We are focusing this afternoon in preparation for communion on Psalm 103. Psalm 103, we're looking at it under the theme Reminders of the Lord's Mercy. Reminders. This might actually be a familiar psalm to you. Maybe you wonder why. It's actually the psalm that's in our form for the Lord's Supper. So in the later part of the form for the Lord's Supper, right after communion, we read this psalm each time we have communion. And so probably the words are very familiar to us. It's also a very familiar psalm because there are verses in it like verse 8, the Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in mercy. That is a phrase that is repeated again and again throughout the Old Testament and the New Testament. Many, many times you read those words all in a row, merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in mercy. And why did the Lord repeat these things over and over? Why do we have psalms like this that review the history of God's people and review God's characteristics and remind His people of these things? Well, the answer is that God knew His people would need reminders, that they would be forgetful. I think many of you, you're familiar with the Exodus from Egypt, we'll touch on that in this psalm, where God's people kept forgetting again and again who He was, and to listen to Him, and forgetting His commandments, and going His own ways. We are forgetful, many of us literally, but then also spiritually, and we are forgetful when it comes to the history sometimes of our own lives. We need to be reminded of what's happened to us. I don't know if that's happened to any of you that you're sitting at a family reunion with your brothers and sisters and they say, don't you remember when this or that happened? When we were at a certain park or we went to a certain place, and if you're anything like me, you might have a complete mind blank, have no memory of it at all until you are reminded. This is why we go to church week after week. It's why we come to God's house, because we are by nature forgetful and sometimes forgetting some of the most important things. And so in this psalm, we're looking at reminders of the Lord's mercy. It's a psalm of David. And you notice with the opening, how critical this reminder is for David himself. Bless the Lord, oh my soul, and all that is within me, bless his holy name. Maybe some of you, you talk to yourselves. You ever do that? Talk to yourselves. Well, David really here is talking to himself. He's speaking to his own soul. He's engaging with himself. It's actually a good pattern for a believer that we would speak to ourselves, remind ourselves, but then especially remind ourselves of God's goodness and his mercy and his benefits and his blessings. I find it very easy myself, and I think from conversations with you, a lot of you do too, to get into a rut of looking at a bit of the dark side of things, the cynical side of things, thinking too much about how everything's going wrong in the world. And there is a time and a place to even memorize a psalm like this, or at least remember the principle that we need to speak to our own souls, speak to our own hearts, that we pray that more and more our inner conversation would turn in this direction. thankfulness, blessing the Lord. Bless the Lord, O my soul. Why would David have to say this? Why would he have to remind himself? Because undoubtedly, if you look at the other Psalms also, sometimes he complained He struggled with depths of misery, with his own sin, his own weaknesses, and so here he talks to himself, and it's as if he's convincing himself, don't fall into Satan's lie. that if you're a true believer, you'd never have an errant thought or you'd never have to rebuke yourself in your own mind that somehow you'd just have this purely sanctified, always thinking good thoughts mind. No, God's people need to call to themselves, stir themselves up, remind themselves to be thankful, remind one another. Another reason many of us Our best to have a spouse, somebody who does the same or close friends or others, but then even ourselves. So he's talking to himself and he's turning his inner dialogue away from probably the norm, which is so easy to slip into being earthly minded. and even cynical at times, and he's turning his mind to blessing the Lord. Bless the Lord, oh my soul. Now it could be, by the way, that David was having a very good and easy day, and he just instinctively blessed the Lord. Hopefully that happens to you as well, but it's good to remind ourselves, especially if we've been through dark times, to review and look back. Now when he says bless the Lord, that might sound strange to you. It always did to me, at least. I wondered, it seemed mostly that we want God's blessing on us. Why is David calling himself to bless the Lord? And we certainly need all blessing from the Lord and we desire it and we understand that we are small and he is big and he blesses us, but we also should reflect blessing. When He blesses us and when He gives us good things and blessings in Jesus Christ, we should be responding by blessing the Lord back, so to speak. We should be reflecting His