SPEAKER_02: Our reading today is from Psalms chapter sixty-two.
SPEAKER_02: My soul waits for God alone.
SPEAKER_02: To the choir master, according to Judithan, a Psalm of David.
SPEAKER_02: For God alone, my soul waits in silence.
SPEAKER_02: From him comes my salvation.
SPEAKER_02: He alone is my rock and my salvation.
SPEAKER_02: My fortress, I shall not be greatly shaken.
SPEAKER_02: How long will all of you attack a man to batter him, like a leaning wall, a tottering fence?
SPEAKER_02: They only plan to trust him down from his high position.
SPEAKER_02: They take pleasure in falsehood.
SPEAKER_02: They bless with their mouths, but inwardly they curse.
SPEAKER_02: Salah.
SPEAKER_02: For God alone, O my soul, wait in silence, for my hope is from him.
SPEAKER_02: He only is my rock and my salvation.
SPEAKER_02: My fortress I shall not be shaken.
SPEAKER_02: On God rest my salvation and my glory.
SPEAKER_02: My mighty rock, my refuge is God.
SPEAKER_02: Trust in him at all times, O people, pour out your heart before him.
SPEAKER_02: God is a refuge for us.
SPEAKER_02: Those of lowest state are but a breath.
SPEAKER_02: Those of high estate are a delusion.
SPEAKER_02: In the balances they go up, they are together lighter than a breath.
SPEAKER_02: Put no trust in extortion.
SPEAKER_02: Set no vain hopes on robbery.
SPEAKER_02: If riches increase, set not your heart on them.
SPEAKER_02: Once God has spoken, twice have I heard this that power belongs to God, and that to you, O Lord, belongs steadfast love.
SPEAKER_02: For you will render to a man according to his work.
SPEAKER_02: And so reads God's word.
SPEAKER_00: God, you are indeed our hope and our salvation.
SPEAKER_00: We rejoice in you this morning.
SPEAKER_00: Help us now by the power of your Holy Spirit to see the beauty of so great a salvation that you have wrought for us.
SPEAKER_00: Give us eyes to see and ears to hear what your truth would have for us.
SPEAKER_00: We pray these things in Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Please take a seat, everybody.
SPEAKER_00: My name is Mark.
SPEAKER_00: I'm one of the leaders here at City.
SPEAKER_00: If you're new or visiting with us, you're very welcome.
SPEAKER_00: You are uh particularly blessed if you're visiting uh this week, uh, because this is the one week where uh Ireland has the big glowy thing in the sky.
SPEAKER_00: You see the Irish people coming out kind of like moles, kind of rubbing their eyes, going, What is that thing?
SPEAKER_00: This is you're doubly blessed because this is probably the only week that the preacher will have his calves out uh and his hairy hobbit feet in uh in sandals.
SPEAKER_00: So do forgive me uh for that.
SPEAKER_00: It's either that or I just faint uh on onto the ground.
SPEAKER_00: Uh please uh open up Psalm 62 on your phone, or if you have a Bible, Lisa read it for us.
SPEAKER_00: We're going to be looking at that.
SPEAKER_00: We do Psalms in the summer.
SPEAKER_00: Um so we started this a few years ago.
SPEAKER_00: For those of you who aren't familiar, we started in Psalm 1 uh about five or six years ago and have just been going consecutively through them.
SPEAKER_00: Like I said last week.
SPEAKER_00: Not quite sure what we're gonna do when we get to Psalm 119.
SPEAKER_00: Um, hopefully, you won't have to do all of that in one week.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, we'll probably get it read and then go home.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, but for now we're in Psalm 62.
SPEAKER_00: And I wonder, as you sit here and as you look at it, uh, how you are at uh doing nothing.
SPEAKER_00: How are you at doing nothing?
SPEAKER_00: Just sitting and being.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe your idea of a holiday is not to uh to go and to sit by a pool, but to go on a uh on a you know, you gotta have an adventure, you gotta hike somewhere, or you've got to be in a city break where you're going here, there, and everywhere.
SPEAKER_00: You don't really like sitting and doing nothing.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe for some of you that's uh ideal and you'd like that.
SPEAKER_00: Um it's particularly not the case when you have uh when you have small children, you think, oh well, go away on holiday, but actually, no, they still have demands on your time, so it's not particularly restful.
SPEAKER_00: How are you at doing nothing?
SPEAKER_00: Let me sharpen it slightly.
SPEAKER_00: How are you at doing nothing uh when things seem to be going wrong?
SPEAKER_00: How are you at stopping and doing nothing when you're in a stressful situation, when things are difficult?
SPEAKER_00: I'm not particularly as a person given to lots of worry and anxiety, but what if I will tell you one way that anxiety gets me or has gotten me in the past, and I don't like how it feels.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe you identify with this.
SPEAKER_00: So I remember I know that I'm feeling anxious because I'll be sitting somewhere, much like here, and I'll be inside my own head, feeling like I should be doing something else.
SPEAKER_00: I'll be sitting there going, no, no, this isn't the thing that I should be doing.
SPEAKER_00: I could be in a lecture, I could be at a conference and thinking, no, I don't feel easy in my own spirit.
SPEAKER_00: There's something else that I'm forgetting, there's something else that I should be doing.
