Jesus, Our Passover Lamb | Student Pastor: Sam Rapp

Well, sometimes all there's left to do is sing.

It might be a mountaintop experience, like when the apostles Peter, James, and John were led with their best bud Jesus to this mountaintop.

And all of a sudden Jesus starts glowing and he's transfigured before them.

Now I'm doubtful that any of you were at the transfiguration or have seen Jesus glowing.

But many of us had had a mountaintop worship experience where it seemed more clear to us that God is real, that he's worthy of our singing, and maybe in that moment singing seemed like the only reasonable thing to do.

On the other hand, maybe it wasn't a mountaintop, but maybe it was in a valley, the end of yourself.

When you didn't have the words to pray, but you had a song.

Maybe you found yourself like the woman at the well in John 4, full of shame, full of guilt, presently living in sin, a woman at the end of herself, and yet the exact woman Jesus met with in the gospel.

And this woman was never the same.

Singing praises to this Messiah in this town that used to shame her.

For me, there have been multiple of each, both mountaintops and valleys, and a lot of mundane in between.

But the reality for you and for me is that in all seasons of life, both mountaintops, valleys, and everything in the middle, we will worship something.

We will have a song of worship that it throws itself onto something.

And here's the big reality.

Because you and I were made in the image of God, we see that in Genesis 1, 26 and 27, that means our most core fundamental need is to be in relationship with and worship the God who created us.

And yet, the big issue that we find, if we're honest with ourselves, is that our hearts attach themselves in worship to all sorts of things that can't quite hold the weight.

The typical American worship values and the culture and air we're breathing are things like success, career, family, comfort, marriage, pleasure.

If you want to know what our culture or what a culture values, just take a good look at the advertisements when you're watching football and the types of messages that they're sending.

And the thing is, all of those things are good things like family worship or career marriage.

But the question is, how do we live as worshiping beings in a culture that demands for us to worship everything else?

Now, my big claim for us is this: you will worship whatever you see as worthy of your affections.

So my hope this morning through Psalm 113 is that you would leave here convinced that it's the God of the Bible, revealed in Jesus Christ, who is worthy of your affections and worship.

You might be wondering, haven't we been in Colossians?

And for that question, you'd be right, but it's Jacket Sunday.

And so we're taking a breath from Colossians, and we're going to be in Psalm 113 as we just read.

So if you have your copy of God's word, I'd invite you to open to Psalm 113 with me.

And as you're turning there, I'd love to give you some context about this psalm.

So we're not 100% sure who wrote it.

Something it might have been David, something it could have been Moses.

We're honestly not sure, and that's okay.

Psalm 113 finds itself right at the beginning of what's called the Egyptian Halel Psalms, which are the Psalms from 113 to 118.

And they're called this because they sing back of Israel's deliverance from Egypt and Exodus.

They're salvation psalms.

And they're called halel because halel is the Hebrew word for praise, and it's probably a familiar sounding word because of the word that we sing all the time, Hallelujah, which literally just means praise Yahweh.

And that's the exact word that starts and ends Psalm 113 is hallelujah.

And even more specifically, these six Psalms 113 to 118 are deeply connected to the Passover, which we can read about in Exodus, where the Israelites are at the end of this moment where God is bringing plagues to Egypt.

And the last plague is that of the spirit of death hovering over the land and striking all of Egypt's firstborn.

And so the Lord instructs the people to take a lamb one year old without blemish, take its blood, and put it on the doorpost, so that as the spirit of death hovers over the land, it's going to pass over their house, leaving them safely.

So the Israelites, year after year, would celebrate the Passover.

It was their like Super Bowl in their spiritual calendars.

It's their Easter, it's their Christmas.

So what the Israelites would do is they would take their copy of the scriptures and they would sing these six Psalms, Psalm 113 to 118.

They would begin the time by singing 113 and 114, and then they'd eat the meal, and then at the conclusion of the night they would sing 115 to 118.

So this is a very, very special collection of psalms for the people of Israel and for us.

And one more, just a quick note.

Every time you see the word praise as a command or as an invitation in the psalm, it's plural.

And what that is inviting us into is to see that God's story is including just us personally, but it's about a bigger story of God's people corporately worshiping together.

So with these things in mind, let's jump in to Psalm 113.

