All right, take your Bibles, turn to Psalm 103, the 103rd Psalm. Psalm 103 has 22 verses in it. And how many letters are in the Hebrew alphabet? I just gave you that number, 22. 22 letters in the alphabet there of the Hebrew alphabet. And this is not an acrostic though, where some of the Psalms with 22 verses start with the letters of the alphabet and go straight through them. This is not one of those though. In this Psalm 103, in those 22 verses, 11 of those verses contain the name of all capital letters, L-O-R-D, which is the covenant keeping God. That's Yahweh. And that's where the focus is as we look at this Psalm. Psalm 102 is a Psalm that is a prayer. Psalm 103 is a Psalm of praise. Charles Haddon Spurgeon said, there is much, or actually too much, Here, for a thousand pens to write, it's one of those all-comprehending scriptures which is a Bible in and of itself. And it might alone almost suffice for the hymn book of the church. It's what Charles Haddon Spurgeon said about Psalm 103. I like this psalm because the first few verses, they've always stuck in my mind. Bless the Lord, O my soul. And of course, there's a song after that. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me, bless his holy name. Here, I want you to think with me for a moment. Have you ever been in a situation where you needed to buy somebody a gift And the person that you were gonna buy a gift for has just about everything that you can think of, and they're hard to buy for. Or maybe somebody that you know, they don't really need anything. What do you do when you're in that dilemma, not knowing what to get for a present for someone who has everything? Now let's flip it a little bit. What can we give to God? God, who owns everything, he's not in need of anything. He's not in need of me being here before you. He's not in need of you being here before me. God is not needy. Matter of fact, the name Yahweh means self-existing one. Before all the worlds were created, God was and God still is. Kind of interesting little blurb I read earlier today. Before God was, there was nothing else. You know, before God created all things in this world is what I'm saying, before anything was, not before God was, there's nothing before God was, before anything, there was just God. Some people might think, well, there was darkness. No, darkness is a thing. There wasn't even darkness. How do you explain that? God who is infinite, who inhabits eternity, he's always been. Therefore, what can you give unto God? Psalm 103 flows from the psalmist's heart. And what it is, here is one who knows the Lord and he senses the presence of God at work. And because he sees God at work and his thoughts are toward God, he wants to praise the Lord. Some of you have come here tonight and you're tired. Like Brother Wayne said, he's tired. There are times praise can be difficult. But you know what, when it comes to praise, we never give Him enough. None of us ever praise Him like we ought in the purest sense. Have you ever had trouble praising God? Have you ever been discouraged? Lost your joy? And maybe come to church And there is praise going up unto the Lord, and you're struggling. Have you ever gotten so far down that you didn't even want to go to church? That you can't even sing? Here in this Psalm, if you think about it, all of this devotion in Psalm 103, all 22 verses, is ultimately perfected by Jesus Christ. Only he could fulfill all this and praise as we should, which we fall short of. There is that song, which I think the choir sang, my hymn of praise is Jesus. Here is cause for praising him. He has done what we can't do. In so many aspects of our lives, we fall short. He is perfect. In this psalm, it's basically divided in three different areas. In verses one through five, it's a personal praise. The psalmist is just praising the Lord. In verses six through nine, what you find is more a national praise. He's calling the nation of Israel to praise. And then in the last few verses, 19 through 22, what you have, or it's actually six through 18, and then verses 19 through 22, you have the whole cosmos praising, all of creation praising God. So I want us to look at that from that angle and look at the first part. In the first five verses, what the psalmist is doing, he's exhorting his soul to praise the Lord. And he does this on three different occasions. In other words, he's talking to himself. You ever talk to yourself? I know you do. We all do. Do you ever talk to yourself in such a way as directing your soul to praise God? Self-talk can bring you down or self-talk can lift you up. I asked you, how do you talk to yourself? You don't need to answer. Here, I want you to notice what the psalmist says. He says in verse one, bless the Lord, O my soul. Let's put it a different way. Soul, bless the Lord. Now, have you ever said that to yourself? I think here's a psalm that we ought to repeat a little bit more frequently, and we ought to command our soul to be praising the Lord. