being seated I invite you to take your copies of God's Word and to turn with me to Psalm 20. Psalm 20 and our sermon title for this morning is In God We Must Trust. In God We Must Trust. Our sermon theme as we've been going through the first 25 of the Psalms in our series called The Spirit Inspired Songbook and we've gotten now to Psalm 20. which like so many of these first psalms is headed by the phrase to the choir master. It is a psalm of David. What we have here is a royal psalm, not unlike the one that is going to come after it and one that was two before it. So psalm 18 was a royal psalm as well as number 20 and 21 also. May the Lord answer you in the day of trouble. May the name of the God of Jacob protect you. May he send you help from the sanctuary, give you support from Zion. May he remember all your offerings and regard with favor your burnt offerings, burnt sacrifices. May he grant you your heart's desire and fulfill all your plans. May we shout for joy over your salvation and in the name of our God set up our banners. May the Lord fulfill all your petitions. Now I know that the Lord saves his anointed. He will answer him from his holy heaven with the saving might of his right hand. Some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we trust in the name of the Lord our God. They collapse and fall, and we rise and stand upright. O Lord, save the king. May he answer us when we call. after God poured out plague upon plague on the land of Egypt and even to the point of killing the firstborn of all of those who were in Egypt, even Pharaoh's own son. They were permitted and allowed and forced out, given by their enemies the very spoils of war, gold and silver, jewelry were poured upon them and precious jewels And they walked out with their kneading bowls and their unleavened bread. They walked out with their staves and their children and their livestock and they went all 600,000 men plus all of the women and the children could have been two, two and a half million. people that were walking out of Egypt, and they went a separate route than usual and encamped in front of the Red Sea and appeared to the Egyptians to be hemmed in. Pharaoh and his servants looked at one another, seeing that the people looked hemmed in and wandering around out in the desert, and they said to one another, What have we done? We've allowed our servants to go free. So Pharaoh took the choices of his warriors and 600 of his chariots, Egypt being the most powerful nation in the world at that time, Egypt having the best army in the world at that time, and they pursued after the Israelites. God told to Moses in Exodus chapter 14 when Pharaoh drew near and the people of Israel lifted up their eyes and behold the Egyptians were marching after them and they feared greatly. Moses said to the people, fear not. Stand firm and see the salvation of the Lord, which He will work for you today. He says, for the Egyptians that you see today, you will never see them again. The Lord will fight for you. You have only to be silent. And the people of Israel, it says, went into the midst of the sea on dry ground, the waters being a wall to them on their right hand and on their left. And the Egyptians pursued and went in after them into the midst of the sea, all of Pharaoh's horses, his chariots, his horsemen. And in the morning watched the Lord in the pillar of fire, and of the cloud looked down on the Egyptian horses and threw them into panic, they clogging their chariot wheels so that they drove heavily. And the Egyptians said, Let us flee from before Israel, because the Lord fights for them against us. Then the Lord said to Moses, Stretch out your hand over the sea, that the water may come back upon the Egyptians, upon their chariots and upon their horsemen. And the waters returned and covered the chariots and the horsemen. and all of the host of Pharaoh that had followed them into the sea, not one of them remained. So thus the Lord saved Israel that day from the hand of the Egyptians. And Israel saw the Egyptians dead on the seashore, and Israel was able to stand on the banks of the seashore and praise the God who had delivered them. For they had not lifted a finger, and God had destroyed all of Pharaoh and his horses and his chariots and defeated the strongest army in the world at that time. in Judges and chapter 4. Jabin was king over Canaan in Hazor. The leader of his army was a man named Sisera. Sisera had 900 iron chariots, and they were against Israel. A woman named Deborah arose and went to a man named Barak. And she said to Barak that the Lord is going to deliver Sisera's army into your hand through me. And she said, be careful, though, because you will get no glory from this because Sisera will be killed by a woman. And you're thinking, who is it going to be? It's got to be her, right? It's got to be Deborah. Well, the 900 chariots went down by the river Kishon. And it says in Judges 4, 15 that the Lord routed Sisera and all his chariots and all his army before Barak by the edge of the sword. And Sisera got down from his chariot and fled away on foot. And he went to a nearby camp to one man named Heber the Kenite. And there his wife, Jael, he came to her tent, and she pulled him alongside and fed him and watered him, so to speak, and put him down for the night. And then she took a tent bag and