The Lord Will Fulfill His Purpose for Me: Psalm 138

The text for the sermon this morning comes from Psalm 138.

It's a psalm written by David that I believe has a lot of application for each and every one of us as we look past to the 2023 behind us as we look forward to a new year, 2024, what the Lord has for us.

Hear the reading of God's holy word.

I give you thanks, O Lord, with my whole heart.

Before the gods I sing your praise.

I bow down toward your holy temple and give thanks to your name for your steadfast love and your faithfulness, for you have exalted above all things your name and your word.

On the day I called, you answered me.

My strength of soul you increased.

All the kings of the earth shall give you thanks, O Lord, for they have heard the words of your mouth, and they shall sing of the ways of the Lord, for great is the glory of the Lord.

For though the Lord is high, he regards the lowly, but the haughty he knows from afar.

Though I walk in the midst of trouble, you preserve my life.

You stretch out your hand against the wrath of my enemies, and your right hand delivers me.

The Lord will fulfill his purpose for me.

Your steadfast love, O Lord, endures forever.

Do not forsake the work of your hands.

This is the reading of God's holy and precious word.

Let's pray that the Spirit would be at work in us in the next few moments.

Father, thank you for sending us your Son.

Thank you for sending us your Spirit.

Spirit of God, would you please unlock the doors that we have erected to keep out your truth and your grace?

Lord, open up the doors and the windows of our soul, that your beauty, Lord Jesus, would shine and make its way in in new ways.

Teach us, Holy Spirit.

We pray in Jesus' name.

Amen.

The Lord will fulfill his purpose for me.

Verse 8 of our text.

Charles Spurgeon, the great Baptist preacher, had many friends, and one of his friends sent him, as it was his custom every year at the end of the year, he would send him a letter with a verse that he would suggest to him as a verse to meditate on the coming year.

This was one of the verses that Spurgeon received one year, about this time of the year.

It's a great verse.

Verse 8.

Your steadfast love, O Lord, endures forever.

Do not forsake the work of your hands.

We're going to unpack that this morning in a few minutes, but we want to see the context of what was going on that David was going through as he wrote these words.

As we come to the end of 2023 and look forward to 2024, we would all do well to learn from David.

It raises questions: why are we on this earth?

What's our sense of purpose?

Do we have a sense of purpose?

Or is it, do we find ourselves sometimes just drifting?

Drifting, well, I from paycheck to paycheck.

Have you fallen into the trap, especially in DC?

Have you fallen into that trap that I am what I do?

Is that your identity?

You know, I I work so hard at doing this, and this is really defines who I am.

We know that's not right.

We know it's not true.

But it doesn't prevent us from sometimes falling in to that way of thinking.

To lose our grip on what our purpose in life really is about.

That's what we're talking about this morning.

Our world can be very small in ways that sometimes just surprise us.

It just shrinks.

Where it almost feels like it's just it's mostly about me.

It's mostly about my world, my circumstances.

No.

No.

We all need a bigger world.

We all need a bigger understanding of God's rule of this world.

Acts chapter 13, verse 36 says in the New Testament, David served God's purpose in his own generation.

Acts 13:36

That's a great verse.

David realized that he had a purpose, that God gave him a purpose in his life, in his time, in his generation, that nobody else could do.

Do you know that's true about you?

We each receive a purpose that God gives us that can be fulfilled only by us, through us.

We matter.

We matter to God and what he wants to do around his world.

That's what David is saying.

And you only have a generation or two to do it.

We don't have that much time on this earth.

Maybe 60 years, maybe 70 years, the scriptures say.

Okay, we're living longer these days, but it's not long.

Pity the person who lives their decades on this earth without truly understanding and recognizing what God made them for, their purpose on this earth.

David knew that.

Let's look at David's life and his circumstances.

It was a difficult time.

Every commentator agrees.

Surrounded by enemies, many Bible scholars believe that this was probably, or at least might well have been the time that Absalom, his son, was trying to take his kingdom and trying to kill him.

Now just think about that.

Writing this kind of psalm when your own son's trying to eliminate you, trying to destroy all your work.

How could he do that?

How could he praise God?

Would we be able to do the same?

If so, he had to deal with many emotions, fear, confusion, anger.

Verse 7 says, Though I walk in the midst of trouble, in the midst of his troubles, David didn't lose perspective of God's purpose in his life.

