Please turn in your Bibles now to Psalm 119 verses 57 to 64. I knew that Joe would be preaching this morning on the parable of the sower and so I With Presbytery coming up, I went back into some other sermons and selected this one that continues to focus our attention on God's word and its value. So I trust that it will be helpful tonight in continuing that meditation that we began this morning. Let's give our attention to God's word. Psalm 119, verses 57 to 64. The Lord is my portion. I have promised to keep your words. I sought your favor with all my heart. Be gracious to me according to your word. I considered my ways and turned my feet to your testimonies. I hastened and did not delay to keep your commandments. The cords of the wicked have encircled me, but I have not forgotten your law. At midnight, I shall rise to give thanks to you because of your righteous ordinances. I am a companion of all those who fear you and of those who keep your precepts. The earth is full of your loving kindness, O Lord. Teach me your statutes." This is God's holy word. Well, how do you know that God loves you? Last week my family was on vacation. We had the chance to hike up Spruce Mountain in Colorado. It's a small mountain by Colorado standards, but it's just the right size for our family with the ages of our kids. We had a wonderful time. There was excellent weather. We enjoyed being out in creation and seeing the good things that God has made. And that's the sort of thing that when I do it, it makes it very easy to say what verse 64 says. The earth is full of God's love. we can see God's loving kindness in his many good gifts that he has given us. And I'm sure you've had similar experiences, whether it's going to mountains or to beaches or to hills or to plains, whether it's in a city or in the country, whatever kind of experience you've seen, this whole world is full of evidence of the goodness, of the love of God. That's not a new phenomenon. That's something that the author of this psalm, thousands of years ago, was able to write down and say. The earth is full of your loving kindness, O Lord. But what stands out about this psalm is that that is not the last thing he says. That is not where the psalm ends. It's not the climactic statement. The climactic statement is not a declaration. It's a prayer, and the prayer is, teach me your statutes. And I find that fascinating, that after saying the whole world, the whole earth is full of God's love, that he doesn't then go on to pray something like, show me the mountains so I can meditate on the greatness of God, or take me to the ocean where I can see the depth and meditate on the one who made such a thing. He doesn't say that he wants to go look at the creation. He says, take me to your word. Teach me your statutes. How do you know that God loves you? How would you find confirmation of such a thing, that God loves you? The psalm that we have before us, this portion of Psalm 119, tells us that we can look at this world and see many good things, but the one that we are to learn about God's love from is directly from God himself. tells us that God has revealed himself especially to us in his written word so that we may come to him and we may learn not just about all the glories we see in this world, but the good news of salvation in Jesus Christ, the good news of how he offers himself to us as our savior if we trust in him. And so I want this psalm to challenge you today to meditate on God's love and especially on how you know God, how you come to God and say that as good as all of the world and the creation is, there's nothing greater or better than God himself. Or to use the words of the very beginning of the psalm to say, the Lord is my portion. The Lord is my portion, God himself. We'll consider this under seven headings today that walk us through the verses of this psalm. The first thing we are called to do is that you should be clear about what you want. Be clear about what you want. When he says the Lord is my portion, he is introducing his fundamental theme. Do you have the Lord as your portion? That which is given to you, that which is allotted to you, that which has been set aside for you, what belongs to you, Is that what you have? Is that what you want? Do you want the Lord as your portion? To know God loves you is to know God himself. We live in a culture that is very materialistic, interested in things around us, wealth and things that we enjoy. We live in a culture that likes to think regularly about Santa Claus. Don't we? And don't we so often hear Santa Claus once a year or so compared to God? Because that's how we sort of think about God. We have this Santa Claus in our imaginations because it doesn't actually matter who Santa Claus is. You don't need to know Santa Claus. You don't need to have a relationship with Santa Claus. What really matters is, is there going to be something under the tree once a year? What we're interested in as a culture is, are we going to get the good things that we want? And that's how we often end up treating God. As we pray to God, as we speak to God, as we try to interact or have some sort of relationship with God, we're using God as a step along the way. And at the end of the day, it doesn't actually matter if he's real or not, as long as we get the things that we want. Whatever it is that we are praying about, as long as the gifts show up on time. But the psalmist says, the Lord, the Lord Himself, He is my portion. He's using imagery that the people of Israel would have been familiar with from the time that they came into the Promised Land. God allotted the lands to the various tribes, and as God was giving each tribe its portion, its inheritance, God was saying that each tribe would have an appropriate amount. We can go to Numbers 33, for example, verse 53. God said to Moses, you shall take possession of the land and live in it, for I have given the land to you to possess it. You shall inherit the land by lot according to your families. To the larger family you shall give more inheritance, to the smaller one you shall give less inheritance. Wherever the lot falls to anyone, that shall be his. You shall inherit