The Exalted King of Things High and Low (Psalm 138)

All right, Well, I'm excited to be here this morning.

I'm grateful to Pastor Jonathan, to the elders, and to

you guys for the opportunity to to speak. I'm grateful

to the band as well too. It's so let me

tell you, it is really odd being in the congregation

uh for the first time in like eight years here

at Withesa and so. But we have a great band

and a great production team and sound team and and

everybody who does so well, so that on a daylight

today when I'm out or giving it this opportunity, that

the things are still still working well. So can we

give them a round of a past But like I said,

my name is Tanner. I care for the student ministry

and the worship ministry here Bethesda and and today we're

going to be uh continuing our our studying songs. But

I wanted to start. I wanted to tell you a

little story very quickly. When I was in high school,

I had a friend whose family owned a restaurant and

UH will not tell you this restaurant and you'll find

out why. But the night before our high school of

varsity basketball playoff game, it was round four of the

state playoffs. It was a big game. Myself and three

other players. We went to this restaurant and you know,

we trusted it. It was our friends restaurant, and so

we go and after practice and we get some food,

and as kindly as I can say it, it was

not good. You know, I've tasted and I've seen that

I'm not going back there. And I think that we

all we've all been to restaurants that we don't enjoy.

We've all had food that we don't like. And generally,

when we go to these places and we don't enjoy them,

positive feedback is not something that we offer them. We

don't always give them praise and thanksgiving when we don't

enjoy the food that they're serving. But when we find

a restaurant, then we enjoy. When Jonathan makes me his

barbecue roots, I praise him for that. I thank faster

Jonathan for the ability that he has to be able

to make these things. I thank him and I give

him praise, a different praise than I'm given to the Lord.

Trust me, but I'm praising him for his ability to

be able to make ribs in the way he does

see because of what he has done, because what Jonathan

has made is good. I offer him forms of thanksgiving

and praise. And as we come to Psalm one thirty eight,

we see that David he has experienced God's goodness, he

has experienced his steadfast love, he has experienced God's faithfulness

and his glory. So David offers thanksgiving and praise to

the Exalted King. So I'm one thirty eight. I'm pretty

sure you can probably tell that it's a psalm of thanksgiving,

and we're unsure of the exact context. And yeah, please

turn there, find your place there in some one thirty eight.

But we're unsure of this exact context of this passage.

There are some who believe that this might have been

written by David in response to tewod Samuel seventh, where

the Lord established a covenant with David, but we cannot

say that with certainty. But there is one thing that

we can say with certainty about this passage is that

David recognizes that the Lord is worthy, and David recognizes

that the Lord is due thanksgiving and praise for who

he is and for what he has done. And so

for us today, we must respond to God's works with

thanksgiving and praise. When we see what he has done.

When we remember who he is, we must respond with

thanksgiving and with praise. And so if you've been turning,

I'll give you a second. If you're not there, Psalm

one thirty eight, I encourage you, if you have your Bibles,

and I hope you do, to turn there. We'll start

in verse one. In Psalm one thirty eight, the psalmist

reads verse one, I give you thanks, O Lord, with

my whole heart. I'm gonna pause. You gotta stand. I've

never done that forward with the students. I like that,

he Loujah. Let's start again. Verse one. I give you thanks,

O Lord, with my whole heart. Before the gods, I

sing your praise. I bow down towards 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. Let's pray, Lord, we thank

you today for this opportunity that we have to to

step into another Psalm Father, to hear the psalmist words,

and how he has offered thanksgiving and praise to you

for all the many things that you have done. And

so Father, I pray today that as we look at

this God, that you would take me off of the

pedestal that today, Father, that this would not be about

me in a suit addressed up preaching the word, but

that Father, that it would be about you. That all

of our attention, all of our focus, would be on you, God,

and that we would offer you thanksgiving and praise for

what you have done here Bethe's the Father, and so

many other places for all of eternity. And so Father,

we thank you, We thank you for your word. Be

with us as we we dive into this chapter in

Jesus name, Amen, you guys, kim me suity. And so

today as we study Psalm one thirty eight, there's there's

one question and you're going to see it on the

screen that I want us to answer. And the question

is why do we praise and thank this exalted King?