His God was calling him to live a life full of praise, a life of thanks for his protection, and a life of discerning God's purpose.

Old Testament scholar Derek Kidner says this about this psalm.

There is a fine blend of boldness and humility in this psalm.

Boldness to confess the Lord before the gods of this world, humility to bow down before him.

And that you that's captured in the very words.

You can taste it as you meditate on this psalm.

What silences are praising hearts?

David says, My eyes are focused on the steadfast love of my God.

I know he will not let me go.

He will hold me fast.

Therefore I will praise him whatever I go through.

Could you say that?

Can I say that?

What silences are praising hearts?

David says, look, give me the opportunity, and I'm going to sing my praises before the rulers of the land, the kings of the earth.

Try to stop me.

Sometimes, though, it takes far less than that to silence our praise.

Sometimes, for strange reasons, we can be silent because we don't want the person next to me to hear me.

Well, that's pretty silly.

I'm not sure of the quality of my voice.

No.

It was never about the quality of your voice.

It's not today the quality of my voice.

It's just not about that.

It's about what God has to say.

Can we hear it?

Can we express it?

You know what worship is.

Worship is pouring out what God pours in.

That's good worship.

That's what David was doing.

Oh, let's take a deeper look at this.

The first of all, a life of praise and thanks.

I give you thanks, O Lord, with my whole heart.

Before the gods, I sing you your praise.

This is what we're called to do today, to give thanks to the Lord as David did, even when his life was threatened, perhaps hanging by a thread.

Probably on the run, literally.

He was praising God.

How could he do this?

For many people in hard times, they have anything, if they have anything to say to God, it's complaints.

Or it might be petitions.

God, get me out of this.

God, get me out of this, what I'm going through.

That's not what David's saying here.

David's using his voice to praise God.

How could he do that?

Can you do that?

Two reasons he gives in the text.

First of all, his praise sprang from what he knew of God's character.

Look at verse 2.

I bow down toward your holy temple and give thanks to your name for your steadfast love and for your faithfulness.

If you are a longtime APC, or you know that Hebrew word, Kesed love.

Your steadfast love.

That we sang about, that holds me fast.

No matter what I go through, I know he has not given up on me.

He is more committed to us than we are to him.

Is that not true?

We may walk out on him, but he doesn't walk out on us.

That's what that word means.

When he enters into relationship with you at the cost of the blood of his own son, do you think he's going to walk away from you?

Because you disappoint him?

No.

This is not a God who walks away ever from his people, his children.

This is a God who comes closer in need.

David knew this.

Do you?

If you do, you will praise him in hard times as well as good times.

We will come into his presence and worship.

It's easy when times are hard to just stop going to church.

I don't feel like praising.

I'm not going to go.

Okay.

There's so much more of God's covenant steadfast love that he wants to teach you.

Are you learning how to praise him?

Are you learning how to trust him in the hard times as well as the good times?

This is what this Psalm is about.

When He becomes our precious, we praise.

We always praise what is most precious to us.

Is that not true?

We always do.

The question is not whether we do.

The question is whom are we praising?

Whom are we worshiping?

What is it that's captured our heart?

The Proverbs put it like this in chapter 3, verse 3.

Let not steadfast love and faithfulness, these same qualities of God's character, let not steadfast love and faithfulness forsake you.

Bind them around your neck, write them on the tablet of your heart.

This is God's character that He wants to carve into our minds, that He wants to carve into our hearts.

You can't get enough of that, nor can I.

And frankly, you can't do it on your own.

Only the Holy Spirit can make that happen in your heart or mine.

Only the Holy Spirit can convince you of his steadfast love and of his faithfulness.

This is what David did.

He says, I give thanks for your faithfulness.

He loves us no less today than yesterday or tomorrow.

That's true.

Why?

Because his love is not conditioned on our faithfulness.

His love is not conditioned on our performance, us performance-driven people.

It's just not, and that's the good news of the gospel.

His love is the same today, yesterday, and tomorrow.

Why?

Because his acceptance of you never was based on your performance.

You can't mess that up.

You can't change that.

Isn't that good news?

It's in Christ Jesus that he chose you.

It's in Christ Jesus that he redeemed you.

It's in Christ Jesus that his love holds you fast.

David says, I give thanks for your faithfulness.

