[0:00] Well, I'd like to ask you to go with me in the Word of God to the book of Psalms, Psalms 34 this evening. Psalms 34 this evening. And I appreciate the opportunity to be here at Vision.
[0:10] I'm always encouraged by being back here at our sending church. I've been traveling quite a bit in the States, presenting everything that's going on there in Chile. But it's good to be back here in the States, or back here in Vision.
[0:24] Good to be back in the States, too. Okay. Psalms 34. I want to ask a question before we dig into the reading tonight, all right? And think about it before you answer, okay? How many here this evening would raise their hand and say, I'm a humble person?
[0:38] Don't raise your hand, all right? As soon as you raise your hand, then you just admitted that you're not a humble person, right? It's the virtue that we lose as soon as we think that we have it, then we lost it.
[0:51] Because being humble is when we realize really who we are. And when we know who we are, we realize that we're nothing and that He is everything. And as we learn more about Him and we get to know Him more, then humility is a natural thing that grows in our own heart.
[1:10] The less we know Him, the less we spend time with Him, the more pride grows inside. And we really start believing that we're something special and that we're really responsible for a lot of things in our lives.
[1:21] When we really know that God is the one that's responsible, He's the one that's given us all the good gifts that we have and all the blessings that we have. It's all about Him. So back on this furlough, I decided, since I'm not week in and week out preparing messages and doing different things, that I would take time in the Psalms just to learn more about God.
[1:40] And knowing more about Him to learn more about who we are in Him and the position we should have with Him, the relationship that we should have with Him as we realize who He is and therefore who we are.
[1:52] And I want to share some of those things with you that I pray will be an encouragement to us all. Let's start in verse number one, Psalm 34. One, the Bible says, I will bless the Lord at all times.
[2:04] His praise shall continually be in my mouth. My soul shall make her boast in the Lord. Who is our boasting going to be in? In the Lord.
[2:16] I don't know how many of you struggle like I do at sometimes taking the credit for good things that happen in life. Do any of you struggle with that? Or am I the only one here? All right, Ty. There's two of us that have that problem.
[2:27] All right. All of us would have guessed it was Ty, right? But you know, here the Psalmist says, My soul shall make her boast in the Lord. The humble shall hear thereof and be glad.
[2:40] The humble will hear that I'm boasting in the Lord and the humble are going to be happy. They'll be glad to see how God is working. And here the Psalmist, David, the king, he's writing and he's saying, And I'm going to realize where everything comes from, where I should boast in.
[2:55] It comes from God. And the humble will hear the king have that attitude and will be thankful for that. Oh, magnify the Lord with me and let us exalt his name together.
[3:08] I sought the Lord and he heard me and delivered me from all my fears. They looked unto him and were lightened and their faces were not ashamed. This poor man cried and the Lord heard him and saved him out of all his troubles.
[3:22] The angel of the Lord encampeth round about them that fear him and delivereth them. Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good. Blessed is the man that trusteth in him.
[3:35] Let's pray together. Lord, I thank you so much for the opportunity we have tonight to open your word, to open the book of Psalms, to read this Psalm that so eloquently expresses the heart attitude that we all want to have.
[3:50] And I pray tonight that your name would be exalted, magnified. I pray we would learn how our attitude should be towards you and toward ourself as we understand how humility comes from knowing you more.
[4:03] Bless this time. And we ask this in Jesus' name. Amen. Well, we're going to look here about how humility comes from knowing God and a couple of truths that I think we can learn here from God's word.
[4:13] The first is humility is when we boast in the Lord. Humility really is when we boast in the Lord. You don't think about boasting and humility being closely related, but it is closely related when we boast in the Lord.
[4:26] You know, David, he had so many things that he could have boasted about. He was chosen and anointed as a young man, the youngest of his brothers there to be the king of Israel. He went out to that battle and he killed Goliath, cut his head off, and he was known for it.
[4:41] The women started singing songs about him. I don't know if you could imagine back in your young days and women singing songs about you. I can only imagine with my teenage boys that that could probably go to your head pretty quickly, you know, having that kind of thing.
