You're listening to audio from Ascend Church. For more information about Ascend or to access more Gospel-centered tools to grow as a disciple of Christ, visit ascendkc.org. Good morning. If you don't all know me, my name is Chad McKinley, and I have the pleasure of serving in many roles here at Edison. I am the Director of Discipleship as a staff member. I am also an elder that gets to serve and lead our church. And what's incredible is that I've been here for 12 years. And time has flown. I have been able to see just God's working and blessing over that time. It's a big milestone. Another big milestone is in September of last year, I turned 40. Yeah, I'm still here. I'm still alive. I'm surprised. I'm pretty sure when I was a 10-year-old, I thought, 40, you're dead or over. And here I am. No, but it's also an incredible thing to see just over what 40 years looks like. And I think one thing that's been happening more and more in my life is that I become more and more of somebody who reminisces about what's going on. And so if you don't know reminiscing, that's indulging in enjoyable recollection of past events. And I'm at the point where there's a long history of past events that I get to enjoy and reflect on. And actually recently, just because of some stirrings and because of some things that God has brought into my life, I've actually been reminiscing over pictures that have occurred over time. And one of those pictures is actually one of the pictures the team is gonna put up behind me. And this is a picture that sits on my desk as a continual reminder. This is actually a trip that my family took to Keystone, Colorado about two years ago. And as you can see, I mean, you all see the picture and it's like, oh, that's beautiful. But for me, as I reflect and think about that picture, a couple of things come to mind. One, I'm a huge outdoors fan. So when I look at that picture, the smell, like right, the smell of pine trees is just indistinguishable. And then the cool air. This is hot summer, and when you go up into the mountains of Colorado, it's like, oh, this is cool and refreshing where we're at. But some other details that you don't know that I know is that this is a great picture that I have with my family with smiling kids, but I'm pretty sure there's some bribery behind this picture. Because I remember that, hey, you see how young they are. And I remember we were all going, we're super excited to go on a trail walk, to go hiking. And you know how that goes with young kids. It's really exciting for about the first five minutes. And there's crying and there's tears that are happening. So my wife wanted me to get a picture with our kids, so guess what? You gotta bribe them somehow. Hey, there's gonna be dessert at the end, or we're gonna go get some special lunch. Whatever it was, it got us to this point where we're smiling, right? And this trip was a great trip. This was a great opportunity to do it, and yes, I can reminisce about the circumstances, like the smells and all that. I can reminisce about the family, and you know, family trips always are interesting. But what I'm most reminded of is when I reminisce about these things, it puts things into perspective. Because the reason this picture sits on my desk isn't because of this specific trip. It's actually a constant reminder of priorities in my life. And so, three priorities that outstand all other priorities is first, it's my walk with the Lord. So I have to remember, I have to be faithful to Him. And I have another picture with my wife, it's just the two of us on my desk, and it reminds me of the priority of marriage in my life and to be faithful there. And then this one with my family and my kids, it reminds me I have a priority as a father. And it just puts all those priorities in proper perspective as I move through the day. Another thing it does is it helps me to rejoice in that God has done so much in my life that as much as the turmoil, as much as things might be difficult for that day, I can rejoice in what God has done and what he's gonna continue to do in my life. And what's so important about that is that I think we're going to look at Psalm 103 today, and that's what David is doing. He's reminiscing about his walk with the Lord. And as you know, Psalms is not in chronological order. In fact, throughout my study, I had a difficult time finding, like, when did David write this psalm in his life? And honestly, I couldn't find anybody that gave a hard conclusion. But personally, based on the context, based on what this says, I would say this is at the end, or towards the end of David's life. And David is actually looking back. He's seeing all the things that have occurred, everything that he's experienced in life, and he's reminiscing. He's not just reminiscing on that. He's reminiscing on the truth of God and what God has said about Himself. So I know I told you Psalm 103, but we're actually going to look at a different Scripture before. I want you to turn back to Exodus 34. It's going to be on page 74. Because what I think that David is reminiscing on is the specific thing that was told to Moses back in Exodus. Because a lot of the same language, a lot of the same words that occur in Exodus 34 are actually words that show back up in Psalm 