SPEAKER_01: Good morning, Church.
SPEAKER_01: Our scripture today is from Psalm 124.
SPEAKER_01: My name is Karen Frazier, and I have the privilege this morning to serve on the connection team.
SPEAKER_01: Again, our scripture reading is from Psalm 124.
SPEAKER_01: If it had not been the Lord who was on our side, let Israel now say, if it had not been the Lord who was on our side when people rose up against us, then they would have swallowed us up alive.
SPEAKER_01: When their anger was kindled against us, then the flood would have swept us away.
SPEAKER_01: The torrent would have gone over us, then over us would have gone the raging waters.
SPEAKER_01: Blessed be the Lord, who has not given us to prey to their teeth.
SPEAKER_01: We have escaped like a bird from the snare of the fowlers.
SPEAKER_01: The snare is broken, and we have escaped.
SPEAKER_01: Our help is in the name of the Lord who made heaven and earth.
SPEAKER_01: This is the word of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you, Karen.
SPEAKER_00: Well, I already introduced myself, so we'll skip past that part, and we'll just start this morning with a question.
SPEAKER_00: When was the last time that you found yourself in a situation where the odds were stacked against you?
SPEAKER_00: Was it perhaps when you received a diagnosis and the doctor told you that there was nothing more that he could do?
SPEAKER_00: Or maybe it was when you discovered something about your spouse that caused you to lose trust and you wondered if your marriage was gonna survive.
SPEAKER_00: Or perhaps it was when you left your job over ethical concerns and you had to start brand new and you're not sure how you're gonna start over.
SPEAKER_00: For me, it was when we started Harbor Church.
SPEAKER_00: My family and I were very comfortable we were at City Light.
SPEAKER_00: I was thriving in my role as the Citroup's director, and church planting for various reasons was no longer on my radar.
SPEAKER_00: But it kept coming up time and again, and the Moore made it pretty clear that that's what he had intended for our family to do.
SPEAKER_00: So I picked up the phone, I called my best buddy Ryan, I asked him what his family had planned over the next 10 years of their lives, and I asked him to put that all on the table and come start a church with me instead.
SPEAKER_00: And when we started, we had no idea if anybody was gonna go with us or how things would turn out.
SPEAKER_00: It felt like the odds were stacked against us.
SPEAKER_00: And if I'm honest, in a lot of ways it still feels that way.
SPEAKER_00: Whether it's converting lost people to Christ, reaching complete financial independence, or securing a long-term gathering space for our church, it often feels like the odds are ever stacked against us, even though our church is doing really well at the moment.
SPEAKER_00: Well, we're in week six of an eight-week sermon series through the Psalms of Ascent, which is a series of songs that God's people used to sing when they're on their pilgrimage to Jerusalem for the annual festivals.
SPEAKER_00: And we've chosen to preach for through this particular sermon series, uh, these psalms, because we think that that's a perfect illustration of the Christian life.
SPEAKER_00: That we too, like Israel before us, are on a pilgrimage from earth, our temporary place of sojourning, to our heavenly Jerusalem, the place where we are going to worship and dwell with God forever.
SPEAKER_00: And the thing about our pilgrimage is that just like the people of Israel, the odds are stacked against us as well.
SPEAKER_00: In fact, there are in the scripture four different opposing forces that are constantly at work against you as a Christian: the world, the flesh, the devil, and the fall.
SPEAKER_00: The first there is the world.
SPEAKER_00: Now, when we talk about the world, we're not talking about God's good creation, birds and trees and lakes and mountains and those kinds of things.
SPEAKER_00: We're talking about the fallen human social order that works in opposition to God simply because you are a Christian.
SPEAKER_00: It's the people and the policies and the principles and the laws and the organizations that are established against Christianity.
SPEAKER_00: The second is the flesh.
SPEAKER_00: Now we're not talking about your physical flesh, your arms and your legs and your body.
SPEAKER_00: We're talking about the fallen, corrupt human nature that is opposed to God from the inside out, that kind of leftover resistance to God even after you've become a Christian.
SPEAKER_00: The third is the devil.
SPEAKER_00: Again, not the red-horned pitchfork-wielding cartoon character that you might be familiar with, but a literal fallen angel who controls the powers of darkness and is constantly working evil against the people of God.
SPEAKER_00: He's baiting the hook of sin with your flesh and with the world to try to lure you away from God so he can hook you and drown you.
