WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:15.599 Hi, my name is George Sinclair. I'm the lead pastor of Church of the Messiah. 00:00:15.599 --> 00:00:20.480 ! It is wonderful that you would like to check out some of the sermons done by Church of the Messiah, 00:00:20.480 --> 00:00:25.679 either by myself or some of the others. Listen, just a couple of things. First of all, would you pray for us 00:00:25.679 --> 00:00:32.159 that we will open God's Word well to His glory and for the good of people like yourself? 00:00:32.159 --> 00:00:37.359 The second thing is, if you aren't connected to a church and if you are a Christian, 00:00:37.359 --> 00:00:42.159 we really, I would really like to encourage you to find a good local church where they believe the 00:00:42.159 --> 00:00:48.799 Bible, they preach the gospel, and if you have some trouble finding that, send us an email. We will do 00:00:48.799 --> 00:00:55.120 what we can to help connect you with a good local church wherever you are. And if you're a non-Christian, 00:00:55.119 --> 00:01:00.320 checking us out, we're really, really, really glad you're doing that. Don't hesitate to send us 00:01:00.320 --> 00:01:05.280 questions. It helps me actually to know, as I'm preaching, how to deal with the types of things 00:01:05.280 --> 00:01:07.679 that you're really struggling with. So God bless. 00:01:12.239 --> 00:01:18.319 Heavenly Father, we now come before you to hear you speak directly to our hearts and our minds. 00:01:19.439 --> 00:01:24.560 Lord, we admit, sometimes we don't want to, we don't want to hear your Word, or we don't want to hear from 00:01:24.560 --> 00:01:30.879 you, but we just want to continue with our everyday life. But Lord, we just ask that you break that 00:01:31.760 --> 00:01:36.960 that mindset, that thing that we struggle with the most, and that you draw us into yourself. 00:01:37.840 --> 00:01:41.280 I pray this in Jesus' name. Amen. Please be seated. 00:01:41.280 --> 00:01:52.560 I like how it feels like I'm preaching in someone's backyard right now. It's like a barbecue going on. 00:01:53.359 --> 00:02:01.040 Okay. So last week, I had the privilege of preaching here, and I used an opener, 00:02:02.319 --> 00:02:07.040 an illustration of me having a conversation with somebody at a restaurant, of the owner of the 00:02:07.040 --> 00:02:12.000 restaurant, when I was getting lunch after ministering at a different church. And we got to 00:02:12.000 --> 00:02:17.520 talking. And I'm going to use a similar illustration today, because it fits so well 00:02:18.400 --> 00:02:23.120 with this psalm. It fits really well. But it's going to be hypothetical. It's going to be, 00:02:23.920 --> 00:02:29.200 suppose you're having a conversation in a coffee shop with a group of friends. And these friends 00:02:29.199 --> 00:02:35.839 all come from different religions or different ideologies. But it's all, it's a good conversation. 00:02:35.839 --> 00:02:40.639 No one gets heated. None of that. It's just, you're having a debate. Everyone's debating about 00:02:40.639 --> 00:02:46.479 their gods or what they hold on to most dearly in their life as their all and end all. And you get to 00:02:46.479 --> 00:02:51.519 talking, talk about your gods, and you start debating. And the psalm we're looking at today 00:02:51.520 --> 00:02:59.200 is kind of like that in a sense. The psalm has this, has a question within it, right at the middle, 00:02:59.680 --> 00:03:06.480 that makes you question who is like our God. And that can, anyone who has a different faith 00:03:06.480 --> 00:03:12.080 background can say the exact same thing. So we're going to come at this psalm in a different way. 00:03:12.080 --> 00:03:16.640 We're going to ask these questions as we go through it, picturing in our minds this conversation 00:03:16.639 --> 00:03:23.199 conversation of these friends around a coffee table that we have. And this psalm, Psalm 113, 00:03:23.419 --> 00:03:27.799 it's very helpful if you can turn to that right now. If you have your Bible, please pull it out, 00:03:27.859 --> 