drove it through his temple so that Sisera was killed that very evening before the Lord. 2 Kings chapter 19 and verse 11. The Rabshakeh of Israel had come before, representing Sennacherib and all of his armies, and they had besieged Hezekiah's Jerusalem. And they said to Hezekiah in a written letter, Behold, you have heard what the kings of Assyria have done to all lands, devoting them to destruction. And shall you be delivered? And he started ticking off nation and nation after nation, and all of their gods and all of their kingdoms, saying how Assyria had destroyed them. What's left of this nation? And what's left of this nation? And what's left of this nation? And Hezekiah, getting this news and this letter from the Rabshakeh of Assyria, he went up before the Lord, and he spread all of this on the ground, and he laid down prostate, and he started praying to the God who was enthroned above the cherubim, and pouring out his heart, and recounting before the Lord how God after God was not able to rescue other nations, and after kingdom after kingdom had fallen, And he asked that the Lord would deliver them, would save them. And he got word from the Lord through Isaiah the prophet. And Isaiah would say this to King Hezekiah. He says, Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel. No, he says, Therefore, thus says the Lord concerning the king of Assyria. He shall not come into this city, or shoot an arrow there, or come before it with shield, or cast a siege mound against it. By the way that he came, by the same he shall return, and he shall not come into this city, declares the Lord. For I will defend this city to save it, for my own sake and for the sake of my servant David. And that very night, an angel of the Lord came down and killed 185,000 of Sennacherib's army that was besieging Jerusalem. And Sennacherib went back home, was bowing in prayer before his God there in Nineveh, and some of his sons came up and killed him. We could mention how the walls fell at Jericho by just the people mounting around and shouting. We could talk about how Gideon had too many men and God saved with just 300 men. We could talk about how David took down Goliath with one stone and cut off the head of the Philistine. The point of all of this is that when there is a battle, the battle is the Lord's, and the Lord is the one who will deliver. that as William Gurnall spoke, he spoke precious truth when he said, One Almighty is greater than all the mighties in this world. Napoleon Bonaparte was asked once, as he was trying to create a great and vast empire, Is God on the side of France? And in arrogance and pride that was not lacking in Bonaparte, he replied, God is on the side of the ones who have the heaviest artillery. He was quoted another time as saying, I am the one who makes circumstances. Yet despite superior forces and weaponry, at the Battle of Waterloo, he not only lost the battle, but he lost his entire empire and was exiled to a barren island called Mount St. Helena. And during the time of his exile, the wee little dictator quoted Thomas Akimpas saying, Man proposes, but God disposes. The battle indeed is the Lord's and that is something that we see in this passage. It is something we understand that we must not trust in horses. We must not trust in chariots. We must trust in the name of the Lord our God. I think this breaks down into three sections. The blessing for the king, you will see there in verses 1 through 5. The assurance from or to the king, there in verses 6 through 8. And then in verse 9, the plea for the king. The key word in these first five verses is the word may. Notice how the phrase may. May the Lord, may the name of God, may He send and give, may He remember and regard, may He grant, may we shout, may the Lord fulfill this idea of may. These people are speaking on the behalf of God to the king. When they talk about you, may the Lord answer you in the day of the trouble. When they're talking about you, it is the people, or maybe perhaps the army, but the people, the congregation, that is speaking to the king on the day of battle, or before he goes out to battle. Notice that the king apparently is a man who offers sacrifices and prayers. The king is one who would undoubtedly go before the Lord. and pray before the Lord and offer sacrifices to the Lord before he would go out and take on Israel's enemies. And the congregation would gather to watch the king to pray. And this is the kind of thing that they would say to the king. They were wishing blessing upon him, praying, they were voicing to him to encourage him the very things that they were praying to God on his behalf and they were pronounced in these blessings not unlike What we do at the end of our services here, when we pronounce a benediction and we say, may the Lord bless you and keep you and all of the rest, I have no power to bring that blessing, but this is my prayer to God on your behalf. I pray that we would go in mercy and grace each and every week. And so I recognize that While I don't have any power to bring that about, God does. And so I voice the prayers that I pray to God on your behalf. And this is what they're doing to the king. They're talking to the king, invoking God's blessings upon him, pronouncing that upon him. What are some of the things that they're pronouncing? Well, first of