Psalm 116. If you haven't opened your Bible yet, please do that. And next week, Psalm 117, we come to the shortest psalm in the whole book of Psalms on missions. We'll look at that. Psalm 118 is a wonderful prophetic psalm. And then 119, the longest psalm in the whole book. I'm probably going to preach that in a topical way over the course of three weeks. I'm not going to spend 22 weeks Going through it, but probably in a topical way. We'll look at that in a few weeks But today I do want to talk about I want to preach this psalm psalm 116 That I titled thank God for delivering you. Thank God for delivering you Follow with me as I read it all to begin I love the Lord because he hears my voice and my supplications, because he has inclined his ear to me. Therefore, I shall call upon him as long as I live. The cords of death encompassed me, and the terrors of Sheol came upon me. I found distress and sorrow. But then I called upon the name of the Lord. O Lord, I beseech you, save my life. Gracious is the Lord and righteous. Yes, our God is compassionate. The Lord preserves the simple. I was brought low and he saved me. Return to your rest, O my soul, for the Lord has dealt bountifully with you. For you have rescued my soul from death, my eyes from tears, my feet from stumbling. I shall walk before the Lord in the land of the living. And I believed when I said, I am greatly afflicted. I said in my alarm, all men are liars. What shall I render to the Lord for all his benefits to me? I shall lift up the cup of salvation and call upon the name of the Lord. I shall pay my vows to the Lord. Oh, may it be in the presence of all his people. precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his godly ones. O Lord, surely I am your servant. I am your servant, the son of your handmaid. You have loosed my bonds. To you I shall offer a sacrifice of thanksgiving and call upon the name of the Lord. I shall pay my vows to the Lord. Oh, may it be in the presence of all his people, in the courts of the Lord's house, in the midst of you, oh, Jerusalem. Praise the Lord. One of the great truths that you and I need to hear in our lives, it's kind of like biblical counseling 101, is that God glorifying living, God-glorifying living is not so much about changing your circumstances as much as it is changing our perspective in the circumstance that God has brought into our lives. You and I I cannot focus on changing things that are out of our control. We need to focus on changing our attitudes when we're in the difficult situations of life. Let me illustrate it. Imagine a man named Joe, Jimmy. Jimmy nearly died in a boating accident. He reads the psalm and he prays verse eight. You have rescued my soul from death. Or the man Samir. Samir nearly died when a mob deceived him and physically assaulted him, but again he prays the psalm, but you, O Lord, spared my life. Have you ever heard before from people, I should have died. I should have died. Maybe you could have said that before, perhaps in your life at different points. Maybe a car accident. Maybe it was a fight. Maybe it was a terrible hardship. I should have died. But God saved my life. Or that girl, Allie. Allie grew up in a single parent home. She was viewed as an unwanted girl. She was viewed as useless, and she was viewed as a bother in her family. She felt like nobody cared for her, and her childhood had plagued her with hardships and afflictions and people lying about her. She came close to death repeatedly. One day she wound up going to a church just because the church gave out food and clothing to those who were hurting. And while she was there visiting that church, she heard the gospel. She was loved by some older women, and she turned to Christ by faith. As a new believer, reading her Bible, she came across Psalm 116. There's this deep, abiding gratitude that marks Allie in everything that she does in her life. Her enjoyment of life, her thanksgiving to God is contagious. And when she came across the psalm, she said, this is my life chapter, that God has had mercy upon me and that God has saved my life. Can you relate to that? Can you relate to any of those situations in life when God has had mercy upon you? Maybe physically, but maybe if you're here today spiritually, no doubt as a believer, I spiritually should be condemned. I should be condemned, but God saved my life. I once was a vile enemy of God, but now I'm welcomed by God as a son. I am adopted into the family of God through Christ and his work on the cross. We're going to look at that tonight from Psalm 116. And you'll remember in your outline there, I put it in the background, Psalms 113 to 118 is a collection of Psalms called the Egyptian Hallel, because they remember how God brought his people out of Egypt. However, Don't let the corporate nature of God bringing Israel out, don't let that take away from the individual love that God has for you as his own child. It's one thing to say Jesus died for everybody in all the whole church, but it's also important to remember he died for me. He died for me. We don't want the beauty of these praise psalms to overshadow the personal faith and the salvation and the deliverance that we have in our God who knows us and He loves us and He cares about us. Psalm 116 is a psalm about a man in trouble. A man in trouble. And what I love about the Bible, it's very down to earth. It doesn't try to ignore hardship. It doesn't pretend that hardship doesn't exist. This is a very real, down-to-life hardship with difficulty and affliction, and yet the man calls upon God, and he prays to God, and he knows that God will answer prayer, and he knows that he needs to go to the corporate assembly and magnify God's name with all of God's people. It's a great psalm. It's