00:03:33.579 because it's really good to see what's going on in the whole psalm. It's good to see if I'm holding 00:03:33.579 --> 00:03:37.879 to the text, and I'm also going to be jumping around. I seem to jump around in the psalm, so that's going 00:03:37.879 --> 00:03:42.319 to happen in this psalm. And the way we're going to do this, we're going to continue our summer series 00:03:42.319 --> 00:03:48.199 in the psalms. And it's always a reminder. Last week, I reminded you how great it is to read the 00:03:48.199 --> 00:03:53.780 psalms. And I'm going to do it again, because the psalms are a great book of the Bible to read every 00:03:53.780 --> 00:03:58.560 day, to read one of the psalms every day, regardless if it's the shortest one, which I believe is only 00:03:58.560 --> 00:04:04.599 two verses, or the longest one, whichever one you want to read, just read it. Timothy Keller has a 00:04:04.599 --> 00:04:08.479 great one-year devotional going through the psalms. I would highly recommend it. I think it's called 00:04:08.479 --> 00:04:15.219 the Psalms of Jesus. Just the psalms are a great book, because it allows you to see the pilgrim 00:04:15.219 --> 00:04:23.439 walking through life, experiencing every emotion, whether it's good, joyous time, or whether it's 00:04:23.439 --> 00:04:29.420 the hardest moments of their life. You see it, and you see them crying out to God. And that gives us, 00:04:30.139 --> 00:04:35.879 that allows us to come to God with every emotion. You don't just have to come to God feeling all 00:04:35.879 --> 00:04:42.319 joyful. You can come to God feeling very bitter, feeling very angry, feeling very sad. You can come 00:04:42.319 --> 00:04:47.259 to God for that. And it's just a good reminder. We should remind ourselves always. And as I said, 00:04:47.439 --> 00:04:53.860 Psalm 113 is a unique psalm. It's a unique psalm because it sets up a question in the middle, 00:04:54.120 --> 00:05:00.000 and leading up to the question, there's nine lines of poetry. And then it asks the question. 00:05:00.000 --> 00:05:07.439 Then following that question, there's another nine lines of poetry after it. And the question is, 00:05:07.639 --> 00:05:13.839 who is like the Lord our God? It's also the title of the psalm in the ESV, and I believe in the NIV, 00:05:14.000 --> 00:05:19.000 it's also that title. And so that's what we're going to ask. Who is like the Lord our God? 00:05:19.500 --> 00:05:25.560 And really in this conversation that we're having with this hypothetical conversation we're having 00:05:25.560 --> 00:05:32.959 with our friends here, we would be thinking this. And our friends sitting around the table would also 00:05:32.959 --> 00:05:38.699 be thinking the exact same thing. Who is like my God? Who is like the God that I worship every week? 00:05:38.720 --> 00:05:45.079 Or who is the God that I go and practice, do my practice every week? And when we think about 00:05:45.079 --> 00:05:51.439 religions, world religions, there's many of them, we're thinking about Christianity, Islam, 00:05:51.439 --> 00:05:58.699 Islam, spiritualism, naturalism, Hinduism, Buddhism, paganism, and secularism. There's all these isms 00:05:58.699 --> 00:06:02.719 happening, all these different religions. And we're going to picture all these people 00:06:02.719 --> 00:06:08.639 sitting around a table having a good conversation, good debate. I know it's rare, but we're going to 00:06:08.639 --> 00:06:14.540 picture that. But there's something about this that no other religion can say. 00:06:14.540 --> 00:06:21.500 No other religion can say about their God is that their God cares, except the Christian God. 00:06:22.080 --> 00:06:26.160 No other religion can say it. So we're going to approach the psalm in that sense, with that in 00:06:26.160 --> 00:06:32.800 our minds. And this psalm shows us that. And we're going to look at it in three ways. We're going to 00:06:32.800 --> 00:06:38.300 look at it in the greatness of God, very similar to the psalm last week. We're also going to look at it 00:06:38.300 --> 00:06:44.280 as the smallness, God