My Confession

Well, good evening. It's good to be with you this evening at Brunsfield Evangelical Church.

Greetings to you from the rest of the pastors and the elders at Corroboros Christian Centre across town.

I have to apologise to you this evening if my voice starts to fade a little bit.

The Nixon household has been unwell this week, and this morning I didn't have a voice when I woke up,

but fortunately when I was preaching it came back.

So let's hope it doesn't work the other way tonight that I start off with a voice and it runs out by the end.

Now, it's been great to be able to sing the passage that we're going to be looking at together,

this evening. It was also great to hear it in a word, wrapped, to us at the very start.

I don't think I can follow that. I'm definitely more of an abide with me person rather than a

wrapped person, but it certainly helped us to think about what we're going to be looking at tonight in the Scriptures.

See, tonight we're going to be spending time in the heart and the soul of the psalmist Asaph.

Imagine that you are sitting with this guy over here, over coughing, and he is unburdening his soul to you.

He is confessing to you how his faith in God almost collapsed and failed him.

You see, Asaph is cracking under the assault and the burden of doubts.

If you have ever wrestled with hard questions or doubts about the Lord, questions like,

is the Bible historically reliable? Can I trust it?

Is Jesus a real person? Did he really exist? Did he really live? Did he really die? Did he really rise again?

Can I be certain about his promises that he makes to me in the gospel that if I believe in him,

I'll be forgiven for my sins and I'll have the hope of heaven?

If you've ever wrestled with questions about, can I be sure about these things,

then you can well sympathize with Asaph in his time of uncertainty.

I've spent many hours in recent years fielding questions from sceptical people at universities around the country,

people who think that the Christian faith is irrational and irrelevant.

I've also spent many an hour pastorally counselling people in my own church and in other churches

who have been struggling as believers, whose faith has been thrown into tremendous doubt and uncertainty

by things that they have read, by questions that have come into their minds

or that they have been exposed to in the world. And these doubts, they have stolen their joy

and have hindered their walk and their effectiveness for Christ.

And so when we think about doubts tonight, I know that we're going to a place that is dangerous.

We're going into a place that is uncomfortable.

And it should be uncomfortable because we're actually going into the trenches this evening together.

The trenches at the front line of the war of scepticism against faith.

But before we get into that battle, before we jump into the trenches,

it's so good to begin our time together where Asaph begins.

Because he knows he's about to take us on a hard journey.

And so right at the very beginning of his psalm, as we have heard, as we have sang,

in verse 1, Asaph tells us what his ultimate conclusion was.

The conviction that has been tested and tried in the furnace of affliction

and that has been proven to be true.

Verse 1, truly God is good to Israel, to those who are pure in heart.

Asaph wants us to know before we get into this battle,

that it is possible to make it out onto the other side.

It is possible to keep going in faith.

And his confession in Psalm 73 shows us the way that we can go,

the way through the minefield of spiritual doubt and uncertainty.

So I'm not going to read the passage again.

We've heard it.

We've sang most of it.

But what I'm planning to do is I plan to walk you through all the passage.

So let's just get stuck in straight away.

I've got three things for you this evening.

The first thing is, the first step, if you like, through the minefield of doubt

is to confess your doubts about God.

You'll find this comes out of verses 1 to 14 of the passage.

Asaph begins by confessing to us how unstable his faith has become.

He says in verse 2,

As for me, my feet had almost stumbled.

My steps had nearly slipped.

Now what has so deeply unsettled Asaph?

Well, he confesses to us the reason in verse 3, if you look at it.

He says,

For I was envious of the arrogant when I saw the prosperity of the wicked.

Now you're meant to have a bit of an experience of deja vu when you hear the prosperity of the wicked here.

You're meant to hear an echo of the opening words of the opening psalm.

Psalm 1.

That psalm states that there are two roads in life.

There is the way of the righteous, which leads to life.

And there is the way of the wicked that leads to death.

Psalm 1 says these words very confidently.

Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked.

It goes on and says,

Instead, his delight is in the law of the Lord.

