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SPEAKER_00: Psalm 118.
SPEAKER_00: If you don't have a Bible, look around you and you will likely see a hardcover Bible.
SPEAKER_00: We will be in Psalm 118.
SPEAKER_00: We say this every week because we mean it.
SPEAKER_00: If you do not have a Bible, please take one of those Bibles around you as a gift today.
SPEAKER_00: My name is Wade Collier.
SPEAKER_00: I am the Missions and Outreach Pastor here at Grand Park Way, and I am humbled and honored to be here reading through God's Word as we, as Neil said at the beginning of service, start a new series of psalms.
SPEAKER_00: If you've been around here for the last month or so, you know that we have been walking through the book of Exodus this morning, and for this month, we hit the pause button to have uh kind of a summer of psalms in the month of July.
SPEAKER_00: If you uh saw an email from our pastor Neil yesterday, uh he he said this about Psalms.
SPEAKER_00: He says, Psalms gives us an honest look at how real people process their emotions, worship God, celebrate, give thanks, and respond to injustice.
SPEAKER_00: And so uh all throughout this month of July, we're gonna be looking at all the different kinds of psalms there are.
SPEAKER_00: Uh I think uh Clyde mentioned this at the beginning during worship, and he said that there are messianic psalms.
SPEAKER_00: Um Neil talked about their psalms uh when we cry out in anger and we cry out at injustice.
SPEAKER_00: And this morning um we had the opportunity to look at a Thanksgiving psalm.
SPEAKER_00: Not a Thanksgiving holiday psalm, but a psalm of thanksgiving.
SPEAKER_00: Um as you were finding Psalm 118, uh there are many uh psalms of Thanksgiving.
SPEAKER_00: And here's the reason that I feel like the Lord drew me to this one, because it includes two different elements.
SPEAKER_00: It includes elements of personal reflection that result in Thanksgiving.
SPEAKER_00: It also includes elements of corporate or communal as a church as we come together in Thanksgiving.
SPEAKER_00: And we we literally see that acted out, and um and and we'll we'll do some of that ourselves this morning.
SPEAKER_00: So get excited about group participation.
SPEAKER_00: I can see it all over your faces.
SPEAKER_00: Psalm 118, beginning in verse one, says this give thanks to the Lord, for he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever.
SPEAKER_00: Let Israel say his steadfast love endures forever.
SPEAKER_00: Let the house of Aaron say, His steadfast love endures forever.
SPEAKER_00: Let those who fear the Lord say, His steadfast love endures forever.
SPEAKER_00: Out of my distress I called on the Lord, and the Lord answered me, and he set me free.
SPEAKER_00: The Lord is on my side, I will not fear.
SPEAKER_00: What can man do to me?
SPEAKER_00: The Lord is on my side as my helper, I shall look in triumph on those who hate me.
SPEAKER_00: It is better to take refuge in the Lord than to trust in man.
SPEAKER_00: It is better to take refuge in the Lord than to trust in princes.
SPEAKER_00: All nations surrounded me, and the name of the Lord I cut them off.
SPEAKER_00: They surrounded me.
SPEAKER_00: They surrounded me on every side, in the name of the Lord I cut them off.
SPEAKER_00: They surrounded me like bees.
SPEAKER_00: They went out like a fire among thorns, in the name of the Lord I cut them off.
SPEAKER_00: I was pushed hard, so that was falling.
SPEAKER_00: But the Lord helped me.
SPEAKER_00: The Lord is my strength, and he is my song.
SPEAKER_00: He has become my salvation.
SPEAKER_00: Glad songs of salvation are in the tents of righteousness.
SPEAKER_00: The right hand of the Lord does valiantly.
SPEAKER_00: The right hand of the Lord exalts, the right hand of the Lord does valiantly.
SPEAKER_00: I shall not die, but I shall live and recount the deeds of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: The Lord has disciplined me severely, but he has not given me over to death.
SPEAKER_00: Open to me the gates of righteousness, that I may enter through them and give thanks to the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: This is the gate of the Lord, the righteous shall enter through it.
SPEAKER_00: I thank you that you have answered me and have become my salvation.
SPEAKER_00: The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.
SPEAKER_00: This is the Lord's doing.
SPEAKER_00: It is marvelous in our eyes.
SPEAKER_00: This is the day the Lord has made.
SPEAKER_00: Let us rejoice and be glad in it.
SPEAKER_00: Save us, we pray, O Lord.
SPEAKER_00: O Lord, we pray, give us success.
SPEAKER_00: Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: We bless you from the house of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: The Lord is God, and he has made his light to shine upon us.
