WEBVTT 00:00:18.960 --> 00:00:20.160 Psalm seventy-one. 00:00:20.640 --> 00:00:23.199 Forsake me not when my strength is spent. 00:00:23.760 --> 00:00:26.320 In you, O Lord, do I take refuge. 00:00:26.480 --> 00:00:28.160 Let me never be put to shame. 00:00:28.320 --> 00:00:30.960 In your righteousness, deliver me and rescue me. 00:00:31.120 --> 00:00:33.039 Incline your ear to me and save me. 00:00:33.280 --> 00:00:37.119 Be to me a rock of refuge, to which I may continually come. 00:00:37.280 --> 00:00:41.200 You have given the command to save me, for you are my rock and my fortress. 00:00:41.439 --> 00:00:47.359 Rescue me, O my God, from the hand of the wicked, from the grasp of the unjust and cruel man. 00:00:47.600 --> 00:00:52.320 For you, O Lord, are my hope, my trust, O Lord, for my mouth, for my youth. 00:00:52.640 --> 00:00:55.759 Upon you I have learned from before my birth. 00:00:56.079 --> 00:00:59.119 You are he who took me from my mother's womb. 00:00:59.359 --> 00:01:01.679 My praise is continually of you. 00:01:02.079 --> 00:01:06.400 I have been as a portant to many, but you are my strong refuge. 00:01:06.560 --> 00:01:10.879 My mouth is filled with your praise, and you and with your glory all the day. 00:01:11.040 --> 00:01:13.840 Do not cast me off in the time of old age. 00:01:14.079 --> 00:01:16.319 Forsake me not when my strength is spent. 00:01:16.560 --> 00:01:19.120 For my enemies speak concerning me. 00:01:19.359 --> 00:01:29.120 Those who watch for my life consult together and say, God has forsaken him, pursue and seize him, for there is none to deliver him. 00:01:29.439 --> 00:01:31.439 O God, be not fra far from me. 00:01:31.760 --> 00:01:33.599 O my God, make haste to help me. 00:01:33.840 --> 00:01:40.560 May my accusers be put to shame and consumed, with scorn and disgrace, may they be covered who seek my hurt. 00:01:40.879 --> 00:01:44.719 But I will hope continually and will praise you yet more and more. 00:01:44.959 --> 00:01:52.480 My mouth will tell of your righteous acts, of your deeds of salvation all the day, for their number is past my knowledge. 00:01:52.719 --> 00:01:56.079 With the mighty deeds of the Lord, God, I will come. 00:01:56.400 --> 00:02:00.560 I will remind them of your righteousness, yours alone. 00:02:00.879 --> 00:02:05.680 O God, from my youth you have taught me, and I still proclaim your wondrous deeds. 00:02:06.239 --> 00:02:15.759 So, even to old age and gray hairs, O God, do not forsake me until I proclaim your might to another generation, your power to all those who come. 00:02:16.159 --> 00:02:19.280 Your righteousness, O God, reaches the high heavens. 00:02:19.599 --> 00:02:22.960 You who have done great things, O God, who is like you? 00:02:23.599 --> 00:02:28.159 You who have made me see many troubles and calamities will revive me again. 00:02:28.319 --> 00:02:31.919 From the depths of the earth, you will bring me up again. 00:02:32.240 --> 00:02:35.280 You will increase my greatness and comfort me again. 00:02:35.520 --> 00:02:38.240 I will also praise you with the harp of your faithfulness. 00:02:38.479 --> 00:02:43.039 O my God, I will sing praises to you with a lyre, O Holy One of Israel. 00:02:43.199 --> 00:02:50.240 My lips will shout for joy when I sing when I sing praises to you, my soul also, which you have redeemed. 00:02:50.400 --> 00:02:58.240 And my tongue will talk of your righteous help all the day long, for they have been put to shame and disappointed who sought to do me hurt. 00:02:58.479 --> 00:02:59.759 And so reads God's word. 00:03:02.560 --> 00:03:03.199 My name is Mark. 00:03:03.280 --> 00:03:05.680 I'm one of the leaders here at uh at the church. 00:03:05.759 --> 00:03:10.960 And it's good to be uh back here speaking with you after uh some weeks off. 00:03:11.199 --> 00:03:18.879 And uh in the summertime, if you haven't been about if it's your first summer uh with us, uh we we look through the psalms. 00:03:19.120 --> 00:03:24.400 We started some years ago uh at Psalm 1, and we just do a psalm a week. 00:03:24.560 --> 00:03:30.240 Not quite sure what we're gonna do when we get to 119, but that's a problem for a couple of years uh down the road. 00:03:30.400 --> 00:03:51.199 And so we're here in Psalm 71 because one of the things that it's good to do in the summertime is to go into the book of Psalms because what the Psalms do, what they're there in the Bible uh for, is to give voice and vocabulary to the entire range of human experience and emotion. 00:03:51.439 --> 00:03:56.400 They are the uh the song book, the prayer book of the people of God. 00:03:56.639 --> 00:04:17.360 And when we are uh sitting uh in our in our rooms or uh on our commute and we're struggling to know how to approach God, and we don't really know what to pray, and we can't really give uh voice and verbiage to our uh to our feelings, the Psalms do that for us. 00:04:17.600 --> 00:04:27.279 Uh the Psalms help us to know in what sorts of ways we can communicate to this great God who has loved us. 00:04:27.439 --> 00:04:30.240 And so we're in Psalm 71 uh this morning. 00:04:30.399 --> 00:04:33.519 If you have it on your phone, it'd be great to have it uh in front of you. 00:04:33.680 --> 00:04:41.199 Or if you've uh if you've gone old school and uh you have an actual physical Bible to have Psalm uh 71 in front of you. 00:04:41.360 --> 00:04:47.040 If you're on a phone app, we're reading in the English standard version that has words like portent in it. 00:04:47.120 --> 00:04:51.519 Um a portent just means a sign, a sign of doom or a sign of calamity. 