Psalm 118. Hear the word of God. Oh, give thanks to the Lord, for he is good. His steadfast love endures forever. Let Israel say his steadfast love endures forever. Let the house of Aaron say his steadfast love endures forever. Let those who fear the Lord say his steadfast love endures forever. Out of my distress, I called on the Lord. The Lord answered me and set me free. The Lord is on my side, I will not fear. What can man do to me? The Lord is on my side as my helper. I shall look in triumph on those who hate me. It's better to take refuge in the Lord than to trust in man. It is better to take refuge in the Lord than to trust in princes. All nations surround me. In the name of the Lord, I cut them off. They surround me, surround me on every side. In the name of the Lord, I cut them off. They surrounded me like bees. They went out like a fire among thorns. In the name of the Lord, I cut them off. I was pushed hard so that I was falling, but the Lord helped me. The Lord is my strength and my song. He has become my salvation. Glad songs of salvation are in the tense of the righteous. The right hand of the Lord does valiantly. The right hand of the Lord exalts. The right hand of the Lord does valiantly. I shall not die, but I shall live and recount the deeds of the Lord. The Lord has disciplined me severely, but he has not given me over to death. Open to me the gates of righteousness that I may enter through them and give thanks to the Lord. This is the gate of the Lord. The righteous shall enter through it. I thank you that you have answered me and have become my salvation. The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. This is the Lord's doing. It is marvelous in our eyes. This is the day that the Lord has made. Let us rejoice and be glad in it. Save us, we pray, O Lord. O Lord, we pray, give us success. Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. We bless you from the house of the Lord. The Lord is God and he has made his light to shine upon us. Bind the festal sacrifice with cords up to the horns of the altar. You are my God, and I will give thanks to you. You are my God, and I will extol you. I'll give thanks to the Lord, for he is good. His steadfast love endures forever. Please pray with me. Father, as we look at this psalm, may we praise you also for your steadfast love. May we praise you that you are good. Father, may these words speak to us wherever we're at today. in our relationship with you. May we feed upon these words. May these words bring us life and joy and hope. And Father, may my words be true. We ask this in Jesus' name. Amen. Psalm 118 is one of five psalms, the previous four, that are part of the Jewish celebration of Passover. They are sung joyfully by Jews as they prepare for Passover. And at the time of Christ, the people had to go to Jerusalem, to the temple. from wherever they lived, and sometimes that was quite a distance, a travel, and as they would travel, they would sing these psalms. Psalm 118 may in fact be the last psalm that Jesus had sung probably with his disciples the night of the Last Supper before he left for the Garden of Gethsemane. This psalm was well known to him We'll see a little bit later, he even quotes this psalm as he describes himself. The first couple verses, the first four verses, and we're going to go through this psalm in a little bit of a cursory manner. The first four verses are almost a response of reading or singing, and you can almost hear the people of Israel as they're traveling to the temple in Jerusalem singing these. It's almost responsive, right? Let Israel say, his steadfast love endures forever. Let the house of Aaron say, his steadfast love endures forever. The way this is written, let Israel, let the house of Aaron, those who fear the Lord is echoed in Psalm 115, which is also one of the Passover Psalms in verse nine through 13. And let me read that to you. O Israel, trust in the Lord. He is their help and their shield. O house of Aaron, trust in the Lord. He is their help and their shield. You who fear the Lord, trust in the Lord. He is their help and their shield. The Lord has remembered us. He will bless us. He will bless the house of Israel. He will bless the house of Aaron. He will bless those who fear the Lord. And as they pray for a blessing upon Israel, they're praying for a blessing upon their nation. The house of Aaron is a blessing they're praying upon the priesthood of Israel. And those who fear the Lord, they're trying to differentiate true believers within the house of Israel. Those who truly love the Lord, who fear the Lord, they're praying for them. Verses five through 22. seem to be the words of the king, and that may have been David, most likely, or referring to David. Verses six, the Lord is on my side, I will not fear, what can man do to me? The Lord is on my side as my helper, I shall look in triumph on those who hate me. And it's not hard for us to remember David as a young man, as a boy, going up against Goliath, the giant, He had no fear of man. He had God on his side. Verse 10, all nations surrounded me in the name of the Lord and I cut them off. Throughout much of David's life, he was hunted down by Saul. He was hunted by armies that hated him. He lived in seclusion, in hiding for many years. David very well knew what it was like to have nations surrounding him. And the Lord cut them off. He protected him in many different ways. We're going to go to verse 14. The Lord is my strength and my song. He has become my salvation. And in this psalm, in the eyes of the king, the Lord becoming his salvation is the Lord granting victory in battle. And for a king, ultimately, that is the highest honor that he could have, that God was on his side in battle. And we know as we have studied the life of David, the many battles that he was in, the many victories he had, That was an irritation to Saul, right? Saul had killed his hundreds, or thousands, and David