Psalms Mixtape, You Oughta Praise - Psalm 103

Well welcome. As Duncan already mentioned, I'm Pastor Jordan, one

of the elders. Here we are continuing in our short

series for the month of December called the Psalms Mixtape,

which will be there shortly. We are looking at the

different types of psalms and how they speak to the

many different situations in seasons that we encounter in life.

And so far we've gone through Psalm eighty two, a

Psalm of thanksgiving, which showed us the vast amount of

reasons we have to always be thankful to God. We

looked at Psalm one p a psalm of lament, which

showed us how we can and should take all of

our requests, all of our problems to the Lord because

he is faithful. We went through Psalm seventy three last week,

a Psalm of wisdom, which showed us how we are

to wisely place our hope and trust in God because

He is wise. It's in Him, in his word that

we find wisdom for how we are to live and

act as believers. We look to Him for wisdom, lean

on his wisdom, not the folly that the world would

call wisdom. Today we'll be in Psalm one O three,

a psalm of praise in which the psalmist David invites

the singers of this beautiful song to praise God for

both who he is and all he has done, because

God and God alone is worthy of all praise. Amen.

So if you would turn with me to Psalm one

O three, we'll read through it. If you need a Bible,

we have some on the connect table outside the doors.

By the way, I just got this bible the Elder.

The three of us got new bibles. And I love

the smell of a new Bible. Oh it is intoxicate,

the fresh print, those trees that gave their life for

this paper. Oh that smells so good. The Psalm one

O three, let's read through it. Bless the Lord, owe

my soul and all that is within me. Bless his

holy name. Bless the Lord, oh my soul, and forget

not all his benefits, who forgives all your iniquity, who

heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from the pit,

who crowns you with steadfast love and mercy, who satisfies

you with good so that your youth is renewed like

the eagles. The Lord works righteousness and justice for all

who are oppressed. He made known his ways to Moses,

his acts to the people of Israel. The Lord is

merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love.

He will not always chide, nor will he keep his

anger forever. He does not deal with us according to

our sins, nor repay us according to our iniquities. For

as high as the heavens are above the earth, so

great is his steadfast love toward those who fear him.

As far as the east is from the west, so

far does he remove our transgressions from us. As a

father shows compassion to his children, so the Lord shows

compassion to those who fear him. For he knows our frame.

He remembers that we are dust as for man. His

days are like grass. He flourishes like a flower of

the field. For the wind passes over it, and it

is gone, and its place knows it no more. But

the steadfast love of the Lord is from everlasting to

everlasting on those who fear him, and his righteousness to

children's children, to those who keep his covenant and remember

to do his commandments. The Lord has established his throne

in the heavens, and his kingdom rules over all. Bless

the Lord. You owe you his angels, you mighty ones

who do his word, obeying the voice of his word.

Bless the Lord, all his hosts, his ministers who do

his will. Bless the Lord all his works in all

places of his dominion. Bless the Lord, Oh my soul,

this is God's word. Growing up, we heard from our parents,

our grandparents, or maybe other adults in our lives about

things that we should and should not do. We heard

things and we're taught things that we ought to do

and things that we were ought not to do. In

my first grade class, and for those of you who

know me, I was homeschool but not until I was

third grade. Yeah, so I was in public school for

a little time. When I was in my first grade class,

I remember yeling some colored pencils and that's why I

gave that background because I didn't like steal from my

brother or sister, and I thought I stole some colored pencils.

I have no idea why. I just wanted them, and

I got in trouble with my parents when they found out,

and I was told, you can't just take something because

you want it. Those pencils didn't belong to you. And

you stole them from the people they did belong to.

And so I learned that stealing is wrong. I learned

that I ought not steal. As a child, I frequently

fought with my brother, whether it's with words or with fisticuffs.

We were frequently fighting with each other, and usually over

very trivial things, because we just couldn't bring ourselves to

forgive the other. And my parents always told us, your brothers,

you shouldn't be fighting. You should be caring for each other.

You're supposed to be kind to one another. You're supposed

to be forgiving of one another. They taught us that

one day, you're going to say something or do something

you can't undo, something you can't take back. And it

wasn't until my brother and I were older and one

of our fights turned physical and we started throwing fists

that I learned the truth of what my parents taught me. Eventually,

in that fight, I threw a punch that hurt my brother,

and I recognized in that moment that I had done

something I couldn't take back. Now, eventually we forgave each other.

