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Oh yeah? Yeah. All right. Hey, don't you ever cry again. Yeah. Oh shit. Come on. Come on. Come on. I don't know what else to do. I don't know what else to do. Okay. You know, there's a lot that
we do off the grid. Okay. It's so good to have you back.
I really appreciate it. You know, it's good to have you
back. It's good to have you back. Well, it's good to have you back.
It's good to have you back. It's good to have you back. It's good to
have you back. It's good to have you back. It's good to have you
back. It's good to have you back. It's good to have you back. It's
good to have you back. It's good to have you back. It's
good to have you back. It's good to have you back. It's good to
have you back. It's good to have you back. It's good to have you back. It's
good to have you back. It's good to have you back. It's good to have
you back. It's good to have you back. It's good to have you back.
It's good to have you back. It's good to have you back. It's good to
have you back. It's good to have I'm going to try and put the
lid on it and see if it works. Good. I don't know. I don't know. I
don't know. So, Alright, we need another orange
fruit. I'm happy to have the opportunity
to do this. So obviously we've got fruit
being gone, we're going to do it a little differently tonight.
But we'll still just kind of open it up to favorite requests. And we'll sit down for 15 minutes
before we start. So anybody got one to begin with? 116C. 116C. Can we get the 1,
2, and 5? 1, 2, and 5. 1, 2, 3, C. 1, 2, and 5. ♪ How shall I know that grace will
be shown ♪ ♪ When all things are good to me ♪ ♪ Selfishness,
love, love, mercy, love ♪ ♪ I do know, love, love, mercy, love
♪ We are in Shaitan, Illinois,
Illinois, Illinois, Illinois, Illinois, Illinois, And on His face His face He wept,
And His mouth His mouth He spoke. Uh, let's sing just the first
verse of that. 2.45, the first verse. He is living in my heart ♪ Where'er thou art and thou wilt
remain with me ♪ ♪ Blessed is the fruit of thy wisdom in the
land ♪ ♪ Blessed is the fruit of thy wisdom in the land ♪ ♪
Praise thy goodness, praise thy goodness ♪ Edward? 44. 44? Number 484, let's sing One and
Three. One, two, three, four, five, We lay our peace at His foot,
and sing of His love. Sing of His healing, and of His care. With us by His
waters, we know His care. O'er the land of the free and
the home of the brave? Where is the land of the free
and the home of the brave? Let's do 509. 509. 509. We'll do 1385 of 509. 1385. ♪ O'er the land of the free ♪ ♪
And the home of the brave ♪ ♪ O'er the land of the free ♪ ♪ And
the home of the brave ♪ ♪ For years we have danced in the
dancing gale ♪ ♪ In the halls of New Brunswick ♪ ♪ Where we
gave our praise to the brave and free ♪ ♪ For our God, our
God, our God, our God, our God, our God ♪ Six, four, three, four and three.
3, 4, 8, 3. You must sing 1 and 4. 3, 4, 8, 3, 1 and 4. ♪ My soul ♪ ♪ My soul ♪ ♪ My soul
♪ ♪ And on earth peace shall prevail
♪ ♪ And on earth peace shall prevail ♪ ♪ And on earth peace
shall prevail ♪ I think it's 308. 308? Yes. Okay. 308. Let's sing again, 1, 2, 3. It's
the day of our lives, the day of our lives ♪ He is in the middle ground ♪
♪ Christ is born today ♪ ♪ Christ is born today ♪ ♪ Rich in marriage
and wars ♪ ♪ God is strong and wise ♪ ♪ How did he not give
away ♪ ♪ Jesus Christ, the Lord himself ♪ I think we got time for maybe
four or two more. Three to nineteen. Three to nineteen? Okay. 319. Let's sing 1 and 3. 1 and 3 of 319. You are the light
of my life You are the light of my life ♪ We ever will love you forevermore
♪ ♪ Oh, when we awoken ♪ ♪ For the beginning and the end of
time ♪ ♪ Our God made us adore him ♪ ♪ Oh, God made us adore
him ♪ ♪ Our God made us adore him Christ the Lord ♪ ♪ Sing
all ye nations, sing in exultation ♪ ♪ Sing all ye citizens of heaven
above ♪ ♪ Glory to God, all glory in the highest ♪ ♪ God the best
adored, God the most high ♪ Okay, and I decided that I would
pick the last one. So, let's start to 42, and we'll
say 7C. 42C. Now let's sing just the 1st and
the 4th, 42 C vs. 1 and 1. Where art thou living, that we
may see? Where art thou living, that we
may see? For I am your eyes and your soul,
And why so troubled shouldst thou be? Hope thou may guide
me, my soul, Who gives His saving help to me? Who gives His saving
help to me? so so Well, good evening. It's very
much a blessing and a privilege to be with you all again on this
Lord's Day evening to worship our great God together. And let's
stand as he calls us to worship from his word in Psalm 95, verse
6. Psalm 95, 6. Oh, come, let us
worship and bow down. Let us kneel before the Lord,
our maker. And let's go before our Father
in prayer this evening. Our God and Father in heaven, truly how
majestic is your name in all the earth. You have made all
things and redeemed your people. You who are eternal, immortal,
invisible, infinite in power, wisdom, and goodness, dwelling
in unapproachable light. To you belong honor and eternal
dominion. May we honor you with our lips
and our hearts as we answer your call to worship you this evening.
