Psalms Of Summer | The Blessed Life

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:07

We're starting a new series today called The Psalms. I'm looking forward to it. I love in the summer. I love taking a book of the Bible and kind of unpacking it as we go throughout the summer. Now, listen, I know some of y'all are gonna have some travels and some plans this summer, and uh I want you to know we are so glad that you are. You can always uh watch on YouTube if you want to, but I also want you to know we're not the kind of church that's looking at your seat saying, oh, that heathen's in Hawaii today. Um, you know, our heart is this that you would grow no matter where you are, that you would find God everywhere that you go, that you would be learning and growing. And one of the best ways that you can do that, listen, is not by listening to me, but by reading his word. And so this summer, as we go through the Psalms, I'd encourage you to stay, uh, no matter where you are, where life takes you, I'd encourage you to stay tuned in online. But more importantly, I just invite you to read the Psalms with us. And so my challenge to you is this that you would read two Psalms a day over the course of this summer series. And what you're gonna find is you're gonna find God speaking to you not just on Sunday, but on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday. So two Psalms a week. Now listen, I know we live in a day of audio. Like you can listen to it on your phone, you can listen to it in your car, you can read it, put it on your nightstand the night before. The book of Psalms is you open up your Bible, it's in the middle, a little bit to your left. It's one of the biggest books that you're gonna see in your Bible. And here's what my prayer, my wife and I were praying for you this summer, and that is this that as you read his word, you would grow stronger and stronger in your faith. We're doing the book of Psalms because I find so much encouragement from the book of Psalms. It it feels so relatable when I read a psalm. It's not just the good stuff, it's the hard stuff. How many of you know sometimes when you go to church, you feel like everybody else has got a good, and you're like, I got it hard, and I don't really know what to do with this. But the book of Psalms, it just tells it like it is, lays it out there the good, the bad, the ugly. But at the end of almost every psalm, what I love about it is no matter the circumstances the writer is speaking of, he always says, but God is good. He always goes back and says, But I trust in God. He always goes back and says, God is faithful. He always goes back and believes and trusts that God is going to be with him no matter what he's going through. The book of Psalms is so relatable, and I'm looking forward to it. My encouragement to you is that you would read scripture and you would be in God's word. Now listen, it's 2026. Y'all remember back in the day when we used to have a lot of church kiosks, those marquees out front that they would change the letters on. You know, I I drive by those sometimes. I think, who would have the time to change all the letters out of the, you know, we have a billboard now. I love our billboard. It says, see what God can do. How many of y'all know we want to be a faith-filled place? Like, hey, hey, church can be good, and uh you you should want to go. And uh, and so I love that. I I love hearing the stories of people who have come into the life of the church, but some marquees and some billboards, they're a little interesting. Have you ever seen one? Well, last weekend we were driving and uh we were going to a small country town and we were driving outside of town and out in the boonies in the middle of nowhere, and uh we drove by, and you know, listen, uh I drive my with my wife all the time, and men, you know what I'm about to talk to, women, I'm sorry, but sometimes my wife just goes, babe! And I'm like, this car, you know, I'm you'll never believe what my friend just texted me. I'm like, ah, we almost got a wreck, you know? So I'm I'm pretty like cautious when I drive. I I try not to do that, but we were driving through this small country town, and I'm like, babe! She's like, What happened to you? I said, look at that church sign. And as we were driving through this small town, here was the church sign right here. I'm not gonna read it out loud, we got kids in the room. Now, listen, some of y'all are gonna be really mad at me right now. Don't send me an email, okay? Now put it, take it down, just take it down. By the way, that's not the actual church. I found the same phrase of a different church, so don't go look them up, okay? Unless you want to go to that church, you can, okay? But but listen, we don't bash other churches. I'm not here to talk down, but I'm I just I have a real problem with that statement right there. For the next hour, my kids are going crazy in the backseat. Dad's not paying any attention. Why? Because I'm in theological la la land thinking about all the reasons why that sign is not accomplishing what they think it might be accomplishing, or maybe it is, shock value. We have a phrase around our house called shock value. You know the statements you just say for shock value. That's one of them. Because all I could think about was that does not motivate me or anyone else to read the Bible. Fear is a lousy motivator. How many of y'all know? Fear is a lousy motivator, but faith is a good one. And then I read something like that and I think about something like that, and my encouragement to you is this I don't, I don't know, maybe maybe your mom made you read the Bible as you washed your mouth out with soap. Maybe she made you read James over and over again. Maybe you grew up in the time when you had to write a Bible verse over and over. Every time you were in trouble, and