We moved on from that that horrible fight, But I

learned in that moment that in giving into my anger

instead of forgiving him, I caused my brother pain. And

I learned that it's better to forgive versus giving in

to my anger. I learned that I ought to forgive.

Consider your own life for a second. Consider the lessons

your parents or grandparents or others in your lives that

have taught you, lessons, lessons of things to do, things

not to do, the moments in your life where you

learn for yourself things you ought not do and things

you ought to do, how you ought to speak the truth,

how you ought to obey the law, how you ought

to love your spouse, how you ought to spend your time. So,

if you're taking notes, my sermon is titled you ought

to praise? You ought to praise? Because with this psalm,

my hope and prayer is that we all consider and

see why we ought to praise God. I'm gonna pray

for exactly that before we get into it. Lord, I

thank you for your word. I thank you for the

truth of your word, and I thank you for your

servant David for guiding his hand as he wrote this

beautiful song that recounts all of the ways you are

worthy of our praise. Lord, I asked that you would

humble our hearts, that you would change from the truth

of your scripture, that we can see all of the

reasons why we ought to praise you and rejoice because

we get to praise you for eternity. Lord, may you

get the glory from our time together, as your word

sanctifies us and your beautiful name. God's people said Amen. Now.

In this Psalm, David writes both how we ought to

praise and also gives us numerous reasons for why we

ought to praise God. In the very first verse, David

writes of how we ought to praise God. Bless the Lord,

O my soul and all that is within me, Bless

his Holy Name. Now, David writes, bless the Lord, Bless

his Holy Name. I want to stop on this for

a second, because this isn't in the sense of how

a greater person blesses a lesser person, because God is

infinitely greater than us, and we could never bless him

in that way, as if we were giving him something

he needed. When David wrote bless the Lord, Bless his

Holy Name, he meant it in the sense that it

both pleases and honors God. When his creation praises him

and thanks him appropriately. And in what way do you

think it's appropriate to bless and honor God? In what

way is it appropriate to praise him? Let me rephrase it,

in what way is best to praise him? Well, if

we look at it again, David tells us how bless

the Lord, O my soul and all that is within me,

bless his Holy name. Since bless the Lord means pleasing

and honoring God with our praise, and the appropriate way

to do that is with all of who we are,

then David's instruction can be understood in this way. We

ought to praise God with everything because it pleases him.

We ought to praise God with everything because it pleases

Him with all that is within you, with your very soul,

with the part of you that lasts for all of

eternity after your body dies. But what does praise even mean?

Perhaps you're wondering. I know, growing up in church, we

often confuse terms praise and worship, or they get kind

of thrown in together. It's praise and worship. It's the

same thing. It's not this won't be on the screen.

Praise is the joyful recounting of all that God has done.

It's the joyful recounting of all that God is done.

Worship is to sacrifice something to someone. In our case,

the one like in Romans tells us to offer up

our bodies as a living sacrifice. It's to give up

something to God. It's a sacrifice of praise. Praise itself

is the joyful recounting of all that God has done.

In Isaiah twelve to five, it instructs us to praise

or joyfully recount of all that He has done with singing.