Jesus is the exalted King, and why is he worthy

of our praise? Why do we praise and think him?

And the first thing that we see, and we just

read point number one, is that he is above all things.

As I stated before, we cannot say with certainty what

caused David to write this psalm. But time and time

again in his life, David has seen the good works

of the Lord. He's seen his power, he has experienced

his mercy, and he has recognized his glory. David knows

that the Lord is above all things, that there is

none greater than the Lord that he serves. David has

experienced that time and time again. So with the entirety

of his heart and the entirety of his mind and

his will, David gives thanks to the Lord for what

he has done. When we continue reading in verse one,

we saw that he says before the gods, I sing

your praise. You know, there were many differing opinions on

what this word God, God's means, And it actually is

the same word that we use for in the Hebrew.

It's the same word that we use for God the Father.

It is elohem. But this passage, I believe from us

studies that these gods that David is talking about are

the false gods that his enemies worship right, the false

gods that the world around him gives praise to. And

in the face of those gods, David says that he

will sing praise to the Lord right, because the Lord

is above and he is greater than any of these

false gods. David worships God because he alone is the

one true God. We all remember a familiar passage with

Elijah and he's on Mount Carmel with the prophets of Bail.

We remember that correct In this passage we see that

the prophets they called on Bail to bring fire from

heaven right, And in that moment Bail did not answer.

It was silent, and they cried, and they cried out,

they cut themselves, but no fire ever came. But we

praise God and we give him thanks, because on that

very day Elijah called to heaven and the Lord sent

fire down, and the Lord proved himself worthy and greater

than all other false gods. The prophets of Bale did

not hold a candle to the Lord of Host, and

he proved himself on that day. And today in our lives,

we look around and there are many different gods that

people serve. You may have friends, coworkers, family that served

gods like Allah or Krishna or Brahma. There's many more.

And there are many even who worship gods like money,

like sex, science or self. I think self is one

of the most sneaky ones. It's so easy to fall

into the worship of self that self can become a

false god. That we choose our own desires and our

own things over what the Lord has for us, and

we make a god out of ourselves. We see this

all around us. But today, like David, like Elijah on

Mount Carmel, you and I worship Jehovah, who's above all things, these,

above all gods. He is greater than any other god,

and he is the only one that can satisfy. And

then we read the Psalmist continues in verse two. If

you look with me, it says, I bow down towards

your holy temple and give thanks to your name for

your steadfast love and your faithfulness. In response to the

Lord's love and faithfulness, David he lays prostrate towards the temple,

revering the Lord with thanksgiving and praise. And then finally

he writes, continuing in verse two, for you have exalted

above all things your name and your word. The name

of God is above all other names. Amen. When we

experience God's steadfast love, when we experience his faithfulness like

David has, when we experience these perfections of His covenant

with us, we cannot help but to praise God. God

has established a covenant with his people, and God has

established a covenant with David. And when we experience the

love and the faithfulness that God has towards us. When

David experienced these things, his response was worship in the

form of praise and thanksgiving. In so much ours, those

who have entered into covenant with God recognize that his

name is greater than any other. And then also we

see that God's not only his name, but his word

is above all. God's word is above all. David has

heard the voice of God. David knows his voice. He

longs to hear him speak. And so I ask you

plainly today in your life, when was the last time

you heard God speak? In First Samuel, chapter one or two,

excuse me, I think the priest Eli and his entire

household are rejected by the Lord. I've been going over

this passage for the students, and they're rejected because Eli's

sons are in sin, right, they're mishandling the sacrifice, they

are doing many different things that are wrong. And so

the Lord rejects Eli's household because Eli has not dealt

with the sin of his sons. So Eli is guilty

as well. And it says in First Samuel that the

Lord's word was rare in these days. There was no

frequent vision see because of the sin of Eli and

his family. The Lord was silent and he did not speak.