And then he says, For you have exalted above all things two things, your name and your word.

The name of Jesus is precious.

The name of God, reverent.

There are so many times in the Bible that we are told more about the character of our God by the names of God.

This is not an exhaustive list, but this is something just to get us thinking a bit more today.

The Hebrew names Elohim, Creator God, the God who created, sustains us, Elohim.

Adonai, ruler, master, the Lord of my life, Adonai.

Jehovah Jirah, the God who provides for all of our needs.

Yahweh, the most sacred of all the names of God, the people would not even pronounce his name out of fear of what might come their way for blasphemy his name.

Yahweh, the one who enters into covenant relationship with his people.

We see that so many places in the Old Testament.

Genesis chapter 15, the street of blood, as Abraham was called to walk with the animals carved in halves and the blood that was spilt.

Genesis 15 · chapter mention

God told Abraham that day, you will not be able to keep the covenant, but I will.

One day my own son will walk the street of blood.

One day my own son will take my wrath for your sin.

The powerful promises that God makes to his people.

Oh, friends, do you see it?

Jehovah Shalom, the Lord our peace.

Jehovah Rapha, the Lord who heals our diseases.

Jehovah Sitekun, the Lord our righteousness.

Jehovah Nisi, the Lord our banner.

He's jealous for his name.

He is jealous for his name.

Be careful how you use his name.

Jesus, the name Jesus.

For he will save them from their sins.

Acts chapter 4, verse 12, for there is no other name under heaven given by which we must be saved.

Acts 4:12

There is no other name.

There is no other person.

The name of Jesus.

Do you know how sweet and precious his name is to all the saints and all the angels in heaven?

To all of his people on earth.

Philippians, so that the name of Jesus, at the name of Jesus, every knee will bow and every tongue will confess.

At the name, the mere name of Jesus.

We all have a choice.

We either bow our hearts at the name of Jesus here and now while we're on this earth.

Freely.

Or one day, every person will do it under compulsion, for punishment, for eternal damnation.

Don't mess with God.

Accept his grace.

Hold the name Jesus is precious.

It is through the Father.

What's in a name?

Quite a bit when it comes to God.

All the different ways that He's revealed Himself, His character to us.

He says, Your name is exalted above all things, but secondly, He says, Your word is exalted above all things.

And the truth is, is the more we come to know Him, the quicker we are to draw nearer to Him in His Word, the more we delight in His gracious commandments.

The psalmist said, When you free my heart, I will run after your commandments.

Did you know that?

Do you know the reason why when you don't want to be in the Word?

It's not because you're lazy.

I mean, yes and no, but not really.

It's not because you're bored.

Do you know the real reason why, if you don't want to be in God's Word, why you don't?

Your heart is bound up.

When you enlarge my heart, Lord, I will run after your commandments.

That's what we all need, the Holy Spirit, to open up our hearts to see the beauty of the King we sing about.

To see how His loving kindness, his holiness, to see all that He is.

You know when that happens, nobody has to tell you to read your Bible.

You just, I the psalmist said, I run to your commands.

Because he saw the character of his God.

Verse 1, I give you thanks with my whole heart.

Before the gods I sing your praise.

Before the rulers of the world.

Commentators have different points of view on who are the gods here.

I believe, I agree with those who say that it's probably the kings and rulers of the nations.

David is saying, you can't stop me.

Even the kings and the rulers who are trying to kill him, you will not kill my praise.

You will not stop my heart of thanks.

I'm gonna pour out worship wherever I am.

Do you see the missionary spirit in this psalm?

Do you have that missionary spirit?

Try to stop me from praising my God.

Try to stop me from pouring out my thanks to my God for what he's done for me.

This is what David's saying.

This also, though, needs to be part of our purpose in 2024.

This is not just for pastors or missionaries or for people like King David.

It's just not.

This is a part of the purpose for every one of us.

Do you have a growing passion to see your neighbors join you in worship?

Do you have a growing passion to see the nations join you in worship?

As I looked around in the first service this morning, I was reminded many times by looking at people, people who are worshiping with us now because they've been invited by their neighbors and friends to come.

It was really encouraging to me.

I didn't, I didn't plan, I didn't write that in my notes.

But as I just looked around, yeah, dozens and dozens of people were here worshiping with us over the Advent season.

