Amen. Please take your Bibles and turn to Psalm chapter 70. Psalm chapter 70. I am out of my element, amen. I'm used to preaching but to a younger crowd, the average age being 12 to 18. So this is quite a bit higher, amen. And the Sunday morning, usually I'm doing all the music and that's where I like to be. But praise the Lord for this opportunity. I was trying to think last time I spoke or preached on a Sunday morning and it was a while ago and I think I've only done it once or twice. And so that's probably to your benefit, but that I've only done it so few times. But I do appreciate the opportunity to preach this morning. And someone mentioned or asked how long this would be, and I said, no one will be offended if I'm done in 15 minutes, right? The restaurants might be shocked, but I'm sure you will be pleasantly surprised if that happens. But let not your heart be troubled. I think I'll go a little longer than that. Amen, thank you, David. Amen, you got an A in the second man course, amen. And we only started three weeks ago, so wonderful. But really, I'd like to just look at Psalm chapter 70, and this is a song of remembrance, a psalm of remembrance or a song of remembrance. And the background for this passage is taken from Psalm chapter 40. This is the last five verses of Psalm chapter 40. And really, Psalm chapter 40 is a song of deliverance, a psalm of deliverance given by David. And we know the story of David's life. Many of us have studied the life of David and really just have appreciated his humanity, and we see the emotions of life, we see the physical anguish that people go through, and really, in the Psalms, we see that we are, yes, we are spiritual beings, but we are emotional creatures. And God made us that way. And I know when I was growing up and early in the ministry, I felt like I had to put my emotions in check. I had to not show my emotion. And I believe that that hindered me really from being effective in the ministry. And so when we think about emotion, we don't like to see people in our when we get emotional, whether we're sad, we're crying, whether we're going through grief, whether we get really angry and we almost blow a fuse, we don't like to reveal that about us. Many of us like to put on a front, a presentation of ourselves that we want other people to be pleased with. But throughout the Psalms, what we see here is an emotional man. And also, not only an emotional man, but a spiritual man as well. And all of us are spiritual beings. Not one of us can set aside the spiritual aspect of our life and think that we will be okay or that we will have a satisfied life. We are spiritual beings, we are emotional beings, and yes, we're physical. But as we go through this Psalms, there's three definite thoughts that I want us to take home this morning with us. And just by way of introduction, Psalm chapter 70 is a Psalm of remembrance. You might say that Psalm 70 is the edited version of Psalm chapter 40, because here in Psalm chapter 40, we see a Psalm of deliverance, David is talking about how God has brought him through so many different situations, so many times that people were pursuing David. You just think about all that David had to go through, the issue with Saul and how Saul was pursuing him to take his life and to keep him from fulfilling God's will for his life. And then you see some of David's own mistakes where he was yes, a man and he fell into sin and that anguish and the spiritual separation that he felt with his God. And then there were also those times of rebellion in his kingdom and how he again was running for his life. And so you just see the various pulls and issues that David had to deal with. And one of the greatest things that we can look at David's life and say, you know what? David was no different than we are. David was no different than we are. He was a physical being, he was a man, he was an emotional being, and he was a spiritual being. And everything that he faced, we, in one way or another, we will face that as well. We're gonna go through those difficult times, we're going to face struggles, and really, as we look at Psalm chapter 70, verse four is the one that really jumped out to me, but we'll take this entire chapter and just really give it a light, a real light viewing, and then we'll dig into verse four, but Psalm chapter 70, verse one, it says, make haste, O God, to deliver me, make haste to help me, O Lord. Let them be ashamed and confounded that seek after my soul. Let them be turned backward and put to confusion that desire my hurt. Let them be turned back for a reward of their shame that say, aha, aha. Let all those that seek thee rejoice and be glad in thee. And let such as love thy salvation say continually, let God be magnified. Verse five, but I am poor and needy. Make haste unto me, O God. Thou art my help and my deliverer. O Lord, make no tearing. And as we look at this psalm, really what I want us to see is I want us to see that we need to seek the Savior. We need to seek the Savior, and we need to