Psalm 105, let me pray before I read God's Word.
God, thank you for this opportunity to get together as your people,
people whom you have gathered as your special possession,
people whom you have redeemed for yourself,
so that we might obey you, so we might worship you.
We ask God that as we go through this psalm together,
that you would remind us of the wondrous works that you have done
in our lives and in the history of your people,
so that we might be spurred on to praise and a life of worship.
In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.
Psalm 105.
We'll give thanks to the Lord, call upon his name,
make known his deeds among the peoples,
sing to him, sing praises to him,
tell of all his wondrous works.
Glory in his holy name,
let the hearts of those who seek the Lord rejoice.
Seek the Lord and his strength,
seek his presence continually.
Remember the wondrous works that he has done,
his miracles and the judgments he uttered.
O offspring of Abraham, his servant,
children of Jacob, his chosen ones.
He is the Lord our God.
His judgments are in all the earth.
He remembers his covenant forever,
the word that he commanded for a thousand generations.
The covenant that he made with Abraham,
his sworn promise to Isaac,
which he confirmed to Jacob as a statue,
to Israel as an everlasting covenant,
saying,
To you I will give the land of Canaan
as your portion for an inheritance.
When they were a few in number,
of little account and sojourners in it,
wandering from nation to nation,
from one kingdom to another people,
he allowed no one to oppress them.
He rebuked kings on their account,
saying,
Touch not my anointed ones,
do my prophets no harm.
When he summoned the famine on the land
and broke all supply of bread,
he had sent a man ahead of them,
Joseph, who was sold as a slave.
His feet were hurt with feathers,
his neck was put in a color of iron,
until what he had said came to pass.
The word of the Lord tested him.
The king sent and released him.
The ruler of the people set him free.
He made him lord of his house
and ruler of all his possessions,
to bind his princes at his pleasure
and to teach his elders wisdom.
Then Israel came to Egypt.
Jacob sojourned in the land of Ham,
and the Lord made his people very fruitful
and made them stronger than their foes.
He turned their hearts to hate his people,
to deal craftily with his servants.
He sent Moses, his servant,
and Aaron, whom he had chosen.
They performed his signs among them
and miracles in the land of Ham.
He sent darkness and made the land dark.
They did not rebel against his words.
He turned their waters into blood
and caused their fish to die.
Their land swarmed with frogs,
even in the chambers of their kings.
He spoke, and there came swarms of flies
and gnats through their country.
He gave them hail for rain
and fiery lightning bolts through their land.
He struck down their vines and fig trees
and shattered the trees of their country.
He spoke, and the locusts came,
young locusts without number,
which devoured all the vegetation in their land
and ate up the fruit of their ground.
He struck down all the firstborn in their land,
the firstfruits of all their strength.
Then he brought out Israel with silver and gold,
and there was none among his tribes who stumbled.
Egypt was glad when they departed,
for dread of them had fallen upon it.
He spread a cloud for a covering
and fire to give light to night.
They asked, and he brought quail,
and he gave them bread from heaven in abundance.
He opened the rock, and water gushed out.
It flowed through the desert like a river,
for he remembered his holy promise
in Abraham his servant.
So he brought his people out with joy,
his chosen ones with singing,
and he gave them the lands of the nations,
and they took possession of the fruit
of the people's toil,
that they might keep statutes and observe his laws.
Praise the Lord.
I don't know if you guys have ever
heard someone tell a story
in a very halting and fragmented way.
Or maybe you've told such a story before.
You start to tell a story,
and then you're hazy on the details,
so you wonder out loud
whether it happened on this occasion
or that occasion,
or whether it was this guy or that guy
that said this or that.
And soon enough, you've lost all the momentum,
and the story never gets off the ground.
And you probably also know a few people
that know how to tell stories
exceptionally well.
They tell really good stories.
And usually, good storytellers
have a couple things in common.
One is that they tend to talk a lot.
And two is that they tend to repeat themselves a lot.
They tell the same stories
in different contexts often.
And that's because that's the reason
why they're good,
because they're practiced.
They've been telling the stories,
and because they've repeated the stories
over and over again to different people,
the details are fresh for them,
and that's why they're able to retell it
in an engaging way.
So in order to retell a story well,
you need first to recall it well.
And Psalm 105 is really teaching us
to recall the wondrous works of God
so that we can retell it to others.
It's telling us to rehearse
the wondrous works of God
so that we can retell it to other people.
