we do know their primary sin was their rejection of God's grace. If they would have received God's grace years ago they would have been taken up to heaven before all this happened.
CONCLUSION:
But what's the point of this 4th Bowl Judgment? Why was it given to us? Was it given to teach us about what would happen at the end of the world as we know it? Yes, the Bible is clear and specific about the major events that will happen and gives us a detailed account of that. But this judgment communicates a clearer warning to us than the others. Notice the 5th bowl judgment says the people also blasphemed and didn't repent. The 7th bowl judgment just says they blasphemed. But the 4th judgment says they blasphemed "the name of the God who has the power over these plagues."
This is very important... now don't we know God has the power and authority over these plagues? If you've read the book of Revelation all the way up to this point and you don't think God has power and authority over all this... you've been reading with your eyes closed. But why was this written. Would it help those who were being judged at all? No! They also know God has the power over these judgments. It's happening before their very eyes! We also read these people didn't "repent so as to give Him glory." But again we have to ask, did they repent? Would they have repented? No! God doesn't judge those who repent and are saved! Again... this wouldn't help these people to know... that their repentance would give save them and give God glory. I believe they already knew it. It has been preached for a long time. That's why I say this passage was given as a clear warning. A warning to those who are now rejecting God's offer of grace. And that warning is this...
BIG IDEA:
In light of the reality of the end, you must respond to God's grace while you still can. We aren't to be concerned with WHEN the end will come, but rather WHAT we will do because the end is coming!
The Bible doesn't speculate about when the end will happen. It just tells us clearly what the end will look like. The question is... how will you respond to it? This is the question of the 4th Bowl Judgment and ultimately the question of the entire book of Revelation. Have you ever taken God's name in vain? Have you made a god to suit yourself? A god that's only a god of love and not justice? If you have, that god is an idol... no better than a lifeless statue. If you've done these things as I did once, then you deserve the justice of God in a literal Hell, a lake of fire.
But there's hope... Rev. 7:16 tells us something about those who receive God's offer of grace and enter into heaven with Him, "They shall hunger no more, neither thirst anymore; the sun shall not strike them, nor any scorching heat." You see 2,000 years ago Jesus Christ came to this earth the FIRST time so that He could die on that cross, take your sin upon Himself and rise from the dead. God says you must turn your back on sin and put your trust in Him. So I say to you today, please don't wait to find out if these verses are talking about you. We don't know who these people are. Their names aren't given to us. May that wake you up today.
There will be people up front to talk to you about these things as the service closes. Please bring us any questions you may have. Let's pray...
Saturday, November 20, 2010
Psalm 52: Sticks and Stones May Break Our Bones...
Words are powerful, aren't they? Words can tear down or build up (James 3:8-10, Eph. 4:29). Someone says to you, "you did a good job cleaning today," "I really got a lot out of the lesson this morning," "thanks for running that errand for me." Tender words heal wounds and facilitate love in the body of Christ. But what about when words aren't so tender? What happens when words don't heal wounds but instead they make wounds? You come home one day to your white carpet to find a rainbow in it. You knew from the book of Genesis that God gave us the rainbow to tell us He would no longer send a flood to destroy the earth, but you also knew that rainbow wasn't supposed to show up on your living room floor. Fruity pebbles. You ask your daughter (culprit) to vacuum the floor, but your words along with the pebbles are swept under the rug. Later you ask if it was done and you're given a firm "yes." Lies hurt. Deception hurts. But even "hurt" doesn't describe when these sins come from those you love. What happens when your best friend gossips behind your back to help them get a position at work that you've been praying for as long as you've worked there? What happens when you come home from church encouraged by the sermon and you have an unsaved family member who's words threaten to take an axe to your joy in the Lord? Now, with your child there will be discipline involved and the dynamic is somewhat different there, but you get the point, right? Sin is evil. That includes verbal sin.
SUBJECT QUESTION:
But the question I wanna ask you today is... how do you respond when that evil comes YOUR way?
Turn with me to Psalm 52. Psalm 52. King David experienced this evil and the prayer and attitude of his heart is recorded for us here in this Psalm. It's called a "maskil" of David. A maskil means "instructive." This Psalm is meant to teach us something. It's going to teach us that (BIG IDEA) Words of evil against us should bring a trust in the love of God for us. When evil is spoken against you and I, our response should reflect our trust in God.
READ Psalm 52.
We're told this Psalm was written during a specific time in David's life. Can I get someone to read 1 Samuel 21:1-9 (slowly and loud enough for everyone to hear)? And then someone else to read 1 Samuel 22:6-23.
After 1 Samuel 21:1-9...
David is on the run. His day to day life is consumed with trying to stay alive as a man he greatly loved (King Saul) seeks his life. The time comes when David is out of food so he travels to an unsuspecting uninformed priest for groceries. And this man Doeg heard the whole conversation.
After 1 Samuel 22:6-23...
Doeg does his duty and reports his information to the king. As a result the priest Ahimelech and many other innocent people die. *******Keep this story in your mind as we look at our text tonight.
READ V.1-4 show us first The Nature of the sin against us.