glory. The idea of blessing is to praise somebody, to wish happiness upon them. The most root meaning of blessing has to do with happiness. So when Psalm 1 begins with, that man is blessed who fears God, it's that happy man. And it's a desire when you bless one, a desire that they would have joy and a certain deep happiness. And here, God's people should be those that are reflecting His glory, blessing the Lord. It's actually what the Westminster divines, the catechism started with. What's the purpose of people? What's the chief end of man? to enjoy God and glorify Him forever. This is what we're meant for. This is what God made us for. And this is why in eternity, He wants to gather in a people who would bless His name, who would praise Him, who would honor Him forever. And here David is reminding himself that even all within him, with his 110%, with all of his heart, desires, emotions, all within me, is this your Desire, this is a mark of a child of God. Not to say that it's unending and there aren't valleys and difficult times and challenges, but in their heart of hearts, they wish they would bless the Lord more often. In their own mind, their thoughts are, I wish I would reflect God's glory or praise him or honor him more. And so there's a need for us to speak to ourselves, and especially if our natural minds have gone to covetousness or complaining. or gossip, or any of a number of sins that our minds can slip into and start to turn over upon that we would call ourselves and remind ourselves. And so, blessing the Lord leads to worship. But then David turns to the things that he should not forget. Forget not all his benefits. And then he opens up this catalogue, benefits, the good things that the Lord gives to his people, who forgives all your iniquities, who heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from destruction, who crowns you with loving kindness and tender mercies, satisfies your mouth, with good things. This is a poetic review that he's going through of all the things that God does for him. He's remembering also what the Lord does for his people. If you can think back through the history of Israel who forgives all your iniquities. God gave his people the picture of sacrifice. all the way from the time of Noah, reminding them that he is a forgiving God who heals all your diseases. The Lord healed them from plagues. He gave the temple and the priests actually as a place where people's leprosy could be shown to be healed. He sent prophets at times to heal people, Elijah and Elisha, and then who redeems your life from destruction. God had pulled his people through the Red Sea. That was a big act of redemption, getting them out of Egypt, pulling them out of that slavery, redeeming them from destruction, crowning with loving kindness and tender mercies, giving them the promised land, giving them all kinds of good gifts, satisfying their mouth with good things. He gave them manna. There's all these pictures that David remembers. It's the Lord who has done all these things. And in his personal life, there were times that he wandered, he was lost, persecuted, and the Lord kept him. We also need to, from time to time, especially if we've been through a hard time, Go through and review a catalog sometimes. Think through, what has the Lord done for us? Yes, there's been hard times, but he's also given us many, many good gifts, but even more, this catalog. Forgiving, healing, redeeming, crowning, satisfying, executing righteousness, watching over his people. It's ultimately all fulfilled. We can look back at a psalm like this and we can see Who really forgives all our iniquities? The Lord Jesus Christ came to die on the cross. Heals all diseases, the Lord Jesus, the healer. Redeems life from destruction, the Lord Jesus who rose from the grave. Destruction, actually, that word destruction is actually the word the pit or the grave. Who crowns you with loving kindness and tender mercies. The pictures of revelation, what the Lord will give to his people, crowning them, giving them robes of righteousness, and then executing righteousness and justice. The Lord promises he will return and he will set all things right. And so all of these things that we need fulfilled in Jesus and his work. It's interesting, if you went through this list, verse three, four, five, and six, forgiveness and healing and redemption and crowning and satisfaction. Everybody wants those things, don't they? A lot of people want the government to give all of those things. We seem to live in an age when people are turning more and more to the expectation that the government will heal their diseases, save their life, give them all these things. Or some people have the unhealthy expectation that a spouse We'll give them all these things, solve all their problems. What a danger there is that we would look to government or family or even children can look to their parents too much and have an unhealthy and unreasonable expectation. No, David here, he's looking now to the Lord and we see this picture that all that we need is in the Lord Jesus Christ. But what David's really revealing in this psalm, when you