Hear us, Father, for we gather together in the name of our Lord
and Savior Jesus Christ, your only begotten well-beloved Son
and our only mediator. Truly our help is in your name,
you who made heaven and earth. For to you, Father, together
with the Son and the Holy Spirit, one God from all eternity and
to all eternity, be glory, wisdom, power, and dominion both now
and forevermore. Amen. Well, people of God, our
God greets us this evening from His Word in 1 Timothy 1, saying,
Grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father in Jesus Christ
our Lord. Glory be to the Father, and to
the Son, and to the Holy Ghost, as it was in the beginning, is
now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen, amen. Our psalm of praise is 103E.
O come, my soul, bless thou the Lord. 103, setting E. O come, my soul, bless Thou the
Lord, Thy Maker, and all within me bless His holy name. Bless
Thou the Lord, forget not all His mercies, His pardoning grace
and saving love proclaim. Bless Him, ye angels, wondrous
in might. Bless His servants who in His
will delight. Good is the Lord, and full of
kind compassion, most low to anger, plenteous in love. Rich is His grace to all that
humbly seek Him, Boundless and endless as the heavens above. Bless Him, ye angels, wondrous
in might, Bless Him, His servants, who in His will delight. His love is like a father's to
his children, tender and kind to all who fear his name. For well he knows our weakness
and our frailty, He knows that we are dust, He knows our frame. Bless Him, ye angels, wondrous
in might. Bless Him, His servants, who
in His will delight. We fade and die like flowers
that grow in beauty, like tender grass that soon will disappear. But evermore the love of God
has changed us, still shown to those who look to Him in fear. Bless Him, ye angels, wondrous
in might. Bless Him, His servants, who
in His will delight. High in the heavens, His throne
is fixed forever, His kingdom rules for all people to know. Bless ye the Lord, through all
His wide dominion, Bless His most holy name, O Thou my soul. Bless him, ye angels, wondrous
in might. Bless him, his servants, who
in his will delight. Amen. Well, we now have the opportunity
to confess our faith using the words of the Apostles' Creed,
which can be found on page 851 in the back of the Trinity Psalter
hymnal, should you need it. 851. Church of Christ, what is
it that you believe? I believe in God the Father Almighty,
maker of heaven and earth. I believe in Jesus Christ, his
only begotten Son, our Lord, who was conceived by the Holy
Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate,
was crucified dead and buried. He descended into hell. The third
day he rose again from the dead. He ascended into heaven and sits
at the right hand of God the Father Almighty. From there he
shall come to judge the living and the dead. I believe in the
Holy Spirit, the Holy Catholic Church, the communion of saints,
the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and
the life everlasting. Amen. Please be seated. We come now to our responsive
reading, which this evening will be in the third psalm, Psalm
3. So turn with me, if you would,
to Psalm 3 in your Bibles. I will begin by reading the odd-numbered
verses, if you would respond with the even-numbered in Psalm
3. Psalm 3 is a Psalm of David,
when he fled from Absalom, his son. O Lord, how many are my
foes? Many are rising against me. Many
are saying of my soul, there is no salvation for him in God. But you, O Lord, are a shield
about me, my glory and the lifter of my head. I cried aloud to
the Lord, and he answered me from his holy hill. I lay down
and slept. I woke again, for the Lord sustained
me. I will not be afraid of many
thousands of people who have set themselves against me all
around. Arise, O Lord. Save me, O my
God. For you strike all my enemies
on the cheek. You break the teeth of the wicked.
Salvation belongs to the Lord. Your blessing be on your people. Amen. Well, our corresponding
psalm is the setting of Psalm 3. Oh, Lord, how many are my
foes? Number three here in the Trinity
Psalter hymnal. And we'll stay seated to sing. ♪ O come, O come, Emmanuel ♪ ♪
O come, let us adore Him ♪ ♪ O come, let us adore Him ♪ ♪ O come,
let us adore Him ♪ ♪ To God, my Sheol, and Holy Lord
♪ ♪ The King of all my world ♪ ♪ My God, your God, who art
on this earth ♪ ♪ Is ever to be said ♪ Oh, say does that star-spangled
banner yet wave O'er the land of the free and the home of the
brave? ♪ And pray with healing voice ♪
♪ We make thanks to the Lord, dear Lord ♪ ♪ Now age after age of old ♪ ♪ For
the Savior, the King and Lord of all ♪ Amen. Well, we have the opportunity
once again now to go to our God and Father in a time of prayer.
So please pray with me. Our Father in heaven, you are
the one deserving of praise from all your creation. You made the
heavens, the angels, the sun, the moon, and the stars, and
they proclaim your glory every day and every night. Even the
storms themselves fulfill your command. You rule over all nations,
and the rulers of the nations owe you praise and honor. We
praise you, Lord, tonight, not only for your great power and
majesty, but also because you have redeemed a people for your
great name. We praise you that we can come
before you and address you as Father through Christ, you who
are the creator and Lord of creation. Father of the fatherless and
protector of widows are you, O Lord, in your holy habitation.