As we read these verses we're forced to ask who this is talking about. Who is this "mighty man?" The majority opinion is that David here is speaking of Doeg. I disagree. A lot of people try to connect these words to Doeg, but we're only told this was written during the time of this incident, not necessarily or entirely written because of the incident. This man Doeg only plays a small part in the greater story of David and Saul. In fact, after these two chapters he's never mentioned again in Scripture. Call me crazy, but I believe the man David has in mind here is King Saul. I can't share all of these observations, but we know Saul was a "mighty man" because he "stood a head above the rest" (1 Samuel 9:1-2). This was part of the reason he was chosen as king. Further this is someone who's "tongue plots destruction." Very often we see Saul plotting to kill David, don't we? (1 Sam 18:9-11, 18:21-22, 18:25, later 23:10). This is also someone who is deceptive (1 Sam 18:21). This is also someone who lies (1 Sam 18:17, 19:6). From the account in 1 Samuel, we have no reason to believe that Doeg did any of these things. We can't tell he was lying (in fact he gave an accurate report to Saul), being deceptive, or plotting anything.
But v.1 asks a kind of thesis-like question, Why practice evil when it's the love of God that actually endures? Maybe you've asked the same question. You find yourself wronged. Someone has spoken evil against you and you ask the question we all ask, "Lord, why are they doing this to me? Why are they saying these things about me? Why act that way when no good is going to come from it? Why do they even open their mouth? Why can't people just consider and act with the 'love of God'?" The simple answer to this question is original sin. People naturally gravitate toward what's wrong. If you don't believe that read psalm 51 and let David tell you about it. But it's one thing to state doctrine and theology and quite another to apply it to our moments of pain isn't it? Well I don't think our Psalm was written to teach us why people do the things they do. I think that's instructive for us. That tells us something. I'll come back to that in a minute. There are three major sins mentioned here: plotting, deception, and lying. These sins usually work in unity. They make decisions together. Where you find one you'll often find the other two in some form.
Plotting is something that happens in the mind. It's something that involves an active premeditation to harm someone. When Saul tried to kill David with the spear (1 Sam 18:9-11) he had to (1) Consider if it was possible to throw a spear that far "Can I hit him?" (2) Look at the spear and pick it up, weighing the balance and taking aim "Let's try it" (3) Throw the spear "Please hit him, please hit him." But the plotting here mentioned isn't merely mental and neither was all of Saul's plotting (18:22). Our text says, "your tongue plots destruction." The level of evil and bitterness must be great for someone to vocalize their plotting. God does say "out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks." Deception is something that happens secretly by it's very nature. Saul deceived David by trying to give his daughter in marriage as a distraction and so that the Philistines would take advantage of this. You can't feel the blade of deception until the damage is done. It's like a disease that eats at your immune system and until you get the results, you had no idea how long it had been there. Lies are evil. Saul says he won't kill David on multiple occasions and yet he keeps going after him. We know after Saul's death that David greatly mourns this loss. He loved Saul, but this man he loved was doing everything in his power to kill him. Have you felt something similar when those you love sin against you? Husband? Wife? Mom? Dad? A good friend? David points out that Saul lied, but what about David's lie? Scripture is honest about the faults of God's people. David told Ahimelech the priest that the consecrated bread was for the men, but it was really for him. Yet this David is the one God says is a man after His own heart. Righteous people sin too don't they? We're not immune to verbal evil. So before you're tempted to lift yourself up and tear the other person down you need to remember that you could fall into the same thing, whether it be on a large or even a small scale. So I said this psalm doesn't dwell on answering the "why" question. Our psalm focuses instead on the "now what?" question (as we'll see). We know "why" in Saul's case. If you remember from 1 Samuel 18, Saul wanted to keep his kingdom and fight what God was doing in replacing him with David. BUT this Psalm still asks the question why yet it doesn't seek any more of an answer to that question. This may not be the best example of this point, but this is very common throughout the Lament psalms. I think that's important, because the answer isn't important. So often we dwell on and speculate about why something is happening to us or we try to make assumptions and use our imagination about someone's motives, but assumptions are SO dangerous. I think an indirect lesson here is that our focus needs to be on the now and not on the why just as the psalmist' focus was.
So we see The Nature of the sin against us. It's primarily verbal and it's evil, but we aren't immune to it and we don't need to ask why it happened.
Secondly, in v.5-7 God shows us the The Judgment of the sin against us.
V.5 begins with two words of comfort, "but God." The intervention of God in our moments of pain ALWAYS means hope and spiritual growth. David here expresses the certainty of God's judgment. Samuel said Saul's kingdom would be torn from him. Here David predicts Saul's removal from the kingdom and his death. A tent is a temporary dwelling place. Saul's stay in the palace was now temporary. Beyond this he would no longer be firmly planted, but he would be uprooted from the land of the living. He would die (1 Sam. 31:4). He would also be subject to humiliation. Why? Because He wouldn't take refuge in God, but did instead look to his own riches and his own evil. The riches here are I believe pointing us to the riches of Saul's kingdom. Saul wanted to maintain his own wealth and trusted that it would remain steady, that his kingdom would survive. There's considerable difference in translation about the second half of v.7.
ESV, "and sought refuge in his own destruction!"
NIV, "and grew strong by destroying others!"
NASB, "And was strong in his evil desire."
Amplified Bible, "seeking refuge and security for himself through his wickedness."
*I think the idea is expressed best in that Saul "sought refuge in his work of evil or his work of wickedness." Saul put his trust in the evil He was doing and not in God. When people sin against us they aren't trusting in God or they wouldn't resort to lies, deception, and scheming. These things are attempts at solving our problems or getting what we want without considering God. It's important to note here too that we don't know if Doeg was torn from his dwelling place or if he died as a result of God's judgment. We also have no concrete evidence that he was trusting in riches or in his works of evil. To what end would he be trusting in such things?