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me, bless his holy name. Here's the exhortation. What does it mean to bless the Lord? When we think about God's blessed me, how do we bless the Lord? When we think about that, when the Lord blesses us, what God does, he sees and knows our needs, and he supplies our needs, and you know what we say? God has blessed us. But that's not the same in how we bless the Lord. When we bless the Lord, we see His excellencies. We see His greatness and perfections. And as we ponder who He is, we respond with praise. And as we praise the Lord for who He is, that's blessing the Lord. Self, soul, praise the Lord. Bless the Lord. He repeats it again. Notice in verse two, bless the Lord, oh my soul. And forget not all of his benefits. Who forgives all your iniquities, who heals all your diseases. He gives five benefits in verses three through five. All of them are participles. They're in the present tense. In other words, God does this for us and he continues to do this for us. These blessings are benefits that God gives his children. I want you to notice what the psalmist says, forget not. Does anybody's forgetter works good besides mine? My forgetter works real good. I forget quite frequently. You know what, we cannot remember everything. And yet here the psalmist says, forget not what? All his benefits. Now how often have we forgotten his benefits? How often have we forgotten to praise him for those benefits? So what we'll do is we'll just stick with the five benefits that he lists here in verses three through five. Notice what he says starting out. In verse three, the word of God says, who that is God forgives all your iniquities. God forgives all your iniquities, all your sins. Now this is foundational to any of the other benefits because you see it's our sins that have separated us from God. But when God forgives us of our sins, then we're in relationship with him, and when we're in relationship with him, then he blesses us. He's blessed us by forgiving us of all of our sins. Because there is forgiveness, now there is a relationship, the blessings of God start flowing. Because he's forgiven us of our iniquities, that means God's presence is always with us. I will not leave you nor forsake you is what God said. Is there a condition based upon that? No, that's an absolute promise from God. God will not abandon his children. We might drift. God don't drift. God's still with us. Because of that relationship, there's not only His presence always with us, there is His power that's always with us. There is His plan that He's got for our lives. God knows the end from the beginning. And if God didn't know that, He wouldn't be God, but He knows, and He is God. Therefore, He has a plan for every one of our lives. And you know what? You wouldn't be here if He didn't have a plan for you. God's got a plan, God's got a purpose. And God will bring His plan to fruition. Now what God does in your life as He's working out His plan in and through your life, He provides for you in life. Whatever needs we have, my God shall supply all our needs according to His riches in glory. God provides our needs. I'm not talking about wants, I'm talking about needs. The things we are in absolute need of, God provides for His children. We see this all wrapped up in this one little phrase right here, who forgives all your iniquities. One of the songs that we sing is His mercy is more. You know what, no matter how great your sins are, His mercy is more. And if you're a child of God, if you sin, His mercy is more. And you know what? He pours out that mercy and grace upon grace. He doesn't change. We're the one that are tossed about and turned about and down, you know. God's the same. Yesterday, today, and forever. He doesn't change. As we ponder the forgiveness of God, how much does God forgive? I want you to notice what the Word of God says. It's pretty clear. I think you can read it and you can tell me how much He forgives. He forgives all your iniquities. That's all past, that's all your present iniquities, that's all your future iniquities. When Christ died upon the cross, you put your faith and trust in him, all your sins, he bore upon that cross. He's not going back for some future sin you might do down the road. He already knew that. He died upon that cross once for all. It is finished, paid in full. You don't have to go back for another payment. of his death upon the cross. It was complete in what he did. How much of our sin, iniquities are forgiven? All of our iniquities are forgiven. You talk about what we're looking at here is the benefits God gives us. Here's the foundation. It is our relationship with him and that's based upon him forgiving us of all of our sins. There's none of us that are perfect. You know what I was pondering a