SPEAKER_00: Bind the festival sacrifices with cords up to the horns of the altar.
SPEAKER_00: You are my God, and I will give thanks to you.
SPEAKER_00: You are my God, and I will extol you.
SPEAKER_00: Oh, give thanks to the Lord, for he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever.
SPEAKER_00: This is the word of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Most theologians view this, and so they're all smarter than me, so I'm gonna go about it the same way that this Psalm is divided into two parts.
SPEAKER_00: Um you have verses one through eighteen, where you have these worshipers, and they're on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem or temple.
SPEAKER_00: They're on a journey to go to worship.
SPEAKER_00: They are going to church.
SPEAKER_00: And then from verses 19 to 29, the worshipers have arrived.
SPEAKER_00: They're at church, they're at temple.
SPEAKER_00: And this is where their worship continues.
SPEAKER_00: Um it's this song.
SPEAKER_00: We have this song of calling out and responding that we'll talk about.
SPEAKER_00: It's this festive worship, but but undoubtedly, and most importantly for us this morning, it it is a response of joyous thankfulness.
SPEAKER_00: Um, and so if you have been here and heard me preach before, you know I'm super creative with sermon titles.
SPEAKER_00: No.
SPEAKER_00: Um, this sermon is titled Why We Should Be Thankful for God's Steadfast Love.
SPEAKER_00: Because we hear it repeated from the beginning and then wrapping up at the end and throughout that God's love is steadfast and it endures forever.
SPEAKER_00: And so, if this is a psalm of thankfulness, and we're thankful because God is in his love, he is steadfast, then we are going to ask the question this morning, why we should be thankful for God's steadfast love.
SPEAKER_00: And the first reason is God's love is loyal.
SPEAKER_00: God's love is loyal.
SPEAKER_00: What I mean by God's love is loyal.
SPEAKER_00: Look with me again at verses 1 through 4.
SPEAKER_00: It says, Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever.
SPEAKER_00: Let Israel say his steadfast love endures forever.
SPEAKER_00: Let the house of Aaron say his steadfast love endures forever.
SPEAKER_00: Let those who fear the Lord say, his steadfast love endures forever.
SPEAKER_00: And so what the writer of this psalm does in this first verse, he calls us.
SPEAKER_00: He calls those who are in worship, he calls those who are on this march to church to acknowledge God's loving kindness.
SPEAKER_00: And then he appeals to everyone.
SPEAKER_00: Here's what I mean by appeals to everyone.
SPEAKER_00: He says, Israel, and then he goes and he says, the priest, he goes, the authority, and then he opens the gates and he says to everyone who fears God.
SPEAKER_00: And so what he's done is he's created this environment where it is an all call.
SPEAKER_00: It's an all call to respond.
SPEAKER_00: It's this worship that is built on responding to God's goodness.
SPEAKER_00: And what do I mean by responding to God's goodness?
SPEAKER_00: Keep your finger right there in Psalm 118 and just turn back maybe a page or two in your Bible and look at Psalm 115.
SPEAKER_00: And he's calling them to remember something.
SPEAKER_00: And here's what he's calling them to remember.
SPEAKER_00: Look at verse 9 of Psalm 115.
SPEAKER_00: He says this O Israel, trust in the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: He is their help and their shield.
SPEAKER_00: O house of Aaron, trust in the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: He is their help and their shield.
SPEAKER_00: You who fear the Lord, trust in the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: He is their help and their shield.
SPEAKER_00: The Lord has remembered us.
SPEAKER_00: He will bless us.
SPEAKER_00: He will bless the house of Israel.
SPEAKER_00: He will bless the house of Aaron.
SPEAKER_00: He will bless those who fear the Lord, both the small and the great.
SPEAKER_00: And so you read that and just turn over to Psalm 118 and look at verse 1.
SPEAKER_00: He has said, This is what you're remembering.
SPEAKER_00: Because of this, give thanks to the Lord, for he is good.
SPEAKER_00: For his steadfast love endures forever.
SPEAKER_00: Because of what we said, let Israel say, his steadfast love endures forever.
SPEAKER_00: Let the house of Aaron say, his steadfast love endures forever.
SPEAKER_00: Let those who fear the Lord say his steadfast love endures forever.
SPEAKER_00: Remember, they're going to church.
SPEAKER_00: This is you in the car with your kids, right?
SPEAKER_00: Why do we got to go to church?
SPEAKER_00: You're reminding them God has been so good.
SPEAKER_00: God has done so much for us.
SPEAKER_00: God's love endures forever.
SPEAKER_00: And so here is what he is leading them into saying.
SPEAKER_00: He's saying, Israel, God and his steadfast love has been your help and your shield because his love is loyal.