very, very practical and very, very needed. One of the profound lessons from our psalm tonight, it comes out in biblical counseling relationships all the time, and we need to hear it again this evening. Much of real life change, real biblical counseling, is not that you change your circumstances of life. Rather, what is true about biblical counseling is that you change your perspective in that circumstance of life. Don't focus on changing the things that are out of your control, like perhaps your life situation, but focus on the things that you can control, like your heart attitude in that situation that you're in. I want you to look at the Psalm, verse three. Just let your eye survey verse 3. It's a long verse. Notice the life-threatening situation. The psalmist says, the cords of death have encompassed me. He says, the terrors of Sheol, or the grave, have come upon me. I found distress and I found sorrow. Verse six, I was brought low and God saved me. At the end of verse 10, he said, I am greatly afflicted. And in verse 11, he is hurt by liars. I don't know about you. That's a pretty crummy situation of life. near death. He's got liars that are all about him. He is in distress. He is in sorrow. He's in great affliction. He has these near-death situations, and he writes this psalm, and here's what we learn. Thank your God for his deliverance. Thank your God for his deliverance. I mean, it'd be easy to complain, It'd be easy to wallow in self-pity. It'd be easy to say, why God? Why me? It'd be easy to blame others. No. What the psalm teaches us is that in the difficulties of life, we need to thank God for the deliverances that he gives. And I want to show you how the psalm explains this in three ways tonight. This is such a great psalm. It's biblical counseling at its best. It's what we all need, from the boys and girls, to the dads and moms, to the single and marrieds. We all need this psalm tonight. Here's what we learn. Number one, in your outline, thank your God, because He hears your prayers. Thank your God, because he hears your prayers. Now, as I read verses one to four, I want you to notice with me the language of praying, calling upon God, begging God, beseeching God in prayer. I love the Lord. Because he hears my voice and my supplications. Because, verse 2, he has inclined his ear to me. I will call upon him as long as I live. Verse 4, I called upon the name of the Lord. O Lord, I beseech you, save my life. Hear my voice. Hear my supplications. Incline your ear. I will call. You know what these verses teach is prayer is not only something that you can and have done in the past, it's something that can be done in the present and in the future. Notice in verse two, I shall call upon God as long as I live. As long as I live. What affliction are you in? What hardship are you going through? What difficulty is plaguing your life? Do what the psalmist does, and you say, God, I know you hear my voice, but then you say in verse two, but I will keep calling upon God as long as I live. I have nowhere else to go but to God. Notice in suffering, verse one begins, I love the Lord. I love the Lord. Sometimes in suffering, you think God has abandoned you. Sometimes in suffering, you might be tempted to argue with God. We might be tempted in suffering to accuse God. No, the psalmist models right here, I love the Lord. There is a genuine love for God because He hears and He's with me and God is near to me even in my suffering. Simple lesson, pain drives the psalmist to prayer. Pain drives the psalmist to prayer and suffering in his life is what launches his supplications to God. You know, remember that account in John chapter 4 of the nobleman's son in the city of Capernaum? His son was sick at the very point of death, John 4, 47. He heard that Jesus had come out of Judea into Galilee and he goes to Jesus and he begs Jesus to come and heal the son because he's at the point of death. And he cries out, and he begs, and he implores Jesus, you've got to come and help and heal my son. And then, according to verse 50, Jesus said, go, your son lives. And the man believed the word that Jesus spoke, and the man went home. And then the boy was living. He was healed. And the man believed with his whole household. He called out to God. He called out to Jesus, literally, physically, right there in his own presence. And he said, I need you to heal my son. Is there a pain in your life? that you need to come to Jesus and pray about. Is there an affliction in your life? Is there a difficulty in your life, an uncertainty in your life that you need to come to God and bring your petitions and your anxieties and your prayers to God and you know that he will hear you and you say with the psalmist, I love God because I know that he hears. And I know that he will answer. Thank God. Thank God for the deliverance that he gives. Number one, you thank God because hear it, he hears your prayers. Number two, if you're looking with me at the outline, number two, we learn from the Psalm in the difficulties of life, you and I must thank God because he delivers your life. He delivers your life. Has he delivered you from a physical assault? Has God delivered you from death, physical death at certain times? Has God delivered you from eternal torment in hell? Has God delivered you from Satan and from all of the evil hosts that are there? We thank our God. Amazingly, in verse 5, Beginning in verse 5, the psalmist is now going to survey the character of God. He's going to survey who God is and what God does. And it's like the cause for rejoicing in the Lord. Here's what's really cool. Your situation, the situation may be very, very rocky, but your Savior never changes. Your life circumstance may be very volatile. It may be up in the air. It