cares for the smallness. And then we're also going to look at it in how 00:06:44.279 --> 00:06:51.919 to worship. How do we apply this concept to our lives? So point one is the greatness of God. 00:06:52.359 --> 00:06:58.699 So we'll look at it beginning at verse two. And the psalmist says this, 00:07:00.359 --> 00:07:08.059 Blessed be the name of the Lord from this time forth and forevermore. So the psalmist right away 00:07:08.060 --> 00:07:15.560 in verse two is going after the sense that God is eternal. And this idea of eternity, 00:07:16.399 --> 00:07:22.240 just personally, really came home to me when we just came back from living in Port Perry, 00:07:22.360 --> 00:07:26.819 where I was an assistant pastor at a church doing this contract piece. It's called a curacy. 00:07:27.379 --> 00:07:30.759 And it's the next step you take after going through school to help train you more up 00:07:30.759 --> 00:07:37.420 to become an Anglican minister. And the thing that really confronted me there right away was my 00:07:37.420 --> 00:07:44.139 mortality. And in one sense, the way it confronted me was that I tried to do things that I used to be 00:07:44.139 --> 00:07:50.560 able to do when I was younger. And my body would get injured or would recover very slowly. So that 00:07:50.560 --> 00:07:56.779 confronted me. But another way I got confronted was that we lived at the time there's no other places 00:07:56.779 --> 00:08:03.500 available for renting, except in an adult lifestyle community. Somehow they let us in. We were the 00:08:03.500 --> 00:08:08.739 youngest people in the community. And we lived in this adult lifestyle community. And you can just 00:08:08.739 --> 00:08:15.019 picture it. It looks like it's pristine. Everything is pristine. Everyone's lawns are perfectly manicured. 00:08:15.079 --> 00:08:19.739 And that's fine if you're into that. But the thing at the center of this community, there was this, 00:08:20.099 --> 00:08:23.959 they called it the center. It was a place where they went and played shuffleboard and all that. 00:08:23.959 --> 00:08:30.639 But they had a flag at the front of it that they'd fly every day. And the flag was the logo of the 00:08:30.639 --> 00:08:35.799 adult lifestyle community. But whenever someone died, they would have it at half mass so everyone 00:08:35.799 --> 00:08:41.079 can see that someone passed away. But the thing is about this community, because it was an adult 00:08:41.079 --> 00:08:46.399 lifestyle retirement community, that flag was always at half mass. About every other week, it was at 00:08:46.399 --> 00:08:53.439 half mass. So you're confronted with it if you're going for a walk that we are mortal. Our mortality 00:08:53.440 --> 00:08:58.140 is very real in our lives. And when you're young, you don't think about it that often. But when you 00:08:58.140 --> 00:09:04.420 get older, you start to think about it. And another way, you might be thinking that, well, Matt, 00:09:04.640 --> 00:09:10.500 you're only 36. I know no one knows my age here, but I'm only 36. So you might be thinking like, I wish 00:09:10.500 --> 00:09:16.940 like, oh, to be your age again, if only. You have no idea, Matt, what's coming. And another thing that I was 00:09:16.940 --> 00:09:22.420 confronted with in Port Perry was that within the first week of starting the job of being a pastor, 00:09:23.160 --> 00:09:29.940 I was at the bedside of a man who was only 15 years older than me. And this man was in a coma. 00:09:30.540 --> 00:09:36.140 His family was around him. And we had the great privilege of coming in and praying with the family 00:09:36.139 --> 00:09:44.539 as they began the process of taking this man off life support. And he died within a couple hours 00:09:44.539 --> 00:09:51.480 after that. So like right away, Port Perry really confronted me with mortality. And this psalm 00:09:51.480 --> 00:09:59.500 confronts us with mortality. But it also confronts us with that eternity. Because God is eternal. And it 00:09:59.500 --> 00:10:07.639 says in verse 2. So if God's eternal, that means we're eternal. But not in the sense of like, we're 00:10:07.639 --> 00:10:12.500 like God. This verse confronts us with that God is eternal. And if God's eternal, we're eternal. 