SPEAKER_00: And then he looks and he says, Priests, sons of Aaron, your God and his steadfast love has been your help and your shield because his love is loyal.
SPEAKER_00: And then he looks out at the entire congregation.
SPEAKER_00: So you're pulling into the parking lot at church and you got the windows down and you're yelling at everybody in the parking lot, and you're saying, Those who fear God, his love is steadfast and it is loyal, and he will be your shield.
SPEAKER_00: Don't you wish you had someone in your life that you could refer to as a shield?
SPEAKER_00: Someone who protects you?
SPEAKER_00: Someone who always has your back?
SPEAKER_00: I was thinking about when I was in college and I met this girl named Sally.
SPEAKER_00: And those of you who don't know, I'll ruin the end of the story.
SPEAKER_00: She ends up becoming my wife.
SPEAKER_00: But when I first met her, for the first time, I was really impressed by a girl.
SPEAKER_00: She loved Jesus and she was beautiful.
SPEAKER_00: She told really bad, corny jokes.
SPEAKER_00: It was the complete package.
SPEAKER_00: What else could you ask for, right?
SPEAKER_00: And so I went home and I talked to some of my loyal friends about her.
SPEAKER_00: And I told uh one loyal roommate about her.
SPEAKER_00: And because I think he listens to the podcast, we'll just call him Cole Morgan.
SPEAKER_00: I need to stop using his real name when I tell the story.
SPEAKER_00: But I uh as I was trying to figure out how I wanted to pursue and how I wanted to spend time with her, this loyal friend Cole Morgan asked her out.
SPEAKER_00: So when I found out, I referred to him uh in a lot of names, but SHIELD was not one of them.
SPEAKER_00: Um but but as we read this morning, as we read Psalm 118, we do know someone whose love is so loyal that it can be referred to as a shield.
SPEAKER_00: Don't turn here, but I want you to look on the screens behind me and look at what God's word says about himself and his loyalty, how his steadfast love is so loyal towards you.
SPEAKER_00: Look at Deuteronomy chapter 7, beginning in verse 9.
SPEAKER_00: It says, Now therefore, that the Lord your God is God, the faithful God, who maintains covenant loyalty.
SPEAKER_00: If you got a pen, underline covenant loyalty with those who love him and keep his commandments to a thousand generations.
SPEAKER_00: To a thousand generations.
SPEAKER_00: I was in a coffee shop yesterday and I had an Aggie ball cap on, as God intended, and uh I had a lady come up to me, and she was excited to tell me that she comes from a family four generations deep of Aggies.
SPEAKER_00: And they have graduates going all the way back to 1900.
SPEAKER_00: And that covered four generations.
SPEAKER_00: And I laughed in her face and I said, I serve a God who has covenant loyalty for a thousand generations.
SPEAKER_00: I didn't really say that, but that would have been cool if I did.
SPEAKER_00: But here's the reason that I want you to highlight that.
SPEAKER_00: Here's the reason that God wants us to know about this covenant loyalty is look at that word, your faithful God who keeps covenant and steadfast love.
SPEAKER_00: That means that the steadfast love is because of a covenant.
SPEAKER_00: What does covenant mean?
SPEAKER_00: Covenant means a solemn agreement or a promise.
SPEAKER_00: Because God has made a solemn agreement and a promise.
SPEAKER_00: Why are we talking about covenant?
SPEAKER_00: And why does it shape our posture of thankfulness towards God's steadfast love?
SPEAKER_00: It's because we live in what is called the new covenant.
SPEAKER_00: And the new covenant is a covenant made first with the nation of Israel, but then ultimately with all of mankind, including us as believers in Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: And in the new covenant, God promises to forgive sin.
SPEAKER_00: He promised there will be a universal knowledge of the Lord, that Jesus Christ will come and fulfill the law of Moses and create a new covenant between God and his people.
SPEAKER_00: And now that we are under this new covenant, both Jews and Gentiles can be free from the penalty of law.
SPEAKER_00: We are now given the opportunity to receive salvation as a free gift.
SPEAKER_00: What is covenant love look like?
SPEAKER_00: What does this look like?
SPEAKER_00: Look on the screens at Ephesians 2, 1 through 10.
SPEAKER_00: This is how deep the covenant goes.
SPEAKER_00: This is how far it reaches.
SPEAKER_00: It says this in Ephesians chapter 2, beginning in verse 1.
SPEAKER_00: And you were dead in the trespasses in which you once walked, following the course of the world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work and the sons of disobedience, among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and we're by nature children of wrath, like the rest of my mankind, but God.