103. And so, if you don't know the context, is that basically Moses, he's on the Mount Sinai. Things are kind of coming to an end. The tablet's actually being rewritten because you'll have to read the story. But Moses basically petitions God. He's like, God, let me see you. And what God says is like, hey, Moses, I'd love to do that, but you will die immediately, basically. Like my glory, my presence is too much, so I want you to hide behind this rock, and I'm gonna pass before you. And so look at verse 5. It says, And so the Lord passed before him, and he's only going to let him see the backside of his glory. That's all Moses gets to see. But he passes before him. And the Lord proclaims this. Look what the Lord proclaims. The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgressions and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and children's children to the third and fourth generation. And Moses quickly bowed his head toward the earth and worshiped. And so what we're going to find is that's a truth that I want you to tuck in your mind. I want you to put that in your mind because as we go through Psalm 103 is I think what David is meditating and reminiscing on is this truth and how it's actually shown up in his life. You see, as we look at Psalm 103, that's on page 502. If you need a Bible, there's Bibles in front of you. It's in those Bibles on page 502. By the way, we as a church want a Bible in every person's hands. So if you don't have a Bible at home, I would encourage you, take this home with you as a gift from us so that you can study Scripture. But David is really reminiscing and meditating on this promise as it has permeated his life. And he is meditating on the truth because it reflects that God's character, what he says about himself, is true. And meditation is a thing that I think has been captured by the world. If you talk about go meditate, you're probably thinking, oh, I've got to sit in a certain position. I've got to clear my mind of all things and just sit there by myself. That's not what biblical meditation is. No, meditation is actually taking truth and rehearsing it over and over in our mind. And it's important discipline in our life. In fact, listen to what David Saxon says in God's bowel plan for the mind. He says, without meditation, our faith and understanding will remain simple and underdeveloped. But meditating deeply on God can inspire rich, loving fellowship with Him. He gives the illustration in his book, it's kind of like tea. If you guys know how to make tea, you know that you start with what? You start with a cup of hot water, right? And then most of us in this day and age, is we got little bags, right? Bags full of herbs and spices that when we put into that water, what happens? It changes the water. It starts to permeate the water. But one thing that you have to do, if you don't know, it's not my favorite thing, but I have done it before, is you have to dip it over and over. You have to let it steep before it's going to get to the flavor that it's intended to be. And so what meditation is, is actually we are the cup of hot water. Our minds are the cup of hot water. And so what we do when we meditate is we actually take the truth of what God says and we dip it in continuously to let it steep and permeate how we think, how we desire, and then how we live. And so it's an important exercise and this is where I think David's getting, he's like, he's having to meditate on the truth about who God is so that he can get to a point to worship And so you can see the big idea for today. Meditating on God's perfect devotion to His people and His promises provoke true worship. So if you're in Psalm 103, you can follow along with me, but before we do that, I just want you to know that David begins the psalm with a call for his personal meditation and worship. And so first, we should meditate on the incredible grace that God has demonstrated in our life. And so you can see how he opens the psalm. He says, bless the Lord. Oh, my soul, all that is within me, bless his holy name. This word bless is going to continue to come up, come up. And so how we can understand what bless is really worship. Worship the Lord. He's calling it for him internally, like, oh, my soul, all that's within me, all my energy, everything within me, devoted to worship because he is holy. Then he goes on, bless the Lord, O my soul. The refrain, again, repeating this. But now you see the statement, and forget not all his benefits. Because David knows that he is going to have to rehearse in his mind the benefits of the Lord if he is going to worship Him properly. And then he goes on to look at the list. He says, who forgives all your iniquity, who heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from the pit, who crowns you with steadfast love and mercy, who satisfies you with good so that your youth is renewed like the eagles. See, David's worship requires such dedication because God's grace has been provided in such abundance. Get that? His worship requires such dedication because God's grace has been provided in such abundance. Because what he's reflecting here, remember, we have David the king. The man here was wealthy, right? He was a king. He had his own country. Like, you'd think he'd be