In all that he does, he prospers.

Then he finishes verse 6 of Psalm 1.

The way of the wicked will perish.

That's the way it's meant to be.

The righteous are meant to prosper.

The wicked are meant to perish.

That's what the Bible says.

Asaph knows that.

And yet that is not what Asaph has experienced in life.

He has seen the absolute reversal of that.

He, a righteous man, is suffering while the wicked prosper.

You see, Asaph lived during dark and difficult days.

Faithless times in the nation of Israel.

It was a time of division socially, of decline and depravity.

In the private home and also in the public square,

the sins of injustice and immorality and idolatry were rampant.

This was a plague upon the nation.

And Asaph confesses to us this evening that these dark times

had raised dark thoughts in his mind and in his soul.

As he then goes through the next set of verses,

you can listen to him as he complains,

as he confesses what he's angry at God for,

why he is frustrated, why he is doubting.

Listen as he complains about, first of all,

how the wicked live in luxury and leisure.

Verses 4 and 5.

For they have no pangs until death.

Their bodies are fat and sleek.

They are not in trouble as others are.

They are not stricken like the rest of mankind.

Jump down to verse 12.

He returns to this theme again.

He says,

Behold, these are the wicked.

Always at ease, they increase in riches.

Asaph is complaining here, it's not fair.

It shouldn't be this way.

He goes on in verses 6, 7, and 8

to complain about how the wicked are desperately antisocial.

He says,

Therefore pride is their necklace.

Violence covers them as a garment.

Their eyes swell out through fatness.

Their hearts overflow with follies.

They scoff and speak with malice.

Loftily they threaten oppression.

You wouldn't want to live with these people as your neighbors.

These are horrendous people to live around.

Asaph lives in fear of his life day and night.

But he goes on again in verses 9, 10, and 11

to complain about how the wicked are defiant in their unbelief.

Verse 9.

They set their mouths against the heavens

and their tongues struts through the earth.

And they say,

How can God know?

Is there knowledge in the Most High?

If you were to put yourself for a moment into Asaph's shoes,

if you were to feel with him and for him in the midst of this dark time,

then you'll recognize this is tough.

This is really tough, excruciating.

It throws into question everything that he has believed about God

and God's promises to his people.

Then in verses 13 and 14,

he almost reached the lowest point of Asaph's journey.

Listen as Asaph confesses just how dark his thoughts and his doubts had become.

All in vain have I kept my heart clean

and washed my hands in innocence.

For all the day long I have been stricken and rebuked every morning.

What's the point?

Is basically what Asaph is asking.

What's the point?

It's not worth it.

It's a lie.

Maybe I would be better off throwing my lot in with the wicked.

Maybe you've been in a place like that before.

Maybe you have asked hard questions about difficult issues.

Maybe you've considered questions like,

why would a good God allow bad things to happen

like the Manchester bombing a few weeks ago

or like the London Bridge attack last night?

Where was God when that happened?

Maybe you would ask questions like,

what if my belief in God is just wishful, delusional thinking?

How can I be sure it's real?

What if I can't trust the Bible in light of the findings of science?

What if it's not reliable?

What if it's not true?

These are hard questions that come to many of us at different times.

I wouldn't be surprised if you struggle with these things.

Confess that I struggle with these things from time to time.

And all of us will face these things, these questions, these issues,

because we live in a dominantly secular society.

21st century Scotland is a secular society.

Fewer than 5% of the population would confess to be Christians of one sort or another.

We are day in, day out bombarded with information and media and ideology

that is contrary to what we believe is true in the Bible.

In our society today, our beliefs are often mocked

and our values are now being seen as being positively dangerous.

There are very articulate atheist personalities

who are out there in the public square,

people like Richard Dawkins, Stephen Fry, Brian Cox.

And rarely do we hear what they have to say answered by a competent Christian spokesperson.

Usually these guys wipe the floor with some bishop in the Church of England.

Okay?

And so I would even suggest to you this evening

that we might face harder assaults on our faith

than what Asaph endured all the years before in Psalm 73.