Pal I'm thirty three to one shows us we can

joyfully recount all that He has done with shouting. I

won't demonstrate for that. I won't demonstrate it for you

right now, because I'm micd up. So Psalm one fifty

tells us how we can joyfully recount all that He

has done with dance and musical instruments. So, since bless

the Lord means pleasing and honoring God with our praise

or the joyful recounting of all that He's done, and

the appropriate way to do that is with all of

who we are, then David's instruction in verse one now

becomes this, we ought to joyfully recount all that God

has done with everything because it pleases him. We ought

to joyfully recount all that God has done with everything

because it pleases him. With singing, with dancing, with shouting,

with musical instruments. We ought to joyfully recount all that

He has done because it pleases and honors him. So

that's the how we ought to praise. Now, what about

the why we ought to praise? Throughout the rest of

this psalm, we'll see David writing of exactly why we

ought to praise God of all that He's done, that

we ought to joyfully recount of with the first of

many things, to praise him for being his mercy. We

praise him for his mercy. Sorry. In verse two Psalm

one Oh three, bless the Lord, oh my soul, David continues,

forget not all his benefits, who forgives all of your iniquity,

who heals all of your diseases, who redeems your life

from the pit, who crowns you with steadfast love and mercy,

who satisfies you with good so that your youth is

renewed like the eagles. Now verse two alone could be

an entire sermon, which we don't have time for. Two

sermons today. Sorry, or maybe you're rejoicing at that, But

I do want to speak about verse two for a moment,

because while the rest of this psalm narrows in and

hones in on specific reasons for why we ought to praise,

Verse two broadly states bless the Lord, owe my soul,

and forget not all of his benefits. That means that

outside of the specific reasons to praise God that David

writes about, this list is by no means exhaustive. By

no means, this list of reasons to praise God doesn't

even begin to cover the numerous other reasons He deserves

and is worthy of our praise. The list we're looking

at today doesn't talk about how God sends the Holy

Spirit the helper who dwells within us John fourteen, verse sixteen.

This list doesn't talk about how God gives peace, joy,

and hope the Romans fifteen, verse thirteen. This list doesn't

talk about how God grants eternal life in Jesus one

John five to eleven. This list doesn't talk about how

God is always with us Matthew twenty eight twenty, or

how God is our help in times of need Hebrews

four sixteen. The list doesn't cover the innumerable practical benefits

just from following God's wisdom. I think about it. If

you committed your life to memorizing and following God's wisdom

that's found in Proverbs, that book alone shows you how

you ought to live in nearly every circumstance. That's a benefit.

When David wrote this psalm and says forget not all

his benefits, I wouldn't be surprised if he was recalling

all the times that God came through for him, like

when God disciplined him and showed him mercy for committing

adultery with Bathsheba and sending her husband to die on

the front lines, or when God protected him and granted

him victory in his fight with Goliath, or how he

raised him up from a lowly shepherd to the king.

The reasons to praise God, Man, I love this list

that David wrote out, and I'm so glad I get

to go through it with you. But don't think for

a second it covers all the reasons. I just wanted

to mention and kind of focus on verse two to

show you that the reasons we ought to praise God

go far beyond the list. We're going to cover today.

And we ought not forget all of those reasons, all

of the Lord's benefits. He is so worthy of all praise,

with just one of the reasons being his mercy. Consider

for a moment just how worthy of our praise he

is for his mercy alone. God created mankind in his

image to walk and to live in a way that's

pleasing to Him, to glorify and honor him. And the

entire Bible is filled with story after story, with example

after example of man living according to our wicked and

sinful desires. But if you read those stories long enough,

what you'll see is time and time again, a loving

and just God showing mercy. The Ephesians two, and you

were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you

once walked, following the course of this world, following the

prince of the power of the air, the spirit that

is now at work in the sons of disobedience, among

whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh,

carrying out the desires of the body and the mind,

and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest

of mankind. God's word teaches us that in Adam all die,

that when Adam disobeyed and sinned against God and the garden,

the curse of sin and death entered the world. And

now all of mankind is born into that curse. Our

natural will and desire is to sin against God, to

rebel against him, to joyfully live in that state of deadness.

We are all born as children of wrath, God's wrath.

But and this is the best, but you will ever

hear verse four of Ephesis two. But God, being rich

in mercy, because of the great love with which he

loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses,

made us alive together with Christ. By grace, you have

been saved. Hallelujah. Because He is rich in mercy, He

lifts us up out of our deadness and makes us

alive in his son, Jesus Christ, and gives us a

new will to please Him. For those that repent and

believe in his son, you're no longer children of wrath.

You are adopted children of God. Hallelujah. Now that is

something you can joyfully recount of for all eternity. The

next reason to praise him for is praise him for

his righteousness. Praise him for his righteousness. We're gonna continue on.

In verse six, the Lord works righteousness and justice for

all who are oppressed. He made known his ways to Moses,

his acts to the people of Israel. So David recounts

how God works righteous deeds and deals with his children's

enemy justly. From God's to Abraham all the way up

to David's time when he wrote this, God performed righteous

acts on behalf of his chosen people. He delivered them

from slavery and oppression in Egypt, provided them food and

water in the wilderness while they were actively rebelling against him.

By the way, even now, he frees his children, us,

the believing ones, from the oppression of the world, by

extending that same righteousness to us by the blood of

his son. Here's why that's praiseworthy. True and perfect righteousness

is not possible for us to attain on our own.