see all these benefits that he's reflecting on, he's really revealing our neediness and reminding us of our neediness. If you look through this psalm, there's a whole set of human problems here. Iniquities, diseases, destruction, or the pit, the grave. Then there's verse nine, the reality of striving with God. People are in a wrestling match, a fighting with God often. Sins and iniquities and transgressions, verses 10, 11, and 12. Being dust, temporary, verses 14 through 16. There's a whole catalog actually of problems in this song. Issues that we face as broken and fallen people. We're sinners. We're sick. We will. All, if the Lord does not return beforehand, get sick, die of something, be in an accident, have some trouble. We, by nature, strive with God. He will not always strive with us. Verse 9, that's something to think of. It pictures like a wrestling match, a fighting with God, like Jacob in the book of Genesis. Are you wrestling with God? Then sins, iniquities, transgressions, verses 10, 11, 12. Using every possible word, the idea of sins is that that's missing the mark and iniquities is misdeeds or guilts. Rebellion, transgressions is more like rebellion or trespassing. And what David has done is he has pictured an honest picture of our problems and the root of them is in ourselves it is our own sin and the hope in this psalm is in the lord and in his work you know as he works through remembering or being reminded of all the good things the lord has done for his people It's interesting his focus in verse 7 and 8. He has made known his ways to Moses, his acts to the children of Israel. The Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in mercy. Now, to somebody who knew the Bible well, and then even the verse before that, justice for all who are oppressed, he's summarizing in verses 6, 7, and 8 the exodus from Egypt. He's giving a summary picture of how God's people, they were stuck in slavery, They were stuck in trouble. They were sinners. They were living under the thumb of Egypt. And then the Lord delivered them. He made known His ways to Moses. The Lord raised up Moses as a leader and as one who could deliver them out. And then He made known His acts to the children of Israel. Remember the ten plagues? But then He also made known His ways to Moses. He gave the Ten Commandments. One of the things we can start to miss, because the Bible does contrast law and gospel, and how we cannot measure up to the law of God and we need the gospel. But one thing we can miss is how the Ten Commandments actually reveal to us just how gracious and merciful God is. When God gave those rules to His people, and He gave that list of Ten Commandments, just imagine ancient times where there were warlords. This morning we talked about kings in different towns and cities who really amounted to warlords often. They would steal people. They would pillage and loot at times. It was very violent. A very dog-eat-dog world. different tribes warring between one another, and then even within nations abuses and wickedness. And in the midst of that, God came. He made his ways known to Moses. He also gave his commandments. He gave a constitution to his people. And so you can imagine a world where you might have adulterous warlords who just took advantage of everybody and tread on the poor. And in the midst of that, God says, no. Thou shalt not kill. If you just take somebody's life, your life should be taken. It's actually a mercy, a restraint, a grace, a kindness. For you shall not commit adultery. God teaches his people the sanctity of marriage and gives them that institution and all of these things. Or even his provision for the poor and the blind. Don't put a stumbling block in front of the poor or the blind. The Lord was revealing through his law that he cared, that he was merciful and gracious. He cared for the smaller people and the weaker people, and his law would protect and keep them. And yet it is a law we cannot keep. But David's now looking back at this history, verses 6, 7, 8. It comes to verse 8, the Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in mercy. He said earlier that that's a refrain in the Old Testament. But the first time it comes out, is Exodus 34, where it's really revealed in a clear way. What had happened there is God had given his law and his commandments. Moses was on top of Mount Sinai. And the people made a golden calf. And that making a golden calf was really a way of copying and going after the ways of Egypt. It was a going back to idolatry. It was a desire to be like the nations that had idols. And they even gave glory to that golden calf. And Aaron even said, look, here's the gods who delivered you out of Egypt. The people were looking to this idol, this calf, and they turned their back. As it were, they cheated on the Lord God. And then Moses intercedes. God says, these people should be condemned. They deserve to die for their sin. But Moses intercedes. He prays for these people. And the Lord uses that situation to reveal. The Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in mercy. It's a quote from Exodus 34. It's the moment that God spares