Hope Through the Low, Calm and Quiet Life

This morning, uh, we are going to be looking at a short but a mighty psalm.

It is Psalm 131.

I would invite you to stand for the reading of God's Word.

O Lord, my heart is not lifted up, my eyes are not raised too high.

I do not occupy myself with things too great and too marvelous for me.

But I have calmed and quieted my soul, like a weaned child with its mother, like a weaned child is my soul within me.

O Israel, hope in the Lord, from this time forth and forevermore.

This is God's word.

Thanks be to God.

Y'all can be seated.

Pray with me.

Father in heaven, we thank you for the gift of your word, that you delight to speak to us, your children, and pray for your Holy Spirit's help to understand this passage.

That your gospel would be made clear, that its power would be applied to our hearts.

You know every heart that comes into this room, that you've called into this place, and I ask that for those of us coming in that are too comfortable by the power of your gospel, you would disrupt us.

And those maybe coming in too disrupted and overwhelmed by the circumstances of life, that you would comfort us by the power of your gospel.

And you would do all this for our good and for your glory.

We pray in your name.

Amen.

Well, one question that I have found increasingly important to ask my students on campus is what is your feed telling you?

That could be their YouTube algorithm feed, that could be their Instagram feed, but wherever they spend time online, their algorithm is telling them something.

It is telling them about where the good life is to be found and how they can maximize getting the most out of life.

And so often when I start to talk with students about what they're seeing, what they're being inundated with, it's so much noise, so much noise about where the good life can be found.

So much so that it's even been given nicknames of maxing.

How do you max your life?

It could be looks maxing.

How do you have the self-care routine, the proper haircut, the way in which you take care of yourself to maximize how you project your image?

It could be through money maxing.

How do you make and optimize every aspect of your time to make the most money, to make yourself most self-sufficient?

It could be through gym maxing.

How do you make sure you have the exact right gym routine to be as strong and as powerful as you need to be, and as lean and as fit as you need to be?

On and on and on it goes.

And there's millions of hours that they could go down rabbit holes looking at this content that is holding out for them.

This is where the good life is found.

And there's a common theme to all of these stories is your life is broken, and there is a promise on offer for you.

If you just submit yourself to this routine, to these steps, you can maximize your potential.

You can maximize your life.

And I think if we're honest with ourselves, even if we're not in college, even if we don't spend time on Instagram or YouTube, there are so many places of noise that ask for our attention, that hold forth these pathways to maximizing our life.

And we can be susceptible to believing their promise, to falling in line with their message and believe their noise.

That if we would just submit to these realities, if we would just submit to these stories, then yes, we could have this maximized life.

But the good news of Psalm 131, though it is short, it is a powerful message of where the good life can actually come from.

Rather than submitting to this promise of if you just ascend and do these rituals and these next steps, you will ascend to happiness.

The good news of Psalm 131 is actually the good life is found in going low, embracing contentment and practicing hope.

That's the path to the good life.

And we're going to see that in these three points.

That the good life does come from going low.

Secondly, the good life comes from embracing contentment.

And then finally, through practicing hope.

So first, the good life goes low.

The setup of this passage or the title is A Song of Ascents of David.

Now, this is a group of Psalms, Psalm 120 to 134, that have this title, and many commentators believe that these were the road trip psalms, as they were for the people of Israel.

That on the three great feast days of the year, they would often travel up to Jerusalem to celebrate, and they would sing these songs as they went up to worship.

And David is saying, People of God, as you go up, don't forget that you actually must go low.

You must humble yourself.

You must go low before the Lord and in his presence.

And the title gives us the context that it is also David as the author.

Now we don't know exactly when he wrote this, but I think that actually makes it even more helpful that David, in all the circumstances of his life that we know about, had many times when he was not calm or he was not quiet, where he actually set his eyes on things that he should not have been setting.

And yet, even he has been able to learn this lesson.

And the audience of the psalm is important.

This is David praying to, oh Lord, the Lord.

This is a private prayer that God has chosen to make public to the people of God that they might learn how David has followed this path of the good life.

And part of that is going low.

We see this in David's address in his prayer by just recognizing who he is coming before.

It's O Lord, the great I am, the self-existing one, the one who is ruler, Lord over all things.

This is the one who David is addressing.

And as he addresses him, he is making the point that my heart, Lord, is not lifted up.

That's an idiom for, it's not filled with pride.

I'm not making a self-assessment of myself greater than I should.

I'm not prideful.

I am going low.

And humility is basically Christianity 101.

It's not the destination on a long path that only the spiritual elite are meant to reach.

It is the path that all of us, all Christians, are meant to walk at all times, we're to be humble before the Lord, following him.