SPEAKER_00: There's a restlessness that kind of distracts me and it makes me hard, it makes it hard for me to concentrate.
SPEAKER_00: And I realize actually my anxiety is getting me in some way.
SPEAKER_00: How are you at doing nothing when things are stressful, difficult, or urgent?
SPEAKER_00: See, sometimes in order to triumph, the best thing that you can do is nothing.
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes the best course of action is to do nothing.
SPEAKER_00: Now I was asking a friend, uh, another pastor friend uh about this uh earlier on this week because I was thinking about illustrations and uh I was kind of struggling a little bit.
SPEAKER_00: And this guy is a huge uh soccer fan, football fan.
SPEAKER_00: So forgive me if I butcher this analogy because the thing that immediately came to his mind was he said, La Pausa.
SPEAKER_00: I was like, sorry, what?
SPEAKER_00: I was like, okay, you're gonna have to stop, but you're gonna have to tell me who this guy is.
SPEAKER_00: But apparently, one of the so people used to think that Lionel Messi was lazy when he was on the football because he's he runs less.
SPEAKER_00: And I actually watched some videos of this happening because I had to kind of figure out, okay, if I'm gonna tell people about this, I need to at least know what this guy looks like, right?
SPEAKER_00: And you watch these videos, and everybody else is running around.
SPEAKER_00: And here's Lionel Messi, who doesn't, I mean, he looks a little bit like me.
SPEAKER_00: Um, doesn't look like the fittest guy on the pitch.
SPEAKER_00: And while everybody's running around frantically, he's kind of walking, walking, walking.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, and then suddenly he just screams it into the back of the net.
SPEAKER_00: And they call that La Pausa, the pause.
SPEAKER_00: The idea being that Lionel Messi does nothing, he doesn't run around like a headless chicken, he surveys the whole game and only acts at the crucial moment.
SPEAKER_00: Bit more in my wheelhouse.
SPEAKER_00: Perhaps it is when you open up your email or you open up your phone, and there is a message there of somebody complaining to you and getting at you.
SPEAKER_00: Something that you've done that's grievous to them, and they just had to tell you.
SPEAKER_00: And you sit there and you think, right, I'm gonna give it back to them.
SPEAKER_00: You sit there and you click, click, click, click, click, click, click, and you type this reply, and just before you hit send, just something just clicks, just a little trip in your brain going, oh, hold on, maybe I shouldn't say that.
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes that happens uh between Philippa and I, I'll get an email or a message and I'll write this reply and I'll show it to Philippa before I send.
SPEAKER_00: She's like, show me that before you send it.
SPEAKER_00: So I show her that.
SPEAKER_00: Excuse me, you can't send that.
SPEAKER_00: So I've ever if I've ever replied to you the next night you're getting draft two, okay?
SPEAKER_00: Uh you should probably sleep on it.
SPEAKER_00: The best thing to do is to do nothing rather than firing back.
SPEAKER_00: It's hard though, isn't it?
SPEAKER_00: It's hard to do nothing at the best of times.
SPEAKER_00: It's excruciating when you're under attack, when you feel god at, it's hard not to fire back uh to that text of that email.
SPEAKER_00: But David begins in verse one by talking about how he's going to wait for God in silence.
SPEAKER_00: How he's staying still.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 1, for God alone my soul waits in silence.
SPEAKER_00: From him comes my salvation.
SPEAKER_00: David knows, David knew certainly in his life, what it was to be attacked, and he describes his attackers for us in this particular scenario in verses three and four.
SPEAKER_00: He says, How long will you uh how long will all of you attack a man to batter him?
SPEAKER_00: Like a leaning wall, a tottering fence.
SPEAKER_00: They only plan to thrust him down from his high position.
SPEAKER_00: They take pleasure in falsehood, they bless with their mice, but inwardly they curse.
SPEAKER_00: David here, if you haven't got the metaphor, David here is the leaning fence.
SPEAKER_00: He's the uh or the leaning wall, he's the tottering fence.
SPEAKER_00: He's saying, I'm in a vulnerable spot right now, and what's happening is that these guys are seeking to take advantage of that.
SPEAKER_00: I've got opportunistic attackers coming my way.
SPEAKER_00: Have you ever felt that?
SPEAKER_00: You're kind of at a you're kind of at a low ebb, things aren't going well, and actually what somebody comes in and does is kicks you while you're down.
SPEAKER_00: He's a leaning wall, a tottering fence.
SPEAKER_00: He isn't in his strongest position.
SPEAKER_00: And these guys are seeking to take advantage.
SPEAKER_00: They are opportunistic abusers.
SPEAKER_00: They've found his weakness and they're seeking to exploit it.
SPEAKER_00: You see, friends see our flaws.
SPEAKER_00: Our friends know our flaws, but they put up with them, they help us to bear them.
SPEAKER_00: We grow together with our friends to help to minimize them.
SPEAKER_00: But enemies see our flaws and they use them, they see them as an opportunity to exploit us and to take us down.
SPEAKER_00: What's more is that these guys are hypocritical.
SPEAKER_00: They're saying one thing and doing another.
SPEAKER_00: Did you see that at the end of verse 4?
SPEAKER_00: They bless with their mouths, but inwardly they're cursing him.
SPEAKER_00: You ever interacted with somebody like that?
