Beard Oil & Mountain Dew | Psalm 133

This message explores Psalm 133 and emphasizes the often-overlooked value of harmony in our relationships, families, workplaces, and church community. Biblical harmony doesn’t mean agreeing on every detail; it means being aligned in purpose despite our differences. David describes this kind of unity as precious and refreshing, showing how deeply God values His people living together in harmony. In contrast, division fractures relationships and communities, especially when disagreements, preferences, pride, selfishness, unforgiveness, and ego become more important than the purpose that unites us. 

This message challenges us to intentionally pursue harmony by practicing humility—choosing to listen, forgive, serve, consider others, and put aside our need to always get our own way. The central reminder is that if we want harmony in our lives, humility must be in our hearts. When people with different backgrounds, opinions, and preferences remain aligned around a shared purpose, their individual contributions come together like musicians playing the same song rather than instruments simply making noise. Ultimately, harmony is precious, pleasing to God, and refreshing to our souls, making it something worth protecting and pursuing in every area of our lives. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Okay, so this morning we're going to look at Psalm 133. Psalm 133 is what is called in uh scholarly context an ascending psalm, or you may have heard the phrase a psalm of ascent. There's actually a story in the New Testament of your Bible where Jesus spits in the ground, makes mud, and puts that mud into a blind man's eyes, sends him down to wash in a pool and come back, and he comes back seeing. And you might be familiar with the story, but the place in the story where this man was was in an open kind of area where people would travel. And back in the day when folks would make this kind of pilgrimage, so to speak, into Jerusalem, they would sing some of these psalms. Remember, we talked about that. The series, now that's what I call music psalms. Psalms, this book in your Old Testament, is a collection of poetic work, basically, that are uh sung to melodies, many of them prayers and songs that are used, and people in the Old Testament would sing them over and over. We have songs like that in our culture. We just sang Jesus paid it all this week at church. That's probably one of those songs that many people are familiar with. And Psalm 133 would have been one of those. So when people would walk that journey, like that blind man sitting in the Gospel of John and that story, he would have heard people walking back and forth singing songs. And Psalm 133 is likely one of those because they would be singing these ascending psalms. And in Psalm 133, written by King David, is so short, and it is one of those psalms that you will read it, check the box that you read it, and there's things in there that you'll never know are in there, but are viably game-changing in your personal life, in your marital life, in your parenting, in your family relationships, in your friendships, in your workplaces and spaces, and as a Christian community, because in there we are going to learn that there is something in our lives that is undervalued and overlooked, and that is this word, harmony. Harmony. Now I say that, and most of us think in the context of music, but the word harmony that we're going to encounter in Psalm 133 basically means union together or unity. But here's what happens: I think our society undervalues harmony because in a culture that values choices over commitments, we allow differences and disagreements to divide us than separate us. Because we don't see the value of unity and harmony as we should. And so we end up experiencing kind of damaging behaviors or effects or potentially even destruction of or fracturings of certain relationships or interactions because we have put such a low value on harmony and a high value on how we feel about disagreements and differences in the context of relationships big and small. And in Psalm 133, we're going to see just how valuable harmony is. And as we lay this groundwork, I want to make sure that I explain what is meant by harmony, because in the original language we're going to read in Scripture it used as that word, but as it is defined as a union or togetherness or unity, what that word means is not agreement in everything. Because some of us are automatically thinking, oh, here we go. He's going to tell everybody, why can't we just get along? And I don't just get along with these people. Have you heard the things that these people have said? Have you seen the way these people act? Have you heard? That's not what I'm talking about. Everybody has preferences, and differences are everywhere. There are disagreements to be had. You have an opinion because you have a brain, and that is normal. Harmony does not mean agreement, it means alignment. And we're going to understand the difference. And we have to, in order for us to get the most out of this psalm, in order for us to get the most out of the lesson provided to us by this song that King David wrote. If you're a note