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[0:00] This psalm we're looking at this evening has a title which we've mentioned, which places it in a historical context. So let's remind ourselves of that event to help us understand why David's heart is filled with thankfulness. 1 Samuel 21, David is fleeing Saul. His circumstances are desperate. His kindred want to kill him. He has few allies. He flees to Ashish, the king of Gath.

[0:33] Now we remember Gath due to Goliath and Gath and Israel have constant enmity throughout their history. And the king recognizes David. His life is at threat. He has handed himself as a prize to an enemy king. So David changes his behavior. The Bible tells us that he acts insane, marks doors and gates and lets spit run down his beard. That brings the king to lose interest in him. And David flees again to live another day. If we didn't have that psalm that we have just sung, we might question David's integrity here. Yet the psalm clearly states that God is the delivering factor in this crisis, not David.

[1:24] Let's seek God's wisdom in prayer. Let's pray. Dear Lord, we thank you for your word. We thank you for its truth. We thank you that it's reliable.

[1:36] We come to you now as we look and open your word. We pray that your spirit fills us, teaches us and guides us. And we pray that everything we do here tonight is honoring to you. In Jesus Christ's name. Amen.

[1:54] Tasting and seeing. These are experiences of humans at the very most basic level. How many times today alone have you tasted something? Either good or bad. How continually are you seeing things? So many things that your brain must process. In fact, so much so that your brain disregards so much of its information as it deems it irrelevant because it can only retain so much.

[2:26] I can't recall what year I was in high school when I first got glasses. I think it may have been six year. But still, I can remember the sheer difference that putting lenses onto my eyes made to my ability to see the blackboard. And yes, in 2007, we still use blackboards. But it changed my overall ability to engage with learning. Seeing things differently enhanced my life. I could see things beyond 10 meters without them being blurry. I could read people's facial cues without being close. It did change my life.

[3:11] Tonight, we're looking at a moment in history where David tasted and saw that the Lord is good. A moment of deliverance and his proclaiming to believers in God that that is an experience for all who follow God as king. We will look at this passage using three titles to keep us orientated.

[3:34] First, remember the taste from verses 1 through 7. Second, taste and see the goodness of God.

[3:46] Taste and see the goodness of God. Verses 8 through 18. And third, taste and see the redemption of Christ. From verses 19 to 22. Remember the taste. First, remember the taste reading again verses 1 through 7.

[4:07] I will bless the Lord at all times. His praise shall continually be in my mouth. My soul makes its boast in the Lord. Let the humble hear and be glad. O magnify the Lord with me and let us exalt his name together. I sought the Lord and he answered me and delivered me from all of my fears. Those who look to him are radiant and their faces shall never be ashamed. This poor man cried and the Lord heard him and saved him out of all his troubles. The angel of the Lord encamps round those who fear him and delivers them.

[4:48] David is engaging in the Christian's most essential art of thanksgiving. Let me say that again. The Christian's most essential art of thanksgiving. He is remembering in which way God truly heard him, was near to him, was near to him, and delivered him. It was an experience so formative to him, there was no way in which he could do anything else but write a psalm of praise, thanks, and application to those he loved. Paul agrees with David here in Colossians 3.17, saying, And then in Philippians 4.6, those famous words that Paul commands, Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. In our text we are dealing with tonight, David says in verse 3 and 4,

[6:05] Let the humble hear and be glad. O magnify the Lord with me and let us exalt his name together. And then in verse 5, Those who look to him are radiant and their faces shall never be ashamed.

[6:19] So why do Paul and David need to compel us to be thankful? I was reading an article on Ligonier's website in relation to these verses, and it told a story that rings true to my experience. It speaks of a parent having to coach their children to say thank you well. Often children can be a whole world of awkward.

[6:49] Guiding them to make eye contact and to speak clearly enough to be understood when saying thank you. Or even if I think about my own life as well.

[7:01] We've all just experienced Christmas, a joyous time of family and friends, but I always get a degree of nervousness prior to receiving gifts.

[7:12] I think, what if I do not show my gratitude? So I go about coaching myself prior to it. Reminding myself to be thankful.