And you have to remember they didn't have the copies

of God's word that we have today so easily accessible

when they wanted to hear God speak. When they wanted

to hear God's word, they relied on God to speak. Right,

for God to speak through his prophets, sometimes audibly. But

God remained silent until chapter three, where he opened up

his voice and he spoke to Samuel. I'm I I

want you to picture. Can you imagine this moment when

God broke his silence and he spoke to Samuel. Can

you imagine how Samuel felt? So you may go through

seasons in your life when you don't hear the voice

of God, when you don't feel his spirit moving and

turning and stirring within you. But when he finally does right,

when we fix up whatever it is that may be

hindering this right, when we come back to the Lord

and we yearn and we seek after him, and he

speaks to us, it's greater than any other word we

could ever hear. We all know the feeling of when

we're in a church service and you hear a sermon

and you can say, you know this sermon was meant

for me. You know, many would say, a preacher, you

were speaking right to me. It's then that we remember

that God's word is more powerful than any word anyone

else could ever give. And so again, when was the

last time you heard God speak? Is it a rare

occurrence in your life? See? God has plainly spoken to

us through his word right, and through his spirit, he

continues to move and stir and speak and believers today,

and when he does, Like David, our response must be

to praise him and thank him his name, his word.

He is above all things. And not only is he

above all things, he is above all kings. If you

look with me in verse four, We're gonna skip over

verse three, but I promise we will come back to it.

Pick up in verse four. It says, all the kings

of the earth shall give you thanks, so Lord, for

they have heard the words your mouth, and they shall

sing of the ways of the Lord. For great is

the glory of the Lord. There are two main things

that I want to look at in this section. I

believe that David is looking forward with great expectation and

hope for the day when the Gentiles are brought into

covenant with God. We know that you know God he

establishes a covenant with David. And we're unsure whether this

psalm specifically is attached to that portion of scripture, but

in general, David is hopeful for what God is going

to do in the future, and he looks forward with hope,

knowing that one day the Lord will send the Savior right,

and in this covenant that he is established, right, gentiles

will be brought in and we're walking through acts. And

we've seen this right, that the Gospel is no longer

just for the Jews. Right. But Paul and Barnabas Silas,

these men they're going out and they're sharing it with gentiles.

Many of these men are gentiles. And David looks forward

to the day when kings and peoples of all nations,

it's not just Israel, will hear and know God's word,

and they will sing his praise. But I also believe

that this passage points us to a scripture in Philippians

chapter two, and I believe it's on the screen, if

you'll look there with me. It says, therefore God has

highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that

is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus,

every knee should bow in heaven and on earth and

under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ

is Lord to the glory of God the Father. And

so at the name of Jesus, every need will bow,

all peoples will bow, from all nations, from all tongues,

from all tribes, they will bow at the name of Jesus.

And so David says, great is the glory of the Lord.

Great is he who is glorified over the glorified, Who

is the King over all kings, and the Lord over

all lords, Great is he in his glory. You know,

less than a month ago our nation voted on who

would be our president. Issues like abortion and gun control, immigration,

they've been hanging in the balance. People wondering with anxiety.

You know, what will the next four years look like.

Political campaigns have been in full swing. Signs have been

all over the road, promotions all over TV and social media,

and news outlets are littered with politics and leading up

to November fifth, arguments and division have flooded our country.

And there are many who, prior to this decision that

was made on November fifth, were hanging the hats of

their joy and their hope on who would win the selection.

And there were some maybe here in this room today

as well, who were struggling and had no hope because

they looked at both candidates and saw that neither were fit.

And whatever your side you're on, I'm not here to

speak politics, but whatever side you're on, you're on whichever,

however you feel about the outcome of this election. My

one question for you is on November fifth, who was

your hope in? Was it in Kabala? Was it in Trump?

Were you hopeless because you felt that neither were good options. See,

we cannot be a people whose joy whose hope is

decided by who sits in the oval office. Our hope

it must be in Jesus. Our hope must be in

the one. And this makes me want to jump out

of this suit. The one who is king over presidents,

the one who is king over rulers, king over kings,

and king over lords. He is greater than any president.

He is our savior. It's not a president who every

need will bow to one day, but it is a

savior who came into the world and died for sinners.