taker, I'm going to give you this just to kind of set the tone for the conversation so that you understand our definition of harmony as we work towards it. Harmony is not agreement in the particulars. Harmony is alignment in the purpose. So I'll say that again so you understand, because most people look at what. I'm talking about why. It's not what, it's why. Harmony is not agreement in the particulars, it is alignment in the purpose. We've all experienced that. We don't agree with what the team has decided, but we agree with what the team's purpose is. So we are going to put our efforts in to accomplishing what the team's mission is. Are you tracking? We understand that. That's the type of unity we're talking about here because every person is a person, and every person, I want to encourage you with this. Every person is talented. You may have come in this morning and thought, you don't know me. I don't feel like I can do anything. I'm not talented at all. I want to encourage you with this. Every single one of us is talented at being frustrating. Because you're a person and you have thoughts and you have opinions, and that can be beautiful, or it can be a big time bummer. And it's all a matter of perspective and how we actually see harmony inside the kingdom of God individually and corporately. So let's read Psalm 133 together. I want you to go there with me. How wonderful and pleasant it is when brothers live together in harmony, brothers meaning kinship, family, people together, right? In harmony, in unity. For harmony is as precious as the anointing oil that was poured over Aaron's head that ran down his beard and onto the border of his robe. Harmony is as refreshing as the dew from Mount Hermon that falls on the mountains of Zion. And there the Lord has pronounced his blessings, even life everlasting. So I don't often do this, but this week I have titled the message Beard Oil and Mountain Dew. That is the title of this week's message, because we are going to look at how valuable harmony is. When I was in middle school, I was in the eighth grade. And does anyone remember when you were in school and you had to take like math, science, history, like the main classes, but then you were allowed to take an elective or two. And you know what I'm talking about? You got to pick a special class. And so in the eighth grade, um we had we had four choices that we could pick. It was either band, choir, shop class, or art. I didn't want to do band or choir. My parents would not allow me to do shop class because 13-year-old me could not be trusted around a band saw or a table saw or with attention whatsoever. And so I picked art, and the reason that I picked art is because I grew up watching The Joy of Painting with Bob Ross, and I loved that. And I wanted that's you know, and and I wanted to take art. So we're a week into art, and the teacher comes in and she puts an apple down on a table, and she says, Okay, the assignment this week is to draw the apple on the table. And so that's what we did. We sat down and we drew the apple, and we got to the end of the week, and everybody turned in their sketches of the apple on the table so they could be displayed. And that week the teacher came up to me and said, Mr. Smith, I'd love to talk to you about your drawing. And I'm like, Yeah, you would. Here we go. And she said, I think you should join the choir. That was her nice way of telling me, I've already gone ahead and registered you for choir, so on Monday when I showed up, magically I was in choir, no longer in art. Which meant that at the end of the semester, I had to perform in the choir concert. Well, in middle schools, oftentimes it'll be like this, at least it was in my school, where the choir and band performed their end-of-year concert together. And parents, you'll understand, you will feel this, parents. You will feel this. Depending with a concert like that, which is middle school band and choir, so we can all look, I've got them. I love them, but let's all be real. Middle school band concerts, you know, it's not. All right, I think we all understand what I'm just not gonna say. But parents, you understand this. The time you spend at that concert is determined by when your kid performs in the concert. So if your kid is up first, you hit the lottery and you get to go to the bathroom and never come back after the first song. But if your kid is in the eighth grade as top dog in middle school and you're the last ones to perform, you get to enjoy all performances, especially that of the sixth grade band. Which is, you know what? You know what it is. So we're sitting there and we're watching the concert because we had to sit with our group and we had to watch. And here's what happens at middle school band concerts, and no one warns you this. No, I've never seen a band director do this, in my opinion, with consideration for the audience. You know what they do? They come out, they look at everybody, they can see you looking at them, and then they turn around and they just start talking to the band. And you think, okay, here we go. They've looked at us, we've made eye contact, they've turned around, they're doing their thing, and the next thing you know, all