00:10:13.179 --> 00:10:18.879 And the way we know God is eternal is that we see in Genesis 1, verse 1, it says, in the beginning, 00:10:19.019 --> 00:10:26.580 God. That means that before the world was created, whether you believe it was seven days or whether you 00:10:26.580 --> 00:10:34.040 believe it was a long creation, God was before creation. He has always been and he always will be. 00:10:35.020 --> 00:10:42.139 But if God is eternal, what does that mean for us? We have to come to grips with that. That what happens 00:10:42.139 --> 00:10:48.480 after we close our eyes here in this world and move on? Well, it's very real and we're going to get to 00:10:48.480 --> 00:10:54.920 that. But here's the thing. Let's go back to the opening illustration. We're sitting around the table 00:10:54.919 --> 00:10:59.620 with our friends here having a debate. And they could be like, well, my God is the same as that. 00:11:00.259 --> 00:11:07.459 My God is eternal. We teach in our religion, our faith, that our God is eternal. So what's it to you? 00:11:08.399 --> 00:11:15.740 And we have to say, well, true. You're right about that. But then we move on to verse 3 in this psalm. 00:11:15.919 --> 00:11:20.039 We move on to it. So let's look at it. From the rising of the sun to the setting, 00:11:20.039 --> 00:11:26.379 the name of the Lord is to be praised. See, here we're confronted with the idea 00:11:26.379 --> 00:11:32.539 of that from the rising of the sun to its setting, the vastness. The psalm we looked at last week 00:11:32.539 --> 00:11:38.839 talked about this as well, the vastness of God. It's talking about everything you look at in creation 00:11:38.839 --> 00:11:45.459 that as far as your eye can see has been created by the God. It's the God of the Bible. 00:11:45.460 --> 00:11:51.700 In the outdoor lifestyle industry, I used to be very involved in the outdoor camping and climbing 00:11:51.700 --> 00:11:58.860 and that kind of recreation. And you'd always hear, always, everyone would say it, I even said it myself, 00:11:59.460 --> 00:12:07.480 that nature is my church, that I don't need a God. I have nature. See, that sentiment is nice. 00:12:07.900 --> 00:12:14.300 That idea of naturalism is nice. But when you really scrutinize it, it starts to fall apart, 00:12:14.299 --> 00:12:21.079 and it starts to actually not be so nice. Because if nature is your God, you have to deal with the fact 00:12:21.079 --> 00:12:27.839 of the survival of the fittest. You have to deal with how cutthroat it is, and you have no answer for it. 00:12:27.879 --> 00:12:35.379 It's just how it was. But if you have a God, and we're arguing here that it's the Christian God. 00:12:35.839 --> 00:12:41.959 If you have this God that's the creator of the universe, the all-powerful, all-creator, created everything, 00:12:41.960 --> 00:12:50.780 we look at nature, and you see an ordering to it. When you look at it, even scientists who do not have 00:12:50.780 --> 00:12:58.160 a Christian faith will say that nature is ordered, and they can't explain it. Even down to the smallest 00:12:58.160 --> 00:13:05.139 atom, it is ordered, it's designed, it runs beautifully. You have to come to terms with that. 00:13:05.139 --> 00:13:14.220 Again, though, our friends around the table would say, well, Matt, my faith also teaches that. 00:13:14.740 --> 00:13:20.299 That my God also teaches that he created the world, or the world always was. 00:13:21.419 --> 00:13:24.500 Well, that brings us to the next verse. Let's look at verse 4. 