Transcription downloaded from https://yetanothersermon.host/_/ctkc/sermons/36202/god-unshakable/. Disclaimer: this is an automatically generated machine transcription - there may be small errors or mistranscriptions. Please refer to the original audio if you are in any doubt. [0:00] Oh, great triune God, we come to you this morning confessing that Jesus is our Lord. Would you show us Christ this morning from Psalm 62? [0:12] God, would you remind us again and again that you are our unshakable God? And that you've made an unshakable commitment to us in Christ. [0:25] Therefore, we will not be shaken. God, we need your help. Spirit of the living God, would you fall afresh upon us? Would you make us a people passionate for your glory, humble, trusting, resting in you? [0:51] We pray this in the name of Jesus. Amen. Amen. Amen. Children, you may now go to your class. And as you're going to your class, I just want to take a moment, in a spirit of thanksgiving, to recognize two newlyweds. [1:12] They got married about a week ago. Mr. and Mrs. Tyler Olson. And just kind of stand up and say hi, if you would. Praise God. [1:29] Well, we're going to be looking at Psalm 62 this morning. And if you would open up your Bibles, there are two pew Bibles. The white one, page 409. The blue one, page 898. [1:39] If you've got another kind of Bible, just open it up right in the middle, and you're probably in Psalms. Psalm 62. We all get shaken. [1:57] When you lose someone you love, and there is a gaping hole in your life, that can shake you up. [2:13] When you're personally attacked, that can shake you up. And that's what's happening in Psalm 62. David is being personally attacked. We see that in verses 3 and 4. That can shake you up. When you come to terms with your own mortality, when you come to terms with your own limited health, that can shake you up. [2:34] When you are confronted with an unexpected thing, whether that's an expense maybe, or a job change, relational change, changes in a church, that can shake you up. [2:48] Most of us are prone to being shaken. And to be shaken is to get pushed out of your comfort zone. [3:01] To get pushed out of what is normally solid and secure. It exposes what you put your trust in. God uses shake-ups for our good. [3:14] And in Psalm 62, what we see David doing is he's responding to being personally attacked. He's getting shook a little bit. And why this is so helpful for us today is seeing how he responds to it. [3:33] David doesn't turn to man. He doesn't turn to money. He doesn't turn to his own power. He turns to his God. [3:44] He's experiencing a kind of heat. A kind of hardship. And David responds by entrusting his heart to his God. Sending his roots out to living water. [4:02] And this morning, if you've come here and you've been shaken, I want to point you to two unshakable truths from Psalm 62. [4:14] Two unshakable truths to set your shaky heart upon so that you're not greatly shaken. So let me read Psalm 62. [4:25] For God alone my soul waits in silence. From Him comes my salvation. He only is my rock and my salvation, my fortress. [4:38] I shall not be shaken. How long will all of you attack a man to batter him like a leaning wall, a tottering fence? They only plan to thrust him down from his high position. [4:49] They take pleasure in falsehood. They bless with their mouths, but inwardly they curse. For God alone, oh my soul, wait in silence. For my hope is from Him. He only is my rock and my salvation, my fortress. [5:03] I shall not be shaken. On God rests my salvation and my glory. My mighty rock, my refuge is God. Trust in Him at all times, oh people. [5:14] Pour out your heart before Him. God is a refuge for us. Those of low estate are but a breath. Those of high estate are a delusion. In the balances they go up, they are together lighter than a breath. [5:25] Put no trust in extortion. Set no vain hopes on robbery. If riches increase, set not your heart on them. Once God has spoken, twice have I heard this, that power belongs to God. [5:40] And that to you, oh Lord, belongs steadfast love. For you will render a man according to his work. What we see in Psalm 62 is David responding to heat. [5:52] When shaken, David set his shaky heart on his unshakable God. He doesn't turn anywhere else. [6:04] He alone focuses on God. We see a progress actually between verse 2 and verse 6. He goes from not being greatly shaken to not being shaken. [6:19] Progress. Progress. So for us, when we get shaken, we must set our shaky hearts on our unshakable God. And so, two things. [6:30] Two unshakable truths for you this morning. If you're feeling a little shook up, these are for you. They have served me so well. Two unshakable truths to get your heart on. [6:42] First one is this. God is unshakable. God is unshakable. God is unshakable. He is immovable. Nothing shakes our God. [6:55] Did you notice there is a repeated refrain? Look at verses 1 and 2. For God alone my soul waits in silence. From him comes my salvation. He only is my rock and my salvation, my fortress. [7:07] I shall not be greatly shaken. And then in verse 5 and 6. For God alone my soul, O my soul, wait in silence. For my hope is from him. He only is my rock and my salvation, my fortress. [7:19] I shall