SPEAKER_00: That you realize that actually what they're saying to your face and how they think about you or what they're saying about you to other people is different.
SPEAKER_00: If that's ever happened to you, then you're in good company.
SPEAKER_00: You're in the company of David the King.
SPEAKER_00: You're gonna see how he interacts with God in that sort of scenario.
SPEAKER_00: But this is how this is how malevolence gets close to us, doesn't it?
SPEAKER_00: It doesn't come with a uh with a big sign saying bad guy.
SPEAKER_00: Nobody comes close to you with with horns and a tail and pitchforks.
SPEAKER_00: No, no, no.
SPEAKER_00: People come close to you with sweet words, with compliments, with bringing you into their trust, confiding in you, saying nice things to you.
SPEAKER_00: I've experienced that.
SPEAKER_00: Being brought into somebody's trust, only to be portrayed by them on down the on down the line.
SPEAKER_00: They come with sweet words, plausible words, but with a rotten heart.
SPEAKER_00: I'm sure that as I speak, like me, some of you are calling to mind people or incidences.
SPEAKER_00: I'm also sure that perhaps some of you are going through some of these things right now.
SPEAKER_00: Just like David, you know what it is to be attacked in this sort of way.
SPEAKER_00: Many of us here have been cheated, betrayed, abused, abandoned, robbed, just as David was, and more.
SPEAKER_00: David through his life wrestled with the desire for for vengeance, for wanting to get his his own back, of feeling angry and feeling hurt.
SPEAKER_00: But David ultimately concluded, and concludes here in this Psalm, that the only rest that he can truly find, the only remedy for his sorrow, is found in God alone.
SPEAKER_00: That doesn't come naturally for him, and it probably doesn't come naturally for us.
SPEAKER_00: But David got there.
SPEAKER_00: By God's grace, we can too.
SPEAKER_00: There is a way of dealing with suffering, malevolence, abuse, and betrayal that is different to what the world offers.
SPEAKER_00: That is more eternally good and satisfying.
SPEAKER_00: David find it, and he would point you to it.
SPEAKER_00: Let's look at some of the things that David resolves either to do or to not do.
SPEAKER_00: I think that David resolves to do three things, and he resolves not to do two things.
SPEAKER_00: Let's look at the three things that David resolves to do in this sort of situation.
SPEAKER_00: First, and perhaps most obviously, is he is resolved to trust God alone.
SPEAKER_00: You think, oh, well, you know, of course I'm going to come to church and hear a point like that.
SPEAKER_00: But it's it's emphasized over and over and over again in the Psalm, this idea of the aloneness of God, that he is the only one worthy of our trust, able to bear the weight of the sorrow and the grief that we carry.
SPEAKER_00: And so he emphasizes it again and again and again.
SPEAKER_00: And why does he emphasize it, even though it might sound obvious to us?
SPEAKER_00: Because we're very much prone not to do it.
SPEAKER_00: He rejects all other avenues, and we'll see that in a second, but just cast your eye down.
SPEAKER_00: Verse one, for God alone, my soul waits in silence.
SPEAKER_00: Verse two, he only is my rock and my salvation, my fortress, I shall not greatly be shaken.
SPEAKER_00: Verse five, for God alone, O my soul, wait in silence.
SPEAKER_00: Verse six, he only is my rock and my salvation, my fortress, I shall not be shaken.
SPEAKER_00: He's reinforcing that.
SPEAKER_00: See that that uh that repetition of verse two and verse six, and then again in verse seven, on God, the idea being, on God alone rests my salvation and my glory, my mighty rock, my refuge is God.
SPEAKER_00: Why does he look to God alone?
SPEAKER_00: If the person who hurt you acknowledged it and apologized, would it fix everything?
SPEAKER_00: Certainly, in some ways, it would make things easier, more bearable.
SPEAKER_00: There would perhaps be a sense of some sort of justice or closure.
SPEAKER_00: But it wouldn't unring the bell.
SPEAKER_00: It wouldn't take it back.
SPEAKER_00: There are things that cannot be undone in this world.
SPEAKER_00: Sinful people, like us, like human beings.
SPEAKER_00: We're not good at restoring what our sin takes away.
SPEAKER_00: Have you noticed that?
SPEAKER_00: We can damage it quite easily, we can tear down quite easily, but it's much harder to build back up.
SPEAKER_00: It's much harder to restore.
SPEAKER_00: We're very capable of destruction, we're much less capable at restoration.
SPEAKER_00: And so the implication there is that we really must take care of how we treat one another, particularly in God's family here in the church.
SPEAKER_00: But that being the case, it means that for our souls to find rest, we need to ask God to do something that only He can do.
SPEAKER_00: Only He can ultimately restore our souls, redeem them, revive them, only He can give us back ultimately, eternally, in that new heavens and new earth, that which was lost.
SPEAKER_00: We see that in the in the book of Job.
SPEAKER_00: The book of Job ends with all things restored to Job through his suffering.
SPEAKER_00: It wasn't restored by any of his comforters, comforters, or his wife, but by God.
SPEAKER_00: See, David looks to God alone because he knows that he needs God to do what only God can do.
SPEAKER_00: The second thing that David is resolved to do is he's resolved to not just know this truth, but to preach it to himself.