We confess our sins to you, Father, and we know that every day we
have failed to keep your law in many different ways. We often
fail to love you with all of our heart, soul, and mind, and
we often fail to love our neighbors as we love ourselves. And so
we repent of this and ask that you would forgive us our sins
for Jesus' sake. We thank you, Lord, for the good
news of the gospel that we hear proclaimed to us week in and
week out. We thank you for what Christ has done for us on our
behalf while we were yet sinners. We thank you also for the comfort
and assurance that this brings to us as we come more and more
to realize that all of your promises and sure-o's find their yes in
Him. We praise and thank you that we can come before you and
address you as Father, even as we're doing this very minute
through Christ. And so we ask that you would
be with our governing officials at the local, at the state, and
at the federal levels. May you give them wisdom to govern well
in truth and justice, and may we be able to live quietly to
mind our own affairs and to work diligently so that we may walk
properly before outsiders. We pray that your spirit would
enable us to pay to all what is owed to them. Taxes to whom
taxes are owed, revenue to whom revenue is owed, respect to whom
respect is owed, and honor to whom honor is owed. We ask that
you would grant us economic stability here in our country now so that
we can continue to support our families. And we also pray for
those around the world. We especially think right now
of Ukraine. Would you give health, rest, and the ability to continue
to those who are working with and making arrangements for the
refugees? We ask, Father, that the war would cease and that
evil would be defeated. We also lift up to you those
recovering from the earthquake in Japan. We thank you for this
local church here in Kalamazoo that has been faithful in the
proclamation of your gospel, the administration of your sacraments,
and the exercise of church discipline. We thank you, Lord, that this
has been true of this church for so many years now, and we ask
that it would continue for generations into the future. We praise you
and thank you for the officers you have set up in this congregation
and for their faithfulness and work. And we thank you that we
can take part in this dialogue of worship each and every Lord's
Day, to receive from you through your word and sacraments, and
to be able to respond to you in gratitude through prayer,
song, and offerings through our only mediator, Jesus Christ.
Please be with us again tonight as your word is proclaimed. We
ask that you would give me clarity of mind and speech, and that
you would be with all of us as we actively listen. May your
Holy Spirit illumine the word to us this evening. And we ask,
Lord, not only for this local congregation, but for your church
all over the country and all over the world. We pray specifically
tonight for Emmanuel OPC in Ontario. We praise you, Lord, that a church
began sharing their building with EOPC. And we ask that you
would continue to lead them, as you have over these past months
and years, to a long-term location. We also praise you for the temporary
pulpit supply you have given to them, and ask that you would
give them a full-time minister soon. We also pray for Pastor
Marcus' work in Battle Creek. May you raise up a large, strong,
ministry-minded Bible study group. that he can lead that will soon
become a new congregation of Christ. We pray for the missionary
families as well that are supported through the HUB spokes program,
for the Westervelds in Quebec, for the Hopps in Haiti, and for
the Johnsons in Thailand. We also thank Lord of all the
seminaries here and abroad, and we pray for them that they would,
as they seek to train ministers of your word, that you would
give them strength, that you would give them the funds that they
need, and that you would give them protection and strength.
We pray that you would give discernment, courage, and protection to the
faithful pastors in Eastern Europe and Russia and all the old Soviet
bloc countries where things are getting worse and worse now.
We also lift up, Lord, the church in Canada, as they are facing
these intense political pressures and have been for some time now,
now backed by legal sanctions, not to preach biblical sexual
ethic. We ask that you would strengthen
them and give them wisdom moving forward. And finally, Father,
we ask that you would watch over us and keep us this coming week
and bring us back again next Lord's Day to hear from you and
to respond to you again. For it's in Christ's name that
we pray by the power of the Holy Spirit. Amen. Well, we have an
opportunity once again to respond to our God and his great mercy
that he's shown to us, his great grace to us with our tithes and
offerings, which this evening are designated for the hub spokes
missionaries, the hub spokes missionaries that invite the
deacons to come forward. so so Yeah. Yeah. Well, please stand with me as
we sing our hymn of preparation, 255, Day by Day, 255. StSq3 3.30 (-0.99") Day by day, and with each passing
moment, Strength I find to meet my trials here. Trusting in my
Father's wise bestowment, I've no cause for worry or for fear. He whose heart is kind beyond
all measure gives unto each day what he thinks best, lovingly
as part of pain and pleasure, mingling toile with peace and
rest. Every day the Lord himself is
near me, With a special mercy for each hour. For my cares he fain would bear
and cheer me, He whose name is counselor and power. The protection of His child and
treasure Is a charge that on Himself He laid. As Your days, Your strength shall
be in measure Is the pledge to me He made. Even in every tribulation, So
to trust your promises, O Lord, That I lose not face we consolation. offered me within your holy word. Help me, Lord, with trial and
trouble meeting, there to take us from all father's sin. One by one, the days of moments
fleeting, till I've reached the promised land. Amen. Well, let's go to our God
and Father one more time this evening and ask for His help.
Our Father in Heaven, we thank You for Your Word, and specifically
tonight, we thank You for Psalm 77. We pray that Your Spirit
would illumine us to understand Your Scriptures tonight. And
we know, Lord, that all of Your Word in the Old and New Testaments
points to Christ. We pray that we would be able
to see Him even better in the Old Testament this evening. For
it is in His name that we pray. Amen. We'll turn with me, if you would,
to the 77th Psalm. The 77th Psalm is perhaps not
the most well-known in all the Psalter, but God's people have
found a lot of comfort through it. It's been a blessing to many
people, especially in days of trouble that we go through. And
hopefully, I trust the Spirit will impress this upon our heart
this evening. Psalm 77, I'll begin reading
in verse 1 all the way through the end of the psalm, all 20
verses. This is to the choir master, according to Jeduthun,
a psalm of Asaph. I cry aloud to God, aloud to
God, and he will hear me. In the day of my trouble, I seek
the Lord. In the night, my hand is stretched out without wearying.