We are in a substantially more difficult situation today.

And that is why I'm so encouraged to find in God's book this psalm.

To find that God has preserved for all the centuries,

for all his people,

the journey of Asaph through his time of doubt,

his time of darkness.

Because God has given us words to use

when we find ourselves in this kind of place.

God has given us a pathway to follow

through the minefield of spiritual doubt and affliction.

If you find yourselves wrestling with the things

that Asaph is wrestling with on your journey through life,

then turn to this psalm and follow Asaph.

He has charted the way through.

And so the first thing that Asaph does

is he confesses his doubts about God.

But he doesn't stop there.

What's the way on?

What are we to do with our doubts?

Well, the second thing is to bring your doubts to God.

You see this in verses 15, 16, and 17.

And the first thing to notice in verse 15 is

there is one thing that Asaph did not do with his doubts.

And that's that he did not recklessly expose

everyone else to them.

He didn't unnecessarily rattle everyone's faith.

Remember, he's just buried his soul to us

in verses 13 and 14.

All in vain have I done these things.

And then verse 15 picks up and says,

if I had said, I will speak thus.

That's stuff in verses 13 and 14.

If I had said those things,

I would have betrayed the generation of your children.

You see, Asaph was a wee bit like Fiona this evening

who's been leading us in worship.

Asaph was a worship leader in the temple of God.

He had a position of responsibility in God's people.

He was an example to all of them

about what the life of faith looks like.

And so as he, as the model believer, if you like,

the faithful Israelite,

as he is gripped and crippled by doubts inside of him,

he doesn't start a blog.

He doesn't start tweeting to all of his followers

to publicly air these things.

That would have done tremendously great harm

to faithful Israelites who already were struggling

in the midst of the dark times

that Israel was facing in those days.

They were looking up to Asaph,

and the last thing they needed was Asaph to go awal.

And so Asaph did not recklessly tell everybody

what he was thinking.

But also Asaph did not just hold on to these things privately

and keep them to himself and try and resolve them.

Instead, the turning point for Asaph in this psalm

comes whenever he stopped holding on to his doubts himself,

trying to work them out on his own.

And he takes his complaints, he takes his questions,

he takes his doubts and his issues to God himself.

Asaph, verses 16 and 17 said,

but when I thought how to understand this,

it seemed to me a wearisome task

until I went into the sanctuary of God.

Then I discerned their end.

Asaph went into God's temple in Jerusalem

on top of Mount Zion.

That is the place where he knew God could be found.

That is the place where God's presence

dwelled among his people.

I wonder, did Asaph remember the words of Solomon

whenever he had opened the temple years before?

Read about that event in 1 Kings chapter 8

1 Kings 8 · chapter mention

where Solomon prays in dedication.

May your eyes be opened toward this temple night and day.

This place of which you have said,

my name shall be there.

So that you will hear the prayer

your servant prays towards this place.

Hear the supplication of your servant

and of your people Israel

when they pray towards this place.

Hear from heaven your dwelling place.

And when you hear, forgive.

I wonder, is that the thing that is in Asaph's mind

when he chooses to go up to the temple of the Lord?

Does he remember the promise

that this is the one place that he knows

that God can be found?

This is the place where if he is praying,

God will be hearing

and God will be answering his requests for help.

And so Asaph, responding to the promise of God in the past,

goes up into the temple.

He perhaps stands with the congregation

as they stand and worship.

He sits as the priests open up the book of the law

and they preach and teach the people.

He observes the sacrifices taking place

as still faithful Israelites come

bringing their sacrifices to have their sins atoned for.

And as he spent time there in God's presence,

in the temple,

it seems that everything changed

in Asaph's troubled, disquieted soul and mind.

Now for us today, we don't have a temple, do we?

This place is a beautiful, wonderful place,

but this is not a temple.

We don't have a temple to bring our troubles

into a building.

But we do have something,

indeed someone,

that is far better.

