Draw Near | One Thing (September 8th, 2019) - Mike Armstrong

Amen.

Well, go ahead and grab a copy of God's Word.

If you have one with you and get it open to the Psalms, Psalm 27 specifically.

And by the way, I will say this if uh if you don't have a copy of God's word, if you don't own a Bible, you can, or you forgot to bring yours, you can just go ahead and stick your hand up.

And uh one of our elders uh would love, or one of our ushers would love to get one uh into your hands.

And if you don't own one, uh you can keep that uh as uh as our gift uh to you.

All right, well, Psalm uh 27, certainly looking forward to uh starting off uh a new uh series to kick off our ministry uh launch here for this year.

Now, a quick question for you, and be thinking really about um this past uh week maybe, but have you you ever feel like uh life just gets a little bit overcomplicated at times?

Yeah, you definitely feel that, right?

I kind of heard the sigh or the groan.

I mean, I think back to school uh can certainly uh feel that way.

I mean, if you are a parent and uh maybe, I don't know, maybe this is uh more of a mom thing than a dad thing.

I'm like, I don't know, I just kind of went back to work, right?

For me, it just felt a little bit on the normal side of things, but uh but if you were a parent, maybe you sense that you know it's a little bit a little bit chaotic getting ready for that, and it's you know, it's all the back to school shopping that you've got to do, and I've got to make sure, yeah, I've got I've got the indoor shoes that are you know non-marking soles, and I've got the outdoor shoes, and I've gotta have, you know, I've got to pack their lunches again, like what a nightmare that is.

And of course it's gotta be, you know, peanut-free, and you know, maybe it's your, you know, it's a new school for your for your kids, and so you're you know mapping out new routes to school and trying to figure out what time do I need to leave, and it's you know, drop-off times and pickup times and getting to know you know new families and your teachers and all of that kind of stuff.

I think as a as a parent, you can feel a little bit like you know, kind of muddled about this and and how to kind of how do I sort all of this out.

And I think that's the same way for uh students, right?

In in maybe different ways.

I think certainly the older you get as a student, as you go you know into high school, certainly, and definitely as you know head off to university, there's kind of a lot being thrown at you uh in that first week.

Again, maybe it's the first time you've left the house and you've moved out, and you know, moms are all gonna start crying right now, maybe, but uh you've moved out and it's trying to figure out you know a dorm, and I've got all these you know roommates now that I've got to get to know and used to, or it's living in an apartment, and I used to be on campus last year, and you're trying to figure out bus routes and and learning that whole transit system, and then you know you go to your first classes in that first week, and you know, man, that is a lot being thrown at you too, right?

I remember getting the syllabus for each class every every uh every day, and you would find out just how much work you're gonna have to do over the next you know several months.

And uh that is, I mean, frankly, let's think about this.

Right?

It's overwhelming at times for a lot of us.

You know, and if you're a parent of a of a child going to school and maybe had to drop them off at university, or you're a you're a student trying to just figure out the course load and all of it, I think it'd be it'd just be quite a challenge for us to just kind of whittle it all down to, you know, what you know, what should my main focus be?

Right?

Like how you know how how do I do this?

What do I need to prioritize here so I can you know kind of cut through all the noise and you know the convoluted collection of demands and all the various responsibilities that I have and actually accomplish the things that I'm supposed to do?

Now, I think the Christian life can feel a little bit like that sometimes, right?

Complicated.

You ever feel that way?

You ever think about all that it entails, and you're just like, man, I just feel I feel overwhelmed by this.

I mean, you take the Bible alone, right?

You take this book and you're like, man, that is that's that's thick.

There's a lot of words in here.

This is this is dense material, and you know, it just feels like a mountain I've got to climb, and I'm at the very foot of that, and I don't even know how to understand it, let alone press it into my heart and soul and learn about God.

I mean, this is gonna take a long time.

We can feel that way.

I think we can feel that way when it comes to church as well.

You know, how do I how do I find a good church and a church where I'm gonna be fed, a church that's gonna be good for my family, a church where I can trust the leadership and you know, and get involved and plugged in and get to know people, and you know, and then start serving and you know, think about giving and all of these different things.

All of that can feel like a bit much.

And then maybe you also consider just your own personal growth as a follower of Christ.

You're like, man, I've got a lot of a long ways to go here.

A lot of growth is needed and required in my life.

And then you think about, well, wait on a wait a second, it's not just about me, it's about it's about others as well, it's about pouring into them, it's about my my family.

You think about discipling your family and you know, leading your crazy kids and you know, all of that type of thing, and that feels like quite a bit.

And then it's not just about your own family, but it's about serving other people and being a servant of them, blessing them and loving them really well.

Am I stressing you out?

Now I think that we would all agree that these are all very, very important things.

Okay, but maybe you've also wondered, man, like how how do I how do I uncomplicate this?

Right?

Just as much as possible.

What should my number one priority be as a follower of Jesus Christ?

How do I refocus and just get after that?

Or like, how do I do this?

Well, in Psalm 27, verse 4, David expresses that in the mayhem and in the complications of being the king of an entire nation, you can imagine the gong show that that would be, right?