My soul refuses to be comforted. When I remember God, I moan.
When I meditate, my spirit faints. You hold my eyelids open. I am
so troubled that I cannot speak. I consider the days of old, the
years long ago. I said, let me remember my song
in the night. Let me meditate in my heart.
Then my spirit made a diligent search. Will the Lord spurn forever
and never again be favorable? Has his steadfast love forever
ceased? Are his promises at an end for
all time? Has God forgotten to be gracious?
Has he in anger shut up his compassion? Then I said, I will appeal to
this, to the ears of the right hand of the Most High. I will
remember the deeds of the Lord. Yes, I will remember your wonders
of old. I will ponder all your work and meditate on your mighty
deeds. Your way, O God, is holy. What
God is great like our God. You are the God who works wonders.
You have made known your might among the peoples. You with your
arm redeemed your people, the children of Jacob and Joseph.
When the waters saw you, O God, when the waters saw you, they
were afraid. Indeed, the deep trembled. The clouds poured out
water. The skies gave forth thunder.
Your arrows flashed on every side. The crash of your thunder
was in the whirlwind. Your lightnings lighted up the
world. The earth trembled and shook. Your way was through the
sea. Your path through the great waters.
Yet your footprints were unseen. You led your people like a flock
by the hand of Moses and Aaron. This ends the reading of God's
holy word. May he bless it to us this evening.
Well, I'm sure each and every single one of us here have experienced
frustration of some kind in our lives. There's a lot of different
types, of course, that we could look at. A lot of different things
that can happen that can make us frustrated. Sometimes it's
little things. It's getting stuck in traffic
when you're already running behind. Sometimes, though, There are
big frustrations. Sometimes things in life don't
go the way that we thought they would, and they don't go the
way that we think they should. And this can be a number of different
ways. Perhaps a loved one has died
unexpectedly, or we ourselves have received a terminal diagnosis
that we did not see coming, or perhaps a grown child walks away
from the faith. There are any number of things
that we could list of the deep frustrations and grievances of
life. And we can ask where God is during
these times. It can cause us to take a step
back and to think, what is going on? How is it that this is possible? How can this happen to one of
God's children? It can make us begin to wonder,
perhaps even begin to doubt. Well, Psalm 77 can help us here. Psalm 77 is the kind of psalm
that we know as a psalm of lament or psalm of lamentation. It's
very personal and profound, it's very deep, and it's a psalm that
was written by the psalmist in the midst of a terrible situation. We don't know exactly what it
was. We don't know quite why Asaph was led to read, or rather
to write, this psalm that we read. But we do know he was suffering. Suffering quite profoundly. And
we'll see what we normally see in Psalms of the Lament. We'll
see really two sections here. That the psalmist will begin
in these kinds of psalms by crying out to God, asking Him for help
in the midst of this situation, whatever it may be that's causing
him so much pain and grief and suffering. And then usually about
halfway through the psalm, there's this pivot, there's this change,
there's this turn to praise. Suddenly the psalmist begins
to understand who God is once again, even if he can't see exactly
what it is that God is doing. And so Psalm 77 follows this
method. It gives us the prescription
on the one hand of what's wrong, or the diagnosis of what's wrong,
and the prescription of how to think about it, how to pray to
God through the midst of it, what to take comfort in, and
what God has done for His people. So we'll see two things, especially
this evening. First of all, we see the day
of trouble. Secondly, we see the deeds of the Lord, the day
of trouble and the deeds of the Lord. So the day of trouble is
in verses one through nine. And as we read through these
verses, perhaps as we read through it just a minute ago, you were
struck by how honest Asaph was. That he wasn't holding back anything.
He wasn't doing what we tend to do and sweep things under
the rug here. He was bearing his heart, bearing
his soul to his creator. He was crying out in all of his
pain and grief and wondering and even doubt. He's saying things
that perhaps make us feel a little bit uncomfortable because these
are the thoughts and prayers of one of God's children when
it seems like to him that God has abandoned him. We see suffering
and frustration and disorientation. He's lost. Life doesn't make
sense to him. As sometimes happens to us, this
is not how he thought things would be, and even worse, this
is not how he thought things should be. And so he's crying
out to God in the midst of this. We see ourselves here perhaps
as he's shockingly honest about how he does not understand what
it is that God is doing or even where God is as he's in pain. Perhaps Psalm 77 is one of the
most helpful psalms in the entire Psalter in helping us to understand
what to do with our doubts and our wondering. Many psalms are
honest. But few Psalms, perhaps, are
as deeply, profoundly open about the things that go through Asaph's
mind when he is going through these terrible times, about the
prayers and the questions, as we'll see in just a few moments,
that he asks God when he's in the midst of his situation. He
starts out in here in the first few verses by crying aloud to
God, we read. Whatever it is that's striking
Asaph is so intense that he is audibly crying out to God in
his anguish. He's trying to call out to God
with his voice. And this doesn't seem to be a
recent situation either as we take a look at some of the language
that he uses. It seems that this is not something that just happened
overnight. As with many psalms, we don't know exactly what it
is that Asaph is going through, we don't know exactly what led
to the writing of this psalm, but we know it's intense, we
know it's painful, and we know that it seems to be going for
quite some time. This is biting and gnawing within
him until he cannot help but cry out to God, because he has
nowhere else to turn. And you see, Asaph was part of
the covenant people of God. He had faith in God's promises.