according to the tribes of your fathers. And so God teaches contentment. God teaches people to be settled in their place. But one tribe was different. Numbers 18 verse 20, the Lord said to Aaron, you shall have no inheritance in their land, nor own any portion among them. I am your portion and your inheritance among the sons of Israel. God said, the tribe of Levi, from one perspective, you're going to be left out, you don't get any land. But that's not really what he's saying, is it? He's saying, you get a special blessing. You get God himself. And that's what the author of this psalm was recognizing, is for all of God's people, it's not about the land that you may be living on, it's about having God himself, knowing that the true gift is having the Lord as your portion. That has always been what God's people are called to. It's true through to the New Testament, as we think about the ways that the New Testament authors, the apostles, write about Christianity. Consider, for example, what Peter said, 1 Peter 2 9-10. He said to Christians, you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God's own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who has called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. How do you find your identity, your meaning as Christians? You look to God in the way he relates to you. You look to God himself. or consider the Apostle Paul writing in Philippians chapter three, verse seven, but whatever things were gained to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ. More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ and may be found in him. not having a righteousness of my own derived from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith, that I may know him and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his sufferings being conformed to his death in order that I may attain to the resurrection from the dead. What is the passion of every true Christian? It is a passion to know God himself through Jesus Christ, to know that Jesus did come and he lived. He died on a cross for sins, that he rose from the dead, and now as I trust in him and turn from my sins, he gives me himself. I can know Jesus Christ. What do you want? That's the fundamental challenge here. Are you able to say from your heart, the Lord is my portion. He is the great gift that I desire, God himself. There's a companion statement in Psalm 119, verse 57, as we consider God himself as the reward, as the portion that we desire. And that statement challenges you to commit yourself to God's words. 57 again, the Lord is my portion. I have promised to keep your words. The Lord is my portion, I have promised to keep your words. How do we know God? We know him through his words. We know him because God has spoken to us. Again, God is not an imaginary God or he's not some version of Santa Claus. How do you know about Santa Claus? Well, you make it up. You can make up whatever story you want and write your movie and create it. You don't do that with God. you know God because He has spoken. And I'm following the pattern of verse 57 by not just saying God's word, but by saying God's words. Both ways of speaking are true. We can talk about God's word, thinking of it collectively. We can talk about God's words, thinking of how we can count them one at a time as specific words. And that does matter because in the last couple of centuries especially, there's been a temptation among Christians to have a certain amount of scorn for all the words, or at least some of the words, that don't seem as interesting, or they don't seem as accurate when compared to certain studies that people are doing. And so Christians will speak about the Word of God, and at times there have been traditions that have said, we love the Word of God, we praise the Word of God, and we don't want to just reduce the Word of God to words on a page. But that's not how the Bible teaches us to think about how God has revealed himself. In fact, it's where that attempt often goes is the word of God is bigger than anything that we can print on a page. You know, we're not gonna take God and wrap him up and publish him in a book as if he's so small. We have a great God, a big God, and we should worship a grand God. Well, those things are true. But the way we know that God is not by finding a ladder that lets us climb up to him. It's because he came to us and he used words that we can understand. And his great wisdom and his great mercy, he accommodated himself to our frailty, to our weakness, and he used words in our language, things that we can look at and we can count them and we can understand the grammar of them and we can study them and meditate on them. God has spoken to us. and it is by His method, by His choice of giving us words that we know Him. God has made a magnificent world, and He's given us grand imaginations, but He expects us to humbly submit. and read his words and to have that commitment. 2 Timothy 3, 16 and 17 says, all scripture, that is these words that have been written down, all scripture is breathed out by God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for training, for instruction in righteousness that the man of God may be complete and equipped for every good work. God has given us his words. And this is the passion that all the writers of Scripture have as they teach us about Scripture. And Psalm 119 is famous for this all throughout the psalm. Think of just in this section the ways that he is speaking. Verse 57, he recognizes, if I know God's words, well, they're God's words. I have promised to keep your words. be gracious to me according to your word. Verse 59, I considered my ways and turned my feet to your testimonies. I hastened and did not delay to keep your commandments. Verse 61, I have not forgotten your law. Verse 62, I rise and give thanks to you because of your righteous ordinances. Verse 63, I'm a companion of all those who fear you and those who keep your precepts. Verse 64, the final prayer, teach me your statutes. Through what God has given us, we know God himself, God himself. If God is your portion, you will be committed to God's words. Again, the application