[7:24] Not fake, but show true appreciation for the act of love the gift giver has given me. I am not good at being thankful.

[7:35] We are often not good at being thankful. Let's hear that I will bless the Lord at all times. My soul makes its boast in the Lord.

[7:48] And this poor man cried, and the Lord heard him and saved him out of all his troubles. Bring those phrases, attitudes, and ideas into both our prayer and thought lives.

[8:05] Are there things in your life that we are not thanking God enough for? Let us, as a people who have been given so much, respond in loving gratitude to God.

[8:19] Researchers in the world of neuroscience range the length of time to be an expert in a certain thing between three and 25 years, depending on who you read.

[8:32] Let us, though, as children of God, start in our determination to be thankful people to a God who deserves every piece of adoration that we can muster.

[8:45] David very much remembered the taste of God's everlasting covenantal love for him through this experience of being delivered from the king, Gath.

[9:00] Let us remember the taste of God's covenantal love for us, and let us turn it into praise. Remember the taste.

[9:11] Taste and see the goodness of God, our second point. This brings us to the deliverance of God, which David experienced and so fondly remembered.

[9:26] Reading verses 8 through 18. O taste and see that the Lord is good. Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him.

[9:37] O fear the Lord, you his saints. For those who fear him have no lack. The young lions suffer want and hunger. But those who seek the Lord lack no good thing.

[9:51] Come, O children, listen to me. I will teach you the fear of the Lord. What man is there that desires life and loves many days that he may see good?

[10:02] Keep your tongue from evil and your lips from speaking deceit. Turn away from evil and do good. Seek peace and pursue it. The eyes of the Lord are towards the righteous and his ears towards their cry.

[10:18] The face of the Lord is against those who do evil to cut off the memory of them from the earth. When the righteous cry for help, the Lord hears and delivers them out of all their troubles.

[10:30] The Lord is near to the broken hearted and saves the crushed in spirit. David changes his tact here in these verses.

[10:41] He moves from this psalm of thankfulness that we find in verses 1 through 7 to instruction of proper fearing of the Lord for the rest of the psalm from verses 8 to 22.

[10:55] However, verse 8 is key. It's where the focus of David changes from compelling thankfulness to encouraging those of faith to experience the goodness of God viscerally.

[11:11] Colin spoke last week of feeling things to the gut. David here instructs us to engage all our senses when thinking about and enjoying God.

[11:23] David in verse 8 says, taste and see. And in verse 11, listen. Three of our five main senses spoken about within four verses of God's given word.

[11:39] A faith without spiritual or emotional level is as full of error as a faith that is all emotion and no contemplation. We cannot fall into either trap.

[11:52] We must integrate every aspect of our senses and mind into the greatest endeavor of enjoying the goodness of our Lord. After all, what is the very first catechism that we learn?

[12:07] Man's chief end is to glorify God and to enjoy him forever. Senses are important in our day-to-day living.

[12:20] I remember when I was a boy, and I'm guessing my father will also remember, when Heinz brought out green tomato sauce. I can't even remember why, but as my dad does, he buys what's new and interesting.

[12:36] I, however, could not bring myself to taste it. It offended one of my senses. How could my beloved condiment be the same when the specific visual element had changed?

[12:54] Or even those of you who have experienced COVID, many lost their sense of taste. Or this can even happen through the basic common cold.

[13:04] When we lose either our ability to taste or smell, the experience of enjoying food is sapped away. Or when we watch TV and the signal drops out, we can often hear the audio, but the screen is still pictulated, completely distorting our understanding of what is happening.

[13:28] Verse 8 says, Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good. From the text, What are some of the highlighted ways in which God is shown and proven to be good?

[13:43] Verse 8, We are blessed by God, and he gives us refuge. Verse 9, We who have a reverential fear, a true fear of God, have no lack, none, none at all.

[14:01] Verse 10, We who seek God, are given from the Lord, all good things that we require.

[14:13] Verses 11 through 14 are wisdom literature, mandating our behavior in this world, to be honoring to our God and our King. Verse 13 is similar to James chapter 3 on the tongue.