SPEAKER_00: David speaks to himself, and so should you.
SPEAKER_00: Because it's the first sign of madness, speaking to you know speaking to yourself.
SPEAKER_00: No, it's much more worrisome when you start answering yourself back.
SPEAKER_00: David speaks to himself.
SPEAKER_00: That's what's going on in this paralleling of uh verse one and two, uh one and two and five and six.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna play a little game of spot the difference.
unknown: Okay?
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna read verse one and two, and then I'm gonna read verses five and six.
SPEAKER_00: And we're gonna play spot the difference because there's a point there to be drawn out.
SPEAKER_00: Have a look at it with me or listen very carefully.
SPEAKER_00: For God alone, this is verse one, for God alone my soul waits in silence.
SPEAKER_00: From him comes my salvation.
SPEAKER_00: He only is my rock and my salvation, my fortress.
SPEAKER_00: I shall not greatly sorry, I shall not be greatly shaken.
SPEAKER_00: Verse one and two, have a look at verse five and six.
SPEAKER_00: For God alone, O my soul, wait in silence, for my hope is in him.
SPEAKER_00: He only is my rock and my salvation, my fortress.
SPEAKER_00: I shall not be shaken.
SPEAKER_00: Do you see the differences?
SPEAKER_00: There's two chiefly to draw your attention to.
SPEAKER_00: In the first verse, he says, My soul waits.
SPEAKER_00: And then in verse five, he speaks to himself and says, Okay, soul, wait.
SPEAKER_00: Do you see?
SPEAKER_00: There's a slight difference.
SPEAKER_00: He takes what he knows about God and what he has done in the past, and he brings it into the present and says, Okay, now that's what I need to do.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna speak to myself.
SPEAKER_00: Listen up, Saul.
SPEAKER_00: There are some things that you need to do right now in order to get through this season.
SPEAKER_00: Are you listening, Saul?
SPEAKER_00: There are things that you're tempted to do, things that you're tempted to trust in, ways that you're tempted to feel.
SPEAKER_00: But listen to me, Saul.
SPEAKER_00: Here's what you need to do wit, without on God alone.
SPEAKER_00: Guys, you are listening to voices all the time.
SPEAKER_00: Voices from other people, voices from family members, voices from social media, voices from friends, voices in your own head.
SPEAKER_00: You're constantly checking yourself if you're anything like me.
SPEAKER_00: How am I how am I coming across?
SPEAKER_00: Or what does that person uh really think of me?
SPEAKER_00: Are they uh speaking one way but actually thinking another?
SPEAKER_00: Or you're you're all up in your own head, thinking, all right, well, nobody loves me anyway.
SPEAKER_00: I don't even know why I'm here, I don't even know why I'm coming to church.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, nobody's my my friend.
SPEAKER_00: You're speaking to yourself, do you see?
SPEAKER_00: You're already doing the talking to your soul.
SPEAKER_00: What David would have you do would be to redeem it.
SPEAKER_00: That it is not enough simply to know Christian things, to know truths about God.
SPEAKER_00: Guys, you all need to be preachers.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: You all need to be preachers.
SPEAKER_00: You preach to yourself the truths of the gospel, the truths that you have learnt, that you know about God.
SPEAKER_00: When things are difficult and you're tempted to forget them, you remember God's past faithfulness, like we looked at last week.
SPEAKER_00: You remember that he is.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, how is so look at some of the ways that he's described in verse 2?
SPEAKER_00: They are amazing and wonderful.
SPEAKER_00: The strength that is in them.
SPEAKER_00: My rock, my salvation, my fortress, I shall not be greatly.
SPEAKER_00: Shaken.
SPEAKER_00: See, listen up, Saul.
SPEAKER_00: We're not going to listen to those lies.
SPEAKER_00: Listen up, Saul.
SPEAKER_00: We're not letting that lie about me, about my value, about my identity get a foothold.
SPEAKER_00: I'm bringing you again, soul, to the waters of life, to the scriptures, to the promises, to the voice of God Himself, and say, listen, Saul, this is what you need.
SPEAKER_00: You need to stop listening to the ill-affed opinions of ill-informed people.
SPEAKER_00: Listen to the God who knows you, who loves you, who has spoken definitively.
SPEAKER_00: You all need to be preachers.
SPEAKER_00: David preaches to himself.
SPEAKER_00: And what is the result?
SPEAKER_00: This is the other uh change between uh verse two and verse six.
SPEAKER_00: Did you see it?
SPEAKER_00: In verse two, he concludes by saying, I shall not be greatly shaken.
SPEAKER_00: I might totter a little bit, but then they'll not get the better of me.
SPEAKER_00: But by verse six, it's changed.
SPEAKER_00: He is he only is my rock and my salvation, my fortress.
SPEAKER_00: I shall not be shaken.
SPEAKER_00: What's happened between verse two and verse six?
SPEAKER_00: His faith has grown.
SPEAKER_00: His confidence has grown.
SPEAKER_00: He's been preaching to himself.
SPEAKER_00: And the result is that his faith is stronger for it.
SPEAKER_00: We've moved from oh, I might get kind of wobbled a little bit, but I'll be okay, to no, I'll not be moved.
SPEAKER_00: Do you see?
SPEAKER_00: That's the result of speaking the truth to yourself, of speaking the truth to one another rather than the lies.
