Psalms for the Summer: Listen and Sing! Psalm 81

Hello, you are listening to Second City Sermons,

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sermon. God bless. Thank you for your word. God,

thank you for times when we are reminded of your

great acts, your great salvation, bringing us

from slavery to freedom, from death to life.

Thank you, Lord, for the gathering of your people,

where we count the cross and the resurrection,

where we look to your word, or that we might

have direction in this life. And how we confess,

how often we dump this, we live wayward lives

wandering from you in the wilderness. And so

God, I pray today that as we sit with your word,

you'd speak to us again, that our hearts would

be moved and our lives would be directed by you

and that we would respond in worship to you,

Lord. Do all these things, God, we pray in your

name for our good, for your glory. Amen. All

right. Like most of life, moving is filled with

uncertainty. You all have done this, I'm sure.

It's filled with sort of unease. And it's not

just because it's a mess, though it is, right?

Stuff everywhere, stuff you're like, what is

this stuff? Stuff you're like, should we keep

that stuff? It's just stuff everywhere. And you're

wondering, of course, if your life is gonna have

a semblance of order ever again. Wondering if

you will get along with your neighbors, wondering

who they will be, if they will like you or your

children or your dogs. These are thoughts that

are going on through my mind, of course. I shared

with you, I know at least years ago, I shared

with you some of the stories of growing up. I'm

not gonna go into these stories right now, but

we had a neighbor growing up who was schizophrenic

and her visions only were sort of oriented towards

our family. And so the police knew us well by

name. Those are stories for another sermon. But

you can imagine moving brings up uncertainty,

of course. And many of you know that over the

past week or so, we have been in the process

of moving. We are actually just moving about

two blocks from the house that we first lived

in uptown near Italian Lake. Some of you were

in that a while back. Some of you have lent a

hand, and I just want to say thank you. That's

very kind of you. But it's been a bittersweet

thing, us moving. It's because, of course, we

brought Henry home to this house that we're moving

from, and we've had many dinners with many of

you, and sweet memories. But moving is filled

with this uncertainty, and largely it's filled

with uncertainty about who will be around us.

So we've had some opportunity to get to know

some of our neighbors a little bit, even this

week. And the couple just the house north of

our house are this older, devout Jewish couple.

And so Marian, The wife, she actually brought

us over a loaf of challah bread, challah, challah,

you know, that bread. It's sweet, it's delicious,

and they have it every Sabbath day. So Friday

night and into Saturday, they put like two to

four loaves between the two of them, which is

awesome. They've lived in that house for about

40 years. They actually got it from the son of

the man who originally built it, who developed

the whole neighborhood. And we heard that story.

Melissa and I yesterday walked a little bit on

our, while we were walking a dog, we talked with

Bert, the husband. And here's the thing, both

of the conversations, how they're going to be

celebrating Sukkot. Sukkot. And what they will

do is they'll take branches, leaves, and they're

going to build this little you know play fort

like we do and of course the top will be shaded

but you'll allow the rain still to come in and

one of the things that they're going to do is

they invite neighbors over to come have coffee

in the in the little fort or they have their

meals in there and they said you know it's a

great time and you can come over and sit and

chat with us and so that sounds great. Of course

some of you know that Sukkot is actually also

known as the feast of Booths, the Feast of Booths.

The Feast of Booths is the celebration of God's

provision to His people from their wandering

in the wilderness, how He cared for them, how

He provided for them, how He brought them out

in safety. But then also while they were wandering,

they were living in booths and God was providing

for them. And how they actually continued that

celebration once they went into the promised

land. And it was actually the celebration that

happens in the fall. Our text mentioned that

it's the first month the trumpet is blown and

that would have been blown to remind people that

we need to celebrate what God's done. He's brought

us into this new year and he's provided for us.

And we have this harvest, this long sort of declaration

year in year out that in the uncertainty and

the mess of life, God's provision is good and

kind to his people. So it's living into this

story of what God has done. It's also reminding

us through his word, the reading of His Word

and the study of it, of what He's done and of

His care. It's sort of a pausing in the just

busy, hectic reality of life to confess God,

to remind one another of who He is, what He's

done. It's a willingness in the craziness to

invite others in and to tell them the stories.