[4:54] I say only imagine, you know, all of us guys are sitting around thinking, yeah, well, we can remember that specific kind of, maybe you. I didn't necessarily have that particular, I know Trent did. Trent, there was a lot of bluegrass songs going on about.
[5:08] There's a couple other things I want to say, but we'll just move on. All right, good. So, humility. Humility comes from boasting in the Lord, from boasting in the Lord. David could have boasted.
[5:19] You and I, we can boast. We're often tempted to boast, to think about our talents and what we've accomplished, the degrees, the job, the experiences that we've had, our health, our families.
[5:31] You know, we can look at things and we can begin to believe that because of who we are are the things that we have done, are the decisions that we have made, separate from God and his involvement in our lives, that we are a product of our own decisions.
[5:46] And obviously, we're a product of the decision of following Jesus and submitting to him and letting him work in us, but it is God who does the work in our hearts and in our lives.
[5:57] So, how do we boast in the Lord? Look what the Bible says there in verse number one. I will bless the Lord at all times. How do we boast in the Lord? Well, we bless his name at all times.
[6:09] We bless him. The idea of bless, we praise him. The interesting thing is the root word there in bless, if we go back and look there at the root word, is the root there is actually to kneel.
[6:22] The idea of we're on our knees. We're before God. We're praising him. We're thankful to him. We're not boastful in ourself. We're not looking unto ourself. We're not thankful for ourselves, but we're looking unto God.
[6:35] We're thankful to him. We're down on our knees in a posture of humility and thankfulness, recognizing who he is. Praising his name. Thanking him for who he is and what he does.
[6:48] And the psalmist here says, David, of all people, someone that could have had many reasons to have boasted in himself, he said, I will bless the Lord at all times.
[7:01] And no doubt for a king, he had to remind himself frequently that he's not the one that's sitting on the throne of thrones. He's not the one that's the king of kings, but it's Jesus. And he humbly submits himself there to bless the Lord, to adore, to praise the Lord there in attitude of thankfulness and respect.
[7:20] Psalms 103, one, the Bible says, bless the Lord. Oh, my soul and all that is within me. Bless his holy name. This idea of blessing and bowing on your knee reminds me of Daniel, Daniel 610.
[7:34] There in the verse, it says, he went into his house and his windows being open in his chamber toward Jerusalem. What did he do there? He kneeled upon his knees three times a day and prayed and gave thanks before his God.
[7:49] Here, Daniel, a living example of that. Back in the Psalms, Psalm 95, six, the Bible says, Oh, come, let us worship and bow down. Let us kneel before our Lord, or the Lord, our maker.
[8:04] You know, as I think back in my own life, when's the last time that I've purposely thought through, I want to be in a posture, either physically or, or a really a heart posture of, of bowing down, of kneeling down, of being there just to bless the Lord.
[8:19] In times of prayer, I don't know about you, but, um, we know that the appropriate way to start our prayers is to go into a time of thankfulness, a time of praise, a time of, of thanking him for who he is and what he does.
[8:32] But I don't know if you struggle with this like I do at times, but I find myself getting down to that. Lord, give us our daily bread. And here's the needs and the problems and the difficulties.
[8:42] And the Psalmist is going to get to those things here just in a little bit and talk about some of his issues that he has going on and the problems and fears. But he starts off by saying, I will bless the Lord at all times.
[8:53] His praise shall continually be in my mouth. Continually. Every day. All day. I'm praising him. I'm in the attitude of bowing before him. I'm blessing him.
[9:04] I'm humbly before him, thanking God for all that he is and what he's done in my life. Humility is when we boast in the Lord. When we boast in the Lord, it comes out in the things that we say with our family, with our friends, speaking about how good God is.
[9:20] But not only do we see, if we're talking about how do we boast in the Lord, we bless him. We fill our mouths with praise, but also that praise comes from our soul. Look what the Bible says in verse two.
[9:30] My soul shall make her boast in the Lord. You know, not only is it on a mouth level, but it's coming from that deep heart level. When we think of the soul, what is the soul? Well, soul is often described as, as our mind.