SPEAKER_00: Some of you might sit here and go, yeah, but it's not just it's just words.
SPEAKER_00: It's just words.
SPEAKER_00: What does any of it matter?
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
SPEAKER_00: Words brought the universe into existence.
SPEAKER_00: Words have destroyed you in the past.
SPEAKER_00: You know the destructive power of words.
SPEAKER_00: You know the destructive power of negative words, of lies.
SPEAKER_00: Why on earth would you think that positive words, truthful words, eternal words, wouldn't have a restorative power?
SPEAKER_00: Words from the God who spoke and light came into existence.
SPEAKER_00: Why on earth would you think that all of this is just words?
SPEAKER_00: When words have destroyed you in the past, other words, these words, have the power to restore you.
SPEAKER_00: There's no such thing as just words.
SPEAKER_00: Thirdly, David is resolved to encourage others to do the same thing.
SPEAKER_00: So he says in verse 8, Trust in him at all times, O people.
SPEAKER_00: Pour out your heart before him.
SPEAKER_00: God is a refuge, not just for me, for us.
SPEAKER_00: He is a refuge for us.
SPEAKER_00: It's lonely, isn't it?
SPEAKER_00: Facing the battle by ourselves.
SPEAKER_00: We can often feel desperately alone and isolated, cut off from the community of faith, cut off from friends who really know us or love us.
SPEAKER_00: The Bible recognizes that.
SPEAKER_00: The Bible is a real book for real people in real situations in the real sinful broken world.
SPEAKER_00: But just as I need to preach to myself, to trust him in the uncertainties and anxieties of life.
SPEAKER_00: So it is true of all of you.
SPEAKER_00: And in the context of the church, we do it together.
SPEAKER_00: We speak these things, we sing these things to one another.
SPEAKER_00: Why do we sing?
SPEAKER_00: We sing, it certainly has a vertical dimension to it.
SPEAKER_00: We're singing to God.
SPEAKER_00: We are praising, worshiping, adoring, honoring, blessing Him.
SPEAKER_00: But our singing also has a horizontal dimension.
SPEAKER_00: We're not just singing to God, we're singing to one another.
SPEAKER_00: Did you know that?
SPEAKER_00: That we are, as we lift our voices, reminding one another of what we are, of what we have received in the gospel, of what is true about God, about what is true about his salvation.
SPEAKER_00: And as we sing, we remind one another.
SPEAKER_00: That's why perhaps you've had this experience of, you know, you're just, you're feeling, you're feeling downcast.
SPEAKER_00: You're really not up for for singing.
SPEAKER_00: You're just kind of at a bit of a low ebb, and you stand there in church and you suddenly become aware of the sound around you and what it is the other people are saying.
SPEAKER_00: And it and it encourages your heart because although they don't know it, they're singing to you, and they're saying, Do you know what, sister, brother?
SPEAKER_00: Open God alone.
SPEAKER_00: Going into the battle, it's not a it's not a solo sport, it's a team activity, and so we help and together help and encourage one another.
SPEAKER_00: We bear one another up.
SPEAKER_00: In the same way that um, you know, in Mark chapter 2, friends of the paralyzed man bring him to Jesus, and and they're the ones who who get him up onto the roof, and they're the ones who who dig the hole and lower him down.
SPEAKER_00: Do you know what Mark says there?
SPEAKER_00: It says, doesn't say that Jesus saw his faith, not the faith of the paralyzed man.
SPEAKER_00: It didn't say Jesus saw the faith of the paralyzed man.
SPEAKER_00: Do you know what it says?
SPEAKER_00: It says Jesus saw their faith.
SPEAKER_00: The faith of him and his friends, perhaps even just the faith of his friends.
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes I feel like we need to lend one another a little bit of faith.
SPEAKER_00: I know that you're struggling, I know that you've got doubts and questions.
SPEAKER_00: Come along with me.
SPEAKER_00: Let me shoulder that burden.
SPEAKER_00: Share a little bit of my faith while you're at a low ebb.
SPEAKER_00: And we'll journey through this together.
SPEAKER_00: Trust in him at all times, O people.
SPEAKER_00: Pour out your heart before him, for God is a refuge, not just for me, not just for you, for us.
SPEAKER_00: And folks, this cannot just be done on a Sunday.
SPEAKER_00: This is why community is important.
SPEAKER_00: You know, right now, everything's a little bit biddy, and we're in our summer sessions, and so yeah, community groups kind of run a little bit differently and things like that.
SPEAKER_00: But through the academic year, one of the important touch points of our life together is when we get together week by week in that regular rhythm of encouraging one another.
SPEAKER_00: Everybody here, because I feel this too, everybody here is so tempted that when you are, when you're tired, when you're not feeling particularly faithful, when you haven't had a good week, when you've when you haven't sent the second draft of that email, but you've actually sent the first one to that idiot, right?
SPEAKER_00: You just think, you know, your temptation is I don't want to go to community group.
SPEAKER_00: You run away from God's people.
SPEAKER_00: The natural temptation for all of us when things were hard is to run away from community, when it's the worst thing that you could do.
SPEAKER_00: I've said this countless times.
SPEAKER_00: You read the book of Ruth, and Ruth chapter one ends with lots of tragedy.