question is simple, are you committed? Do you read these words? Do you study these words? Do you memorize these words? As we thought this morning about the different kinds of soil representing our hearts. Is your heart good soil that God's word can grow in? If God is your portion and you want to know him more, God has given us a simple, almost seems too simple to us at times. We want to go to the majesty of the mountains or listen to the beauty of music or enjoy the limits of our human capacities through sports or other things. No, it's very simple. We go to God's words. Commit yourself to God's words. The points that follow now unfold these truths. The next we are taught in verse 58, seek grace from God. Seek grace from God. Verse 58, I sought your favor with all my heart. Be gracious to me according to your word. God's word. leads us to God's grace. When you want something good, when you want favor from God, you go to Him and you seek it from Him. Knowing God as your Savior does not mean you are to then despise everything God has created, as if setting up this contrast between the Creator and the creation means you must hate everything that God has created. No, God has made these things. He has made them good. Consider a passage like Romans 8.32. He who did not spare his own son, but delivered him over for us all, how will he not also with him freely give us all things? Paul is saying God has given us his own son, and that is far more value than anything else in this world. That is that focus on God himself. But then he says, well, if he did that, of course, if there's anything else you need, whatever other thing you might need, God will provide that too. God will take care of the good things that you need. And so it's appropriate to pray, as Jesus taught us, give us our daily bread, give us the things that we need to be provided for. But we always seek favor from God, we seek God's grace, having that perspective that remembers. We do that saying, the Lord is my portion. Jesus himself taught this very well at the end of Matthew chapter 6. He says, "...do not worry then, saying, What will we eat, or what will we drink, or what will we wear for clothing? For the Gentiles eagerly seek all these things. For your Heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you." So do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will care for itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own. And that is our guiding principle as we seek God's favor. We pursue those things that are God's things. We pursue God, and he takes care of the rest. He promises he will take care of the rest. It's a helpful reminder that as we focus on God's grace, we don't need these other things as much as we think we do. Because we do need God to provide us with a certain amount of food, water, shelter, clothing, a certain amount of money, but what is the use of all those things? It's a temporary usefulness for things in this world, but no matter how much money you have, your money can never tell you your sins are forgiven. It can never say that to you. You may enjoy having children, but your children can never say, now you are holy and sanctified. There is no good life in this world that will take you to the next life, the eternal life that is in heaven. And so look to God for grace. Don't look to the good things that God has given to answer the most important questions. Look to God in his word to tell you what is most important and trust in him. And he will keep your focus on what matters. Seek grace from God according to his word. Next, as we continue through Psalm 119 verses 59 and 60, teach us to be obedient to God. Be obedient to God. I considered my ways, and turned my feet to your testimonies. I hastened and did not delay to keep your commandments." I considered my ways. Now that portion of this verse is something that I think most people in America would probably say, yeah, that's important. We can find all kinds of things telling us We're too busy. We're too distracted. We need to reflect on these things. We need to get our minds back on what's really important. We spend too much time on our screens. We need to have more meaningful things in our lives. And then we can go to the stores, and we can pick up our books on self-awareness, and mindfulness, and self-care, and so on, and learn lots of tips to help us consider our ways. And maybe some of those books have some things that are practically helpful at a certain level. But why? Why, America, do we need to do these things? Why not be distracted? Why not give ourselves to our screens? Why would we want to change the way that we are? That's the question that the techniques cannot answer. Why does that matter? The Bible has a very clear answer. The reason that you should be considering your ways is so that you can turn your feet to God's testimonies. The reason that you should consider your ways is so that you can obey. You don't need better self-awareness just so that you can be healthier, or have more energy, or have better self-esteem, or whatever you want to attach to that. All of those things ultimately turn up empty. There's only one goal that actually makes it worth it, and that is what God says to do. I considered my ways and turned my feet to your testimonies. That is why it's valuable to reflect on yourself and what you are doing. Not only so that you can obey, but so that you can obey quickly. You can obey right away. That's how he develops this thought. Turn my feet to your testimonies. I hastened and did not delay to keep your commandments. Sometimes delay might be wise. Sometimes delay is our way of giving enough time. It's a form of patience to make sure we make the right decision. But other times, delay can be deadly. Delay can have disastrous consequences. One of the most famous stories of delay in the Bible comes in Genesis chapter 19. You have the man Lot. living in the city of Sodom. God has said that if he does not find ten righteous people in this city, he will destroy the city. Two angels come to the city, find it full of wickedness. Lot has them into his home. They protect him and his family. They warn him, this city is going to