Psalm 105, and I'll read through the whole of the psalm here. Oh, give thanks to the Lord. Call upon his name. Make known his deeds among the people. Sing to him, sing praises to him. Tell of all his wondrous works. Glory in his holy name. Let the hearts of those who seek the Lord rejoice. Seek the Lord in his strength. Seek his presence continually. Remember the wondrous works that he has done, his miracles and the judgments he uttered. Oh, offspring of Abraham, his servant, children of Jacob, his chosen ones. He is the Lord our God. His judgments are in all the earth. He remembers his covenant forever. The world, the word that he commanded for a thousand generations, the covenant that he made with Abraham, his sworn promise to Isaac, which he confirmed to Jacob as a statute to Israel as an everlasting covenant, saying to you, I will give the land of Canaan as your portion for an inheritance. When they were few in number, of little account, and sojourners in it, wandering from nation to nation, from one kingdom to another people, he allowed no one to oppress them. He rebuked kings on their account, saying, touch not my anointed ones. Do my prophets no harm. And when he summoned a famine on the land and broke all supply of bread, he had sent a man ahead of them, Joseph. who was sold as a slave. His feet were hurt with fetters. His neck was put in a collar of iron until what he had said came to pass. The word of the Lord tested him. The king sent and released him. The ruler of the people set him free. He made him lord of his house and ruler of all his possessions to bind his princes at his pleasure and to teach his elders wisdom. Then Israel came to Egypt. Jacob sojourned in the land of Ham, and the Lord made his people very fruitful and made them stronger than their foes. He turned their hearts to hate his people, to deal craftily with his servants. He sent Moses, his servant, and Aaron, whom he had chosen. They performed his signs among them and miracles in the land of Ham. He sent darkness and made the land dark. They did not rebel against his words. He turned their waters into blood and caused their fish to die. Their land swarmed with frogs, even in the chambers of their kings. He spoke and there came swarms of flies and gnats throughout their country. He gave them hail for rain and fiery lightning bolts through their land. He struck down their vines and fig trees and shattered the trees of their country. He spoke, and the locusts came, young locusts without number, which devoured all the vegetation in their land and ate up the fruit of their ground. He struck down all the firstborn in their land, the first fruits of all their strength. Then he brought out Israel with silver and gold, and there was none among his tribes who stumbled. Egypt was glad when they departed, for dread of them had fallen upon it. He spread a cloud for a covering and fire to give light by night. They asked and he brought quail and gave them bread from heaven in abundance. He opened the rock and water gushed out. It flowed through the desert like a river for he remembered his holy promise and Abraham his servant. So he brought his people out with joy. his chosen ones with singing, and he gave them the lands of the nations, and they took possession of the fruit of the people's toil, that they might keep his statutes and observe his laws. Praise the Lord. And this is God's holy and inspired word. May he impress it eternally on our hearts. Sinclair Ferguson, most of you know who Sinclair Ferguson is, Presbyterian pastor and one of the finest theologians of our day. He is famous among the staff of the churches and organizations in which he serves for asking new job applicants for ministry positions, which he oversees. He's famous for asking them this question, What do you think about when you have nothing else to think about? Maybe you've heard him talk about that before if you've ever listened to him. If you go to apply for a job, which he's supervising, he's going to ask you, what do you think about when you have nothing else to think about? The staff calls it the Ferguson question, I think. And he makes this point, and I think it's true, that whatever it is that fills your mind, when there's nothing to fill your mind, reveals a lot about who you are, right? It reveals a lot about the treasures of your heart. And really, that question, it can very quickly reveal our sin, can it? What do we think about when we're not, when there's nothing else to think about? It can reveal our idols, can it? The idols of our hearts, But sometimes because we're Christians, because our minds belong to God, because we belong to God, because our minds are being renewed by God, sometimes when there's nothing else to think about, we as Christians, we think about God, don't we? I hope you do, I assume you do. And it's certainly true for the psalmist here. His mind is captivated by God. and particularly by God's work throughout history. And this is primarily what the psalm is doing. It's tracing God's mighty acts throughout the Old Testament and celebrating it and rehearsing it and remembering all of these things that God has done. It's a psalm remembering the power of God, the power of God on open display in the lives of his people throughout incident after incident in the Old Testament. It's recalling the goodness of God and the grace of God and pouring out His mercy on His people whom He chose and saved. And as the psalmist is pondering the mighty workings of God, this