But we must ask how could David say such things? David did know by the prophecy of Samuel that Saul's time would come to an end and it would be a reflection of God's judgment on him, but on what principle could he stand on to be so certain ...He knew the character of God. God is just and "vengeance is the Lord's." He's the one who punishes the guilty. He's the one who deals with hearts. How does this help you and I? We may not have a Samuel today to tell us how our situations will turn out. We can't go to a witch of Chicago and conjure up the spirit of Samuel to prophesy over our situation. I hope you wouldn't try to do that. Very problematic. But when people sin against us with words that feel like swords we can rest in the character of God. I'm not talking about a Buddhist idea of Karma... what comes around goes around. I'm talking about a just God in heaven who knows exactly how and to what degree to rebuke the sins of mankind and especially the sins of His children. God disciplines those He loves. We need to believe that. We need to rest in that truth. We rest in it though, we don't glory in it. Proverbs 24:17-18 tells us, "Do not rejoice when your enemy falls, And do not let your heart be glad when he stumbles; Or the Lord will see it and be displeased, And turn His anger away from him."
So we see The Nature of the sin against us, and The Judgment of the sin against us.
Finally we see The Response to the sin against us in READ v.8-9.
David says he is not like the tree that Saul would be... the one that's uprooted from life. David is like an olive tree. This tree grew for hundreds of years, yielding 6 gallons of oil on alternate years. This is a tree that stands and it stands in the presence of God. V.8 tells us David trusts in the steadfast love of God "forever and ever." We see a return here to the opposite of the evil in v.1. David's hope is found in his trust in the love of God. If you are a child of God tonight, do you believe God loves you? There's so much confusion and misuse of the love of God these days. We're so busy showing people the justice of God in our culture (and rightly so) that we sometimes minimize a biblical understanding and application of God's love. I want to tell you today that if David could trust in the enduring, steadfast love of God then we can do the same! Psalm 36:7 says, "How priceless is your unfailing love, O God! People take refuge in the shadow of your wings." Romans 8:39, "Nothing can separate us from the love of God." You see if we forget that God loves us we begin to think of a way to retaliate when others sin against us. We begin to do some plotting of our own. If not that, we get angry, we go into panic mode and freak out. We must remember that the love of God is upon us and we can trust that His love for us will help us endure... because that's what it does!
Not only does David TRUST in the love of God though... he also THANKS God. How often do we actually thank God because of His character and His justice? I gotta tell ya I'm thankful that God is just and that He's the one who takes care of all that. It saves me the time, pain, and heartache it would involve to worry about paying someone back. So I ask you... how often do you thank God because of who He is? How often do you (in the midst of being wronged) thank God that He is sovereign and still on His throne? Finally, David WAITS for God. We're so reactionary aren't we? When someone hurts us we want to kick and scream and DO something about it. It's so contrary to who we are to wait. A pastor once gave me some great advice. He said when something major happens or something that really hits your heart hard... that it's a good general rule that you wait 48 hours before acting on it. This is wise advice because no matter how mature we think we are... we can still be unstable. We don't like waiting. We're a culture in which the microwave doesn't beep fast enought. And the older I get the more I realize that the Christian life is really just a series of waiting seasons. We wait until God moves in this direction or that direction then we wait until a door opens or closes in another direction. Waiting is hard, isn't it? But when God moves and the waiting is over it's usually just followed by another kind of waiting. Getting what we want or God culminating our waiting period doesn't solve the problem. No... instead we need to learn how to wait. David was on the run for his life. He had no choice but to wait on God to bring justice in the situation. We may not have David's exact situation, but we need to learn from his example. You may have a similar situation... one that's just as sticky. Maybe the person who has sinned against you is your boss and they have a firey temper. In fact you fear for your job if you were to retaliate. They've slandered you behind your back and told your co-workers things that simply aren't true and what can you do now? They have the authority.
TRUST God
THANK God
WAIT on God
How do we do these things?
By grasping the truth that Words of evil against us should bring a trust in the love of God for us.
All this comes back to trusting God... trusting that He loves us and knows the situation, trusting that He is still sovereign and still just and He'll bring about the end that most glorifies Him.
"Sticks and stones may break our bones, but words will never hurt us." This is true in the end not because it's a pithy saying, but because we have a God and Father who loves us and His love endures despite the evil of others... forever and ever.
Let's pray...
SUBJECT QUESTION:
But the question I wanna ask you today is... how do you respond when that evil comes YOUR way?
Turn with me to Psalm 52. Psalm 52. King David experienced this evil and the prayer and attitude of his heart is recorded for us here in this Psalm. It's called a "maskil" of David. A maskil means "instructive." This Psalm is meant to teach us something. It's going to teach us that (BIG IDEA) Words of evil against us should bring a trust in the love of God for us. When evil is spoken against you and I, our response should reflect our trust in God.
READ Psalm 52.
We're told this Psalm was written during a specific time in David's life. Can I get someone to read 1 Samuel 21:1-9 (slowly and loud enough for everyone to hear)? And then someone else to read 1 Samuel 22:6-23.
After 1 Samuel 21:1-9...
David is on the run. His day to day life is consumed with trying to stay alive as a man he greatly loved (King Saul) seeks his life. The time comes when David is out of food so he travels to an unsuspecting uninformed priest for groceries. And this man Doeg heard the whole conversation.
After 1 Samuel 22:6-23...
Doeg does his duty and reports his information to the king. As a result the priest Ahimelech and many other innocent people die. *******Keep this story in your mind as we look at our text tonight.
READ V.1-4 show us first The Nature of the sin against us.