SPEAKER_00: Two of the sweetest words, if not two the two sweetest words you'll ever hear in your life.
SPEAKER_00: But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ.
SPEAKER_00: How strong is the loyalty of the love of God that it reaches into you when you're dead.
SPEAKER_00: And you are dead in your trespasses.
SPEAKER_00: And you have bought into every lie in the world, and it says that God, rich in mercy, reaches out, and by grace you have been saved.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 6, and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the highly places, uh heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not the smartest guy in the world, but I think that immeasurable means you can't measure it.
SPEAKER_00: I'll get back to you.
SPEAKER_00: Riches of His grace and kindness towards us in Christ Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: For by grace you have been saved through faith.
SPEAKER_00: And this is not your own doing, it is the gift of God.
SPEAKER_00: Not a result of works, so that no man can boast, for we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.
SPEAKER_00: Why is God's love loyal?
SPEAKER_00: Now look back at Psalm 118, verses 1 and 4.
SPEAKER_00: Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good.
SPEAKER_00: If there was ever any doubt that he is good to you, and his love is loyal, always think of Ephesians 2.
SPEAKER_00: Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever.
SPEAKER_00: Let those who fear the Lord say, His steadfast love endures forever.
SPEAKER_00: And if you believe that and you lean into that and you receive that, then you can do just as the psalmist asked the congregants to do, and just as God asked us to do, and we have an understanding why we should be thankful for God's loyal love.
SPEAKER_00: We can respond with his steadfast love endures forever.
SPEAKER_00: We can do that, right?
SPEAKER_00: Hello?
SPEAKER_00: We can do that, we can respond.
SPEAKER_00: Let's do that.
SPEAKER_00: So I'm gonna read the first part, and I want you as as a congregation, as a community, to read the second part.
SPEAKER_00: Let those who fear the Lord say.
SPEAKER_00: Now here's what I don't get about church.
SPEAKER_00: Why the monotone?
SPEAKER_00: Can we try again?
SPEAKER_00: Let those who fear the Lord say.
SPEAKER_00: See, there was a lot of inflection, mainly from the ladies, but guys will work on it.
SPEAKER_00: Alright.
SPEAKER_00: But here's the deal.
SPEAKER_00: Here's the elephant in the room that for some of us, and for some of you, it is hard to fathom God's loyalty.
SPEAKER_00: It is hard to wrap your head around someone who is perfectly loyal.
SPEAKER_00: Um because for some of you, the people who were and are supposed to be loyal in your life, have been everything but.
SPEAKER_00: And their failures in being loyal to you has then perverted and unfairly and unrightly altered your view of this God whose steadfast love is completely and totally loyal.
SPEAKER_00: Um Dr.
SPEAKER_00: Richard Kriker, who is this great pastor to pastors, um, says this, and the quote will be on the screen.
SPEAKER_00: He says, It is also the knowledge that people with whom we place our loyalty will disappoint us.
SPEAKER_00: However, but God, right?
SPEAKER_00: We cannot base our character and self-image in their reaction only in who Christ is.
SPEAKER_00: Our outlook on life and reaction to people needs to be rooted in God, not on how those people respond to us.
SPEAKER_00: We are not responsible for how people treat us, we are only responsible for treating them with utmost character as a reflection of Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Hence, the word Christian is being like Christ, not self-like.
SPEAKER_00: If we can do this, if we can fully understand church and live a life with this thankful posture that is rooted in God's loyal love for us, if if if even though we have experienced disloyalty on levels that I'm not even going to try to imagine that have happened to you, um and we we experiences in our lives, um, because people that we have given our loyalty to um but lived at the mercy of their own experiences or their own hormones or their own sin or their own selfishness, as a follower of Christ, nothing can separate you from the steadfast loyal love of God.
SPEAKER_00: That we can change our perspective on how people have from how people have broken and said they would be loyal and they have not been to a God who is always loyal, whose steadfast love is always loyal.
SPEAKER_00: You want to see the extent of steadfast loyal love?
SPEAKER_00: Don't turn there, but if you're taking notes, maybe mark Romans 8 35 through 39.
SPEAKER_00: And we'll finish talking about loyal love and move on.
SPEAKER_00: But I want you to hear the extent of this loyal love.
SPEAKER_00: This is how deep.
SPEAKER_00: Romans 8, beginning verse 35, who shall separate us from the love of Christ?
SPEAKER_00: Shall tribulation or distress or persecution or famine, nakedness or danger, or sword, or the disloyalty of someone we trusted?
SPEAKER_00: As it is written, for your sake we are being killed all the day long.
SPEAKER_00: We are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.
SPEAKER_00: No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.