isn't just an empty intellectual exercise for him. It's not a trivial pursuit, I guess we could say, couldn't we, as he's remembering these things. You know, we do that, right? We just remember things trivially, like we might remember the best years of our favorite sports team, maybe, rehearsing that, remembering that. Sometimes I listen to sports radio, and that's often what they do. They go back in time to the great days of whatever sports team. My brother, I was telling Dave this the other day, my brother wrote a book last year, and it's gonna be published next year. Cincinnati Reds baseball team. It's called the Big 50 and in that book he rehearses the top 50 men and moments of Cincinnati Reds baseball history. I look forward to reading it when it's published. Hopefully I'll remember some of the men and moments that he writes about. It will be an enjoyable exercise in baseball trivia. but the psalmist is doing something very different here as he is recounting the greatest moments in the history of redemption as God acts for his people. This is not merely an intellectual exercise or trivial exercise. As the psalmist remembers these things, he is calling us into action in view of them. It's in view of who God is and what God has done that in the first six verses of this psalm, he crams in all kinds of imperatives directing us to do something. He's calling us to action. The psalmist is about the awesome works of God. And because our God is awesome, Verse one, we are to give thanks. Verse one, we are to call on his name. Verse one, we are to make known his deeds. Verse two, we are to sing to him. Verse two, we are to tell of all his wondrous works. Verse three, we are to glory in his holy name. Verse three, again, we're to rejoice. Verse four, we're to seek the Lord. And verse five, we're to remember the wondrous works he's done. I think there are nine imperatives here. crammed into these verses. This is not an empty intellectual exercise. This psalm is a call to action. And every time we're introduced to some aspect of God's greatness, whether it be through reading the scriptures or hearing a sermon or remembering some act of God in the Bible or in our personal lives, every time our mind is filled in some way with thoughts of God, we are being called to action. And sometimes that action means telling others about God. Verse one, we make known his deeds. We tell other people about it. We do that sometimes trivially with sporting events, right? Did you see the Penguins game the other night, we might ask. We tell other people about the deeds of our sports team, and more so, infinitely more so, we ought to, when it comes to God, we make his needs known. Sometimes the action that we're called to means that we worship, we sing to him, verse two, sing praises to him. Sometimes the action we're called to is rejoicing. Verse three, we allow our hearts to be filled with joy because of what we know about God. I am convinced that this is always, when I preach, when we hear others preaching, there's always all kinds of application that ought to be made in view of God's word, but I'm convinced that One of the applications that always has to be made when we are partaking of preaching or reading God's Word is the application of rejoicing. We hear God's Word, we rejoice in it, whatever it may be. This morning, wasn't this the case? It was for me, anyway, from 1 Peter. I'm still trying to process this truth, that before the foundation of the world, God foreordained his Son, for our salvation. I'm still trying to process that truth. I think I will be into eternity, and I'm sure all of us will be. It's a truth that's so great, it's so beyond me, that I don't know what else to do with it than to rejoice in it. I don't know if I have another application for it, to rejoice in that truth. It's a truth that extends well beyond the capacity of my puny mind to know and understand and comprehend, but it does not extend beyond the capacity of my heart to rejoice in it. So this morning as Peter took us deep, deep, deep into the nature of God, the things of God, implicit in that is a call to action, right? To rejoice as we remember that. And that's what the psalmist is calling us to do. All of these imperatives in verses one through six, of all of them, The imperative that sets the stage then for the rest of the psalm really is the last imperative found in verse five, verses five and six we might say. And that's the imperative to remember. Remember the wondrous works that he's done, his miracles and the judgments he's uttered. Oh, offspring of Abraham, his servant, children of Jacob, his chosen ones. This imperative sets the stage for the rest of the psalm. And we have to understand as he's speaking to the offspring of Abraham. that this is us. We may not be the physical offspring of Abraham, but we are the spiritual offspring of Abraham. We're the children of promise through faith in Jesus. So this is uniquely addressed to you and me tonight. And the psalmist is calling us to remember and in a sense to travel along with him as he walks through the history of God's works and miracles and judgments displayed openly in the Old Testament. And so that's what he does in this psalm. It's a psalm of thanksgiving in the form of a historical narrative as he walks through God's dealing with his people. And remember, as he does this, this is meant to be sung. This is a historical psalm meant to be sung. Singing helps us to remember, right? Remember, remember, what