you suddenly just hear this. And you're looking around thinking, no, no, this is bad. And it's just here, there, and everywhere. And then eventually the director turns around and gives you one of these. And I'm like, tell me you are not soliciting an applause, man, because that you should be fired. And what you realize is they were tuning and warming up because then they turn around and it's oh, now that's a song I can distinguish. I have heard hot cross buns 42 times. I know that song. Why does it make sense? Because now all of a sudden the parts go together. Initially, when they're warming up, you just hear individual stuff as they're warming up. But when the parts come together in, what's the word? Harmony, the song makes sense. It's even based on the level of playing. Pleasant. It's even pleasant. But see, here's the thing that I believe we deal with in our modern culture. And I think it's on a personal level and a corporate level. We don't understand how valuable harmony, unity really is. We don't see it as precious or as refreshing as David writes. And so as a result, we let things divide us. We have become so comfortable with separation and division that we feel that on every level, that we are willing to have family members who we don't have a relationship with anymore because they voted differently than us once. That we are willing to have friendships fracture at all ages and stages because we do not like the things that they said about another person, and instead of loving them enough to challenge them and huddle up together and have an honest, humility, grace-filled based conversation to move forward, we would rather just say, oh yeah, I don't like them either, and we just divide and separate. We see this in our families. How many of us will sometimes deal with things like this in our families, where you become ships passing in the night and you don't talk to each other, you don't talk to your kids or whoever. Why? Because you're frustrated and you're just like, you know what? No. And I'm I don't want, I, you know, harmony, schmarmony, right? I'm just gonna do me. And we've become so comfortable with it. And what do we feel? What do we feel? We feel nothing good from that. You know why? Because nothing good comes from division. In fact, God hates it. God actually hates discord. It's in the book of Proverbs. We're told here's a list of things that God hates, and one of those is discord and division among God's people. Do you know why? Because He loves us, and He knows division and discord is damaging and destructive. But oftentimes we don't recognize the value of harmony and unity, so we don't pursue it because to us it's not precious. What do you do with something that's precious? You handle it with care, don't you? Something that is precious to you is valuable. And oftentimes it's it's two things, really. We don't understand what unity is. We think we have to agree on everything we've established. You do not. But agreement is not alignment. Alignment is based on perspective and purpose. Agreement is based on preferences. And they're not the same thing. And if we don't value it, we won't treat it as precious and we won't see how worthwhile it is to pursue. So it's easy for us to just disconnect when we disagree, divide when we disagree, separate when we disagree, and end up with fractured, broken, sporadic relationships and sounding like the sixth grade band warming up instead of playing together. Because we don't pursue it as precious, valuable, pleasing to God, and refreshing to us. And here's where we geek out in the Bible story for just a moment, because in this psalm are actually stories, they're examples. And David writes these, and to the reader at the time, they stand out. But to you and I, thousands of years later, I mentioned oil pouring over a man named Aaron's head and running down his beard and getting on his shirt. And some of us are thinking, mmm, that's not gonna come out in the wash. And we don't recognize the significance of this, but I want you to consider it, and when you do, it's gonna make harmony and unity look different. You're gonna understand why it is so pleasing to God, so precious to us. So in the Old Testament of your Bible, God's people, the Israelite people, were set aside and they dealt with captivity. They would be taken uh captive, they would have victories and failures and all sorts of things. And there was a particular section of your Bible in the Old Testament where God's people were taken captive by the Egyptians, and insert a man named Moses. You may have heard of him, and Aaron, who came to rescue God's people from Egypt, take them out of captivity. Well, then they start to build together, they start to build community, and God gives them a way of living. They called it the law, the Mosaic Law. And in that law was here's here's righteous living. And the reason he did that is because for God's people at that time, and I would love to see God's church get back to this in a lot of ways, for God's people at that time, the most important thing in their lives was being in right standing with God. That what was of paramount importance for their entire existence was what pleases God so that they