What the psalmist is going to open us up with a praise.

Says this, Praise the Lord or Hallelujah.

Praise, O servants of the Lord, praise the name of the Lord.

Blessed be the name of the Lord from this time forth and forevermore.

From the rising of the sun to its setting, just like the song we just sang, the name of the Lord is to be praised.

So the psalm opens up with this beautiful news.

We don't have to guess we're worshiping to.

It's not as if there's some mysterious deity in the sky that we're launching songs up to, hoping that we're right, hoping that they stick.

Kind of like when your grandma would throw pasta at the wall and see if it sticks, and then you'll know it's ready.

It's not as if we're doing that.

No, the psalmist brings crystal clear focus for the Israelites and for you and me, that we have a God who has revealed himself crystal clear.

The psalm opens with the praise, praise the Lord, which again in Hebrew is literally just the phrase hallelujah, which means praise Yah or praise Yahweh.

And this sort of brought the Israelites right back to the Exodus again.

Where Moses is out in the wilderness, he's keeping his father-in-law's flock, and he comes across a burning bush.

And this bush is not burning up into ashes, it's just on fire.

And so Moses does what we would have done is like, this is a great sight.

The bush is on fire, but it's not being burned.

And then the Lord he yells out to Moses, says, Moses, Moses.

And Moses says, Here I am, Lord.

And then Moses, and then the Lord turns to Moses and says, Hey, take the sandals off your feet, for this is holy ground.

So Moses does that.

And then the Lord says very pastorally to Moses, out of this bush, must have been crazy.

He says, Moses, I've seen the affliction of my people.

I know your hurting.

I've heard your cries.

So here I am to deliver you.

So Moses, go to Pharaoh.

And Moses says, That sounds great, God.

But when I go to the people and say that God has come to deliver us, and they say, What's his name?

What should I say?

And God comes back with this crazy answer.

He says, I am who I am, or an even better translation, I be who I be, which I just love.

Moses, tell them, I am, sent me to you.

The pre-existent, independent, eternal one who has power, who has always been, will always be, he's the one who sent me to you, Moses.

And it was in this moment in Exodus 3 where the people of Israel got a crystal clear answer about who this God is that has sent them, Yahweh.

He's given them his name.

And in the opening of this psalm, we're reminded not once or twice, but three times of the personal, near, relatable God who has made himself known as Yahweh.

Praise the name of the Lord.

Blessed be the name of the Lord.

The name of the Lord is to be praised.

So when we sing to the Lord, when we pray to the Lord, when we read in our scriptures, we're not guessing about who this God is that we believe in.

He's not some far-off, impersonal or unknown God.

Rather, we meet a God who has crystal clear made himself known.

What's the first thing you do when you meet somebody?

You say, What's your name?

And typically right after that, you say, Okay, what do you do?

And that's exactly how God has made himself known in Exodus 3.

Here's my name, Moses, and here's what I do.

Here's my operation, I deliver.

I see your pain, I see your suffering, Israelites, and so here's my name, and here's what I'm gonna do, I'm gonna set you free.

So as the Israelites sing this psalm of praise in 113 to God, they're brought back time and time again to the moment of their redemption.

To the moment where their shackles of Egyptian slavery were crushed off their wrist.

Where a new people fully free and fully known by their personal God.

A.W.

Tozer puts it beautifully in the beginning of his book, The Knowledge of the Holy.

The first line of the book says this: what you think about when you think about God is the most important thing about you.

And what this psalm does for the Israelites, for you and for me, is give us a crystal clear reminder of who this God is.

He's a personal God.

He's not far off from the sin and struggle of his people, but he's right there in the midst of it.

And he promises to deliver them.

And so the Israelites and we are invited to think about God rightly.

The one who is personal, and the one who has delivered and redeemed his people.

Therefore, the psalm just makes sense.

Blessed be his name.

From this time forth and forevermore, from the rising of the sun to its setting, because the blessing of the Lord's name reaches to unimaginable heights.

It extends both in time from the rising of the sun, or from this time and forevermore, and in space from the rising of the sun to its setting.

And that has proven to be true.

We're here today in Marietta, Georgia, thousands of miles away from Egypt, thousands of years since it was written.

And yet here we are in Marietta, Georgia, reading this same psalm, praising the revealed and redeeming God.