He was a descendant of Abraham, not only naturally, according
to the flesh, but also spiritually as one who had faith in the same
promises that Abraham had. But clearly, this does not mean
that Asaph's life was free of trouble and of wonder and of
doubt. It didn't lead to a pain-free
existence for the psalmist. And perhaps that's something
that we should stop and think about. Maybe the sheer number
of lament psalms in the Psalter can help us to realize something.
That life is hard. It is full of troubles and pains
and trials and tribulations. And that the Bible faces this
head on. It doesn't sweep it under the
rug. Especially the psalms show life as it is. Warts and all. Pains and trials and tribulations
and all. And do we ever think, perhaps
we've heard this, perhaps we've even said it, come to Jesus for
an easy life free of troubles. Maybe we don't say it as explicitly
as that, we aren't as brash as that. But perhaps in our minds
there's some understanding, there's something that we think that,
yeah, you come to Jesus and he's the answer to all of your troubles.
And ultimately that's true, but that doesn't mean it's going
to be an easy life. It doesn't mean things are going to go well
for us at all times. The Psalms show us this, and
we see Asaph desperate. In verse 2, we see him stretching
out his hand in prayer. It's almost as if he's reaching
out, trying to grab a hold of God, and he's wondering where
he is. He's trying to see if God even hears him. This is his
day of trouble, as he writes, and he can't seem to get relief,
yet he knows that if relief does come, it will only be from God.
He knows in verse one that God will hear him, yet he is not
comforted. He remembers God, yet he moans
and his spirit faints, as he says. Notice with me again verse
four. You hold my eyelids open. I am
so troubled that I cannot speak. He is so troubled that he cannot
sleep. In fact, more than that, it's as if he's saying to God,
you yourself are reaching down from heaven and opening up my
eyelids, keeping me from getting the sleep that I need. Whatever
this trouble was, whatever this situation was that he found himself
in, it was causing severe insomnia for him. And we know this, of
course, don't we? Anyone who's gone through significant troubles,
often one of the first things to go is sleep. And of course
that makes everything spiral out of control more, doesn't
it? The more tired you get, the more sleep you miss. When it
rains, it pours, it seems for Asaph. That everything is falling
apart for him, that everything is going the exact opposite of
what he would hope and dream. So he begins to think of God's
promises in the past. And then he compares them to
his present situation, what he is experiencing right now here
in the present, in the here and the now. He begins to wonder. It makes him even more disoriented.
He's even more lost after he does this, because he knows his
God, the God in whom he believes, has made these promises to his
people. He has done these things in the past. And yet here is
Asaph, a child of this very same God, suffering in the present
without any seeming relief in sight, without anything seemingly
on the horizon that's going to change his situation. And so
what does he do? He begins to ask deep questions,
which is exactly what we should do in situations like this. He
doesn't sweep his suffering under the rug. He doesn't pretend it
isn't that bad. He doesn't try to man up, as we might say, and
keep plugging away. He asks specific questions of
God, these specific rhetorical questions as we see in verses
7 through 9. Will the Lord spurn forever and
never again be favorable? Has his steadfast love forever
ceased? Are his promises at an end for
all time? Has God forgotten to be gracious?
Has he in anger shut up his compassion? We begin to see as we read through
these rhetorical questions that whatever is afflicting Asaph,
whatever trouble he is in, seems to be trouble for the nation
of Israel as a whole. And these questions are full
of covenantal terms, whether it's maybe some kind of famine
or disease or defeat in war, whatever it may be, it seems
to be afflicting all of God's covenant people. And Asaph is
asking, have you forgotten your promises? Have you turned your
back on us? Have you abandoned us? Are you
no longer our God? Will you ever again be gracious
or will you spurn us forever? Perhaps we can identify with
the psalmist here in some of our wonderings. He's going to
God with these deep questions. He's going to his covenant Lord
asking these questions about his covenant faithfulness to
his promise. Are you going to be faithful
to what you have said? He isn't pretending that he's
not hurting. He's being quite open. Shockingly open, perhaps.
Shockingly honest compared to maybe what we would expect. And
he cannot yet see what he's looking for, but at least he's looking
in the right direction. He's looking to God, the only
one who can save him, the only one who can deliver him from
whatever this is that's going on in his life. And he does not
turn inward. He doesn't follow the advice,
perhaps, that we're tempted to follow from our day and age.
Now follow your heart or look inside yourself to find answers.