a great way to remember by putting it into song. This is something Michelle Skarzinski has really helped our family with by introducing songs into our family life to help us to remember God's word. Songs taken straight from the book of Philippians, for example. Our kids can sing scripture. They've memorized scripture by song. There are songs that help you learn the catechisms. There's a variety of those songs you can drive in your car and listen to them. Let your children listen to them, perhaps. By singing, we remember. By singing, we remember. You can just learn just about anything by song to my shame. So this is a song about history. When I think of songs about history, I think of Don McLean's American Pie. To my shame, I could sing, I think, every verse of that eight and a half minute long song. Maybe some of you can, too. I bet you can, right? I bet you can. I know the history. I know some of the history of the song. It's about the plane crash and deaths of Buddy Holly and Richie Valens and the Big Bopper. And there's all kinds of history crammed into that song, although much of it is indecipherable, right? It's hard to understand, and every time it comes on the radio, I hear it, I sing it, and this happens to me, this happens to me every time it comes on. I think, I can sing every word of this song, but can I recount in the same way or greater way the history and deeds of my God throughout the scriptures. Can I sing of them like that, at the drop of a hat, like I can sing that song, American Pie? Can we sing of God's miracles and judgments as readily as we can sing so many other songs today? I hope so. the psalmist commands us to remember, and by virtue of it being a psalm, to sing of the wondrous works that God has done. So that's exactly what he does with the rest of the psalm. And just touch on the different sections of the psalm quickly, walking through it here. In verses seven through 11, the psalmist remembers the covenant God establishes with his people. He remembers God's covenant. God's covenant is a unilateral binding agreement to bless his people and save them. It's unilateral because the whole thing depends on God, not on us. You see in verse nine how the covenant is described. God has sworn allegiance to his people. I'm sorry, it's God's sworn promise to Isaac. It's unilateral. It's from God to us. In verse 11, the covenant is God's swearing to give Israel a land in which to dwell. It's unilateral because the whole thing, the whole promise depends entirely on God, not on us. It's unilateral and it's binding because it's eternal. It can't ever be broken or forgotten or destroyed. Verse eight, God remembers his covenant forever for a thousand generations. Verse 10, it's an everlasting covenant. calling us to remember the great works of God, the psalmist immediately directs us to God's eternal covenant that he establishes with his people and that then undergirds all of God's working on our behalf. Now this is something to sing about, isn't it? This is something to sing about. The foundation for the song American Pie is in this plane crash, and the plane crash happened because Buddy Holly wanted to fly to North Dakota where there was a washing machine so that he could do his laundry in the middle of winter with an uncertified pilot. That's not much of a foundation to sing about, is it? It's not much of a foundation. The foundation for this song, Psalm 105, is that God has established his unilateral binding covenant with us. He's named us as his people, promising unimaginable blessings, because as we saw this morning, before the foundation of the world, God foreknew Christ and ordained him to save us. And in Christ, before the foundation of the world, in love, he predestined us that we might exist for his glory. Now that is something to write a song about, isn't it? And that's what the psalmist has done here. And the psalmist goes on to be clear in verses 12 through 15. He wants to be clear that he's not singing about the greatness or glory of God's people. That's not the point of the song at all. Verse 12, they were few in number, God's people. They were of little account. They were nobodies. It doesn't celebrate their greatness, it celebrates God's greatness as he protects his people and even rebukes kings on account of them, allowing no harm to befall them. Friends, as you recount God's greatness and his power and his might, do you remember that God protects you, that he goes with you and defends you and guards you? God says of his people, verse 15, touch not my anointed ones. Do my prophets no harm. That's what God says of you. To every force in this world that would seek to do you harm, God stands in the gap and says do not touch them. He will not allow you to be lost or destroyed. We may suffer, we will die, but we will not be lost or destroyed ever because we belong to God. God protects us. We're of no account in and of ourselves. The song isn't about our greatness, it's about God's greatness. But he protects us and that's something to sing about, isn't it? Something to remember and to rehearse and to tell others of. And then in verses 16 through 22, the psalmist sings about Joseph. And really this is about God's sovereign supervision and ordering of history in order to protect his people and fulfill his covenant promises. I like this section of the song because when I read the story of Joseph, it's like looking at history and seeing God clearly standing above, not just behind, but over