The standard is too high. It's simply too high. We

have no ability to achieve righteousness in and of ourselves.

But Christians possess the righteousness of Christ because in two

Corinthians five, for our sake, he made him to be sin,

who knew no sin, so that in him we might

become the righteousness of God again, I say Hallelujah. On

the cross, Jesus exchanged our sin for his perfect righteousness,

so that we could one day stand before God, that

he would not see our sin, that he would instead

see the righteousness of his son. Do you understand what

that means? That means we are both accepted and treated

as righteous by God on account of what Jesus finished

on the cross. Jesus was made sin and made us righteous.

Jesus was treated as if he were the sinner, and

we are treated as if we were righteous. And we're

given that precious gift not because we achieved it or

will ever achieve it, but because God is rich in

mercy and grace. What and that is something you can

joyfully recount of for all eternity. Amen. The next reason

to praise him for is for his love. Praise him

for his love. Continuing on in our texts verse eight,

the Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and

abounding in steadfast love. He will not always chide, nor

will he keep his anger forever. He does not deal

with us according to our sins or repay us according

to our iniquities. That is a sermon. Oh, thank you Lord,

For as high as the heavens are above the earth,

so great is his steadfast love toward those who fear him.

As far as the east is from the west, so

far does he remove our transgressions from us. As a

father shows compassion to his children, so the Lord shows

compassion to those who fear him. For he knows our frame.

He remembers that we are dust as for man. His

days are like grass. He flourishes like a flower of

the field. For the wind passes over it, and it

is gone, and its place knows it no more. But

the steadfast love of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting,

on those who fear him, and his righteousness to children's children,

to those who keep his covenant and remember to do

his commandments. Wow, we've seen how God is merciful. We've

seen how God is righteous, and now we see how

those praise worthy attributes, those praise worthy reasons are an

outpouring of his great love. His mercy towards us, his

righteousness that he extends to us are an outpouring of

his love. I'm gonna read it again. Yeah, I want

you to grasp how great his love is for you.

He does not deal with us according to our sins,

nor repay us according to our iniquities. You're gonna see

later that we are in his kingdom. As king, he

is well within his rights to do whatever he wants

with his creation, with everything within his kingdom. But instead

of punishing the ones in his kingdom that broke his law,

he sends his only son to be punished to save

us to himself. For as high as the heavens are

above the earth, so great is his love, his steadfast

love towards those who fear him. As far as the

east is from the west. That's infinite. By the way,

Unless you're a flat earther Gavin that travel east long enough,

you will never reach west. It just keeps going. Man,

because he is loving, he shows us mercy instead of

the wrath do our sins for those that fear him,

who walk in reverence and awe of who he is.

He loves like a father loves their child, from everlasting

to everlasting. As far as the east is from the west,

that's how great his love is. And that love is steadfast.

That means it doesn't waiver, it doesn't fail, it doesn't fade.

His steadfast love is eternal. It's sufficient, it's pure and perfect,

and yet completely undeserved. Because we can't keep his covenant perfectly,

we can't keep his commands perfectly. But his son did,

and Jesus's life and his sacrifice on the cross was

the greatest of the infinite displays of God's love. And

it was completely undeserved. In spite of your sin, in

spite of your rebellion, in spite of your deadness and

your sins, and you're running away from him, he still

chose to love you. God's love is steadfast. It doesn't waiver,

it doesn't fail, it doesn't fade. It's eternal, sufficient, perfect

and pure, and completely undeserved. And that's something you can

joyfully recount of for all eternity. Amen, I'm not mad.

At if I sound mad, I'm not mad. I just

get fired up about stuff like this, and I want

you to be fired up too. The next reason to

praise him for I love this one. Praise him because

you were created to praise, Because you were created to praise,

Just literally do what you were made to do. We

get verse nineteen through twenty two. The Lord has established

his throne in the heavens and his kingdom rules over all.

Bless the Lord, ohe you his angels, you mighty ones

who do his word, obeying the voice of his word.

Bless the Lord, all his hosts, who his ministers, who

do his will. Bless the Lord all his works in

all places of his dominion. Bless the Lord, Oh my soul.

Everything was created for his glory, to the praise of

his mighty name. Everything that he created, he has dominion over.