So, the first time that the Feast of Booze is

mentioned is in Leviticus 23. you all no doubt

know that Leviticus 23 is the great chapter about

how the people of God organized their time. Remember

that? Moses lays out sort of a weekly remembrance,

but also a yearly remembrance, a calendar. So

the beginning of that chapter begins with the

Sabbath, a weekly remembrance of the God of creation

and the God of salvation. But at the end of that

chapter, there's the section on the feast of

booths. And so I'm going to read a little bit

of it for you, okay? That's verse 39 of Leviticus

23. On the 15th day of the seventh month, when

you've gathered in the produce of the land, you

shall celebrate the feast of the Lord seven days.

On the first day shall be a solemn rest, and

on the eighth day shall be a solemn rest. And

you shall take on the first day the fruit of

splendid trees, branches of palm trees, and boughs

of leafy trees, and willows of the brook. And

you shall rejoice before the Lord your God seven

days. So this is a feast of remembrance. a feast

remembering the provision of God and the uncertainty

of the wilderness, but also kind of a continual

remembrance that God is with us in the uncertainty

and the crazy and the busy and the wildness of

life. You know, they were asking the question,

no doubt, will He be with us in those times?

Is He still present? Will He still provide? Will

God finish what He started when He brought us

out from slavery? Will He bring us to the promised

land? That's a Christian question too, right?

Yearly, just will the harvest come in? Will we

have what we need in this life? Will we be able

to eat? Can we sit together, linger over a meal,

dwell in one another's presence, welcome neighbors

in through the upheavals of life? And another

question is, will we sing? But we hear the trumpet

blast that the new season is here, that God's

promises are secure. Will we celebrate? So why

I'm going into all this is because Psalm 81,

most believe, is the Psalm of Sukkot, of the

Feast of Booth. And there's a number of reasons

to think this. Most specifically, it says, blow

the trumpet, which is the shofar, that horn,

you know, horn. Blow it at the new moon and at

the full moon on our feast day. And that would

have been the beginning of this season. So this

is a psalm that is happening right around, very

likely it's the one that would have been sung,

studied, prayed for right around the Feast of

Booths. So there's a number of reasons for this,

but what I want us to see this morning is that

this psalm presents us in some ways with the

same lesson of the Feast of Booths. It's sort

of the same question of what do we do with the

uncertainty? Do we know the story of God? What

do we confess? That's part of it, the act of

confession. But it also presents us with a concern,

which is you actually believe the confession,

and then it also presents us with a call. If

you believe the confession, you kind of press

through the concern, what is the outcome, the

call? Okay, so first the confession. That's going

to be in the middle of this psalm. And I want

to just say this confession addresses the uncertainty

of life with the story of God's salvation and

also the declaration from his word, okay? So

if you have your Bible open, look down with me

at verse six and seven. Okay. I relieved your

shoulders of the burden. Your hands were freed

from the basket. In distress you called. and

I delivered you. I answered you in the secret

place of thunder. I tested you at the waters

of Miraba." So, first I want you to see how this

psalm in the event of the Feast of Boos was the

occasion for this singing. That's the occasion

for it, right? That's when they're doing it,

but it's a confession of what has God done? What

has He done? What is the story of God's salvation?

Well, Maybe you saw this, right? I relieved your

shoulders of the burden, shoulder burden, your

hands freed from the basket. I mean, all that

shoulder burden, hands basket, all that is the

picture of what was happening under slavery.

Heavy laden. Hands were worn. They were burdened.

They were carrying around those things which

didn't belong to them. They were slaves. They

had to remember, they had to confess where they

had come from. Okay, so I thought, I think this

is a good time to say this, because I think it

makes some sense to the passage. One of the things

we do every week in this service is we confess

our sins, right? That's one of these things.