SPEAKER_00: And the final one is the fall.
SPEAKER_00: Not the season where the leaves change colors and fall to the ground and everything looks pretty for about 10 minutes.
SPEAKER_00: But the brokenness that we all experience living in a world where Adam and Eve have uh introduced sin into the world.
SPEAKER_00: It's the fact that our bodies don't work the way they're supposed to, our relationships don't work the way they're supposed to, our created order doesn't work the way that it's supposed to.
SPEAKER_00: And so whether it's spiritual, personal, practical, relational, the odds are stacked against you as a Christian on your pilgrimage to the heavenly Jerusalem, and without God's help, the truth is none of us are gonna make it very far.
SPEAKER_00: But that's where Psalm 124 comes in.
SPEAKER_00: Because Psalm 124 is written by King David and it commemorates one of two events.
SPEAKER_00: The first possibility is a time before David was king of Israel.
SPEAKER_00: He was on the run from Saul, scared for his life, and Saul and his army are enveloped around him, closing in, and it looks for sure that David is going to die.
SPEAKER_00: And then at the very last second, a messenger arrives and says, Hey, the Philistines are raiding Maan.
SPEAKER_00: So Saul stops what he's doing, turns his attention away from David, and goes to deal with the Philistines instead.
SPEAKER_00: The second possibility is a time shortly after David was crowned king, when the Philistines assume that God's people are weak and vulnerable.
SPEAKER_00: And they begin to galley in the valley of Rephaim.
SPEAKER_00: And what they're planning to do is they're planning to assault David, to capture him, and to annihilate the people of Israel, wiping them completely off the map.
SPEAKER_00: Now we're not sure which of those events that this psalm is actually referring to, but years later, David commemorates God's deliverance in one of those particular moments, so that God's people would know what to do when they have faced similar challenges on the road to Jerusalem as well.
SPEAKER_00: And that brings us to our big idea this morning, which is this that when the odds are stacked against you, turn to the Lord for help because he is on your side.
SPEAKER_00: And that begs the question what does it look like to turn to the Lord for help?
SPEAKER_00: Well, I think Psalm 24, 124 is going to give us three things, three ways that it looks like to turn to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Turning to the Lord looks like remembering what he's done, praising him for his saving grace, and trusting him with whatever comes next.
SPEAKER_00: Now, in an age that is obsessed with being the hero of your own story, my hope is that Psalm 124 is going to free you from trying to white-knuckle your way through life, trying to pretend like you've got everything together, and trying to perform your way into a better situation.
SPEAKER_00: My hope is also that Psalm 124 would reassure you that God is present and active in your life right now, and he's working for your good, no matter what it is that you're facing in this moment.
SPEAKER_00: And so we'll start with verse one, remembering what he has done.
SPEAKER_00: If you have your Bible, go ahead and turn there with me now, or you can follow along on the screen behind me.
SPEAKER_00: But verse one says this if it had not been for the Lord who is on our side, let Israel now say, if it had not been for the Lord who is on our side when people rose up against us.
SPEAKER_00: Now, biblically, corporate worship should be two things.
SPEAKER_00: It should be expressive and it should be formative.
SPEAKER_00: It should serve as a vehicle for expressing our enjoyment of who God is and what he's done, but it should also serve as a tool for shaping and forming our theology to help us know and understand and believe right things about God and what he's done for us through Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: And so practically what that means is that when we gather for corporate worship, we should feel the freedom to lift our voices.
SPEAKER_00: We should feel the freedom to raise our hands.
SPEAKER_00: We should feel the freedom to clap and to sing out, maybe even to dance a little bit.
SPEAKER_00: Now, as a bunch of former Lutherans and Presbyterians and Catholics, a little dancing is good.
SPEAKER_00: You don't have to get crazy, just a little, right?
SPEAKER_00: We can be expressive in our worship to God because what he's done is amazing.
SPEAKER_00: And if we would go to a sporting event and we would clap and cheer and jump up and down in our seats, how much more should our worship express our delight in who God is and what he's done for us as well?
SPEAKER_00: At the same time, what this means is that we should be careful to choose songs that are meaningful, that say true things about God and what he's done, and that refuse to sacrifice truth for beauty.
SPEAKER_00: Because our worship should be both expressive and formative.
SPEAKER_00: It should be both beautiful and true.