00:13:24.500 --> 00:13:41.720 Here we see that the psalmist is talking about that God is above every nation. There's no nation that rises 00:13:41.720 --> 00:13:47.980 above the God, of this God. There's nothing that can come above him. He is the all-powerful, 00:13:48.100 --> 00:13:53.460 the almighty God. He is the one who is high above all nations. Nothing can come to him. 00:13:53.460 --> 00:13:59.759 Nothing can grasp him. And then it talks about his glory. This brings to mind, in Genesis 11, 00:14:00.120 --> 00:14:06.200 the Tower of Babel, the famous Tower of Babel scene in that chapter, when man is together, 00:14:06.400 --> 00:14:12.379 humanity is together, and they're building a tower. They all speak one language. And they keep building 00:14:12.379 --> 00:14:17.420 this tower, rising up, because they want to come to God. They want to be like God. And if you keep 00:14:17.420 --> 00:14:23.139 going through that chapter, you see there's an irony in the text, because it says God has to come 00:14:23.139 --> 00:14:31.519 down to them to see what they're doing. That God has to come down, because no kingdom can rise up to 00:14:31.519 --> 00:14:38.799 him. And then it addresses his glory. Because when you look at his glory, it almost, in a sense, 00:14:38.840 --> 00:14:42.679 makes you feel small. It's like when, I believe, the northern lights, you could have saw them last 00:14:42.679 --> 00:14:47.019 night here if you're out in the country somewhere. It's like when you look at the northern lights, 00:14:47.019 --> 00:14:55.980 you're silenced. You feel this sense of awe. You feel this smallness of, you feel small as you look 00:14:55.980 --> 00:15:03.579 at it. It gives you this sense of awe. That's what it means by the glory of God, his glory, the glory 00:15:03.579 --> 00:15:12.000 above the heavens. God is the one who is above all nations, all kingdoms, all powerful. His glory reigns 00:15:12.000 --> 00:15:19.139 forever. And we feel a reverence to it. But again, if we come back to our conversation with our friends 00:15:19.139 --> 00:15:25.340 from different faith backgrounds, they can all say the same thing about their gods. That this, my God 00:15:25.340 --> 00:15:33.059 is all powerful above every nation, every kingdom. That my God has the greatest glory, that no other God 00:15:33.059 --> 00:15:39.440 is greater than his glory. We have to come to terms with that. But the same, but here in the text, 00:15:39.440 --> 00:15:48.100 we get to verse 5. And verse 5 is where we part ways with our friends in this debate. And I would say 00:15:48.100 --> 00:15:57.840 we trump them, in a sense. Verse 5 shows us that actually the God of the Bible is the one who is the 00:15:57.840 --> 00:16:07.440 all-powerful, the all-creator, the everlasting, eternal God. And his glory is great. And it shows us this 00:16:07.440 --> 00:16:15.220 in the next verses. And it shows us this in a very unique way that no other religion or faith-based or 00:16:15.220 --> 00:16:22.340 ideology can say the same. So let's look at it. And that is verses 5 to 8. So we have the question, 00:16:24.380 --> 00:16:31.700 who is like the Lord our God? Who is seated on high? Who looks far down on the heavens? So far, 00:16:31.700 --> 00:16:38.420 our friends can agree with us. But then we get to verse 7. He raises the poor from the dust 00:16:38.420 --> 00:16:47.580 and lifts the needy from the ash heap to make them sit with princes, with the princes of his people. 00:16:50.780 --> 00:16:57.100 None of the other people around the table could say their God does this. None of them. If you really 00:16:57.100 --> 00:17:02.420 look into it, none of them can say that. They might say it. But actually, if you really go into it, 00:17:02.720 --> 00:17:09.279 it doesn't. Only the Christian God can claim this. Because when we look at verse 7, it says, 00:17:09.380 --> 00:17:18.400 he raises the poor from the dust and lifts the needy from the ash heap. What does ash heap and dust 00:17:18.400 --> 00:17:27.540 signify? It signifies death. It signifies extreme humiliation to those sitting in the dust at the 00:17:27.540 --> 00:17:35.140 side of the road. It signifies that. And it says this God raises them up and they sit with princes. 