Jesus is the king who is above all kings, and

every knee shall bow, every tongue confess that he is Lord.

So we see that Jesus is above all things. And

we see that Jesus he is above all kings, not

only that number three. Jesus he cares for all. If

you'll pick up with me, I'm gona bounce around a

little bit we're gonna read verse three, and then we'll

jump to six and finish with verse eight. Verse three.

On the day I called, you answered me. My strength

of soul you increased. For though the Lord is high,

he regards the lowly, but the haughty he knows from afar.

Verse seven. 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,

Lord endures forever. Do not forsake the work of your hands.

As we look at this passage, it becomes blatantly clear.

And we know this because we know God's character. But

he cared for David. The Lord cared for him. And

on the day that David called, he answered. I saw

the Lord and he heard any answer I had. When

that song was picked this week, I had not made

the connection. But as we were singing it this morning,

I was. I was encouraged by that, And I think

the Lord he works little things like that. Out. See

when David called, he answered, and reading the scriptures, we

see that there are many enemies that have come against

David in his life right, we cannot, like I said,

for certainty, we cannot tell you what enemy has come

against David here specifically in this passage, what struggle is

David going through? But there are many who have come

against David. And we read One of my favorite passages

is Psalm forty two, and in Psalm forty two, David

is mourning because of the oppression of his enemies, and

he says to God his rock. What he says, He says,

why have you forgotten me? The answer is he has not.

He has not forgotten David. God has cared for David

like a sheep who walks in the midst of trouble.

He has preserved his life and cared for him, protected him.

God has cared for David and given him victory over

his enemies. And he has a purpose for David that

he will fulfill. And we know that it's from David's

descendants that a savior will come. Reading Matthew one, and

that savior's name is Jesus. We continue. We see in

verse eight he says, do not forsake the work of

your hands. David desires to be used by God. Do

not forsake the work of your hands. Here's one theologian

who has said of God, his creating hands formed our

souls at the beginning, his nail pierced hands redeemed them

on cavalry. His glorified hands will hold our souls fast

and not let them go forever unto his hands. Let

us commend our spirits, sure that even though the work

our hands have made void the works of his hands,

yet his hands will again make perfect all that our

hands have unmade. You see, David was a sinner like

you and I. He was one whose sin and flesh

his nature causes the works of his hands to create

struggles and destruction. This is what we do as sinners,

broken people. But God cared for David, and he desired

to use David so much so that what David's hands

had undone God could make new. We read in John

three a very familiar passage. We read of a time

where Jesus is sitting and he's having a conversation with

a man named Nicodemus. See Nicodemus was a respected man

in a Pharisee, and Jesus in this passage we all

know it very well that he shares with Nicodemus. How

to be born again. And then he goes on John

three sixteen, the very familiar passage, he shares with Nicodemus

God's love for him and for the whole world. And

in the next chapter we see that Jesus now he

approaches and has a conversation with a woman at the well. Right.

This is a Samaritan woman. She's an outcast, she's a sinner,

she's a non Jew, She's somebody who the Jews would

not have associated with. But Jesus he approaches her and

he has a conversation with her. And in this conversation,

knowing that she's a sinner, that she's had multiple husbands, right,

and the one that she lives with now is not

her husband, Jesus does not condemn this woman, but instead

he cared for her. He shared the truth with her,

and he offered her a living water. And so hear

me today, God cares for you. He doesn't just care

for the peace people regarded as high. He also cares

for the lowly. He cared for Nicodemus, his treasured and

exalted on earth Pharisee, but he also cared for this

Samaritan woman who was hated by Jesus' own people. See.

Everyone in this room knows what it feels like to

feel unworthy, when someone thinks that they're too good to

talk to you, when someone thinks that you are not

worthy of attention or a conversation or even a glance.

We all know what it feels like to be treated

like we're worthless and we don't matter. But hear me,

God wants to talk to you. He cares for you,

and no sin, no struggle, no insufficiency could separate you

from his love. He wants to talk to you. He

wants to know you intimately. He cares for you, and

he walks with you. He protects you like a shepherd.