So the first part, 1 to 11,
verses 1 to 11 is about
retelling God's wondrous works,
the command to retell God's wondrous works.
And then verses 12 to 45
is the command to recall God's wondrous works,
what he's done in the past.
And you can see in verses 1 to 5
a series of commands.
Give thanks, call upon God's name,
make known his deeds,
sing, sing praises,
tell of all his wondrous works,
glory in his holy name,
rejoice, seek the Lord,
seek his presence,
remember.
So these are the commands
to retell God's wondrous works
to those around us.
And then that hinge command,
remember,
connects it to the rest.
Verses 5 to 11
describe our part of the covenant
to God,
our relationship to God,
and God's part of the covenant
to us
in a mirroring structure,
verses 5 to 11.
So verse 5a tells us
to remember the wondrous works
that God has done.
And then verses 8 to 11
tell us that God himself
remembers his covenant forever.
Verse 5b tells us
to remember the judgments
that God ordered.
Verse 7b tells us
that God's judgments
are in all the earth.
And then verse 6
tells us who we are
in this covenant relationship,
the offspring of Abraham,
God's servant,
children of Jacob,
God's chosen ones.
And then verse 7a
tells us who God is.
He's the Lord.
That's the proper name
for God, Yahweh.
He's the Lord, our God.
So there's this mutuality
in our relationship with God.
God is our Lord.
We are his servants.
God remembers his covenant
with us,
and we are to remember
how he's kept his covenant
and praise and worship him.
And verse 11
closes this section,
first section of the psalm,
by telling us,
reminding us of God's promise.
To you,
I will give the land of Canaan
as your portion
for an inheritance.
And the rest of the psalm
is really about recalling
those wondrous works
that God did
in giving his people
the land of Canaan
as their inheritance.
There are three major
geographic movements
in that next section,
verses 12 to 45.
So 12 to 22,
recall God's wondrous works
from the wilderness
to Egypt.
And then 23 to 36,
about God's wondrous works
from Egypt
back out to the wilderness.
And then verses 37 to 45
is about from the wilderness
to the promised land.
And because this redemptive outline
of the old covenant people of God,
it's a shadow of the redemptive realities
that we've experienced through Christ.
It's the shadow of the new covenant people.
And there is an application
for all of us as well
as we're reading this psalm,
even though it's about something
that happened in the past to Israel.
Twice in this psalm, for example,
God's people are described
as sojourners.
Look at verse 12 and verse 23.
So sojourners in the wilderness
and sojourners in Egypt.
And 1 Peter chapter 2, 11
describes us Christians this way.
Beloved, I urge you as sojourners
and exiles to abstain
from the passions of the flesh
which wage war against your soul.
So Israel's sojourning
in the wilderness
and in Egypt foreshadows
our sojourning in the world.
And Israel's possession
of the promised land
foreshadows our eventual
full possession of the kingdom of God
and the new heavens
and the new earth.
So we could relate
all of these things
to our circumstances as well.
So so let's first look at
the faithfulness of God
to his people
from the wilderness to Egypt
in verses 12 to 22.
Verses 12 to 15 say this,
when they were few in number
of little account
and sojourners in it
wandering from nation to nation
from one kingdom
to another people.
He allowed no one
to oppress them.
He rebuked kings
on their account
saying,
touch not my anointed ones
do my prophets no harm.
I think because we've rehearsed
or heard this story
so many times
of God's,
of the exodus
and that redemption
of his people
that it's,
we sometimes forget
how far fetched
it really is.
You know,
that how unlikely
it was for this
to actually happen to them.
You know,
I mean,
it began with God
promising Abraham,
right,
a people,
a nation
and a place
for them to dwell in
with the presence of God.
A people,
a place
and the presence of God
with them.
The only thing that he
really had going for him
was the presence of God
because he didn't even
have a single child
to his name
at the time
God gave him the promise,
right?
And he didn't have any
parcel of land
that he could call his own.
And so he was a sojourner,
a wanderer
in foreign nations
with no place
to call his own
and yet God
protected him
and his family
and he even rebuked
kings on their account,
he says.
So this is an allusion
to Genesis 12, 17
and Genesis 23,
20,
chapter 20,
verse 3,
where God rebukes
Pharaoh,
king of Egypt
and Abimele,
king of Gerar,
respectively,
on account of Abraham
and his wife Sarah.