00:04:51.600 --> 00:04:55.920 Um, and we'll get to that in just a uh a couple of minutes time. 00:04:56.160 --> 00:05:11.040 Uh I don't know if you've noticed, if you've been around City uh for any length of time, one of the things that uh we don't have very uh very many of, though we are increasing in number, is that we don't have very many older people. 00:05:11.360 --> 00:05:17.680 We tend to be a young uh congregation, uh mostly uh young professionals at the minute. 00:05:17.839 --> 00:05:31.279 We used to be loads of students, then the students graduated and stuck around, but we tend to be kind of late 20s, early 30s, uh young professionals who are who are living in and around the city. 00:05:31.439 --> 00:05:44.639 I guess that that kind of makes sense because as as people grow up, they tend to move out of uh of the city because they can, you know, well, they can't afford to live in Dublin, so they uh they want to start a family and so they move further away. 00:05:45.040 --> 00:05:47.600 And uh so we tend to be quite young. 00:05:47.759 --> 00:05:56.079 And I suspect because we're quite young, uh, we don't really think about what it's like to uh to grow old and to get older. 00:05:56.160 --> 00:06:01.600 It's probably been about 15 or 20 years since somebody came up to you and said, What would you like to be when you're older? 00:06:01.839 --> 00:06:04.160 Um, maybe you're still working that out. 00:06:04.319 --> 00:06:06.319 Maybe that's uh that's an active question. 00:06:06.399 --> 00:06:09.839 What would I like to be uh when I when I grow up? 00:06:10.560 --> 00:06:12.399 But grow up we will. 00:06:12.480 --> 00:06:23.680 Uh some of us, uh some of you uh started uh City Church as students, and now you're married, or you're buying your first house, you're you're starting a family. 00:06:23.839 --> 00:06:30.240 I was uh 28 years old uh when City Church started, now I'm getting grey bits in my in my beard. 00:06:30.560 --> 00:06:34.480 And uh we are all feeling the advancing of the years. 00:06:34.639 --> 00:06:38.399 You may be starting to kind of make noise as you as you get out of chairs and things like that. 00:06:38.480 --> 00:06:41.600 You kind of going doing that. 00:06:43.519 --> 00:06:53.680 Growing older is not a guarantee of growing wiser, nor is it a guarantee of getting happier. 00:06:55.439 --> 00:07:06.000 We all, unfortunately, probably know older people who are pretty miserable and not altogether fun to be around. 00:07:06.240 --> 00:07:11.519 They see the world through the through the darkest of lenses. 00:07:13.120 --> 00:07:24.399 Equally, we know, uh, I'm sure probably, that it is possible for you to grow old and still be foolish and to make foolish decisions. 00:07:28.319 --> 00:07:34.319 I'm assuming this morning that we don't want to be like that. 00:07:34.480 --> 00:07:39.680 If you're like, yeah, I'd I'd rather be a miserable idiot, well, then you can switch off. 00:07:39.839 --> 00:07:41.279 Go and see Barbie. 00:07:41.519 --> 00:07:57.680 Um uh but assuming that you don't want to be uh unhappy, foolish in uh in your older years, then Psalm 71 has some help for us this morning. 00:07:59.519 --> 00:08:09.680 I suspect that many of us, if not all of us, we want to grow in grace and wisdom and respectability and stature and love. 00:08:12.160 --> 00:08:23.279 But none of us arrives at our 70th birthday, blows out the candles, and is miraculously transformed into that kind of person instantaneously. 00:08:23.680 --> 00:08:33.519 That kind of person is crafted and cultivated over uh over 10,000 little decisions all along the way. 00:08:35.200 --> 00:08:43.039 Your future self is sculpted from the marble of who you are today and the decisions that you make. 00:08:43.840 --> 00:08:47.840 Don't be like Homer, not the Greek writer, the Simpson. 00:08:47.919 --> 00:08:58.480 Uh there's a there's a uh there's a great moment, you may remember, where Homer is uh he's sitting there and he's he's eating a jar of mayonnaise with a with a spoon. 00:08:58.720 --> 00:09:02.879 Um and he says, and somebody comes up to him and says, You know, isn't that a terrible idea? 00:09:03.039 --> 00:09:08.080 Isn't it going to kind of throw throw your blood pressure through the roof, your cholesterol, you're gonna die of a heart attack? 00:09:08.240 --> 00:09:11.120 And he says, Yeah, that's a problem for future Homer. 00:09:11.279 --> 00:09:12.960 I'd hate to be that guy. 00:09:13.279 --> 00:09:13.919 Do you know? 00:09:14.080 --> 00:09:23.279 So don't be like Homer making the decisions now and making choices now and kind of operating like, well, I'd hate to be future, Mark. 00:09:23.440 --> 00:09:24.559 Sucks to be him. 00:09:24.799 --> 00:09:26.480 I'd hate to be future Homer. 00:09:26.639 --> 00:09:32.080 No, the the the person that you're going to be is sculpted out of the marble of who you are. 00:09:32.240 --> 00:09:34.879 And Psalm 71 sees that. 00:09:35.679 --> 00:09:44.159 The single unique thing about this Psalm is not that uh the psalmist is in trouble. 00:09:44.480 --> 00:09:48.399 You can't chuck a brick without the psalmist going, oh no, there's many foes around me. 00:09:48.639 --> 00:09:55.519 Um or similarly, you can't chuck a brick without going saying, Lord, you are my rock and my refuge, you are my fortress. 00:09:55.679 --> 00:09:57.519 You're the one that I'm going to praise all the time. 00:09:57.679 --> 00:10:01.679 Those are great things that we're going to dig into, but they're not unique to this psalm. 