could be in right standing with God. Because we live in this new covenant, because of the work and person of Jesus Christ through salvation, God recognized that there's nothing we can do on our own to be in right standing with him. So he made a way to us. Well, one of the ways he did that in the Old Testament, primarily for his people, was to introduce this position of priest. That word priest in the Old Testament, it means mediator or go-between. That's actually what the word means. You picture priest as a figure that you've seen in movies, but the actual word meant a go-between. We derived the English word priest from that. And the idea was that this priest would offer sacrifices that were given to atone for the sins to help the people under the old law be in right standing with God. Aaron was the first high priest of the Israelite people. So this, in context, was a big deal. And when he was anointed, he was anointed in such a way that would, here's a big uh kind of Bible word for you, that would consecrate him. It would be designated for a specific purpose. He was set apart to do this thing. And when they consecrated him and anointed him with this oil, it wasn't the type of oil like if you go to In N Out after a church today and they drop your fries into the oil. It's not that. It's not oil like you think that you're gonna cook with. It was a perfumaic oil and it was of high value. It would have been contrived of different ingredients that were hard to get and it smelled good. It was a pleasing aroma. It was dense and you could, it would fill a space, and so if you witnessed him being anointed with it, you in your senses could sense the value of the oil as it was being poured over his head, and that moment would have been celebrated as he was being consecrated, and it would have been a precious moment for the Israelite people to say, our highest pursuit in life is to be in right standing with God, and we now have a go-between to help us be in right standing with God. Praise God for setting apart this man in this moment, and we have anointed him with this oil, and it was so pleasing to highlight how pleasing it was to be in right standing with God. And so when you read Psalm 133, and David says, harmony is as precious as the anointing oil that poured over Aaron's head, you can get a feel for just how pleasing it is for God's people to be united. He goes on even further and says how refreshing harmony is. As the dew from Mount Hermon, you're thinking, where's Mount Hermon? I've never heard of that. Here's Mount Hermon. This is what it looks like right there. Do you notice anything about that mountain other than that it's really big and tall? What do you notice? Snow on it, right? So about 6,000,000 miles that way, something like that, you will reach the peak of Mount Hermon that borders Israel. It's actually the highest peak in that area. At just under 10,000 feet elevation above sea level, you can see what happens there. It gets cold. And so it snows. Well, there's an ecological phenomenon that happens on Mount Hermon. It's really unique. In that part of the world, it can be a dry and arid place at times. And in the hottest months of the year, it gets up into triple figures. And if you've ever felt 100 degrees or higher, you know what that feels like, and you need something to refresh you, don't you? You need this. And so here's what'll actually happen. And the readers would have understood this at the time. Because of the elevation of Mount Hermon and it gets cold, the condensation that would form up there would form kind of these snow capped environments. And here's what happens when it's hotter, in the hotter months, these summer winds will blow against the mountain and it will start to melt some of that condensation, and it will form a dew that rolls down the mountain, and it creates a bit of humidity so that it is a little bit. Refreshing to the environment. So when David says harmony is as refreshing as the dew from Mount Hermon, everyone who lived there would have understood, yes, because when we're parched and when it's hot and when we're miserable and when the grass needs this and the environment needs this refreshment, it provides that dew almost had a quality and everybody would understand that at that moment. And so here's what David writes when it comes to unity. And I'm not saying again, not agreement in the particulars, but alignment in the why, God's people. Union, together, united in our why. When David writes, how wonderful and pleasant it is when brothers live together in harmony, as precious as the anointed oil, and as refreshing as the mountain dew. David is imploring the reader to understand how valuable harmony is. That being division. And it destroys and it never helps and it never builds. It only tears down. And God wants better for his people. But we have a hard time getting there, don't we? Harmony's hard to get to. It's hard to get to, and the reason it's hard to get to is because we're human beings. And as human beings, we have preferences, we have thoughts, we have feelings. And they tend to get in the way of harmony. For some of us, we just think that harmony is agreeing on everything, and we think, well, if we