The lessons and carols.

Many visitors.

You invited.

That's good.

Let's share the praise with people who desperately need to praise, learn how to praise God.

The second point is a very brief one, but important.

Thanking God for his protection, verse 7.

Though I walk in the midst of trouble, you preserve my life.

You stretch out your hand against the wrath of my enemies, and your right hand delivers me.

We've already said this this morning.

But let's come back to it.

What troubles did God deliver you from in 2023?

And if he didn't change the circumstances as quickly as you wanted, was he changing your heart?

Sometimes the circumstances don't change.

Not like we want.

But there's always a change that God desires.

Always.

My heart.

My will.

This is what David is saying.

I, yeah, I shared this with a couple months ago in one of my sermons this summer.

God literally saved my life.

Literally saved my life.

And I wrote it down.

I had a hard time stopping to write.

There's a rock in my office that's got that name on it.

Don't pass quickly from the providence of God.

When He protects you in the middle of your troubles.

There's always going to be troubles.

Always.

Don't live your life trying to navigate around your troubles.

Learn to live your life in a way that you find your God faithful in the middle of your troubles.

That's what David is saying, exactly what he's saying.

Thank God for his protection.

But lastly, a life trusting God to fulfill his purpose in our lives.

We're back to verse 8.

The Lord will fulfill his purpose for me.

Your steadfast love, O Lord, endures forever.

Do not forsake the work of your hands.

The old King James put it like this: the Lord will perfect that which concerns me.

I like that too.

Clearly, the New Testament equivalent of Psalm 138, verse 8, is Philippians 1, verse 6.

Psalms 138:8 Philippians 1:6

He who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Jesus Christ.

This is the Old Testament truth that corresponds to the New Testament.

Do you know what Paul said in that?

Philippians 1, 6.

By the way, where did he write that from?

Prison.

Sounds like trouble to me.

He says, and I am sure of this.

How does somebody say that?

How does somebody who's going through hard times say, I'm sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until Jesus returns.

Man, that's a precious promise to believe, to live by.

She knows I'm hopeless, John.

But those some of you, some of you have unfinished projects at home.

Some of those projects may never get done.

It's not just the handyman projects around the house.

Aren't there lots of things in our lives that we begin that we never finish?

Isn't there a lot of unfinished business in life?

That's just the way it's going to be.

And it drives some of us nuts.

But that's okay.

You're going to have to deal with it.

Not everything's going to get done.

You can't say that about your God.

Everything he starts, he finishes.

This is what he's saying to us.

David says, for me, but this is not just David, this is for every one of his people.

This promise is true for every one of his people.

I love the way Derek Kidner put it in verse 8.

Look at it.

Verse 8.

Look at the first line and the last line, third line.

The Lord will fulfill his purpose for me.

Do not forsake the work of your hands.

Kidner says the first and the last lines of this verse make personal, confident, and urgent use of the truth that they find in the middle verse, in the middle phrase.

That's powerful insight.

Because there's lots of things.

We can be so subjective, right?

We could be so moody.

Can't you be?

We can be so up and down, not only with our projects, but our feelings, our emotions, the way that we think about ourselves, the way that we think about other people, the way that we think about other people thinking about us.

There's so much that could just send us on this roller coaster.

Look at the middle of the verse.

What grounds David is not his emotions.

What grounds David is not his feelings, it's not his circumstances.

It's God's kessed love.

Your steadfast love, O Lord, is never going to fail me.

That's something that we can put our faith in, no matter what comes our way in 2024.

Grace will complete what grace begins.

So I have a couple questions as we close.

Is your God getting bigger in your eyes?

We talked about that with Mary, right?

Mary's magnificent a couple weeks ago.

Mary says, I will magnify the Lord.

What does that mean?

Are we making him bigger?

No, we can't make him bigger.

He is infinitely, eternally, and unchangeably all that he is.

But he can become bigger in our eyes.

In our estimation.

He should be getting bigger and bigger and bigger for each of us.

Are we magnifying him as Mary did?

Our world must expand if we're going to fulfill our purpose in 2024.

I really believe that.

No Lone Ranger Christians.

Let's get away from this growing trend within evangelical circles of this very highly individualistic faith.

It's just me and God.

No, it's not.

It never was, it never will be.

That's not for you.

I'm just kind of off on my path doing my thing.

