Final Charge | Psalm 103:1-5 (May 8) Mike Armstrong

Hello and welcome to the Redemption Church Podcast.

We're a church in Newmarket, Ontario, Canada that exists to glorify God through the fulfillment of the Great Commission and the spirit of the Great Commandment.

Thanks for joining us today.

Father, we're here to gather today to worship you, to praise you, to praise our holy triune God, Lord.

And as we have done that, and as we seek to continue to praise your name, Father, we pray that you would receive it.

We pray that you would be honored.

We pray that you would be glorified.

Father, we pray that in all things we would seek to give more of our lives to you.

Lord, I pray that we would seek to surrender.

I pray that we would do all that we can to find our hope and our satisfaction in you.

And so, Father, receive our praise.

Speak to us as we uh work uh through your word here this morning.

Uh Lord, bless us, Lord.

We know you have blessed us.

We know there are so many blessings that we have by way of our relationship with you as we talk about those very things today, Lord, stir our hearts with joy.

Lord, we pray all of this in Christ's name.

Amen.

Amen, amen.

Hey, we'll go ahead and grab a seat.

Good morning and welcome.

Uh redemption.

Like I said, we're gonna get into the word of God here in just uh a second, but uh two quick things I want to say.

Happy Mother's Day to all the mothers here.

We're thankful for you.

We love you, we trust that your families are gonna celebrate uh you today and uh show you lots of love.

Uh and in the same breath, I've said this before in previous uh Mother's Day and Father's Day.

Uh sometimes for some of us uh this is not a joyful, uh happy day at all, as it uh reminds you of difficult relationship maybe that you had with your uh mother.

Maybe it's hopes and dreams that have not been realized uh for you.

And so we want to uh express our sensitivities to that and uh know uh that uh we've been praying for you as well, uh leading in uh to today.

Um and so uh again consider that.

You know, when we think about Mother's Day and the joy that that is for so many, it's uh it's a hard day.

I know of uh women who uh can't even come to church on Mother's Day because of how difficult it is, and so uh our hearts go out to you uh as well.

Again, uh before we get into the word here, one more thing.

You've uh you've seen, you saw the announcement, you see on the on the chair in front of you there are those QR codes.

Now I know we've talked about these every week and you don't listen at all uh whatsoever when we talk about those, but this is uh for you really to help us.

Okay, we want to pray for you.

Okay, we we have a heart to pray for you.

Our elders, our leaders, and uh and so this is if you grab your phone right now.

Oh, he means it.

Yeah, yeah.

Grab your phone right now and scan it.

You take the picture app open, you scan it, you click on the link, and there's a place there.

Now, somebody put your phones back.

I saw it.

I saw you like show me, you pretend you're gonna do it, and then it goes back into the pocket.

No, grab it.

Seriously, grab it now.

It takes you to this page right here.

This is a way that you can connect to everything in our church.

But you go to that connect prayer hands thing, there's a place there for you to write in prayer requests.

Okay, and we want to do this.

This is like a huge part of our church.

It's one of our six distinctives.

We want to pray, but we need your help in being able to do that.

Yes, we can pray generally for you, absolutely, and we do, but we want to pray specifically uh for you as well.

Okay, and so fill that out, please.

This is not just a one-time thing uh because Mike's making you feel awkward and forcing me to do it.

This is like literally every Sunday, whether you're new or whether this is your church home, uh, you've been here from the beginning, literally every single week.

Grab your phone, fill that out.

That would be so helpful to us so we can be tracking with you and praying for you.

You can see all the different things there that you can find information about, giving, uh, registering for redemption kids.

You can watch the live stream right through there, which is maybe weird if you're in the room and also watching this.

Um, but there are ways that you can find weekly updates, everything, it's all right there.

Uh, please do that.

Don't just humor me.

Actually, do it.

That would be really helpful.

Thank you so much for that.

All right, Psalm 103.

Grab your Bibles, I will too, and uh turn it to uh Psalm 103 today.

Now, um something that I've noticed has uh it's actually probably more concerning about myself than I even realize is uh is how forgetful I am as a person.

Anybody else like that?

Am I alone in this?