history, organizing everything, superintending everything to his own end and his own purposes. And it's awesome to see, isn't it? And the psalmist is doing the exact same thing here. He's saying, wow, wow, look at this. Here's Joseph, and then Joseph went into slavery, and then his brother sold him, and all this evil stuff was going on. But then he rose, rose in the ranks of the kingdom, and God used Joseph to deliver his people out of famine and to bring them into the protection of Egypt. The psalmist is standing in awe of this, remembering this. I love, I love how he does this. You know, the psalmist is saying what Joseph himself says, what his brothers meant for evil, God meant for good. It's something to celebrate, something to sing about, something to remember, as we live in historic time, I guess any time is historic times. As we look at our world, as we wonder what's going on, what's God up to, we may not know the end of what God's up to, or the immediate end of what God's up to, but we know the ultimate end, don't we? That he's working good for his people. And then in verses 23 through 44, the psalmist sings about their delivery from Egypt. And this forms the bulk of the psalm. This is the Old Testament dramatization of salvation and redemption and deliverance. God performs signs and miracles through Moses. God sends plagues, darkness, and blood, and frogs, and hail, and insects, and locusts, and death, and God does it all for his covenant people, and the psalmist sings of it and celebrates it. In verse 39, as they're delivered in this great salvation, God goes with them, he goes with them. He spreads a cloud for covering and fire to give light by day. That is the visible presence of God with them, leading and guiding and protecting. It is also a picture of how God is with us today, at least. a shadow of a picture, we might say, because God is with us much more so, not by cloud and fire, but by Christ in us, by His Spirit in us. And God provides for them all their needs. Food, verse 40, quail and manna. Water, verse 41, from a rock. And then in verse 44, God gives to them a land, a home, and I don't have to remind you of this, The dramatic salvation that's being recounted here from the Old Testament is a picture, a prophetic foreshadowing of the true home and the true salvation and the true deliverance that Christ accomplishes for us. And with that in mind, we actually have so much more to remember and sing about than the psalmist, don't we? We do. For him, the promise of salvation was a future hope For us, we have the fullness realized in Christ for what he's already accomplished. So we have more to remember, more to sing about how Jesus humbled himself in the Incarnation, how he obeyed his Father in the face of immense trials and temptations throughout his life. No human being ever faced the intensive attacks of Satan as Christ did, as intensive. No human being ever stood in the crosshairs of Satan in such an extreme way. And he did it all for us, succeeding, gaining victory over every trap Satan would lay. And we remember how Jesus taught us, how he showed us clearly who God is through his person. We remember and we sing of how he suffered and died, how he rose in victory, how he ascended in glory. We remember and sing about how he's coming again and All of the imperatives of the opening verses to give thanks and sing and rejoice that we find in this psalm, all of those imperatives are all the more important for us today because we have more to sing about, more to rejoice in, in Christ. And then the song ends. With a final and very important statement summarizing the purpose of God saving work and power as it's exhibited through history. Well, what's all this for? What's all this about? What's God doing in all this verse 45? It is also that we as God's covenant people might keep his statutes and observe his laws. In other words, God's grace abounds to us, not that sin might abound, but as Romans 8 fore, so that the righteous requirements of the law might be fulfilled in us who walk not according to the flesh, but according to the spirit. This is the culmination of God's mighty acts of salvation in history to make us to be his holy people who, by his grace and power, keep his statutes and observe his laws. It's an awesome thing that God does for us, isn't it? It's something to sing about. And it's something to think about, to rehearse, to remember in our minds. Remember the question, what do you think about when there's nothing else to think about? Does your mind go back through the course of history, maybe through the course of your own personal history, ever tracing God's goodness to you? Do you ever find your heart, when you're sitting there, sitting there in quiet, I'd just like to be able to sit in the quiet sometime with five kids. But when you're sitting there in the quiet, does your heart ever go back to what God has done for you in Christ? And do you find yourself rejoicing in that truth, singing, singing out because of that truth? I hope so, I hope so. We have so much more to sing of now that Christ has come. Well, let's pray as we close. Almighty God, Love your word. We love these great acts that have been openly displayed throughout history, pointing us to your power and might and to your covenant love and to your grace. We love the salvation that you've purchased for us. We love you, our God and King. And may we do what this psalm calls us to as we seek to rejoice in all of these things. In Jesus' name, amen.