I'm very pleased to introduce our speaker. You know, sometimes we do say he needs no introduction. Well, I guess that's probably true, but we'll be formal today. Very pleased to have with us Dr. Nick Wilmer, the pastor of Covenant Presbyterian Church in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. And of course, he's one of our adjunct professors and teaches church history. So we're very glad he's here to preach to us today. Let's read God's word. verses, we'll read them all and then we'll consider them briefly this morning. I'm, uh, this usually doesn't mean a thing, but today, because he's there because 12 o'clock is, is a one is a, is an important time. It does mean something. So God's inerrant word. Remember, this is God talking to us. Bless the Lord. Oh, my soul. Oh Lord, my God, you are very great. You're clothed with splendor and majesty, covering yourself with a light as with a garment. Stretching out the heavens like a tent, he lays the beams of his chambers on the waters. He makes the clouds his chariot. He rides on the wings of the wind. He makes his messengers winds, his ministers a flaming fire. He set the earth on its foundation. it with the deeps of the Garmin. The waters stood above the mountains. At your rebuke, they fled. At the sound of your thunder, they took to flight. The mountains rose. The valleys sank down to the place that you appointed for them. You set a boundary that they may not pass, so that they might not again cover the earth. You make springs gush forth in the valleys. They flow between the hills. They give drink to every beast of the field. The wild donkey seeing among the branches. From your lofty abode you water the mountains. The earth is satisfied with the fruit of your work. You cause the grass to grow for livestock and plants for man to cultivate, that he may bring forth food from the earth and wine to gladden the heart of man, oil to make his face shine, and bread to strengthen man's Trees of the Lord are watered abundantly. The cedars of Lebanon that he planted, in them the birds build their nests. The stork has her home in the fir trees. The high mountains are for the wild goats. The rocks are a refuge for the rock badgers. He made the moon to mark the seasons. The sun knows its time. Young lions roar their prey, seeking their food from God. When the sun rises, they still away and lie down in their dens. Man goes out to his work and to his labor until the evening. O Lord, how manifold are your works! In wisdom have you made them all. The earth is full of your creatures. with creatures innumerable, living things both small and great. There go the ships and Leviathan, which you formed to play in it. These all look to you to give them their food in due season. When you give it to them, they gather it up. When you open your hand, they are filled with good things. When you hide your face, they are dismayed. When you take away their breath, they die and return to the dust. When you send forth your spirit, they are created, and you renew the face of the ground. May the glory of the Lord endure forever. May the Lord rejoice in his works, who looks on the earth and it trembles, who touches the mountains and they smoke. I will sing to the Lord as long as I live. I will sing praise to my God while I have from the earth and let the wicked be no more. Bless the Lord. Oh my soul. Praise the Lord. Grass withers and the flower falls. The word of our Lord remains on and on and on. Amen. Amen. Let's pray together. Father, we ask you now to bless this time that we would use it well and we glorify you while we're here. Well, it's always hard for me to preach these because I don't know quite what to do. And so up until 20 minutes ago, I had something else planned. But I decided, no, this is what I want to preach. So here we are. Question for you, what moves your soul? What makes a difference? And we live in a world, I was listening to talk radio yesterday, Actually, I was tempted yesterday driving over here. I heard Sinclair Ferguson preach on persecution and how important it is and necessary for the church and how we think of it often as a curse. You know, it's something must be wrong if we're being persecuted. This position is just the opposite. It probably means we're doing something right if we're being persecuted. And I thought, oh, that'd be a great sermon for these guys because they're going to be persecuted. Let me just tell you, it's going to happen. and it won't be people you don't know usually. But I thought, no, that's it. But as I listened to some of the talks that radio, sports as well as just plain Jane, it struck me again how easy it is for us to use words like amazing and incredible and remarkable and wonderful about the most mundane things. And so, my challenge for you this morning is don't do that. You'll fall into that trap. It's easy. It's easy for Dr. P and I to use words like that for Alabama football. It just is. Over in my part of Tennessee, there are a lot of Kentucky fans float down in there. We're real close to the Kentucky line. And it's easy for Kentucky fans Michigan either. And it just is. And so, A, tame your emotions, but in taming them, direct them the right way. We're made to be emotional. We're emotive beings. That's