And David, he's saying, I've I've humbled myself.

And he's holding out to the people of God, have you, as you approach the Lord, have you humbled yourselves?

Have you gone low?

That's part of the good life, is we must walk this path of humility and go low before the Lord.

Jesus says as much in his ministry in Matthew 18, he puts it this way Truly I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.

Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.

And so it presents the question then, how?

How do we go low?

How do we humble ourselves?

I think verse one shows three ways in which, or three factors of humility, of going low.

We've said that the audience that he's praying to is the Lord recognizing the greatness of the one that you're coming before, and in light of who God is, assessing yourself of who we are before him.

We have nothing to bring that God needs from us.

We have nothing to bring that would impress God.

And so, therefore, the only way to approach him is not by going up to the heights where God is and dwells, but taking him up on his promise that he also dwells with the lowly, the contrite of heart, and trusting that he will meet us there, not trying to impress, but going to the place that he promises to be in humility.

This is part of humbling ourselves.

It's been said, I think, well, that humility is not thinking less of yourself, but thinking of yourself less.

It's this idea that we're not self-consumed, we're not necessarily just putting ourselves down, this kind of warm warm theology, but we're just thinking of ourselves less.

We have this holy sense of self and who we are in relation to God and our dependence on Him and His greatness.

This is the path of humility.

And this is to pervade every aspect of our life.

When David says, Oh Lord, my heart is not lifted up, he's not simply addressing his emotions or his mood.

Uh, and he's more referencing, as scripture references, the heart as being kind of the embodiment of personhood, the whole will, emotions, desires, everything about a person.

It is the control or command center of the human being.

And David is saying before the Lord that that has not been lifted up.

I'm not prideful.

I know who I am, I know who you are, I am low, I am humble before you.

We can kind of think of our hearts being lifted up or our mood being up as a good thing.

Uh, scripture is very clear that for our heart to be lifted up is an idiom of pride.

And David is saying, I haven't, I haven't gone there, Lord.

Before you, right now, I have gone low.

The second thing he says is, My eyes are not raised too high.

My eyes are not raised too high.

So if he has a proper sense of self before the Lord, this is referring to his sense of self before others.

He hasn't raised his eyes towards others, he's not looking down on others.

He has a sense of humility and he's gone low, knowing who he is not only before the Lord, but also before others.

And this is part of the good life is having that sense of humility and self in our relationship to God and how we relate to others.

Because if we don't, pride is actually how we're going to both relate to God and to others.

John Stott is a commentator said it this way at every age and stage of our Christian development and in every sphere of Christian discipleship, pride is our greatest enemy, and humility is our greatest friend.

So, what that means, therefore, is then to go low, you and I must fight, resist pride.

And we actually have to befriend humility.

Our hearts, the very center of all that we are and who we are, must go low before the Lord.

And also refuse to look down on others, those that we might think aren't measuring up to our standards, aren't performing how we would like them to.

And how easy it is for our hearts to go there.

Even if we have a quote unquote proper sense of self before the Lord, so easy do our hearts go to judging others, to looking down on them.

One of the more embarrassing and obvious examples of this from my own life happened two years ago.

My wife was seven months pregnant with my now one and a half-year-old son.

We had uh we have a four-year-old, so I guess she would have been uh two and a half at this time.

And I get home from work, and she, my seven-month pregnant wife, is watching a show with my daughter outside of a TV time that we've agreed upon.

The house is a wreck.

There's dishes in the sink.

I've come home just to grab something, then I'm headed right back out.

And the prideful, contemptful thought in my mind comes this way.

What do you do all day?

Now, I was wise enough not to voice that thought, but I saw that and I was like, mmm, that's not what I want to go with.

Let's do a rough draft.

Uh that's a rough draft.

What's what would be a better thing to say?

And I was just sitting there angry, thinking about all the things that I'm doing for our family and all the ways that my wife is not doing the things that she quote unquote should be doing.

Seven month pregnant, by the way.

Um, and as she left to take my daughter somewhere, I prayed, Lord, this is what I'm wanting to say.

What would you have me say?

How do you see my wife?

And immediately he he brought to mind the way in which Paul talks about the sufferings of Christ and the sufferings of creation, waiting for the redemption, being like a mother waiting to give birth.

And and the work that that is, the pain the child bearing.

And it just prompted me to think of she's doing so much for our family right now.

And so to be able to see my wife, not through my own pride and contempt, but to be able to have access to how the Lord sees her and be able to offer that to her was actually a blessing rather than if I had been so foolish to say my original thought.

Church, so often we need to slow down, to go low before the Lord and both confess where we are putting down and viewing others wrongly and say, Lord, how do you see me?