all, and I'm getting some of this outline from Steve Lawson's wonderful sermon on this passage, and he says, first of all, we see that he's invoking God's protection here. May the Lord answer you in the day of trouble. May the Lord of God of Jacob protect you. He's asking that God would shield and protect you. This is a time of war and distress. There are arrows flying and there are swords clashing, and they want the king to be saved, to be spared, to be delivered and protected, shielded by God. But it's interesting that they call God the God of Jacob, noting that this is a covenantal relationship that they have with God and that the king has with God. This God of Jacob language is the same revelation that Moses had at the burning bush in Exodus 3, remember? It is a shortened form of what God revealed Himself. I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. The very one who had made these covenant promises to the patriarchs, to their fathers. They gave them the promise of the promised land and made these covenant promises. He's saying, may He provide this covenantal protection over you. They're not only invoking God's protection, they're invoking God's presence. Look at what He says in verse 2, may He send you help from the sanctuary, give you support from Zion. Well, the Zion, heavenly Zion, there's heavenly Zion, then there's earthly Zion. And earthly Zion was the Temple Mount, specifically Jerusalem, the Temple Mount, and the sanctuary or temple itself of God, the Holy of Holies, maybe most specifically. And what these places represented was God's presence among His people. God's permanent dwelling and pleasant there within and among his people. And so when he's praying for God from the very sanctuary of Zion, he says he's praying for God to send forth his power and to send forth his provision from this very present. May he grant you help. May he grant you support. So if God is with him, then God is with him in power. and God is with him with these wonderful resources that he has, the very cattle on 10,000 hills, if you will, that he has all of this that he can provide for his people. Not only does he invoke God's protection in his presence, but they invoke God's prosperity. Verses 3 through 5. May he remember all your offerings and regard with favor your burnt sacrifices. May he grant you your heart's desire and fulfill all your plans. May we shout for joy over your salvation and in the name of the God set up our banners. May the Lord fulfill all your petitions. So they invoke God's prosperity in three ways. May God favorably accept his offerings. The king is making these offerings for blessing. The king is one who himself is praying, is worshiping, is offering up petitions to God. We can certainly see David being one who would do this. David, a king after God's own heart, before he would go out to war, before he would make war on the enemies of Israel, that he would offer up sacrifices and make petitions and worship the Lord, asking for God's favor. They're saying, God, would you be favorable towards his sacrifices? Would you accept them? Would you, O Lord, graciously advance his plans So grant him his heart's desire, fulfill all your plans. If this is David, of course, and David originally wrote this, then we recognize that David is a person after God's own heart. His heart's desires are matching with those of the Lord's. So this is not some sort of evil desires that the king might have, but his desires are to protect and provide for the people and to destroy the enemies that would attack his people. to make the Lord's kingdom great. So they're praying that God would grant him success and these plans that he makes, these strategies that he uses within the context of battle, that they would be blessed, that they would go well. And then thirdly, that God would joyfully accomplish the victory. May we shout for joy over your salvation, the deliverance that's provided for us. And in the name of our God, may we set up banners. They are victory flags, banners that are lifted up, standards that celebrate this planting of victory that we can claim. that God has accomplished. Plant our flags in what God has done. Notice then, in verses 6 through 8, that we have either the king answering back, because it changes from we to I. Now I know. that the Lord saves his anointed but it goes again to we and seven and eight but he may be speaking for all of them this is either the king then answering back his assurance of what they're doing, or some have said, in accordance with a passage like 2 Chronicles 20, that this may be a Levite, a prophet or a priest who might pronounce this to the congregation himself, and so that the king might hear. Notice, first of all, what he says in verse 6 is, Now I know that the Lord saves His anointed. He will answer him from his holy heaven with the saving might of his right hand. The anointed, of course, is the king. That the Lord has saved the king. What I love about this is that the tense of this verb is what we call a prophetic perfect. That he is speaking of an outcome that has not yet happened as if it has already happened because it is so certain, it is so guaranteed that it will come about. He's saying, now I know that the Lord saves His anointed, and He's saying that before He ever goes to battle. This is the utmost confidence and assurance