We've got a few forgetful uh people for sure.

Um I'll give you a couple of examples.

Like a daily occurrence in my home.

I wish I could say it was like every other day or only five days a week, but it's literally seven days a week.

Uh, an occurrence for us is me forgetting where I put my earbuds, right?

The kids, they they get this uh uh as I'm like scrambling around looking for these things.

There are like three or four locations I would ever put them in in my in our house, and yet every day I can't remember, I forget where I put them.

We're running around, we have experienced the gamut of emotions when it comes to this.

Like it's been anger, it's been frustration, it's been like detached surrender to my forgetfulness, it's been laughing about it.

I mean, it's been quite the scene, okay?

That's one thing.

Uh a couple of weeks ago, uh so this was I, you know, I I had we had the family chat where I announced my resignation.

It was later that week on Thursday.

I forgot to set my alarm to go to men's ministry, and so everyone shows up uh without me.

I realized it like mid-morning, and I was like, oh my word, I'm gonna get destroyed by these guys for forgetting to come.

And you know, all the jokes started to roll in, of course.

Maybe the best one was uh, Mike, we just feel too sorry for you to make fun of you these days, which I thought was a particularly clever burn uh for sure.

But maybe my fur my favorite, my favorite um moment at all, when it calls favorite moment, was years ago.

Um I actually forgot one of my best friends' names.

Okay, we were like hanging out, there's a bunch of guys, and his name is Tom, and I like stumbled and I called him Tim.

And we like, you know what it's like when a bunch of dudes are together?

Like it just it was ruthless, right?

But not aimed at me.

Funny enough, it was aimed at him, and everyone's like, man, what a loser! Like, no one likes you, and everyone's ripping on him, and he's just sitting there like my best friend doesn't even know my name.

And I mean it continues on to this day.

Like, we all just call him Tim now.

It's been like 15 years.

He's in my phone as Tim Washburn.

Okay?

Listen, forgetfulness can be a can be a huge problem, and uh, it certainly is uh for me, but listen, it can also be a spiritual problem that we face, that we that we deal with, right?

And you know, if you've been walking with Christ for more than five minutes, uh you know how easy it is for us to forget spiritual things.

Right?

We forget things about the Lord and need to be reminded of them.

It's a big reason why we come to church and we hear the gospel week in and week out, because we need that reminder over and over again.

Right?

Something that we just read in our Bibles yesterday.

You know this, you had this quiet time, it had this profound impact on you, and you're taking those verses or that biblical story into your life, and it's and it and it means something throughout your moment-by-moment uh day, something like that can be all but forgotten 24 hours later.

Right?

And we and we fall back into the same old bad habits, or you know, maybe you're reminded of God's love through the gospel, and you're like, oh yeah, I need this, and it's it's maybe through a message, or it's that small group, and you're talking about that, and and it's the community, and wow, the love of God towards us is incredible, and then you know, by the drive to work the next morning, we're struggling again and we're and we're doubting God's love.

Right?

This kind of thing, it just happens to all of us, happens all the time.

Okay, well, today uh we begin kind of crazy, my final sermon series with you as your pastor, and and I mean it's weird.

It's weird even say that uh out loud for me.

Um and admittedly, you know, though I'm not trying to be like mushy about this or anything, um it kind of hit me hard this week as I was thinking about that.

You know, I'm just thinking, man, this is this is really happening?

Like this is this is weird.

I mean, it honestly is, but but I really want to conclude my time with you as your pastor uh with a final charge to you.

Okay, and then so this is gonna be four messages.

That's how many Sundays uh we got together, four messages that will hopefully you know leave some of the most important themes and and truths of the Bible just ringing in your ears, right?

As we transition here, that's what's gonna be striking to your souls, right?

So to conclude our time together well, right?

To conclude our time together well, but to also, you know, to also kind of set you up to hit the ground running uh with miles.

Okay, so today's message is really about remembering, okay, when we when we know, again, how easy it is to forget.

We've been talking about that.

But remembering how awesome the Lord is.

Right?

As simple as that, how awesome he is, reminding ourselves of this, right?

Stirring up our souls with a sense of God's goodness.

Right?

His goodness towards you and I.