tens of thousands. God was definitely on his side. Verse 15, glad songs of salvation are in the tents of the righteous. The right hand of the Lord does valiantly. In that time, the right hand was the hand that was able to bear a sword. It was a sign of military might, of victory, and David is proclaiming God's hand in the victories that he had throughout his life. Verse 18, the Lord has disciplined me severely, but he has not given me over to death. We know that David was brought to very low points in his life. His own son, Absalom, had sought to kill him. The sin that David was involved with, Bathsheba, was a low point in his life. God brought him out of that. He disciplined him severely, but he did not give him over to death. Verse 19, open the gates of righteousness that I may enter through them and give thanks to the Lord. The king is praising God for allowing him, a Jew, to enter the sanctuary of God and to sing his praises, to sing of the praises of a good God, a merciful God, a powerful God, a righteous God. This is the gate of the Lord. The righteous shall enter through it. Verse 21, I thank you that you have answered me and become my salvation. Again, my victor. Verse 22, the stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. If we look at this part of the Psalm, In describing David, we know that he was probably the most unlikely to be chosen as king in his family. He was the youngest of many brothers. In many ways, David, in his life, was rejected. He was not thought of as Saul was, of being of great stature and a great person. And as we see through David's life, many ways that he was rejected. As the stone was rejected, he became the cornerstone. He became the greatest king that Israel had ever seen. And God used that for his purpose. Israel was itself rejected as a stone was rejected. They found themselves as a nation, as slaves in Egypt without rights, without personhood. In essence, they were property and their only value was the worth of their work. And they can see themselves as that stone that was rejected that had become the cornerstone, that nation. for no reason other than God loving them, chose them to be his people and brought them out of slavery and gave them a land and gave them a king and became their God and they were his people. From a people that were rejected, outcast as slavery, to God's people with their own nation, they can see themselves being that cornerstone. Verse 23 and following goes back to almost a corporate worship. They're rejoicing in the Passover, rejoicing in God calling them out and giving them his law and giving them a land and giving them a king. Verse 23, this is the Lord's doing. It is marvelous in our eyes. This is the day that the Lord has made. Let us rejoice and be glad in it. Save us, we pray, O Lord. O Lord, we pray, give us success. Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. We bless you from the house of the Lord. The Lord is God and has made his light to shine upon us. Bind the festive sacrifice with cords up to the horns of the altar. You are my God and I will give thanks to you. You are my God and I will extol you. We'll give thanks to the Lord for he is good, his steadfast love endures forever. What a great and joyous celebration this was for the nation of Israel, that God would love them enough and call them out of a land of slavery, bring them to a new land, give them his law and call them his people. And this is what they were celebrating. How special were they in the eyes of God, the creator of the universe, the lawgiver, the sustainer. There was a lot of excitement and celebration at the Passover for who they were. There was a great feeling of thankfulness and pride as a people waiting for the Messiah. They were celebrating and singing psalms as they traveled to Jerusalem. Even in their excitement at Christ's triumphant entry, they quoted verse 26, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. In their excitement for anticipation of the Passover as they were singing these psalms, they were coming through the gate and there was Christ. And in their excitement, they proclaimed this to him. He, at least they thought at that time, was the Messiah they were waiting for. But it was their pride that got in the way of seeing the truth. For those of you who don't know, I know we have some visitors here tonight. I'm a therapist and I do home care, but I work for the Jewish Association on Aging. So many of the people that I see are Jewish. Many are Orthodox Jews. And I have some wonderful conversations, especially with the Orthodox. With the Reformed and Conservative, not so much. It's not really a religion to them. But a lot of what I'm going to say is what I see from them, what I hear, how I see them practice their faith. And the only way I can describe their religion is a religion of remembering. That is very important to them. And that is, in essence, what this psalm is. It's a psalm of remembrance, what God has done for his people. what God has done for his king, and it's praiseworthy, but it's only part of the story. We don't have cable. We have, I don't know what we have, a fire stick or something. And we have many different channels. And there's one channel that comes on, and I was scrolling through it, and it was, the title of the channel was Nothing But Trailers. And I thought, who wants to see an RV show, right? But it's about movie trailers. And that's all it's about. Who would watch that? I can't even tell you the last movie that I went to see in the theater. But I know when you go, it's not just a two-minute commercial. It's usually a great production of a trailer, maybe five minutes, right? And you get the main characters. You might even get some of the plot. You get some of the excitement. But you don't get the whole story. And you can't, by seeing that trailer, say, this is my favorite movie. And in essence, that's what the Jews have done. They only have part of the