can't do that, we're not going to be fine. If you've been married for longer than 20 minutes, you know you're not going to agree on everything. You're going to have to figure out this harmony thing pretty quickly, and you get the definition better as you journey through life, but it still is difficult to get there. And the reason it's difficult to get there is because there are things that prevent unity. And a lot of them are just normal things. The most obvious is differences. You're different than the person next to you. You have different thoughts sometimes, you have different opinions sometimes, and that's okay. I want to encourage you with this because, again, we've kind of adopted this group think tribal mindset in modern society that says if somebody doesn't think like me, then I don't need to be in their life, and I don't want them in my life. And so what ends up happening is disagreements and differences end up creating division instead of offering opportunities for conversation and understanding. Because compassion will be the result of pursuing harmony in your life, meaning you may not agree with everything that person says, thinks, or does, but you can see them as just as valuable as you are in the eyes of God. And even if it's things that are just disagreements, and I'm not talking about what you might define as sinful versus righteous, but even just preferential things in your life, you at least allow yourself to see their perspective as equally as viable as your perspective. Because you choose to take a posture of, I'm going to pursue harmony, instead of, well, if you don't lock in with exactly what I want, we can't have a relationship. I wonder how many friendships would look different if we pursued unity and harmony. I wonder how many marriages, family relationships, workplace relationships would look different. I wonder how many churches would look different. How many churches have gone through issues and struggles, no church is immune to it. No matter where you are, what size church you are, you will have people with differences of opinions. And so many people get focused on what versus why. And so people will disagree on the way things are painted or decorated or this decision that's being made. And then we accidentally insert division into conversations, don't we? We don't do it on purpose. We don't do it on purpose, but sometimes we will say things like this, oh yeah, well, they did this. And when you think about it, like, hold on, are you a part of this Christian community? Yeah. Then it's not a they. It's an us. It's a we. Inside of Christian community, the word they is not a good word. It's we, it's us. And we don't mean to do that. We're not being, we're not trying to be malicious. We're just, man, we're voicing our preference, and so we do that. And we incidentally and accidentally can kind of plant that seed. And you understand it on a basic level. Okay, here's one for anyone, if you have domiciled with another person, in the context of marriage, you've experienced a very similar thing that has happened to you. It can't have only happened to me. I'll toss one out where things are said accidentally or things are said without being said. You ready? Here it is. You get up, you get ready for the day, you go put your outfit together, you walk out into the room, you get ready to head out the door, and your spouse looks at you and says, You wearing that? And you're like, Not anymore. Now, they didn't look at you and said, You don't look good. Because they didn't have to. You understand that. See, sometimes we'll do that and we we look at it and we say, no, no, no, I'm not sowing division, but are you inserting passive aggressive dynamics into conversations on a personal level and on a corporate level, and then wondering why there's tension in the relationship. It could be that you're saying things without actually saying things. And it could be completely benign, or you could be, you know, dropping some passive aggressive stuff there. Whatever it is. We do that, and the reason we do that is because we do not hold harmony as precious and as valuable as God says it is. It is wonderful and it is pleasing to God. Because harmony means God's people are united, and He wants that for us. But what's what gets in the way? Pride? That's a big one. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. No, no, no. Unless I get what I want, nobody gets what they want. No, no, no, no, no. No, no. They need to apologize to me. Then I'll consider being alright with them. No, no, no. You know what else gets in the way? Selfishness. It's just a common thing. And this is not to beat you up, this is just real talk, right? You know why selfishness gets in the way? Because you want what you want. And if other people don't want what you want, you're like, well, then I don't want you. And I'm okay with it. We've all we've we've experienced this on so many levels in our lives that it's become commonplace, and that's what's happened. Tension and division has become commonplace in our lives. So we don't look out for threats against unity and harmony because we're not pursuing unity and harmony. Unforgiveness is a big one. We say, no, no, no. I'm