thought just last week? Only Christ knows the depths of the wrath of God towards sin. We don't know the fullness of that. Christ does. Only He knows how to fully praise the Father. We only know a little bit. And oh, how we need to learn more and know more. Here we just take it for what it says. He's forgiven us of all of our iniquities. And then the Word of God says He heals us from all your diseases. Now what does this mean? There are many prosperity groups that name it, claim it, that say, I've had a lady tell me one time, this close friend, she's claimed her victory over cancer. She'll never get cancer in her life. That's not what this is saying. What is God saying when he says he heals all your diseases? Reflect back with me. Who is this psalmist talking to here? In Psalm 103, who's he talking to? He's talking to soul, Whitney. He's talking to self. Soul, praise the Lord, who heals all your diseases. Now, what does that mean if He's speaking to our soul? That means He heals all the diseases of your soul. Can God heal all your physical diseases? Absolutely. Does God guarantee He's gonna heal all your physical disabilities or faults or problems, whatever? No, that's not a guarantee. Can He? Yes. Will He? That's according to His will. It's not according to your will. It's according to His will. There are godly people who have suffered in this world. Suffered from sickness and recovered. But you know what? They eventually die. And some people act dumbfounded when that happens. One of the preachers in town I knew, supposedly a faith healer, passed away a few years ago from sickness. That's always baffled me. Looks like they would live forever. If they name it, claim it. The doctrine does not match. Here, what the word of God is saying, how does God heal all of our soul's diseases? Look over in Psalm 107. In Psalm 107, down in verse 20, Psalm 107, down in verse 20, He sent his word and healed them and delivered them from their destructions. This is talking about their sin that was destroying their life. He sent his word and he healed them. It is God who heals us from our guilt, from our anger, You go over to Galatians chapter 5 and you can read all the works of the flesh. God heals us from all that. He heals us from greed, from jealousy. It is God who is at work who heals us from hate. Listen to what it says in 1 Peter. In 1 Peter chapter 2 and verse 11. Dearly beloved, I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lust, which war against the soul. Can God heal us from that? Absolutely. Can God heal us from the diseases of the soul? Absolutely. Notice the next little phrase in verse four. Who redeems your life from destruction? Do you remember the Hebrew word for redeems or redeemer? That's mercy, love, compassion. The word for kinsman, redeemer? Goel. Here is the word we find with Boaz in the book of Ruth. He redeems your life. He purchases your life. Wow, what a picture here. What does he purchase our life from? Notice it says from destruction. It's just talking about going down into the pit. It's talking about how God's redeemed us from the pit. We were dead in our trespasses and sins and he has purchased us with his own blood. Something I really emphasized this past Sunday night. It is God who redeems your life from destruction. And remember, this is a participle. He keeps doing that. He is faithful in what he does. He is our goel, our kinsman, redeemer. But notice what the next phrase says. It says, who crowns you with loving kindness and tender mercy. Here's the fourth benefit. Boy, we're really not gonna make it all the way through this song, are we? Look at here, just on verse four, God crowns us. You know what a crown is, something you put on your head. God puts on your head a crown, and it's loving kindness, that's the word, has said, and tender mercies. God crowns us with loving kindness and compassion. You know what that means? You as a child of God, you should have a love for others. Even if they're hateful, even if they're worldly and ungodly, we should love that person and have compassion toward them. How we want to strike out like the suns of thunder and call down fire from heaven upon people who don't agree with us, but that's not what God's calling us to. He's crowned our heads with loving kindness and compassion are mercies. That means we need to be showing that even unto others. The fifth benefit here, He satisfies your mouth with good things. It is God who satisfies us, and only He can satisfy our deepest needs. We think if I only had something, or if I only had this, or if I only had that, then I'd be satisfied. Then we get that, and then if I only had this, or if I only had that, things of this world do not satisfy. Completely. There can be satisfaction for a moment, but only God can fully satisfy his children. The word of God says, so that your youth is renewed like eagles. In other words, he is the one who renews our strength. Our strength comes from the Lord. Though the outward man perishes, Yet the inward man is renewed day by day. If you haven't been by to see Brother Craig Lowe, you ought to go by and see Brother Craig Lowe. He is a blessing. 