[9:43] It's described as the, the seed of our emotions, of our will. They're in the deep part of our heart, where we feel it and where we think about all that God has done for us.
[9:54] How many of you are married here this evening? Raise your hand. All the married people. I don't know how many times you might find yourself saying things like, thank you for, or I love you, or I appreciate you, or different things of the nature.
[10:06] And, and you mean it, but it's more of a, your, your mind's halfway distracted on other things that are going on, but you're trying to cultivate that sweetness. And maybe I'm confessing and I'm the only one that, that struggles with some of those kinds of things.
[10:19] But I know Kaysen was telling me about that earlier. And I know that, that he's got that issue. So I got Ty backing me up and Kaysen with me today. Um, God's going to work on their hearts before the service is over with, but really feeling it, thinking about it.
[10:32] You know, that, that time of meditation, meditation is such a, a lost biblical habit for so many of us where we pause what we're doing, where we set things aside, where we focus on him, where we talk to him, where we hear from him.
[10:46] That's what the Psalmist is encouraging us to do. And how do we grow in humility? Maybe you think about yourself and your own attitudes and you might admit, I struggle with pride and I struggle with thinking more highly of myself than I ought to.
[11:00] Well, a cure for that is to get to know God more, to think about him more, to meditate on him more, to understand who he is and to meditate on those things on a regular basis.
[11:10] Thinking about what God has done, what God is doing. We seek praises, or we speak praises with our mouth, but they are born in the depths of our soul. Uh, they're in the depths of our hearts.
[11:20] You know, there in Latin America, oftentimes people repeat a religious ritual of prayers. And many of those that would be more dedicated to, to God in their eyes, they'll, they'll repeat prayers on a more regular basis.
[11:35] And they'll have some, they'll repeat five times and others one times. And even they'll have different beads that'll help them to kind of follow along, to keep up with the practice. But it's all just from the mouth. But here the Psalmist is talking about not repeating some ritual or going through the modern day version of a prayer app and just scrolling through, but really praying sincerely from our heart.
[11:55] And it's great to use an app. It's great to use a list. It's great to use all those things. Some of you are going to, are thinking now, as soon as Brother Gardner gets back, we're going to, the app is wonderful.
[12:07] So verse number three says, verse number two says, look at verse number three. Oh, magnify the Lord with me and let us exalt his name together.
[12:19] So how do we really take time to boast in the Lord? We bless them. We fill our mouths with praise. We praise him from our soul. We magnify him to magnify. The Lord is to call him great, which seems a bit ironic for small, finite human beings to call him great, right?
[12:37] It's stating the obvious, but it's really also brings us to the point of realizing he's great and we're not great and he's everything and we're not. And we confess that and we say it out loud and we appreciate him and we realize who we, who he is and we boast in him magnifying the Lord and everything.
[12:56] Look what the Bible says there. Oh, magnify the Lord with me and let us exalt his name together. So not only are we magnifying, but we're exalting kind of a synonym there. And we're doing that together.
[13:08] We're doing that with other people. It brings us to the idea of a church service where we gather together with other Christians and we share testimonies like you heard from the missionaries tonight about how God is good and the things that he's doing and the way that he's blessing around the world and all the different exciting spiritual gifts that he's given us and opportunities that he's given us.
[13:29] Praise the Lord. We come together and we praise the Lord together. That is a way that we grow in humility, knowing him more, boasting in the Lord and in what he does in our lives.
[13:42] Look what the Bible says in verse number four. We'll go back and read that there. The Bible says, I sought the Lord and he heard me and delivered me from all my fears.
[13:53] Humility is not only learned as we boast in the Lord, but it's also developed as we depend on the Lord, as we depend on the Lord. The psalmist says here that he sought the Lord in prayer.
[14:05] He sought God. He went looking for the Lord and for an answer from the Lord. He needed help from God. It's interesting here in the passage because it progresses. In verse number seven, he talks about fear or it talks about fearing him.