You see, the glory of God today

does not dwell in a building of bricks and mortar,

but the glory of God dwells in

the body of a person of flesh and blood.

His name is Jesus Christ.

You don't have a place to go into,

but you do have a person

whom you can invite into your struggles.

Someone who is willing to walk alongside you

and journey with you

and help you through those dark,

difficult storms of fear and doubt.

And the Lord Jesus,

he is accessible anytime,

anywhere,

about anything.

And he welcomes us when we come to him.

If our doubts and our struggles,

he's glad that we would come and turn to him.

He welcomes us even when we come

with simple,

struggling,

doubting faith.

I know that because

that's what you see

when you read about Jesus in the Gospels.

When you read about his life,

that's exactly what happened

when people who were struggling came to him.

One of my favorite stories in the Gospels

is in Mark chapter 9.

Mark 9 · chapter mention

In that story,

a father brings his demon-possessed son to Jesus.

The father has tried everything

to try and get his boy freed

from this force that wants to destroy

and take his life.

This demonic presence throws him into the fire,

throws him into water to drown him.

He's out to destroy this little boy's life.

The father doesn't know what to do,

but he hears that Jesus is in town.

The father brings his son to Jesus

because he believes Jesus can do something to help

that no one else can do.

Yet nevertheless,

the father does not fully know

what to make of Jesus.

His faith is mixed with fear and uncertainty.

And as he comes to Jesus,

he confesses this.

Mark chapter 9, verse 24.

Mark 9:24

Lord, I believe.

Help me overcome my unbelief.

You wonder, how will Jesus react?

He's just come to him and said,

Jesus, I need you to help me with something,

but I'm not fully convinced.

I've got some unbelief and doubt in me.

Does Jesus react and say, go away?

Does Jesus say,

how dare you come to me

when you don't fully believe in me?

Is Jesus angry?

No.

No.

No.

Jesus sees this man's dear heart,

his love for his son.

He sees that he is troubled,

that he is doubting and uncertain.

And Jesus gives him a reason to believe.

And Jesus helps him.

And Jesus heals his son.

That story is great news for all of us

when we struggle and we wrestle with our doubts.

It shows us that Jesus has opened wide arms

and says, come.

Yeah, you've got struggling, doubting, faith.

So come.

Invite me into your doubts and into your struggles.

I'll be there with you.

I won't abandon you.

We can be honest with God.

We don't have to run away and hide from him.

We don't have to pretend with him.

We don't have to be ashamed.

We can bring these things to God.

We can ask him for his help to work things through.

We can bring these things alongside

a trusted Christian friend.

Because God, by his Holy Spirit,

will minister to you through

that wise Christian friend or pastor or elder.

They will help you.

There have been many Christians

who I have never met in my lifetime,

but who have hugely helped me

and ministered to my heart and my soul

with my doubts and questions

through their books.

People like, if it comes up,

Ravi Zacharias.

People like Tim Keller.

Even people like C.S. Lewis or Lee Struble

who were committed skeptics,

who actually selected to disprove the Christian faith.

And on their journey of research,

discovered, oh goodness, it's true,

and became Christians.

These people and many more

have been dear friends to me

whom God has used to minister

into my heart to teach me

and to help me work through things.

And so when you are struggling with doubt,

the first thing to do

is to confess your doubts about God.

And the next thing to do

is to bring your doubts to God.

He's big enough.

But then we need to see what happens next

as the psalm resolves itself

in verses 18 to 28.

And this is the third thing,

that you can resolve your doubts

by taking God at his word.

You see, doubts ultimately revolve

around the question,

can I trust what God has said is true?

Can I trust that what God has said

in his book is true?

Can I stake my life, my death,

my eternity upon it?

That's the question

that Asaph is wrestling with.

Is it in vain?

And that's the question

that is resolved in his mind

and in his heart through his journey.

In the temple,

there were no heavenly visions.

There were no incredible miracles.

God didn't answer

all of Asaph's questions,

didn't resolve all of his issues and doubts.

But God did bring into new focus

in Asaph's mind some old truths.