rejoice. We need to be glad in His salvation, and we also need to magnify the Lord. But as we go through this psalm, I want us to see that there is a peace that comes through knowing our shepherd. The psalmist was known as the shepherd of Israel. He wrote Psalm chapter 23, and how many times have we looked at Psalm, and many times we see it quoted on the back of a funeral program. And really it's meant for a psalm to help us through life, not just through the dark times of death, but through life in all aspects of it. And so there's a peace that comes through knowing our shepherd in an intimate way. This brings us an uncommon peace that a natural man or an unsaved man cannot know. And many of these Psalms were written as songs. They were songs. And really Psalm chapter 70 is taking that prayer or that praise from David. And many commentators believe that they were reworking, they took Psalm 70 and reworked these last few verses so that it could be used in the temple worship and that it could be brought forth in a song in worship to the Lord for a special purpose. And so as we look at this, we see the psalmist's prayer of help. The psalmist's prayer of help. And you know, many times we go through situations of life and we see the Psalms here. Many times the songs that are not only found in the book here, the Bible, the songs that are found in our hymnal are taken out of great times of distress. great times of anguish in people's hearts and in their lives. And what we see here, my mind, as I was thinking of Psalm chapter 70, and you saw the anguish that the psalmist was going through, my mind automatically went to Fannie Crosby, and she was a great hymn writer of the past. And if you would look in your hymn book at number 697, it's, My Savior first of all, my Savior first of all, knowing that she had gone through her entire life not remembering or being able to see a single person's face. But yet she was looking forward to that day in heaven where when she would wake up in heaven, she would see her Savior first of all. That's an amazing thing. And you think of how many people become bitter because of physical maladies, and many people become bitter because they feel that God has cheated them in some way, and yet she kept her perspective. My mind also goes to the hymn writer G.A. Young. He wrote hymn number 406 in our hymnal. God leads us along. God leads us along. And sometimes we think, oh, he just had a great spiritual day one day and he decided to write a nice flowery poem and that really just, you know, he was just on the mountaintop. Well, actually it was written in a time of great despair because He had surrendered to preach. He had a young family and he, it was back in, I believe the late 1800s or early 1900s and he had moved his family. He was a successful carpenter, but he had moved his family because he had surrendered. to God to preach the gospel. And as he was living in a shack, if you will, and he had used his skill and extra money that he received from preaching, he would use that and he built his family, not a big mansion, but a nice humble home, a home he supplied with his own hands. And there were some young men in that community that didn't like his preaching, that really stood against what he was preaching. the gospel, and one night when they were coming home, he saw that his home was in flames, and those young men had set his home on fire and burned it down to the ground. And then, he wrote, God leads his dear children along, some through the water, some through the flood, some through the fire, but all through the blood. And so, we just see that in the Psalms, the psalmist really reveals who we are in our physical state, our emotional state, as well as our physical state. And so we see the psalmist in verse one, he says, the psalmist's prayer for help. And one thing I want us to remember is that we all need help. We all need help. Sometimes you just can't muscle through it. Sometimes you just can't get up and say, okay, we're just gonna work through this thing. Sometimes it's gonna knock you flat. Sometimes it's gonna, you won't physically feel like doing anything, you won't emotionally feel like doing anything, you won't spiritually feel like doing anything. You just wanna sit there and just, bah. And the psalmist saw that we need help, and we need to see that we need help. We can't do it in and of ourselves, we all have needs. We all have needs. It may be that some have the financial needs, some may have physical needs, some may have those emotional needs, but we all have needs. My mind goes to the physical needs that we have. It could be an ailment that someone is going through that no one else knows about. It could be that you're suffering through something and you don't have the peace to tell anyone else, but we need that help. We need that help. It could be that you're waiting for something, some news in regards to your physical wellbeing, and it's hard for you to express that. We have physical needs. It could be something that has plagued you for years and