As we read these verses we're forced to ask who this is talking about. Who is this "mighty man?" The majority opinion is that David here is speaking of Doeg. I disagree. A lot of people try to connect these words to Doeg, but we're only told this was written during the time of this incident, not necessarily or entirely written because of the incident. This man Doeg only plays a small part in the greater story of David and Saul. In fact, after these two chapters he's never mentioned again in Scripture. Call me crazy, but I believe the man David has in mind here is King Saul. I can't share all of these observations, but we know Saul was a "mighty man" because he "stood a head above the rest" (1 Samuel 9:1-2). This was part of the reason he was chosen as king. Further this is someone who's "tongue plots destruction." Very often we see Saul plotting to kill David, don't we? (1 Sam 18:9-11, 18:21-22, 18:25, later 23:10). This is also someone who is deceptive (1 Sam 18:21). This is also someone who lies (1 Sam 18:17, 19:6). From the account in 1 Samuel, we have no reason to believe that Doeg did any of these things. We can't tell he was lying (in fact he gave an accurate report to Saul), being deceptive, or plotting anything.
But v.1 asks a kind of thesis-like question, Why practice evil when it's the love of God that actually endures? Maybe you've asked the same question. You find yourself wronged. Someone has spoken evil against you and you ask the question we all ask, "Lord, why are they doing this to me? Why are they saying these things about me? Why act that way when no good is going to come from it? Why do they even open their mouth? Why can't people just consider and act with the 'love of God'?" The simple answer to this question is original sin. People naturally gravitate toward what's wrong. If you don't believe that read psalm 51 and let David tell you about it. But it's one thing to state doctrine and theology and quite another to apply it to our moments of pain isn't it? Well I don't think our Psalm was written to teach us why people do the things they do. I think that's instructive for us. That tells us something. I'll come back to that in a minute. There are three major sins mentioned here: plotting, deception, and lying. These sins usually work in unity. They make decisions together. Where you find one you'll often find the other two in some form.
Plotting is something that happens in the mind. It's something that involves an active premeditation to harm someone. When Saul tried to kill David with the spear (1 Sam 18:9-11) he had to (1) Consider if it was possible to throw a spear that far "Can I hit him?" (2) Look at the spear and pick it up, weighing the balance and taking aim "Let's try it" (3) Throw the spear "Please hit him, please hit him." But the plotting here mentioned isn't merely mental and neither was all of Saul's plotting (18:22). Our text says, "your tongue plots destruction." The level of evil and bitterness must be great for someone to vocalize their plotting. God does say "out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks." Deception is something that happens secretly by it's very nature. Saul deceived David by trying to give his daughter in marriage as a distraction and so that the Philistines would take advantage of this. You can't feel the blade of deception until the damage is done. It's like a disease that eats at your immune system and until you get the results, you had no idea how long it had been there. Lies are evil. Saul says he won't kill David on multiple occasions and yet he keeps going after him. We know after Saul's death that David greatly mourns this loss. He loved Saul, but this man he loved was doing everything in his power to kill him. Have you felt something similar when those you love sin against you? Husband? Wife? Mom? Dad? A good friend? David points out that Saul lied, but what about David's lie? Scripture is honest about the faults of God's people. David told Ahimelech the priest that the consecrated bread was for the men, but it was really for him. Yet this David is the one God says is a man after His own heart. Righteous people sin too don't they? We're not immune to verbal evil. So before you're tempted to lift yourself up and tear the other person down you need to remember that you could fall into the same thing, whether it be on a large or even a small scale. So I said this psalm doesn't dwell on answering the "why" question. Our psalm focuses instead on the "now what?" question (as we'll see). We know "why" in Saul's case. If you remember from 1 Samuel 18, Saul wanted to keep his kingdom and fight what God was doing in replacing him with David. BUT this Psalm still asks the question why yet it doesn't seek any more of an answer to that question. This may not be the best example of this point, but this is very common throughout the Lament psalms. I think that's important, because the answer isn't important. So often we dwell on and speculate about why something is happening to us or we try to make assumptions and use our imagination about someone's motives, but assumptions are SO dangerous. I think an indirect lesson here is that our focus needs to be on the now and not on the why just as the psalmist' focus was.
So we see The Nature of the sin against us. It's primarily verbal and it's evil, but we aren't immune to it and we don't need to ask why it happened.
Secondly, in v.5-7 God shows us the The Judgment of the sin against us.
V.5 begins with two words of comfort, "but God." The intervention of God in our moments of pain ALWAYS means hope and spiritual growth. David here expresses the certainty of God's judgment. Samuel said Saul's kingdom would be torn from him. Here David predicts Saul's removal from the kingdom and his death. A tent is a temporary dwelling place. Saul's stay in the palace was now temporary. Beyond this he would no longer be firmly planted, but he would be uprooted from the land of the living. He would die (1 Sam. 31:4). He would also be subject to humiliation. Why? Because He wouldn't take refuge in God, but did instead look to his own riches and his own evil. The riches here are I believe pointing us to the riches of Saul's kingdom. Saul wanted to maintain his own wealth and trusted that it would remain steady, that his kingdom would survive. There's considerable difference in translation about the second half of v.7.
ESV, "and sought refuge in his own destruction!"
NIV, "and grew strong by destroying others!"
NASB, "And was strong in his evil desire."
Amplified Bible, "seeking refuge and security for himself through his wickedness."
*I think the idea is expressed best in that Saul "sought refuge in his work of evil or his work of wickedness." Saul put his trust in the evil He was doing and not in God. When people sin against us they aren't trusting in God or they wouldn't resort to lies, deception, and scheming. These things are attempts at solving our problems or getting what we want without considering God. It's important to note here too that we don't know if Doeg was torn from his dwelling place or if he died as a result of God's judgment. We also have no concrete evidence that he was trusting in riches or in his works of evil. To what end would he be trusting in such things?