I'm reminded of Hebrews 12, where the writer of Hebrews just walked us through the Hall of Faith, as it's been called, where he shows us many men and women who lived faithful lives, showing how God was in their story, because the stories of the saints are so powerful.

And right after the Hall of Faith, he opens chapter 12 with this word for us, Hebrews 12, 1 and 2.

Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and sin which cling so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him, endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

Because, beloved, the reach of Christianity extends, leaps and bounds beyond what we can see, getting to the billions and the billions of people who have bowed the knee in faith to Christ and the 2.4 billion that exists in the world today.

And so we also, as we read Psalm 113, are invited to join the anthem of the great cloud of witnesses that has existed for all time, looking to Jesus.

Let's continue on.

Psalm 113, 4 through 9.

The Lord is high above all nations and his glory above the heavens.

Who is like the Lord our God who is seated on high, who looks far down on the heavens and the earth?

He raises the poor from the dust and lifts the needy from the ash heap to make them sit with princes, with the princes of his people.

He gives a barren woman a home, making her the joyous mother of children.

Hallelujah.

After opening with the invitation reminder for the people of God to praise the revealed and redeeming God, the reminder of the far reaches of his praise, and the reminder of the beauty of his name, the psalmist continues with the crystal clear focus about who this God is like.

I love how the great British preacher Charles Spurgeon explains this psalm.

He says, This the music concludes upon its keynote.

The psalm is a circle ending where it began, praising the Lord from its first syllable to its last.

May our life psalm partake of the same character and never know a break or conclusion.

In an endless circle, let us bless the Lord whose mercies never cease.

So we're invited to ask the question, the psalmist asks in a rhetorical question in verse 5 Who is like the Lord our God?

To this, of course, we say no one.

Yes and amen.

But then, what is this Lord like?

We see the great paradox of God here, that he is a God who is high above the nations, enthroned on high, lifted up above all people, is the Lord of hosts, and that is awfully good news for you and for me.

Because this shows that the Lord, the God we believe in, is powerful enough to handle every single detail.

Never a moment where he's tired, never a moment where he's emotionally anxious and abreacting to a situation, never a moment where the triune God, Father, Son, and Spirit says, let's call a board meeting because something on earth went wrong.

There's never a moment where that happens.

Every single thing, every single hair on your head, every single detail in human history has been orchestrated by a God who is not far off, but is present.

And that is unbelievably good news for you and for me.

Especially as we look at our nation and all the crumbling that's going on there, as we look at the wars and the suffering in the world, as we look at our own lives, at our own hurts for us and for our loved ones.

And yet in that we can have confidence that no matter how much of a mess it might look like it is in the world and how much of a mess it is in our hearts and our lives, God is never anxious.

And he's holding all things perfectly for our good and his glory.

And not only is that true, and it is very true, that he is enthroned on high, as we see in verse 5.

Not only is he high and lifted up, but one of the great surprises of the Christian faith is what comes next.

That the high and exalted God of creation is intimately and passionately involved and interested in the hurts and joys of his creation.

Look at verse 5 and 6 with me again.

Who is like the Lord our God, who is seated on high, who looks far down on the heavens and the earth.

So that little section there where it says who looks far down, if you highlight or underline in your Bibles, that'd be the place to do it.

An even better translation of that phrase, who looks far down, could be this: who constantly humbles himself, who in an ongoing manner is a God who brings himself low to meet his people in their mess, to meet his people as they are.

Poor, needy, hurting, to the barren woman, unable to bring forth children.

The exalted royal one, the one enthroned on high, far above the heavens, is eager to stoop down to the depths.

Even to the needy in the ashes, to the barren woman, and raise them to unimaginable heights.

Verse 7 through 8 are a direct parallel of another story in the Bible.

They're an almost word-for-word copy of what we see in 1 Samuel 2, verse 8, which is the story of Hannah.

1 Samuel 2:8

So Hannah was this woman who was married to a man named Elkanah, and she experienced this reality that many of you have experienced.

Many of you know someone who is experiencing, or maybe you're presently experiencing this, which is the inability to have a child.

There are few griefs like this one.

There are few griefs like this one.

And Hannah is deep in the depths of it at the beginning of 1 Samuel.