[14:29] David tells the follower of God to keep your tongue from doing evil and your lips from speaking deceit. In verse 14, David implores the reader to do a full 180 turn away from doing evil and completely turn to doing good.

[14:51] Then, he doubles down on an important aspect of the Christian life and the goal of being a peacemaker, not by telling the hearer just to seek peace, but also to pursue it actively.

[15:09] Pursue, seek, doubling down on the important aspect of being peacemakers. Verses 15 through 18 return to meditations on the goodness of God.

[15:23] There are also clear echoes of the Beatitudes of Christ in Matthew 5, which is why we read it earlier in our service. Here, in verse 15, the Lord, Yahweh, watches over us, listens out to us when we are in our distress.

[15:43] There's a film that always draws an emotive reaction from me whenever I watch it, and we watched it as a family recently. I don't know if any of you have seen the film Big Hero 6.

[15:57] It revolves around a robot called Biomax, a personal healthcare companion is how he's described. Whenever anyone cries out in pain, it activates and says, I was activated when you said, Al, how would you rate your pain from 1 through 10?

[16:17] I should never do an accent. Biomax is always listening out for people in pain, but he relied on being geographically nearby the situation and having a fully charged battery.

[16:32] God never sleeps. God never slumbers. He never requires charge. God is omnipresent and not limited by geography.

[16:44] He is always watching over us. At all times. Everywhere. And he always listens to us in our distress.

[16:56] Verse 16 brings comfort to us in a world where we see injustice swarm. We can empathize with Jeremiah when he implores God saying, Why does the way of the wicked prosper?

[17:09] To know that we have a God who is against the wicked and will bring ultimate justice is truly reassuring and essential for our understanding of this world as Christians.

[17:23] Paul in Romans 12 verse 19 states, Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God. For it is written, Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.

[17:40] God will judge. God is the judge. And we praise him for it. That is his job and not ours. Verses 17 and 18 shine forth beautiful goodnesses of our Father.

[17:56] In verse 17, we read, When the righteous cry for help, the Lord hears and delivers them out of all their troubles. The word that most often stands out may be delivers.

[18:11] It's the action term. It's the changing circumstances term. And then in verse 18, The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit.

[18:24] The word that is regularly picked up on here is saves. Again, the action word. These are both amazing and vital truths of our God and his goodness and what he does do for us.

[18:39] However, two words stand out for me like cars with their beams on amongst a series of cars with just mere headlights. These words being hears in verse 17 and the word near in verse 18.

[18:58] When a child cries out, parents will know the difference between disobedient crying and truly distressed crying. When a child does cry in true distress, the parent will not stay away and ignore their child with any interest and completely disinterested.

[19:19] They will hear. They will then come near and then they will try and deliver them out of their distress. God.

[19:30] God is the perfect father and he, as David shows, hears us and comes near to us in such a sufficient way that no human being ever trying to replicate it could.

[19:46] This is our God. This is our King who has forever been good, is good today, is good right now and will forever be good and pours like a waterfall out his goodness upon us.

[20:06] Our God is good and we should taste and see the goodness of that God, our God. We should remember the taste of his goodness in our past experiences and our faith and moving toward our third point, taste and see the redemption of Christ.

[20:30] Taste and see the redemption of Christ. Reading verses 19 through 22. Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivers him out of them all.

[20:42] He keeps all his bones, not one of them is broken. Affliction will slay the wicked and those who hate the righteous will be condemned. The Lord redeems the life of his servants, none of those who take refuge in him will be condemned.

[20:59] Let's remember the context in which this piece of scripture is written. David is in Gath. The king of Gath has not killed him, so yes, in the short term he has been delivered.

[21:12] But still he is in a foreign land filled with enemies. Saul is still seeking out to kill him to the point that Saul is about to massacre a series of priests that helped David during his escape.

[21:26] So in what way can David say the Lord delivers him out of all his troubles? You will hear ministers stand in pool pits like this one and time and time again saying that Christianity is not a promise to the avoidance of world troubles.

[21:45] But in fact, Christianity can bring increased hardship. Being a Christian can increase hardship. And they'd be correct to say so. Yet they'd also believe every Christian like David here can be genuinely delivered from all their troubles.