00:10:01.840 --> 00:10:06.879 What's unique to this Psalm are the time stamps. 00:10:07.679 --> 00:10:13.360 What's unique to this Psalm are the timestamps that the psalmist uses. 00:10:14.159 --> 00:10:18.799 So verse 5, he talks about how he's trusted from his youth. 00:10:19.200 --> 00:10:24.799 And so verse 9, he said, uh, they say, Don't cast me off, therefore, in old age. 00:10:25.039 --> 00:10:27.600 Verse 17, from my youth you have taught me. 00:10:27.759 --> 00:10:31.679 Verse 18, so do not forsake me when my hair is gray. 00:10:32.240 --> 00:10:36.720 The unique thing about this psalm are the time markers. 00:10:37.919 --> 00:10:56.879 Here's someone looking back at the past faithfulness of God, and then looking forward to the next chapters of his life or her life, and saying, I want to grow up, I want to grow old in God. 00:10:59.200 --> 00:11:06.000 I want to be mature and godly and happy and rejoicing and satisfied in God. 00:11:07.279 --> 00:11:27.039 I don't want to think just in terms of the here and now, of the moment-by-moment existence, but to zoom out and to think in terms of lineage and legacy about impact over decades and down generations. 00:11:29.360 --> 00:11:35.440 So this is great, Sam, for us as a young, predominantly congregation to be looking at. 00:11:36.720 --> 00:11:44.080 Because it causes us to step back and think for a second, okay, what kind of older person do I want to be? 00:11:44.879 --> 00:11:48.320 That might not just be uh, you know, gray hairs and dentures. 00:11:49.039 --> 00:11:54.159 That might be what kind of mum do I want to be, what kind of dad do I want to be? 00:11:54.320 --> 00:12:04.639 What kind of colleague as I grow up, or what kind of manager as I go through my career, what kind of person do I want to be as I move through the chapters and seasons of my life? 00:12:07.679 --> 00:12:23.440 In order to get there, I want to draw out five resolutions that I think you should make this morning in order to become the kind of person that the psalmist is aspiring to. 00:12:25.440 --> 00:12:33.200 First resolution resolve to make God your continual refuge. 00:12:34.320 --> 00:12:37.440 Resolve to make God your continual refuge. 00:12:37.679 --> 00:12:41.120 Verses one to three In you, O Lord, do I take refuge. 00:12:41.200 --> 00:12:42.639 Let me not be put to shame. 00:12:42.799 --> 00:12:45.279 In your righteousness deliver me and rescue me. 00:12:45.440 --> 00:12:47.600 Incline your ear to me and save me. 00:12:47.840 --> 00:12:52.159 Be to me a rock of refuge, to which I may continually come. 00:12:52.480 --> 00:13:00.240 You have given me the command, you sorry, you have given the command to save me, for you are my rock and my fortress. 00:13:01.120 --> 00:13:15.600 As I said a moment ago, with many of the Psalms, the psalmist finds themselves in distress, they are anxious and oppressed, worried, hurt, there is opposition to them. 00:13:16.960 --> 00:13:21.919 And this doesn't just happen at once in a person's life. 00:13:22.159 --> 00:13:29.600 Suffering and trial come continually, seasonally to each of us at varying degrees. 00:13:29.679 --> 00:13:39.759 Some are light burdens to bear, and some are heavy, and we bur we bear them for many years. 00:13:41.840 --> 00:13:52.480 So he says, verse 20, You have made me see many troubles and calamities to revive me again from the depths of the earth. 00:13:53.120 --> 00:13:56.879 God has been with them through trial and suffering. 00:13:59.120 --> 00:14:07.039 And so the question is where will this person, where will the psalmist, and then where will we take refuge? 00:14:07.200 --> 00:14:12.480 Because their suffering is always kind of coming wave after wave, season after season. 00:14:12.639 --> 00:14:15.120 There's a question of, well, where are you going to run to? 00:14:15.360 --> 00:14:19.120 Oh, sinner man, where will you run to, as Nina Simone saying, right? 00:14:19.759 --> 00:14:22.080 What will be your refuge? 00:14:22.559 --> 00:14:25.840 You might not realize this, but you all run to something. 00:14:26.080 --> 00:14:36.559 Some of you run to bitterness, cutting yourself off from others, wallowing in in resentment and self-loathing. 00:14:37.600 --> 00:14:40.639 And that becomes a kind of comfort. 00:14:43.120 --> 00:15:05.360 For others, it is the refuge of uh of escape, burying yourself in work because the uh the issues at home are too much, or the forgetful high of uh of a few too many on a Friday night. 00:15:06.320 --> 00:15:14.159 You might just dull the suffering slightly, turn down the volume on the issues, even just for a little while. 00:15:14.320 --> 00:15:16.720 What you're doing now is you're taking refuge. 00:15:18.799 --> 00:15:23.120 Many nowadays seek refuge in victimhood. 00:15:25.120 --> 00:15:27.200 Being a victim is a great refuge. 00:15:27.360 --> 00:15:28.399 Do you know why? 00:15:29.279 --> 00:15:34.720 Because if you can claim victim status, you never have to repent. 00:15:35.120 --> 00:15:36.559 You never have to say sorry. 00:15:37.360 --> 00:15:39.279 You never have to change. 00:15:40.639 --> 00:15:45.840 And everyone around you is the one who is who has to say sorry to you and change what they think. 00:15:46.080 --> 00:15:49.360 It's a great thing to be a victim. 00:15:50.559 --> 00:15:55.840 And so lots of people run to it for refuge. 