But we must ask how could David say such things? David did know by the prophecy of Samuel that Saul's time would come to an end and it would be a reflection of God's judgment on him, but on what principle could he stand on to be so certain ...He knew the character of God. God is just and "vengeance is the Lord's." He's the one who punishes the guilty. He's the one who deals with hearts. How does this help you and I? We may not have a Samuel today to tell us how our situations will turn out. We can't go to a witch of Chicago and conjure up the spirit of Samuel to prophesy over our situation. I hope you wouldn't try to do that. Very problematic. But when people sin against us with words that feel like swords we can rest in the character of God. I'm not talking about a Buddhist idea of Karma... what comes around goes around. I'm talking about a just God in heaven who knows exactly how and to what degree to rebuke the sins of mankind and especially the sins of His children. God disciplines those He loves. We need to believe that. We need to rest in that truth. We rest in it though, we don't glory in it. Proverbs 24:17-18 tells us, "Do not rejoice when your enemy falls, And do not let your heart be glad when he stumbles; Or the Lord will see it and be displeased, And turn His anger away from him."
So we see The Nature of the sin against us, and The Judgment of the sin against us.
Finally we see The Response to the sin against us in READ v.8-9.
David says he is not like the tree that Saul would be... the one that's uprooted from life. David is like an olive tree. This tree grew for hundreds of years, yielding 6 gallons of oil on alternate years. This is a tree that stands and it stands in the presence of God. V.8 tells us David trusts in the steadfast love of God "forever and ever." We see a return here to the opposite of the evil in v.1. David's hope is found in his trust in the love of God. If you are a child of God tonight, do you believe God loves you? There's so much confusion and misuse of the love of God these days. We're so busy showing people the justice of God in our culture (and rightly so) that we sometimes minimize a biblical understanding and application of God's love. I want to tell you today that if David could trust in the enduring, steadfast love of God then we can do the same! Psalm 36:7 says, "How priceless is your unfailing love, O God! People take refuge in the shadow of your wings." Romans 8:39, "Nothing can separate us from the love of God." You see if we forget that God loves us we begin to think of a way to retaliate when others sin against us. We begin to do some plotting of our own. If not that, we get angry, we go into panic mode and freak out. We must remember that the love of God is upon us and we can trust that His love for us will help us endure... because that's what it does!
Not only does David TRUST in the love of God though... he also THANKS God. How often do we actually thank God because of His character and His justice? I gotta tell ya I'm thankful that God is just and that He's the one who takes care of all that. It saves me the time, pain, and heartache it would involve to worry about paying someone back. So I ask you... how often do you thank God because of who He is? How often do you (in the midst of being wronged) thank God that He is sovereign and still on His throne? Finally, David WAITS for God. We're so reactionary aren't we? When someone hurts us we want to kick and scream and DO something about it. It's so contrary to who we are to wait. A pastor once gave me some great advice. He said when something major happens or something that really hits your heart hard... that it's a good general rule that you wait 48 hours before acting on it. This is wise advice because no matter how mature we think we are... we can still be unstable. We don't like waiting. We're a culture in which the microwave doesn't beep fast enought. And the older I get the more I realize that the Christian life is really just a series of waiting seasons. We wait until God moves in this direction or that direction then we wait until a door opens or closes in another direction. Waiting is hard, isn't it? But when God moves and the waiting is over it's usually just followed by another kind of waiting. Getting what we want or God culminating our waiting period doesn't solve the problem. No... instead we need to learn how to wait. David was on the run for his life. He had no choice but to wait on God to bring justice in the situation. We may not have David's exact situation, but we need to learn from his example. You may have a similar situation... one that's just as sticky. Maybe the person who has sinned against you is your boss and they have a firey temper. In fact you fear for your job if you were to retaliate. They've slandered you behind your back and told your co-workers things that simply aren't true and what can you do now? They have the authority.
TRUST God
THANK God
WAIT on God
How do we do these things?
By grasping the truth that Words of evil against us should bring a trust in the love of God for us.
All this comes back to trusting God... trusting that He loves us and knows the situation, trusting that He is still sovereign and still just and He'll bring about the end that most glorifies Him.
"Sticks and stones may break our bones, but words will never hurt us." This is true in the end not because it's a pithy saying, but because we have a God and Father who loves us and His love endures despite the evil of others... forever and ever.
Let's pray...
Friday, November 19, 2010
Is it alright for God's people to express sorrow?
Sitting at Starbucks one night at about 11pm, a friend expressed that in her younger years she greatly struggled with depression. She grew up in the church until 5th grade and in her moments of lament she was simply told to be joyful in the Lord because that's how Christians were supposed to be. She was given the impression that being upset was wrong. I believe the Body of Christ often walks the halls of the local church, shares in times of fellowship, and sings praises to God alongside one another with this same perception. It shows when we share "too much" of what is going on in our lives and our "too much" is met with skepticism, harsh dogmatism, or rebuke by our brothers and sisters. It shows perhaps even in our definition of "too much" as we grow a fear of how our candid thoughts and feelings would be received. It also shows at times in our own prayer life as we relate to God. The Lament psalms come to us as an instructive example that speaks directly to such perceptions. Is lament legitimate among God's people? What does biblical lament look like? How can the church practically address this issue? These are the questions the church needs to answer for the health of the Body.