SPEAKER_00: Basically, everybody dies except for this woman called Naomi.
SPEAKER_00: She had gone away from God's people.
SPEAKER_00: She'd gone away to a land where they did not worship or know the God of the Bible, and she returns at the end of chapter one.
SPEAKER_00: And do you know what she says to God's people?
SPEAKER_00: They look at her and go, is this Naomi?
SPEAKER_00: Because she's just she's so haggard by all of the grief that's fallen her.
SPEAKER_00: They don't even recognize her.
SPEAKER_00: Is this Naomi?
SPEAKER_00: She looks terrible.
SPEAKER_00: She comes back into the community of God's people and she says, God sent me away full.
SPEAKER_00: And I have come back empty.
SPEAKER_00: But she's back with God's people.
SPEAKER_00: Do you see?
SPEAKER_00: She hasn't just stayed away in the land of even going, oh, I can't possibly go back there because you know, I kind of I kind of checked out from from kind of church things and community group, basically, from you know, yeah, Christmas time, and you know, I can't really go back because you know they'll be I'm so ashamed, or you know, they'll they'll just not accept me.
SPEAKER_00: Nonsense.
SPEAKER_00: You go back and go, do you know what?
SPEAKER_00: I'm not really doing okay.
SPEAKER_00: But Mark said that the best thing for me to be is here, and God's word says that the best thing for me to be is here, and so I'm here.
SPEAKER_00: And I need the community around me.
SPEAKER_00: Man, that might be one of the best conversations that you could possibly have.
SPEAKER_00: Because I don't imagine that anybody will ever respond and go, Oh, I've no idea what that's like.
SPEAKER_00: Do you know?
SPEAKER_00: Three things that David has resolved to do.
SPEAKER_00: To trust God alone, because only God can restore the things that we have lost.
SPEAKER_00: That's what Nicodemus means, by the way, when we looked at it in John 3, when Nicodemus says to Jesus, well, how can these things be?
SPEAKER_00: Can a man return into his uh mother's womb and be born again?
SPEAKER_00: Born a second time?
SPEAKER_00: Well, Nicodemus is not an idiot there.
SPEAKER_00: Nicodemus is saying, Jesus, there's some bells that cannot be unrung.
SPEAKER_00: And that's true.
SPEAKER_00: If the world is just a closed system, only God can restore all things to you.
SPEAKER_00: Only God can give you that new start.
SPEAKER_00: If it's resolved to trust God alone, he's resolved to preach to himself, because he knows that that will strengthen his faith and resolve, and he's resolved to encourage others to join him.
SPEAKER_00: Two things that he's resolved not to do, and then we'll conclude.
SPEAKER_00: He's resolved not to place his trust in people.
SPEAKER_00: Look at verse 9.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 9's quite uh quite tricky uh to understand, uh, but I think probably the central point is is easy enough.
SPEAKER_00: It says, Those of low estate are but a breath, those of high estate are a delusion.
SPEAKER_00: In the balances, they go up, they are together lighter than a breath.
SPEAKER_00: First of all, this is not to say that we should just completely mistrust everyone.
SPEAKER_00: That would cut against the grain of let's do this together, right?
SPEAKER_00: Um, it's not to say that we should just mistrust everyone and always be suspicious.
SPEAKER_00: You know, rather, David is saying when all things are said and done, human beings cannot fix the restlessness that is in our soul, the pain that we feel, or indeed have inflicted on others.
SPEAKER_00: And here's one of the crucial things about Christianity and about the message of Jesus that you need to kind of resolve in your own head and in your own heart.
SPEAKER_00: And the reason why I say it's crucial is because it's counterintuitive to the way that you are taught to act or taught to think.
SPEAKER_00: We're taught to think that tangible things, the people that we can feel and uh and uh and interact with and relate to, uh, we think because we're using our senses, that they are more substantive than the God that we can't see, the God who is immaterial, who has left us his word, but we don't we don't touch him, we don't come face to face with him in that sort of sense.
SPEAKER_00: And so our mind thinks, oh no, no, okay, well, I can I can get further here with this person that's in front of me because we think in material terms.
SPEAKER_00: But one of the things that verse 9 does is it turns it on its head.
SPEAKER_00: It says, Do you want to know what the what the thing of no substance is, what the immaterial thing is?
SPEAKER_00: It's people.
SPEAKER_00: People are like a breath.
SPEAKER_00: And that's all the way through the Bible.
SPEAKER_00: We're like a flower that blooms one day, the wind comes over it, and it's gone.
SPEAKER_00: We're so tempted to trust the stuff that we can see and to doubt the things that we can't, whereas actually in Christianity it's the opposite way around.
SPEAKER_00: God says, no, no, don't trust what you can see.
SPEAKER_00: Trust me, God says.
SPEAKER_00: One of the paradoxes of what it means to be a Christian, not to attach our heart to people or to strength.
SPEAKER_00: That's why God in the Old Testament is always saying to the kings of Israel, He says, Do you know kings, don't trust in horses.
SPEAKER_00: Don't trust in chariots.
SPEAKER_00: Because the temptation is that the king walks out, you know, trooping of the color, and he sees all of these vast horses and chariots and goes, I'm so powerful, nobody will defeat me.
SPEAKER_00: And then he's gone.