information. And the information they have is true. It's not misleading, but it's only part of the information. I say it's a religion of remembering. The Jews that I talk to, especially when we have good heart-to-heart talks, they are a people without hope. They have no true hope of salvation individually. Their hope is that they will be remembered. And it's important to them that they are remembered. And I think they believe when the Messiah comes again and calls Israel together, that if you are remembered, that you will somehow spiritually be a part of that. Remembering is very important to them. When I go into facilities that are run by the Jewish Association, you will see plaques everywhere. water fountains, benches, right, in memory of this, in memory of, they want to be remembered. When I come here, I cross Boston Bridge and I go up Center Street Extension and there's a Jewish cemetery off to the side. And if you ever pass a Jewish cemetery, take a look at the tombstones. You will see small rocks placed on top of the headstones. When people go to visit someone at the cemetery, it's a custom to place a small rock so other people know they were there. They're being remembered. It's just a custom they have. But take notice of that next time. I said it was their pride that got in the way of seeing the truth, a national pride, a pride in their heritage, a pride in their past, a pride in who Their ancestors were Abraham, Isaac, Jacob. I believe that we underappreciate the depth of this pride ourselves. Let me read from Luke chapter 18, a parable which is very familiar to you. a Pharisee and a tax collector. He also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous and treated others with contempt. Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed thus, God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week. I give tithes of all that I get. But this tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, God, be merciful to me, a sinner." When we read the prayer of the Pharisee, it jumps out at us as this man is hard. He's cold. He's harsh. He's praying, thanks to God that I am not like that man. To appreciate the depth of their pride, we need to understand too that it was common for a Jew at that time, and even today, to thank God in prayer that they were not born a slave. That would disallow them to come into the temple. To thank God in prayer they were not born a woman. And to thank God in prayer They were not born a dog or a Gentile. That's pride. That's harsh pride. And I think we need to understand the depth of that when we consider how the Jews rejected Christ and everything he stood for. Now, before we condemn them for their pride, We too are a prideful nation to an extent. We call it patriotism, and that's not a bad thing. Don't we celebrate the Fourth of July, right? That is our independence. That's kind of our Passover, right? We became a nation, not by the hand of God, but by our hands, but we celebrate that, and that's okay. Through the course of my work, I also have had the pleasure of meeting and getting to know many World War II veterans. A B-24 pilot who flew over the oil fields in Romania, which was a devastating attack. B-17 tail gunner, another man who drove a landing craft on the beaches of Iwo Jima for 30 days. And their stories are fascinating, and I love to hear what they say. And there's a sense of pride in what they accomplished. They were heroes, especially because the other blessing I have is getting to know men and women who were concentration camp survivors. and hearing the atrocities that they went through, that multiplies that sense of pride that we have for what was accomplished at that time. I remember years ago, maybe 15, 20 years ago, one of the men's retreats, a friend of ours who some of the men will know, Rex Downey, laid out the Battle of Midway on the floor of the Lodge with cutout islands and with model aircraft carriers and battleships. And my boys still remember that to this day. And the purpose of him doing that was to show the providential hand of God in that battle. It was a pivotal battle in World War II. There were some circumstances, I don't remember the exact details, but the Japanese Army was kind of caught off guard. They were in the process of changing their bombers to bombs or torpedoes or torpedoes to bombs, I don't remember which, that kind of got them caught off guard. Another sign of God's providential hand was they sent out scout planes in all directions to find out where our Navy was. And the one plane that flew over Admiral Nimitz's Navy, the radio didn't work. So we saw how he pointed out to us God's hand worked in this battle. And we can take pride in that. I believe in that battle there were four aircraft carriers that we sank out of the six that attacked Pearl Harbor. It was a successful battle. It was a great victory. And we should be proud of that. But what would have happened? What kind of a people would we be today? What would our national pride be like if Nimitz and his Navy is coming around the bend of Midway Island, and they come face to face with the Japanese Navy, and before a shot is fired, The ocean opens up and the entire Navy goes to the bottom of the sea and the ocean swallows them up again right before the eyes of our Navy. What kind of a nation would we be if the thousands of our troops who invaded Norway, I'm sorry, Normandy, And we were prepared to lose thousands of lives. What happens if we storm the beaches, we go inland, and the Germans are dead? As happened to King Jehoshaphat, right? He had come against three nations that were opposing him. And before he got to the battle in the Valley of Jehoshaphat, those three nations had killed every man there. without Israel losing a man. What would our pride be, our sense of patriotism, if that happened to us? It would be over the top. Let's take just a very quick look at how Psalm 118 applies to Christ. Verse 19, open