be destroyed. You need to get out. And so Lot starts talking about it. He tells his sons-in-law, the city's going to be destroyed. But Lot doesn't go anywhere, and they think that he's joking to them. They stay in the city. He spends the night there. Finally, in the morning, the angels say, you really have to go. It's really almost over, and the Bible uses the same word that it uses here about delay. Lot lingered. Lot hesitated. Lot delayed. Lot was a man torn between love and loyalty to the world and love and loyalty to God. And in God's mercy, God brought Lot out, but at great cost. Because Lot's example of delay, of lingering, of looking back, of not having an interest in obeying God's commandments right away, that example led to his wife turning around and being destroyed, his daughters giving themselves to the immorality of the world. I hastened and did not delay to keep your commandments. Why does it matter if you're a little too distracted, a little too busy, a little bit too much enjoying what's going on in this world? Because if you are not obeying God's commandments, the consequences are deadly. So consider your ways and obey God. Be obedient to God. Continuing on to the next verse, we are taught to be content with God, be content with God. Verse 61 says, the cords of the wicked have encircled me, but I have not forgotten your law. Sometimes God will withhold certain good things. He won't give us all the good things of this world to help us focus on having Him. as he is our portion. But this verse pushes this even further. It's not just that we are to be content because I have enough to eat and I have enough to take care of my family. This says, even as God may afflict you, even as God may allow the wicked to surround you, to tie you up, to trap you so that you cannot move, God is still your portion. God is still worth clinging to above all else." That's what he says, the cords of the wicked have encircled me. but the Lord is still his portion. He says, I have not forgotten your law. This is still what matters the most to me. This is the one thing that the wicked can never take away. The cords of the wicked probably is a metaphor that we can think of various ways that we are trapped. Sometimes for God's people, it has been a literal experience. God's people have been physically bound. God's people have been placed in jail. All the freedoms that we like to enjoy, these things have been taken away from God's people. But if you have learned God's word, then you can say, even tied up by the wicked, I have not forgotten your law. And you can know that that is enough. God is enough. You can be content with God even in such a difficult circumstance. Because the wicked will try to lie to you. They will try to tell you that they have taken the place of God. When they try to control you, they will tell you that they are sovereign instead of God. They are the ones who decide what freedoms you have, not God. They are the ones who decide whether you will have hope for the future or not. They will have their moment, their little bit of power, their little bit of glory, their little bit of control. But you will remember That's pathetic compared to the real God. The power that the wicked have is pathetic compared to the eternal power and the glory of God and the one who has promised he will never leave you nor forsake you. I've recently been reading in a book that's called The Art of Divine Contentment by a Puritan author, Thomas Watson, and he considers the difficulties of suffering and how that affects contentment, and he goes ahead and lists about the hardest questions that he could list. He starts with, should you be content if you lose your child? And then he just keeps going. Should you be content if you lose your job? Should you be content if your closest relationships are destroyed by conflict? Should you be content if you are betrayed by those you love? Should you be content if you are slandered and your reputation is destroyed? Should you be content if people cannot understand you or appreciate you for who you are? Should you be content if you suffer terrible pain? Now, he doesn't just list them like I did. He does understand these questions deserve answers. He gives careful answers to each question, but it's always coming back to the same principle. Well, if you have God himself, yes, you should be content. If you have God himself, whatever else may come in this world, how can you not be content? You have the greatest thing possible. And perhaps one of these descriptions sounds too familiar to you right now, or perhaps it is some other form of suffering, some other way that the cords of the wicked encircle you. But remember that if you belong to Christ, no one can come between you and your God. The Lord is your portion. And so pray like the psalmist did, and say to your Lord, I have not forgotten your law. I still cling to you. Be content with God." Next, number six, we are taught to be disciplined for God. Be disciplined for God. Verse 62 says, at midnight I shall rise to give thanks to you because of your righteous ordinances. Now why would a person get out of bed at midnight? Okay, sometimes you wake up, you have to get up for something, and just a little while, you have to go to the bathroom or something, you go back to sleep. That's, like, you can get up at midnight. Sometimes, maybe you just can't sleep. Maybe you get up at midnight because you've been laying in bed awake, and you just need to walk around and do something else. Maybe that's why you're up in the middle of the night. But then there's a whole other category of, you're up at midnight because you have something to do. you have an important reason to be up at midnight. Maybe you're going on a trip and you like to drive in the middle of the night, so you set an alarm and you are going to wake up at midnight so that you can get on the road. And that last category is the feeling we get from this verse. It's not that, well, I happen to wake up and so I guess I'll praise God since I can't sleep. No, he's saying, I'm very intentional about what I do. I wake up, I rise up at midnight to give thanks to you because of your righteous