and it was just because you began to associate the wrong things with the word of God. I think that's harmful. The reason I think it's harmful is because God's word was never designed to scare you, it was designed to help you. It was not designed to discourage you, it was designed to encourage you in your faith. And when I think about the motivator behind this, I think about that. When you read the Bible, the Bible is not about getting hell out of you, it's about getting heaven in you. There's a big difference. Getting hell out of you is the idea that, well, I'm a bad person, I got a lot of bad stuff, and I just need to get the bad stuff out of my life. I want to make you a promise and a commitment that as you read the word of God, it's going to put heaven in you. And a byproduct of that is that hell will come out of you. But the motivation is not that hell comes out of you, because here's what happens: you can take something out of your life and you have nothing. And nothing is kind of the same thing as still not having God in your life. The motivator behind reading Scripture and reading the Bible is that heaven would come to you. And here's what Jesus says: that any time the light shows up, what happens to the darkness? It flees. The byproduct of reading the Word of God is some of the hard parts of you and some of the challenging parts of you will be purged. Maybe see some of the uglier sides or the rougher sides. Yes, the byproduct of reading scripture is that it will refine you and use scriptural terms. It will sanctify you. But I want to tell you this that the motivator behind reading the Bible is that you grow in your relationship with God, that you become more connected with Him, that you have the life and growth and maturity in your faith. That through the reading of Scripture, God is actually speaking to you. So here's what we believe as Christians. When we come to church, we're not reading a collection of things that a bunch of dead people wrote down. It's not just a history book, it's not just things that people said might be a good idea. Here's what we believe. We believe that God, the Bible is God's inspired word. That he used human writers to write the things that he would want you to know. And that it's for everyone. But it's not just for everyone, as my four-year-old son would say, it's also just for you. And so here's our encouragement to you as you read that you would take God's word as his word to you. And the question is, what is his word telling you? What is he instructing you? Now, listen, I I want to paint all of this because I know sometimes you can come to church and you're like, preacher, that's your job. You're supposed to tell everybody to read the Bible. I know, but it's not just my job, it's my burden. It's not just what we do because that's what people have always done, it's because it's proven to work. That there is a receipt to this thing. That we can look back and say, God's word has been working for generations, and if it worked for them, it will work for you. So if our life comes down to this, uh one of the things that I love about the book of Psalms is it Psalm opens Psalm 1 with this Blessed is the man whose delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night. The book of Psalms is 150 chapters. Now, before that overwhelms you, most of them are small. How many of y'all like to start with the small stuff? Don't start with Psalm 119 and quit. I love starting with the small, because listen, sometimes it's not about the quantity that you need, it's about the quality of what you need. And one verse sometimes will do me for a whole day. Sometimes I'll sit down and I'll just read and read and read. But other times I'll sit down and read three words, and my wife will look over and she'll be like, Is that all you got? And I'm like, that's all I need. Because sometimes just a few words give me everything that I've been looking for. And I love what how Psalm 1 starts because it's like a summary, it's like giving you a synopsis of the entire book. And he's saying this: Blessed is the man whose delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night. Now, listen, this is written in Psalm. They don't have the rest of the Bible yet. When he's talking about the law of the Lord, he's talking about God's word to them, God's instruction to them. So here's what I want you to know. If you want a blessed life, your blessed life starts not by some random happenstance. I used to think that the people who are blessed, God just woke up every day and just dropped a little blessing and if it fell on you, you got lucky. That's not how God's blessing works. It's not random. I love what it says: blessed is the man. In other words, you can choose today to be blessed. To be blessed sometimes is translated, happy is the man. Happy is the man, favor upon the man. Sometimes, as we think about this, we we think in today's world, we think blessed and we think materialism. Like it just takes over in our understanding of being blessed. And so sometimes I understand that I say the word blessed and people don't like it because of the connotation they've picked up along the way. But here's what I believe just because man ruined the word doesn't mean God still can't use the word. If he said it, he meant it. So I have to get back to the root of what he's saying, and what he's saying is this when you love my word, when you delight in my word, when you consume my word, here's what he says, it will change your life. Now, anybody have dramatic people in your life? Stop looking at your neighbor. I said, stop. Y'all getting worse back there. You know, sometimes it can be over-emphasized. You know, the phrase, if you do this, it's gonna change your life. And then it's some ad on social media, you know? It's like a hundred-day workout program. You're like, yeah, right. Clearly. Um