[14:19] But a little bit before that, in verse number four, the last part of the verse, it says that he delivered me from all my fears. A little further down in verse number six, it talks about how he saved him out of all his troubles.
[14:30] The Lord delivereth him and delivers them. In verse number seven, here you have troubles and fears and deliverance that is being sought after. And this humble psalmist is realizing, my boast is in Jesus.
[14:45] The humble psalmist is realizing, I depend on him. I lean on him. I can't. He can. I need him in order to do the things that I am doing.
[14:56] He prayed. In verse number four, the Bible says, I sought the Lord. In verse number six, this poor man cried. The psalmist there pointing to himself, like speaking about himself in third person. This guy, this man, this poor man cried unto the Lord.
[15:10] And look what the Bible says. In verse number four, I sought the Lord. And what did Jesus do? What did the Lord do? Help me out there. The next phrase. And he, he heard me. And in verse number six, this poor man cried and the Lord heard him.
[15:24] What an exciting thing to know that when we pray, God hears us. And when we go before him and we take our fears, the things that are down inside, the things that are non tangible, the things that people don't know about, the feelings level of our life and all the things that are racing through our mind, even this week, as you're going through whatever you're going through, we take those fears to the Lord.
[15:45] We cast those burdens on the Lord and the Lord. He loves us. He takes care of us. He is a good God. And here the psalmist is encouraging us to take our burdens to the Lord, to present these things to him.
[15:59] Look what the Bible says as we continue on there in verse number seven, verse number seven, the angel of the Lord encampeth round about them that fear him and delivereth them.
[16:12] So when we talk about humility is when we depend on the Lord. Well, how do we depend on the Lord? We pray to him and we fear him. Verse number seven, those that fear the Lord.
[16:22] In verse number nine, it talks about, oh, fear the Lord, ye, his saints, for there is no want to them that fear him. Several times there, it talks about fear.
[16:33] Now, when we talk about fears, sometimes the Bible uses the word fear as like having fright of a certain thing. But when we talk about the fear of the Lord, it's not a fright, but it's standing in awe of.
[16:45] It's a respect toward. Back to that first verse that we saw, bless the Lord. There I am on a knee praising his name. Here a little bit further down, it talks about, hey, blessed are those, or happy are those that fear the Lord, that have that correct attitude toward God, that stand in awe.
[17:04] Man, I'm just in awe of who he is, in awe of what he's doing, in awe of his grace, in awe of his mercy, in awe of how he saved me, in awe of all the things that he's doing on a daily basis.
[17:16] Praise be the Lord. And we stand in awe before him. That, as we, as we do that, we're expressing that dependence on him and growing in humility.
[17:28] He protects us when we stand in awe from him. The angel of the Lord encampeth round about them that fear him and delivereth them. What an encouraging verse to read about. Especially David in the context that he was in, in so many wars and conflicts and battles and people that were trying to kill him.
[17:45] But he was able to say with confidence that he stood there and the Lord protected him. The Lord was there with him. And no doubt serving overseas and being on the mission field, there are so many times when we've known specifically that God has protected us, in very real ways.
[18:02] I remember a time when it was on a, the 11th of September, which is a, a day of some political chaos there in Chile from years ago. And every year they have riots.
[18:13] And we had bought the first church property there in Chile. And we were getting close again to, to that, that time of year when all the riots will be going on. And I remember telling one of the guys I was working with, we're not going to have the church building burnt down.
[18:26] We're not going to have it looted. This kind of thing happens on this night. And so I'm going to leave my wife and kid. I think there was a kid then, maybe kid. No, there was two. The wife and kids back at the house, because we lived in a neighborhood that had a gate, but the church property was a lot more vulnerable and the area was a lot rougher.
[18:40] And so I'll go there and spend the night at the church with a couple of men. And we'll be there to protect the church property. And we were there in the, at the middle of the night. And I remember looking out of the window and we're seeing a big bonfire being built in the street as they're cutting the electric wires and, you know, they're tearing down the stoplight that was there and the fire is getting bigger.