part of being made in Imago Dei, right? We're intellectual, we're emotional, and we're will. We will. We want. We do. So, there. Psalm 103 would have been a great one to preach because there the psalmist tells us, bless the Lord my soul, and he begins that just as he does Psalm 104 and he ends it the same way, bless the Lord oh my soul. It's full of this call for blessing the Lord, for heaping upon him everything he deserves. But in Psalm 103 it's about salvation, it's about redemption. It's about the forgiveness of sins. It's a beautiful song. It's one of my favorites. That's a temptation this morning too. Psalm 104 though if you notice was more about creation. In fact it was almost completely about creation and at the end providence. So 103 we are to be We're to be wowed and amazed and marveling at God's redemptive purposes. In Psalm 104, we're to be wowed and remarkably moved and saying incredible things, which are really credible, just in case Dr. McGilvrick hears that I said that word, about God as our creator and sustainer or provider. So I want us to look at that a little bit. Listen to what David Dixon, if you've not been acquainted with David Dixon yet, his commentaries, particularly in the Psalms, are so wonderful. Listen to what he says here. As in the former Psalm 103, the prophet stirred up himself and all others to glorify God, especially for the works of grace. Eric Kidner says, variety and breadth, sharpness and detail, sustained vigor of thought, but this song of praise among the giants. And it is. It's a remarkable song. I hope you're familiar with it. I want to become more familiar with it. And Dixon, being of the older Puritan, Presbyterian types, picks up on a theme here. we're looking to this morning basically follows the days of creation. And so that's what I want to do. First, look at the scope of the psalm. What's the scope of the psalm? Scope of the psalm set forth right there in 1041. Bless the Lord oh my soul. We're supposed to bless the Lord. As I said that's just we're supposed to heap upon God what he what he deserves. That's what a blessing is when he does it. When God blesses us. When we do the benediction at the end dispensing the good things of God for his people. And here we are in turn to do that to God, where he prays Thanksgiving, and the way he tells us to do it is by remembering. We're to remember all these things. If you go back to chapter 103 verse 1, that's exactly how he tells us to bless all of our inequities, our diseases, that he is forgiven and healed. Remember, he says, so we're to bless the Lord. But I want you to notice something there in the scope of this psalm. Oh, Lord, my God, you are very great. The scope of this psalm is to bless the Lord and to bless the Lord largely not just because of who he is when he's done, but who he is to us. Personally, one of the things I, you've heard it in class if you've listened. And I say this often in sermons and often around the table with someone. I've been talking to this gentleman recently who's really struggles with assurance. He grew up in a holiness background, Methodism, and then free will Baptist life later. He just really struggles with whether or not you can know any comfort in this life. And, you know, I keep doing all the things. You know, you're looking too much at yourself. You need to look at Christ. Let's shift your attention here. But one of the things I told him recently, I said, you know, you don't understand for whom Christ died. Brothers, you do understand that we as Calvinists are the only ones that can talk about a personal salvation. Arminians can. They believe in a generic, you know, salvation for masses. But we can really talk about Christ Jesus as our personal Savior, because He died personally on the cross for us. This long list, Revelation 7 says, a list beyond numbering for us, for whom Christ died. And the psalmist gets that. Oh Lord, my God, you are very great. So don't miss that. The scope is to declare the greatness of God and to do it as one for whom God has done all these things. He did all this salvation for us back in chapter three and all of creation and providence. And one of the beautiful things you see in this is that everything God created had a purpose. It wasn't just, you know, the vegetation. Let there be vegetation, just for the sake of there being vegetation. Vegetation was for the creatures to eat, for us to enjoy. In a time like this, in the spring, when we're starting to see the vegetation come back to life, not that it was dead, but we talk in those terms, it's coming back to life, sprouting, little buds coming on the trees, haven't driven out the countryside toward Blue Ridge, but I'm guessing we're pretty close to not already having peach blossoms. We're reminded that it's not just an end in itself. God had a purpose for that. It was for the crown jewel of creations for us, as well as for the other creatures to enjoy. So the scope of the song is to bless the Lord for He is great. Second, and this is God's greatness. And he argues God's greatness twofold. I already said that one is creation. And then briefly toward the end, he picks up on providence. I just want to walk us through this a little this morning. I would take more