And sometimes people are like, why do you keep

doing that? You know, why do we do these same

things every week? And I have a number of answers

for that. One of the answers is that sin is always

distancing. Sin always distances. We know this

in our human relationships. We harm somebody

and you're like... I don't feel like we can be

very close. Or you can't be very close at least

until you name it, right? And you own it and

you confess it and you receive forgiveness and

there's a reconciliation. That's how life works.

And that's how life works with God too. We come

into a presence of a holy God and we say, Lord,

we're not worthy because we've erred and strayed

from your ways. Like philosophy, we've ran away

from you. So forgive us so that we can be bound

together again. But part of what we're also doing

is we're remembering where we were without God.

Burdened, heavy laden, shoulders heavy, hands

worn thin. We're saying outside of you, we are

just slaves. Unless you act, and before you acted

for us, this is how we wander. There's just something

good in reminding ourselves, what are we without

God? Where were we without God? So confession

is a confession of the story of God's redemptive

acts, his great act of bringing people out from

slavery to himself, God's deliverance of his

people. He says in verse seven, in distress,

you called and I delivered you. And it goes down,

I am Lord your God in verse 10, who brought you

out of the land of Egypt, out of the mouth, open

your mouth wide. I will fill it. So this confession

that's taking place is a recounting of God's

great salvific acts, his act of salvation, which

is to say that in the midst of the confusion

of life, they're to remember God can do that.

He hears your cry. He delivers you. He brings

you out from that. And he says, open up your

mouth wide. I'm going to fill it. I'm going to

care for you. An interesting thing, of course,

is that they come out of Egypt and they come

into the wilderness wandering time. And then

it talks about how God tests them at the waters

of Miraba, right? Verse seven, the last part,

I tested you at the waters of Miraba. Miraba

was the place of God's providing water for His

people in the wilderness, but it's also a place

of testing. Another thing is mentioned there.

It says the secret place of thunder. Most everyone

believes that that's the place of Sinai, where

the cloud comes and the loud sounds of thunder

as Moses is up on the mountain. But anyway, so

this is recounting in some ways this salvation

story of God. But also, actually, what would

have happened at the Feast of Booze is not just

recounting the story of what God has done, but

also recounting his work, his law. You could

say miraba, his acts, and Sinai, his words. How

were they to live? Would they continue as they

did in Egypt? Were the 400 years of the Egyptian

habits that they had sort of formed, were they

going to define their lives or were they going

to live according to God's words to them? So

they'd gather together in these booths as they

still do today, as we still do in a way each

Sunday, and they would recount the great works

of God and they would remember His words to them.

Our Old Testament reading this morning, the Rebekah

read for us was Deuteronomy 31. And I wonder

if you heard that because it's all the people

are gathered together and even says the little

ones. Everybody needs to gather together and

it's done so on the Feast of Boos and the law

of God is brought out and all of it's read. Sometimes

you guys think maybe the scripture readings are

too long in this church. It's all everybody is

listening. That's part of what's happening at

the Feast of Boos. And of course, we kind of

have a glimpse of that happening here in this

verse or in this passage too, in this chapter.

Verses four talks about the statutes and the

rules of God. Verse five talks about the decrees

of God. And then actually, if you go down, there's

actually sort of an echo, if you will, of the

10 commandments, sort of saying, here, the law

of God is put forward. Verses eight and nine.

And 10, here, O my people, while I admonish you,

O Israel, if you would but listen to me, there

shall be no strange gods among you. You shall

not bow down to a foreign God. And that sounded

like the Ten Commandments. Verse 10, I am Lord

your God who brought you up at the end of Egypt.

Again, like the preface to the Ten Commandments.

Which is to say that this is not just a recounting

of what God has done in his acts of salvation,

but this is also a declaration that we need the

words of God in our lives. We need direction

from God's words. There's some obvious questions

for us. What do you do in uncertainty? Where

do you go when mess feels too great? When the

burden feels like it's too much? What do we do

in our wilderness experiences? What do we do

when we're reminded again that we are not in

the promised land yet? What do you do when you're

wondering about your children's health or will

you get a job that you need? Sometimes it's hard,

right? Sometimes it's hard. Life can be incredibly

challenging and incredibly uncertain. And part

of what this text is saying is be reminded that

the Lord is strong, that He can take you out

from slavery. He can bring you to Himself. that

He gives you His words for direction in your

life, tell the story of God, recount His deeds,

listen to His words for direction. And think

about this, this happened for a week straight.