And that's what got him through.

Indeed, there are three new assurances

about old truths

in this last part of the psalm.

These are the things that served as fuel

to keep the flame of Asaph's faith burning

in the midst of the dark times

in which he lived.

First of all,

there was a new assurance

about the peril of the wicked.

See this in verses 18 to 20.

Of the wicked, Asaph now sees,

truly you set them in slippery places.

You make them fall to ruin.

How they are destroyed in a moment,

swept away utterly by terrors.

Like a dream when one awakes,

O Lord, when you rise yourself,

you despise them as phantoms.

Then there's a new assurance

about the security of the righteous.

Verse 21 to verse 24.

Asaph says,

When my soul was embittered,

when I was pricked in heart,

I was brutish and ignorant.

I was like a beast towards you.

Nevertheless,

I am continually with you.

You hold my right hand.

You guide me with your counsel.

And afterward,

you will receive me to glory.

And then there's a new assurance

about the goodness of God.

The last four verses.

Whom am I in heaven but you?

And there is nothing on earth

that I desire besides you.

My flesh and my heart may fail,

but God is the strength of my heart

and my portion forever.

For behold,

those who are far from you shall perish.

You put an end to everyone

who is unfaithful to you.

But for me,

it is good to be near God.

I have made the Lord God my refuge

that I may tell of all your works.

Finish it off.

Go back to verse one.

Truly God is good to Israel,

to those who are pure in heart.

Asaph's struggle was provoked

by his present sufferings.

The righteous suffering,

the wicked prospering.

It's the wrong way around.

But now he has a new perspective

on these events

in the light of the future.

Because yes, right now,

the righteous do suffer,

the wicked do prosper.

But it will not always be that way.

God's going to put things right.

Just as you wouldn't judge

the winner of a race

by who's leading at halfway time.

Just in the same way,

you shouldn't say that

just because the wicked are ahead,

just know that they're always

going to be ahead.

No, when all is said and done,

when time is up,

when the finish line is crossed,

we will find things being

as yackly as God has said,

that the righteous

shall prosper forevermore

and the wicked shall perish

forevermore.

Indeed,

verse 20 says

that the wicked will vanish

like a bad dream

when you wake up

first thing in the morning.

It was so real.

And then you open your eyes

and you can't even remember

what it was.

They will vanish

like phantoms.

And Asaph takes

all these things,

all these old truths

to heart in a new way.

And he resolves

to trust God

in these dark days.

And Asaph today

is alive in glory.

Asaph today

sees

that this is true,

that God

did not disappoint him.

And Asaph would say to us

if he was here,

keep going.

Keep going.

Things will right themselves

in the end.

Now as we sort of

wrap things up

for this evening,

we have to ask

who do you most identify with

in this psalm?

Whom are you?

Are you an Asaph?

A Christian,

a believer,

but you're beset

by troubles and doubts

at this time

about your faith.

Let me urge you

to follow in Asaph's footsteps

and do exactly

these things,

to confess these things

openly about God,

to bring them to him

and to someone

who's trusted,

to read,

to learn,

to discuss,

to pray

and ask for help.

and resolve

by trusting

that what God says

is true

and will be proved

to be true.

So,

wise piece of advice.

I've never been able

to find out who said it,

but they said,

doubt your doubts

and believe your beliefs.

But whatever you do,

don't make the mistake

of doubting your beliefs

and believing your doubts.

You need to know

that every time

you have a doubt,

what you're actually

encountering

is an entirely

alternative set of beliefs.

So,

you're doubting your beliefs

and that doubt itself

is a world

of alternative beliefs.

And so,

when you encounter a doubt,

you need to ask

questions of it.

You need to push back

against it

and ask,

okay,

you're raising questions

about my faith

and the reasons

that I have for my faith,

but what reasons

do you have doubt

for saying what you say?

Are your reasons

any better than my reasons

for believing

that Jesus Christ

is the Son of God

in the flesh,

that he lived,

he died,

he rose again?

Do you have better reasons

to doubt?