SPEAKER_00: Next chapter.
SPEAKER_00: God's constant, you know, you're trusting the wrong thing.
SPEAKER_00: If you're trusting what you can see, you're trusting the wrong thing.
SPEAKER_00: Trust rather the God who's spoken, the God who is there in eternity, who knows all times and peoples and places, and who brings about all things according to the counsel of his good and sovereign will.
SPEAKER_00: Don't trust people, they're a breath.
SPEAKER_00: Talks about men of low estate, men of high estate.
SPEAKER_00: Perhaps you might think of it like this you know, men of low estate, they lack the means to help.
SPEAKER_00: They might be willing to help you out, but they they don't have the means to do it.
SPEAKER_00: Those of high estate often become kind of self-loving and and corrupt.
SPEAKER_00: They want to keep things for for themselves, and and so they they they don't help those who are in need.
SPEAKER_00: People can help our temporal situations.
SPEAKER_00: When we bail somebody out.
SPEAKER_00: But our souls, our souls can never find rest in something that a person can do.
SPEAKER_00: This is a challenge to all of us who look to people for a sense of approval or affirmation or acceptance, who crave that relationship thinking, if I have that, if they love me, then I'll be satisfied, I'll know who I am, this will be great.
SPEAKER_00: No, no, they might be temporary fixes, but they cannot satisfy an eternal yearning, and David knows it.
SPEAKER_00: And he would encourage you to resolve not just to trust in people for that which only God can do.
SPEAKER_00: The second thing that he's resolved not to trust is he's resolved not to trust in wealth.
SPEAKER_00: So he says in verse 10, put no trust in exhortation, sorry, extortion, set no vain hopes on robbery, if riches increase.
SPEAKER_00: Set not your heart on them.
SPEAKER_00: When things are uncertain, it can seem like material wealth is the answer.
SPEAKER_00: There's a great uh sense of control over your circumstances.
SPEAKER_00: If you uh if you are materially well off, say, well, you know, I can pay all, I can pay all my bills, everything's covered, I've got a little bit saved away in the bank for that rainy day fund.
SPEAKER_00: And so it gives you this sense that that things are okay, that you're okay, that there's a bit of control there over your circumstances.
SPEAKER_00: And God would say, Look, money's not evil.
SPEAKER_00: The love of money is the root of all kinds of evil.
SPEAKER_00: Money's not wrong, but what money can do is it can capture your heart.
SPEAKER_00: Money can give you a false sense of security.
SPEAKER_00: When it all goes, that's when you're oh my goodness, what's going to happen here?
SPEAKER_00: And so he's warning, he's saying, you know, don't let it capture your heart.
SPEAKER_00: It's the that's the big uh kind of archetypal motif of the dragon, right?
SPEAKER_00: What do dragons love?
SPEAKER_00: Dragons love gold.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: And they sit on great hordes of gold.
SPEAKER_00: Dragon sickness can befall all of us, particularly if we're motivated to uh to advance, to build our career.
SPEAKER_00: Not wrong in and of itself, but you've got to be careful of the dragon sickness.
SPEAKER_00: You've got to be careful that it might want to take hold of your heart.
SPEAKER_00: Again, it's not wrong to have money, it's not wrong to be well off, but it is wrong to love it and to find your identity in it, to think that you're only secure if you have it.
SPEAKER_00: God would say, be careful there.
SPEAKER_00: If you so if your riches increase, it's possible.
SPEAKER_00: Set not your heart on them.
SPEAKER_00: Now, certainly there is uh a stronger exhortation to trust in dishonest gain.
SPEAKER_00: Dishonest gain sets you up for a fall, not least, because it actually makes you fearful of others.
SPEAKER_00: You know, if you are if you're uh corrupt and uh and you play fast and loose with your with your finances, if you are a bit of a liar, you'll constantly be suspicious because you'll think that people will try and do what you do to them.
SPEAKER_00: It'll make you fearful that others will uh try to uh to take advantage of you.
SPEAKER_00: It will make you prideful because it will make you think that there is a God who does not see and that you can get away from it or get away with it.
SPEAKER_00: It also tempts you to play God because in stealing and taking things for yourself that is not yours, you're playing God.
SPEAKER_00: You're saying to God, God, you've ordered the universe in such a way that uh I'm not getting as much as I think that I need.
SPEAKER_00: And that you know best.
SPEAKER_00: What's the rem how do you know if uh your heart is captivated by wealth?
SPEAKER_00: Or how can you help it to not be captivated by wealth?
SPEAKER_00: Well, the gospel answer is generosity.
SPEAKER_00: The gospel answer is generosity.
SPEAKER_00: How generous are you with your time and with your money?
SPEAKER_00: There's nothing to do about uh, you know, this isn't going to be some sort of presentation about I'm not gonna bring up bar charts about you know our monthly deficit or anything like that.
SPEAKER_00: It's not about asking you to give to the church, though if city is your home, you should.
SPEAKER_00: But there should be a hard attitude of generosity.
SPEAKER_00: If you're like, no, no, I cannot give to this because uh there is there is something in me that cannot let go of this, then perhaps you have a trust issue.
SPEAKER_00: It is not about being lavish even in your giving.
SPEAKER_00: It is about giving in a way that in your own conscience you know that you are being generous.