And that's really how Psalm 103 begins.

This Psalm has been, I think, powerful in my life.

I've read it so many times in the last uh number of months, but just notice with me here the first uh two verses.

You have your Bibles open.

Uh, read along with me.

Look what it says.

It says, Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me, bless his holy name.

And then he says again, bless the Lord, O my soul.

And notice this part, and forget not all his benefits.

Okay, forget not all his benefits.

You you see there what the psalmist is doing, right?

You see it?

I mean, he's he's like kickstarting himself here.

He's kickstarting his his forgetful, his potentially weary or or or maybe stagnant soul.

Right?

He's kind of getting that going again.

He's getting it going to bless God, to bless his and to praise him, to marvel in his excellence.

I mean, we we've all as parents we've we've had to had to wake our kids up in the morning, right?

And you you go into their room and you're like, hey, you know, Garris, time to wake up, kind of thing, and and and you know, they don't move.

And then so you kind of like maybe sit down on the edge of the bed and you kind of grab the shoulder and you kind of kind of nudge the shoulder a little bit, and and and maybe there's a bit of a stirring, and then you get time to get up, you leave, you come back, they're still not awake, right?

And so with your kids, you're like, okay, it's time to get up, right?

Let's go, right?

We're we're we're it's it's getting crunch time here.

And and and that's really what the psalmist is is doing here.

It's like what he's doing to his to his own soul.

He's uh he's trying to awaken it.

I mean, what's meant by the word soul there is like that deepest part of us.

Okay, that like the fabric of our being.

Again, he's awakening, he's trying to revive his heart, his desires again that have kind of gone dry, his motivations that have gotten, you know, kind of gone in another different direction.

Okay, it's kind of like he's performing CPR for his soul.

That's what that's what this these verses are kind of getting at.

Now, here's how uh Derek Kidner uh puts it.

We'll get this on the screen for you.

He's a theologian.

He says this.

He says, he says, the psalmist is rousing himself to shake off apathy or gloom, using his mind and memory to kindle his emotions.

Right?

That's so good.

I love how he he puts that.

And I mean, how how often do we find ourselves in need of doing that when it comes to the Lord, right?

I think for many of us, the last two years have felt like this.

Right?

It's gotten us into this weird place, this strange rut where we just feel off.

Right?

I've said it, right?

We feel we feel low, we feel distant from the Lord.

We feel stagnant in our souls, we feel numb even.

And as Christ followers, we we sense this need to have our love and our joy and our passion, all those things for the Lord to be resuscitated again.

But again, the big question is how do we do this?

How do how do we revive?

How do we be revived?

Right?

What is our responsibility in this?

You know, the Lord is going to come and meet us and do that work in our hearts for sure, but we're not entirely passive in it, right?

So how do we do it?

Okay, well, the psalmist here he he he points the way.

Notice what he says again.

We looked at it, but I'll say it again, verse two.

He says, Forget not all his benefits.

Okay, in other words, remember.

Remember the benefits of the Lord.

Okay, that that word benefits there, it means goodness.

Remember God's goodness.

Right?

Remember the blessings that we have in Christ, or the advantages to you and I that come as a result of our relationship with God.

Right?

There are many advantages.

I mean, do you ever think of it that way?

Do you stop and consider?

Like, man, I am so blessed.

Like, there it is, so awesome to be a Christian.

It is incredible to know God.

How amazing that I have the God of the universe in my life, all the things I get from Him.

Right?

I I I think maybe it's kind of easy for us to forget those things and to have sort of this warped, jaded view of the Christian life.

We can get into that place where we get so so caught up maybe in this just in the sheer difficulty of it.

Right?

The challenges of being a Christian.

Like, for example, maybe where we're like, you know, wow, like I seriously, I gotta put up with him or or her in my life, this person at church or or my small group or my family.

Like, doesn't this person realize how difficult they are?

Right?

And we we look at that as a challenge and a hassle and a pain only instead of maybe a good thing.

Maybe the Lord has put that person in our life for our sanctification, to test us, to strengthen something that is weak in us, to point out our need for Christ.

Right?

That's just one example.