I mean, that sounds hard to do, doesn't it? Like,

we have a hard time sometimes just making weekly

worship a habit, though it was our Lord's habit.

And then they're saying a whole week, gather

together and do this. Even that feels like such

an uncertain thing. How would you plan for that?

How would you prepare for that? How would you

do food for that? A lot of people are traveling

to Jerusalem like Jesus did in John 7. For that,

that sounds like such a mess, such a crazy time.

But God's saying, do this because this will settle

you in the midst of uncertainty. Some of you

are familiar hopefully with Rabbi Jonathan Sacks.

He was the chief rabbi over the UK. He passed

away a little while ago. He was also a member

of the House of Lords. He wrote this, if I were

to summarize the message of Sukkot, I'd say it's

a tutorial in how to live with insecurity and

still celebrate life. How do you live with the

uncertainty that our life presents us with time

and again and still celebrate? Life, he continues

on, life can be full of risk and yet still a

blessing. Faith doesn't mean living with certainty.

Faith is the courage to live with uncertainty

knowing that God is with us on that tough but

necessary journey to a world that honors life

and treasures peace. How do we do this? How do

we live faithfully in uncertainty? Well, I think

part of what this text is telling us is that

we recount collectively. the great acts of God's

salvation. And we give ourselves to His word

for our direction. So that's kind of the first

thing is I think there's a confession here that

this is what we need. And this is what God has

given us. He's given us salvation. He's given

us His word. But there's also a big concern in

this psalm. There's a big concern because as

much as it is an invitation to this midst of

uncertainty and this invitation of this confession,

This is a Psalm with a deep concern. Did you

notice, this was brought up in our staff meeting

this week when we looked at, did you notice how

dramatically different the beginning of this

Psalm is than the end? It kind of starts really

high and then it goes pretty low. And it does

that because the concern is, will you listen?

Will you listen? Because so often people of God

actually just don't listen. We'd rather hear

other voices. We'd rather listen to our stomach

and our sort of carnal urges. We'd rather listen

to our neighbors, what they're saying. Think

about this. I think actually some of these are

mentioned here in this text. It mentions Miraba

here, and there's two events of Miraba in the

Wilderness Wandering. There's one at the beginning.

There's one at the end, and most people think

they're different places. They have different

names. The first one is Exodus 17. Exodus 17,

the people are quarreling with Moses. Remember,

just two chapters earlier, they're letting Miriam,

the sister of Moses, lead them in singing. Two

chapters later, they're saying, oh, I wish we

were in Egypt again. They're quarreling. They're

testing the Lord. They say, why do you bring

us to this place only to kill us? And it's actually

because of this quarreling and because of this

testing of the Lord that that Meribah is called

Meribah Massach, which means literally quarrel

testing. So this mentions Meribah and you're

supposed to go, oh, so you can actually know

the story of salvation. You can receive God's

word and you can just quarrel and say, Lord,

I don't really believe it. I don't believe you're

gonna care for me in the midst of all of this

uncertainty of the wilderness. The second mirabai

can be found in numbers 20. And there again,

we kind of have the same thing. There's a little

detail that's kind of interesting though, because

there they're saying, you're gonna let our cattle

die out here in the wilderness. Which say their

uncertainty wasn't just about their own welfare,

but their stuff. I've got all this uncertainty

around my stuff, Lord. Are you gonna care for

us? Does God care? Of course, my guess is that

all of us know that question. Do you care for

us in the wilderness? And if you know those stories,

they're both really interesting stories because

they're both stories of judgment and stories

of grace. The second one, Moses and Aaron are,

you know, Moses isn't allowed to go into the

promised land because he strikes the rock with

his staff. You know that story. The people of

God are judged at the first one. There's judgment,

but there's also grace because God doesn't provide

for them. Which is to say all of this mention

of Mirabah here in this passage is to say that

Mirabah is a place of uncertainty where their

stomachs wanted to be satisfied and so they quarreled

not believing that God would actually care for

them in the midst of that uncertainty. So they

test God. What about the place of thunder that's

mentioned here? I said that that was Sinai. Think

about this. This is the time when they're not

just listening to their stomachs instead of trusting

the Lord, they're listening to their neighbors.