SPEAKER_00: For I am sure that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able for us, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
SPEAKER_00: God's steadfast love is loyal, church.
SPEAKER_00: It's loyal, and the next thing that we see is that his love delivers.
SPEAKER_00: Is that his love delivers.
SPEAKER_00: What do I mean?
SPEAKER_00: Look at verse 5.
SPEAKER_00: It says, Out of my distress, I called on the Lord, and the Lord answered me, and he set me free.
SPEAKER_00: There is so much just in this one verse.
SPEAKER_00: It's good for a couple sermons at least, but for the sake of time, I just want to draw our attention to the way that the psalmist uses it to set the stage for the case of this steadfast love of God and how it delivers.
SPEAKER_00: Look, he says, I called on the Lord, the Lord answered me, and the Lord set me free.
SPEAKER_00: I called on the Lord, he answered me, and he set me free.
SPEAKER_00: If you remember, if you were here two weeks ago as we were finishing chapter two of Exodus, we talked about your posture before your heavenly Father.
SPEAKER_00: And we talked about this posture of response and how our response is predicated on the response of God, our Father.
SPEAKER_00: And verse 5 says, I called on the Lord, the Lord answered me, and the Lord set me free.
SPEAKER_00: God's response, his answer is to deliver.
SPEAKER_00: Hear that?
SPEAKER_00: He delivers what he knows that you need.
SPEAKER_00: Because he delivers.
SPEAKER_00: He's the one delivering.
SPEAKER_00: And why is this a big deal?
SPEAKER_00: I was reminded as I was sitting and I was um trying to take a way too long sermon and make it uh uh quite a bit shorter, and I was reminded about 10 years ago, I found myself um really burnt out uh where I was working.
SPEAKER_00: And I knew um that I was looking for an avenue out, and by an avenue out was I didn't know what was next.
SPEAKER_00: I just know I didn't want to keep doing what I was doing.
SPEAKER_00: Um and so what I did was I just started to apply jobs, I started to put my resume out.
SPEAKER_00: Um, none of these jobs were ministry related, um, which I've been called to do, um, to be set aside for vocational ministry, but I was so burnt out and so at the end of myself that uh I was just looking for anything.
SPEAKER_00: Um so I was offered a job, and it was a job where I had absolutely no experience, I had no passion to do it, and God had absolutely no call on my life to go.
SPEAKER_00: So, long story short, I would have been miserable.
SPEAKER_00: Um and I was a couple days away from signing on the dotted line and and taking that position.
SPEAKER_00: And my wife, um, Sally from the story, right, who has always been better at listening to the Lord than I have been on a dirt road in Canyon Lake, Texas, just looked me in the eye and said, Why don't you just ask the Lord what you're supposed to do and then just listen?
SPEAKER_00: Simple enough.
SPEAKER_00: And God delivered.
SPEAKER_00: I cried out to God, He answered me, and He set me free.
SPEAKER_00: And so the the reason the reason I share that is this this is in God's deliverance is where we make sure our theology is right.
SPEAKER_00: And theology is just a big word to say we understand the nature of God.
SPEAKER_00: Because here's what I mean by by God's deliverance, because if we're not careful when we read that He set me free.
SPEAKER_00: Then we begin to want to do like I did and create our own deliverance, which isn't deliverance at all, it's just escape.
SPEAKER_00: It's this man created freedom.
SPEAKER_00: When it says in verse 5 that he set me free, in the New American Standard Bible, it says He set me in a large place.
SPEAKER_00: He took me out and He set me in a large place.
SPEAKER_00: The message translation puts it this way I was pushed to the wall.
SPEAKER_00: I called to God, and from wide open spaces he answered.
SPEAKER_00: So you're pressed into the corner of this wall and you call out to God and you hear from the other side of the wall, from this wide, expansive place, you hear God answer.
SPEAKER_00: What an incredible picture of freedom this presents in front of us.
SPEAKER_00: Because what we can do and what we can begin to believe, church, is that freedom and deliverance looks like blank.
SPEAKER_00: My life would be so much better if I just had blank.
SPEAKER_00: If God would just give me this, everything would change.
SPEAKER_00: And that's not freedom.
SPEAKER_00: That's a dog run.
SPEAKER_00: And here's what I mean by that's a dog run.
SPEAKER_00: Have you ever seen one of these before?
SPEAKER_00: Is you've created your own environment and you find yourselves like these dogs.
SPEAKER_00: And you're living on Astro Turf, fenced in, looking at about as expanse as it gets in Bighorn, Wyoming, Bighorn, Wyoming.
SPEAKER_00: And there's all that room, and yet you're living right here.