So it's just,
it's kind of crazy
to think about,
right?
This little man
in this big country
and God rebukes
kings
on account of him.
Likewise,
Joseph began
as a slave
in fetters,
so how unlikely
is it that he,
that the pharaoh,
king of Egypt,
will himself
free this slave
and make him
the lord over his house
and the ruler
over his possession.
So like,
all these things show
that God literally
orders the kings
of earth
to do the bidding
of his people
who are few in number
and of no account.
And if we were to
apply that to our lives,
then why do we worry
and fret so much
that God's plan
for us
might not unfold,
right?
That we might,
that we,
that God's plan for us
might be frustrated
by our circumstances
or whatnot
because it doesn't matter
if you look at
the story of Israel
how much the odds
are stacked against us
because God's promises
will be fulfilled
because God can order
even the kings of earth
to do our bidding
whenever he wants.
And the phrase
that God's people
were few in number
and of little account
is reminiscent
of Deuteronomy 7,
6 to 8.
It says this,
For you are a people
holy to the Lord your God.
The Lord your God
has chosen you
to be a people
for his treasured possession
out of all the peoples
who are on the face
of the earth.
It was not because
you were more in number
than any other people
that the Lord
set his love on you
and chose you
for you were the fewest
of all peoples
but it is because
the Lord loves you
and is keeping the oath
that he swore to your fathers
that the Lord
has brought you out
with a mighty hand
and redeemed you
from the house of slavery
from the hand of Pharaoh
king of Egypt.
That's the,
and that logic of salvation
applies to us as well.
So why do you think
you are a Christian?
Why do you think
that you are saved?
Because if our beginning point
of our answer
is our merit
instead of God's grace,
if we start with
our deservingness,
whether it's our morality
or our sincerity,
our good works,
if we start there
instead of starting
with God's prior love for us,
then we have
the sequence backwards.
God didn't choose
his people
because they were numerous.
He chose them
while they were the fewest.
Likewise,
God chose us
while we were still dead
in our trespasses and sins.
So secondly,
let's look at
God's faithfulness
to his people
from Egypt
to the wilderness
in verses 23 to 36.
Jacob came to Egypt
with his relatively small
extended family,
but as verse 24 says,
the Lord made his people
very fruitful
and made them stronger
than their foes.
So stronger than Egypt,
which was arguably
the most powerful nation
in the world at the time.
And you can see
God's sovereign hand
through all of history,
right?
Verse 25 tells us
that it was God
who turned their hearts
to hate his people
to deal craftily
with his servants.
So even though
we could look at that
and see Egypt
turning against Israel
and think that
they were subject
to the whims
of the Egyptians,
their hatred,
their power.
But it was actually
God who turned
the Egyptians
against Israel
because that was
his way of bringing
about their redemption
and liberation.
So it's really,
it's a powerful,
far-reaching statement
about the sovereignty
of God.
So likewise,
then,
we can be assured
that nothing happens
to us,
even things that
seem bad,
even things that
seem so opposed
to God's will,
things that happen
to us,
that they're not
happening apart
from God's
sovereign control.
It happens,
it's part of his plan
to redeem his people
and bring glory
to his name.
And then,
verses 26 to 36,
we count how
God demonstrated
his power
through the plagues
that he unleashed
upon Egypt.
These plagues
are really quite amazing
because each plague
kind of represents
a subjugation
and a repatriation
of the gods
Egyptians worshipped.
So it's like
you could
turn the world
dark,
for example,
is a repudiation
of the Egyptian
sun god,
Ra,
right?
And turning
the Nile into blood
is a repudiation
of the Egyptian
god of the Nile,
Hapi,
right?
So it's like
making the land
swarm with frogs
is a repudiation
of the Egyptian
god of fertility,
Heket,
who was depicted
in the Egyptian art
with the face
of a frog,
right?
So it's like,
and so on.
So basically,
like,
the very,
very things
that the Egyptians
turned to
for their security
and the very things
that they boasted of
are the very points
at which God
exposed them
and defeated them,
right?
It's like so,
it's like so satisfying,
right?
But the,
I mean,
you could think of,
I don't know,
I was trying to think
of an illustration,
like how demoralizing
that is,
if you're,
like one that's
opposing God,
right?
Like think of,
I think of someone
like Simone Biles,
you guys know who that is?
She's like an American gymnast,
right?
