Preaching the Psalms

This Wednesday in Teen Church we're starting a new series in the Psalms. Well be looking at Psalm 1, 25, 32, 45 and 51 together, before leaping in Hebrews at the start of the school year. If preaching the Psalms is anything like as difficult as picking Psalms to preach, i might be in trouble.

I think there are several good reasons for preaching through Psalms, particularly to teenagers, and particularly in the summer. First of all, pragmatically, a lot of people are away in the summer, so it's hard to go through a loing book study and build any kind of momentum doing it. We spent the last school year looking at Mark, and, like i said, we'll spend most of the next one in Hebrews, but with people in and out for a couple of months, doing something that is not, strictly speaking, sequential seems to make a lot of sense.

Also, as with any book of the Bible, the way you preach helps your listeners to know how you read. How you deal with problems with a text as you preach it helps people listening know how you deal with those problems as you read it. This is especially important in the Psalms i think. The Psalms are a Christian book, a book about Jesus from beginning to end. We've lost some of that emphasis in 2013, and i'm looking forward to getting it back. Psalm 1 for example, teaches us about a righteous man. That man is Jesus, not you and me. One of the best ways to teach people to read the Bible well is to preach the Bible well.

This leads to the next point. Luther says that the Psalsm are a miniature Bible. If Jesus isn't the God of the Psalms, then who is? Andrew Bonar encourages us to read the Psalms with one eye on David, and another eye on Christ. Gordon Wenham reminds us that Psalms 1 and 2 introduce us to a rightoeus, royal man, and Psalms 3-150 tell us about this man. We need to know about this man, we need to know about Jesus. Where better than in a book packed with Jesus!

And in a book packed with Jesus through every cirucmstance of life. Want to know how to praise Jesus while you live in a cave, or when your life is under threat, or when everything is going your way, or when nothing is...read the Psalms.

Of course, there are dozens of other reasons, and dozens of themes in the Psalms that we won't cover in just five, but that's no reason for not starting off...

Psalm 40

I'm all for singing the Psalms, so without further ado, here's Newsong's interpretation of Psalm 40.

The Greatly Afflicted One

The story of the Bible is a story of the affliction of God's people. The faithful by the unfaithful.

Cain kills Abel. Noah is mocked. Abraham wanders homeless. Moses was opposed. The prophets were killed. The Kingdom was exiled. And Jesus suffered it all, and more.

Psalm 129:1-2 sums this up. Greatly they have afflicted me from my youth, let Israel now say, greatly they have afflicted me from my youth. This Psalm is put with the songs of ascent, sung by faithful pilgrims on the way to Jerusalem to celebrate. maybe the psalmist was reflecting on his own difficulties,  when it struck him that his people, God's nation, had been afflicted from the very beginning. And so Psalm 129 is born, and the pilgrims reflect as they sing.

Israel was afflicted by enemies. As soon as David died there was war, and even though that didn't split the Kingdom, David's grandson's foolishness soon did. They were afflicted, they were persecuted, they were sent far from home. Remember these things Israel, and sing of them as you go. 

Then comes Jesus, standing in Israel's place. Surely the tenants will respect the son? But no, the perfect Son of God was arrested, mocked, beaten and killed. He was afflicted, just as God's people have always been. The Bible teaches us these things for our good. It shows us a parade of imperfect man bring used by a perfect God. Imperfect men, afflicted by other imperfect men. And then the perfect man is afflicted too. The Bible can not be all ice cream and sunshine, because the life isn't all ice cream and sunshine. The Bible prepares us for life by showing us the reality of the affliction of God's people.

But verse 2 continues. 'Yet they have no prevailed against me...' From the very beginning God's people have been afflicted, set against, but here is the church, thousands of years later. The hammer of the world smashes itself on the anvil of the church. God's people are afflicted, but God's enemies do not prevail, and they never will.

Sing this, Israel, sing the end of verse two. Remember the affliction, and sing of the victory. Maybe, in Luke 24, Jesus taught His disciples from this Psalm. God's enemies have never prevailed over God's people, just like death did not prevail over Jesus. And we can know, for sure, forever, that God's enemies will not have the final say, because they did not have the final say, they did not prevail over The Afflicted One.

Beholding Is Becoming

I joked the other week that the best thing a young preacher can do is get married, because married life opens up a plethora of new sermon illustrations. I was joking, of course, in some ways. You really should get married, to a woman who loves Jesus more than you, and doesn't complain when you construct the world's busiest calendar for the first half of 2013 but off all the wonders of married life, sermon illustrations come well down the list, but on they are on the list.