Israel. despite their wandering, despite their sinfulness, despite their going their own way. And you see, child of God, until you see how much of a rebel and an idolater you've been. and how you've gone your own way. And until you are honest with yourself to confess that, and to admit that, that we are just like Israel, and to admit that all we like sheep have gone astray, you will not see the beauty and the glory of this truth and this verse that echoes through the whole Bible, where the Lord takes a people who just cheated on Him. You hear from those sometimes who have been cheated on and how they're absolutely gutted. And they had gone to another god. They had turned from him who redeemed them out of Egypt and yet he said and he revealed to Moses word after word, you have these catalogs of sins and weaknesses and wanderings. And then the Lord reveals this catalog, merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in mercy. That's the story of the Bible. Sinners wander, turn their back on the Lord God. They go their own way like a dog to his vomit, to what is really disgusting in the eyes of the holy God, idolatry. And God gave them new tablets, gave them his law again, another chance and another chance. And then they went to the border of the promised land. They lost faith. And the Lord gave them another chance and another chance. He was revealing this truth. And we also need to be reminded of this. And this is why we need the Lord's table from time to time, this table spread out to us. It preaches to our mouths and our ears. And as we looked at this morning to all of our senses, it preaches this truth. The Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in mercy. He will not always strive with us. The idea of striving with man comes out before the flood. How people are fighting with God and with each other. And yet the Lord God spares Noah. And here the believer has this hope. He will not always strive with us, nor will he keep his anger forever. that God spares and He's merciful to His children because of the work of His Son. And so this psalm, what it's doing is it's revealing God's character. It's taking both sides, it goes back and forth from the sins and the iniquities and the problems and the weaknesses, and then it echoes back mercy and grace. The word mercy echoes all through this psalm. That the Lord is merciful. Look at verse 11, and it gives the biggest pictures possible of mercy. Because David's been reflecting on how God's so patient. For as the heavens are high above the earth, so great is his mercy towards those who fear him. The greatest possible vertical dimension. as far as you could possibly get. We would say the distance to the end of the universe. as far as east is from west. The greatest possible distance they could imagine, horizontally, east to west. So far has he removed our transgressions from us. David here is foreseeing and even prophesying how perfect and complete the work of Jesus Christ is. When you trust in Jesus and when you look to him, all those sins of the past, It's like they're put away even further than the other end of the universe, all those light years, or the distance from east to west, they're gone, wiped away, removed from us, no longer on our account. Do you trust in the Lord Jesus Christ? Here is the good news, trusting in Him, the past is gone, it's clear, it's finished. God's character is revealed here to show that he's also, verse 13, as a father pities his children. So God doesn't just forgive sins, and he doesn't just sort of say, well, that's okay, and then sort of leave his children and not care about them. No, he pictures, verse 13, as a father pities His children. So the Lord pities those who fear Him, for He knows our frame. He remembers that we are dust. Here, David is giving reminders of God's character, and he's showing that our God, our Father, it's not that He's some harsh taskmaster or some distant one who doesn't care when we stumble or scrape our knees, so to speak. He's a Father who pities his children. Some fathers are warmer than others. There's always a balance with that. Some of us are thankful to have maybe a wife who picks up the child who's been crying or is a little more tender. Well, here, David doesn't picture the Lord as a distant, harsh father, but as a pitying father, one who looks down on those who fear Him, His children, those who have a deep respect for Him, and He knows our frame, He remembers we are dust, He's paying attention, He's interested, and He has an insight here into the heart of the Lord our God for His children. He pities them, He cares about them. You know, we don't like pity, do we? A lot of us. We don't like people to pity us. But what a beautiful picture it is that God the Father pities you, His children, that He cares about the trials that you are going through, that He remembers your weaknesses, that we are delicate and weak, for as for man, his days are like the grass, as a flower of the field. So he flourishes, for the wind passes over it. This is a picture of those desert winds. The Scirocco, they call it in the Middle East, how a hillside could be covered in flowers