what I love about God's word is he doesn't lie, he doesn't make stuff up, he's not trying something that he's never tried out before and saying, I'm just gonna make you the guinea pig. If it's in his word, it's true. If it's in his word, it's for you. And here's what he says: that you can have a blessed life when you hold tight to his word. That you will be blessed in all the areas of your life. So we're gonna be in the Psalms this summer, and that is really the heartbeat of the Psalms is that the psalmist is writing on how to help you hold on to God's word. The psalmist is writing on instruction on how to help you live the life that God has called you to live. And what I love about the Psalms is the Psalms is a collection of books. It's not just one, it's actually five books make up the Psalms. That's why there's 150. There's different segments and collections, sometimes 10, sometimes 50, different collections of Psalms that were all compiled. Maybe they were distributed at one point in time in smaller books, but by the time we get to the Bible, they're all put together. And what I love about it, there's five books, and there's all different kinds of psalms in there. They're written by different people. Most of them are songs and hymns to be sung. I will not be singing them to you this summer. There's a reason I'm a preacher, not a singer. But David wrote most of the psalms. Most of the psalms that you read were written by King David, a very heroic figure in our faith and in the Old Testament, a guy who didn't get it all right, but yet he had a heart for God, the Bible says. And David holds nothing back. You read Psalms from Solomon. They're probably they believe there's one or two Psalms that were written by Moses himself. Somebody, you want to read some from Moses, you know? It's like the influential people, but what I love is they don't hold anything back, they tell you like it is. So if their life was in the pit, they tell you, my life is in the pit. If they were going through a hard time, they tell you they're going through a hard time. They're not good Christians just pretending like everything's okay. They're telling you how it is, and then they're telling you the thoughts they have about God. And what makes the psalm so relatable is it's highly emotive. There's a lot of figurative language, there's similes, there's metaphors, there's hyperboles, people, they're over-exaggerating words just to help you capture the point. And I I read it, I relate it a little bit like this. I love to tell stories in my message, and the reason I love to tell stories is number one, to keep you from sleeping. So if I see someone sleeping, I start telling a story. But number two, listen, when I tell you a story, everything about my story doesn't have a theological meaning. Does that make sense? In other words, I'll tell you a story. Why do I tell you these stories? Why? Because I want you to start thinking thoughts about God. I want to, I want to orientate your perspective and start connecting with the Lord. And so when the psalmist comes out and says, You're like a tree, you shouldn't say, I'm a tree. The psalmist is not giving you a theological discourse on the fact that your life is a tree. Here's what he's doing: he's trying to help paint a picture for you that you might have the right thoughts about God and towards God. And what makes Psalms so different is you'll read in the New Testament, the New Testament is mostly written by Saul, other than the Gospels, and Saul's writing all these letters, which happen to be a lot of theological jargon, a lot of discourse on doctrine and what you should believe and some facts and some history in there. But the Psalms aren't that. Why? Because the Psalms are unique from any other book. Because the Psalms are written of people talking to God, about God. It's not like Isaiah or the prophets, where you know the phrases you've heard maybe, thus saith the Lord. The Psalms are different. The Psalms is not, and God says you should, and fill in the blank. The Psalms go the opposite direction, they go from man to the Lord. And oftentimes what happens in the Psalms is the writer is writing from his heart and he's talking to his mind. You know, sometimes your heart needs to inform your mind. Sometimes your mind gets it wrong. You're like, but I'm really smart. Sometimes your mind gets it wrong. But I got a 4.0. Sometimes your mind gets it wrong. And what David does is as he writes these psalms, these songs and these hymns that are sung, it's their way of informing their mind of the right thoughts they should be thinking about God. It's their way of dealing with some of the pits and the challenges that they're going through. And so I don't usually do this, but just to start this series, I want you to know the different kinds of psalms. There's all kinds. There's a psalm of lament. A psalm of lament is expressing struggles, suffering, or disappointment to the Lord. There are times when the psalmist will just write out, Lord, this is really hard. I'm real you ever been there? Sounds like your prayer? That's because these psalms are prayers to the Lord. There's psalms of thanksgiving. How many of y'all know? If you're gonna be negative, you should also be positive. How many of you know if you're gonna tell them like it is when it's bad, you should tell them like it is when it's good. And a lot of the Psalms, here's what they help us do. If God has done something good in your life, you should tell him about it. David is giving us an example. My God is following me, his goodness follows me all the days of my life. I am where I am because of what he's done. I can do the things that I can do because of how good he's been to me. I didn't deserve it, but God blessed me with it. And David is always quick to say, Lord, I thank you for your goodness. Have