years and years. We all have needs. And if we don't have physical needs, just live a little longer and we'll have some physical needs. We'll have some physical needs. Paul talked about that thorn in the flesh that he had to work through and it was sent to buffet his body. And you see the anguish that goes on when we have those physical needs. There's also the emotional needs that we go through. And many times the greatest trials we face are dealing with the emotions from the various issues that have to be dealt with on an emotional level. There's those relationship difficulties that we face. Have you ever had a relationship difficulty? We all have. We all have, it could be a marriage difficulty, it could be that feeling of being distant from the ones that you love, that one who is pushing you away, and God understands that, and Paul understood the emotions that a person goes through, and so we see that we have physical needs, we have emotional needs, and we have spiritual needs. My mind goes, let's go to Hebrews chapter four, Hebrews chapter four. Hebrews chapter 4, let's begin reading in verse 14. It says, Seeing then that we have a great High Priest that is passed into the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our profession. Verse 15, for we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin. Verse 16 says, let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need. And that's exactly what the psalmist did in Psalm chapter 70. He cried out for help. Why? Because he was in physical need, he was in emotional need, and he was in spiritual need. But yet Christ understood all of this. Christ was tempted in all points like as we are, yet without sin. Christ knew what it was to be touched with infirmities. He was touched with the feelings of our infirmities. Christ knew what it was like to be tired. When the disciples came to Him and they said, carest thou not that we perish, the disciples were just wrapped up in their emotions and the physical danger that they were facing, and yet Jesus Christ was tired, and Jesus Christ was worn out from His ministry. Christ knows what it's like to be tired. I think he knew Christ was touched with the feelings of our infirmities. Could it be that Christ knew what it was like to be sick, to deal with a common cold? The Bible tells us he was touched with the feelings of our infirmities. He knows everything that we have been through, and he can help us through those times. The emotional stresses of this life, Christ knew. Christ knew. He felt the responsibility. He felt the weight of the responsibility that he had as a man in that society. Can you imagine? Yes, he was fully God, but yet he was fully man. And so he understood every aspect of our life. And he understands the weight of maybe not being able to supply for a family. He knows the difficulty it is to deal with maybe money issues and emotional issues, and he was touched with everything. And so many times, we get our focus off of Christ. We get our focus on our emotional difficulties, our emotional stresses, but I'm jumping ahead of myself here a little bit. But Christ knows what we're going through on every level. on every level. And then in verse two of this Psalm chapter 70, it says, let them be ashamed and confounded that seek after my soul. Let them be turned backward and put to confusion that desire my hurt. There are those that seek to do us harm. Now I'm not saying we need to get a martyr's mentality or a martyr syndrome and just woe is us because we're Christians. That's not what I'm saying. I'm just saying we have to be aware of it. We have to be on guard that Satan is not our friend and Satan is seeking to get us and Satan is seeking to put stumbling blocks in our way to trip us up. How many times could the psalmist say and he talked about how Satan had set a snare and there were those that had set a snare to do him hurt, to do him harm, to destroy him. And yet we see here, there are those that would seek to do us harm. There is the world. In chapter 70, verse three, it says, let them be turned back for a reward of their shame and say, aha, aha. The mocking of God's people by the world. The world seeks to mock us. And the world does mock us. But that shouldn't dissuade us from doing what God has called us to do. That shouldn't keep us from moving forward. And that's what this psalm is really talking about. There's the mocking of God's people by the world. You think of all that David had to deal with and how the Philistines would see the turmoil and the frustration and how many times there was that rebellion against David. And man, the Philistines many times tried to take advantage of God's people at those times. And so we see that, that he had to deal with all those things. And then verse four, there's the joy that comes from our relationship with the Lord. There's the joy that comes from our relationship with the Lord. In verse four, it says, let all those that seek thee rejoice and be glad in thee, and let such as love thy salvation say continually, let