not be shaken. They're very similar, aren't they? They're very similar in what they say and how they say it. And they're very personal. Did you notice all the my's? [7:30] My rock, my salvation, my fortress, my refuge, my hope. David is waiting on God. [7:43] He's resting in his God. He's experiencing hardship and it's got the potential of throwing him. And so he turns to his God. [7:54] So what does he do? He calls to mind three specific things about God. God is a rock. God is salvation. God is his fortress. [8:07] God is unshakable because he is an unchanging rock. God is unshakable because he is unstoppable in his salvation. God is unshakable because he is an indestructible fortress for those who love him. [8:25] I want to help you see how God as our rock, salvation, and fortress helps us to set our hearts on a God that is unshakable. When David says, my rock, what is he referring to? [8:44] Well, he's referring to his God. His unchanging rock. Back in the mid-70s, there were these things called pet rocks. [8:56] I was alive then, believe it or not. And these pet rocks were these little smooth stones and they had faces painted on them or glued on them. [9:07] And what you would do is you would take this pet rock as your own and you'd carry it with you or put it in a place where you would take care of your pet rock. And the idea is your pet rock depended on you. [9:19] When David says, my rock, he's not speaking of God as his pet rock. He's not talking about God as though God needs him. [9:32] As though God is dependent on him. David is saying that God, you are my rock. I need you. I need you to carry me. [9:45] I need you to care for me. What David has in mind here is a massive boulder. That provides refuge in danger. [9:57] We see the connection between rock and refuge in Psalm 61. And so if you just glance over to Psalm 61 verses 2 and 3, you read, Lead me to the rock that is higher than I, for you have been my refuge. [10:12] Rock, refuge. God is David's rock. God is David's refuge. And so when you get shook, you want something solid to hold on to. [10:25] You want to find refuge. You want solid ground to stand on. You want to know what you can count on. And so what God is saying here is this. I am your unchanging rock. [10:37] I'm your solid. You can count on me. You can trust me. I am unchanging. The fancy word for unchanging is immutable. [10:50] No mutating. No changing. Malachi 3.6 For I the Lord do not change. Unchanging rock. [11:01] The triune God of the Bible does not change. Each member of the Trinity does not change. We read in Hebrews 13.8, Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever. [11:21] Revelation 1.8 Jesus, the risen Christ, I am the Alpha and Omega, who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty. God is our unchanging God. [11:36] The triune God of the Bible is our great unchanging rock. He is where we find our refuge. [11:52] He is where we set our feet. We are secure in Him. He's our solid. Christ is our unchanging rock. [12:06] Our God is unshakable. He's immovable. He's worthy of our trust. David just doesn't say God is... [12:19] He's not just saying my rock. He says something else. He says that God is my salvation. God is our unstoppable salvation. In Psalm 62, again, David is waiting on God to deliver him, to rescue him from the danger he was facing. [12:38] He looks to God for deliverance. So must we. When we get shook, we've got to call to mind that God is our salvation. [12:49] He's our deliverer. He's unstoppable in it. No one can stay His hand. He's able to bring us through hardship. Look with me at Psalm 62, the last two verses, verses 11 and 12. [13:04] Once God has spoken, twice have I heard this. That might kind of sound unusual to you. That's just kind of a Hebrew way of calling your attention to something. This is important. Once God has spoken, twice have I heard this, that power belongs to God and that to you, O Lord, belongs steadfast love. [13:26] Power belongs to God. God is omnipotent. Unlimited in His power. But what we need to see here is power for what? Power to save. [13:39] Power to deliver. Power to rescue. A really clear way to see that is when Israel is moving out of Egypt and they're on their way and they've got their backs put against the Red Sea. [13:57] Do you remember this? Do you remember what God does in a show of His power? He divides the Red Sea. He separates the Red Sea and His people walk through. [14:08] It's a display of power towards deliverance. Towards salvation. Power belongs to God. And then we also read, to you, O Lord, belongs steadfast love. [14:23] When we see that, it's God's loyal love. His devotion to do good to His own. And what we see David doing is coupling God's power and His steadfast love. [14:37] God leverages His power for the good of His people because He loves them. And He delivers them. And so He opens up the Red Sea to deliver His people from danger because He loves them. [14:51] To bring Him to Himself. You know, there's no clearer place to see this coupling of power and love than in the cross of Jesus Christ. [15:05] At the cross and through His resurrection, Jesus wins the victory over sin and death. And He does it in His power out of love for us, those He would save. [15:18] What