98 years old, and you can tell the Lord's renewing his strength day by day. The inward man, the outward man's perishing. That's true of all of us, but the inward man is being renewed with the strength of the Lord day by day by day. Notice as we move right on through this Psalm, it goes from verse five to verse six, and all the way from verse six all the way down to verse 18, talking more about the nation of Israel, praising the Lord. Notice what it says in verse 6. The Lord executes righteousness and judgment for all that are oppressed. In other words, the psalmist, and it looks like it's David who is the psalmist here, he's not just speaking about himself, he's talking about all of God's people. He executes righteousness and judgment for all that are oppressed. And then this little verse here, I love this verse, verse seven. Verse seven, the word of God says, he made known his ways unto Moses and his acts unto the children of Israel. Notice what God did. As it speaks about his righteousness, it talks about his ways. He made known his ways. to Moses. This is a quote, kind of like, we'll look back in Exodus chapter 33. In Exodus chapter 33 and down in verse 13. Exodus 33 verse 13, Moses said, now therefore I pray you, if I have found grace in your sight, show me now your way. that I may know you, that I may find grace in your sight and consider that this nation is your people. In other words, God was doing mighty works and those were seen by the children of Israel. Those were his acts. But it was Moses who wanted to understand the ways of God. Many people want to see the power of God. They want to see God work in certain ways. But I want you to notice what Moses desired. He desired to know the ways of God. And the word of God tells us that he made known his ways unto Moses. His ways, that's talking about the meaning and the motives of why God is working in certain ways. Many people like to see the spontaneous, the spectacular, the parting of the Red Sea. Jesus saying, peace be still. People want to see the grander things. But I want you to notice what Moses desired. Moses desired to know the ways of God. Oh, that we had more of God's people desiring to know God's ways. In other words, the motives and the reasoning and how God is working. Now, you know what? We can ask Him, but it's His will to show. And if you don't show, well, you know what? We keep asking and we keep working and we keep serving. We keep learning of him and the more we learn of him, I really believe, just like my dad said, the more you're in the word, the more you're gonna understand. So it's important that you get into the word of God that you might know the Lord even more. Don't be just like the children of Israel who see the acts and see the deeds, but don't know his ways. In verses eight through 12, here is what we see is the mercies of God. In verse eight, it's a quote from Exodus chapter 34 and verse six. The Lord is merciful and he's gracious. He's slow to anger and plenteous in mercy. He is slow to anger. He does not treat us as we deserve. He's plenteous in mercy, and though his anger might endure for a moment, his mercy is plenteous, it's more. He will not always chide, neither will he keep his anger forever. He hath not dwelt with us after our sins, nor rewarded us according to our iniquities. In other words, we need to be thankful for how God works, but you know what, we need to be thankful for how God does not work sometimes. We are thankful that he has not rewarded us according to our iniquities. As we look at this here, what we see, he does not treat us as our sins deserve. We see that the atonement has satisfied the wrath of God. Because his wrath is satisfied, notice what it says in verse 11 and 12. For as the heaven is high above the earth, so great is his mercy toward them that fear him. How great is God's mercy toward you if you fear God? It's higher than the heavens. As far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us. I want you to notice here a little geometry. There's the heights and the depths of God, and there is the width that he's explaining here. Now if you think about as far as the East is from the West, they never meet. The height, you can keep going and keep going and keep going. The depth, what happens when you put those two together? You got a cross, don't you? Isn't that amazing? If you put the north, south, east, and west together, you measure the intersections of the lines is a cross. While we see the measure of God's mercies that extend forever and ever, I want you to notice that being applied in verses 13 through 16. Verse 13 says, like as a father pities his children, so the