Psalm 4 is a psalm of individual lament that opens with "Answer me when I call, O God of my righteousness! You have given me relief when I was in distress. Be gracious to me and hear my prayer! " In this verse David gives his Address to God. If we were to stop here the point could be reasonably made by this verse alone. In these words we hear an urgency and an honesty. It comes across as a kind of demand. There is no nuance of "answer me if you want to, God." This is the true heart of David as he wrestles with the place of this distress in his life. When we read these words and ask if it is wrong to say similar things to God, in some sense we are asking the wrong question. The question instead is, "Is it honest or realistic to talk this way to God?" The answer to this question must be yes. David pours his heart out to the Lord without fear or reservation, calls for mercy in his situation, and calls for God to listen to his prayer. The tenor of this address is common throughout the Psalms (13:3-4, 69:13-14, 119:145-146, 143:7).
Lament psalms also have a section describing the specific situation of the distress. It is actually called the Lament or Complaint portion. Psalm 4:2 says, "O men, how long shall my honor be turned into shame? How long will you love vain words and seek after lies?" V.6a also says, "There are many who say, 'Who will show us some good?'" Similarly and more directly we find statements like "I pour out my complaint before Him; I tell my trouble before Him." (142:2), "...I am restless in my complaint and I moan" (55:2), and of an important theological comfort, "Evening and morning and at noon I utter my complaint and moan, and He hears my voice." (55:17). Is it alright to complain to God? Rather, is it honest and realistic to complain to God? To this we also must answer yes. He hears our cries and listens to our complaints as the loving patient Father He is. In our church culture we often operate under the assumption that it is wrong to complain to God. The truth is that the Lord is intimately acquainted with the struggles of the human soul and He meets us where we are in our normal complaints just as He met David where he was in Psalm 4:3b, "The Lord hears when I call to Him."
Lament psalms also contain a Petition. In Psalm 4 we find this petition in the call for God to hear and in v.6b to "Lift up the light of your face upon us, O Lord!" Similar themes in Psalms are petitions for God to "forget not the afflicted" (10:12). We also find the impreccatory requests like, "Break the arm of the wicked and evildoer; call his wickedness to account till you find none" (10:15). Without getting too bogged down in the impreccatory issue it's important I believe to note that these requests are bundled up in the psalmists' trust in and assumption of the character of God. He is a just God and it's clear that he deals out justice appropriately to those who deny Him. The Psalmist only makes these requests in accordance with His known character. The most familiar part of our prayers is our asking things of God. This comes most natural to us and therefore doesn't need too much defense. When the psalmist asks God not to forget those who are afflicted though, we may immediately question his theology. Doesn't he know God doesn't forget things? Doesn't he know God doesn't forsake us? Doesn't he know God listens to us? "God isn't deaf," we may say. Here we must all admit that in our moments of pain the amount of theology or propositions we can know simply don't do the job. The head often doesn't communicate well with the heart. The beauty of Lament psalms is from them we can see that God understands this and He is patient to hear us in these moments and meet us there.
Finally the Lament psalms give us a portion expressing a certainty of having been heard. This is often a call to praise or trust in God. Psalm 4 shows us this in v.7-8, "You have put more joy in my heart than they have when their grain and wine abound. In peace I will both lie down and sleep; for you alone, O Lord, make me dwell in safety." Similarly, psalm 55 ends with the brief yet heavy phrase, "But I will trust in You." This is encouraging because the prayer to God that begins in pain will end in a firm trust that God not only will be but is faithful. Often our laments don't see the optimism the psalmists show us. We must show the church that biblical sorrow is legitimate, however it should be surrounding in praise. This presents a challenge for us. In our moments of lament we need to look to the promises of God and the sufficiency of God to grant us help, grace, and strength.
From all of this I believe we can learn a simple truth. It is that God's people today can be honest in their times of sorrow because God's people in the Psalms were honest in theirs. The church today is afraid to be vulnerable. We've bought into a culture of religious individualism. We think our faith and how our pain and struggles relate to it should be our own. We buy this lie and in doing so we stunt our growth in so far as it depends on us. We believe this and wonder why we have trouble relating to those to whom we want to minister. I believe to address this situation we need a biblical world view to affect how we express our sorrow. We need to look to the psalms and see their no-nonsense nature. We need to know that God's people need not be divorced from their feelings. We can express them in all their naked glory to a God who sees that nakedness, sent His Son to die for it, and knows it better than we do. We have a God who entered our earthly reality in the person of Jesus Christ and can "empathize with our weaknesses" (Heb. 4:15).
Secondly we must use this biblical understanding as a foundation to then teach God's people how to pray. We need to know that it is alright to let it all out before God. We need not force or fabricate emotion in our prayer, but we need to know that it is legitimate and that He is unafraid to hear and respond to our honesty in His own sovereign way. It may be that in our familiarity with verbal prayer that we find it difficult to be honest. In these cases it would help for us to write out a prayer as a letter. We can also look toward the communal Laments in Psalms (12, 44, 60, 74, 79, 80, 83, 85) as examples of prayers that depart from the "I" of individuality and present a unified plea to God in a group. For those who are in a place where they can express distress in their individual times of prayer it may be helpful to join a small group of other brothers and sisters who share the same lament and can seek the Lord in honesty together. If God is not afraid to hear us then we need not be afraid to speak to Him both alone and together. As God's people today may we follow the example of those who have gone before us!
Psalm 4 is a psalm of individual lament that opens with "Answer me when I call, O God of my righteousness! You have given me relief when I was in distress. Be gracious to me and hear my prayer! " In this verse David gives his Address to God. If we were to stop here the point could be reasonably made by this verse alone. In these words we hear an urgency and an honesty. It comes across as a kind of demand. There is no nuance of "answer me if you want to, God." This is the true heart of David as he wrestles with the place of this distress in his life. When we read these words and ask if it is wrong to say similar things to God, in some sense we are asking the wrong question. The question instead is, "Is it honest or realistic to talk this way to God?" The answer to this question must be yes. David pours his heart out to the Lord without fear or reservation, calls for mercy in his situation, and calls for God to listen to his prayer. The tenor of this address is common throughout the Psalms (13:3-4, 69:13-14, 119:145-146, 143:7).