you thanked God lately? Is your book of Psalms, the five books of Psalms, is it complete and whole? Does it include laments? But does it also include thanksgivings? I love some of the Psalms are salvation history. What does that mean? They're stories of God's saving work and deliverance. And it's not telling it from a historical perspective, it's telling it from a heart perspective. It's David saying, Do y'all not remember the day when it didn't look like this? Do you remember the day when we were in slavery and things weren't going well? Do you remember the day when it felt like all hope was lost, but then God brought us through. He delivered us. It's a salvation history. Parents, this is a lot like you. Psalm 78 says this tell the coming generation the works of your God. That's a salvation history. What are you doing? You're saying, son, dad didn't always used to be this way. You see, I had a life like this, and I went to places I didn't want to go, and I did things I didn't want to do. My life didn't always look this way. And I just want to tell you why. Because I don't want you to make the same mistakes I made. I want you to stand on my shoulders. I want you to be more blessed than I was. I want you to have what I didn't have. What are you doing? You're recounting to the next generation why? That they might hear and know and live different. A lot of the Psalms are salvation history. Why? Because when we remember the things God has done, here's what it does. Listen, don't miss this. When we hear the things God has done, it builds our faith for the things He can do. You find yourself in a pit and you're like, man, I don't really know what to do. Well, you could talk the problem all the way to Papacitos, and I'm telling you, those chips are blessed and highly favored from the Lord. But if you talked negative all the way there and all the way home, it doesn't matter how blessed those chips are, you're still not blessed. But you know what? If you talk a little negative and say, man, my life's been a little bit hard, but I just want to tell you, honey, I just want to remind you, the time we went through something and we came out the other side. Why? Because God helped us. What are you doing? You're building your faith for what God can do. Salvation history is really important. This is not like history class. How many of y'all? History class, no thanks. School, no thanks, been there, done that, got the diploma, not going back. Some of y'all like barely got the diploma and never, ever. Listen, I used to be a youth pastor for 15 years. I still have horror pains. Like when I walked into the cafeteria of the school, I'm like, oh, it just takes you right back. Y'all go to your kids' sporting games and you're like, oh man, this place. Listen, how many of you know when you start recounting what God has done for you, it helps build your faith. The Psalms are an important, integral part of your faith. Why? Because they do these things for you. They help you express yourself to God, but also know, because listen, these weren't just writings of men expressing themselves to God. God put them in the Bible. Which means this: they're God's inspired word to you. It might be a little complicated here, but you gotta understand this. If it's in the Bible, God has put his stamp of approval on it. The writers of Scripture were not just men who got together and said, I'm gonna write a best-selling book. And they compiled it all together and put it on Amazon and boom, it went viral. Listen, the Bible is full of people, men and women, just like me and you, who, as they lived their life, God inspired them with a word from heaven and they wrote it. So, in one sense, the Psalms are man's message to God, but in other sense, when God put it in the canon of Scripture, it's God's stamp of approval to say this: this is my word to you. What David went through can bless you. What the people of Israel went through can bless you. It's God's inspired word to you. It's not just salvation history, it's also celebration and affirmation. How many of y'all like to party? All right. The Psalms are wisdom psalms. Ladies, how many of your husbands need wisdom? Yeah, that baby has a lot to say about that. What does that mean? It means in the Psalms you will find wisdom for life that you'll never find anywhere else. This is really important. Because we can have a tendency, and by we, I mean, I'm serious, I can have a tendency to go looking for answers to life's things in all kinds of places. And what the Psalms do is they present a picture of wisdom, and you could be going through something and think, I have no idea what to do here. And then I can stand here on a Sunday morning and read a psalm out loud, and you could go like this. That's it. That's all they needed. Why? Because there is wisdom in God's word for your life. It'll give you direction, it'll give you answers. Unless you think it's just for Christians at church, I want to tell you something. This wisdom is the best wisdom you're gonna find out there. In fact, it helps you in business. Some of the best business leaders I know, they live their life by God's word. I didn't say the richest people I know. What I said is some of the best business leaders I know. What I'm telling you is this rich in being in business doesn't make you A good business leader. Some of the most fruitful business people I know, they lead their staff and their teams based off the wisdom of God's word. And people would say, oh, well, that has nothing to do with what I do every day at work. Oh. Has everything to do. Has everything to do with how you raise your kids. I just quoted Psalm 78. You know what Psalm 78 says? It tells you to tell the coming. Psalm 78 will tell you how to raise your kids. And you may have read 10 parenting books and thought, man, I can't do this. But you can