[19:00] But I knew some of the guys that were out on the street. And so I told the church guys, man, we know these people. We're out knocking doors, visiting people. Let's go out. Why be back here scared? We can go out and maybe even invite them to church for Sunday.
[19:12] So we opened up the gate. We're standing there. More and more teenagers are coming. And some are, you know, got their heads covered. And we hear the police riding by and they've got the tear gas that, you know, every now and then you'll smell a little bit here and there.
[19:25] And so things started escalating and they started getting a bit rougher. And so we decided let's shut the gate and go back inside the church and turn the lights off. And we'll just watch from the windows. And, you know, they started jumping over the fence to grab some things to burn because we had some, some scrap wood and things there on the fence, but they're just, yeah, we'll just let that happen.
[19:45] They ripped open a gate of a neighbor at a catty corner from the church, about 50 yards from where we were watching from a window and pulled the car out and burn it in the street. And we're thinking, man, I should have stayed back with my wife and kids.
[19:57] This is crazy. Thankfully, the security got better. That was like in 2008 or something like that. But seeing the Lord take care of us, the Lord take care of us. I was sharing with a group of missionaries and just knocking doors and handing out some flyers, somewhere in that same timeframe.
[20:13] And a guy walked up to me in Spanish and he said something, but he slurred it and I didn't understand him, but he pulled his t-shirt up and he had a pistol there, you know, right there tucked in his pants. And obviously it was something about giving your money or something like that.
[20:26] And so I just handed him a track and in English, cause I thought it'd be better than Spanish. I said, Hey, come to church on Sunday. And I just kept walking down the street. Lord, please don't let me get shot.
[20:36] Cause I've got a wife and some kids at home. And you know, there's, but the Lord, Hey, here, David says, I'm living in awe of the Lord. I'm living humbly praising his name.
[20:49] I don't know all the things that are going to happen in the future, but I have fear and there's troubles and there's all these difficulties. And I'm taking them to the Lord and I'm leaning on him because although I might have a position and although I might have some, some human power and authority, the truth is I stand in awe of Jesus and I need him and it's all about him.
[21:11] And I've got to have the right attitude looking to him because without him, I am nothing and I can do nothing. And I have these fears and have these burdens and I need the Lord close to me.
[21:22] The angel of the Lord encampeth round about them that fear him and delivereth them. Look what the Bible says in verse number eight. Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good.
[21:33] Blessed is the man that trusteth in him. Blessed is the man that trusteth in him. It reminds me of Psalms one, verse number one. Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the seat or in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful, but his delight is in the law of the Lord.
[21:52] And in his law doth he meditate day and night. Blessed is the man or happy is the man that avoids all these, these things of sin and those that are walking in sin.
[22:04] And that man that meditates in God's word day and night. It's going to be like that strong tree that's planted there by the waters. He'll have fruit. He'll be a person that honors the Lord, a person that is, that is blessed.
[22:18] And here the psalmist later in Psalm 34, he's inviting others. Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good. Blessed or happy is the man that trusteth in him.
[22:30] Happy is the man. Blessed is the man that trusts in him. How can we, as we think about, how can we depend on the Lord? What does it mean to depend on the Lord? Well, we pray to him. We fear him.
[22:40] We trust him. We trust the Lord. We trust him because he's good. We trust him because he will answer our prayers. Talking about the app again, I'm going to try to redeem myself. Some of you have even seen how the, the prayer requests have been answered, but then some of those answers have not been what we were anticipating.
[22:58] And the answers have been no, because God can answer yes, or he can answer no, or he can answer wait. Not, not yet. Right. But we know that God does hear prayers and he does answer prayers.
[23:10] And we have not because we ask not. And we ask, and we show that dependency on him, on the Lord. We trust him because he's good. We trust him because he answers our prayers. We trust him because he will deliver us.
[23:23] The Psalm does not say that we will not have fears, enemies, and troubles, but it does promise deliverance for them by God's power. Look what the Bible says here in verse number nine, as we keep going on here.
[23:35] Oh, fear the Lord, ye, his saints, for there is no want to them that fear him. Those that stand in awe before the Lord, what do they want?