excited about all the blessings that came with that. But that's not what he focuses on. No, he actually focuses on the spiritual reality of God's grace in his life. Because when it says, he who forgives all your iniquity, is that this is a man who just isn't talking about this conception of God's forgiveness and iniquity. No, he's reflecting on himself. If you know David's life, David did some nasty things. So David committed adultery with another woman. And then guess what? He arranged a hit on her husband to be murdered. He also numbered Israel, a thing that went against God's command that resulted in thousands of people dying under God's judgment on his sin. And we could go and list different things of David, of what he committed, but what David's reflecting on is he realizes the magnitude of his sin, his iniquity. He looks at it and goes, God's forgiven it all. He forgives all your iniquity. He goes on to who heals all our diseases. This heal, you could put maybe physical disease in there, but I think based on the context, based on the fact that he's looking at spiritual realities, the diseases he's talking about are actually just the spiritual hardship, the spiritual judgments, the spiritual whatever afflictions that come with being sinful and hurtful and the suffering that occurs. And so when he looks at who heals our diseases, he's he's reminded the eternal prospect of that one day, everything, all the pain, all the suffering, it's going to go away. It's because of God and His healing. Then it goes on, who redeems us, who redeems our life from the pit. Redeem is an interesting word. Redeem actually means buy back. For money, usually, is what it's talking about. And so when it says it's bought, it was redeemed or bought back from what? From the pit. It's that he's reflecting on the fact that God has made the necessary payment to actually where he doesn't have to go through judgment apart from him. He continues on. It's like, all right, now I'm... been redeemed from the pit. That's no longer my destination." But now he's reflecting on something of the riches he's found in God. He said, "...who crowns you with steadfast love and mercy." I love that phrase. I mean, we have a king who's saying, who crowns you, who crowns each one of us, but not with a physical crown, but with steadfast love. This word for steadfast love is hesed, and hesed is a word that in Hebrew that actually means covenant faithfulness. What does that mean? Well, it's a reminder that God loves us. He has a devoted love to His children, and He demonstrates that devoted love by keeping every single promise that He has shared. And so as we look at this word and look at all the promises that it holds, it's a reminder, like, we can have confidence that God is going to fulfill it in our lives if we are his children. So he rewards us with promises and grace that's unearned. Then he goes on, who satisfies you with good. Satisfies with good, and you're like, all right, yeah. Now we're getting to the richest part here, David. But that's not what David's after. David's actually reflecting on like, nah, that satisfaction's already happened. He's provided everything necessary in himself, and that is what's good. He's satisfied means that he provides himself in relationship with you so you can be content. And by being completely satisfied in God alone and his provisions or benefits, you can have a satisfied mind in any situation. And these benefits are the present reality, not something that you have to eventually gain. Best way I can think about that is like when you're full from a large dinner. Right? When you're full from a large dinner that I can set about any other food in front of you, even your favorite food. Maybe it's your favorite dessert. Maybe you're able to do that. But if you are truly, truly full, you're not going to have a desire for that. When he's reflecting on it, we are so satisfied with his good that there's nothing in this world that we need to actually be content, to have joy, to have peace. Then we can look at the result of that, and that's what it says, "...so that your youth is renewed like the eagles." What he's reflecting on is like, okay, we have gone through all the benefits of being in Christ, and that should be what strengthens us. That's what strengthened him to worship God. Bless the Lord, O my soul. That is fueling the worship that he's giving to God, and that's what should fuel our personal worship in the Lord. Because what David unpacks is really the spiritual reality that could be for each one of us. Because when we read this, we can fast forward to the New Testament, and guess what? Many of the same promises, maybe they're worded a little bit different, are shared there too. In fact, throughout this word, you will find the things that are benefits to David are the same things that God promises as benefits to us if we are his beloved children and follow him. Because we can have any and all of our iniquities forgiven. Doesn't matter how bad, how terrible things we have done, is that there is a magnitude in each of our lives that we have sinned against God and needs to be forgiven. We have been healed, if we believe in Christ, from being spiritually dead to spiritually alive. We have hearts of stone that turn to