read one psalm if you listen to his words. Can I tell you what? Your kid could be blessed because of it. Your kids can stand on your shoulders and go places you were never able to go. Why? Because you had the heart to give them a prayer. A song. A song. The last one is this. There are songs of trust. Psalms of trust, also songs of trust. What do they do? They focus their attention on God's faithfulness, goodness, and trustworthiness. These psalms are the writer's way of saying, God, I trust you. That's why I love like Psalm 61, Psalm 63. It says something like this. It says, lead me to the rock that is higher than I. What is he saying? God, I don't know what to do, but I trust you. God, everything's not looking right, but I'm going to ask that you be my firm foundation. I'm going to lead, I'm going to ask you to lead me to the rock that is higher than I. Why? Because I trust in you and I trust in you alone. I love what Psalm 62 says, for God alone, my soul waits in silence. Anybody like to wait? I already waited on 1488 for five years. I don't want to wait anymore. But when I read that, I learn that I need to wait. That in the silence God speaks. That God can give me direction and wisdom. And that my waiting in the silence on God alone is my way of saying this. God, I trust you. Don't you love the proverb? I know this is in Psalms, I'm getting off track. Don't you love the proverb? Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding, and all your ways acknowledge him, and he will direct your paths. You know what my wife and I often say, I trust in the Lord. I trust in the Lord. I trust in the Lord. When something doesn't come in good, a bill doesn't come in good, a health diagnosis doesn't come in good, and we talk about it. You know a phrase that often ends our sentence? We just got this bill, but I trust God. We just have this doctor's report, something doesn't feel right, but I trust God. What are you doing? You're singing your own spiritual song to the Lord. It's not just what God did in them, it's what he wants to do in you. So I want to read Psalm 1 to you. Here it is. Blessed be the man. Psalm chapter 1, verse 1. If you ready, Sam ready. Blessed be the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers, but his delight is in the law of the Lord. And on his law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its seasons, and its leaf does not wither. How many of y'all don't want to wither? I don't want to wrinkle either. In all that he does, he prospers, but the wicked are not so, but like chaff that the wind drives away. 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. I love how he begins to play this out. He's contrasting two ways of life. The psalmist is coming and he's saying there's two paths to life. There's two ways. There's two routes that you can take. One is blessed and the other is cursed. One is blessed and the other is wicked. Now I know that wicked is not a word that we use regularly. In fact, in today's age, we might think that's not very politically correct, but I just want you to understand the contrast of what he's drawing to. He's saying there is a way that follows God and there's a way that doesn't follow God. There's a way that leads to life and there's a way that leads to death. When he uses the word righteous, he's saying being in right standing with God. I want to be in right standing with God, being in a relationship with Jesus puts me at rights with God. I'm part of the righteous chosen children of God, and so are you. And he's saying, there is a way in which the righteous chosen children of God walk. And he says, if you want to be blessed, then you will not do these things. And he goes on and he lists it, and he says, they do not walk in the counsel of the wicked. Now the counsel is a thought process, it is a worldview, it's things that happen in the mind, it's a way of thinking. He's saying, when you become a believer in Jesus, you think differently than the world. The way you always thought isn't the way you should continue to think. Just because you thunk it before doesn't mean you should think it now. And here's what he's saying: they walk in the counsel of the wicked. In other words, God says, go this way, and something inside of them says, but I'm gonna go this way. He says they walk in the counsel of the wicked. Then he says they stand in the way of sinners. Now I used to think that meant like heroic. Like, oh, there's sinners out there, and I'm gonna stand in your way. That's not what it means. Stand in the way of sinners means doing what they do, living the life that they live, being just like them, being no different than a follower, not being a follower of Jesus, being different from the world, but just being like the world. And he says, then what happens is it goes from walking in the council, thinking thoughts in your head, to now your feet are standing in a place that you weren't standing before. And then he says, eventually you sit down in the seat of scoffers. And the word the word scoffers we don't use either. It's the idea that they're mocking. There's this idea behind it that it's an open rebellion to the ways of God. God, I'm not for you, I'm against you. It's an open rebellion. It's a, it's a it's a position in which a person could camp. I'm not with God and I refuse to be with God. And so what he's saying is there's this progression in the Psalms. He's saying, if you want to be blessed, then I'd encourage you not to walk in the counsel of the wicked, because if you do, you're gonna find the life that God intended for you is not gonna happen the way he intended. What you're gonna find as you sit in the seat of scoffers, he's saying this is not God's best plan for your life. Unless you think God is about a bunch of rules. I want to encourage you today, God is not about a bunch of rules, God is about