Lament psalms also have a section describing the specific situation of the distress. It is actually called the Lament or Complaint portion. Psalm 4:2 says, "O men, how long shall my honor be turned into shame? How long will you love vain words and seek after lies?" V.6a also says, "There are many who say, 'Who will show us some good?'" Similarly and more directly we find statements like "I pour out my complaint before Him; I tell my trouble before Him." (142:2), "...I am restless in my complaint and I moan" (55:2), and of an important theological comfort, "Evening and morning and at noon I utter my complaint and moan, and He hears my voice." (55:17). Is it alright to complain to God? Rather, is it honest and realistic to complain to God? To this we also must answer yes. He hears our cries and listens to our complaints as the loving patient Father He is. In our church culture we often operate under the assumption that it is wrong to complain to God. The truth is that the Lord is intimately acquainted with the struggles of the human soul and He meets us where we are in our normal complaints just as He met David where he was in Psalm 4:3b, "The Lord hears when I call to Him."
Lament psalms also contain a Petition. In Psalm 4 we find this petition in the call for God to hear and in v.6b to "Lift up the light of your face upon us, O Lord!" Similar themes in Psalms are petitions for God to "forget not the afflicted" (10:12). We also find the impreccatory requests like, "Break the arm of the wicked and evildoer; call his wickedness to account till you find none" (10:15). Without getting too bogged down in the impreccatory issue it's important I believe to note that these requests are bundled up in the psalmists' trust in and assumption of the character of God. He is a just God and it's clear that he deals out justice appropriately to those who deny Him. The Psalmist only makes these requests in accordance with His known character. The most familiar part of our prayers is our asking things of God. This comes most natural to us and therefore doesn't need too much defense. When the psalmist asks God not to forget those who are afflicted though, we may immediately question his theology. Doesn't he know God doesn't forget things? Doesn't he know God doesn't forsake us? Doesn't he know God listens to us? "God isn't deaf," we may say. Here we must all admit that in our moments of pain the amount of theology or propositions we can know simply don't do the job. The head often doesn't communicate well with the heart. The beauty of Lament psalms is from them we can see that God understands this and He is patient to hear us in these moments and meet us there.
Finally the Lament psalms give us a portion expressing a certainty of having been heard. This is often a call to praise or trust in God. Psalm 4 shows us this in v.7-8, "You have put more joy in my heart than they have when their grain and wine abound. In peace I will both lie down and sleep; for you alone, O Lord, make me dwell in safety." Similarly, psalm 55 ends with the brief yet heavy phrase, "But I will trust in You." This is encouraging because the prayer to God that begins in pain will end in a firm trust that God not only will be but is faithful. Often our laments don't see the optimism the psalmists show us. We must show the church that biblical sorrow is legitimate, however it should be surrounding in praise. This presents a challenge for us. In our moments of lament we need to look to the promises of God and the sufficiency of God to grant us help, grace, and strength.
From all of this I believe we can learn a simple truth. It is that God's people today can be honest in their times of sorrow because God's people in the Psalms were honest in theirs. The church today is afraid to be vulnerable. We've bought into a culture of religious individualism. We think our faith and how our pain and struggles relate to it should be our own. We buy this lie and in doing so we stunt our growth in so far as it depends on us. We believe this and wonder why we have trouble relating to those to whom we want to minister. I believe to address this situation we need a biblical world view to affect how we express our sorrow. We need to look to the psalms and see their no-nonsense nature. We need to know that God's people need not be divorced from their feelings. We can express them in all their naked glory to a God who sees that nakedness, sent His Son to die for it, and knows it better than we do. We have a God who entered our earthly reality in the person of Jesus Christ and can "empathize with our weaknesses" (Heb. 4:15).
Secondly we must use this biblical understanding as a foundation to then teach God's people how to pray. We need to know that it is alright to let it all out before God. We need not force or fabricate emotion in our prayer, but we need to know that it is legitimate and that He is unafraid to hear and respond to our honesty in His own sovereign way. It may be that in our familiarity with verbal prayer that we find it difficult to be honest. In these cases it would help for us to write out a prayer as a letter. We can also look toward the communal Laments in Psalms (12, 44, 60, 74, 79, 80, 83, 85) as examples of prayers that depart from the "I" of individuality and present a unified plea to God in a group. For those who are in a place where they can express distress in their individual times of prayer it may be helpful to join a small group of other brothers and sisters who share the same lament and can seek the Lord in honesty together. If God is not afraid to hear us then we need not be afraid to speak to Him both alone and together. As God's people today may we follow the example of those who have gone before us!
Friday, November 12, 2010
Home Again... short lived.
My semester and my time at Moody is rapidly approaching its' end, yet I find myself sitting in the library of my community college in Hurst, Texas. This was expected, yet it wasn't. My mom's health has been so up and down lately that I wanted to mkae sure I could see her while I was still able to. It's one thing to have ups and downs, but quite another for them to be as drastic as they have been. First she seemed near death and then we found out her infection was gone and the tests were looking good. They were about to move her to a physical rehab center to stay for months to continue recovery. But then it got worse. The fluid her body has been collecting due to a pretty inoperative liver has reached her lungs. She needs a tube to breath. In response to the question, "how long will she live?" The doctors have said it's a day to day thing. I wanted to see her in case I wasn't able to before the semester ended.