And so they're waiting on Moses to come down

from the place of thunder, right? The mountain

Sinai. And they're like, this is taking too long.

Aaron, why don't you listen to us and let's thank

a God of gold. They're saying, I don't think

this God's gonna provide for us. His timing is

not what we desire, what we thought it would

be. And so let's do each other and make a different

plan. And they reject God. They reject his worship.

They reject his timing. Of course, there's all

kinds of times when we think we know better than

God. If you only would do this at this time.

There's times where we think, oh man, we had

it so much better back then. But the concern

of this passage is not that they don't just know

the story and they haven't received God's word,

but that they really aren't listening. Instead,

they're listening to their bodies, or they listen

to their neighbors, or they're listening to that

which is not the Lord. So, verse 11, but my people

did not listen to my voice. Verse 13, oh, that

my people would listen to me. Verse eight again,

hear, O my people, while I admonish you, O Israel,

if you would but listen to me. So here's the

concern, they won't listen. I mean, it's this

act of gathering together, of recounting the

deeds of God, of hearing His word, but they're

just going through the motions. Here, I mean,

they know this stuff, but they're not really

listening. And how common is that for us? I mean,

how common is that in the life of the church?

Yeah, I know that. I know that story. I've heard

that story so many times. One thing, again, that

was mentioned this week in our staff meeting

is how often the Bible tells the same story itself

again. How I brought you out from slavery to

myself. They're hard at hearing. And they're

hard at hearing because they lack faith, because

listening is an act of faith. Listening is an

act of saying, I might not know it all. I might

need someone outside of me to direct me, to teach

me, to train me. To not listen is to say, I know

best. I can do it. They wouldn't listen to God.

Here, okay, this is one of the meditation quotes

inside of your bulletin, but hear this quote

from Henry Nowen from his book, Bread for the

Journey. To listen is very hard because it asks

of us so much interior stability that we no longer

need to prove ourselves by speeches, arguments,

statements, declarations. True listeners no longer

have an inner need to make their presence known.

They're free to receive, to welcome, to accept.

Listening is much more than allowing another

to talk while waiting for a chance to respond.

I've done that plenty of times as I'm sure you

have. Listening is paying full attention to others

and welcoming them into our very being. The beauty

of listening is that those who are listened to

start feeling accepted, start taking their words

more seriously and discover their own true selves.

Listening is a form of spiritual hospitality

by which you invite strangers become friends

to get to know their inner selves more fully

and even to dare to be silent with you. And this

past is saying that the Lord Himself is saying,

would you listen to me? Would you listen as an

act of faith? Not having to be defensive. What

are all the other things? Not having to think

through your own arguments or your statements,

your own declarations, but listen to me. So there's

this confession, right? About what God's done.

It's great acts of salvation. There's this confession

about His word and how we need direction from

it. And then there's this concern because people

are like, We don't really want to listen. That's

the pattern. We don't really care to listen.

Now the song begins with a call. So we're going

to end at the beginning. Okay. So sing aloud

to God our strength. Shout for joy to the God

of Jacob. So let me get back to Sukkot. Feast

of booze. One practice of observant Jews is to

take three different branches, often to bind

them together, and then to take a fruit. Normally

it's a citron, like a large sweet lemon, when

you go into the booth to celebrate it. It's part

of celebrating the Feast of Booths. And actually,

if you heard, this is mentioned really specifically

in Leviticus 23. I read it earlier, but it said

this in verse 40. the fruit of splendid trees,

branches of palm trees, and boughs of leafy trees,

and willows of the brook. So there's like three

different branches. There are specific ones and

then a fruit. Okay. And the names that Jews give

these things are the lulav, the hadas, the areva,

and the etrog. So here's something that I read

that was really interesting is that all of these

different species are There's no one place in

Israel where all of these species can be found.