Maybe for some of us that you know we think about the difficulty of life and and and the challenges being a Christian in the sense of like, like, oh man, like I I I gotta serve again this weekend in the church?

Like I served three weeks ago or last week or whatever it was, and like really, this is inconvenient.

You know, what a hassle.

This isn't this is this rubs against what I would rather do.

Seriously, or or wait a second, you're saying that I need to read my Bible every day?

Like that's that's work.

That's that's that's difficult.

Don't you understand my life?

I gotta be on the road by 5 a.m.

I come home, I'm tired.

I don't I don't have time for this, I don't have the energy for this.

You know, as and as we look at those things, they're they're all actually you can look at them as good things, but but as we look at them with with kind of this negative spin that we put on it, and and and those those those thoughts kind of get reinforced, those attitudes kind of kind of flow through our soul over and and over again, it becomes very easy to really deep down wonder, you know, what are the benefits of being a Christian?

Like this just kind of stinks, to be honest.

Like it's hard.

This is this is brutal.

Like, what advantages, benefits are there from knowing Christ?

Right?

We're too well versed in behaving like good Christians to actually say that out loud.

But do you sense those things circulating through your soul sometimes?

They they swirl, don't they?

Which which necessitates this much-needed perspective shift, this wake-up call, this snap to attention that we've been talking about.

Okay, and so the writer says here that we we get to that point of being awake and being revived by by remembering all of his benefits.

And he gives us here a list of them for us in the next just three verses.

We're only looking at verses one to five.

We've already looked at two this morning.

So let's get to what are these benefits, okay?

What are they?

Well, the first thing here is this my soul comes alive as I remember the benefits of the Lord.

You want your soul to be revived and come alive again?

Well, here's the first thing He forgives and heals me.

He forgives and heals me.

And I think we see these benefits as clearly as can be in verse 3.

It says, Who forgives all your iniquity, who heals all your diseases.

This is the benefit of the Lord.

Now, now that the Lord forgives all your iniquity, which is really just another word for sin, okay, that he forgives all your iniquity is shockingly amazing when you consider just how much iniquity we've all racked up over the course of our lifetimes.

Right?

That he forgives every single one of it.

To know that in Christ, our our past, right, our present and our future sins are all forgiven is not just a wild thing to consider, right, to think about.

It's actually a necessary thing to think about.

You know, when we when we when we try as we try to remember here, it it's not and it's not just the amount of sin that's forgiven, but also the the actual specific types of sin, the the the depth of our iniquity that's forgiven.

Right?

That's another crazy thing here.

It's good for us to remember that too.

Because we can easily begin to doubt that.

We can doubt the forgiveness that God offers us.

Right?

We can question it.

We can kind of get ourselves thinking like, does God really forgive that sin?

Like surely he can't.

Like, like maybe for you, you've got some some dark secrets.

Right?

And perhaps you've doubted his forgiveness as just that area you've kind of kept locked away in a box in a dark corner somewhere.

Like doubted that he'd actually forgive you for the abortion that you had years ago that you've hidden.

Right, that not even your spouse knows about.

Or maybe it's the unspeakable abuse that you're responsible for.

And it's still going on.

And you're like, no way, no way the Lord would forgive me of that.

It's truly shocking to you and I when we consider that in Christ all of it, right?

All of our iniquity is forgiven.

It's not held against us anymore.

He's not continuing to bring that up to you.

It's paid for entirely by your Savior.

It's washed in his blood.

That's what happened.

Right?

Might I suggest that not having the wrath of God aimed at us anymore, no matter what you're guilty of, that's uh that's a rather great benefit to being a Christian.

It really is.

Now, that being said, some of us might actually have uh an easier time accepting that God forgives all of our sin more than we can accept the next part that it says there.

That he heals all your diseases.

Right?

You might look at that and you might go, well, wait a second, that's that's not true.

How does he heal all our diseases?

What about terminal cancer?

What about like Parkinson's?

Right?

Obviously, these are these are diseases that aren't always healed.

Now to help us understand this and wrap our heads around it, uh the the those word that the words forgives and and and heals are used there in the same sentence there that you see there in verse 3, that it that it's used there in the same sentence suggests that heals all your diseases is is intended here as more of a metaphorical phrase connected to the forgiveness of sins of the first part of that verse.