God be magnified. The psalmist is saying here, get to know the Savior. In our words today, he's saying, get to know the Savior. Sadly, we often forget that God's ways are not our ways. What am I saying? What do I mean? We face physical problems. We face sickness. We face financial difficulties. We face relationships that begin to fracture and fall apart. And this leads to an emotional roller coaster, the anxious hours, the sleepless nights, and sometimes the lashing out. And many times we don't know where to turn, we don't know what to do in those situations. Have you ever been in a situation where all of a sudden someone may say something, even your child may do something, and it just aggravates you, it gets you in a moment, and then you say, ah! You kind of lash out. Man, that's what Satan seeks to do to us. He seeks to agitate our soul. He seeks to sift us as wheat. And so when we go through these difficult times, we face these problems just as David did. You know, there's those times of despair. There's our hopelessness. And then we cry out to God. Sometimes it's a cry of anger. Have you ever cried out to God in an angry spirit? I have. God, why are you doing this to me? God, why are you allowing this into my life? What is going on here? And we cry out in anger. Sometimes we cry out in grief. Sometimes we cry in bitterness to the Lord. Job, in Job chapter 14, verse two, it says, man that is born of woman is a few days and full of trouble. We're all gonna go through difficulties. We're all going to go through those times of emotional upheaval, just as God's people did, just as we see in the Scriptures that anyone that was used of God, anyone that had a close relationship with Jesus Christ, had to deal with something, had to deal not only with physical, but emotional and spiritual difficulties in their life. And that's really what develops us as Christians. Through this difficult time, the psalmist was able to grow closer to the Lord. And as Satan would seek to use the difficult times in our life to push us away, to get us bitter, to get us mad at God, God wants to use those difficult times to make us into His image, to be more conformed into the image of His Son. And so as the world and our flesh would like to focus on our physical problems first, and then our emotional problems, and then if we have time we'll take care of the spiritual, but God's way is different than that. As we saw on Wednesday, God's way is first spiritual, God's way is first emotional, and God's way is then physical. So we put the spiritual first, Don't ignore our emotions. God doesn't ignore our emotions, but he helps us deal with our emotions in the right way. God doesn't have us ignore the physical. There's a lot said in the scriptures about how we need to take care of things physically, but he helps us deal with every situation of life. And then verse five, it says, but I am poor and needy. Make haste unto me, O God. Thou art my Lord, or my help, and my deliverer. O Lord, make no tearing. All of us need to see our Savior. Never lose sight of the Savior. Never lose sight of Jesus Christ. So what do we need to do this morning? We need to focus on the spiritual. We need to focus on our spiritual man. I don't know what people came to church, what kind of burdens they came to church with, but I do know that whatever burden we're carrying this morning, whether it's emotional or physical or spiritual anxiety that we're feeling, we need to focus on our Savior. We need to focus on Jesus Christ. And so the psalmist in verse four, it says, let all those that seek thee rejoice and be glad in thee. I want us to think about this. And if you leave home or you leave the church going home with one thought, I want this to be the thought. You need to seek the Savior. Seek the Savior. Seek the Savior. Seek the Savior. 1 Chronicles 16, verse 10. It says, glory ye in his holy name. Let the heart of them rejoice that seek the Lord. Seek the Lord and his strength. Seek his face continually. Every day we need to get up and we need to seek the Lord's face. No matter what we're going through, we seek the Lord's face. The psalmist said, I'm going to seek the Lord. And he understood the joy, the peace that comes through. Yes, he was going through a time of where he needed God to step in and deliver him, but he understood that he still needed to seek God. He still needed to pursue that relationship with His Savior. And there's a fulfillment, there's a joy that comes from not only knowing, but seeking the Lord. Seeking Him on a daily basis. Have you ever gotten through a week and you never really picked up your Bible, you never really prayed like you should, and you just kind of have that guilt, that frustration rolls in. But we need to We need to, on a daily basis, seek the Lord. There's a fulfillment that comes from not only knowing, but seeking the Lord. Lamentation chapter three, verse 25, a familiar passage of scripture, and we see where the song, great is thy faithfulness, was taken out of Lamentation. But in Lamentation