The etrog comes from the plains, the lulav near

the springs in the valley, the chadas in the

mountains, the areva near the wadis and the major

rivers. So to worship this would mean that all

of God's people from all of these different corners

had to come together. They had to come together

to feast. to celebrate, to sing. And when they

came together, they were making a collective

statement. Here's one thing I read. Because there's

different thoughts about what's going on with

these branches. I mean, there's different thoughts

historically in terms of commentaries and also

even just different thoughts now that I found.

But this is one thing I found. The lulav has

taste but no smell. So you can study the word,

meaning you can kind of know it a little bit,

but you don't live it, right? The haras has some

smell, but no taste, which is to say you live

part of it, but you don't really know it. The

hadas has no smell and no taste. And so you can

not know it and not live it just like it, just

reject all of it completely. And then the etroch,

which is the fruit, has both taste and smell.

And there's an invitation in all this, right?

In that symbolism, there's this invitation. What

are you going to be? Are you going to know it

and live it? Are you going to know the story

of salvation and delight in the direction of

God's Word? Are you going to hold them together

as something lovely and tasty? And this is how

this song begins. Let me read verse one again.

Which is to say that this confession and this

concern, sort of the answer in a way to whether

or not you've really heard is, do you worship?

Do you desire to sing? Are any of you wondering?

And the answer is yes. Are there more tambourines

up here to shake? I actually mean that because

what do we do when our team wins the game? We

don't sit still. We celebrate. And if you know

God's great acts of salvation, if you know His

word for you, you can either reject it or you

can come to the feast. Those are the options.

Reject the idea that He will actually provide

for you the midst of uncertainty or show up and

sing loud. It's a call to worship. This is a

psalm for a feast. And the question was, will

you feast? Will you celebrate what God has done?

Will you come to worship? Will you come to declare

the God who meets us in our need, who saves us

from our slavery? And think about this. This

was a call to the people of Israel, right, who

had been brought out from slavery in Egypt. But

how much more is this a call to us? who confess

that God Himself takes on flesh for us. God Himself

goes to a cross for us. He pays for our sins

for us. He gives us His righteousness, as we

heard from 2 Corinthians 5, right? You might

become the very righteousness of God. If you

know that, frankly, actually let me say, a test

of whether or not you know that is will you feast?

Will you sing? Do you find worship to be life

in the midst of a dry land? joy that can exist

in the midst of uncertainty and of sorrow. How

do you face the fact of uncertainty? That's part

of the question of this. And the invitation is

to this God who does act for His people, who

does speak to His people. And the invitation

is, come and worship the Lord. Sukkot was a test

for the people of God, and worship in a way is

a test for us. We lay aside the uncertainties,

lay them at the foot of the cross, and trust

that if God gave us His very Son, how much more

will He not give us all things necessary for

life and for faith? And so right now, I just

want to say, if you are living in the mess, the

busyness, the craziness, the uncertainty of life,

which I'm sure many of you are, come and worship.

Come and feast. When you do so, do not give up

the habit. Go to the feast. I think our Lord

Himself does this in John chapter 7. He's like,

John 7 · chapter mention

ah, they might find out who I am and get all

mad. And so he gets all disguised and he still

goes to the feast to declare what God has done,

to hear the words, to celebrate. Those sisters,

I think this is the great answer to our uncertainty,

living into the life of God, living into the

story of God, hearing the words of God and celebrating.

Let me pray. Lord, I pray that we would learn

how to at a table in a way as you Lord God have

done as we read Psalm 23 in the presence of our

enemies in the midst uncertainty and the chaos

of life that would be those who are able to still

celebrate what you have done to take time and

remember and and to listen to find life in the

midst of chaos. God, I pray that you would be

at work in us, that you give us listening ears,

not just hearing, but really listening to you,

learning from you, being reminded of your great

acts for us, and that you transform us through

this, we pray. Amen. Thank you for listening

to Second City Sermons podcast. We hope this

sermon has encouraged you to worship God and

to celebrate the gospel of Jesus. Please consider

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God bless.