Lord pities them that fear Him. A father sees his child in a helpless situation. What does the father do? He helps the child. How much greater our Father in Heaven who helps us and He has pity upon us. because He knows our frame. You know what? We're temporal upon this earth. We're just flesh and bone. And He remembers that we are dust. As for man, his days are as grass as the flower of the field, so he flourishes. In other words, as you look at life, life is very transient. For the wind passes over it, it's gone, and the place thereof shall know it no more. How many lives have passed out of this world? We're talking thousands and thousands and thousands multiplied by thousands. And then he compares the psalmist does with how God is infinite. Man upon this earth is temporal in this life. But notice in verse 17, the mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting upon them that fear him and his righteousness unto children's children to such as keep his covenant and to those that remember his commandments to do them. In other words, God is infinite. And that mercy continues on and on and on. in the last three verses here, verses 19 through 22. What the psalmist does in these last verses, he calls on all of creation to praise the Lord. Praise the Lord, all you nations. Notice what it says. The Lord has prepared his throne in the heavens. His kingdom rules over all. That speaks of God's sovereignty. No matter what man may do, God still rules over all. We've got an election coming up, and let me tell you, it's an important election. Very important election. I don't know who's going to win the election, but this I do know, God's going to be on the throne no matter who does win the election. God rules. His kingdom rules over all is what the Word of God says. Here is the psalmist with the right look. Don't be looking to Washington. Don't be looking to the capital in the state of Kentucky. The right view, God's throne is in heaven and His kingdom rules over all. Though man may strive and thinks he's got it down pat, let me tell you what he don't. Man's plans are dwarfed in the sight of God. In these next few verses, What the psalmist does, he calls on the angels and the host of heaven and all the servants and all of his works to praise the Lord. Notice it says, bless the Lord, you his angels, that excel in strength, that do his commandments, hearkening unto the voice of his word. Bless ye the Lord, all ye his hosts. This is all his servants, you ministers of his, that do his pleasure. Bless the Lord, all his works. in all places of His dominion. Bless the Lord, O my soul. I close this psalm out, just giving you a pointer. The more you know the Lord, the more you're gonna praise the Lord. How do we know the Lord more and more? Some of you already know the answer to this to some degree. How do we know Him more? We behold Him in the Word of God. And as we behold Him in the Word, we desire to know Him more. Where are you gonna find Him? You'll find Him in the Word. You'll find Him more and more. As you get in the Word, the Word of God gets in you. God reveals to you who He is. You behold Him in worship. whether it's corporate worship or personal worship, when you sing songs of truth and you're around those people who walk with him, you know what? God's gonna reveal himself more and more. There's one other way. You behold him in creation. The heavens declare the glory of God. Do you ever sometime just walk and look and stand in awe of how God has made all things? You know what? We are fearfully and wonderfully made. We are made up, just think of one person, made up of millions and millions of cells. And if you just took one of those little cells, boy, it's programmed to do its thing. Just one out of the millions and millions It's mind-boggling. That didn't just happen. All these cells all of a sudden got together and formed a body. No. There is a master design, a master planner who's on the throne, and we ought to behold Him in all of His creation. Though sin has affected this world in a drastic way, you know what? We can still see the glory of God all around us. if we just take time and look. And you know what that'll cause you to do? It'll cause you to praise the Lord even more. How we ought to praise Him all the days of our lives. And oh, how often we come up short in praising Him. We're gonna have a word of prayer and then we're gonna sing a song. So let's all stand. Father, we thank you for your precious word and the power of your word and how you use your word in our hearts and our lives and reveal yourself to us and your plans to us and your promises to us. Lord, our hope is in you. So Lord, we ask that you work in our hearts and our lives. Ever draw us nearer to you and having a desire to know you more and more and more. That we might praise you all the more and more and more. We'll give you the thanks for Christ's sake. Amen.