Last week, after a girls 'soccer' game (I coach our high school team) I came home, and the very first thing I did was put on a load of laundry. It was a tough game against a team we should have beaten easily, but only scraped by with a goal about thirty seconds from time, occasioning a 20 yard sprint and fist pump display from yours truly. I needed a shower, I wanted some time to process the win and what it meant for our season - we've since lost in the play offs - but instead I was doing laundry.

Why?

Because beholding is becoming. As I've lived with Rachel for the last nearly four years, my priorities have changed. I can see the benefit in hovering, laundering and washing up. I load the dishwasher when it's time, I make sure Rachel's clothes are clean, folded and out away. Now, none of this may last beyond the first week of the summer holidays, when Rachel is freed from third grade, but the point remains, it happening now. As I have beheld, as I have loved, I have become.

And we behold Jesus in the Bible, as we love Him in His perfections, in His condescension and in His life, death and resurrection, we become. God's voice changes our categories, it changes our priorities, it changes our desires. We want to go the church, we want to give our money, we want to live the good life of obedience. The light of the Gospel has shone in our hearts, and chased away, destroyed, the darkness.

This is part of the mystery of discipleship. This is part of the exposure of discipleship. Even though discipleship must never be reduced to meeting and mechanics, discipleship does happen in meetings, whether 250-1 or 1-1. As we're exposed to our wives, we become like them, as we're exposed to our saviour we become like Him.

Sadly, it's not just good things that in beholding we become. It's also idols. Psalm 115 tells us that idols have eyes but do not hear, hands but do not feel, feet but do not walk. They are deaf, dumb and insensitive to the beauties of Christ. And those who worship them will become like them. Isn't that what happened to Israel in exile? A kind of living death, cut off from the land and the promises? Isn't that life today without Jesus? Cut off from anything worthy of the name of love, life and hope?

One way or another, for better or worse, we behold, and we become.

The Imprecatory Psalms

The following is inspired by Gordon Wenham's book, 'The Psalter Reclaimed.' Go buy it.

What do we do with the imprecatory psalms? How can we amen a prayer that asks God to dash the heads of babies against a rock? Or that our accusers would be cloaked in shame so that it would soak into their bones? This sentiment disturbs our quiet times doesn't it? But how are we supposed to engage with these Psalms? If we're serious about the Bible, we can't just strike off the things that make us uncomfortable, or there would be very little left.

So what do we do with the imprecatory Psalms?

We could take a popular approach, and say that they are simply the remnant of a pre Christian view of God. The leftovers from a time where law ruled instead of grace, and should be ignored as such. But the problem with calling them left overs, is that it means that someone left them over. We can't believe that the Psalms included every single song written by the Hebrews, obviously, so for some reason, these unpleasant prayers or songs or praises were left in the Bible. Why?

How can we read these Psalms like Christians? What do they teach us? First, it's worth remembering that the imprecatory Psalms are simply strong laments. Jesus prayed through the Psalms of lament as He went from the upper room to the cross, but we live in a lament free society. The first world prosperity Gospel holds that anyone who damages my self esteem is guilty of sin. We don't lament very often, we don't wail. Our popular songs are upbeat, Christian radio stations want to create 'an atmosphere of positivity.' Laments are odd to our ears. And where laments are odd, imprecations will be odder still.

But these odd prayers are Christian scripture, just like the rest of the Old Testament, since we're there, so what do we do with them?

Firstly, these Psalms help us identify how serious sin is. Our sin. As Judges ends with the sin inside the camp, so taking these psalms on our lips should make us think about the sin in our camp. How have we oppressed, and let down, and marginalised? How does our life look under the white hot glare of Christ's gracious perfections? Are we praying these Psalms as the aggrieved or the aggressor? They help us see how God feels about personal sin, and about institutional sin.

These Psalms wake us up to God. Just like pain plants a flag in our lives to show us that all is not well, so the imprecatories plant a flag in scripture that all is not well within our hearts, our institutions, and our creation. In a world anaesthetised by religion and numbed by entertainment, these Psalms shake us awake.

The imprecatory Psalms help us to empathize with Christians all over the world. With Christians who are being persecuted, with Christians who really have been that poorly treated and really are that justly angry about it. They give us a window into a world where the choice is not 'which multi million dollar sanctuary do I visit this week,' but 'do I keep my family, or do I go to church?'