Which which the forgiveness of sins, that that's a spiritual disease.

Right?

Do we do we understand that?

So it means I think it's more metaphorical there than a reference to physical diseases being healed, which God does do sometimes as well.

But of course, we know doesn't always happen.

Okay, so when he says he forgives all your iniquity and who heals all your diseases, kind of two ways of saying the same thing.

Okay, the benefit that the psalmist is telling us to not forget about.

He's like, Don't for don't forget those things that you and I receive through Jesus.

It's that we're forgiven and healed.

We are forgiven and healed.

The disease of sin is no longer terminal for those of us in Christ who've been forgiven.

He heals you and I of the eternal effects of sin, which is ultimately what?

It's death.

Right?

It's it's it's hell.

And he does this by giving you and I eternal life, raising you and I from spiritual death to spiritual life through Christ.

So that you and I can enjoy our healing forever in glory with our Heavenly Father.

Now, like I said, these are the kinds of things that you and I kind of naturally and very easily forget.

Right?

And we're gonna talk about a couple of more here, but before we move on to more benefits of knowing the Lord very quickly, here are four ways that we forget God's benefits.

Okay, four ways.

We're gonna get them on the screen here.

There's all four uh all at once.

We'll go through them very quickly, but these are some of the ways our our forgetfulness tends to manifest itself.

Because maybe you're thinking, I don't know if I really forget.

I remind myself quite a bit.

So, what do you mean by forgetfulness?

Well, I mean these four things.

There's probably more.

But the first one is just that we neglect them.

This may be the most obvious.

We neglect thinking about God's benefits.

We we lose focus, we get caught up on other things, other issues of life, and and these benefits kind of drift into the recesses of our of our minds and our hearts, where they sort of lose that moment to moment, you know, on the ground benefit and impact and meaning that they're to have.

In our lives, right?

So we neglect them.

The second one there says we don't plumb their depths.

That's another way that we forget God's benefits.

We don't plumb the depths of these things, right?

We understand that God forgives and that he heals in a very surfacey way.

And we haven't really stopped to consider what is that exactly?

Like let's let's plumb the depths of that a little bit more and understand that.

So it has a deeper impact and a different meaning, other than just a Sunday school of answer, right?

Of forgives, heals.

Because we don't plumb their depths.

How about the third one?

We don't we stop applying them personally.

This is a huge way that we forget God's benefits.

We tend to think about things like forgiveness and God heals.

We think of those things conceptually.

This is an idea, this is a thing that exists out there, but we don't, we don't draw that into our own experience and consider how those things are true for us.

How has God forgiven us?

How has God healed me?

Or what do I still need to seek forgiveness for or healing from?

Right?

Sometimes we're we're much better at applying these things to other people than we are in applying them to ourselves.

That's the way we forget.

And then, of course, the last one there is just we think of them in their past tense only.

Like how awesome the Lord is for what he has done, which is true.

But we think of all the benefits and all the great things, the forgiveness, the healing, the rest that we're gonna look at.

That's a past tense thing.

And we're not that great really at thinking about what that means for us right now, and what that means for us tomorrow, and what that means for us eight months from now.

Right?

We we think of them in the past tense, and I think it is much more helpful for us when we start to think beyond past tense to now and into the future.

Alright, so he forgives all our iniquities, he heals all our diseases.

Again, just two of the advantages of the blessings that you and I receive from knowing the Lord Jesus Christ.

Here are the next ones.

My soul comes alive as I remember the benefits of the Lord.

He redeems and honors me.

He redeems and honors me.

Verse four says, Who redeems your life from the pit, who crowns you with steadfast love and mercy.

Okay, let's look at that first part there.

When I think about how God redeems my life or our life from the pit, my mind naturally goes to Joseph.

Right?

You think about the guy who was who was literally tossed in a pit by his jealous uh older brothers, and then he was sold into slavery.

We can read all about that in Genesis chapter 37.

Genesis 37 · chapter mention

Okay, but really that this whole story, Joseph's whole story, is one of redemption, right?