Asaph knows what's in himself and it's not helping. His help
will come from the Lord, his help will come from the sovereign
God of Israel, or his help will not come at all. And as he's asking these questions,
as he's wrestling with the deep things of God, as he's truly
trying to figure out what is going on here and who is God
as he's acting in the world, Finally, answers begin to come
to him. Finally, he begins to see things as they truly are. This brings us to our second
point this evening, the deeds of the Lord in verses 10 through
20. Here is where we see this great
pivot that we come to expect as we read different psalms of
lamentation, where the psalmist goes from crying out to God in
his pain and discomfort, his doubts and his wonderings, to
praising God for who he is, perhaps even in the midst of this suffering
situation that is still going on. We notice in verses 10 and
11 that this is where the shift in thinking occurs. You might
notice a little note in your Bible, at least in the ESV, there's
a little 2 at the end of verse 10, and basically all that means
is we're a little bit unsure about what this particular word
could mean, whether it could mean years or changing. But really, the only difference
this makes is whether or not he changes his mind in verse
10 or verse 11, because this is the point where he begins
to really understand who God is and what God does. He's beginning
to think differently. Suddenly, he begins to remember
the deeds of God on behalf of his people, and not just to remember,
oh yeah, God did that, but to really think about them, to meditate
on them, to realize what their importance truly and really is. He remembers your wonders of
old, as he says in verse 11. He remembers, he realizes that
no God is great like his God. And this God redeemed and rescued
his people in the past. So what Asaph is doing is suddenly
he's taking comfort in what God has done for his people in history. Now this Psalm, Psalm 77, became
my favorite Psalm at a particular point in my life. It was a A
tough time. I was away at seminary my first
year there, and my parents were getting divorced back home, and
all these things were happening. My theology was changing. I was
becoming more and more reformed from a Baptist background. All
these things seemed to be swirling in life, and I was beginning
to wonder, where can I look to for comfort? What should my foundation
truly be? Is it just going to be uncertainty
and doubt and wondering and pain the rest of my life? And so I
began to look at Psalm 77. I really began to understand
what it is that Asaph is saying here under the inspiration of
the Holy Spirit. I began to look not to how I felt, not to how
things seemed to be to me at the time, but to what God has
done in history for His people, what God had done in history
for me. You see, what Asaph does here
is he does not go to the old cards that perhaps were tempted
to play to say, well, I know that this is true because it
just feels right to me. Or we could say, perhaps Christianity
is true because it's made such a positive difference in my life.
Now, those things may be true for you. I hope that you can
say that Christianity just seems right to you and that it has
made a positive difference in your life. But in the midst of
suffering and doubt, when the trials and tribulations come
upon you, Is this what you should be banking on? Is that your foundation
and your hope and your comfort and your assurance? Is that where
your hope should lie? And the answer certainly is no. Could
Asaph, the psalmist, as he's lying awake at night feeling
like God himself is holding open his eyelids, as he's crying out
to God, as he's reaching his hand out for comfort, can he
say, well, at least this feels right to me? And certainly the
answer is no. Life didn't make any sense to
him at that point, as life often doesn't make any sense to us
as we go through trials. Could he take comfort in the
fact that this has made such a positive difference in my life? And clearly
the answer is no, he was still struggling, he was still suffering
and doubting. In fact, perhaps it was worse for Asaph than for
someone who didn't believe in the Lord, because Asaph had this
understanding of who God is, that he is the all-powerful one,
he is the good one, he is the one who takes care of his people,
yet he was suffering. You couldn't make these things fit together.
Boys and girls, I don't know if you've ever played with those
building blocks like Legos or Duplos before. Maybe you've seen
a younger sibling first begin to understand how these things
work and sometimes you'll watch a very young child try to put
the blocks together and it doesn't work for him. They try to connect
things that aren't supposed to connect. They try to put things
together backwards or side by side. And you can begin to see
the frustration mount, can't you? These things go together
somehow, the child just can't figure out how. And that's what ASAPH is doing
right here. That's often what we experience as Christians,
because we know that our God is in control. Particularly as
Reformed and Presbyterian Christians, we know He is sovereign in all
things. We know that He is great, we know that He is good, and
we also know that we suffer. Making those two things fit together
can be difficult. Sometimes it almost seems impossible
to our eyes. But Asaph doesn't look to what
he knows in his own life. He doesn't look to how he feels,
whether this seems right to him or whether it's made a positive
difference in his life. Instead, he looks at and remembers
what God has done for his people in history. Specifically, what
he looks at is the exodus of Israel from Egypt. Let's read
these last several verses again, because this is very important,
not only for this psalm, but really for the Bible as a whole.
Look with me again at verses 15 through 20. You with your arm redeemed your
people, the children of Jacob and Joseph. When the waters saw
you, O God, when the waters saw you, they were afraid. Indeed,
the deep trembled. The clouds poured out water.
The skies gave forth thunder. Your arrows flashed on every
side. The crash of your thunder was in the whirlwind. Your lightnings
lighted up the world. The earth trembled and shook.
Your way was through the sea, your path through the great waters,
yet your footprints were unseen. You led your people like a flock
by the hand of Moses and Aaron." Asaph goes back in his mind to
the Exodus, and we can ask, what was the Exodus for him? What
was the Exodus for all the people of Israel? Well, to put it quite
shortly and quite simply, the Exodus for them was salvation. It was redemption in their minds.
And the rest of the Bible often uses language and imagery from
the Exodus when it describes how God is going to redeem and
save his people in the future. The Exodus was not just the salvation
of the Hebrew slaves from their bondage in Egypt. It wasn't just
the plagues that God brought upon their oppressors. It wasn't
just the fact that they were able to plunder the Egyptians
as they left. It wasn't just walking through the Red Sea on dry ground
as the waters closed in on their enemies who followed them. Yes,
this included a lot until Israel even eventually came into the
Promised Land. It included the wilderness wanderings. It included
coming to God at Mount Sinai and meeting with Him. It included
the conquest. It included coming into this
Promised Land. It's a dwelling in God's promised
place where He would dwell with them as their God. and they would
dwell with Him as His people. Really, this is the reversal
of what we see as the problem in the Bible from Genesis 3 onwards,
isn't it? Boys and girls, what happened
in the Garden of Eden when Adam and Eve fell, when they sinned?