Arguably the most dominant athlete
in the history of modern sports,
the way she's dominating
the sport that she's in.
And so she's,
because usually gymnasts
have like a specialty,
every gymnast has like their own,
the thing that they're the best at,
right?
So if it's like the floor exercise
or a balance beam,
like usually you're weaker
than one,
stronger than the other,
or evolved.
When you fall behind
in one of those events,
you hope to make it up
in the event
that's your strength,
but then when you compete
against Simone Biles,
it's completely demoralizing
because you're weak on one
and then you think
you'll make it up
but then you actually
lose more ground
and lose by a significant margin
because she's just
that much better than you
at everything
that you're good at,
right?
It's like,
that's like what,
it's like kind of like
what happens,
like except in a far more
drastic and dramatic way,
right?
That God takes all these things
that Egyptians boasted about
and found their strength
in and then shows them,
you just got nothing
on me,
right?
And that's how powerful
God is.
And if that's what the Lord
does for his people,
like if,
then of course for us,
even though we might feel weak
in the presence
of the Egyptians,
we might feel weak
in our battle
against the world
of flesh and the devil,
right?
That kept us imprisoned
formally.
They're no match
for the Lord God
who redeems his people
from their slavery.
and that's the,
God,
and Christ,
as Ephesians 2
talks about,
defeats each of those things,
the world,
flesh,
and the devil.
He unites us with him
so that we have his resurrection
power and life in us.
Even after the Exodus,
the odds of Israel
surviving in the wilderness
and capturing the land
of Canaan are long,
right?
I mean,
they're just,
they just left their homes
and now they're in the wilderness.
The desert.
And as verses 37 to 45
tells us,
however,
God leads them safely
through the wilderness
and into the promised land.
It says that he gave them
bread from heaven
and water from the rock,
gave them the land
of the nations.
And this journey
of Israel
from the wilderness
to the promised land
foreshadows our journey
from our present exile
to the kingdom of God,
to dwell in place with God.
And that's why
in John 6,
32,
35,
Jesus says,
truly,
I say to you,
it was not Moses
who gave you
the bread from heaven,
but my Father
gives you the true bread
from heaven.
For the bread of God
is he who comes down
from heaven
and gives life to the world.
I am the bread of life.
Whoever comes to me
shall not hunger
and whoever believes in me
shall never thirst.
So Jesus is explicitly
taking this account
in the wilderness
of God providing
for his people
and saying,
I am that provision
to you from God
to sustain you
in this wilderness
and to bring you
into the promised land.
Similarly,
that's why
in 1 Corinthians 10,
3,
4,
Paul writes
that in the wilderness
all of God's people
ate the same spiritual food
and all drank
the same spiritual drink
for they drank
from the spiritual rock
that followed them
and the rock
was Christ.
So this is not
kind of an inappropriate
allegorization
of the passage.
Israelites did literally
drink from water
coming from a rock,
a literal rock.
But since the Old Testament
frequently uses
the image of rock
to describe God,
God is our rock,
Paul's making
a theological connection
that ultimately
God is the rock
who provided water
for his people
and that in this
new covenant era
that Christ is the rock
from which living water flows
as John 4 talks about.
So it's through
the broken body
and poured out blood
of Jesus Christ
through his death
from the cross
for our sins
that we receive forgiveness
and new life
so that we can enter
into the kingdom of God.
And that brings us
to the end of the psalm
which gives us
the purpose
of this salvation.
Why does God
redeem a people
for himself?
Verse 45 says,
That they might
keep his statutes
and observe his laws.
Praise the Lord.
Isn't that interesting?
Right?
God doesn't save them
because they kept his laws.
He saves them
so that they will
keep his laws.
And that logic
is the same for us,
for Christians.
Ephesians 2, 8-10
says,
For by grace
you have been saved
through faith
and this is not
your own doing.
It is the gift of God,
not a result of works
so that no one
may boast
but we are his workmanship
created in Christ Jesus
for good works
which God prepared
beforehand
that we should walk
in them.
Just as Israel
was delivered
and brought
into the promised land
so that they might
keep God's statutes
and observe his laws,
the church is delivered
from its slavery
to sin
and brought into
the kingdom of God
so that,
not because of the good works
but so that
we might do good works.
And so this is
this
recalling the wondrous
works of God
not only are we able
to tell his works
to others
it's what enables us
to persevere
in obedience
in faith
and to continue
to live in this
state of exile
until we come
to God.