SPEAKER_00: It should say true things about God that we can understand with our mind, and it should do so in a way that engages our hearts so that we actually want to praise and worship Him.
SPEAKER_00: And what we have here at the beginning of Psalm 124 is a little bit of both.
SPEAKER_00: If you notice, verse 2 is essentially a repetition and an extension of verse 1, with that little phrase, let Israel now say, stuck right in between.
SPEAKER_00: Now, commentators would agree that the psalmist is probably doing one of two things.
SPEAKER_00: Either he's using the song catechetically as a way of kind of what we do here at harbor sometimes in our confessions and professions, saying something to the congregation, and then inviting the congregation to repeat that back to him as a way of shaping and forming them in their knowledge of God.
SPEAKER_00: Or the other possibility of what David might be doing here is he's simply leading worship.
SPEAKER_00: He's taking that little moment in between a chorus or a verse or whatever, I don't know music very well, but the thing in between, that's empty space, and he's speaking to the room.
SPEAKER_00: He's leading them in worship.
SPEAKER_00: He's not just standing there singing songs, he's actually leading the congregation in their worship of God.
SPEAKER_00: But either way, the point is that the psalmist is inviting God's people to express their joy in what God has done so that it can shape and form who they are and how they live as well.
SPEAKER_00: And there's one thing that the psalmist wants God's people to know here that the Lord is on our side.
SPEAKER_00: Notice that God does not use the David does not use the generic word for God here.
SPEAKER_00: He used the covenant name, the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: That's significant because that name implies commitment.
SPEAKER_00: It's the name that God uses to affirm his unrelenting commitment to the welfare of his people throughout time and history.
SPEAKER_00: He's not just some generic far-off God who set the world into motion and hopes that you can kind of figure it out.
SPEAKER_00: He's actively engaged and committed in the life and welfare of his people, who he has pledged himself to in covenant love.
SPEAKER_00: And David uses that name because that's the name that the people of Israel would recognize.
SPEAKER_00: That's my God.
SPEAKER_00: That's my Lord.
SPEAKER_00: He is committed to me, to us as individuals, and as a congregation.
SPEAKER_00: So the psalmist is using this song to help God's people remember that their God is the Lord and He is on their side.
SPEAKER_00: The psalmist then uses two images to help God's people remember what God has done: a beast and a flood.
SPEAKER_00: In verse 3, we see the image of a beast, kind of an allusion to the beast, when David says, they would have swallowed us alive.
SPEAKER_00: Then in verse 4 and 5, we see the image of the flood, where David says, the flood would have swept us away, the torrent would have gone over us, and then over us would have gone the raging waters.
SPEAKER_00: Now, David is choosing vivid language here because he wants you to get the sense that they are facing impossible odds.
SPEAKER_00: They had absolutely no chance of survival apart from the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: But God.
SPEAKER_00: Now the text doesn't actually use that language, but that's essentially what it's saying.
SPEAKER_00: It's saying we were literally going to die, but God intervened and saved us from our enemies.
SPEAKER_00: And what David wants to do is he wants to strengthen Israel's faith by helping them to remember what God has already done.
SPEAKER_00: Now I've shared my story with you guys a number of different times, uh, but uh I became a Christian when I was 17 years old through uh Jeff and Marty Wanning, who were leading a dinner and Bible study at their house for the Miller North football team.
SPEAKER_00: It is basically like a harbor group or a small group, uh, but only there were 60 hungry high school football players there.
SPEAKER_00: So uh they fed us dinner, they did a Bible study, and uh through that the Lord worked in my life.
SPEAKER_00: There were a number of other people, of course, who were involved in that.
SPEAKER_00: My mom, who made it in a laid an amazing Christian foundation for me, I think an FCA sponsor, tons and tons and tons of kids' ministry volunteers and Sunday school teachers, all making a deposit that would eventually lead me to faith in Christ.
SPEAKER_00: But uh the pivotal moment was with Jeff and Martin Wanning in their house.
SPEAKER_00: And uh I think probably about the time I got to college, I started writing them a thank you know every single Thanksgiving.
SPEAKER_00: And uh I'd sit down, I don't know if I've hit all 22, that's 22 years ago, and I'm not sure I've hit all 22, but I bet I've hit 17 or 18 out of the last 22 years.
SPEAKER_00: And uh something interesting happens.
SPEAKER_00: Every time I sit down to write that thank you know, it brings me to tears.