I'm not sure what y'all were doing, but I'm no, that's not for you.

Our world must expand.

Look at David's.

David says, I want the nations to praise you, God.

I want my enemies to praise you, God.

I want my neighbors to praise you, God.

This is good stuff.

Some commentators have suggested, and I tend to agree with them, that David might well have had another experience, earlier experience in his life and mine, 2 Samuel chapter 7.

2 Samuel 7 · chapter mention

I'm going to read some verses when God came to him.

2 Samuel 7.

Verse 11, From the time that I appointed judges over my people Israel, and I will give you rest from all your enemies.

Moreover, the Lord declares to you that the Lord will make you a house.

God's going to make David a house?

Do you remember in the context?

David wanted to build a house for God.

He wanted to build the temple.

You remember what God said to him?

No.

You're a man of blood.

It's not for you, it's for your son.

When your days are fulfilled, here we're back to back to purpose language.

When your days are fulfilled, and you lie down with your fathers, I will raise up your offspring after you.

You shall come out from your body, and I will establish his kingdom.

Solomon's kingdom?

No.

The greater Solomon, Jesus.

He shall build a house for my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever.

What a grand promise that God made to David.

David, I know you want to build me a house.

You want to build me a temple.

David, I'm going to build a temple through your line, through your ancestry.

I'm going to raise up my own son.

I'm going to give you my own son, and he's going to be the true temple.

It's not going to be a building.

It never was, it never will be.

Jesus is the true temple.

And you're going to come to Jesus, and you're going to see his beauty.

You're going to know his steadfast love.

And you're going to find your rest in him, the true temple.

It's coming.

This is what God promised David.

I could easily believe that this is what David's is on David's mind as he writes these words as well.

Oh, how he did that.

Verses 20 in that same chapter.

What more can David say to you?

Talking about himself in second person.

What more can David say to you?

For you know your servant, O Lord God, because of your promise and according to your own heart, you have brought about all this greatness to make your servant know.

Therefore, you are great, O Lord God.

There is none like you.

There is no God beside you, according to all that we have heard with our ears.

Man, this is good stuff.

David, watch what I'm going to do with your life.

Watch what I'm going to do through your life.

And it's not because of you.

It's because of my promises.

It's my faithfulness, but I'm looking for people to use.

And you know what?

That includes you.

What's your purpose in 2024?

Is it just to get by?

Just to survive?

No.

He's got much better things for you and for me.

We can say with the psalmist, the Lord will fulfill his purpose for me.

What's that gonna look like?

I'll tell you this: the only way you're gonna find it is on your knees in prayer.

The only way you're gonna find it was with a heart like David.

You've got to get your assignments from God, just like David did.

This is not just about you blue skying your life.

This is not about you scheduling your life.

It has nothing to do with that.

This kind of purpose living comes from God Himself.

It comes from His Holy Spirit.

It comes as you're in the Word of God, it comes as the Word of God saturates your mind and your heart.

God gives us our His assignments for us, doesn't He?

There's nothing more exciting that you could have than to get your assignments from God Himself.

What He wants you to do that nobody else can do but you and His kingdom work.

It's a team.

It's a powerful team when it's God's team.

And guess what?

You and I get to do this.

We get to do this.

May we do our work with joy, with much praise.

Thanking him.

I love the way this hymn we're gonna sing in a moment, says all of our tomorrows.

Hands to the plow.

We are pressing on and running hard to win the prize.

Empowered by the love of God, with grace before and grace behind.

For lo, what hope before us stands, you finish all that you began.

Eternal joy is in your hands.

And all of our tomorrows.

Can you say that?

Will you be able to sing that in a moment?

All of your tomorrows?

That's crazy talk.

Unless you know the gospel.

Unless you know Jesus.

And that truth will change your life.

What is his purpose for you?

Join me in prayer.

Father, we we do invite you in, Holy Spirit, to continue to speak into our life, search us, and show us that we would know what you would reveal to us about our purpose.

But Lord, one thing we don't have to question, one thing we don't have to guess, is you've already done everything you needed to do to reveal your greatest purpose for our greatest need.

You sent your son to save sinners like us.

Thank you, Jesus.

Thank you, Jesus.

Your name is precious.

You are precious.

May you become more and more precious to us in this new year.

I pray in Jesus' name.

Amen.