SPEAKER_00: Because when you decide that deliverance and freedom look just like this one thing, then you begin to think that God only cares about that one thing.
SPEAKER_00: And then you think it's worthy of worship, and you think God's as excited about it as you are.
SPEAKER_00: And so then your worldview is so small as you look out at the freedom and the deliverance and the wide open spaces that God's loyal, steadfast love will call you to, and you're looking at it through chicken wire standing on astroturf.
SPEAKER_00: But you want to know what God's deliverance looks like?
SPEAKER_00: It looks like this.
SPEAKER_00: That's God's deliverance.
SPEAKER_00: That's wide open spaces.
SPEAKER_00: I grew up as a kid with family that worked and trained hunting dogs.
SPEAKER_00: And I remember as a kid going down to feed cattle or going to go fishing, we'd have to walk by the dog runs.
SPEAKER_00: And those dogs were a mess.
SPEAKER_00: They were crazy, and they were manic and they were full of anxiety and bouncing all over the place.
SPEAKER_00: You never want to get too close, but the minute they saw a shotgun, the minute they saw hunting clothes, their whole demeanor changed.
SPEAKER_00: And they were focused, and you let them out of the gate, and there was just this spirit of freedom on them.
SPEAKER_00: Like, it's time to live what I was created for.
SPEAKER_00: It's time for us to live like we were created for, and that's what God's steadfast love delivers.
SPEAKER_00: It's because uh it's because of this deliverance that God offers us that we can run in these wide open spaces.
SPEAKER_00: So, what does it look like?
SPEAKER_00: What does the Psalm tell us that this deliverance looks like?
SPEAKER_00: Starting in verse 5.
SPEAKER_00: We talked about this, that God delivers you his freedom.
SPEAKER_00: In verse 6, it tells us how God will deliver you from your fear of other people.
SPEAKER_00: He'll deliver you his help.
SPEAKER_00: He delivers you the right focus of your trust.
SPEAKER_00: It's interesting there in verse 8 and 9 that um that the psalmist talks about men and princes.
SPEAKER_00: He says, your freedom and your deliverance isn't in the person that lives next door to you, it isn't in the person that you share a bedroom with, it isn't the person that signs your paychecks, it's not a person that holds a political office.
SPEAKER_00: That is not where your hope comes from.
SPEAKER_00: That's not what delivers you.
SPEAKER_00: God says, your deliverance comes from me.
SPEAKER_00: He delivers you his confidence and his peace in the midst of trial.
SPEAKER_00: He delivers you his salvation, his joy and shrink, says verse 14.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 18, which should be easy to skip over, is he delivers you his discipline.
SPEAKER_00: You're like, that doesn't sound good.
SPEAKER_00: I'll pass on that.
SPEAKER_00: It's not what we think.
SPEAKER_00: We've lost it.
SPEAKER_00: You don't know what discipline is?
SPEAKER_00: If we had the picture of the dog run up there again, I was reminded of when I the first church I worked for, and the teenager that was living in the house was doing things behind closed doors they shouldn't be doing.
SPEAKER_00: Are we all on the same page?
SPEAKER_00: And so the mom came and took the door off the hinges.
SPEAKER_00: It's God coming in and kicking the gate down and taking the bolt cutters to the dog run cable and setting you free.
SPEAKER_00: Setting you free from your small worldview and showing you how small your freedom and your deliverance looks like, and saying, No, let me show you what a wide open space looks like.
SPEAKER_00: And lastly, he delivers you a song.
SPEAKER_00: In verse 14, it might have quotes around something the psalmist writes.
SPEAKER_00: And the reason it has quotes is that's the first line of what's called the song of the sea.
SPEAKER_00: And in a few months, when we're back in Exodus and we get to Exodus 15, after the Israelites are delivered to the Red Sea, they sing this song.
SPEAKER_00: And when the psalmist thinks about God's deliverance, he thinks about this mental picture of God taking him through.
SPEAKER_00: And we all have some connection with some song and some memory.
SPEAKER_00: Um, I think about when my grandfather died, I was nine years old, and it was it was rough on me.
SPEAKER_00: He was my hero.
SPEAKER_00: He was a war hero.
SPEAKER_00: He stormed the beach at Normandy.
SPEAKER_00: He was a real cowboy.
SPEAKER_00: Um, and he he passed away at cancer when I was nine, and I was crushed.
SPEAKER_00: And I remember my grandma's little brother threw me in his truck, and it was the first time I'd ever heard Hank Williams.
SPEAKER_00: There's a tear in my beer.
SPEAKER_00: And I can't hear that song without thinking about my grandpa.
SPEAKER_00: Um, and so there's a song and it's attached.