[22:01] Is this a conflict? The question must be asked and answered. What is the deliverance that David is speaking about and what is the deliverance in our experience?

[22:13] There's both an immediate and a long term. In the immediate, the solution is found where we are satisfied. Or more importantly, whom we are satisfied with.

[22:27] Whom was David satisfied in? whom should we find our satisfaction? John Piper's famous Desiring God tagline was, God is most satisfied in us when we are most satisfied in him.

[22:44] Whether or not that is completely accurate as a statement, it does point us towards the biblical mandate for us to be fully satisfied in God. D.A.

[22:55] Carson guides us through these set of ideas. He draws in many passages to clearly portray in what way we are satisfied in our glorious king.

[23:07] These can be summarised in Genesis 15. God himself is the very great reward of his covenant people. Then in the Gospel of John he highlights that the triune God makes himself present in the lives of his people by his spirit.

[23:24] through Christ we have abundant peace and everlasting joy with the end result that our hearts will neither be troubled nor afraid.

[23:36] So God himself is our very great reward. God is present with us by his spirit and Christ we have abundant peace and everlasting joy resulting in our hearts neither being troubled nor afraid.

[23:52] This this is the model that David can with all truth despite his perilous circumstances that have not changed say that God has delivered.

[24:03] His bones may not have been broken in this encounter with the king of Gath. He may only be going on to fight another day but he goes on living in hope with assurance and with the true satisfaction in God his king who will never leave him or ever let him down.

[24:24] He has been delivered from all his troubles in the best way possible. He has been saved from his problems and troubles in the best way by relying on God and his hope and his foundation.

[24:39] Christian, in the midst of your troubles, our troubles, meditate in these verses. Scripture has been given to you because God loves you.

[24:51] Christian, in the heights of joy, meditate on these verses. In whatever place we are in life, let us think about and embark on finding our satisfaction in God.

[25:05] Now, you may be sitting here saying, I'm not a Christian. What does this mean for me? Stop talking to them and talk to me. Well, I have great news for you.

[25:19] in Psalm 34 20, the words are, he keeps all his bones, not one of them is broken. This phrase appears in one other place in the New Testament in John 19 36.

[25:33] For these things took place that scripture might be fulfilled. Not one of his bones will be broken. This passage refers to the single most important moment in history for humanity and for God's people.

[25:50] Jesus Christ has just died on the cross for sins. The common practice during this process would be to break the legs of people being crucified to speed everything up.

[26:03] But when the soldiers approached Jesus he was already dead. So they did not break his bones. He has already cried out and has finished declaring ultimate victory over death and sin.

[26:18] He is already whilst going through the pain of the cross still interceded on behalf of the sinner mocking him saying forgive them for they do not know what they do.

[26:32] The Christ whose bones were not broken died for sinners. Romans 5 8 God shows his love for us that while we were still sinners Christ died for us.

[26:46] 2 Corinthians 5 21 Do you want this abundant peace this everlasting joy true deliverance from your troubles not changing your troubles but being able to genuinely be satisfied in God how all who did receive him who believed in his name he gave the right to become children of God the Bible tells us believe in him believe he died for you believe he rose again from the dead declare with your mouth that he is the Lord and you will be saved if you have never done this before and you do you will have started out on the greatest journey you ever will have ever thought of beginning and we know that our

[27:51] God will never let us down remember the taste of the goodness of God to you to all of us taste and see the goodness of our God once again and taste and see the greatest gift in the redemption of Christ Amen let's pray our great saviour you are endlessly good what pure goodness we find in the God of all creation thank you you are all good and the source of goodness itself we pray we recall the times when in our lives with all our senses we have understood and enjoyed your goodness to us we pray that we never forget the goodness of the redemption of

[28:54]  Christ if there were no cross there would be no hope if there were no grave there would be no hope if there were no resurrection there would be no hope but there were all these things in your glorious redemption plan for us we hope because you gave us a firm foundation in Jesus we with David again join in saying we will bless the Lord at all times we will continue in our endeavour always to taste and see the Lord is good we pray all this in Jesus Christ name Amen the love to you you you you you