00:15:58.080 --> 00:16:10.240 But as with all of these false refuges, they actually don't lead to health and happiness and wholeness over the long term. 00:16:10.399 --> 00:16:12.960 They are short-term fixes. 00:16:14.159 --> 00:16:17.600 They leave us feeling more isolated, more empty. 00:16:17.759 --> 00:16:21.840 They strain the relationships that we are in even more. 00:16:23.120 --> 00:16:28.240 And they leave us unable to face the things that we need to change about ourselves. 00:16:29.519 --> 00:16:32.879 So the psalmist saying don't run to these false refuges. 00:16:34.799 --> 00:16:36.159 God is a refuge. 00:16:36.720 --> 00:16:43.519 And he's not like these other things that we run to, because he can actually change circumstances. 00:16:44.320 --> 00:16:50.879 Verse 2 In your righteousness, deliver me and rescue me. 00:16:51.120 --> 00:16:54.159 Incline your ear to me and save me. 00:17:00.559 --> 00:17:09.279 The chief difference between the refuges that we tend to run to and the refuge that God is is that God can actually change your circumstances. 00:17:10.079 --> 00:17:11.839 Our God is a savior. 00:17:12.559 --> 00:17:17.039 He is a deliverer, not just a distraction. 00:17:18.480 --> 00:17:28.079 Moreover, he is good in your righteousness, that is, your unwavering commitment to goodness and to truth. 00:17:29.119 --> 00:17:30.160 Deliver me. 00:17:30.960 --> 00:17:35.920 And so he does not let suffering go unnoticed or unacknowledged. 00:17:37.599 --> 00:17:43.759 He sees you in your trial and does not let you go uncomforted. 00:17:44.559 --> 00:17:47.279 Make him your refuge. 00:17:49.359 --> 00:17:53.680 Run to him, cry out to him, tell him exactly how you're feeling. 00:17:54.880 --> 00:17:57.359 Cling to the promises of who he is. 00:18:00.960 --> 00:18:03.680 What a kinder cultural community we would be. 00:18:05.279 --> 00:18:11.279 If we made God our refuge, and not the things that I mentioned, particularly victimhood. 00:18:16.559 --> 00:18:40.960 If we ran into the arms of Jesus in times of hurt, rather than taking up arms against one another, if we were so assured of his forgiveness and love for us that we didn't need to cling to victim status, but that we could forgive and apologize and reconcile. 00:18:43.839 --> 00:18:58.720 One of the ways that we grow in God is we resolve to make him our refuge, to repent this morning of those false refuges that we have sought and to pursue Him continually. 00:19:01.039 --> 00:19:02.720 Second resolution. 00:19:03.519 --> 00:19:10.720 Resolve this morning to remember God's past kindness to you. 00:19:11.359 --> 00:19:14.319 First, first verse four and six, and then verses sixteen and seventeen. 00:19:14.400 --> 00:19:20.480 Verse four to six Rescue me, O my God, from the hand of the wicked, from the grasp of the unjust and the cruel man. 00:19:20.640 --> 00:19:24.400 For you, O Lord, are my hope, my trust, O Lord, from my youth. 00:19:24.559 --> 00:19:27.920 Upon you I have leaned from before my birth. 00:19:28.240 --> 00:19:30.960 You are he who took me from my mother's womb. 00:19:31.200 --> 00:19:33.599 My praise is continually of you. 00:19:34.079 --> 00:19:42.720 Verse 16, with mighty deeds of the Lord, of the Lord God, I will come, and I will remind them of your righteousness, yours alone. 00:19:42.880 --> 00:19:46.000 O God, you have taught me from my youth. 00:19:46.960 --> 00:19:50.880 And still I proclaim your wondrous deeds. 00:19:52.079 --> 00:20:08.559 The Psalmist, in their trouble, is looking back over their life, and rather than seeing their life as a catalog of disasters, they see it as a tapestry of the faithfulness of God. 00:20:09.839 --> 00:20:14.079 So what are the decisions cognitively that you need to uh to make? 00:20:15.279 --> 00:20:22.000 Will you look back at your life as a catalogue of sufferings and disasters? 00:20:22.160 --> 00:20:25.440 Will you focus on those negatives? 00:20:26.079 --> 00:20:33.119 Or will you see the golden thread that God has begun to weave through each of those things? 00:20:34.880 --> 00:20:40.079 Whichever one you pick will make you a very different person. 00:20:42.000 --> 00:20:48.559 The psalmist is resolving to look back and to see God's continual work. 00:20:52.960 --> 00:20:55.119 And this is what happens, isn't it? 00:20:55.680 --> 00:21:02.000 That in the moment of trial, in the moment of suffering, it's really hard to see what God is doing. 00:21:02.079 --> 00:21:12.400 It feels like it feels like the clouds have kind of covered the face of uh of the sun, of uh of the brightness, of the goodness of God, right? 00:21:12.480 --> 00:21:15.039 And and and so it's we can't see. 00:21:16.799 --> 00:21:29.599 It's not until we actually are removed from it that we look back at times of suffering and trial and go, gosh, I didn't I didn't realize that you would change me in that sort of way. 00:21:29.680 --> 00:21:34.000 And oh, I can see what you were doing there in in that relationship. 00:21:34.240 --> 00:21:40.720 And I felt in you taking that thing away from me that you were being cruel to me, but now I actually see that you were being kind. 00:21:41.279 --> 00:21:43.279 Have you ever had that experience? 00:21:43.599 --> 00:21:46.960 Do you think in the moment that God's being mean to you? 00:21:47.200 --> 00:21:49.519 But then you look back and go and go, Do you know what? 00:21:49.680 --> 00:21:51.599 That's the best thing that could have happened to me. 00:21:51.839 --> 00:21:54.559 I'm really glad that God wrestled that thing from my grasp. 