I guarantee you,

time after time

after time,

it doesn't.

And so,

believe your beliefs,

doubt your doubts.

Don't make the mistake

of believing your doubts

and doubting your beliefs.

Look at the reasons.

Are you like those tonight

who are called

by Asaph the wicked?

Those who live their lives

independently from

and defiantly

against God.

Because Asaph sees

that if that is

who you are this evening,

if that is how you live

your life here and now,

then that is also

how you will live your life

throughout all the endless

ages of eternity.

C.S. Lewis,

the Christian writer,

once said that in the end

there are only two types

of people in the world.

Those who say to God,

thy will be done,

and those to whom God

will say,

your will be done.

Terrible words.

And God does not want you

to perish like the wicked.

That's why he sent his son,

Jesus,

into this world.

John 3.16 tells us,

for God so loved the world

that he sent us

his one and only son

so that whoever believes

in him should not perish

but have everlasting life.

The thing that Asaph

was hoping for

and looking for

in this psalm.

If you're among the wicked

this evening,

then turn and trust in Jesus.

But maybe there's a third

type of person

who would be here

this evening.

And maybe you're

the sort of person

who is searching.

You're searching for answers.

You're searching for meaning.

You're searching for that thing

that seems to be missing

in your life.

And maybe you have discovered

that the prosperity

of the wicked,

the prosperity of this present life

doesn't truly satisfy.

Perhaps you're like

the old billionaire

Robert Maxwell

who said,

I worked all my life

to reach the top

only to realize

when I got there

there's nothing there.

A man who was found

not long after saying that

over the side

of his private yacht

dead in the water.

Perhaps you are

wanting the kind of assurance

that Asaph has

at the end of this psalm

that he can say

that even though

my heart and my flesh

shall fail

yet you are

the strength of my life

and my portion forever.

If you're here

this evening

and you are searching

and you're looking

then what you're looking for

is the Lord Jesus.

Your heart is

like a home and beacon

for him.

And so I'd urge you

I would encourage you

to please

investigate Jesus

for yourself.

There are people here

at the church

who can help you.

Someone who brought you

perhaps can help you

and point you

in the right direction.

But please

whatever you do

investigate him.

It will be the most

important thing

that you ever do.

With these words

I want to close

in there from C.S. Lewis

again and he said

that Christianity

is a statement

which if false

is of no importance

and if true

of infinite importance

the one thing

it cannot be

is moderately important.

So if you're searching

tonight

find out more.

Let's pray.

Let's pray.

Lord and Father

we thank you

that you truly

are good to Israel.

You are truly good

to your church.

Thank you for your

wonderful love

that you sent your son

to rescue us.

We who were counted

among the wicked.

We who lived our lives

in sin

ignoring you

couldn't care less

about you.

Thank you

that you have

come down

and rescued us.

Thank you

that you are

the God

who also

is open to questions

that you have

given us

minds to think

and to reason.

Thank you

that the faith

that we have

stands up to scrutiny.

We thank you

for the great

encouragements

that over the

many centuries

that the Christian

church has been here

that the greatest

intellectual minds

of atheism

have attacked it

and sought

to destroy it.

Other religions

have come in

with their other ideas

and yet the one thing

that has stood

unshakable,

firm,

unmoving

is the word of God

and the Bible

and the gospel

of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Thank you

that it has

stood the test

of time.

It has stood

as the rock

of ages

and so help us

today

to cling tightly

as we live

in our society

which is filled

with unbelief

and doubt

and godlessness

and atheism

and agnosticism.

Help us

to stand firm

and cling fast

to the rock

and help us

Lord

as we wrestle

with the

uncertainties

and the questions

that come up

into our minds,

the questions

that other people

would share with us

that they're wrestling

with.

Help us

to journey

with Asaph

and help us

to reach the other

side,

keeping going

in faith

and reaching

that same conclusion

that truly

you are good,

truly your word

is trustworthy.

So Lord,

have your way

in our hearts

and our minds

this evening.

We pray in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.