the dividing of the Red Sea shows is that God exercises His power out of love for His people to save them. And what the cross of Christ shows is that God exercises His power for those He loves to deliver them, to rescue them. [15:37] Nobody can stop God's power to save and to rescue. Nobody. You know, there is an interesting word here. [15:49] The word salvation in Hebrew, it's the word Yeshua. And when used, it's used to name people. [16:01] Joshua is the word, this word salvation applied to a person. That's His name. And I don't know if you know this, but it's also the name Jesus. [16:14] Jesus is a translation of Joshua. God saves. And in light of Christmas, do you remember Matthew 1? [16:29] An angel of the Lord appears to Joseph and says, Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. [16:40] She will bear a son and you shall call Him Jesus, Yeshua, for He will save His people from their sins. [16:53] Jesus is God's power and love incarnate. Incarnate. Made flesh. He came to die and to be raised to deliver a people for Himself. [17:11] God's deliverance of His people out of Egypt was unstoppable. And God's salvation of us through Jesus is unstoppable. What He began, He will carry on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus. [17:26] He has, one sense, already saved us. He's forgiven us and justified us. In another sense, He is saving us. He's working out our salvation, making us holy. In another sense, He still will save us. [17:38] There's a day where we will be glorified. Completely rid of our sinful nature. What a day that will be. He is unstoppable in carrying this out in His own. [17:52] And yes, often that requires upheaval and pain and sin. but God uses it all for His good. For our good. [18:04] For His glory. God is an unstoppable salvation. He is our unstoppable salvation. God is unshakable. [18:18] And not only is He a rock, not only is He salvation, He is a fortress. Do you see what David says? My fortress? [18:31] And not just any fortress. An indestructible fortress. Martin Luther penned a song, A mighty fortress is our God. [18:46] You know the rest? A bulwark never failing. Let's try that again. A mighty fortress is our God. [18:58] A bulwark never failing. God is our indestructible fortress. [19:10] Unfailing! There was this ancient fortress still there in southern Israel. Not that I've been there personally. [19:20] I've just seen pictures and read about it. It's called Masada. And Masada was this fortress built on this rock outcropping. It's like this island of rock coming out of the desert. [19:36] And so 1300 foot sheer walls. Cliffs. And on top of that was built a fortress. [19:46] 13 feet foot walls on top of that. Oh! Could you imagine trying to take that if you were an enemy army? [19:58] It would have been a daunting fortress. But it eventually fell. Our God who is our fortress never fails His people. [20:14] never fails. David is saying that God is His indestructible fortress high against His enemies. God can handle anything that David's enemies would throw against Him. [20:29] Anything. Anything. Any besiegement. Any weapon. Anything. God was David's fortress. [20:41] He would not be shaken by it. And by the way our greatest enemy the enemy of our soul the devil when Christ died and was raised from the dead the devil was defanged. [20:55] He prowls around like a lion but he can have no eternal impact on us as God's people. God is our indestructible fortress. [21:07] I was a little reluctant to use this but imagine God as a citadel atop of a granite mount. [21:23] You know Mir Ashtereth from Lord of the Rings the great white city beautiful it's almost impregnable you have this sense of presence. [21:40] God is our living fortress our living protection. I want you to think about God as our fortress and outside the main gate as we before we enter into through the portico there is something written on this fortress it's the name faithful and true our fortress is faithful and true that's our God and we walk in through the portico and we come underneath the main gate and we turn around and see what's written on the inside of the front gate and you know what's written on the inside of the front gate never will I leave you never will I forsake you God is our fortress indestructible think about it this way there's no threat bigger than God no he is the great I am he cannot be destroyed he's the creator and sustainer of all he is indestructible he's the giver of all life he is our indestructible fortress we have a living fortress in our God he is our defense and our protection he is our ever present help in time of trouble it's to him in whom we go and are safe [22:58] God is our fortress he's unshakable in who he is and so when we get shook we put our shaky hearts on our indestructible fortress who always has our good in mind so this first truth that God is unshakable I've tried to help you see it because he's our unchanging rock unstoppable salvation an indestructible fortress our triune God is unshakable and we set our shaky hearts on him but there's a second unshakable truth that I really want you to see this morning it is super sweet it's really important and it is how can you know that God is your rock how can you know that God is your salvation