00:21:54.720 --> 00:21:58.880 You look back in hindsight and you see the faithfulness of God. 00:21:59.279 --> 00:21:59.759 And so. 00:22:00.079 --> 00:22:12.079 So the trick is, is in the moment when you're in a season of trial and suffering, and you can't see what God's doing in that situation. 00:22:13.200 --> 00:22:17.039 You look back and go, Well, I can see what God was doing here. 00:22:17.200 --> 00:22:19.119 And I remember that he was kind to me here. 00:22:19.200 --> 00:22:22.960 It felt like he was being mean to me, but actually it was kindness and grace and love. 00:22:23.039 --> 00:22:24.319 Okay, I understand that. 00:22:24.480 --> 00:22:26.400 And I can count these blessings here. 00:22:26.559 --> 00:22:28.880 Okay, so I can see all of that. 00:22:28.960 --> 00:22:32.079 And so I'm gonna believe that that's true for this. 00:22:32.799 --> 00:22:40.559 Can't see it now, but I'm gonna believe that God, who is the same yesterday, today, and forever, hasn't suddenly changed to hating me. 00:22:41.759 --> 00:22:50.319 And so I'm gonna believe that for this until the time that this situation becomes part of that golden tapestry. 00:22:50.400 --> 00:22:50.799 Do you see? 00:22:50.880 --> 00:22:51.599 Does that make sense? 00:22:51.839 --> 00:22:52.720 Does that make sense? 00:22:53.119 --> 00:22:54.799 Right, good, excellent. 00:22:55.039 --> 00:22:56.799 Glad to see you still awake. 00:22:57.839 --> 00:23:00.000 That is what he is doing. 00:23:01.920 --> 00:23:13.359 He's recalling God's faithfulness from his youth, from the womb, from those earliest days. 00:23:14.319 --> 00:23:17.519 I love this little image of from from the womb. 00:23:19.599 --> 00:23:30.640 One of the things that you need to know is that God's kindness, his grace to you, flows irrespective of understanding or of strength. 00:23:33.279 --> 00:23:36.799 He remembers God's faithfulness even from the womb. 00:23:38.559 --> 00:23:50.720 It means that God's kindness flows to us before we ever understand anything, before we have any strength in ourselves. 00:23:51.680 --> 00:23:53.920 And that's really good news. 00:23:58.240 --> 00:24:01.359 And so the encouragement is to start remembering now. 00:24:02.319 --> 00:24:14.799 To think today, even right now, I suspect that in some of your minds, little little synapses are firing, little memories are coming up of you looking back and going, yeah, God was faithful then. 00:24:14.880 --> 00:24:19.519 I understand, I understand what it was like to think that God was being mean to me, but actually he was kind. 00:24:19.599 --> 00:24:24.160 And it's it's remembering those, it's cementing those things. 00:24:24.400 --> 00:24:46.799 That's why in the Old Testament, you know, uh you hear people about people kind of uh erecting stones um called Ebenezer's rocks of remembrance to remember uh God's past faithfulness, because a rock, it's it's a tangible thing you can see as you as you walk on your journey through your day, you can see that rock and go, do you know what? 00:24:46.960 --> 00:24:54.400 That rock, that rock's there because of this battle that we won, because God gave us the victory. 00:24:54.640 --> 00:25:00.799 And that rock's there because of the of the time that he delivered us, even though we didn't deserve it. 00:25:00.960 --> 00:25:09.359 And all the way through, as they meander through the promised land, they they see these totems of God's faithfulness. 00:25:09.599 --> 00:25:15.440 And I guess by way of application, not to be kind of too corny about it, what's that gonna be for you? 00:25:17.440 --> 00:25:24.799 I think I would never do this because Philippa would hate it, but I understand why people get tattoos, right? 00:25:26.000 --> 00:25:37.839 At particular moments, or because of particular things, because they are they are permanent totems and and symbols of God's past faithfulness. 00:25:38.319 --> 00:25:51.039 Or maybe it's it's keeping a diary, or uh having a having a memento pinned up on your board or on your or on your study desk or on your sideboard at home. 00:25:51.839 --> 00:25:53.599 It might be a song. 00:25:54.079 --> 00:25:58.559 There are songs that I can think of that if and I'm not gonna sing them for you now, but you can talk to me about them. 00:25:58.720 --> 00:26:07.119 There are songs that I can think of that when I listen to them, they take me right back to particular moments, and I remember God's faithfulness to me. 00:26:07.920 --> 00:26:10.880 How are you gonna remember God's past kindness? 00:26:11.839 --> 00:26:14.799 What stones of remembrance will you erect? 00:26:19.599 --> 00:26:26.480 Maybe you're sitting here this morning and you can't think of a time when you have seen God's past kindness to you. 00:26:27.279 --> 00:26:32.160 Things look so bleak that you can't possibly see anything of that golden thread. 00:26:33.839 --> 00:26:34.880 Let me give you one. 00:26:36.720 --> 00:26:43.440 We don't need simply to look at our own subjective past experience. 00:26:44.799 --> 00:26:56.720 Every follower of the Lord Jesus has a totem raised in history to look back to to see the enduring and unending kindness, grace, and love of God. 00:26:56.880 --> 00:26:59.039 And it's the cross of the Lord Jesus. 00:27:00.640 --> 00:27:10.799 We look back in history to Good Friday, and we ask of that day, does God love me? 00:27:11.200 --> 00:27:13.680 Is God committed to me in his righteousness? 00:27:14.480 --> 00:27:16.799 Is God a savior to me? 00:27:17.359 --> 00:27:18.960 Is God a deliverer? 