So Hannah was, for years, experiencing tear-filled prayers and unimagined levels of grief because of this reality to not have a child.

So we see this moment where Hannah gets to the end of herself.

She's praying to the Lord.

And one of the priests, Eli, he's sitting at the door post, just kind of hanging out as the priest, and Hannah shows up.

She's so upset that she can't even eat.

I'm sure many of you have been there before.

I know I have.

And she makes a vow as she's praying, which is a covenant promise to the Lord.

And she says, Hey, Lord, if you if you open my womb, if you if you give me a child, I'm gonna dedicate this child to be a Nazarite, which was somebody that was fully dedicated to the Lord.

You can read about it in number six.

And her prayers are bitter.

They're not happy prayers.

They're full of pain.

And something crazy is that as she's praying, Eli, the priest, notices that her mouth isn't moving, but words are coming out.

And so he just assumes that she's drunk.

And he speaks harshly with her about it.

But she says, I'm not drunk, I haven't had anything to drink, Eli.

I know this is crazy.

But what I'm doing, Eli, is I'm pouring my soul out before the Lord.

Maybe you've prayed like that.

Maybe you have been unable to get pregnant or a family member.

Maybe you have been deep in the grief of a death of a loved one, and you just have been pouring yourself out before the Lord.

So Hannah's crying out.

And then here's the blessing that Eli, the priest, gives to her in 1 Samuel 1:17.

1 Samuel 1:17

Then Eli answered, Go in peace, and the God of Israel grant your position that you have made to him.

So Hannah goes away encouraged, hopeful, and maybe this God will answer my prayer in this way.

And then verse 19 gives us this.

They rose early in the morning and worshiped before the Lord, then they went back to their house at Ramah.

And El Kanaan knew Hannah his wife, and the Lord remembered her.

I love that.

The Lord remembered her.

Not as if he forgot, but he takes a special care into the heart of his daughter here.

So then Hannah conceives.

She bears a son and she names him Samuel.

And then she prays or sings this prayer in chapter 2.

It's this prayer of praise or worship, saying, God, you are enthroned, you're sovereign.

And then we see a word-for-word copy in that prayer of what we have here in Psalm 113.

This is 1 Samuel 2.8.

It's going to sound familiar.

He raises up the poor from the dust, he lifts the needy from the ash heap to make them sit with princes.

So as the people of God would sing this psalm, Psalm 113, they would be reminded of this very special moment where the enthroned God met with this precious woman in her grief and in her heartbreak.

This enthroned God met with this woman so torn up that she couldn't even eat.

God steps down from his throne of glory to meet her there.

Psalm 113 shows us this great downward to upward sweep of the gospel, where the high and lifted up God of creation humbles himself ongoingly, not unapproachable or uninterested in his people, but one who throws himself on their mess.

We know this for one great reason.

Hebrews 1, 1 through 3 gives us this.

Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world.

He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power.

After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the majesty on high.

The revealed and redeeming God of the Old Testament, with his name, with his word, and with his deliverance at the turn of the millennium, was then revealed in Jesus Christ, born of a woman.

The joy of Hannah has become the joy of Mary, who gave birth to the sinless Son of God, who then in Luke 1 would give a song of praise much like Hannah's in 1 Samuel 2, which is Mary's magnificat in Luke 1.

For one far greater than Samuel is here, Jesus Christ our Lord.

Derek Kidner in his commentary on this psalm writes this verses 7 and 8 anticipate the great downward and upward sweep of the gospel, which was to go even deeper and higher than the dust in the throne of princes from the grave to the throne of God.

It is here that God's glory most sharply differs from man's, a glory that is equally at home above the heavens and at the side of one grieving person.

And no one knows this downward and upward sweep more than the Son of God, Jesus Christ, who from eternity past was in perfect communion and in fellowship with God in heaven, but stepped into time, put on flesh, lived a sinless life, and died a death beyond imagination that just those who would simply believe would be brought even beyond the heights of princes.

Paul in Philippians 2 kind of shows us this downward movement of Christ for sinners.

He says, This have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men, and being founded human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

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 confessed that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father.

So what this tells us is that the exalted and throned King, Jesus Christ, he took all the benefits he had as God, he placed them to the side.