SPEAKER_00: Every time I put pen to paper, I remember.
SPEAKER_00: I remember what it was like to be lost and far from God.
SPEAKER_00: I remember what it was like to be dead in my sins and transgressions, I remember what it was like to be far from God and without hope in the world.
SPEAKER_00: And when I finish that writing that letter and I put it in the mail and I send it off, something else happens.
SPEAKER_00: It begins to renew and reinvigorate me.
SPEAKER_00: It begins to remind me of the incredible, unrelenting love of God towards me as his son.
SPEAKER_00: It reminds me of the extravagant, amazing grace of Jesus that he would die for me to bring me back to himself as a son of God.
SPEAKER_00: And you know what happens?
SPEAKER_00: No matter what I have going on in my life at that moment, no matter how good, no matter how bad, it could be the worst season of my life.
SPEAKER_00: I could be facing the worst circumstances I've ever been through.
SPEAKER_00: And when I write that note and I put it in the mail, it does something to my soul.
SPEAKER_00: It reinvigorates me, it strengthens me, it brings to mind all of the good things that God has already done for me in such a way that I feel like I'm ready to face tomorrow, no matter what tomorrow may bring.
SPEAKER_00: Because that's what remembering God's work does.
SPEAKER_00: It anchors you in the tangible, personal, real life work of God so that your heart never forgets not only what God has done, but what God continues to do in your life today.
SPEAKER_00: Now, the reason, a reason, why so many people struggle when uh when uh turning to the Lord for help when uh circumstances get hard is because they wait until it's too late.
SPEAKER_00: They haven't trained themselves to turn their hearts to the Lord in their everyday life, and then a life circumstance slams into them, throws them off course, and they get disoriented and don't know where to go.
SPEAKER_00: Start turning to things like social media or pop psychology or the subtle, easy vices that are easy to slip back into when we're not trusting in Christ.
SPEAKER_00: And so the encouragement and encouragement is don't wait until you're in a crisis to turn to the Lord for help.
SPEAKER_00: Train your heart to turn to the Lord every day by remembering what God has done now.
SPEAKER_00: Keep a prayer journal where you can look at the prayers you've prayed and you can look back and see how God has been faithful to you in your life.
SPEAKER_00: Create a life map, get out a piece of paper and identify where the moments in your life where you see saw God break through in a significant way that it will just remind you and strengthen you when you revisit them.
SPEAKER_00: Schedule a day of solitude, maybe once a quarter, a couple times a year, to get away, to sit down, to reflect and remember how God has been at work in your life in the last three, five, or six months.
SPEAKER_00: Or maybe study church history.
SPEAKER_00: Look at what God has done in the lives of God's people over the course of the last several centuries, and be amazed and encouraged how God has been faithful, not just to his people in the Bible, but to his people going forward who have built their lives on God's word.
SPEAKER_00: And let me also just say that if you're in a crisis right now, remembering what God has done might be the best place for you to start.
SPEAKER_00: Before you pick up the phone and you call a pastor, though we're happy to help you, before you go to counseling, before you check social media, before you ask a friend, remember.
SPEAKER_00: Remember what God has already done.
SPEAKER_00: And let that strengthen you as you take your next steps in this season of your life.
SPEAKER_00: Because remembering isn't nostalgia, it's training.
SPEAKER_00: It's not just about getting a warm, fuzzy feeling so you can feel better about your situation.
SPEAKER_00: It's keeping God's work before you so that it shapes and forms your life and your worship.
SPEAKER_00: But it's not enough for this to be done individually.
SPEAKER_00: The text actually doesn't even use the word I.
SPEAKER_00: The text uses words like we, us, our.
SPEAKER_00: This is a corporate psalm.
SPEAKER_00: It's not just about what God has done for David.
SPEAKER_00: He starts there, but he zooms out and he remembers what God has done for his people.
SPEAKER_00: And so we not only need to remember what God has done for us as individuals, we need to remember what God has done for his people in Harbor Church as a congregation, but also throughout church history among his people.
SPEAKER_00: That's why we gather on Sunday mornings for worship and teaching.
SPEAKER_00: That's one of the reasons why we do assurance of pardon and profession of faith to anchor us in the historic truths that have always been passed down throughout the ages.
SPEAKER_00: And that's why we scatter into homes every week for Bible study.
SPEAKER_00: Because these weekly rhythms help us remember what God has done so that our hearts are conditioned to turn to Him when we're in need.