00:17:36.980 --> 00:17:46.640 In Charles Dickens' last novel, Our Mutual Friends, there's a character who owns the dust heaps 00:17:46.640 --> 00:17:54.060 outside of London. And what a dust heap is in that era, in Charles Dickens' era, is that at that time, 00:17:54.680 --> 00:17:59.860 there's no HVAC. They have to use coal or wood to heat their places. And they have to get rid of the 00:17:59.860 --> 00:18:07.200 ash. And the ash would go outside of the town of London. And they would put in these heaps. But the 00:18:07.200 --> 00:18:12.980 thing is, whoever owned these heaps, we wouldn't think much today. But back then, whoever owned the heap 00:18:12.980 --> 00:18:20.980 would be extremely rich. Because ash back then, they turned it into bricks. And they built the houses 00:18:20.980 --> 00:18:28.519 of London and the buildings of London. So whoever owned it was extremely wealthy and extremely powerful. 00:18:29.140 --> 00:18:37.099 But whoever worked at the ash heap was extremely poor, was extremely destitute, was at the lowest, 00:18:37.099 --> 00:18:43.599 the bottom of the barrel. The thing is, they'd have to sort through. It wasn't just ash they'd sort 00:18:43.599 --> 00:18:50.059 through in these heaps. That there'd be garbage. There'd be human excrement in it. It'd be awful. 00:18:50.639 --> 00:18:58.459 Awful work. And these people would be considered this low. It'd be like, you'd rather go to the 00:18:58.459 --> 00:19:02.839 workhouse. If you read those novels or watch the BBC stuff, there's always the workhouses. 00:19:02.839 --> 00:19:10.259 The workhouses would be better conditions than in these ash heaps. So it's like, the bottom, 00:19:10.959 --> 00:19:17.039 nothing is almost worse than that, working in the ash heaps. And that's, this is what the text is saying. 00:19:17.519 --> 00:19:27.119 That this god stoops down, comes down to these people, and raises them up, and sits them with princes. 00:19:27.119 --> 00:19:35.859 His princes. That means, he sits them with royalty. No other faith can say this about their god. 00:19:36.519 --> 00:19:41.559 All the other faiths would just say, well, that's just the way it is. That's karma. It's just how 00:19:41.559 --> 00:19:48.239 they're lot in life. But here we see in the Bible that this god raises up the needy, the poor, 00:19:48.240 --> 00:19:56.440 the destitute. He raises them up and makes them royalty. But the psalmist doesn't stop there. He 00:19:56.440 --> 00:20:04.319 keeps going. If we look at verse 9, look at verse 9. He gives the barren woman a home, making her the 00:20:04.319 --> 00:20:10.859 joyous mother of children. Praise the Lord. I'm going to, I just have to acknowledge here, every time 00:20:10.859 --> 00:20:18.059 when you hear a barren woman, we need to really reflect on that. There is people within, around us 00:20:18.059 --> 00:20:24.839 who really struggle with infertility. And when they would read, they would read this, and they would 00:20:24.839 --> 00:20:32.699 feel, they could feel a sense of grief, sense of anger, bitterness, sense of despair, hopelessness, 00:20:32.699 --> 00:20:39.619 or even jealous of those they see around them who have kids. It's very real, infertility. But we see 00:20:39.619 --> 00:20:46.079 here that the psalmist writes about those. And we see in the Bible that God uses barren women 00:20:46.079 --> 00:20:52.619 through the Bible for key moments through it. But what it's talking about here is that in this era, 00:20:52.779 --> 00:21:00.619 this time, in the people of Israel, in this culture, that barren women were considered worthless. 00:21:01.819 --> 00:21:09.279 They were considered even lower than the people in the dust heaps, those who would be just on the 00:21:09.279 --> 00:21:15.079 side of the road begging. They're worse in this era, in this culture. They'd be socially, 00:21:15.079 --> 00:21:24.579 socially ostracized. No one would want them. Husbands would divorce them. What this is saying here, 00:21:24.660 --> 00:21:31.740 it's not giving a promise that if you pray to God, you will have children. What it's saying, though, 00:21:31.740 --> 00:21:42.180 is that when you follow this God, he gives you a dignity, and he gives you a home, and he makes you joyous, 00:21:42.420 --> 00:21:51.779 not through children. That may happen. But he makes