chapter three, verse 25, the Bible tells us, the Lord is good unto them that wait for Him. The Lord is good unto them that wait for Him, to the soul that seeketh Him. What got the nation of Israel, if you would read through Jeremiah, Jeremiah was known as the weeping prophet, and you would see how the nation of Israel forgot God. They started trying to meet their own needs, and they set God aside, and they got to pursuing other gods, and they just forgot everything that God had done for them And yet in lamentation we see God was willing to restore them. God is willing to restore us. It could be that we just got all caught up in our physical problems, our emotional problems, and maybe we failed time and time again spiritually. We need to come to the Lord and we need to seek Him and He is there. He is there. The Lord is good unto them that wait for Him, to the soul that seeketh Him. Let me ask you this morning, are you seeking the Savior? Are you seeking the Savior? Are you seeking your personal Savior? Could be that you do not know Jesus Christ as your personal Savior. You need to accept Him today. You cannot deal with the emotions of life. You cannot deal with the physical problems of life. And you definitely cannot deal with the spiritual need that your soul has apart from the Holy Ghost of God living inside of you. You need Jesus Christ as your personal Savior. You need Him today. We need to focus, we need to seek the Savior. Psalm 27 verse 8 to 9, it says, And that's a commitment that you and I need to make this morning. As our heart cries, and I believe if we have the Holy Ghost of God's living inside of us, and we hear a message and we read the scriptures that we're seeing this morning, that something in our hearts, the Holy Spirit of God in our hearts would give us that desire and that little nudge in our heart and our mind that says, I need to seek my Savior. I need to seek the Lord. And we need to make that commitment, as the psalmist said in Psalm 27, chapter 27, thy face, Lord, will I seek. And then he says, hide not thy face far from me, put not thy servant away in anger. He says, thou hast been my help. leave me not, neither forsake me, O God of my salvation." We need to seek the Savior in every area of our life. In 2 Corinthians 12, verses 8 and 9, we see the humanity of Paul. We see the the frustration that Paul was going through because of that thorn in the flesh. He says in verse 8, it says, "...For this thing I besought the Lord thrice, that it might depart from me. And He said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee." For my strength is made perfect in weakness. Most gladly, therefore, will I rather glory in my infirmities that the power of Christ may rest upon me." What was the Apostle Paul saying? He's saying, I'm willing to go through what I need to go through so that I can know my Savior better, so that I can be more effective for Him. Sometimes we want the pressure, the intensities of life to be taken off so that we can kind of just coast through life, but we'll never know our Savior apart from those difficult times. Because it's in the difficult times that we learn to trust God. We learn to put Him where He belongs on the throne of our heart. And so we need to seek the Savior. We need to love his salvation. Let me ask you, do you love his salvation? Do you love his salvation? It says, let all those that seek thee, the Lord, rejoice and be glad in thee, and let such as love thy salvation say continually, let God be magnified. Do you love his salvation? Salvation is not in us. All we had to do was accept it. All we had to do is say, thank you, please forgive me of my sin, and accept the Savior. Have we forgotten what God has done for us? The psalmist didn't forget, because as he was praying for that deliverance in Psalm chapter 40, he was able to write the Psalm of Remembrance in Psalm chapter 70. In Psalm chapter 40, verse two, it says, he brought me up also out of an horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings. Isaiah chapter 61, verse 10, it says, I will greatly rejoice in the Lord. My soul shall be joyful in my God, for he hath clothed me, for he hath clothed me with the garments of salvation. He hath covered me with the robes of righteousness. As a bridegroom decketh himself with ornaments, and as a bride adorneth herself with her jewels. Have we forgotten God's salvation and what He has done to us? We ought to love His salvation. We ought to just stop and think about the salvation that we have in Christ. I won't take the time this morning, but read Ephesians, Ephesians 1, Ephesians 2, and just see what God has done for us. the position we have in Christ. I was going to read it this morning, but I won't take the time to read Ephesians chapter 2 verses 1 to 10. I know I've done it before, but do we love His salvation? Have you ever stopped and thought about the salvation that we have? Yes, we'll go through those difficulties, but because we have His salvation, the Holy Spirit of God living inside of us, that enables us