hearts of flesh. We have been ransomed, we have been bought with the blood of Christ. We have been changed from enemies to children. As we are crowned with His steadfast love, we have been changed from outsiders to heirs, to heirs in Christ. We get to inherit what only belongs to Christ. We get to inherit it that should satisfy us. Because it is everything we need in this world. So my real question then, it comes down like, as we reflect on this, are you remembering the benefits of the Lord? Because I know like you, probably like me, it doesn't matter what stage you are in your spiritual walk, is that oftentimes we start to let those things slip. We start to forget those things. We become apathetic to the magnitude of what God has done in our life. We should be like David, because David wasn't looking to physical blessings or good circumstances. He also did not look at the heartbreak that's happened in his life to dissuade him from contentment and love for the Lord. And it was all because he was content, full in his relationship with walking the Lord, because of the incredible grace he had been given. And so for us, we each needed to answer the question, is God enough? Is God enough in our life that we can be satisfied or are we saying we need something else? The great thing is is that the reason that we can know that God is good enough is because He says He is good enough. In fact, it's what David transitions to in verse six. So we then move from meditate on the incredible grace to actually meditate on His impeccable character. So you see he's starting in verse six. He finds that the substance of what David is unpacking is actually gonna be centralized in one of the main truths here in the following verses. And so he starts out, the Lord works righteousness and justice for all who are oppressed. And so he's really reflecting on the judgment of God. And he's like, God is a true judge. So when you see works righteousness, it's really works justice. And then it says, and justice is actually judgment. for all of the press, is that it reminds us that God is a just God. And he made this known, his ways to Moses, his acts to the people of Israel. Like, when we think about the deliverance of Israel from Egypt, it's like, because what he's reflecting on here is not what the Israelites did. It wasn't about the commandments. It wasn't about obedience. It was like, no, he made known his ways to Moses, his acts to the people. This is what they saw from God. And God did some amazing miracles. I mean, he changed a Nile River to blood. I mean, he delivered them. There were stones that fell from the sky, the hail. Like, there's so many things that God done. He prom into the promised land. He actually took vows on himself, where like Jericho, he judged Jericho and did all the work there. Like, he is reflecting like, okay, this has always been evident, but it was evident of what? Verse eight. The Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love. Sound familiar? It's Exodus 34 6. It says, because if you remember, it said, the Lord passed before him and proclaimed, the Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness. You see what he's reflecting on is God is who he says he is. And that he is going to keep his promises and that everything he proclaims is true. And we can have confidence in that. But you can see, then, He's actually going to help us understand some of these terms. One of those terms is He's slow to anger. Because look at verse 9. He says, He will not always chide, nor will He keep His anger forever. You see, God is a holy and pure God who identifies what's wrong in this world and ensures the wrongs are going to be made right. God is angry. It's when you look at the slow to anger, it's not that God, like you have to poke God and say, okay, how much do I have to poke? How much do I have to press his buttons before he gets angry? That's not what that's talking about. Is that God, when any sin occurs in this world, it brings his anger. There's anger stored up for that sin. And when he says he's slow to anger, he's slow to act. He's slow to judge that anger. In fact, all of us here today are evidence that he's slow to anger. You're alive. When you're like, wait, what? Our sin requires us to die physically. But you all are alive even though that each of us are sinners who have sinned against God, we are still alive. Why? God is slow to anger. He is slow to anger and bring that judgment upon our life. And the reason that he's slow to anger is because he ultimately is going to get a place where he gives us opportunity of the grace to forgive. But before we understand that, we have to have an understanding of the urgency of why we need to know where we stand with God. Because some of us are beloved children of God, and we reside in His presence. We have the opportunity because it was saved by grace through Jesus Christ. We are His beloved and holy children. Others of you are not. And so right now, you are viewed as an enemy of God, according to Ephesians 2. You are separated from him. There is a judgment that is on your life if you stay there, if you stay outside, because he is going to act on his anger and bring judgment. In fact, that's what you see in verse nine. He will not always chide. You're like, what