"Lord, I know You can do great things. I have a Book that says You do and shows You have. God, you raised Lazarus from the dead... can You raise my mom from spiritual death? You are mighty to save. God, people ask how I'm doing. I don't know what to tell them. I knew my mom's body would give out. I knew that. I just want to see her in heaven one day. I want to leave this world to find that she came to know You. That's all I care about and that's what hurts the most right now. Lord, I believe the time is near for her. I know you can break the hard heart and heal the broken heart. Please do that God. Do it with her and do it with all those affected by this, Your will permitting. Oh God please work here I ask You. Yet in all things, not my will, but Yours be done. It's in Christs' name I pray it, Amen."
As I continue to wonder what God may do as this chapter in my life comes to its' end, I find that I have no more answers than I did when I last wrote. After a very interesting couple months, I feel like I'm back at square 1 in many respects. I'm sure that isn't the case though. God has a purpose for all things even if it's hidden deep in His sovereignty. This doesn't stop me from bewilderment though. It's not easy to be willing to take God's sharp turns and hit His predestined potholes gracefully in life, knowing and trusting that He brought us to them for good reason. Schoolwork is one of, if not the last thing on my mind. Procrastination pursues me. Today is the day of the week when I spend time in prayer about my current and future ministry. I have been diligent here. Still speaking with 2 churches. The one in Michigan hasn't responded back but supposedly has reviewed my resume and answered questions. I had another one in KS call me. They added me to a list of people they'd narrowed it to from the mass of those who applied. They only did this after they'd realized they overlooked me on accident. So I slipped through the first filter process on accident!!! But was it accident God? So I read through their doctrinal statement and constitution. I answered a list of questions they had. They responded to my doctrinal questions and we agree!!! In fact they said one of the reasons they're looking for a new pastor is because their old one didn't preach in accordance with the things I mentioned! I was very pleased to hear that. We'll see what God does there. It's close enough to home that I can see people I care about and far enough away that I'm not at home. I continue to pray about my future in minitsry. As I return home I'm reminded again that I don't want to stay here. The house is filthy and soon it will be populated with 4 people, 4 dogs, and 5 cats. I WANT OUT!
"Lord God, You know the plans You have for me. I know they are good, but I don't know what they are... and that's ok. I trust You. God I don't know where I'll be this time next year, but You know. Lord, I graciously ask that You would give me a glimpse into what's next God. If not, please supply the faith I need to keep taking steps off of cliffs. I'm in Your hands God. You know my desire to serve You. You know how You've prepared me and to what end. You know who I am better than I do. Please God, please work in me. I believe it's all coming soon Lord. I may be wrong, but I've seen too much to not believe that. Too much has happened for that not to be true. Yet in all things not my will but Yours be done. In Christs' name I pray, Amen."
"Lord, I know You can do great things. I have a Book that says You do and shows You have. God, you raised Lazarus from the dead... can You raise my mom from spiritual death? You are mighty to save. God, people ask how I'm doing. I don't know what to tell them. I knew my mom's body would give out. I knew that. I just want to see her in heaven one day. I want to leave this world to find that she came to know You. That's all I care about and that's what hurts the most right now. Lord, I believe the time is near for her. I know you can break the hard heart and heal the broken heart. Please do that God. Do it with her and do it with all those affected by this, Your will permitting. Oh God please work here I ask You. Yet in all things, not my will, but Yours be done. It's in Christs' name I pray it, Amen."
As I continue to wonder what God may do as this chapter in my life comes to its' end, I find that I have no more answers than I did when I last wrote. After a very interesting couple months, I feel like I'm back at square 1 in many respects. I'm sure that isn't the case though. God has a purpose for all things even if it's hidden deep in His sovereignty. This doesn't stop me from bewilderment though. It's not easy to be willing to take God's sharp turns and hit His predestined potholes gracefully in life, knowing and trusting that He brought us to them for good reason. Schoolwork is one of, if not the last thing on my mind. Procrastination pursues me. Today is the day of the week when I spend time in prayer about my current and future ministry. I have been diligent here. Still speaking with 2 churches. The one in Michigan hasn't responded back but supposedly has reviewed my resume and answered questions. I had another one in KS call me. They added me to a list of people they'd narrowed it to from the mass of those who applied. They only did this after they'd realized they overlooked me on accident. So I slipped through the first filter process on accident!!! But was it accident God? So I read through their doctrinal statement and constitution. I answered a list of questions they had. They responded to my doctrinal questions and we agree!!! In fact they said one of the reasons they're looking for a new pastor is because their old one didn't preach in accordance with the things I mentioned! I was very pleased to hear that. We'll see what God does there. It's close enough to home that I can see people I care about and far enough away that I'm not at home. I continue to pray about my future in minitsry. As I return home I'm reminded again that I don't want to stay here. The house is filthy and soon it will be populated with 4 people, 4 dogs, and 5 cats. I WANT OUT!
"Lord God, You know the plans You have for me. I know they are good, but I don't know what they are... and that's ok. I trust You. God I don't know where I'll be this time next year, but You know. Lord, I graciously ask that You would give me a glimpse into what's next God. If not, please supply the faith I need to keep taking steps off of cliffs. I'm in Your hands God. You know my desire to serve You. You know how You've prepared me and to what end. You know who I am better than I do. Please God, please work in me. I believe it's all coming soon Lord. I may be wrong, but I've seen too much to not believe that. Too much has happened for that not to be true. Yet in all things not my will but Yours be done. In Christs' name I pray, Amen."
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