It's his kingdom, all of creation. From the angels that

obey his word, to the stars that shine in the

night sky, they were created to praise him, to honor him,

to please him. From the flowers that bloom in the springtime,

to the beetle that crawls on the ground, They were

created to honor him, to please him, to glorify him,

to praise him, to show of his mighty works. Look

at verse forty eight. Oh I love this. Praise the Lord.

Praise the Lord from the heavens, Praise him in the heights.

Praise him all his angels, Praise him all his hosts.

Praise him, Sun and moon, praise him, all you shining stars.

Praise him, You highest heavens, and you above the heavens.

Let them, praise the name of the Lord. For he commanded,

and they were created, and he established them forever and ever.

He gave a decree, and it shall not pass away.

Praise the Lord from the earth, you, great sea creatures,

and all deeps, fire and hail, snow and mist, stormy wind,

fulfilling his word, mountains and all hills, fruit trees, and

all cedars, beasts, and all livestock, creeping things and flying birds,

kings of the earth, and all peoples, princes and all

rulers of the earth, young men and maidens, together, old

men and children, Let them praise the name of the Lord.

For his name alone is exalted. His majesty is above

earth and heaven. He has raised up a horn for

his people. Praise for all his saints, for the people

of Israel who are near to him.

Praise the Lord. Praise the Lord. You were created to

do it, and that's our application. That's literally it.

Praise the Lord. Praise the Lord. You were created to

praise him. You and the rest of creation were created

to praise him. And as this psalm has showed us,

he is infinitely worthy of that praise. So sing, shout, dance,

lift up an instrument. Praise God joyfully, recount of all

He's done, for all of who he is, with all

of who you are. Praise God for his mercy, for

his righteousness, for his love. For all the reasons we

couldn't even get into praise the Lord, these are all

reasons we ought to praise God. And not to wait

till a certain time, not to wait till we're in

heaven with Him. But right now, these are all reasons

we ought to praise God. And I want you to

carefully hear this. These are all reasons we get to

praise God. They're all reasons we get to praise Him

for all eternity. Hallelujah, Duncan, would you come up. We're

gonna do a few things now. We're gonna have a

time of response. If you came prepared to give, you

can give with the giving envelope. Drop it off in

the box by the connect table. Myself, pastor Greg are

going to be available on either side of the room

to pray with you. We would love to pray for you.

If you'd rather submit your prayer requests on the connect

card just on the back here, you can write that

down and we send it off to the whole church,

so that more people can be praying for you. Not

because God hears it any better when multiple people pray

for it, but maybe there's a chance that the person

who reads it can be the answer to that prayer request,

because God uses his people to answer prayers. And then

we're gonna close with another song of praise. There's this

song that I sing frequently on my own private praise time,

and one that I feel perfectly encapsulates the many reasons

we have to praise God, the many reasons we have

to praise God right now and for all eternity, And

in this song it speaks about how even eternity seems

too short a time to praise Him. The lyrics of

the song in tenderness, he sought me, weary and sick

with sin, and on his shoulders brought me back to

His fold again, while angels in his presence sang, until

the courts of heaven rang. Oh the love that sought me,

Oh the blood that bought me, Oh the grace that

brought me to the fold of God. He died for

me while I was sinning, needy and poor and blind.

He whispered to assure me, I've found thee thou art mine,

I never heard a sweeter voice. It made my aching

heart rejoice. Oh the love that sought me, Oh the

blood that bought me, Oh the grace that brought me

to the fold of God. Next verse upon his grace,

I'll daily ponder and sing anew his praise with all

adoring wonder his blessings. I retrace. It seems as if

eternal days are far too short to sing his praise.

I love that when we truly take the time to

consider all of who He is, all that he has done,

and that he promises to do, promises that will be

fulfilled by the way. When we consider all that, no

amount of praise is enough. Eternity is far too short

to praise him for that. But we're sure gonna try.

Duncan and my wife Lindsay are gonna lead us in

this song, and I want each of you to consider that.

Consider all the reasons Psalm one oh three gave us

for how we ought to praise God, even the reasons

that didn't list. Consider all the reasons we get to

praise God for eternity. Consider how worthy he is of

our praise, how deserving he is of our praise. Consider

how you were created to do it, and in light

of all those reasons, just praise him. Praise him because

he's worthy, praise him because you ought to, praise him

because you get to. Would you stand