does that word mean? He's not always going to battle and dispute evil. Again, God's not overwhelmed by what's going on in this world. He's not overwhelmed by evil. He's holding back from actually taking care of it. And so he's not gonna let it always occur. He is going to bring judgment on him, nor will he keep his anger forever. Again, there's a motivation for God to take care of this problem that he is going to satisfy. But thankfully, that there's two ways that God can satisfy this anger. He can satisfy in judgment on the creation, he can satisfy judgment by condemning man to hell, a literal place, a place of pain and suffering, or he can satisfy his judicial anger by satisfying it in him himself. In fact, that's what we see in verse 10. Because it goes on, he says, he does not deal with us according to our sin, nor repay us according to our iniquities. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his steadfast love toward those who fear him. For he knows our frame, he remembers that we are dust. And so you see here is that there's another way. Because when he's really reflecting on how God is a forgiving God, we really need to stop there. Because each of you came in this morning and you have a definition of what forgiveness means. I know for many years, I had a certain definition. And sometimes forgiveness is like, hey, we're just going to overlook what's happened. We're just going to move on. We're just going to say, all right, yep, you're sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry that occurred. And we just think like it's an overlooking of the wrong that occurred. We're avoiding maybe the pain that has been caused. And that's sometimes what forgiveness has looked like. Sometimes forgiveness is like, yeah, yeah. The person comes, says, they're sorry, it's me. I'm like, oh, that's great. I forgive you, but nope, not going to relationship with you. That's not gonna happen. But that's not what forgiveness is either. In fact, forgiveness is the act of paying the debt that someone else's owes you. Because here's what forgiveness really is, is that when people sin, there's a debt created. And each of you sin against each other. So if someone sins against me, guess what? There's been a debt. There's a transgression against me that has to have some type of repayment. And so if I forgive that person, guess what? Somebody has to pay. And what I'm choosing to do in forgiveness is take on the payment, take on the hurt, take on the pain myself, and release the other person from paying me back. And that's exactly what God does with us. He says he does not deal with us according to our sins. He will not treat us as we deserve. nor repay us according to our iniquities." Meaning like he, when he forgives us, he's not going to require repayment for what we have done to him. And guess what? It's a massive, huge debt. But he's not going to ask back for repayment. But instead, we see in verse 11, for as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is the steadfast love towards those who fear him. Well, basically what he's showing is that I am going to act in my covenant faithfulness to give you forgiveness that's necessary for your life. He is the one who's going to make the payment. And how do you do that? Well, for David, how you have seen that picture is through the sacrificial system. Remember that the Israelites sacrificed millions and millions and millions of animals. And what it was to show is like, you know what? You sacrifice these animals so that your sins will be forgiven. In fact, one of those animals that occurred every year was the lamb. There were certain things about that lamb, and I don't have all the time to get into those details. What's significant is, is all that was supposed to be a picture. A picture for what was to come. And John the Baptist had a great insight. When he saw Jesus, he said, here comes the name of God, the one who is going to take away the sins of the world. See, everything was given the Israelites a picture for the Messiah. for the one who had to pay, and the one who's going to pay so that we could have forgiveness or salvation in Him. Romans 5, 9 says, Since therefore we have now been justified by His blood, much more shall we be saved by Him from the wrath of God. The wrath of God, what we deserve to pay, He saved us from. For while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son. Much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by His life." This can be true of anybody. That's what's great about this, is like when we look at His forgiveness, anyone can be forgiven. But God's just not giving a blanket statement for everyone in this world to be forgiven, like there's nothing to be done. And so if you sit there and you think like, oh, God loves me, I'm going to be forgiven. I don't need to do anything. It's wrong. No, God requires repentance. Some of you might not know what that word is, but let me help you understand what repentance is. Repentance is recognizing that you personally have made choices and have desires that go directly against God and his commandments. So you recognize that I am a sinner. That is my identity. It also recognizes if you are in Christ that I have still sinned against God. But then we have to actually seek