having a relationship with you, and he knows how best that relationship works. This is not a do-and-don't rules conversation, but I do want to paint you a little bit of a picture. Teenagers, are you with me? Okay, I just want you to know something. I love you, and I'm gonna pick on your parents too, okay? But I want to paint a picture. So hang out with me, teenagers. I'm still cool, I still know all the trendy things. Parents, you can relate to this because you tell the kids in your house, you say, hey, this is the way that we do it. Here's your phrase. In my house. In my house, we do this. In other words, what you're saying, to live in my territory, to live in my space, these are the rules, these are the things, this is how our relationship is going to go best. Now, teenagers, contrary to your opinion, they're not doing it just because they want to be mean. All right, parents, I'm helping you out now, okay? Cheer me on. They're not doing it just because they want to be mean, they're doing it because they want you to be blessed. And so often what happens, we understand this in the parental relationship status. Here's what happens we we draw a boundary around our house and we say, This is how we do it. These are our values, this is our culture, this is our ecosystem that we live in. And so often, inevitably, what happens is we draw this line in the sand and we say, do not cross that line. And your cute kids grow up and become teenagers. When they grow up and become teenagers, they grow BO and attitudes. You're like, what happened? People used to want to take pictures and squeeze your cheeks. And here's what happens the counsel of the wicked begins to influence, and the question is, how close can I get to this line? Oh, I'm not really over, mom. I'm not really over, Dad. Like, I'm I'm still good. Am I gonna get grounded for this? Right? And so the question becomes here's the line. How close can I get to it? Why? What happens? Because when your kid was a kid and innocent in your home and was only surrounded by your influence, they only knew one way, and that one way was the blessed parameters of your house. But as they grow, they're now exposed to more voices. Listen, y'all need to pray for this generation. They're exposed to more voices than any other generation ever before. Why? Because you may have had five friends, you weren't that cool. But they got people on social media all over the world with influences. Listen, I'm not scared of the world. I'm not here to rail against the world today. I'm just I'm just telling you, like it is. The voices and influence of the world, what is the psalmist saying? He's saying the counsel of the wicked. In other words, influences from the outside are trying to get to their thought. And when they get to their thought, they know this they can change their life. When you get to the thoughts, you will change the way that you live. And so that influence comes and they step over across the line, and the things they didn't used to do before, they'll now do, and things that weren't the norm before, or maybe not a part of your culture in your household. Maybe they've now embraced and accepted. That's standing in the way of sinners. The things that their friends will do, they will do just because their friends did it. And by the way, don't forget, parents, you did it too. And then there comes a point in time where sometimes they sit in the seat of scoffers. In other words, your household may be a household of faith, but you feel like your child is far from God and you're wondering, how do they get here? I was a youth pastor for 15 years. I never had a parent come to me when their kid was on that side of the line. I only had parents sit across the counter from me, across the desk from me, crying because their kid was sitting right here. And it's in this place that the challenge can be all about the chair they're sitting in. You'll never believe what my kid did. You'll never believe the things they're saying. You'll never believe the people they're hanging out with. My encouragement was always this. It's not about what they've done, it's about what they've thought. The issue isn't what's happening right here, the issue is about the thinking that happened back there. And here's what the psalmist is saying. The way that you go back there, listen, I want you to know there's no one ever too far gone from the grace of God. It doesn't matter if you're on that side of the line or this side of the line, God can do as much for you here as he can do for you there. And so I just want to tell some parents in the room right here, parenting tip, I don't have teenagers. I just worked with him for 15 years and lost all my hair. So I just want to tell you if you have a teenager right now who doesn't like you, you're doing your job. I uh to the to the to the parent who's saying, My kid's no longer my friend, but I'm just I'm just encouraging them to go to church. Listen, I tell so many people right here, and I'd say, Well, are they going to church? And they say, No, they're not going to church, they don't have any friends there. I don't care if they don't have any friends at church, they go to church. Uh well, they don't go to church, I'm afraid they're not gonna like me or want to go to church when they get old. Listen, I don't care. I just want them to have the word of God in them. Why? Because I believe the word of God in them will change their future and shape them. And so maybe there's some parents in the room, and you just need to know this. You just need to know that you're putting seed in their life. You just need to know that your job isn't to be their friend, you're there to protect their soul. You you are you are breeding eternity inside of them. Why? Because you want them to be blessed. So, teenagers in the room, if you're here and you're mad at your