00:27:19.839 --> 00:27:23.039 And we look at that cross and we conclude, yes, he is. 00:27:24.319 --> 00:27:25.519 Yes, he is. 00:27:27.119 --> 00:27:58.720 And so the words of uh of Paul uh in Romans uh 5, uh, eight and nine are true, that if he loved us while we were still sinners, that is, hostile to him, far away from him, if he loved us enough to send his son when we were in that sort of relationship with him, how much more will he be a deliverer and a savior and a father to us now that we are his forgiven and adopted children? 00:28:00.240 --> 00:28:05.599 Look back, remember God's past kindness. 00:28:06.400 --> 00:28:12.960 Third resolution resolve to speak of God's mercy. 00:28:13.759 --> 00:28:21.519 Verse eight, my mouth is filled with your praise and with your glory all the day. 00:28:22.240 --> 00:28:32.799 Verse 15, my mouth will tell of your righteous acts, of your deeds of salvation all the day, for their number is past my knowledge. 00:28:33.039 --> 00:28:38.640 I love this image in verse eight, where the psalmist says, My mouth is filled with your praise. 00:28:38.720 --> 00:28:48.000 It's almost as though their mouth is so full of God's goodness and kindness. 00:28:48.240 --> 00:28:54.079 They have so much to recount that they don't have any space for any moaning. 00:28:54.319 --> 00:28:59.680 There's no space in there for grumbles because it's just so full of praise. 00:29:01.279 --> 00:29:03.279 I wish I could be more like that. 00:29:05.680 --> 00:29:11.119 Our words have a profound effect, not just on others, but on ourselves. 00:29:12.160 --> 00:29:23.759 We're constantly being spoken to, we're constantly speaking to ourselves complaining and grumbling and moaning. 00:29:25.279 --> 00:29:28.160 It act in a perverse sort of way, it can be fun. 00:29:29.119 --> 00:29:34.720 And it can be kind of unifying, if you notice that, in like uh on a work team. 00:29:35.279 --> 00:29:47.920 It's kind of good just to kind of grumble and moan uh about about a project, about a client, about a boss, because it kind of it kind of perversely unites the rest of you in your moaning. 00:29:52.640 --> 00:29:56.799 But it ends up being such a shallow display of unity. 00:29:58.960 --> 00:30:06.160 As we grow older, we don't want to be people, I'm assuming, who grumble more and more. 00:30:07.599 --> 00:30:16.319 Because as Christians growing up and getting older, it actually means that we have more to act to thank God for. 00:30:16.559 --> 00:30:27.039 One of the reasons why it's good that our years advance is because the catalogue of God's faithfulness and kindness and how he's revealed himself to us rises, we have more and more to thank him for. 00:30:39.039 --> 00:30:42.960 And yet, so often it's kind of the opposite. 00:30:43.039 --> 00:30:50.640 The people who are who are baby Christians, who've only been Christian for uh a very short time, they're the ones who are just full of how great God is. 00:30:51.440 --> 00:31:01.839 And those of us who have been Christians for 20 years now, um familiarity breeds contempt, doesn't it? 00:31:01.920 --> 00:31:05.759 And we kind of give ourselves in to to moaning, we forget how good we've got it. 00:31:11.279 --> 00:31:22.559 One of the ways that God uses our past experiences is so that we can speak of it and what he has done to others. 00:31:24.079 --> 00:31:31.440 Verse 15 to tell of his righteous deeds to encourage others to keep going. 00:31:31.759 --> 00:31:47.839 It's one of the ways that we will you will see God's purposefulness in your past suffering, is when some years hence you get to have a conversation with somebody going through exactly the same thing, and you go, here's what I learned, and there is hope on the other side. 00:31:48.319 --> 00:31:51.680 And I know what it's like exactly to be where you are. 00:31:52.319 --> 00:31:54.799 Let me tell you what God taught me. 00:31:56.000 --> 00:32:00.880 Link arms with me and let me shoulder some of this burden because I know what it's like to be there. 00:32:05.359 --> 00:32:24.799 As we grow up together as a church, we must be people who who speak in lots of little informal ways of God's faithfulness to us in our community groups and over lunch to speak of kindnesses. 00:32:25.519 --> 00:32:44.000 As we've given prayer points for job applications or for uh or for health or for uh or for a parent or a spouse or a child to testify to God's goodness, perhaps even if those prayers don't go answered in the way that you expected. 00:32:45.200 --> 00:32:54.559 Let's also uh pray that as we grow up, I mean this is the thing, City Church doesn't have very many old people right now, just give it time. 00:32:56.880 --> 00:32:58.160 We're gonna get there. 00:32:58.960 --> 00:33:01.039 And wouldn't it be great, actually? 00:33:03.200 --> 00:33:11.119 If we all allow our hairs to grow gray or fall out, whichever is uh is uh foreordained for you. 00:33:12.240 --> 00:33:30.400 As we allow our hairs to grow gray, and I want to pray that our church family would be backfilled with people who are our age now, and we get to tell them about God's enduring faithfulness to us individually and as a family. 00:33:31.119 --> 00:33:48.240 We get to encourage them and and be it's one of the lamentable things about being a young congregation is it's hard to do the uh older saints mentoring and caring for younger believers. 