ordinances. God is so precious to him that he decides to interrupt his sleep so that he can give thanks to God. Now, he's not necessarily telling us that this is what he did his entire life long. He's not telling us the details of his habits, but by presenting this example, he is showing us what our whole life should be shaped like. If God is valuable enough, if God is precious enough to interrupt your sleep just for the purpose of giving thanks to him, how much more, when you wake up naturally in the morning, should that be the first thing that you do? How much more as you go through your day should this be what is on your mind? How much more when you go to bed at night should you understand that this is a time to pause and give thanks to God because of his righteous ordinances? Are you disciplined for God so that you can praise him, so that you can know him? If you set your alarm in the morning so that you can be on time for work, or you can get up early enough to exercise, or whatever else you may want to do, how much more should you use that alarm and whatever tools are available to you to discipline yourself, to focus your mind on God, be disciplined for God? Finally, Verse 63, find friendship through God. Find friendship through God. He says, I am a companion of all those who fear you and of those who keep your precepts. Once again, we see the balance that this portion of the psalm has in showing us that we are to value God above all else and we are to enjoy the good gifts of God's creation. In this case, the gift of friendship, the gift of companionship. But especially what he points out is that his friendship, his companionship, is with those who fear God, those who, like him, seek to obey God's commandments. And I think it's inevitable that a truly close friend will be a spiritual peer. Are you going to share your heart with someone who doesn't understand how your heart works? If your heart loves God, if your heart sorrows over sin and hates sin, if your heart longs to know more of God, how are you going to have a best friend who couldn't care less about those sorts of things? Of course, you can establish relationships, you can seek to become close to people, but there will be a line that cannot be crossed, and either they will join you or you will join them. A close, long-term, Friendship requires a spiritual peer, someone who, like you, fears God. And so there is a great opportunity here, a great thing to give thanks for, that God provides those kind of friends, and yet there is, in this teaching, a very sobering warning about friendship and a reminder of how important God is. Young people, especially, The Bible speaks to you about this. The Bible says, young person, the friendship temptation is coming. Proverbs chapter 1, they are going to come to you and say, come join us. Come together with us. We're all going to be together. We're all going to share together. We're going to do things together. Then it goes on, it says, what are they doing? We're going to go hurt people. And it says it that bluntly to help us see that the sorts of things young people do together for fun are not always so innocent. You will be tempted by an invitation to companionship and friendship with those who want you to go sin with them. But to join with them is to risk your soul. If God is your portion, The list of people that you are willing to have on your list of companions, your close friends, that list actually becomes very short. You can be friendly to many people, but true friendship you will reserve for those who, like you, fear the Lord. Those who will encourage you to draw closer to God and to run away from sin. Of course, it's not just for young people. The desire for companionship lasts throughout our lives. It takes different forms. It has different ways that it affects us. The longing for companionship is often something that people at the end of life have spoken of as an aching thing, especially after losing a spouse, for example. The same principle remains. If God gives you that good gift of friendship, of someone who fears the Lord, give thanks to Him for that. but the Lord is your portion. And so you will not be friends with just anyone. You will not seek companionship with just anyone, but with those who fear the Lord. And so the psalmist walks us through these principles, these various applications of how the Lord is our portion and brings us again to the end of the psalm where we started our meditation thinking about the love of God. The whole earth is full of it. The earth is full of the loving kindness of God. And we celebrate that. We celebrate all the good things that God has done, all the good things that God has shown us. But then we pray, Lord, teach me your statutes. For all the good things that are out there, for all the ways that we see God's beauty and glory, this is what we want the most. We want God himself who gives himself to us in the words that he has given us. And we pray, Lord, teach me your statutes. Lord, you are my portion. Whatever else may happen in this life, I want to know God himself. Let's pray together. Our God, what an extraordinary prayer it is to ask that you would give our hearts and minds and attention to words written on a page, to something that may seem so simplistic at times. And yet we know that this is how you have given us something far more extraordinary than we will ever understand or imagine. You have given us yourself. because you have spoken to us. You have told us who you are and you have told us who we are. You have taught us about our sinfulness. You have taught us about the only Savior, Jesus Christ, and called us to trust in Him. You have taught us to count everything as a loss for that one good thing, that we may know Jesus Christ, His suffering, His death, the power of His resurrection. Father, we pray that you will turn our eyes towards you We pray that you will protect us from the things that tempt and distract and draw us away. Help us to take the teaching of your word, to believe it, and then to obey it, and help us to do it quickly, so that we might be conformed to your will, and might know you more. We ask in Jesus' name, amen.