We need the imprecatory Psalms, and the fact that we feel so uncomfortable with them probably shows us just why we need them. We need to be woken up from our doze about sinful things. We need to see the damage that sin, both personal and institutional does to those sinned against. We need to know how God feels about sin. We need the imprecatory Psalms so that we can pray for our brothers and sisters across the world suffering for their faith. So that we, in some small way, can feel the injustice they face, and the way it makes them feel.

And we need these Psalms to spur us on the share our faith, to preach the Gospel. Why? Because for those outside of Christ, 'come Lord Jesus,' is the most imprecatory Psalm there is.

The Preacher Says 'come with us...'

Warren Wiersbe said that ministry is the overflow of our relationship with God. Simply, that if 'ministers' in particular, and Christians on the whole, are in the business of offering Christ to others, they can not offer what they do not have. Someone else, i forget who, said that the problem with so much preaching is that preachers are like starving chefs who barely lick their own fingers. No heart warming ministry will flow out of a heart that has not been warmed.

On Thursday morning i read Numbers 9 and 10, Psalm 45 and Acts 17, and i saw some of this in action. The opening verse of Psalm 45 is 'my heart overflows with a pleasing theme...' What is that pleasing theme? The Handsome, God-blessed victorious King, who reigns forever and whose bride enters his presence with joy and gladness. This instructional love song was written and sung for the new son of David sitting on the throne of Judah, and is fulfilled the final Son of David, sitting on the throne of the universe.

This is a 'pleasing theme.' It's good to think about Jesus! It's good to stop and look at the sunrise on a cold, clear winter morning, good to stop and watch a cardinal pick about in your garden, good to slowly wallow in the truth of the Gospel. And this theme overflows. The Psalmist can't keep it in any more, praise is cascading from his lips for the king, and for The King. He invites others to sing with him, as they consider the beauty of this great King.

Moses does much the same in Numbers 10. It's nearly time for the camp to set out, and he wants his brother-in-law to go with them. Partly because he knows the lay of the land, he's a wilderness expert, and can help them on the way. But Moses is far more concerned about Hobab, at least at first. He says 'come with us, and we will do good for you...' Come to Israel, come to the LORD, come to Canaan. Abandon your false gods. Yes, for objective reasons of truth and helpful reasons of guidance, but more, come with us because we will do good to you. It will be good for you to be in relationship with the LORD and His people. It will be good for you to enjoy the promised blessings of Canaan, it will be good for you to rejoice in the atoning blood of the lamb as we celebrate Passover.

The LORD's goodness is a pleasing theme that overflows from Moses lips. He's tasted and seen, and now he says come and see. Is our preaching, our evangelism, the same? Do we offer a 'get out of Hell free' card, or do we offer a love stronger than death? Do we offer a new set of rules, or a king that will ruin our hearts for other lovers? Do you offer the Gospel to law-breakers, or to adulterers?

Paul's Mars Hill address in Acts 17 is the cornerstone for people who think that unless we offer a Gospel wearing a nose stud and laden with expletives we're doing it wrong. Look, Paul goes to Athens and meets them on their own terms. He doesn't really though does he? Hey, Athenians! God doesn't live in these temples you've built, God doesn't need your service, God is not unknown. If he was trying to be culturally sensitive at the cost of Biblical faithfulness he didn't do a very good job!

What does Paul actually say? Consider the God who loves you enough to give you the rain in it's season, who loves you enough to reveal Himself to you, who loves you enough to go to the grave and defeat death on your behalf. Not like the Greek gods, who were just bigger and more powerful people, with their jealousies and sins writ large, but a God who is fundamentally not like us. Paul says 'come to Jesus, and He will do you good.'

The Psalmist's heart, and Moses's heart and Paul's Gospel warmed heart overflowed with a pleasing theme, do our hearts do the same? As our hearts overflow, do our voices say, 'come with me, taste what i've tasted, see what i've seen, and it will do you good.'

How To Be Happy (Psalm 32)

How can we be happy? God has designed all of us to long for happiness, to want to be happy. God has made us to be happy, which is why people spend billions of dollar every year on entertainment, whether it’s sport, or movies or vacations of whatever else. We all long to be happy.

Psalm 32 gives us the key to happiness, it tells us how we can be happy forever. That word blessed that we saw in verses 1 and 2 just means ‘happy.’ We want to be happy, and this Psalm, a ‘maskil,’ a psalm of instruction, tells us how to be happy. In verses 1-5, we see how to be happy, and in verses 6-12, we see the difference that real happiness makes in our lives.