and green and beautiful after the rainy season, but then the hot winds could come in. And from what I've been told, I've never seen it, but the wind can come in and it can dry a field into good hay in just a matter of hours in the Middle East. And here, David gives a picture. That's what our lives are like compared to God. Just a few moments. We flourish for a time. There's a beauty to our lives. But God remembers this. Dust to dust, we die. The Lord knows and He cares. So much so that He sent His Son to the grave to lie in that place of death. He pities His children. He cares. He knows about the times and the seasons of our lives, the beginning and the end, and he watches over all of it. There's a picture here with interest, like an attentive father, how inattentive we can be, sometimes distracted, don't even hear maybe what our children say. But here, our heavenly father is pictured as the one who knows everything. who watches everything, who cares, who pities His children. And at the Lord's table, again, we see a picture of this that He provides for His children who are so limited, so foolish. If you review the history of this psalm, it's really saying, we're a bunch of fools, temporary, small, sinful. But God cares, and he ultimately sent his son. And then even more, his righteousness is to children's children and to such as keep his covenant. Here's a hopeful covenant promise that the generations of godly people, those who think of his word and who teach it to their children, who draw near to him. in covenant that He gathers them in and there's even a hope for their children and the next generations that He preserves and He keeps even our children and our children's children. Well, then we come to the ending of the psalm. We'll look at it, Lord willing, more in a moment The Lord has established His throne in heaven. It ends then with the blessing to the angels. We'll look at that at the table. But it ends with this reassurance. You know, we look at this world and we see that we live and we die. We see the wandering. We see the trouble. And there's a reassurance here. The Lord has established His throne in heaven. You know, there may be rebels on this earth. There may be prime ministers who are living in complete rebellion against God. There may be emperors, Caesars, and others in history, but the Lord's throne is established in the heavens. He may be patient with them. They may be rebels. They may do their own thing for a time, but He does rule over them, and they will answer to Him. And the Lord will vindicate and care for His people in the end. And He will guide them. We don't know if that will be in many generations. We don't know if He may return tomorrow to make this fully and finally true. His kingdom rules over all. This may be tomorrow, this may be in a thousand years, we don't know. But we know for sure that the Lord, His throne is established, He's ruling right now. And all those that rebel against Him, whether they may think they are the richest and the most powerful on this earth, will give an account. And we have to be reminded of that also from time to time with a psalm like this. The Lord will establish His kingdom on this earth. He is ruling now. and his kingdom rules over all. Have you bent the knee also to the king of kings? It's a reminder. Yes, the Lord is one who pities his children and provides for them. He's merciful and gracious, but he's also our king. And having seen what a merciful covenant king he is, to go the way of the cross, his son for us. How much more should we bend the knee and bow to him? But then also the call comes of the gospel as we have the table in a moment. that there's an invitation here to have a reminder. The reason our Lord's Supper form uses this psalm after each communion is because it's a psalm of remembrance. It's a psalm of reminding. And a big part of communion is that we would come and we would remember the Lord's death till he come. And you are called, even invited, even commanded those of you who truly believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, as we looked at this morning, take, eat, those are commands to come to the Lord and to show that you are absolutely, as a poor and needy sinner, trusting in Him. Amen. Let us pray. Father in heaven, we thank you that you have sent your son, the Lord Jesus Christ. We thank you for the grace and the mercy that is revealed in him, that despite how we, like the children of Israel, have gone our own way, despite how we have made idols, how our churches have failed and faltered in these past years, that you are yet the Lord who is merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in mercy. Lord, we thank you. and we praise you for the work of your son and we pray in his name that you would forgive our sins. We pray that you would guide us by your spirit and that as we gather in communion that that would be done to your glory. We also pray that you would watch over and be with those members of the congregation who are not with us. Please bless them where they are and strengthen them. We pray this all in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, amen.