00:33:50.799 --> 00:34:22.400 How cool would it be if in this room this morning there were a hundred mentors in 10-15 years' time who were able to speak of the enduring faithfulness of God who have experienced suffering and trial and loss and grief and yet who have persevered and are able to strengthen the backs of those young people who might come in through our doors. 00:34:24.239 --> 00:34:26.159 I think that'd be really wonderful. 00:34:27.280 --> 00:34:30.159 But we resolve to be those people now. 00:34:31.840 --> 00:34:39.119 Fourth resolution resolve to cultivate an indestructible hope. 00:34:39.440 --> 00:34:40.719 Verse 14. 00:34:44.719 --> 00:34:53.760 But I will continue, sorry, I will hope continually, and will praise you yet more and more. 00:34:56.559 --> 00:35:05.679 One of the reasons why I suspect that we don't dwell on the idea of growing old is because we tend to see old age simply in the negative. 00:35:06.159 --> 00:35:19.599 We think of it in terms of waning strength, limited vitality, slowing down of body and of mind, the uh the increased likelihood of ill health. 00:35:20.880 --> 00:35:24.400 But none of this is the end of the story for the Christian. 00:35:25.440 --> 00:35:41.920 The advancing of years is also the ever-growing brightness of the day when we will see Jesus face to face, of the end of suffering and hardship, of the end of tears and grief. 00:35:48.000 --> 00:36:05.679 We start our Christian life like young saplings, green and soft and full of potential, stretching for the light, reaching higher and higher, but also fragile. 00:36:09.039 --> 00:36:19.519 Hope is like bark shielding us in times of trial. 00:36:20.639 --> 00:36:38.880 It is deep roots, keeping us stable as the storms rage, and the psalmist is encouraging us this morning to cultivate that hope in our lives. 00:36:42.239 --> 00:36:46.880 Well, it's linked with praise, as we've just seen. 00:36:47.039 --> 00:36:56.320 It's one of the consequences of having your mouth full of who God is, of speaking of Him continually, of testifying to His goodness. 00:36:56.400 --> 00:37:00.159 Because you're not just speaking to the other person, you're also speaking to yourself. 00:37:02.000 --> 00:37:04.320 And it deepens our hope and resolve. 00:37:04.400 --> 00:37:06.480 Or have you ever had the experience? 00:37:06.880 --> 00:37:11.039 I don't know if you realize this, but I'm kind of an external processor. 00:37:11.679 --> 00:37:14.239 Um, I process by speaking. 00:37:14.400 --> 00:37:20.400 Um I don't understand what it what it is for you just to sit there in silence when you're feeling loads of things. 00:37:20.639 --> 00:37:22.400 You can talk to my wife about that. 00:37:22.639 --> 00:37:24.800 Um, I like to speak things out. 00:37:25.119 --> 00:37:36.239 Have you ever had the experience of uh of of talking to somebody and then coming to a realization yourself about the thing that you're talking about? 00:37:38.320 --> 00:37:41.039 This might be a silly reference, it's just kind of coming to mind. 00:37:41.119 --> 00:37:54.079 There's the the video of uh Elon Musk giving somebody a tour uh around SpaceX and talking about the the boosters, and this guy asks a question uh about uh about it being like cold injection versus hot injection. 00:37:54.159 --> 00:37:58.239 And as he's kind of talking about it, he's like, oh yeah, um okay, we're gonna change that. 00:37:58.320 --> 00:38:06.400 And then they come back a year later and they completely change the engineering system uh of the uh of the thrusters and the rockets because he's verbally processed things. 00:38:06.800 --> 00:38:09.039 He's realized something in real time. 00:38:09.199 --> 00:38:17.119 Have you ever had the experience of realizing, oh, that's what God was doing, or oh, I hadn't seen it that way until I actually spoke it out. 00:38:17.440 --> 00:38:27.199 Telling people, praising God, remembering and recounting actually helps to strengthen our own hope and resolve. 00:38:29.920 --> 00:38:36.559 This telling others also, I think, by implication means community. 00:38:37.119 --> 00:39:01.920 That one of the things that we do is we cultivate hope together, as we hear of and tell of God's faithfulness, as we sing together those great songs of the faith that help to stir our hope, as we sit under God's word, as the psalmist gives voice and vocabulary to our to our suffering and helps us to cry out to him. 00:39:02.800 --> 00:39:10.400 All of these things together help to form that bark and to deepen those roots that we might hope more. 00:39:12.320 --> 00:39:28.880 That is, as we rejoice together and as we weep together, as we remember what God has done for us, and when we feel utterly hopeless, having others come alongside and bearing us up and sharing just a little bit of their hope with us. 00:39:30.880 --> 00:39:36.559 Let us resolve, therefore, to be a community that cultivates hope together. 00:39:37.760 --> 00:39:44.800 Remembering our great God and Savior, encouraging one another to keep going. 00:39:45.920 --> 00:39:48.159 That's biblical encouragement. 00:39:48.880 --> 00:39:52.320 Talked about this in our Wednesday community group. 00:39:52.400 --> 00:40:00.480 Uh, but people think of encouragement in terms of um that's a lovely, it's a lovely top you've got on today. 00:40:00.559 --> 00:40:02.480 Have you got a new hairstyle? 00:40:02.559 --> 00:40:04.800 Uh you that sort of compliments. 00:40:04.960 --> 00:40:07.119 The biblical encouragement is not that. 00:40:07.679 --> 00:40:17.360 Biblical encouragement is it's like doing a hike and feeling weary and having somebody come come alongside you and go, right, summit's there. 