[23:46] The idea there, what do they lack? Like the Bible says in, in Psalms 23, the Lord is my shepherd. I shall not want. I shall not lack. I will be complete in thee.
[23:57] I have everything that I need. I have all the spiritual resources, all the tools, everything that I might need. I have because I have Jesus. I'm in him. He's in me.
[24:07] And the, the Psalmist here says that, um, Oh, fear the Lord, ye, his saints, for there is no want to them that fear him. If you stand in awe of yourself, then you're going to be lacking many things.
[24:20] If you stand in awe of Jesus, then there will be nothing that you will lack because you'll have everything that you need in him. Look what verse says, uh, verse number 10, the young lions do lack and suffer hunger, but they that seek the Lord shall not want any good thing.
[24:38] What an interesting example that he uses there. The young lions do lack and suffer hunger. What is a, what is a lion? When we think of a lion, a lion there on the prairie, he's the, the king.
[24:49] He's the one that dominates. He's the one that when he's hungry, he goes and he finds the weakest one and there's, there's, there's lunch and there's, um, supper and I've got breakfast lined up for tomorrow. He, he, especially the young ones, but the Psalm is using that example.
[25:03] Even the young lion sometimes is hungry because he doesn't get what he's searching for. But those of us that search for the Lord and seek the Lord and, and lean into him and desire to know him and to serve him and to bless him and to stand in awe in front of him.
[25:20] There is nothing that we will lack. What a blessing. And that's the reason why we depend on him because we know he's a good God and he is trustworthy.
[25:30] And we pray to him because of that. And we bow down to him because of that. And we love and follow after him because of that. But not only do we see those truths, but the last truth, humility leads us to encourage others to know the Lord.
[25:45] Humility leads us to encourage others to know the Lord. In verse number three, Oh, magnify the Lord. What's the next two words? With me.
[25:55] Oh, magnify the Lord with me. There's some other verses they're putting up on the screen that were support verses that we're not going to use. All right. But if you want the whole thing, just look at the screen behind me and you'll get those as we go.
[26:06] So here he says, magnify the Lord with me. In verse number eight, the Psalmist is encouraging. He's inviting. It's actually an imperative where he's commanding saying, Hey guys, taste and see, taste and see.
[26:21] You don't believe me. Maybe you've never given your life to the Lord. You don't understand what I'm talking about, how I'm, I'm giving myself to him and I'm bowing down to him and I'm praising him.
[26:31] And it's not about me. And it's not a boast in David, but a boast in God and everything. You don't understand why I live that way. Well, you just need to taste and see. You just need to get to know him.
[26:42] Come over and meet my Jesus, get to know him. And if you are a Christian, you've already placed your faith in him. Maybe you've never lived a life of complete surrender where you've said, Lord, here I am.
[26:53] I want to serve you and follow you and honor you and obey you and praise your name every day because from you, we get everything that we need. Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good.
[27:05] Blessed is the man that trust, trust in him. Taste doesn't suggest a sip or a nibble. It implies feeding on the Lord through his word and experiencing all he has for us.
[27:18] It means knowing him better and enjoying him more. Oh, taste and see. How can we get to know the Lord more so that we live in greater humility? How do we draw closer to him so that the natural response of our, of our mouth that's born out of our heart is to praise him and to thank him?
[27:37] How does that happen? What happens? The more we taste and see the Lord, the more we read God's word, the more we meditate on who he is. I want to invite you all this evening to think about, um, what, what, what attitudes need to change in your own life.
[27:51] It'll be great time to bow your knee tonight and thank him for who he is and what he's done. It'd be great time to bow your knee and acknowledge that you need him. Seek his help tonight with your fears, with your needs, with your troubles.
[28:03] He's a good God and he will help you taste and see that he is good because he is enjoy Jesus. Get in the Bible more so you can enjoy him more and decide to tell others about him and his goodness.
[28:17] There's the missions there at the end of the, the passes there. Oh, taste and see, invite others to know who Jesus is and God can use us as we enjoy him to have a greater passion to help others know who he is and enjoy him as well.