SPEAKER_00: So remembering what God has done, that's the first way that you can turn to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: The second way that you can turn to the Lord for help is by praising him for his saving grace.
SPEAKER_00: So look at verse 6, which says this says, Blessed be the Lord, who has not given us as prey to their teeth.
SPEAKER_00: We have escaped like a bird from the snare of the fowlers.
SPEAKER_00: The snare is broken, and we have escaped.
SPEAKER_00: First, notice the language.
SPEAKER_00: The psalmist is inviting God's people to celebrate the good news that God has come to the rescue.
SPEAKER_00: He's calling them to celebrate God's saving grace.
SPEAKER_00: You can almost hear as if he is saying, My chains are gone, I've been set free.
SPEAKER_00: God, my Savior, has ransomed me.
SPEAKER_00: He is declaring the good news of God's salvation by grace through faith.
SPEAKER_00: Notice also, however, the emphasis.
SPEAKER_00: There are no explanation points in the Hebrew language.
SPEAKER_00: Those are added in the English to help us understand the emphasis and the tone of the text.
SPEAKER_00: And they're added here because that's the emphasis that the language in Hebrew gives us in the original language.
SPEAKER_00: And they're added because God's people aren't merely to remember or to praise God's saving grace in kind of like an intellectual academic way.
SPEAKER_00: We're supposed to do so in a heartfelt way.
SPEAKER_00: We should exclaim it, we should be excited about it, it should animate every part of who we are and how we live our lives.
SPEAKER_00: And then finally, notice the progression of the text here.
SPEAKER_00: First comes memory.
SPEAKER_00: If the Lord had not been on our side, then comes reflection.
SPEAKER_00: They would have swallowed us up alive.
SPEAKER_00: And then comes praise.
SPEAKER_00: Blessed be the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: But the question is, why doesn't the Psalm stop at verse five?
SPEAKER_00: Why does it shift from remembrance to praise?
SPEAKER_00: Because remembering the rescue isn't the point.
SPEAKER_00: Delighting in the rescuer is.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Is it because God is vain and needs your applause?
SPEAKER_00: No.
SPEAKER_00: Is it because God is insecure and needs your validation?
SPEAKER_00: No.
SPEAKER_00: Is it because God is lonely and needs your company?
SPEAKER_00: No.
SPEAKER_00: That's not in either.
SPEAKER_00: You see, the psalmist turns remembrance into praise, not because he thinks that God won't be fully God until he gets it, but because he knows that you won't be fully satisfied until you give it.
SPEAKER_00: See, speaking of this issue in his book, Reflections on the Psalms, C.S.
SPEAKER_00: Lewis argues that praise is not merely the expression of our joy, but the completion of it.
SPEAKER_00: It's not enough for us to delight in something.
SPEAKER_00: We have to instinctively express our delight in it.
SPEAKER_00: There's something about our experience that is somehow incomplete until we express it in one way or another.
SPEAKER_00: Think about this in your own life, for example.
SPEAKER_00: When you enjoy an experience or receive good news, what do you do?
SPEAKER_00: You tell people about it.
SPEAKER_00: When you visit the ocean or you hike a mountain, you take pictures and you bring it back and you share with your friends or you post it on Instagram.
SPEAKER_00: When you meet that special someone, you write about it in your journal.
SPEAKER_00: You pick up the phone, you call your best friend, you tell somebody about the good experience that you've just had.
SPEAKER_00: When your lab results come back clear, when you get a raise, or when you try a new restaurant, you call a spouse, you text a friend, you write a review.
SPEAKER_00: Because it's not enough for us to merely enjoy something, we have to express our enjoyment of it as well.
SPEAKER_00: And that's why the psalmist turns remembrance into praise.
SPEAKER_00: Because he knows that praise is not the price we pay for delight, it's the consummation of it.
SPEAKER_00: Praise is what makes our joy complete.
SPEAKER_00: So the psalm doesn't turn to praise because God needs you to praise him.
SPEAKER_00: The psalm turns to praise because you need you to praise him.
SPEAKER_00: You see, you're hardwired for happiness, and everything you do, from the food you eat to the shows you watch, to the people you associate with, to the career you pursue, is driven by a deep, unrelenting pursuit of happiness.
SPEAKER_00: And the problem isn't that we want happiness too much, it's that we settle for too little.