It's one of rescue.

That's what the word redeems means.

Rescue.

He was rescued from the pit, right, by the Lord, and years later he's actually used by God to rescue his brothers, right?

To rescue his father's family from this bad famine that had taken place.

You know, all by way of this position of power that he'd been given by Pharaoh in Egypt.

His entire life story is a story of redemption, but so was ours.

The entire Bible is about redemption.

That's why we named our church that.

Right?

Like that, that is, that is it.

We've been rescued.

That's what this word is really uh speaking to uh to us about here.

And I'm sure you, you know, you can look back on your life and all these different moments and point to ways where the Lord has rescued you from various pits that you have been in.

You've been trapped in, where you feel helpless.

Because you are helpless, right?

And you can't claw your way out, and it's just a faint light at the top, and you can't see, and there's nowhere to go, and it's dark, and it's depressing, and it's scary, and it's it's all of those things.

Just a complete and total need for the Lord to do the work, right?

To do the redeeming, to rescue.

And I'm not trying to be dramatic here or anything, but that's kind of how I've been feeling about myself over the last couple of years.

It's been a pit.

Right?

And this verse, like I said before, it's brought me a lot of comfort.

Tell me to know that the Lord is still at work in my life.

I'm gonna cling to this.

One of the great benefits of the Lord is that he rescues us, he helps us in our time of need.

But beyond those life scenarios that we need to be redeemed of, those circumstances, ultimately this verse is pointing to the even greater reality that God redeems us from the pit of sin.

You know, from the pit of death and hell, and he and he rescues us by giving us eternal life.

Right?

This redemption, this rescue, whether in this life, as you and I encounter various hardships and challenges, or or when it comes to the eternal life that we've been promised through Jesus, right?

That he redeems our life from the pit.

It's such an epic benefit.

Incredible benefit we get from God.

We get that.

Now, the next part of verse 4 there is what does it say?

It says that he crowns you with steadfast love and mercy.

That he crowns you and I is very interesting.

It's to say that he actually honors us.

Right?

He honors you and I.

He awards us.

He presents you with accolades.

Isn't it incredible that God does this?

We often sometimes just think that you know the father is about wrath.

Right?

It's about punishment, it's about holiness.

We don't measure up and all that.

And and and maybe he's stingy towards us, or Jesus is the nice guy, the father is the bad guy.

Right?

We've been talking about this in men's and women's study lately, too.

Right?

But that's just that's just not true.

He crowns you, he honors you.

I mean, you think about a king or a queen being being crowned, right?

That is a that is an honor that is, you know, that just simply does not compare with much else in this life.

Being a king or a queen, I mean, you think about how many individuals from the beginning of time have been have been considered royalty throughout human history.

It's really not that that many people.

That God actually crowns and honors us is wild to think about.

You know, when we consider what we again, what we've already been talking about here this morning through our time together, just the the amount and the severity of our iniquity against him.

Right?

That God honors us, he crowns us, he showers us with with accolades.

It's hard for us to wrap our heads and our in our minds around that.

Okay, but understand this too, and this is what's so rich about that word crowns.

It doesn't just mean honor.

It actually also can mean to surround, okay, or or to envelop.

Okay, just as like a crown is you know, yeah a circle that envelops a person's head when it is placed uh on it, okay?

He he he surrounds you and I with, what does it say?

It says with steadfast love and mercy.

Right?

Steadfast love and mercy.

I mean, incredible that one of the benefits that God has lavished upon you and I is that He He doesn't simply decide not to destroy us because of what Christ has done.

That would be far better than we deserve, far more than we deserve, but it's that he actually honors us.

He surrounds you, he surrounds me, you know, he envelops us into this warm embrace of steadfast love and mercy.

That's what you and I get out of knowing God.

Right?

We've all had experiences in life where we've had like a parent or a teacher, maybe a coach, I don't know what it might be, but but somebody, somebody who's in authority who we've done something wrong, and they withhold punishment from us, right?

That's that's mercy, right?

But they do it in a way where it was also accompanied by by a very obvious coldness towards us, right?

Or a disdain towards us.

Like I'm letting you go, but you don't deserve it.