How do you see this person in my life?

My child, my coworker, my boss, my my spouse, how do you see this person?

And from there we can actually follow him in the path of going low, of humbling ourselves.

This takes vigilance.

This takes watching our hearts closely.

Proverbs 4 gives the warning keep your heart with all vigilance, for from it flow the springs of life.

So as David's describing what it has meant for him to go low, he he speaks of that posture of the heart.

That it has to be humble, it has to be low, it can't be contemptuous, it can't look down on others.

But he also says that his perspective, his eyes are not looking down on others, and they haven't taken in things that are too great, too marvelous for him.

He's he's refused to set his eyes and his mind on things that are too great, too marvelous for him.

He knows his place.

He knows that uh he is not God.

I you all have likely heard the joke that you know the difference between uh us and God.

God never confuses himself for us.

He David has learned that.

He's no longer applying for the job of Lord of his life.

He is saying, Lord, I have no notes, I trust you, you can lead me, you can guide me.

I am going low before you and before those that you've called into my life.

So this is what it looks like to go low before the Lord.

And where that leads us is then a sense of acceptance of wherever he has allowed us to go, wherever he's led us, is an acceptance or an embrace of the circumstances he's called us into.

And so that's the second thing that we see is the good life embraces contentment.

That if if we go low, if if we know that he is Lord and we are not, that wherever he has us is where we are meant to be in those circumstances, and we can embrace contentment.

I find it encouraging that that David puts it this way I have calmed and quieted my soul.

This has been a process.

This is something that he's had to work at.

It's not something that just immediately came natural to him.

Uh it's it's evident that both from what we know of his life and even the way he phrases it here, there have been many times in his life where his soul has not been quiet.

It has not been calm.

He has given in to the noise of culture around him or the desire to change his circumstances.

And he's had to work the process of calming and quieting his soul.

Paul says he had to learn the same lesson.

Uh in Philippians 4, he talks about having to learn contentment in all circumstances.

He's learned what it is to be in plenty and in want, to abound in every circumstance, he says, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need.

And David, likewise, here he's learned this and he's embraced contempt, and it didn't come naturally, it didn't come from him simply experiencing changed circumstances.

He had to learn to quiet or turn down the volume of his loud and restless soul.

This was something that he became practiced at.

Think about what are the messages that your soul will throw at you to say you need to do something, you need to be better at something, if you were only like this person, if you were only as accomplished as this, then your life would be better, then you would experience the good life.

David has learned to turn the volume of those messages down.

I have calmed and quieted my soul, he says.

And the picture that he gives is a part of the process.

He says, like a weaned child with its mother, like a weaned child is my soul within me.

This picture of a weaned child, an unweaned child is one as they're in their mother's presence, they're mostly focused on what the mother can give them.

What can I get from your presence?

But the picture of a weaned child is one that has had this at one point necessary good thing taken away in order that they might experience the sustenance of what is better, of what is best.

Growth requires this, this taking away.

And so often this is a really painful process.

The child wants what the mother is withholding.

It doesn't understand why are uh why is my mother taking this away from me?

And it's painful, it's confusing.

Um it's it's been described, you know, mother birds, when their birds refuse to fly, they'll they'll start kind of scooting them like towards the edge of the nest, like flapping their wings to make room for them to fly.

And and even then, if they don't take flight, if they don't get the message, they'll start dismantling the nest.

They'll start taking it out from under them.

And imagine that picture as the baby bird.

You're like, mom, what are you doing?

This is my home.

Why are you taking this away?

And and so often the picture is true that we don't understand why God might be taking something away from us.

But oftentimes, maybe I'll even say most of the time, God uh helps us grow, not by giving us things, but even by subtracting, by pruning, by taking away.

Even the good things that we think we we need, sometimes God takes them away that we might grow into experiencing what is best.

One of my seminary professors, he would say that all good parents answer two questions with an emphatic yes.

Kids are always asking this, and every good parent must say yes to these two questions.

First, do you love me?

Second, will you say no to me?

And both.

Of those have to be answered with yes.

Yes, I love you.

Yes, I delight in you.

Yes, I enjoy your presence.

Yes, you are mine.

Yes, I will say no to you.

I know what is best for you, and I will take things away.

I will prevent you from getting the thing that you think you want so that you might grow, that you might flourish, that you might live.

And David is saying, like a weaned child with his mother, he's gone through the painful process of having things taken away that he might know what is better.

And what's better is like a weaned child is my soul within me.

He's saying, like a weaned child can just sit in his mother's presence, enjoying her presence, not needing anything from her, but just enjoying her embrace, so his soul now is in the presence of God, can enjoy being with God.