that he is your fortress the second unshakable truth is this the first is God is unshakable the second is this [24:12] God is unshakable in his commitment to you Christian unshakable immovable and to make the point I just want you to notice the word my in Psalm 62 my for God alone my soul waits he's referring to his whole being he's putting his whole being resting it on his God but then he says he only is my rock my salvation my fortress look at verse 5 my hope my rock my salvation my fortress verse 7 my salvation my glory he's my reputation 7 my mighty rock my refuge is God my oh my oh my there are a lot of my's here David apparently is pretty confident that his [25:16] God is for him that God is for him how did David know that and can we tap into that ourselves well there's a couple reasons why David was this confident God had made a covenant with his people the Mosaic covenant but where I want you to see is back in your Bibles it's in 2 Samuel 2 Samuel 7 God makes a very specific promise to David and I don't know if this was if Psalm 62 was written before or after 2 Samuel 7 but I want you to hold on to this nonetheless in 2 Samuel 7 God makes a covenant with David it's a very unique covenant and so if you pick up in verse 14 he says this now he's talking to [26:22] Nathan the prophet who will relay this to David but he says this I God will be to him a father and he shall be to me a son referring to David when he commits iniquity I will discipline him with the rod of men with the stripes of the sons of men verse 15 but my steadfast love will not depart from him as I took it from Saul whom I put away from before you verse 16 and your house and your kingdom shall be made sure before me your throne shall be established forever what 2 Samuel 7 is is a messianic promise that there's going to be a forever king that sits forever on David's throne and that forever king is going to set up an unshakable kingdom so what we see going on here is that David had a confidence that God would be unshakable in his commitment to him so that word my it's packed with David taking God at his word that his love would never depart from him and that promise in 2 Samuel 7 of an heir of [27:37] David that would sit on David's throne forever do you know who fulfilled that Jesus Jesus is the forever king who will sit forever on David's throne he will reign forever and set up he is setting up an unshakable kingdom him why am I telling you all this here's why that my in 60 Psalm 62 that belongs to you David's my becomes Mike's my through Jesus that my is your my my my rock my salvation my fortress it's through the blood of Jesus that we can say that God is now for us it's because of what God has done through Jesus to bring us into his new kingdom as his new people and that we can claim that promise that [28:41] God is our God and you'll never leave us nor forsake us all the promises of God are yes and amen in Jesus 2nd Corinthians 1 so David's my becomes Mike's my it becomes your my that God is your God he is your rock he is your salvation he is your fortress he is your refuge he is your hope he is your ever present help in time of need so when we read these my in Psalm 62 and we read them as David's we can take them as our own we can make them my my my God what this means is that we can have confidence that the unshakable triune God of the Bible is our unshakable God my unshakable God and he's made an unshakable promise to us in [29:43] Christ that he wrote in the blood of Jesus and then sealed with the resurrection of Christ himself it's a promise we can't shake therefore because God is unshakable and his commitment to us in Christ is unshakable therefore we will not be greatly shaken we will trust in our rock we will trust in our fortress we will trust in our refuge God is unshakable and his commitment to us is unshakable we are able to claim this and so we must claim it we live here and we're going to experience the same movement that we see in the psalm will move from being shaken to not shaken because our trust is in our unshakable [30:47] God I don't know where you are this morning if you've not been shaken you will be shaken sometime and when you are set your shaky heart on your unshakable God who's made an unshakable promise to you in Christ David in Psalm 56 9 he was under a different threat at that time he was afraid you know what he said but this I know that God is for me and in Christ we can rest our hearts on that this Thanksgiving we've got some wonderful things to be thankful for God is unshakable and his commitment to us in Christ is unshakable as well and so we will not be greatly shaken let me pray for us [31:49] God we are your people and God for those of us who put our faith in you we know that you've purchased us with the blood of Christ we belong to you we are yours our souls find rest in you God alone you are our rock you are our deliverer you are our fortress against the enemy God you are our refuge you are our healer you are our shepherd you are king of kings and lord of lords you are the head of this body and God we entrust ourselves to you we pour out our souls to you we don't turn in other places we look to you lead on our God direct our steps for the name for your name's sake in Jesus name amen