And we've seen this imagery so much. In the Psalms

that David, he talks about a shepherd who in like

the ravines, and in the dark alleys and in the

shadow valley of the shadow of death. Right, that God,

he is a shepherd right who leads and guides us. Right,

He cares for our souls, and in those difficult times,

in those dark times, he uses his rod and his

staff to protect us, to comfort us and lead us

and keep us on his path. The Lord cares for

his people. And no matter what the person next to you,

or your friend, or your coworkers or whoever else thinks

of you, no matter how worthless they make you feel,

God cares for you. God loves you, and he desires

a relationship with you. And in response to that, we

should praise him. We should give him the thanks that

he is due, the thanks that he is worthy of.

As I closed, I thought I was gonna go a

little longer than this. You're welcome. That's the band. You

guys can come up. As I close, many of you

know Grace and I we just had our first son,

our first child, and his name is Sammy. And there

were many, even many of you, who told me that

I had no clue what I was getting into having

a son, And man, oh man, were you right? I

had no idea? All right, Sammy is a blessing and

he is great, and he can scream pretty loud, and

sometimes he's difficult to get to go to sleep, but

praise God, the other night he slept ten hours straight.

I'm praising and given thanksgiving for that. And I've told

many of you, and many of you have heard this

and just personal conversations. We as believers, as humans. We

can never fully understand God's love for us. There's no

way that we could ever understand how much the Father

loves us. Right. But I think when when we had

our son, I think I understood it just a little

bit better, right, And I still I cannot fathom how

much God loves me. I cannot fathom how much the

Father loves my son, right, but having him, and how

much I care for him. All the diapers I've changed,

I didn't think I'd ever do that, all the sleepless nights, right,

the times where he's screaming and and you just want

him to stop. Right. Sometimes there's there's a little frustration

over this situation, and just it's the difficulties of it. Right.

But even in that frustration, I still love him and

I care for him, and I'm still going to feed

him right with a bottle. I'm still going to swaddle

him and care for him and put them to sleep.

And I think about our relationship with the Lord and

the times when I fail, right, the times when I

sin against him, And trust me, I've sinned against the

Lord far more than Sammy has sinned against me. God

loves me more than I love my own son. He

loves my son more than I love my son. How

can we fathom this? Many of you, most of you

have children, right. If you don't, maybe you have nieces

or nephews, little cousins, whatever it may be, and you

care for them so deeply. I have two little cousins.

Their names are Wyatt and Tyler, and I love those

boys so much. I love even before Sammy was born.

They're three and I think seven, and they're just a lot,

lots of fun and I really do love those kids.

And I remember telling their mom when Grace was pregnant.

I was like, what if I don't love, say me

as much as I love your kids, because I really

did love their kids, and I really do. But now

that he's here, I understand how much you can love

a child, right, And it makes no sense to me.

But God cares for you more than you care for

your child. And we can't fathom that, and we can't

understand it. We don't understand that when we would sin,

when we would run away, when we would turn from him,

that he would still love us and care for us.

But He has the King of kings, the Lord of lords,

the one who is above all other kings, above all

other nations, all other gods cares for you intimately. And

when David realized this, he praised him and he offered

him thanks because for what he has done and who

he is, that's what he is worthy. Let's pray where

we thank you today for who you are. God, to

thank you that you have sent your son into the

world to die for sinners like me. God, that you

care for us enough. The King of kings and Lord

of lords, the one who has created the heavens and

the earth, cares intimately for each and every single one

of us here. So Father, I thank you for this truth. God.

I pray that we would find rest and we would

find hope and satisfaction in this and know that nothing

else will ever satisfy. But you are the living water

that fills us up. That you are the lamb who

died and rose again for us that we may have hope. Father,

And so I pray that we would never hang our

hope on kings of the earth, on rulers of the

earth and presidents. Father, we would never hang our hope

and our joy on our spouses or our children or

anybody else, our pastors, but Father, that we would hang

the hats of our hope on you, you Hm God,

and we would be grateful this Thanksgiving season God, and

we would praise you and thank you for what you

have done and how you have cared for us. What

we love you. We praise you, we thank you for

this day in Jesus name, Jesus pain all to Hi