may be uncertain. Maybe there's a difficulty, an anxiety, a worry, a fear. There's something in life, a relationship in life, a place where God has you, and it's tough. But God never changes. He never, ever changes. Let's be like a surveyor, as it were. Let's just kind of look and scan the relevant data, as it were, of the character of God. Look at verse 5. Gracious is the Lord. Gracious, a word meaning God is forgiving. He is abounding in mercy. Verse 5. He is gracious and righteous. Our God is a God of moral integrity. That's your God. That's my God. Moral integrity. And verse 5, yes, our God is compassionate. Oh, the Hebrew word for compassionate speaks of a great tenderness. A tenderness. One who understands the frailty of children. God is so tender and compassionate. And in verse 6, the Lord preserves. That's interesting. The word in Hebrew means God keeps. He guards. He preserves. He's like a watchman, always keeping alert for any invaders that could come in. God preserves you. Amazing. And we read in verse 8 that our God is the rescuer. Our God is the rescuer. He rescues our soul from death and our eyes from tears and our feet from stumbling. What a God. What a God who does all of that. We need to remember who our God is. Verse 10, the psalmist says, you know, I believed and I'm afflicted and I spoke. And I believed in my God. Faith survives the pressures of life, even the disillusionment, the disaster, the disease, the dread, the fear. Why? Because we have faith in our God. I think so often the pains and troubles of our life are prolonged because we forget the character of our God. We forget the reliability of our God. And we forget the trustworthiness of our God. Let me show you how practical this is. This week, I was reading, preparing for this, and I came across a story of a man named John. John lives in Kenya. In the middle of the night, he was taken out of his home forcefully by a mob, a violent gang. And he was lined up with others in his village, those on his left and those on his right. And one by one, all of those on his left were killed one by one. And then all of those on his right were killed one by one. He was beaten, but amazingly, his life was spared. John, at a later point, came to himself, studied the word, and he said this, The Lord has helped me overcome, and he has helped me to regain my health and my strength. God delivers. That's what our God does. God heard, God delivered, God saved his life, and he gave all glory to God. That's real. God delivers. He delivers your life. He delivers my life. And one of the things that I think is really helpful when we look at verses 5 through 11 is summed up there in your notes there. Do you see this biblical counseling lesson there? Number one, whatever situation of life, number one, consider God. Consider God. not look inward, not look at other people, not look at the situation around you, but consider God. Remember God. Look up to the person of God. And then second, that means we have to counsel self. That means I got to speak to my own heart. I can't succumb to fear. I can't succumb to worry. I can't succumb to anxieties that could flood my heart. Soul, put your hope in God. Preach, counsel your own heart. Consider your God, counsel yourself. And then third, you cling to hope. You cling to hope. This is, this is whatever God brings in life, whatever situation I'm in, whether it gets better or it gets worse, whether my trial is more difficult or my trial goes away, I must cling to biblical hope and walk on trusting my God. simple biblical counseling truth that we need to hear because of the afflictions of life. And yet our psalm models it for us. You and I learning from Psalm 116, we ought to thank God for his deliverance. Number one, because he hears your prayer. Number two, because he delivers your life. And then the psalm concludes verses 12 to 19. Number three in your notes, thank your God, because he deserves your praise. He deserves your praise. Now there's so much here, and the Hebrew is very colorful, and I wish we could just spend hours working through all of it together, but I want to pull out a few of these nuances here. Look at verse 12. What shall I render to the Lord for all of his benefits to me? You think, that sounds like Psalm 103. Forget none of his benefits. Forget none of his benefits. The good gifts that God has given. How shall I render? How shall I give? How shall I repay to my God for all of the good things? Wait, wait, wait. Psalmist, you almost died. You're going through affliction. You've got people that are lying about you. You're going through difficulty. What do you mean God has been bounteous and good to you? But that's the kind of perspective we need to have. That God has been so good. In verse 12, all the benefits that God has given, the psalmist is overwhelmed with the boundless provisions of God. How could I ever thank him enough? How could I ever repay him? How could I ever praise him enough for the many, many good things that he has done? Maybe a good word for me and you tonight. Is there anything that you can do tonight? Maybe anything you could do tomorrow morning, perhaps, where you might need to change your perspective a little bit to make gratitude the overflow of your heart. Maybe it's a tough day. Maybe a discouraging day. Maybe you're weary, you're tired, you're fatigued. Maybe you feel ill. Maybe there are relational conflicts. There's friction, whatever it might be, in home, at work, with relatives, whatever it might be. How can you alter and change your perspective to make gratitude the overflow of your heart? The psalmist What, what shall I render to God for all of his benefits to me? Verse 13, he continues, I will lift up the cup of salvation and call upon the name of the