God's forgiveness. We have to go to the foot of the cross and believe that Jesus paid the payment for the sin committed. And that's all the sins of your life. You're faithfully looking at Christ and saying, the reason I can be saved is because of what He did, of how He paid for it. And seeking forgiveness acknowledges that you offended God because you violated His commandments. But then repentance also means that you commit to turn. I think this is the part that sometimes people miss. Because so many times people can sin. I've been there. I'll sin and I'll just continue sinning and sinning and God's going to be okay with it. He's going to forgive me. It's like, no, that's not true. God wants true repentance. He wants godly repentance. And godly repentance means you actually change direction. You change direction to move to God. You change direction to love and obey Him. That's the direction you go. And if God says you have that heart, He forgives you. He's gonna cast it as far as the east is from the west. And the reason that is so important is basically what He's saying, I'm not going to bring that to your account ever again. And that's important, because if God let our sin be any part of our identity, we could not stand in his presence. And he knows that. Because in order to be before Him, we have to be beloved and holy children. Well, guess what? We are sinful people. So when we seek His forgiveness, He's like, I'm gonna take that sin and remove it from you. Remove it from your identity, as far as the East is from the West, so that I can remain in relationship with you. That I can continue being steadfast love pouring into your life. And that's what's so important. It shows the amazing, grace of God. It shows that His character is impeccable. But the forgiveness doesn't just stop with pardoning us, but it also lets us to have a relationship with Him. Because that's important, because if we were just sinners and we were apart from God, and then He forgives us, and He's like, alright, go do whatever you want. Good luck. No, that's not what He wants. He wants relationship, and we see it in 13 and 14. It says, And that word for compassion actually occurs earlier. It's talking about His mercy. And what's great about that is it's a reminder, like, His forgiveness actually gives us the mercy to be in His presence. In fact, listen to what Aaron Siriona says. He says, rather, God forgives us and makes us, but we'll have children. He doesn't blacklist us. If you don't know what blacklist is, it means that it doesn't put us on a blacklist that He doesn't want to deal with us anymore. We now belong to him as children who owe him an infinite debt of love. God's forgiveness leads to relationship, not away from relationship. We see that by him identifying himself as the father in our life. And I get it. Father, we start throwing father and children, child relationships around, and you all sit here and you have very different views about that. In fact, I've sat with many people who struggle with calling God our father. Why is that? Well, we've had fathers who influence our perception of God. So some of you, had absent fathers in your life. Maybe they're physically absent. Maybe you have no idea who they are. Maybe they left your family at an early age and they just never were present. Or they're absent fathers who just had no involvement. They were there physically, they were around physically, but they weren't really involved with you. That's hard. Some of you had authoritarian fathers. Fathers that just seemed, ah, I can't meet their expectations. They're never pleased with what I do. I can work, work so hard, and they never give me thanks or praise. And so it influences how we look at God the Father. It looks that he's never pleased with us. There's not enough that we can do for him. Or maybe you had an abusive father, one who brought physical injury into your life or emotional injury, whatever that looks like. And so then we look at God and look at our trials and afflictions like, God, you just want to hurt me. Take it personal with him. Any pain in your life is because God is hurting you. Or maybe you did have a father you'd say was loving, was very permissible. What I mean by permissible, he got away with everything. You could do whatever you want, and there was no discipline behind it. And so what becomes of God? Oh, God, I can go sin, and thank you for that forgiveness, thank you for that grace. I'll use that account up as much as I can to do what I want. The fact is, none of these describe God and His character. See, God's character is perfect, which means if you are His child, He loves you perfectly. And what we need to make sure is we let God define Himself and what it means to be our Father. Don't let your experience define who He is, but let His Word define who He is. And let that be the lens that you see Him in your experiences in this world. So important. We have to let the Word define who God is. We have to let that define His character. And so my question to you is then, how are you meditating on God's character? Because oftentimes I think like we read this big, thick book, right? And we're thinking through and like, okay, God, what do I need to do? What do I need to do, God? What do I need to do? And