And there's there's an anger, there's a coldness, there's like a relational distancing in that moment.

Where, yeah, we're getting mercy, but we're also getting a bunch of other things along with it that that isn't so great.

Okay, but with God, we not only get the forgiveness and the healing and and redemption, we also get crowned with honor, drawn in to the sweetness of his steadfast love and mercy.

Steadfast meaning that it doesn't it doesn't waver for for even a moment.

It's steady, it's constant, it's it's prevailing.

That's what he draws you into, that's what he pours out on you.

Okay, realize the heart that God has for you as his child in this.

Realize how much he loves you.

Psalm 34, I love it.

Taste and see that the Lord is what?

He's good.

Taste it, see it, feel it, experience it, love it, know it.

Forget not these benefits.

That's what the psalmist is telling us.

I mean, as we're going through this, do you start, do you feel like the icy layer of your heart is starting to start to crack a little bit, and you feel the Lord starting to move and work as we stir these things up in our souls?

I mean, it's the goodness of God that has this effect on us.

Again, we're not quite done even with it all.

Here's the final set of benefits.

He satisfies and renews me.

He satisfies and renews me.

Verse five shows us that.

It says it very clearly: who satisfies you with good so that your youth is renewed like the eagles.

That the Lord satisfies you and I might be one of the most elusive things for us.

Right?

As first world Christians.

Like it's it's so hard for us to attain that satisfaction in God, I think.

Which again is it's it's a sad thing, isn't it?

I mean, it truly is sad, but it's because we've got so many other shiny things out there that distract us, that draw us in, that wow us, that but pull us in, that divert our attention away from the goodness of God and finding and achieving satisfaction in Him.

Right?

Things that promise to satisfy, but never really do, right?

That's the world.

We get easily suckered into all of that.

We get drawn in thinking that these earthly things are gonna satisfy when they just don't.

Right?

At best, they bring us temporary pleasure.

And so many of us would rather have that, I think, because we have not experienced the deep satisfaction that comes from knowing God.

You know, but all of that said, I it's kind of funny.

I've sensed in people over the last while some of my conversations with you, and I've been kind of sensing this in myself somewhat as well, more and more, that you know, the older that I get, the less, the less, I don't know, impressed I am by certain things of the world that I maybe found I was impressed by a while ago.

I mean, what the world offers, I'm just finding it less and less satisfying.

And not even just that, I'm finding some of those things deeply unsatisfying.

Like, man, why do I chase after that?

Why do I want that so much?

And again, I'm not saying that I can't be, you know, still impressed by certain things.

You know, I haven't arrived at anything yet.

And I'm also not saying that we shouldn't or can't even find some enjoyment in what this life has to offer and what God gives us to enjoy in this life.

I'm not saying any of that either.

It's just that I'm I'm kind of experiencing and noticing that the things that really used to capture me and wow me just don't really as much anymore.

You know, whether it's things like I've talked about before, golf and you know, getting new golf equipment, or it's the you know, the newest device, the newest iPhone, or the flashiest vehicle, and all the new every year something's coming out.

I'm just like, I don't, I don't know.

Like getting uh getting a new phone is like is it just me or is it that like one of the best days of the year?

Right?

Like we we like it.

It's it's it's fun, but I just have you noticed that like they're not that much better from year to year, and they don't satisfy me.

And literally before the end of the day, it's like it's the same phone, it's the same stuff.

Why do I put why do I have so much tied up and invested in this?

Notice how like satisfying myself with copious amounts of rich foods, right, which which I tend to run to, it doesn't satisfy me.

It makes me feel filthy, to be honest with you, and gross and unhealthy.

And then have you noticed this too?

The other side of that coin, like I'm gonna get healthy again.

I'm gonna go for a run, I'm gonna eat properly, I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna do that, and then achieving that, that also doesn't satisfy.

Not in the way that the world promises it will.

It spent billions and trillions to promise you and try and succor you into thinking that that is gonna satisfy.

They don't.

I just think more and more, I want to learn to find my satisfaction in Christ.

That's it.

Because He alone is where I'm gonna find it, right?

Where I'm gonna find the satisfaction that He has created me to experience.

iPhone doesn't plug the hole.