SPEAKER_00: And so here's my question for you this morning.
SPEAKER_00: When you think about God's deliverance, how his steadfast love that endures forever, how it's delivered you, what song comes to mind?
SPEAKER_00: Hint, this is the group participation portion of the sermon.
SPEAKER_00: What song comes to mind?
SPEAKER_00: What song comes to mind when you think about God's deliverance in your life?
SPEAKER_00: Amazing grace.
SPEAKER_00: Now I'll tell you in the first service, this side carried this side.
SPEAKER_00: It was rough.
SPEAKER_00: We had to have a staff person step in and pinch it.
SPEAKER_00: That was rough.
SPEAKER_00: So you guys be thinking, because I'm gonna come at you.
SPEAKER_00: What song over here?
SPEAKER_00: Amazing grace.
SPEAKER_00: Times two.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, now amazing grace is covered.
SPEAKER_00: We can't do that one anymore.
SPEAKER_00: What else?
SPEAKER_00: On Christ's solid rock I stand, absolutely.
SPEAKER_00: Love lifted me, yes.
SPEAKER_00: In my father's world, absolutely.
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
SPEAKER_00: Over here.
SPEAKER_00: I won't more time.
SPEAKER_00: Be thou my vision.
SPEAKER_00: We got this side covered.
SPEAKER_00: You guys need to step your game up.
SPEAKER_00: Let's go.
SPEAKER_00: One more time.
SPEAKER_00: Grace, like great is thy faithfulness, yes.
SPEAKER_00: It is well, just as I am.
SPEAKER_00: There's a hand back here.
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
SPEAKER_00: Yes, you.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus loves me.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Man, now we're really done.
SPEAKER_00: See?
SPEAKER_00: All the rest of you.
SPEAKER_00: Can I share mine?
SPEAKER_00: Mine was a few weeks ago when when Neil, our lead pastor, was up here preaching, he referenced it.
SPEAKER_00: He was telling, talking about redemption, and he talked about Chris Christofferson writing a song for Johnny Cash.
SPEAKER_00: And I was sitting over here, and if you were new around here, you might have seen me.
SPEAKER_00: I went straight to the ugly cry.
SPEAKER_00: It's a song called Sunday Morning Coming Down.
SPEAKER_00: And here's why I think about God's deliverance when I hear that song.
SPEAKER_00: And here's why the psalmist sings the song is I found myself in the summer of 1996.
SPEAKER_00: And I'll get through this, I promise.
SPEAKER_00: I found myself in the summer of 1996.
SPEAKER_00: I woke up in the front seat of my truck.
SPEAKER_00: And I woke up in the front seat of my truck because I was in such a state the night before I couldn't find my way home.
SPEAKER_00: I turned the ignition in my truck, and uh on the radio, Sunday morning coming down, Johnny Cash.
SPEAKER_00: And I sat in my truck and I just wept.
SPEAKER_00: Because I lived my entire life in this dog run.
SPEAKER_00: And I explored every corner and found nothing.
SPEAKER_00: And I was drugged by a very brave youth pastor to a youth camp.
SPEAKER_00: And it was on that Thursday that God delivered me and God saved me, and God gave me new life.
SPEAKER_00: And so when I think about God's deliverance, I think about Johnny Cash singing Sunday morning coming down.
SPEAKER_00: And the reason that we talk about these songs is um is there's this steadfast love of deliverance that allows us to have a song.
SPEAKER_00: It allows us to have that whole list.
SPEAKER_00: It allows us to have a life that is only possible through God's steadfast love.
SPEAKER_00: And so, as we draw to our last point, you still with me?
SPEAKER_00: It says that in verse 21, that I thank you that you have answered me and that you have become my salvation.
SPEAKER_00: God's love saves.
SPEAKER_00: This is why we're thankful for God's steadfast love.
SPEAKER_00: It saves.
SPEAKER_00: Look at verse 22.
SPEAKER_00: The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.
SPEAKER_00: These are the same words that Jesus is going to say about himself in Matthew and Mark and Luke.
SPEAKER_00: And the psalmist here, most believe that he's comparing himself to an unwanted stone.
SPEAKER_00: And so, whenever builders you've ever been around of a stone building is being constructed, there's some certain stones that just don't, they're not cut right and they don't fit, and they're cast aside.
SPEAKER_00: Um, and the writer has felt that same way.
SPEAKER_00: He's felt discarded like one of these stones.
SPEAKER_00: But here's what God does.
SPEAKER_00: This is what the psalmist tells us how God saves, that restores him from being discarded to usefulness and given him a position of prominence in his kingdom.