Not just to get his things, to get his power to change his circumstances, but he can enjoy his presence.

This is a part of what the good life is when we embrace contentment, that we can face any and all circumstances when we know and trust that we have God's presence available and with us.

And his presence is like a mother, tender, near, caring, drawing us in to his embrace.

And I find it encouraging too that we know that this is from David is because this is on offer for the likes of David, those who have failed, those who have had many moments when they haven't calmed and quieted their soul.

That if you are here this morning with a soul that feels really loud, that feels noisy, that has been listening to lies and all the different types of messages, that this presence of a God who delights in you and invites you into his embrace is on offer for you today to calm and quiet your soul, to enjoy his presence and embrace the contentment of knowing that if I have him, if I have his presence, I have all.

I have everything I need.

I can be content.

We are in a season of life where bedtime routine is getting longer and longer.

Our four-year-old has invented every type of delay tactic that I think I can could think of.

And so it's always one more story or one more song or one more minute of cuddles or snuggles.

And we have this story box called a Tony, and you can record your voice, and we had the thought maybe we could just record ourselves reading stories and just hit play and just like walk out.

I think that might work for like maybe a night.

And inevitably, our daughter would likely say something like, but the Tony doesn't hold me.

The Tony doesn't like stay with me.

And this is the childlike faith that David is saying, this is what the good life holds, is a heart that has gone low, stays humble, and can embrace contentment in just having the Lord's presence.

Doesn't have to have a changed circumstance, doesn't have to have different things from him.

He is enough, his presence is enough.

That is what I want.

And when we can embrace that, it also means that we're gonna have to work this in by practicing hope.

This doesn't come naturally, it's something that we work at, it's something we practice.

So finally, what we see is he practices hope.

Now, he's been addressing the Lord in his own heart, and he kind of shifts in verse three to addressing the people of God, saying, Oh Israel, hope in the Lord from this time forth and forevermore.

This is him saying, What I have experienced, I want you to experience, people of God.

I want you to experience the peace in the presence of God holding, embracing you.

This is on offer for you.

Hope in the Lord from this time forth, forevermore.

He's saying, if you don't have it right now, it's available to you today, from this time forth.

But it also is so good that it can't be taken away from you.

For forevermore, this is on offer to God's people.

If they would go low, embrace contentment, hope is available to them.

And hope in the biblical sense is not wishful thinking for how things might turn out well.

It is this joyful anticipation of trusting and knowing that the promises of God and what He's promised us, what He's promised to do will in fact come true.

But we have to practice that hope, do we not?

Because if you're like me, so often you probably can pass the theology exam that says, like, I know why Christ came, I know that he was born of a virgin, I know he lived a life and did miracles, I know that he died for my sins, I know that he raised from the dead, I believe all that.

I even believe what he's promised in the future: that he's gonna come again, he's gonna make all things right, he's gonna wipe away every tear, he's gonna make all pain go away.

The way Hebrews puts it is he's the same yesterday and today and forever.

I don't know if it's true for you, but sometimes it's the part of and today.

That he's gonna come through for me and today.

He's gonna be true to who he is today in my present circumstances, and those are the places we have to practice that hope, that joyful anticipation for what he's promised, what he has said he has done for us, what he promises to do for us.

We have to work that into our hearts and our experiences in the presence.

This is a part of living the good life, is practicing that hope, that joyful anticipation.

And what David is saying is, church, people of God, this is on offer for you today.

So if you don't have it, if you're coming in in the midst of really hard circumstances, this is for you.

This is not the end of some pathway for the spiritual elite.

This is on offer for all people of God.

And the beautiful part about this, I think, is when we recognize that we failed in going low, when we failed embracing contentment, when we failed in accepting and surrendering all of our circumstances to God, David himself failed in these regards.

Though David is giving an example for the people of God, we know that he has failed, and so we can have hope that there actually is a greater David, one who was exalted, name above every name, who didn't consider equality with God a thing to be grasped, but actually humbled himself, taking on the form of a servant.

Even dying a death on the cross, going so low as to die that humiliating death.

That is how low he went.

We have one who embraced contentment, embraced the hardest of circumstances, was able to calm and quiet his soul in the most fretful circumstances that any human has experienced.

In the Garden of Gethsemane, when he's praying, he says, Lord, not my will, but your will be done.

Submitting, embracing the Father's care, even in the midst of the scariest, most terrifying circumstances, as he was headed to the cross.

The greater David, the one who has offered hope to all of his people, because he has taken on the hopeless end of death for us, he has conquered it, that we might have hope in him because he was resurrected, he is risen, and he is returning in power.

We can have hope in the promises that he offers and the good life that he leads us in.

That's an invitation.