to deal with any situation. Not in our own power, but in the power of the Holy Spirit. And so, as we think about this psalm, are you seeking the Savior today? When was the last time you sought Him with your whole heart? not just trying to get us through a difficult situation, but where you genuinely love Him and wanna know Him better, wanna know Him better. We need to seek the Savior. We need to love His salvation. And then the psalmist here at the end of verse four, it says, let God be magnified, because we seek the Savior, Because we love His salvation, we're gonna magnify God in our trials, in the difficulties of life, and even in the good times of life. And so we need to seek the Savior, love His salvation, and then we need to let God be magnified in our life. Let God be magnified in our life. What does it mean to magnify or to be magnified? It means to promote proudly. It means to promote proudly. You know, as I was, I came home later last evening, and my son, he was promoting something. He was looking at the computer screen, checking up the scores of the preseason hockey games, and he's not a Canucks fan, he's a Winnipeg Jets fan, but you know, I've been a Canucks fan, Vancouver Canucks fan since I was young. All right, I think 2004, 2005, they went on a great playoff run, but, We'll save that for another day. But you know what? He was promoting proudly that they were losing. I came home and said, he said, Dad, your team's not winning. Love you too, son. All right? He was proud of that fact. And I'm like, really? All right, it's only preseason. These guys are all getting sent to the minors in a week or two. You know, and, but he was promoting proudly that they weren't doing well. And you know what? Webster says about magnifying, he says, to make great in representation, to exalt in description or praise. You know, do we promote our Savior proudly? As people see us go through the various situations, the various trials, the various times where even when we're in victory, are we promoting our Savior? When we go through those times of difficulties, are we promoting the Savior? When we go through the victories, are we promoting our Savior? Are we magnifying our Savior? This word magnify, as we break down that word in Psalm chapter 70 verse four, it's really, it infers to watchtowers of the ancient cities. Many times you'd come over a rise or you would look at a city in the distance and the first thing that you would notice were the large, Watchtowers, the towers of that city. And that's what is being inferred here. I remember as you would drive into Winkler or you'd look at Winkler from a distance, what would you see? You'd see the Winkler Water Tower. It's gone, but it was there. And it was one of the first things that you notice. And that's what the psalmist is saying, hey, as people see you go through these difficulties, difficult times, these emotional stresses that we all are going to face, the physical maladies, those thorns in the flesh, as they see you go through it and you're seeking the Savior and you love His salvation, what is going to happen is Christ will be magnified in our life. And that's really what brings a Christian fulfillment, is when we magnify our Savior. And so, show Jesus Christ through your life. Show Jesus through your life. John chapter 3, verse 14 and 15. And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up. Yes, we look at all that David went through, and all the anguish that he had to work through, and how many times did God have to deliver him, but it was never about him. It was about His God. And He always brought praise and admiration. He always magnified God. And that's what needs to happen in our life. In verse 15 of John chapter 3, because the Son of Man is lifted up, Jesus Christ is lifted up, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life. In John chapter 12, verse 32, it says, and I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me. Our life, we are here to magnify Christ. We are here to magnify Christ. 1 Peter 2, verse 9, it says, But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a peculiar people, that ye should show forth the praises of Him who hath called you out of darkness into His marvelous light. Philippians 2, verse 15, it says, "...that ye may be blameless and harmless, the sons of God without rebuke, in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation, among whom ye shine as lights in the world." And so in conclusion, Is Christ being magnified in your life? Is Christ magnified in your life? When people look at what you're going through, when people see the physical stress that you're going through, the emotional stress, and even sometimes the spiritual anguish that we go through in this life, are they saying, wow, they're really going through a tough time? Or are they saying, wow, God's grace is sufficient for them? God is giving them exactly what they need. Are we deflecting whatever we're going through, whatever praise we receive, are we deflecting that and saying, let God be magnified?