SPEAKER_00: And here's what I mean by a position of prominence is that uh whoever this psalmist is, whether it's King David, some psalms it has by the author, the singer of songs, uh, psalm of David, whoever this is, um, God has saved them from the discard pile.
SPEAKER_00: They found themselves in a pile of useless stones, and they and they found themselves then not only included by God's salvation, they found them placed as the cornerstone.
SPEAKER_00: Now I know this will surprise many of you.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not an engineer and I'm not an architect, but here's what I do know is that when they when they were building um a structure, that they, the cornerstone was central, and everything was aligned, and everything in the foundation was built in parameter and in thought and in forethought and prominence of this of this of this cornerstone, this keystone, this capstone.
SPEAKER_00: To take a discarded piece of material and redeem it and make it pivotal is what God does.
SPEAKER_00: To take a discarded piece of material, redeem it and make it pivotal is what God does.
SPEAKER_00: I want you to hear this, and we'll be done.
SPEAKER_00: Look at verse 23.
SPEAKER_00: It says, This is the Lord's doing.
SPEAKER_00: It is marvelous in our eyes.
SPEAKER_00: And then you go to verse 24, it says, This is the day that the Lord has made.
SPEAKER_00: Let us rejoice and be glad in it.
SPEAKER_00: How many of you heard that before?
SPEAKER_00: That's not a standalone statement.
SPEAKER_00: I know it looks good on your wall.
SPEAKER_00: I know teenagers might have it on the back of their letter jacket.
SPEAKER_00: That's not a standalone.
SPEAKER_00: It's because this is the Lord's doing.
SPEAKER_00: It is a marvelous sight in our eyes.
SPEAKER_00: This is the day that the Lord has made.
SPEAKER_00: What it's saying is today is the day that God took someone from the literal trash pile and made them a child of God.
SPEAKER_00: This is a day worthy of celebration.
SPEAKER_00: And here's the deal: some of you might be able to accept that God is loyal, and you might even be able to let in that he delivers.
SPEAKER_00: But for some of us, the thought that God would take a discarded, useless piece of material, which what we believe about ourselves, and then he would take it and he would make it a capstone.
SPEAKER_00: You notice that the Psalmist doesn't say he took a brick, dusted it off, and made it a useful brick.
SPEAKER_00: It says it took this useless piece and it put that purpose to death and brought to life a whole new purpose and a whole new life that is central and it is vital.
SPEAKER_00: This is God's desire for your life.
SPEAKER_00: And so here's how we're going to close.
SPEAKER_00: Clyde's going to come.
SPEAKER_00: Clyde's going to come in in a moment, or just a moment ago, rather, I read the message translation of one of these verses.
SPEAKER_00: And I want to read the last portion of Psalm 118 over you from the message.
SPEAKER_00: And this is our response this morning.
SPEAKER_00: Clyde will play.
SPEAKER_00: I'm going to read, and then I'm going to pray, and we're going to be done.
SPEAKER_00: Sound good?
SPEAKER_00: Says this thank you for responding to me.
SPEAKER_00: You've truly become my salvation.
SPEAKER_00: The stone that the Masons discarded as flawed is now the cornerstone.
SPEAKER_00: This is God's work.
SPEAKER_00: We rub our eyes, we can hardly believe it.
SPEAKER_00: This is the very day God has acted.
SPEAKER_00: Let's celebrate and be festive.
SPEAKER_00: Salvation now, God.
SPEAKER_00: Salvation now.
SPEAKER_00: Oh yes, God, a free and full life.
SPEAKER_00: Blessed are you who enter in God's name.
SPEAKER_00: From God's house we bless you.
SPEAKER_00: God is good.
SPEAKER_00: He has bathed us in light.
SPEAKER_00: Festoon the shrine with garlands, hang colored banners above the altar.
SPEAKER_00: You're my God, and I thank you.
SPEAKER_00: Oh my God, I lift your praise.
SPEAKER_00: Thank God He is so good.
SPEAKER_00: His love never quits.
SPEAKER_00: Father, you love us with a covenant love.
SPEAKER_00: And for you to break that would be you sinning against yourself, which is impossible.
SPEAKER_00: And so we, as believers in you, are recipients of your loyalty and your deliverance and your salvation.
SPEAKER_00: And for that we're thankful.
SPEAKER_00: We pray things your name.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Stand up, if you would.
SPEAKER_00: And if you would, put your hands out like this.
SPEAKER_00: Your God's love is steadfast.
SPEAKER_00: Your God's love endures forever.
SPEAKER_00: It is loyal, it delivers, and it saves.
SPEAKER_00: Your God never quits.
SPEAKER_00: In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.