you joyous through being his child when you put your 00:21:51.779 --> 00:21:58.180 faith and trust in Christ. It gives you this dignity. He gives dignity. So he gives dignity and worth to the 00:21:58.180 --> 00:22:08.880 poor, to the needy, to those who are considered the worst of society, and those to the women who have 00:22:08.880 --> 00:22:13.740 been pushed to the side because of something like a barrenness. He gives dignity to them. 00:22:16.539 --> 00:22:24.279 The God of the universe cares for the poor, the needy, the rejected. All other religions and faith 00:22:24.279 --> 00:22:32.539 or ideologies can't say that. They just say it's their lot in life. Even secularism, which claims 00:22:32.539 --> 00:22:39.019 not to be a faith, but it actually is a faith base, says they help the poor. But when you look into it, 00:22:39.059 --> 00:22:46.279 they actually just push them to the side. They just do the photo op. Only the Christian God gives 00:22:46.279 --> 00:22:55.359 dignity to the most downtrodden. But how? We have to ask that. How is this Lord, who is like the Lord 00:22:55.359 --> 00:23:01.700 our God, how is he so great? How does he do this? Well, he does this through his son, Jesus. 00:23:03.279 --> 00:23:07.420 There's a famous passage in the book of Philippians. I know you guys just went through Philippians, 00:23:07.539 --> 00:23:15.980 so you should be able to quote these verses. And it's Philippians chapter 2, verses 5 to 11. 00:23:16.279 --> 00:23:21.399 Where it says this, where Paul is writing to the Philippian church. He says this, 00:23:22.059 --> 00:23:28.779 Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, 00:23:29.440 --> 00:23:35.579 did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself by taking the form 00:23:35.579 --> 00:23:42.819 of a servant, being born in the likeness of men, and being found in human form of a servant, 00:23:42.819 --> 00:23:48.919 being born like a servant, and being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient 00:23:48.919 --> 00:23:57.139 to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore, God has highly exalted him and bestowed 00:23:57.139 --> 00:24:03.599 on him the name that is above every name, so that at the time of Jesus, every knee should bow, 00:24:04.000 --> 00:24:10.000 in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus is Lord, 00:24:10.000 --> 00:24:18.960 to the glory of God the Father. What this is saying is that the God of the universe sent his Son, 00:24:19.099 --> 00:24:26.799 came in the form of man, became poor, needy, worthless, rejected, and died a criminal's death 00:24:26.799 --> 00:24:34.279 on a cross outside of Jerusalem in the ashes, in the dust. He died for you and for me, 00:24:34.700 --> 00:24:45.000 to give glory to you and to me, to give royalty to you and to me, to give endless joy to you and to me. 00:24:46.099 --> 00:24:51.899 See, to those who call themselves followers of Christ, and they put their faith and trust in Christ 00:24:51.900 --> 00:24:58.600 as their Lord and Savior, this promise is given to you, then you can confidently say, 00:24:59.000 --> 00:25:07.860 who is like the Lord our God? Because there is no other. This God, Jesus Christ, is the only God. 00:25:08.540 --> 00:25:13.100 There's no other God. He gives royalty to those. He sets them with princes. 00:25:13.099 --> 00:25:21.339 And if that's the case, when we look at this psalm, we see that it's laid out in a sense of praise. 00:25:22.000 --> 00:25:27.859 The psalmist is reflecting on this greatness, the great God of the universe who's created everything, 00:25:28.639 --> 00:25:33.240 but that also stoops down and lifts up those who are destitute, 00:25:33.939 --> 00:25:37.379 those who have been rejected by society. He lifts them up. 00:25:37.380 --> 00:25:45.160 And then it's in a form of praise. If you look at verse 1, it says this, 00:25:45.680 --> 00:25:51.380 praise the Lord. Praise, O servants of the Lord. Praise the name of the Lord. 00:25:52.320 --> 00:25:58.340 This psalm is a psalm of praise. It starts with praise, and it ends in praise, a call to praise. 