parents today, I just want you to know something. They want something good for you. Listen, I'm talking about teenagers, but I'm not talking about teenagers at all. Because this is what God would say to you. Okay, okay, teenagers, turn to your parents now and say, all right, this one's for you. Because you know the difference in a teenager versus you? They still have the gift of a parent who loves them enough to tell them and inform them of God's ways. You know, the only difference between them and you is that you have grown up, you've gotten bigger, your problems might have gotten harder, you might be facing more challenges, and maybe you don't have the voices in your life being the gift that you are to your kids. So what's the difference? There is none. The Lord would say the same thing for you. What you tell your kid, it's not just what you say, it's what you do. And what the Lord would say to you is this you can be blessed. You can be blessed when you delight in my word, when you hold on to my word, it will bless you. To those on this side of the line today, and you're saying, My faith is strong and I'm living for the Lord, then don't forget that you're just one thought away from going in the wrong path. You still need the grace of God. God, I remember what you did for me, and I choose to not forget. Listen to what it says in Psalms. He says, uh He says the word, he says, Restore to me the joy of my salvation. Here's what he's saying, restore to me the joy of my salvation. Don't let me forget what you did for me. Why? Because I'm only one thought away from thinking I did this all by myself. I'm only one thought away from thinking I got it all figured out. I'm only one thought away from the pride that leads to fall and destruction. And so we stay in the same place as our teenager. If you're over here on this side of the line today, here's what I want you to know: there's a way back. If you feel like nothing in your life is working the way it's supposed to, if you feel the word cursed feels like the way your life is going, I want you to know something that God is for you, that he wants to bless you. And his blessing comes, listen to this, not in what you're doing. His blessing is not in your behavior, it's not in your choices, his blessing comes in your love for his word. His blessing is not contingent upon your perfection, it's contingent upon what his word will do in you if you will just open it and read it and receive it. He's saying, I'm gonna bless you all the days of your life. I'm gonna plant you, I'm going to prosper you, he says, but you have to delight in his word. So please hear my heart in this. This is not just read another reading plan. This is not just another pastor saying, read your Bible. This is your life and your medicine and your sustaining power. This is for your growth in your maturity. This isn't because it's a bunch of rules, it's not just because you're at a church today, you're hearing this. Listen, there have been over a billion downloads. U version downloaded, made a Bible app. A church in Oklahoma made a Bible app, and it's been downloaded over one billion times. They just celebrated that this year. We have more access to God's word than any other generation before us. I want you to think about this. People in these times, they don't all have their own copy of the Bible. They go to church on Sunday, and you know what they do? Listen, y'all think I'm bad. They stand there for four hours while they just read God's word. You know what they're doing? They're holding on to it. Why? Because when they go home, they didn't have a copy of their own. There was a manuscript that was held as a tabernacle that the priest read. And they're saying, I need to hang on to every word. Why? Because when I get to Monday and I can't open it for myself, I need to hang on to every word because I'm gonna need some food for tomorrow too. And they would stand there, stand, stand. Listen, sometimes when worship goes 32 minutes, Jazz, I'm like, my legs are getting tired. They would stand there for four hours. Why? Because they wanted to hang on every word. They delighted in his word. They knew that his word would change their life. Now, listen, we have more access to the Bible than any generation ever before us. We don't just have one copy, we have 10 in our house. We have it on our Apple device. We can download it 24-7. What I'm saying is the issue in our lives is not our access to God's word. The issue in our life is not what God's word does or doesn't do. The issue in our life is the hunger and thirst on the inside of us for things over the line instead of the things right here. He says, if you just read, it's not just reading. Listen, parents to the teenagers, this is more important than their grades. Sorry. I'd rather my kid not get A's, but know the word of God. This is more important than their extracurriculars. Why? Because one day they're gonna get old like us, and they're not gonna be able to play that good anymore, anyway. But the word of God is timeless. The word of God will save their marriage one day. The word of God will be spoken through your child to your future grandchildren to plant seeds in them. I'm just please hear me. It is the most important thing that we do. Do you eat every day the food on the table before you? Yes. What the psalmist is saying, then eat the word of God, because it will bless you. Here's three things it'll do. Number one, it'll plant you in the ground. It will plant you in the ground of your faith. Number two, number two is this it'll make you productive. It says it yields its fruit in its season, and it will not wither. For Isaiah 55, for as the rain and the snow came down from heaven and do not return there, but water the earth, making it bring forth and sprout. Listen to this, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater. So