it becomes like, that's the repetition. Or, we read, and it's like, for me, there's a certain time in my morning, I'm gonna read God's word, and it's like, alright, it becomes this block in my schedule, and so it's like, alright, I read, and I hear your word, and then I just go about the rest of my day, never reflecting on it, never meditating on it. But you see, like what we see from David's example is like what he was learning from his word impacted his whole life and permeated his whole life. And that's what his character should do in our life. So we need to make sure that we are meditating on His character, because actually meditating on His character will help us realize the complexity and the magnificence of who He is. It will ultimately provide perspective, not just understanding of what is going on in life. So meditating on His character should ultimately lead to imitating Him. Because God is a merciful, gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love. But what that means is that we have an opportunity, an inconceivable opportunity, in fact. So that's point number three. We need to meditate on the inconceivable opportunity that we have. He dies into verse 15, and he says, As for man, his days are like grass. He flourishes like a flower of the field, for the wind passes over it, and it's gone, and its place knows it no more. What David is getting at is like life is brief. You all live in Kansas. You know what wildflowers do. Remember those little white flowers that pop up? They're weeds, sorry, they're weeds. But they're wildflowers, right? What happens to them? They're there in the spring, but then the heat comes. It gets hotter, it gets drier. And what happens? They're dead. They only have a moment. And that's how easy it is in our lives. It's just a flower that flourishes, but then the wind passes over and it's gone. There's this short time, but it's reflect on the fragility and the temporariness of life on earth here. But you see, but the steadfast love of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting. David's quoting the great Buzz Lightyear. He said, to infinity and beyond. God's steadfast love is to infinity and beyond. And the reason that he's doing this is because he wants you to get the comparison. He wants us to have the comparison to understand, like, when you compare those two of our life with his steadfast love, like, they're so different. The best way that I can think through this is actually I see pictures that give us perspective on just how small, how temporary this life is. And Tim's gonna put an image behind me. This is an image of the universe. I don't know about you, I see pictures of space. I see all that goes around and it just reminds me like, where's Earth? Where is it? I don't see it. It reminds you like Earth compared to the galaxy is so small. And yet for me, that's so big. I'm just a speck on this Earth. That's what he's trying to get with us in time. It's like, your life and my life is so short. There's brevity to it, but the steadfast love of the Lord endures forever. There's no end to it. Because we have the opportunity to actually experience that steadfast love now, And we have experienced it for eternity on end. When we reside in heaven, we will still see the hesed of the Lord, His covenant faithfulness. And so with that perspective, the opportunity is then not to live in fear and obedience so that we can reside, or the opportunity is for us to live in fear and obedience so that we can reside in this everlasting nature of God's faithfulness. It's abiding. remaining in His steadfast love. So what do we do? We have the opportunity to be committed to Him. That's what it says on those who fear Him, who stand in reverent awe, really those who are in relationship with Him and His righteousness to His children and children. His steadfast love is going to go beyond our lives. But He says to those who keep His covenant and remember to do His commands, get to reside in His steadfast love. And so this covenant is, it's a covenant that's actually, what I would argue, is found in Deuteronomy 6, 5. It's the same covenant that Jesus reiterates when he says, hey, when he's asked, what are the two greatest commandments? Deuteronomy 6, 5 says, you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul and with all your might. That should be our perspective of this life and what we are committed to do. Why? Because God commits that to us. He commits that opportunity to us. We are children of His. And then it says, and we need to remember His commandments. And remembering His commandments, a further affirmation of Deuteronomy 6-6, it says, these words that I command you shall be on your heart. And so the commandments, there's lots of commandments in God's word. But it's great because we can be able to live in them. We can actually do them. We know that that, and whenever we respond in a godly way, that we can continue to experience His steadfast love. And that's a freedom. See, what is the opportunity that we are missing out on oftentimes is that we get to live in relationship and in God's steadfast love. And so that gives us an amazing freedom, not a begrudging, obligatory drudgery. Because that's oftentimes what we think. Like we can think of like, oh, yep, got