00:40:17.599 --> 00:40:20.000 The summit's there, and we're gonna go together, right? 00:40:20.079 --> 00:40:20.800 We're nearly there. 00:40:20.960 --> 00:40:22.400 Look how far we've come, right? 00:40:22.480 --> 00:40:23.199 Do you see that? 00:40:23.360 --> 00:40:25.440 You've walked all of that. 00:40:26.000 --> 00:40:27.360 Don't give up now. 00:40:27.519 --> 00:40:32.719 The peak's there, and we're gonna get there just in time for sunrise. 00:40:32.880 --> 00:40:39.360 And we're going there together, and when we get to the top, we're gonna pull out a flask of tea and we're gonna watch the sunrise together. 00:40:39.519 --> 00:40:40.400 Don't give up now. 00:40:40.719 --> 00:40:41.360 Keep going. 00:40:41.440 --> 00:40:42.800 That's biblical encouragement. 00:40:42.960 --> 00:40:44.960 That builds hope. 00:40:45.199 --> 00:40:46.239 Keep going. 00:40:47.920 --> 00:40:49.599 Final resolution. 00:40:50.159 --> 00:40:53.039 Resolve to be a person of joy. 00:40:54.320 --> 00:40:56.079 Resolve to be a person of joy. 00:40:56.239 --> 00:40:58.000 Decide that now. 00:40:58.480 --> 00:41:00.320 Verse 23 and 24. 00:41:00.719 --> 00:41:04.400 My lips will shout for joy when I sing praises to you. 00:41:04.559 --> 00:41:19.360 My soul, which you have redeemed, and my tongue will talk of your righteous help all the day long, for they have uh for they have been put to shame and disappointed who sought to do me hurt. 00:41:20.480 --> 00:41:31.679 The psalmist wants to finish their days joyfully, laughing, singing, dancing. 00:41:33.039 --> 00:41:51.039 We must resolve to be joyful people as the years advance, because it is not a guarantee that we will arrive at our old age with happiness and with satisfaction. 00:41:52.079 --> 00:42:17.199 I want us to be older saints who sing with dentures a clacken, who dance and who shout and who are glad in God, who enjoy the days that God has given us, however long they are, in the world that He has made. 00:42:18.719 --> 00:42:22.719 By that time there will be so much for us to be glad in. 00:42:22.960 --> 00:42:31.199 We need only look and acknowledge all of the small blessings that God has bestowed upon us each day. 00:42:33.280 --> 00:42:44.480 And as we approach our advancing years, we can do so with ever-increasing joy because of the great love of Jesus. 00:42:46.239 --> 00:42:52.400 The end of the Christian story is not oblivion, it is new creation. 00:42:52.880 --> 00:43:04.639 It's the renewal of all things, it's the renewal of our bodies, of every ailment that has befallen us, of every creak and crackle that we experience. 00:43:06.800 --> 00:43:10.239 This is the future hope that Jesus has secured for us. 00:43:13.440 --> 00:43:25.280 One of the reasons why we cannot simply take refuge in the things of this world is because of what Jesus' life means. 00:43:25.519 --> 00:43:27.440 We're not just victims. 00:43:28.800 --> 00:43:30.639 We're also victimizers. 00:43:31.039 --> 00:43:33.760 We're not just victims, we're also perpetrators. 00:43:35.840 --> 00:43:38.400 Life is not black and white. 00:43:41.440 --> 00:43:46.159 The psalmist here at the start of the psalm lays claim to God's righteousness. 00:43:46.239 --> 00:43:47.519 It's an intriguing thing, isn't it? 00:43:47.599 --> 00:43:57.280 He says, In your righteousness, save me, deliver me, in your commitment to moral perfection, rescue me. 00:44:01.440 --> 00:44:13.199 If God's committed to being morally perfect, if he's committed to righteousness and utter holiness, how do I lay claim to being rescued? 00:44:14.159 --> 00:44:16.719 Because I have no righteousness in myself. 00:44:17.119 --> 00:44:26.960 Yeah, I do some nice things from time to time, but even they're tainted with self-seekingness and selfishness and pride. 00:44:28.159 --> 00:44:34.719 How do I lay claim to God's righteousness and asking him to save me? 00:44:35.599 --> 00:44:37.599 It's only because of Jesus. 00:44:40.239 --> 00:44:45.440 You see, before we can say any of the Psalms, we need to hear them on the lips of the Lord Jesus. 00:44:45.679 --> 00:44:49.360 Only he can go to his father and go, in your righteousness, deliver me. 00:44:49.519 --> 00:44:49.840 Why? 00:44:50.000 --> 00:44:51.840 Because he had no sin of his own. 00:44:53.679 --> 00:44:58.480 He was morally flawless, that lamb without spot or blemish. 00:45:01.199 --> 00:45:06.800 And yet he goes to that cross that we have spoken about. 00:45:08.639 --> 00:45:11.119 And dies the death that we deserve. 00:45:12.880 --> 00:45:21.519 So that we might lay claim to the righteousness of God and say, deliver me, save me, give me that continual hope. 00:45:21.599 --> 00:45:23.519 It's only because of Jesus. 00:45:24.079 --> 00:45:34.559 You cannot enjoy the things of Psalm 71 until you enjoy Jesus. 00:45:35.039 --> 00:45:41.679 Until you have come to Him and had your sin forgiven. 00:45:42.239 --> 00:45:55.760 It is only through Jesus, who lived perfectly from his youth, calling on the name of the Lord, and yet who laid down his life long before old age that we are given this hope. 00:45:57.840 --> 00:46:01.519 This is how we grow and mature as believers. 00:46:04.079 --> 00:46:08.159 And you don't need to be 60 or 70 years old to be mature in God. 00:46:10.079 --> 00:46:29.840 We can be elders and matriarchs of the family of God here at City now, when we resolve to take refuge in Him, to remember His past kindness, to speak of Him, to hope in Him, and to be glad in Him.