and certainty that God will grant this sort of victory. It has not yet happened, but it's as sure as it will because of the confidence that they have in God. This is like in Ephesians, when in Ephesians chapter 2 it says, you and I have been seated with Christ in the heavenly places. Well, we're still here on earth. How are we seated? Well, we're seated there because Christ is seated there at the right hand of the Father. And as certainly as He is there, we are already there. It's as good as we're there. It's guaranteed that we will be there. We've trusted in Him. I love in Romans chapter 8 and 29 and 30, for those whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son. Those whom He predestined, He also called. Those whom He called, He also justified. So all of that we can speak in the past tense, but he says those whom he justified, he also glorified. See this golden chain of salvation, the very ones that he foreknew and predestined and called and justified will also be glorified, but he can speak of that in the past tense as if it's already happened. In Deuteronomy chapter 17 and verse 16, the Israelite king was told not to go back to Egypt, not to accumulate horses and chariots, not to return there. He must not build the army greater. Now, that didn't always happen. Solomon amassed a great army full of many, many thousands of horses and chariots. But here he's saying in verse 7, some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we trust in the name of the Lord our God. In this case, what he is saying is to trust in horses and chariots is to trust in an idol. It is to trust in any human or earthly sort, source of protection or deliverance. Chariots were especially fearful things because they could ride right through masses of humanity, massive armies, and take them down, riding over them. So this heavy sort of cavalry of chariots could destroy an army of people on foot very quickly and rout them. So the simple question for us is what are we trusting in? Are we trusting in horses and in chariots or are we trusting in the name of the Lord our God? Christian, when the doctor comes in and informs you that you have cancer, where are you turning? Are you turning to medical expertise? Are you turning to chemotherapy there as your hope? Now hear me, please understand what I'm saying. David did not go into war without training his men. David did not go into war using no strategy for battle. He took swords. He took horses. He took plenty of soldiers. He understood those things and the need for those things. Yet he recognized that his hope could never be ultimately in those things. It had to be in the Lord God Almighty. When I preach, when you and I witness to others, what are we trusting in? If I get up here and try to tell you things in my own strength, in my own intelligence, and even basing it on my study or whatever, and not dependent upon the Spirit of God, if we're witnessing to someone and we're thinking that we can persuade them with all our charm and all our wit and all of our intelligence, and somehow reason them into the kingdom, then we're badly mistaken. But does that mean that I don't prepare? Does that mean that we don't try to make rational arguments? Does it mean that we do not try to persuade? Absolutely, we try to do those things. The Holy Spirit uses those things. Nevertheless, what we recognize is that we are utterly dependent on God's Spirit to do anything. When you take a test, where do you turn? When a loved one dies, what is your hope? When you suffer a miscarriage or your adoption falls through, where do you turn? When you lose a job or have an unexpected bill that comes up and needs to be paid, what do you do? Christian, as an American citizen, When your country falls apart, when her defenses are down, her borders are not protected, her children are murdered, her families are being destroyed, her citizens have no moral compass, where do we place our trust? In the next election? In presidents, senators, congressmen, Supreme Court justices? Do we even dare to place our trust in the Constitution itself? Vote by all means. Protest. Write letters. Make arguments. Get involved. Run for office. Do all of that. But dare not trust in these things and fail to trust in the Lord our God. Because that's our hope. Our hope is in absolute dependence upon the Lord our God. Those who trust in horses and in chariots, they will collapse and fall, it says. But those who trust in the name of the Lord our God will rise and stand upright. In verse 9, we see then the plea for the king. I want you to see that the psalm begins and it ends in exactly the same way, pretty much. Both verses at the beginning and at the end contain the words, that contains the word answer, and they contain the word day, though some translations, English translations, obscure the fact that both, they have the word day in it. So in this case, the first verse says the Lord will answer, it calls on the Lord to answer on the day of distress, or the day of trouble. And the last verse calls on the Lord to answer on the day when we call. Scholars call this beginning and ending of the passage an inclusio. It's like bookends, one on one side and one on the other. It's like the front door and the back door of a house. And so you can remember, For instance, Psalm 8, that