time in a different context, but notice God said, let there be light. Genesis one, three through five. You see it there in verse two. Beginning in verse one, he says, you're clothed with splendor and majesty, covering yourself with the light as with a garment. Now, if that were the only thing the psalmist said in this whole psalm, we would be stretching. We'd be doing some sort of hermeneutical gymnastics to get the first day of creation out of that. But because of what follows, I don't think it is a stretch at all. And remember, what was it that lit up the first day? It was not the sun and the moon. Christ. We know that because we go to Revelation 21 and 22 and we're told that. When there is no longer any sun or moon, there's still the brilliance of Christ flooding the heavens. The glory of the Lord that Isaiah saw filling all the firmament. And so, this is day one, covering yourself with a light as with a garment, stretching out the heavens like a Day two, you go back. God said, let there be an expanse in the midst of the water. He called the expanse heaven. There was evening, there was morning the second day. Heaven's established, distinct from the created realm the second day. And then day three, he opens up. God said, let waters under the heavens. So you got the separating, the land and the waters. There's evening, there's morning the third day. Verses five through 17 pick up that thing. He set the earth on its foundations. You've covered it. Now I wanna just draw your attention to something. Could be a little confusion. You just read this passage. Verse nine, you set a boundary that they may not pass, so that they might not again cover the earth. Temptation there is to reap the flood here. But I think if you'll bear with me just a moment, we'll move back to Job chapter 38. It is interesting. Dr. Shaw, but in the commentaries I didn't find anybody referencing this. And that's always a little pichon on camera. I wonder if I'm right on this, but I really do think I'm right on this. And Dr. P is going to say amen in a moment because he's preached through Job and in Job 38, Job a better way to end chapter 104. But nevertheless, you have to wonder if the psalmist writing 104 had not been reading Job. Because when God assaults Job at the end, if that's too strong, I'm sorry, but I don't think it is. I mean, he really is. He's assaulting Job. He's laying it on thick. Job, who are you? I question you, and you make it known to me. And then he goes on, and he starts, where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me. Or who, verse eight, shut in the seas with the doors when it burst out from the womb, when I made clouds its garment, and thick darkness its swaddling band, and prescribed limits for its door, and set bars and doors, and said thus far you shall come and no farther, and here shall your proud ways be stayed. day three. Then day four, we see it as we move on down. He made, verse 19, the moon to mark the seasons. The sun knows it's time for setting. You make darkness and it's night. When the sun rises, verse 22 says, they still away. Man goes out to his work, to his labor until the evening. So we have day four. There in those verses, Well, so now, notice how he feels this. He didn't just say the moon to be beautiful and golf dad at night, or the sun. By the way, I was just hearing an astrophysicist speak a couple of days ago, and the sun has at least 5 million more years, so don't worry about the sun running out on us. When the sun rises, they steal away and lie down in their dens, the young lions. Man goes out to his work. Notice there's a purpose here stated. The moon, the sun. It involves us, not just to heat the earth, not just to provide a time to sleep, though there is, but there's this purpose in mind. The scriptures are clear about this. Bad things happen at night. Wicked men do their deeds at night. And here the schedule is set for us. Yes, animals, they retreat, but man during the day goes out to labor until the evening. Six days of labor set forth there and given to us in the fourth day, the sun. for. Oh Lord, how manifold are your words. In wisdom have you made them all. The earth is full of your creatures." It's just, here's this dot, this parenthesis, this Paul thing where he just can't contain himself anymore and he has to burst out into emotion. He has to burst out into praise. He's blessing wrote. But Karl Barth got this right in Chapter on Wonder, W-O-N-D-E-R, in his Evangelical Theology and Introduction, written not long before his death, right at the end of his teaching career. He says this, if at any point in doing your theology you're not struck by awe and He's right. He was wrong in other things, but he was right on that. And you see that in the psalmist. What moves the psalmist? Just thinking about God's creation. But notice something. This is not just thinking about God's creation. This is thinking about God. He's focused on the one who created. And if you go back, and we don't have time, but if you go back just, well, let's just start up there with a few examples. Verse one, you are clothed verse six you covered it with a d verse nine you set a boundary verse 10 you make springs you get the point over and over the emphasis as dr dyer would