Well, they were in God's holy presence, we know. In His garden,
really in the first temple, as we could think about it, which
Ezekiel 28 tells us was a mountain garden. And when they sinned,
they could no longer be in His presence. So they were driven
off that mountain, driven out of his temple, driven away from
his presence. What we see in the Exodus is a reversal of this.
Here we see the people of God brought through judgment of the
sea, unscathed, alive. They are brought out of their
oppression and they are brought directly to the mountain of God once again. Now, this was big in and of itself.
This was the destruction, at least for a while, of one of
the greatest powers of that age, of ancient Egypt. It was the
delivery of thousands upon thousands of men, women, and children who
were formerly slaves walking through the midst of a body of
water that was divided for them. This would have been breaking
headline news if they had such a thing in those days, but it
was always meant to point to something bigger. Nexus was always
meant to point to something better. We see that the Old Testament
and the New Testament itself speak about the redemption that
Christ won for his people through the lens of the exodus. They
use the same terminology and language and figures of speech
and mental word pictures from the exodus. This is the greatest
exodus, the greater exodus, not merely the redemption of Hebrew
slaves from Egypt, but the redemption of a people for God's great name.
We begin to see here, don't we, that all the parts of our salvation
are here in the story of the redemption from Egypt. The Hebrew
slaves were rescued from the oppression of Pharaoh. We are
rescued from the dominion of sin and the devil. The Hebrew
slaves are brought into the presence of God at Sinai, and we are brought,
as Hebrews 12 tells us, to Mount Zion and to the city of the living
God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable angels in
festal gathering, and to the assembly of the firstborn who
are enrolled in heaven, and to God, the judge of all, and to
the spirits of the righteous made perfect, and to Jesus, the
mediator of a new covenant. The Hebrews are brought through
their wilderness wanderings in the desert to Canaan, the promised
land of God. And we are brought through our
wanderings on this fallen, sinful, often painful, tribulation-filled
earth into the ultimate Canaan, the ultimate promised land, into
heaven. So what we see here, what ASAP
does is what we should do when doubts begin to creep in our
minds, when pain is threatening to overwhelm us, when we're beginning
to question God and His promises because of our intense suffering.
Notice what we haven't read here in the second half of Exodus
77. ASAP's situation itself has not changed, but his perspective has. Life
is still chaos to him. His situation is chaotic in his
mind as he looks around and sees everything happening. But now
he remembers God's control over the chaotic waters of the Red
Sea. Much of the language from this
psalm, from Psalm 77, is taken from the song of the sea in Exodus
15. It's that song that the children of Israel sang to God after he
had delivered them. The Israelites, we have to understand,
were terrified of the sea. Although the promised land was
on the coast of the Mediterranean, the Israelites, for most of their
history, wanted absolutely nothing to do with it. They loved the
land. They loved the farms and the
vineyards and that sort of thing. The sea was terrifying. The sea
was uncontrollable, untamable chaos. That's one of the reasons
why it's so shocking that Jonah got on a boat to avoid God's
call to go to Nineveh. because Israelites were supposed
to avoid boats. It could only lead to trouble, it could only
lead to death and destruction because you can't control what's
happening on the sea, you can't control the waves, you can't
control the wind, you cannot control the storms, you cannot
control the beasts in the sea. It was chaos, pure chaos. But God delivered His people,
we read in Psalm 77, from the raging waters, even in the midst
of the raging waters. And that brought great comfort
to Asaph in the midst of his own chaos, in the midst of his
own uncertainty. He begins to remember and realize
that the Hebrews in Egypt couldn't see their salvation coming any
more than he could, yet it came just the same. He begins to understand
that God is free. He's not operating according
to our schedule. He's not doing things exactly in the same way,
in the same order that we want, but he is still great and he
is still good. He finds comfort not in his feelings,
but in what God has done outside of him in history, as should
we. This is where we should go and look in the midst of our
suffering. Notice again with me verse 19. Your way was through the
sea, your path through the great waters, yet your footprints were
unseen. In the words of one scholar,
that God delivers his people without visible footprints is
of great significance for the psalmist, whose suffering arises
from the perceived absence of God. God's presence need not
always be detectable for His deliverance to be certain. God's
presence need not always be detectable for His deliverance to be certain. So when we come to church on
the Lord's Day, when we gather one day out of seven, we hear
in some way the message of our own exodus, led not by Moses,
but by Christ Himself. This is where we hear the message
and the promise of deliverance proclaimed to us week in and
week out. This is where God has promised
to come and meet with us, to strengthen us through the proclamation
of his word and the administration of his sacraments. And maybe
you're here this evening and you do not have faith in Christ.
You're not trusting in him for your salvation, for your standing
before a holy God. And you're wondering, how can
I be part of this ultimate exodus? How can I know that I will be
truly redeemed, not from physical slavery, but totally and completely? Well, the message to you is a
very simple one. To repent of your sins and to believe the
gospel, to trust in this Christ who came to deliver His people,
to throw yourself on His mercy and grace and know that He will
redeem you just as He has promised. Only those who are in Christ
can have this hope. And if you're here tonight and
you're trusting in Christ, even if you're going through the midst
of a terrible situation, even if the pain is overwhelming you, This is not a promise that God
will take you out of that situation. It's not a promise that everything
will change as we think about it. But it is a promise that
just as God went through the chaotic waters of the Red Sea
with Israel and protected them, so He is with you. Even in the
midst of your chaos. And so Christian, I don't know
why you are suffering. And most likely neither do you.