SPEAKER_00: We substitute temporal goods like money and sex and social media in place of the eternal good, which is God Himself, our creator.
SPEAKER_00: And the truth is that none of these things are bad.
SPEAKER_00: Exercise is good, food is good, your career is good, relationships are good.
SPEAKER_00: What's wrong is that they're temporary, finite, and fragile.
SPEAKER_00: They can be taken away from you at a moment's notice.
SPEAKER_00: And that's why we get anxious and angry when people and circumstances and suffering rise up against us because they threaten some immaterial good that we're deeply and desperately afraid to lose.
SPEAKER_00: They threaten our comfort and our significance.
SPEAKER_00: They threaten our control and our approval, causing us to frantically grasp for anything and everything that we can find to give those things back: a bank account, a TikTok influencer, uh, social media, or maybe even social distance from other people so we can isolate and disassociate.
SPEAKER_00: And that's why this is so important for us, that we would cultivate a heart of praise.
SPEAKER_00: Because praise directs our affection and our attention toward God, who is ultimately our highest good.
SPEAKER_00: It causes us to go from a closed grip on life to an open-handed approach on life.
SPEAKER_00: That we build our lives on the only thing that cannot depreciate, be broken or lost.
SPEAKER_00: See, by praising God, we teach our hearts to rest in the good news that our deepest joy is not found in people or circumstances, but in the infinite, all-satisfying goodness of God.
SPEAKER_00: It's not just that he gives you comfort, that he gives you significance, that he gives you approval, it's that he is your comfort.
SPEAKER_00: He is your significance, he is your approval.
SPEAKER_00: And all the material goods that you desire find their ultimate fulfillment and consummation in him, because he is your ultimate good.
SPEAKER_00: And the result of praise is not only that it completes our joy, it's also that it reorders our loves.
SPEAKER_00: And as our loves get reordered, ordered, our delight in God grows.
SPEAKER_00: And our joy ultimately becomes indestructible and unshakable.
SPEAKER_00: Because no one and nothing can take from you God Himself.
SPEAKER_00: No matter what you face, no matter what circumstance, no matter what hardship, no matter what suffering, no one and nothing can touch your ultimate good.
SPEAKER_00: Because God has pledged himself to you in Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: And when we turn to God for praise, it leads us down the path of indestructible joy because he becomes our soul's unending delight.
SPEAKER_00: And so it's important for us to be a people of praise because it sets our delight on God, our highest and ultimate good, which can never be shaken, never be destroyed, and never be taken away.
SPEAKER_00: So finally, turning to God for help looks like trusting Him with whatever comes next.
SPEAKER_00: Psalm 124 simply ends with verse 8, which says, Our help is in the name of the Lord who made heaven and earth.
SPEAKER_00: So this is where the rubber meets the road here.
SPEAKER_00: And uh to really kind of understand what's happening here in this passage, you need to understand the difference between what an author is saying and with what an author is doing with what an author is saying.
SPEAKER_00: David is saying that Israel should remember what God has done and praise him for his saving grace.
SPEAKER_00: What David is doing is building Israel's confidence in God.
SPEAKER_00: His logic goes something like this Remembering what God has done should naturally turn into praise.
SPEAKER_00: Praising God for his saving grace should naturally turn into joy in who God is.
SPEAKER_00: Joy in who God is should naturally turn into confidence in what God can do for us now.
SPEAKER_00: And confidence in what God can do now should naturally turn into trusting him with whatever comes next in our lives.
SPEAKER_00: So David is using Israel's past to prepare them for their future.
SPEAKER_00: Let's take a quick minute to unpack this one verse.
SPEAKER_00: David says, our help.
SPEAKER_00: The word for help here is not referring to assistance, it's referring to rescue.
SPEAKER_00: God is not a personal assistant who just gives you a little bit of a boost so you can be more efficient in your daily life.
SPEAKER_00: God is more like a first responder who intervenes when you're unconscious and unable to help yourself.
SPEAKER_00: And David says that our help is in the name of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Now, a person's name refers to that person's reputation.
SPEAKER_00: Back in the day, Sports Illustrated, for example, had the slogan of the most trusted name in sports.
SPEAKER_00: That was their way of saying, hey, they have a reputation for good reporting, therefore you should buy their magazine because you can trust them to report on whatever's happening.
SPEAKER_00: In a similar way, David is saying that you can trust God's help because he has a reputation for saving his people.