Being born as a human in a stable surrounded by donkeys, needing to have his bottom wiped, the Lord Jesus Christ went to the deepest of depths, to the bottom of the ashes, to the deepest and darkest places, so that he might bring you and me who were there up to unimagined heights of glory.

So, beloved, what else is there to do?

As we look upon our revealed and redeeming God who is exalted and throned on high and at the same time is eager to step into our depths, what else is there to do but what the psalm says?

Hallelujah.

Now, before we close, there's one big thing we need to wrestle with together.

How far do the promises of this psalm reach?

In other words, hey Sam, this sounds great.

This sounds great, but I've been trying to have a baby for years.

Sam, this sounds great, but my best friend, my sister, my daughter hasn't been able to get pregnant for years, and she is torn up.

Sam, I'd love to be able to sing like Hannah, like Mary, but what if I don't ever get pregnant?

Does that mean this psalm isn't delivering on its promises?

I want to say a couple things to this.

First, as I said before, that there are not many griefs as painful as the inability to get pregnant.

It is rich with tears, with hopelessness.

And I want to say first that it is not a grief that God is far from.

He cares deeply and tenderly for the barren woman.

So if that's you, if that's a best friend, a sibling, God loves to sit in that grief with you and feel it with you.

Now the second thing is that the upward movement that the Psalm does promise is only a taste of what it'll be in glory.

Meaning we don't get the full taste of this upward movement until Jesus returns and makes all things new.

Until that day, we're going to be living in this paradox, what theologians have called the already but the not yet.

Meaning we are already beloved, already forgiven, already redeemed, and we get the full tastes of those things, but we are still living in a world that is terribly damaged by sin.

In a world of death, of depression, of addiction, of barrenness.

And so this psalm is not promising for all things to be made right now.

But it is promising that one day all things will be made right.

And so we don't get a full taste now, but we have hope for the full taste then.

So I want to close our time together reflecting on this beautiful reality that this psalm invites us into.

Jesus, our Lord, was born into a Jewish family, which means that he celebrated the Passover year after year, which means that at the Last Supper with His disciples at Passover, on his last night on earth, just hours before he would offer himself as the Passover Lamb, he would sing our psalm with his disciples, knowing exactly what he was about to do.

Knowing that he was about to be the Passover Lamb.

Knowing that he was going to be the Lamb without blemish, who would throw his blood on the altar of the cross so that just you and I, who would just believe, would be brought from death of our sin into life in the cross of Christ.

So here's what we're gonna do.

I'm gonna read this psalm one more time, and as I do, I want you to just take a deep breath and feel the relief of your forgiveness.

And imagine your Lord Jesus with all of his best buds on his last night on earth, about to break bread together for Passover, and they're about to sing this song together.

This psalm, knowing what's coming next, because, beloved, sometimes all there's left to do is sing.

So picture your Savior singing this with me at Passover, Psalm 113, one more time.

Praise the Lord.

Praise, O servants of the Lord, praise the name of the Lord.

Blessed be the name of the Lord from this time forth and forevermore, from the rising of the sun to its setting, the name of the Lord is to be praised.

The Lord is high above all nations, and his glory above the heavens.

Who is like the Lord our God who is seated on high, who looks far down on the heavens and the earth?

He raises the poor from the dust and lifts the needy from the ash heap to make them sit with princes, with the princes of his people.

He gives the barren woman a home, making her the joyful mother of children.

Praise the Lord.

Hallelujah.

Yes and amen.

Let's pray.

Father, I thank you that you did not look upon your sinful estate of creation and say good luck.

But rather, as we see clearly in our scriptures today, that you, the God enthroned on high, who has stepped into time, giving us an open door into life and light and joy and forgiveness.

So Lord, we just ask that you would help us see that you're not a God far off, that you're a God who has stepped into our reality, both with us being freed from our sin, but also us in our present moment with all the struggle, all the pain, all the grief, all the barrenness, all the depression, all the doubt.

Lord, you do not shy away from our struggle.

You do not shy away from our tears and our questions, but you say, Come to me all who are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

So, Father, would you open our hearts all the more to the beauty of the cross and the sufficiency of Jesus for our full forgiveness and belovedness?

And as we receive the sacrament, Lord, would you even make it fresh for the first time?

We pray this all in Jesus' name.