00:25:58.760 --> 00:26:05.840 This is a form of Hebrew poetry. I think it's a chiastic psalm, where it really rings home. 00:26:05.839 --> 00:26:11.899 It's a reminder to continually praise. And whatever happens in the middle of the psalm is why you should pray, 00:26:12.139 --> 00:26:16.359 why you should praise. And in verse 1, it says, servants of the Lord. 00:26:17.439 --> 00:26:21.059 Servants of the Lord are the only ones who can truly praise the Lord. 00:26:21.819 --> 00:26:27.439 And we have to remember that Christ, I read about it actually yesterday, in John, 00:26:28.259 --> 00:26:32.179 he does this thing to his disciples where he washes their feet. 00:26:32.180 --> 00:26:38.360 And he does this to signify that he is their servant. He came to serve them and save them. 00:26:39.160 --> 00:26:46.340 See, Christ became the servant so that we could be the servants of God, that we have an example of how to do that. 00:26:47.000 --> 00:26:53.240 Only the servants, true servants of God, those who commit their lives to Christ, can worship truly. 00:26:54.400 --> 00:26:56.220 And the name of the Lord, what does that mean? 00:26:56.220 --> 00:26:59.779 The name of the Lord means how God has revealed himself. 00:27:00.519 --> 00:27:05.799 And we see how God has revealed himself through the Old Testament, how he works through his history. 00:27:06.160 --> 00:27:09.940 And then he reveals himself ultimately in his son, Jesus Christ. 00:27:10.299 --> 00:27:16.440 And he shows his great love for us through his death and passion on the cross and his resurrection. 00:27:17.019 --> 00:27:17.700 We see it. 00:27:17.700 --> 00:27:22.779 We see how we can worship this God because he cares so deeply for us. 00:27:22.819 --> 00:27:28.759 He's not just a far-off God who's there on the sidelines and hopefully you'll get there. 00:27:29.160 --> 00:27:32.960 He is a God that is so intimately involved in our lives. 00:27:33.500 --> 00:27:39.440 And we can give him praise for that because he's a great God and he's a God that cares for the needy, the poor. 00:27:39.440 --> 00:27:54.200 The thing also about this psalm, just to quick, to wrap this up, that this psalm is the beginning of, I believe, a set of six psalms that's used at the Passover feast, the Jewish tradition. 00:27:54.920 --> 00:27:58.720 And what the psalms signify, just got to get to my notes here. 00:27:58.720 --> 00:28:06.360 What the psalms signify, from Psalm 113 to Psalm 118, it's this. 00:28:06.620 --> 00:28:08.660 It's a raising up of the downtrodden. 00:28:09.000 --> 00:28:10.740 It's a reflection on the great exodus. 00:28:11.420 --> 00:28:12.880 It's the corporate praise. 00:28:13.059 --> 00:28:14.240 It's personal thanksgiving. 00:28:14.519 --> 00:28:17.259 It's world vision and a festal procession. 00:28:18.519 --> 00:28:22.980 The psalms remind us of God's works through history. 00:28:23.140 --> 00:28:27.819 The psalms remind us that this God is very present in our lives. 00:28:27.819 --> 00:28:35.359 And it's only because of Jesus that we can praise the Lord with assurance, with dignity, with joy and hope. 00:28:36.179 --> 00:28:41.500 Because he became weak, we can be strong in Christ. 00:28:42.139 --> 00:28:42.879 Let's pray. 00:28:46.879 --> 00:28:53.460 Heavenly Father, we just give you thanks and praise for your greatness, how you revealed yourself. 00:28:53.460 --> 00:29:00.819 For your greatness, but we also give you thanks and praise for how you care about those who are so small. 00:29:01.819 --> 00:29:03.400 That you care for us, Lord. 00:29:03.620 --> 00:29:08.340 That when we could not help ourselves, you helped us through your son, Jesus Christ. 00:29:08.940 --> 00:29:10.420 Lord, help us to remember that. 00:29:10.940 --> 00:29:13.220 Help us to remember to always praise you. 00:29:14.100 --> 00:29:15.740 Help us draw us into yourself. 00:29:16.680 --> 00:29:17.920 And we pray this in Jesus' name. 00:29:18.680 --> 00:29:18.940 Amen. 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:24.279 00:29:24.279 --> 00:29:54.259 Thank you.