to me the gates of righteousness that I may enter through them and give thanks to the Lord. On Christ's triumphal entry into the city, the people missed it. The gate of salvation was not the gate he came through on Palm Sunday. The gate of salvation was the gate he was led out of the city on Good Friday to his execution. That was the narrow gate. That was the gate of salvation. That was the gate that Peter himself rejected. When Christ predicted that he would be tried, he would be executed, and Peter said, by no means. Christ says, get behind me, Satan. You're standing in the way. That was the gate of righteousness. Jesus quotes Verse 22, in Matthew 21, in Mark 12, in Luke 20, 1 Peter even references this. He references Christ as a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense for those who do not believe. In verse 25, save us, we pray, O Lord, we pray, give us success. This was also part of the Jewish celebration of the Feast of Booths. This was what they would sing. They would cry out as part of the celebration. And in John chapter 8, on this high day of the holiday, as this was being sung as part of a water libation ceremony, when the water for the week that was used ceremonially was dumped out, And the people sang this, save us, O Lord, we pray, give us success. Jesus cried out, if anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. Verse 27, the Lord is God and has made his light to shine upon us. Also the Feast of the Booth later in John chapter eight. During that feast, there were large torches that were lit. And the fuel for the torches were the old robes of the priests. And they lit the night. They lit the temple for this week-long celebration. And in John chapter 8, Jesus points out, I am the light of the world. The Jews rejected Jesus as the Christ in part because of their pride. And it was their pride, their sense of being better than others that blinded them to one of the great promises and commandments given to Abraham. In Exodus chapter 12, verse 2, God tells Abraham, I will make of you a great nation. And I will bless you and make your name great. so that you will be a blessing. And he later reiterates that after Abraham is willing to sacrifice Isaac in Exodus 22, 18, and he says, and in your offspring shall all nations of the earth be blessed. It was their pride that did not allow the nation of Israel, to be a blessing to other people. Their religion was a closed religion. If you weren't part of that, you were nothing. You were a dog. Probably the closest people to them in practice of their faith were the Samaritans, and they were worse than dogs. They were given great blessings by God in the Exodus. by God choosing them as his people, by giving them his law, by giving them a land, by being their God, and they failed to be a blessing to other nations. And that's one of the things they were so angry at Christ for. It was okay to be good to a Jew, to a pious Jew. What did they accuse him of? You hang out with whores and tax collectors. You hang out with sinners. He was in the work of being a blessing to the nations. So how do we apply this to us? At first glance, it's easy to think that The psalm teaches us that we should be joyful when we come to worship and that there is truth to that. Our confession says that when we come to hear the word preached and when we come to the sacrament that we are to be prayerfully prepared. Coming to worship, especially when you have young kids, is sometimes a very trying experience. And I can remember when our children were little, coming to church and just asking myself, what am I doing? I'm really going to church? And my knuckles are white on the steering wheel, and the kids are fighting in the back. Who's in my seat? Sometimes I would try to lighten the mood. I would ask them questions, you know, does everybody have underwear on? Yeah, Dad, you know. Until one Sunday. Our son Josh forgot to put underwear on. Coming to worship. joyfully because we should is one thing. I think the point of this psalm is that we should come to worship joyfully because we do not have a faith of remembering. We have a faith of hope. We have a living Savior. We have Christ dwelling in us. Not just promises of the past, we have promises of the past ourselves, that He knew us before the beginning of the world. We have promises for today, that He loves us, He takes care of us today, and we have promises for the future. That should bring joy to our heart when we come to worship a God who cares for us, as a living Savior, who works in our lives, Because we have a hope in Christ. We have hope in Christ living in us. Not a hope in our past, not a hope in our ancestors. But a promise that we are forgiven. A promise that the creator of the universe sees us through the filter of his son and sees the good in us that he has put there. and not the sin in us that we have put there. That should be a cause for rejoicing. That should be a cause for praising the Lord when we come to worship. That should be a cause for us to praise God as the psalmist does in verse one and in verse 29. Oh, give thanks to the Lord for he is good. His steadfast love endures forever. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we come before you as your people. We pray that through the power of your spirit living within us, we have a living faith, a faith that at times may falter, a faith that at times may be weak, but a faith that nonetheless is alive and that you will see through to completion. We do not call ourselves your people because of who our ancestors were. We call ourselves your people because you have loved us and have chosen us and have saved us. and have placed your spirit within us. Let that be a cause for our rejoicing as we come to worship you, a living God, and may that love of you spill out to a love of others as we extend that living faith and become a blessing to the nations. We pray all these things in your son's name, amen.