SPEAKER_00: He has a track record of intervening and working on his people's behalf in desperate situations throughout history.
SPEAKER_00: And so you can trust him with whatever you have going on in your life right now.
SPEAKER_00: And then the passage ends with the phrase, the maker of heaven and earth.
SPEAKER_00: This should hopefully remind you of that cute little jingle.
SPEAKER_00: He's got the whole world in his hands.
SPEAKER_00: But your lack of applause tells me that I should probably never do that again.
SPEAKER_00: But that's the idea.
SPEAKER_00: That's essentially what David is saying.
SPEAKER_00: He's saying, God's got the whole world in his hands.
SPEAKER_00: And if he's got the world in his hands, guess what else he has in your hands?
SPEAKER_00: Your situation, too.
SPEAKER_00: And if you can trust that God's got the world in his hands, how much more can you trust him with what you put in his hands also?
SPEAKER_00: It's worth noting finally that the psalm is left open-ended.
SPEAKER_00: David ends with a principle.
SPEAKER_00: Our help is in the name of the Lord, but he doesn't offer any application.
SPEAKER_00: And I think that's intentional.
SPEAKER_00: You see, the psalm ends the way it does because David can't predict what's going to happen in your life.
SPEAKER_00: You might live a long, healthy, happy life where all of your relationships remain intact and you don't experience much suffering along the way.
SPEAKER_00: And if that's you, praise God, you are the exception.
SPEAKER_00: Most people make it to the heavenly Jerusalem a little dinged up in life, right?
SPEAKER_00: And it's more likely than not that at some point in your life, the odds are going to be stacked against you and you're going to face challenges that are too much for you to handle.
SPEAKER_00: For some of you, that could be failing health.
SPEAKER_00: For others, it could be opposition from family or coworkers or even the government.
SPEAKER_00: For others, it might be financial instability or estrangement from people you love or broken relationships from a previous community.
SPEAKER_00: And you can't predict what's going to happen next.
SPEAKER_00: But you can trust God with whatever it happens to be.
SPEAKER_00: And that's what this psalm is really all about.
SPEAKER_00: But we have to be really careful here.
SPEAKER_00: Because the psalm offers us a principle, not a promise.
SPEAKER_00: It says that our help is in the name of the Lord, not that the Lord is going to guarantee the outcomes that we want in life.
SPEAKER_00: That's an important distinction because we often think that trusting God means that God is going to work things out the way that we anticipate that He should, when what it actually means is that He's actually working for our good in every circumstance we face.
SPEAKER_00: But more often than not, God uses our circumstances to change us before He changes our circumstances.
SPEAKER_00: He can and does change our circumstances, He can and does intervene.
SPEAKER_00: He can and does rescue.
SPEAKER_00: But a lot of the times the situation we're facing is actually the help that we need is help on us, when the help that we want is help on our situation.
SPEAKER_00: And both of those things can be true.
SPEAKER_00: So what does it mean to trust God?
SPEAKER_00: It means holding both possibilities with open hands.
SPEAKER_00: God may change your circumstances, and we should pray that he would.
SPEAKER_00: Because God is more committed to your spiritual and eternal welfare than he is your physical and temporal comfort.
SPEAKER_00: Now we know this to be true because of what Paul says in Romans 8 28.
SPEAKER_00: He says, all things work together for the good of those who love God who have been called according to his purpose.
SPEAKER_00: Now, if we stop there, we might be tempted to believe that the good that Paul is referring to means that every disease will be healed, that every relationship will be restored, that every wrong will be made right.
SPEAKER_00: But we all know well enough that that's an incomplete interpretation of what that means.
SPEAKER_00: And it's not what Paul has in mind here.
SPEAKER_00: Because he tells us what that purpose is in verse 29 when he says this.
SPEAKER_00: In every situation, in every circumstance, that is the good that God is after.
SPEAKER_00: That is the purpose that he is seeking to accomplish.
SPEAKER_00: And so when the Bible talks about God's help, it's ultimately talking about what Paul says in Romans 8.31, where it says, if God is for us, who can be against us?
SPEAKER_00: He who did not spare his own son, but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things?
SPEAKER_00: You see, apart from Christ, you have more than the odds stacked against you.
SPEAKER_00: You have sin and death stacked against you, and that's a battle that every single one of us will lose every single time.
SPEAKER_00: But God, in his great love for us, sent his son Jesus Christ to fight the battle for us, dying on the cross in our place for our sins.