So who is the happy man? Verses one and two tell us ‘blessed is the man whose transgressin is forgiven, whose sin is covered.’ How can you be happy? By having your sins forgiven. Later on in this psalm we will learn that sin is a great weight that we carry around with us, but we probably feel like that about sin already. Sin stops us from being happy, and the forgiveness of that sin leads to happiness, leads to real, deep, rich, Biblical happiness. And we’ll see why at the end of the psalm. Verse two puts the same truth in a different way. Blessed we are, happy we are, when the Lord does not count our sins, when He does not remember them, when our sins are covered.

We meet these verses in the NT, when Paul quotes them in Romans 4:7-8. How are our sins forgiven? Not by works, but by faith in what Jesus has done. We see right away that this OT Psalm teaches us that a relationship with Jesus is the way to happiness. This knowledge that our sins are forgiven, and that we can be free from the penalty of them, and free to have a relationship with God, is the only way to real happiness. We see in verse 10 of this Psalm that it is the one who trusts in the Lord who is surrounded by steadfast love. David tells us, and Paul tells us, as Jesus told us in Matt 5:8, that the way to happiness forever is only found in a relationship with Jesus. Only then are our sins forgiven, only then is our sin covered, only then will the Lord not count our iniquity against us, and only then will we be happy.

But this is a lesson that David had to learn the hard way, and maybe some of us do as well. Read verses 3-5 with me. This reads like David’s personal experience. He tried to find happiness by hiding his sin, but it didn’t work. We’ve all been here haven’t we? We try to pretend everything is going great. We’re happy, we’ve got great friends, good grades and things in our relationship with Jesus are great. But all the time we’re dry inside. All the time our hearts are ‘dried up as by the heat of summer.’ We’ve got no life in us, no joy in the Lord, nothing but hidden sin that eats us from the inside. All this will continue until we confess our sins, until we come back to Jesus in faith once again. Verse 5 ends with David finding forgiveness from the Lord, and with forgiveness, happiness.

So that’s the first part of this Psalm, that’s how to be happy. The next question is what difference does this happiness make to us? Read verses 6-11 with me.

The first word in verse 6, therefore, shows that what follows applies the truths that we just learned. The truth is that the godly still sin. Godliness is not marked out by perfection but by repentance. So those who repent should do so now, while God may be found. They should repent as soon as their sin is made known to them. Like David when Nathan came to him after his sin with Bathsheba, we need to repent as soon as possible. Repentance is a sign of godliness. The godly shouldn’t be like a wild animal who need a bit and a bridle, but should be wise in turning to God for forgiveness. And what a wonderful God they find in verse 7 when they do repent. Look at that with me:. God becomes the hiding place of the repentant, He preserves from trouble and surrounds with deliverance. When we repent we find happiness, because we know that God is no longer angry with us. When we repent we see the smile of God on the face of Christ. When we repent from our sin, when we stop hiding and agree with God in confession, we are protected by Jesus blood. This is the greatest joy there can be, to know God as a place of refuge, not to have to hide from Him. This is real happiness. Not sinful happiness that leaves us dried up like grass in the summer, but a happiness like a tree in bloom. This is the happiness, the blessings promised in verses 1 and 2. When we confess our sins, remember 1 John 1:9 tells us, God is faithful and just o forgive our sins. He becomes our protection, and we are blessed.

Verses 10 and 11 sum up why a relationship with God though Jesus is the only way to happiness. Remember what we saw last week, that sin wears a mask of beauty, but underneath the mask is the evil and destructive truth. Verse 10 gives us a further look into that truth. The wicked look happy most of the time don’t they, and by worldly standards they are. The standards of the world are deceptive. The American dream is deceptive, not because godless living doesn’t make people happy, but because it will not make them happy forever. David gives us the real truth. Underneath the sorrows of the wicked are many, they have no hope, they have no real, lasting joy. They might be happy for the 80 years they live on earth, but what are those years compared to an eternity without God?

To be happy, we need to be surrounded by the steadfast love of the Lord. And this happiness won’t vanish after 80 years, or 80 million years, but will last forever. Christians are the only people who will live happily ever after, their sins confessed and forgiven, protected by Jesus, and surrounded by His love. No wonder in verse 11 David breaks forth in praise. He can’t hold back any longer but rejoices in the great work that God has done.

Are your sins forgiven this morning? Then be glad, rejoice, there’s nothing standing between you and God. If your sins are not forgiven, what are you waiting for? Why are you pretending everything is ok when it’s not? Why are you letting God’s hand rest heavily upon you, when instead you could be surrounded with His steadfast love? Why are you exchanging an ocean of everlasting joy for a drop of happiness?
If you want to be happy, and you do, then you must come to Jesus. He’s the only way.