Golfing doesn't plug the hole.

Shopping sprees, vacations, bigger houses, more money, that that stuff doesn't satisfy us.

And we all know it, we've heard it before, I've said it before.

And yet we still go after it, don't we?

He alone is where we're gonna find it.

He satisfies you with good.

Do you feel this way?

Are you dissatisfied in your soul with the world and wanting to find that more in Christ?

I mean, let's go after that as God's people.

Let's pursue that.

And notice how it continues the thought here by adding, so that your youth is renewed like the eagles.

So your youth is renewed like the eagles.

I mean, that's a that's a hope-filled verse, right?

For a weary kind of post-mid whatever pandemic world we're in right now.

Right?

We need that.

Our youth, like vitality returned.

I mean, I don't know if I'm the only one who feels this way, but I feel like in the last two years, I've aged 20.

Like I just don't feel right.

I mean, I remember going to my my physiotherapist a little while back for hip problems.

I've actually talked about my hip problems, which is weird in a sermon, but I have.

Okay, and as he worked me over on the table and he's you know going through the right hip and then the left hip, he's working through range of motion.

He's like, wow, man, you have like the left hip of a of an 85-year-old.

And I remember kind of laughing and thinking, harsh, but fair.

And definitely how I feel.

I feel like an 85-year-old.

Listen, if you're feeling drained, like your vitality has been sucked out of you and evaporated, your exuberance depleted, whether that be emotionally, or mentally, or spiritually, or maybe even physically, all these things are connected, right?

Isn't it amazing to know that the Lord satisfies you and I with goods so that your youth is renewed?

The older we get, the more we like long for that, right?

Isn't it awesome to know that that not only is it possible to be rejuvenated and to be renewed in the Lord, but that God actually promises to do it.

He does it.

It's it's it's two of the benefits of knowing him, of our salvation.

Right?

I believe firmly that the Lord allows you and I to chase after satisfaction through what the world offers.

He allows you and I to feel weary and worn out and disappointed in various ways.

So that he can teach us that that a true sense, a true experience of these things can only be found in him.

Him alone.

Church, if I could just leave you with a few things over our next month together, one of them would be that you would see, that you would taste, that you would feel, that you would know that the Lord is good.

He's good.

That the benefits that he offers you today are richer than anything else you could long for, anything else that you could chase after.

That you would remember these things more often.

That you would remind yourself of these things over and over and over again.

And that your soul, your mind, you would come alive as you do this.

And that as a result, our souls would bless his name.

That's what he says over and over again, right?

The first two verses, that we bless his holy name.

So listen, let's let's do that together once more here as I pray.

Lord, we come to our great God, our heavenly Father, our amazing Savior.

Lord, we come before you and we rejoice in who you are.

We rejoice in your sheer goodness.

Lord, forgive us for forgetting those things, forgetting those benefits, even questioning, wondering, maybe even saying out loud at times that it's just not worth being a Christian.

Because life is difficult and life is hard.

Lord, forgive us for that because there is nothing more worth it.

There is nothing better.

Lord, I pray that we would remember, uh, like the psalmist does in Psalm 13, when he states that you have dealt bountifully with him.

Lord, I pray that that would be what we think.

That would be what we know, that would be what we understand and experience, that you have been bountiful to us.

These benefits abound.

That we would forget not all his benefits.

We've looked at around six or so.

There's there are far more than that, even.

God, would these things become sweeter to us?

Would you work through those crusty layers of our heart and our mind, the areas where we're blind, the areas where we're hurting, the areas where we're depressed, the areas where we're angry, that there all of those things, Lord, would you get into those areas of our hearts and souls and remind us of your goodness?

Lord, would you transform us by it?

Lord, we praise you and we thank you for your goodness to us in these ways.

And we pray this all in Jesus Christ's name.

Amen.

Amen, amen.

Well, hey, um, that's uh our time together this morning.

I want to leave you uh with that one more time.

Happy Mother's Day to all the moms.

We've got some flowers uh out here that we want to give you on your way out, so make sure uh that you grab one of those.

But have a great day celebrating with loved ones.

We'll see you next week.

You are loved.