not, I'm not, I'm not going to forgive them. They did too much. Could it be that forgiveness is less about them and more about you? Because unforgiveness only creates bitterness, weight, fractures, and division. Forgiveness could bring freedom. And remember, it's not agreement in the particulars, it's alignment on the why. You may not agree with that person, and you may not even continue a relationship with that person, but you're still gonna see them the way God sees them, which is as equally loved and in need of grace as you. So you can let that go, work through that, and move forward because harmony matters to you. It's precious. It's precious. You know what else gets in the way? Ego. And this is one nobody likes to talk about because we think I don't have an ego. Only celebrities have egos, only sports stars have egos. And you're like, well, hold on a minute. I'll share one because I've done this, and I'm gonna be vulnerable with everybody because I believe in a church of our size, in multiple services, and those watching online, that I am not the only one who has experienced this. And it goes a little something like this. You have the conversation in your head. Sometimes you say it out loud, don't. Learn from your pastor, don't. But sometimes in your head you have this conversation at home. Is anybody gonna recognize how awesome I am? You have those weeks? I have done the dishes three times this week. Where is my parade? And then you're waiting for it. And you realize you get through the end of the week, and you're like, I was not generous at all with my family because my ego told me they need to tell me how awesome I am before I show them how loved they are. And we end up creating tension and a little division in our homes because we choose ego, pride, selfishness, unforgiveness, differences. And we don't pursue harmony. Here's a word I want you to understand this because it is a formula to remember. If you want harmony in your home, humility must be in your heart. If you want harmony in your home, humility must be in your heart. If you want unity in your marriage, humility must be a constant practice. If you want harmony in your parenting, in your friendships, in your extended family relationships, in your workplaces, humility must be in your heart and constantly practice in your life. And the reason for that is because harmony is precious, it is pleasing to God, and it is refreshing to the soul. And it matters more than we think. Because here's what'll happen. Here's what will happen. You'll feel the effects of disjointed dynamics in your life. Think about it. Think about it. Your life will start to sound like the sixth-grade band warming up. And you wonder why it sounds like a mess. Even as Christian communities, as churches, right? If we want to see God move in our cities, in our communities, through our churches, no one wants to attend a concert that sounds like the warm-up. So if we're not united, what's attractive about that? What is pleasing about that? But if we're united. In a church of our size, people think differently, vote differently, have different interests, have different opinions, have different backgrounds, maybe even a few things in scripture that we might not even fully agree on. But our church has mobilized itself to do what? To do things like bless our community, foster care families, salvation armies, uh drives and initiatives to help people to spread the love of Christ to our community. We're about to bless a bunch of teachers. And why? It's because we are pursuing unity. We may not agree in all the particulars, but we are aligned in the why. Because it is pleasing to God and it is precious. It is precious. Division is destructive. Harmony is healthy. You will never get harmony in your life without humility in your heart. So, how will you pursue harmony in every area of your life? You're gonna have to talk back to your pride, check your ego, serve when you want to be selfish. Consider when you don't want to, forgive when you don't feel like it. Bless when insulted. But as refreshing as that mountain dew in the Middle East and that beard oil. Harmony is precious, pleasing to God, and refreshing for the soul. Pursue harmony, pursue unity. Because it not only blesses God, it blesses you. Let's pray, and then I have some final instructions for our school drive. God, thank you again for your word. I pray that it guides us and leads us. And that is all I think I need to pray. It's in your name.

SPEAKER_00 36:34

Amen. Thank you so much for joining us today at Sunrise Church. We hope this message encouraged you and blessed you. If one of the ways that you choose to worship with us here at Sunrise is by giving online, there's a link right here that you can follow and it'll take you to that payment portal. Everything that you donate helps not only go towards reaching people in the greater San Diego area, but also all around the world. If you want to get further connected, whether in person or online, you can email this email right here, and either myself or one of our team members will be there to answer it and help you get connected in any way that you need. Thank you so much for joining us, and we'll see you next week.