begins, O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth. And then it ends with the very same phrase. This is what we see here. And I want you to see two things in this plea. And when they pray, O Lord, save the king, may he answer us when we call. I want you to see two things about this salvation that God provides, that first of all, salvation is dependent upon God's reputation, and secondly, that salvation is dispensed through God's representative. God's salvation is dependent upon God's reputation, and salvation is dispensed through God's representative. There's a repetition in the psalm of the word name, of the phrase the name. There's an emphasis on the name of God. Look at verse 1. May the name of the God of Jacob protect you. Look at verse 5. We may we shout for joy over your salvation in the name of our God set up our banners. Again, there in verse seven, some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we trust in the name of the Lord our God. Why is it that the people of God can speak with such confidence about what God will do for the king. May he do this, may he do that. Because they have this covenant relationship with him, because they are under the name of God, and the name of God, represented in the law of God, tells us what his reputation and his character is. He is the God of Abraham, of God of Isaac, the God of Jacob. He is the I am that I am. He is the one who will have mercy on whom He will have mercy and will harden whom He will harden. He is the God who is slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and mercy and so on and so forth. So they're acting in faith and pleading based on God's name, His reputation, upon His covenant faithfulness. And what they know is this, that if God is for us, who can be against us? That's what they're saying. Who can battle us, who can defeat us, if God is for us and we know what God is like and what God has done for us? We have this covenant relationship that proves that He's for us. You and I know that God loves us. Why? Because He has sent His Son as a demonstration for that, to die on the cross for our sins. We can be convinced that He is for us. We will not win the battle if God does not help us. We will not win if God does not help us. And we are absolutely, utterly dependent on Him. If God will not protect, if God will not send help, if He will not give support, if He will not remember our offerings and regard with favor our burnt sacrifices, If He'll not fulfill our plans and our hearts' desires and listen to our petitions and allow us the salvation to set up our banners, if He will not do that, we cannot stand. Our salvation is totally and utterly dependent upon God's reputation, His faithfulness, His ability to keep His Word and to stay who He is. But then lastly, our salvation is dispensed through God's representative. The people are praying for the king of Israel, for the Lord's anointed, and the anointed is the Messiah. The king often is called the anointed one. David was often used by this term and was himself anointed. But what the people are doing in praying for the king is they're praying for their own benefit, too. They know that their salvation, their deliverance, their security, their protection is wrapped up in the king's ability to defeat the armies. So they're praying for their own safety and security in the Lord. They recognize that as the king goes, so they go. They benefit from the victories he won. Their hope and their salvation was tied up in him. So that's why they're offering these blessings. God saved the king because through him we're saved. Israel's enemies will destroy all of us if the king is destroyed and has to flee. What I want you to see is that ultimately God heard and answered the prayers of the anointed king, Jesus. that God accepted His once and all for all sacrifice on the cross, and He accepted so with favor, that the resurrection is a sign and a vindication of this acceptance of God's sacrifice, or of Jesus' sacrifice for us. That Jesus' heart's desires was to save all that the Lord had given to Him, to give them eternal life, to keep and guard them, and to bring them to the Father. And God heard his request. He granted and fulfilled all of these plans that Jesus has, that we can plant our flags, raise our banners in what Christ has done because of Jesus. We can have joy and rejoice in the victory that Jesus has brought us. God has brought us in Jesus. Ultimately, I want to ask you this. On the day that you stand before God in judgment, you will face the greatest battle in all of your life. The very judgment of God, the wrath of God, on the day that you stand that, Will you be trusting in human effort or will you be trusting in the name of the Lord our God? Because some trust in horses and in chariots and in their own strength, their own goodness, in what they've done. And when they do that, they will collapse and they will fall. They will not be able to stand. But if we trust in the name of the Lord our God, we will rise. We will stand upright. So on that day, your only hope in that great battle with death and with judgment, your only hope is to trust in the name of the Lord our God, the very name that is above every name, Jesus is Lord. Let us confess that, let us believe that, let that be our hope and our trust in all things, in Jesus' name. All the people said, let's pray.