SPEAKER_00: You know that you are trusting in God for what you have and for the future.
SPEAKER_00: David is resolving not to trust in people and not to trust in wealth, because they both give a false sense of security, a security that only God can provide.
SPEAKER_00: Finally, finally, David spells out again in verses 11 and 12 why it is that we should trust God, and this is where we'll land.
SPEAKER_00: He spells out why we should trust God.
SPEAKER_00: And he points us to three things to power, to love, and to justice.
SPEAKER_00: Have a look at 11 and 12.
SPEAKER_00: For God has spoken, sorry, once God has spoken, twice I have heard this, that power belongs to God, and that you, O Lord, and to you, O Lord, belongs steadfast love.
SPEAKER_00: For you will render to a man according to his work.
SPEAKER_00: Power, love, and justice.
SPEAKER_00: Love without power is sentimental, doesn't really do anything.
SPEAKER_00: It's like a hallmark card, it's a go be warm and well fed sort of expression.
SPEAKER_00: That's love without power.
SPEAKER_00: But imagine if you had a God who was all power and no love.
SPEAKER_00: That incidentally is the God of Islam.
SPEAKER_00: He is power before he is love.
SPEAKER_00: To have a God of power and not love is terrifying.
SPEAKER_00: To have a God of love without power is Sentimental and immaterial.
SPEAKER_00: Who can give us rest?
SPEAKER_00: The God who is both power and love.
SPEAKER_00: Who can enable us to trust Him when everything seems to be going wrong?
SPEAKER_00: The God who is both power and love.
SPEAKER_00: If God were not powerful, then we would be left to our own exertions in order to find rest.
SPEAKER_00: If God were not loving, we would never be at rest in his presence.
SPEAKER_00: But Christianity speaks about a God who is both.
SPEAKER_00: He is both power and love.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus embodies this in his life, in his ministry, where he exhibits power over every dominion of this creation, over the sickness, weather, the spiritual realm, death itself.
SPEAKER_00: But he is also full of love and compassion.
SPEAKER_00: And he speaks to his people, and he says, Come to me, all who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
SPEAKER_00: Take my yoke upon you.
SPEAKER_00: My yoke is easy, my burden is light, and you will find rest for your soul.
SPEAKER_00: The God of power and the God of love are one and the same.
SPEAKER_00: The one and only Lord Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: This God, too, is concerned for justice.
SPEAKER_00: This is why the cross of Jesus was necessary.
SPEAKER_00: Because in all of the battering and abuse and opportunistic malevolence, God doesn't wink at any of it.
SPEAKER_00: God doesn't say, no, it doesn't matter.
SPEAKER_00: Forget about it, get over it.
SPEAKER_00: God never says that to his people.
SPEAKER_00: It's why the cross of the Lord Jesus was necessary.
SPEAKER_00: God does not leave sin unanswered.
SPEAKER_00: If you are in pain this morning because of a past hurt, a past abuse, you are invited by the scriptures, by God Himself, to look to the cross and to see a God of power and love, who is not ignorant of our sin, but who brings justice upon it.
SPEAKER_00: The justice for sin fell on the Lord Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Or it will fall on those who do not acknowledge him as Lord, as Savior.
SPEAKER_00: But it is not just the things that have been done to us that make the cross necessary, it is the things that we have done.
SPEAKER_00: It's lovely, isn't it?
SPEAKER_00: To to just lovely is the wrong word.
SPEAKER_00: There is something quite sedentary in being the victim.
SPEAKER_00: There's something that you don't need to change, you don't need to acknowledge anything, you don't need to repent of anything if you just see yourself as the victim.
SPEAKER_00: And sure, I am sure that there are people here who have been wronged in awful ways and surely are the victim of malevolence.
SPEAKER_00: But it would be not the full story to think that therefore we are perfect and have nothing ourselves to acknowledge.
SPEAKER_00: We don't just look to the cross and see dealt with the harms that have been done to us.
SPEAKER_00: We see dealt with the harms that we have done to others.
SPEAKER_00: We are not solely victim, we're also perpetrator.
SPEAKER_00: See, the lines are not clear-cut.
SPEAKER_00: We don't live in black and white, we live in the gray.
SPEAKER_00: The cross doesn't just deal with the things that have been done to us, but the things that we ourselves have done, and that is why we need it.
SPEAKER_00: We need justice to fall on Jesus, so that by his grace it does not fall on us.
SPEAKER_00: We need his cross, we need his empty tomb.
SPEAKER_00: And in the resurrection of Jesus, God shows that sin has been dealt with, that justice is the place that we are going, that all sin will be brought to light and will be finally dealt with, either on the cross of the Lord Jesus or in the life of the person who has done it.
SPEAKER_00: And so we move forward with faith.
SPEAKER_00: We need the cross in order for any of this to be true.
SPEAKER_00: We need the cross in order to find the rest for our souls that only God can bring, because that is the mechanism by which he brings it.
SPEAKER_00: We need the cross in order to find hope for the future, in order to be able to say to your soul, rest in God alone.
SPEAKER_00: He is the God of power, he is the God of love, he is the God who will not leave this sin unacknowledged or unanswered.
SPEAKER_00: So I'm trusting you, my fortress, my salvation, until I see you, and until you wipe away every tear from my eyes.