SPEAKER_00: And three days later, Jesus beat the odds by defeating Satan, sin, and death, using the greatest evil the world has ever seen, the crucifixion of God's Son, to accomplish the greatest good, the salvation of ill-deserving sinners.
SPEAKER_00: Now, if you are in Christ, your greatest problem has been solved through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: That's good news this morning.
SPEAKER_00: That the one foe, the one enemy that was guaranteed a knockout blow to you was defeated by Jesus Christ at the cross.
SPEAKER_00: That's why Christians can say with confidence, our help is in the name of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Not because God promises to make your situation better, but because he promises to use it for your good.
SPEAKER_00: At the same time, I wonder this morning if there are some of us in the room who've kind of given up on God.
SPEAKER_00: We've looked at our situation and it's impossible for us.
SPEAKER_00: And we haven't gotten to the point where we're willing to put it in God's hand and say, but maybe, but maybe God might intervene and do something here.
SPEAKER_00: And there are some of us who've been praising, praying for God to change us, which is right and good, I want to encourage you to do, who actually need to take a step back in the other direction.
SPEAKER_00: And you need to pray with boldness again, with fresh faith that God would change your situation as well.
SPEAKER_00: Because it's not either or, it's both and.
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes God really does change us through our circumstances.
SPEAKER_00: And sometimes God in his providence changes our circumstances.
SPEAKER_00: So I want to invite you to hold both possibilities with an open hand.
SPEAKER_00: Praying and trusting that God is on your side, working for your good.
SPEAKER_00: But as we do, we have to remember that trusting God looks like trusting with our circumstances and trusting Him with our well-being in our circumstances.
SPEAKER_00: So that's the good news this morning.
SPEAKER_00: That if you have trusted Christ for your salvation, you can know for certain that God is on your side.
SPEAKER_00: And you can have confidence of that because of the cross of Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: And if you've never done that, if you've never trusted Christ for your salvation, to forgive your sins, to make you right with God, to conquer death on your behalf, that's the best place to start.
SPEAKER_00: Because if you can trust God for that, you can trust God for anything else in your life as well.
SPEAKER_00: And we invite you to take that next step this morning.
SPEAKER_00: So, Harbor, let's not be a stubborn, self-reliant people who refuse God's help because we want to do it ourselves.
SPEAKER_00: Let's be a humble, God-dependent people who turn to the Lord for help.
SPEAKER_00: Because in Jesus Christ we can say with confidence that He is on our side.
SPEAKER_00: Let's pray.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, we thank you for our time together in your word this morning.
SPEAKER_00: For Psalm 124, which is such a gift for us, weary pilgrims, on our journey to the heavenly Jerusalem.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, I thank you that we can turn to you for help.
SPEAKER_00: And the odds are stacked against us because you are on our side.
SPEAKER_00: And I pray, Lord, that as a people you would help us to remember what you've done.
SPEAKER_00: Teach us to praise you for your saving grace.
SPEAKER_00: And help us to trust you with whatever comes next.
SPEAKER_00: Let it pray for particularly for my brothers and sisters right now who are walking through challenges in life, whether it's with their health or their relationships, their finances or their career, family dynamics or self-doubt.
SPEAKER_00: For now, Holy Spirit, through the Lord's Supper, through the remaining songs that we have to sing.
SPEAKER_00: Would you come?
SPEAKER_00: Would you strengthen my brothers and sisters?
SPEAKER_00: Would you comfort them?
SPEAKER_00: Would you lift their drooping heads and strengthen their weak hands?
SPEAKER_00: They may continue walking on the road to their heavenly Jerusalem, knowing that you are on their side and available to help.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you for your providence and your kindness to them.
SPEAKER_00: To teach us to be mindful of those who are struggling and hurting.
SPEAKER_00: That we would not leave that to the professionals, but that we would be a community who rolls up our sleeves and gets involved in each other's lives, who carries one another's burdens and who helps one another.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, who is actually a means of help to each other and an answer to this psalm in the congregation.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, finally, I pray for those who are here this morning who do not know Christ, who cannot say with confidence that you are on their side working for their good because they've never trusted you for their salvation.
SPEAKER_00: Now, as we turn our attention to the Lord's Supper, may this be a means of grace to us.
SPEAKER_00: And an assurance of all that you are and all that you've done and all that you continue to do through Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.