say is upon god you did these things there's no idea here that they just sort of kind of happen theistically naturalistically and by that i mean theistically in the sense this writer has a clear understanding in his mind that God did this actively and then notice he says okay I'm not finished verse 25 here's the seat great and wide you almost get the sense in fact I think probably this is the case he's sitting there he's sitting there on the edge of the Mediterranean probably maybe vacation I don't know he's looking because read that here's the sea great and wide you can just see him sitting there and then he says hey there in the distance go the ships and leviathan leviathan look at him playing out there let me ask you is that what happens when you go to the beach are your eyes fixed often on the horizon it's remarkable God. That water, water would be all over us that quickly. So we're told if we're not for God having set the bounds. Here's the sea great and wide. Now you're saying already established. And it's interesting now keep in mind but somebody's going to read through this and say but you know he kind of gets out of order sometimes because even though he comes on uh he comes on down to talk about uh you know the creatures now this is this Because all these things were made for us. All these things were done for us. The birds in the skies, he's already plugged them in elsewhere, not because that's where they came in creative order, but because to show us that was the purpose of those earlier creation moments. This is not him giving us day one, day two, day three in a technical the scheme days one and following but he puts it all in perspective he paints it for it so it's not just this technical mechanical repetition so that you understand that God had purpose in all of this so he did all this flitting about with creation and the wonders of it and man's place That's the point. We can't miss that. And as I said, verse 24 epitomizes that. Oh Lord, how manifold are your words. But he's not finished. He moves from creation to providence. You pick that up there in verse 27. He says, these all look to you to give them their food in due season. When you give it to them, they gather it up. When you open your hand, it on God. They either have it or they don't have it because God. Period. When you take away their breath, they die. When you send forth your spirit, the play there, the breath, the spirit, you know your Hebrew well enough already. And so when you, when a being loses its life, the giver of life comes along and replenishes the earth. That's part of Providence. May the glory of the Lord endure forever. May the Lord rejoice in his works. Who looks on the earth and it trembles. Who touches, we're still providing here. We're still upholding, guiding, directing, governing all things whatsoever from the greatest to the least here. Who looks on the earth and it trembles. Who touches the mountains and they smoke. And then this section reminds you of what the whole chapter is about. about God providing and providing he then intermitted with it is praise he just now he's out of control you know there's no way to verse 24 and erupt into praise it's just every it's just it's every he's alternating now God does something he praises he blesses the Lord and notice the last bit of providence comes with judgment Let sinners be consumed from the earth and let the wicked be no more. Listen, in the presence of, in the face of, in the context of a holy God who he's talked about at length for giving sin and now he's talked at length about creating and providing, there's no place for sin. There's no place for sinners. They have no place before a holy God. of course points us forward to the new heavens and new earth the new creation where there is no more mourning and weeping there is no more death there's no more sin in that context and then closes bless the lord oh my soul now you say no it closes with praise the lord i want to suggest to you that praise the lord belongs with chapter 105 I'm an inerrantist. This is not an inerrantist issue. This is, did they get the verses right in this cluster? Notice how 105 ends, praise the Lord. He's been in this little series of bless the Lord to begin, bless the Lord to end, bless the Lord to begin, bless the Lord to end, and it looks to me like praise the Lord So what moves you? Remember how we started with a question? What moves you? Does your salvation that God has procured for you and applied to you by the Holy Spirit, does that move you? Is that what you're amazed by? How about creation? And this is a wonderful time of the year to let creation prompt you to say, their percentile of success in the brackets for March Madness. What is it moves you? What is it amazes you? Tell you what, folks, that's the only thing to keep you going in the middle of hard times. If your God's not the one amazing you, people won't. I will guarantee you. Your God has to be the one. I trust that's true. With Bob Drake, if you believe that, let's pray. Father, we thank you for this morning, for your word, and ask now that you'd be pleased to bless us as we have blessed you. We don't deserve it, you do. We ask now that you'd be very pleased to heap upon us and we'd be moved.