to make the check boxes. I got to read God's Word because, well, I have to. Or, oh, I really need to pray. I need to, I know, this is what God wants me to do is talk to Him. Oh, OK, I'll do it. Or, oh, yeah, God, I will obey you to my comfort level, God. Kind of what we talked about, right? I will forgive you, forgive the people in my life. They're loving or at least kind to me. But man, those others, they're really hard to deal with them. Nope, not gonna forgive them. They have done something too great. Or, like what I experience oftentimes, God, I will be patient, but here's the limit, God. So if my kids are, if I'm coming home from a hard day's work and my kids are just like bickering, like, oh, that's beyond that, that's up here, God, I'll be patient here. If they're quiet and calm and want to just have a good conversation, then, then, then I'll be patient with them. I'll keep your commandments. That's not what God's saying. It's reflecting like, no, we have the opportunity to do it. And if we do it, we reside in steadfast love. We will see the benefits. We will see the strength. We will see the great opportunity. Because meditating on God's grace, character, and opportunity, what it should do, it should provoke immense worship. We see that the Lord has established his thrones in the heavens and his kingdoms rule over all. Bless the Lord, O his angels, you mighty ones who do his word, obeying the voice of his word. Bless the Lord, all his hosts, his ministers who do his will. Bless the Lord, all his works in all places and his dominions. Bless the Lord, O my soul. You see, when he's reflecting that God is over all, like this is a king talking about a king. David is a king, and he has the opportunity to rule over things. He has a throne, but it's an earthly throne. And he's going, God, your throne's in heaven. I have a small throne, you have the ultimate throne. Then he goes on to say, you have a kingdom that's overall, and I just compare it to my kingdom, which just has boundaries. There's certain people I rule over, and he's like, Not everything that's created in this world needs to be bringing worship to you. That's the conclusion that David comes to. Because when you look at, bless the Lord, oh, his angels. He's looking at the angelic beings that are doing what his word, obeying his voice. He's like, you, you all, you all need to worship him. He's like, oh, the host, yeah, other angelic beings, ones that serve him on a daily basis, like you need to rejoice and worship him. Then he goes, bless the Lord, all his worship. You're like, what? Where do we get off this? What's he mean by his word? It's us. It's man. It's the creation that he made. We are his work. And he's like, each of us, each of us should be worshiping him in all places, all across this world, in all dominions. And he gets back to person, but it's a personal choice. It's a personal thing. I am going to worship the Lord. Oh my soul. Well, basically, David Combs is that whatever occurs, however people respond, he is personally committed to worshiping the Lord. So my question to you, are you in a place where you are worshiping him? So I'll have you bow your heads, close your eyes. We're gonna have some moment of reflection right now. See, one of the pillars that we have at Ascend is we unashamedly adore Christ through worship. And as we've seen is that worship, we can get into routines. Like one of the routines here that we have, which is a great routine, is that we give you a time of reflection, we pray, and then we go to worship. Well, I'm gonna change that routine today. Because what I want you to do is bow your heads and really meditate on God and His character. I want you to meditate on the work that He has done and think about, where are you with Him? One of those truths is that God is holy and He is just. So what position are you with Him? Are you a beloved child who has trusted Christ as their Lord and Savior, and you stand in His presence and be able to know that He is gonna confidently reside in relationship with you? Or are you outside of that? Because if you are outside of that, you are going to stand before a holy and just God, and He's going to say, you have to pay for your sins. And there's an opportunity today to actually go to Christ and ask Him to pay for your sins, for what He did on the cross, and put your trust and belief in that. but God is also gracious, he's merciful. What's great about that is, whatever sins in your life, is that sometimes we think it's too heinous to bring before God, but we're just being nonchalant about it. I would say, take it serious, but also know that you are putting a gracious, loving God who promises he will forgive you, but you got to repent. So maybe you need to meditate on that and consider what repentance looks like in your life. But then God is steadfast loving. And it means that He's always is. It's always occurring. It's always available. But yet, the world's hard. It gets tiring. It gets confusing. And so taking the time to actually meditate on that steadfast love, His covenant faithfulness to you, What it will do is stir in you how to live with Him, how to live for Him. It should change your heart and your desires and give you the strength to actually endure wherever it's going on.