Lord. I think this is in contrast to Psalm 75. There is a cup in the hand of the Lord, and the wine foams. It is well mixed, and God pours out of this, and all the wicked of the earth must drain and drink down the dregs of this cup. But not so with the psalmist here. The psalmist says, I will lift up a different cup. Not the cup of wrath, but the cup of salvation. I have a cup of salvation given by God. Praise Him and worship Him. And then he talks about paying his vows to the Lord, which is probably fulfilling his promise to God, maybe a worship vow, a worship commitment to God, an offering to God. I will fulfill that. In verse 15, he almost died, but notice in verse 15 how he reflects it. He says, Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of all the godly ones. God cares about all of his own people. They are his treasured ones. No child of God is in distress. No child of God dies. without the Lord's keen awareness. God knows, and he cares. And that's why in verse 16, the psalmist says, I am your servant. I am your servant. You have loosed my bonds. And then he ends the psalm by talking about praise and worship to God, even in the congregation. Will you take your Bible? And let's see if we can pick up on this a little bit more. Go to Romans chapter 8. Romans chapter 8. I don't know if we could read this passage enough. There's so much wonderful glory here. But I think it's good for us to read Romans 8 beginning in verse 31 because we have every reason to thank God because he does deserve our praise. Romans 8. Romans 8 31. What then shall we say to these things if, if God is for us, who is against us? If you're a believer here today, God is for you. He is for you. Verse 32. He who did not spare his own son, but he delivered him over for us all, how will he not also with him freely give us all things? Who will bring a charge against God's elect? God is the one who justifies. I mean, if God justifies you, who's going to bring a charge to your account that's going to have any merit? God is the one who justifies. Verse 34, who is the one who condemns? Christ Jesus is he who died, rather who was raised. And he's at the right hand of God who intercedes for us. Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Tribulation? No. Distress? No. Persecution? No. Famine? No. Nakedness or peril or sword? No. Just as it is written, for your sake, we are being put to death all day long. We were considered as sheep to be slaughtered. But in all these things, we overwhelmingly conquer through him who loved us, for I am convinced. What a great thought. I am convinced. that neither death, nor life, angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, I mean nothing, will be able to separate us from the love of God. which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Talk about thanking God because he deserves our praise. This is what the psalmist is doing. I will pay my vows to the God, to the Lord. I will praise him and call upon the name of our God. Christian, don't we have great reasons to praise him? We have a God who has justified us. We have a Savior who has died for us. We have a God who intercedes for us. What a good God. And ponder this. Remember the context of the Hallel, Egyptian Hallel Psalms, these praise cluster. They're all remembering, Psalms 113 to 118, how God brought the nation out of Egypt. What a mighty God! What a powerful God! Two million Israelites out of Egypt. God did it by His mighty power in His outstretched arm. And that God of the world is the same Lord of your heart. That same God who rules all creation is the God who is intimately acquainted with all of your ways. He is the Lord of all, and he wants to receive your praise and your worship. So you and I can thank God for his deliverances. So, Summing it all up again, just because review is so helpful for us, whatever your situation may be in life, hardship, affliction, trial, pain, near death, disappointment, discouragement, whatever that might be, it may be hard, it may be tough, it may be trying, look to your Savior. Look up to your Savior. He is your personal rock. Compassionate, loving, gracious, and tender. And then, the Savior is the one who gives you strength to live. Not strength from yourself, but strength in Him through the Word, and through prayer, and through diligence as you're working out your salvation for His glory. You can continue on. If you don't have Christ, you don't have hope through this hardship. But if you believe on Christ, if you trust in Him, if you repent and believe in this gospel, what a great God that you can call my God and my Savior and my Deliverer while going through the difficulty. I want to close by reading a couple of verses that I'm sure you know well, but just hear them. from the Apostle Paul, 2 Corinthians chapter 4. Hear what Paul says in 2 Corinthians 4, 16 to 18. Therefore, we do not lose heart. Though the outer man is decaying, our inner man is being renewed day by day for momentary light affliction. is producing for us an eternal weight of glory, far beyond all comparison, while we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal. Praise the Lord. Momentary light affliction. one moment in glory, beholding our Savior's face, we'll make it all worth it. Let's pray. Father, thank you that you have given such a clear guidance for us in the psalm tonight, that we can thank you for delivering us, that we can thank you that you hear our prayers, we can thank you that you deliver us, that you never change, that you are worthy of praise. We pray that you will meet with us, that you will come and be with us powerfully, and that you will hear our prayers, that you will answer our prayers now in the prayer meeting, all for the glory of Christ. In his name we pray. Amen.