shall my be my word that goes out from my mouth. It shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that for which I purpose, and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it out. What does that mean? His word in your life will do what it's supposed to do for you. Doesn't matter who you are, where you've been, the things you've done, doesn't matter how smart you are, how good you are at reading, doesn't matter if you've been a Christian for your whole life and read the Bible a hundred times, or if it's your very first time. If you read ten paragraphs or if you read one verse, God's word never fails and it will put something in you. And the last thing it'll do is it'll make you prosperous. Now I know some people don't like that word, but this is what it says. He said in Psalm 1, Blessed is the man who doesn't do those things, but what he does is he delights in the word of the Lord, it will make him prosperous. The idea behind prosper is this it will push you forward, it will propel you. Have you ever been stuck in a place and wondered how you're gonna get out? The way you get out is the prospering of the Lord. He will take you in the sticky, muddy places of your life, and he will push you to places you could never go on your own. It will make you prosperous. Kind of like this guy I met recently. I a couple of years ago, I met him and we become friends and we talk often. He doesn't go to the church here, but he began to tell me his story. And I met him in Starbucks and we began a relationship and started talking and having conversations about the things of God. He said, Are you reading a Bible? And I said, Yes, I am. He said, Well, the Bible changed my life. I said, Well, tell me about it. He said, Well, I was one of five kids, five boys. He said, and at a young age of 43, he said, I am the only boy remaining in my family. How many of y'all ever been through traumatic situations in your life? You got a past, some things have happened, you got a history. Two of the boys had committed suicide, one was murdered, one accidentally passed away. And he said, I found myself asking in my life, what is the point and the purpose of my life? Why am I the only one left? This is not how our story was supposed to go. And he said, I was so hungry for purpose and success in life that I threw myself into all the wrong things. He said, I uh he became really good at sports, he excelled in his career and went really, really high in his career. He said, and I had a dream job. And one day when he reached the NFL, he said, I obtained the dream job I always wanted. He goes, the only problem was I finally got there and realized I don't want it at all. And he said, I made this realization because how many of you know sometimes with the success come other things? I'll never be like that, I'll never do that, I'll never go there. He said, The money was attractive, the lifestyle was attractive, but on the inside, he said, I started to realize I didn't just want success, I wanted significance in my life. And I couldn't find it anywhere. And he started uh getting into alcohol and became heavy drinking. He said, I would drink every night after the kids would go to bed. The next morning I'd wake up and my wife would say, You went hard last night, didn't you? And he said, I just didn't have my life together. And he said, I'm doing all of these things. He said it hit the rubber at the road when he said one night I was on an airplane. And he said, I was crying on the airplane. I said, Why were you crying on the airplane? He said, Because my wife the day before had given birth to our next child. He goes, and they were still in the hospital, and I was on the plane, crying on the way to our next city to go. Why? Because it was the job and it's what I had to do for my job. He said, In that moment I realized something. This isn't the life I want to live. So the thing I always wanted in my life, I finally got, and only to find out it's not blessed, it's cursed. And he said, So I I I binged that night and woke up the next morning. When I woke up the next morning, I said, something has to change in my life. He said, for the first time I picked up a Bible and I began to read. And I said, Hold on just a minute. I said, You mean you like started going to church and got saved and met all these Christians and they helped change your life? He said, No. I said, What? He said, I began to read my Bible. The last time he drank alcohol was three and a half years ago. Recently, his wife looked at him and said, This his wife said, This is the man I always knew that I married. And kids have their dad, he's found freedom. He's not doing all the things that he thought he would be doing. You know what he's doing now? He's helping vets rehabilitate into civilian life. He's taking the same skills, the same success he found in other places, and God is using it. And last Monday, a guy comes to him and says, as he's rehabilitating, he's trying to figure his life out. He says, the vet came to him and the vet said, I've never seen God as clear as I've seen him in you. Would you tell me something about what you know that I don't know? And he looks at him and he says, Listen, when my life all fell apart, I just picked up the Bible and I started reading it every day. And I looked at him, I said, I said, You know, we as Christians don't even read our Bibles every day. He goes, I know, but that's the one thing that changed my life. Maybe what you need is not another event, not another activity, not another blog, not another thing that somebody says will change your life. Maybe for you, the thing you've been looking for all along is what the psalmist says at the very beginning. Blessed is the man who loves the word of God. Would you bow your heads and close your eyes, Father? I'm just gonna pray this prayer simply today.