I don't know when your suffering will end, and I can probably
say that neither do you. But we can both know this, that
God has acted in history to save his people, in the Exodus and
ultimately in Jesus Christ. So when suffering comes, and
it will, don't sweep it under the rug, don't try to press on
through it. Don't pretend Like it's not that
bad or that you're doing okay when you really aren't. Instead,
cry out to God with the psalmist. Cry out to God with Asaph. Wrestle
with the deep questions while keeping your eye on the Lord
as he did. And ultimately, Christian, remember the exodus. Remember
that God delivered his people from slavery in Egypt. That he
brought them through the waters that killed their oppressors.
That he brought them to the foot of his holy mountain and eventually
he brought them into his own land where he dwelt with them
and they dwelt with him. You remember also, Christian,
that God, through Christ, has redeemed you. That Jesus has
paid the penalty for your sin. He obeyed perfectly in your place. He rose again for your justification.
He is even seated now at God's right hand, ruling over all things.
That He is your High Priest, interceding for you with God
forever. And that you who have faith in
Him, have been rescued from the tyranny of sin and the devil.
You have been brought unscathed through the judgment. You have
come to the very mountain of God, and you will one day dwell
in the ultimate promised land forever. And so let's close with
a description of that promised land in Revelation 21. And I
heard a loud voice from the throne saying, Behold, the dwelling
place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and
they will be his people. And God himself will be with them
as their God. He will wipe away every tear
from their eyes, and death shall be no more. Neither shall there
be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former
things have passed away. Remember, Christian, that God
has acted in history to save you. And because of that, you
can know that this land will one day be your land, no matter
the suffering that you are experiencing in this life right now. Because
God has redeemed his people in history, because Christ has come
and led a greater exodus than Moses led. And we can have hope
even in the midst of suffering. Let's pray. Our Father in heaven,
we praise you for your sovereignty over all things. We praise you
for your mercy and grace to your people, whether undeserving Hebrew
slaves in Egypt or undeserving sinners in Michigan. Thank you,
Lord, for the salvation that has been won for us in Christ.
We pray that as we make our way through this life that is often
full of pain and tears, that you would keep our eyes fixed
upon this redemption and the hope that we have in Christ.
For we pray all these things in his name. Amen. Well, please stand with me as
we sing our psalm of response, number 222, O God, our help in
ages past, number 222. O God, our help in ages past,
our hope for years to come. ♪ And our eternal home ♪ Under
the shadow of your throne ♪ Your saints have dwelt secure ♪ Subdition
is your arm alone ♪ And our defense is sure ♪ Before the hills in
order received her frame. From everlasting you are God,
through endless years the same. A thousand ages are like an evening
dawn. Short as the watch that ends
the night before the rising sun. The busy tribes of flesh and
blood Lived all their lives in tears. Carried downward by your
flow And lost in falling years. Time, like an ever-rolling stream,
Clears all its sons away. They fly, forgotten airs of dream,
Rise at the opening day. Though far our help in ages past,
Our hope for years to come, Well, I will pray a prayer of
blessing for us as we leave this place. Our Father in heaven,
may the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and
the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with us all. We pray this
in Christ's holy name by the power of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
♪ Oh, say does that star-spangled
banner yet wave ♪ ♪ O'er the land of the free and the home
of the brave ♪ ♪ O'er the land of the free and the home of the
brave ♪ ♪ Oh, say can you see by the dawn's
early light ♪ ♪ What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming ♪ ♪
Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight ♪ ♪ O'er the ramparts we watched were
so gallantly streaming ♪ No, I didn't think that was the
best time. It was a very different time for me. It was a very different time
for me. It was a very different time for me. It was a very different time for me. It was
a very different time for me. It was a very different time for me. It was a very different
time for me. It was a very different time for me. It was a very different
time for me. It was a very different time for me. It was a very different time
for me. It was a very different time for me. It was a very different time for me. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. We're going to start with feedback,
and then we're going to move to progress. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No. No. Yeah. So, I will have myself, but,
uh, I don't know what I'm going to do about it. Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, you're, you know,
you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. And then the next one. Woo! Woo! Woo! So that's how I described it
up there. So I'm going to take a description of how I came up with that idea. And I'm going to give
you guys a little bit of a guess as to how I came up with that idea. Yeah, so my voice kind of died.
I don't know why that happened. I don't know what someone did. So I realized I was trying to
be more self-conscious than he was. I made a mistake in one place,
and I'm ashamed. Yeah, it's funny. I mean, you suck at everything else, but that's how I do this. So, yeah.
I don't know. Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Please. Yeah. I've never seen her in a long
period of time. And every time we get exposed to people, Margaret is constantly on her phone, asking if there's
anything she can do to help fix some of the things that are wrong with her. This morning, she was found
dead in the kitchen by the attorney on the street doing medicine. And during all of that time, she turned
to Margaret and asked, how's your daughter doing? Yeah. Yeah.
In the Day of My Trouble
| Sermon ID | 3282222434369 |
| Duration | 32:19 |
| Date | |
| Category | Sunday - PM |
| Bible Text | Psalm 77 |
| Language | English |
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