Psalms 27:4

All the complexities and and the challenges that would go along with that, the number one thing that he is committed to prioritizing in his life.

You know what it is?

Being near God.

Like that's it.

That that is what I am going after, simplifying it as as much as humanly possible.

Because when you when you strip everything else away, that's that's ultimately what our walk with Christ is about, right?

Drawing as near as we can to the Lord.

And experiencing that you know that that richness, that that heart satisfaction, that that intimacy that comes from being close to Him.

And so what we're gonna do here, starting this morning, is spend the next several weeks looking at the Psalms and exploring how we can do this.

How do we actually do this?

I think this is a fantastic way to start off a busy fall.

Would you agree with that?

Right?

Today we're gonna have a, you know, I think it's gonna have a very kind of New Year's Day message feel to it.

As we're again, we're we're reassessing some things, and it's gonna be some new commitments and maybe some new goals for us as we consider how to, you know, reset and and recalibrate spiritually and focus on what matters most.

Alright, so I want to read this verse here today, just looking at one verse, we're gonna break it down into three parts as we go, but here's what it says here, Psalm 27, verse 4.

Psalms 27:4

And you've probably heard it before.

One thing I have asked of the Lord, that will I seek after, that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord, and to inquire in his temple.

Lord, I pray that as this one thing was David's priority, it would become ours as well.

Father, I pray that as each of us have likely had a little bit different week than uh we've been able to enjoy throughout the summer, just kind of the busyness and and all of it of readjusting to new fall schedules and new fall systems and new habits and all of these things, Father.

I know that these things can be overwhelming and challenging to us.

Father, I pray that as we think about this and get ourselves uh into a position here as a church where we can hit the ground running and jump back into the fall in this new ministry year with uh you know on all cylinders and have all that clicking, Lord.

I pray that we would not just, you know, try harder in a bunch of different areas, Lord, but we would really, really seek to be close to you.

Father, I pray that your Holy Spirit would use this one powerful, simple, amazing verse to transform hearts here today.

Father, we confess that we don't have the strength, but Lord, we also in faith prayer, pray and believe that through you these things are possible.

Lord, I pray that we would come away from this morning with wind in our sails and new joy and a new attitude, new commitments, new fire, Lord.

Not just to be better people, but Lord, to truly draw near to you and prior to prioritize that above all else.

And so, God, would you be merciful to your church today?

Lord, we confess our love for you, we confess our need for you, and so we ask that you would answer us, you would hear our cries, and you would meet us in this place.

We pray this all in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Amen.

Well, here's the first thing.

Uh, in your notes, if you like taking notes, the first or the number one priority of my life is to be near God.

All right, so I will resolve to go hard after this one thing.

Okay, now Psalm 27 already mentioned that it was written by uh King David.

Well, it was written by him uh during a season of his life, during a time of uh obvious turmoil.

All right, enemies and you know, adversaries and foes and evil ones.

This is all the language that he uses uh in this psalm.

They were constantly posing a threat, not just to him, but to uh the Israelite nation.

And as I'm sure he had just a million prayer requests going up to the Lord about that alone, right?

And we certainly see a number of them in this psalm.

Verse 4 itself is just so powerful because it expresses, you know, this acute moment of clarity and razor-sharp focus in the heart and in the mind and in the will of David.

Where he's just like, you know, in the in the complications and in the in the challenges and the busyness of my life, and you know, all the things that I would like to see happen, all the things that I would like to see get fixed and improved.

The bottom line is that what's best for me no matter what is that I saddle up as close as I possibly can to my creator and go hard as that after that as I can.

That's really what he says here in the first part of that verse.

Here it is, let's look at it again, verse 4a, if you will.

We're gonna look at A, B, C today.

It says this, as one thing.

One thing, I love that.

How clear is that?

You need to underline that, highlight that in your Bible.

One thing I have asked of the Lord that I will seek after.

Okay, what he's expressing here is that when you boil down his life purpose, amongst all the other tasks and goals and commitments and responsibilities and the busyness that compete for his attention and his time and his energy and you know, all of you know those things, he's gonna seek after this one thing above all.

Now, because we've already read the entire verse, we know what this one thing is.

It's it's to dwell in the house of the Lord.

Okay, we're gonna get into that a little bit more uh as we go here, but real simply put, it just means you know being near God.

Right?

That that's that's what he's going after.

And so in this here, David gives us this amazing key here to simplifying our our lives, right?

When you and I, when we feel overwhelmed by by the chaos of it and just the demands that are constantly uh on us, right?

It's it's to seek after him.

Right?

To seek after you know means literally to search for or or or to investigate carefully.

All right, all right.

So so the the vibe of this verse here is is intensity, right?

There's nothing passive about what David's saying.

There's nothing you know aloof about all this.

He's he's not trying to mail this in at all.

He's like, man, I'm going hard after this.

He's resolved, right?

He really is.

Now, why should you and I, you know, in the busyness and in the you know the constant demands and you know the various intricacies of of our you know life circumstances, why should we focus on this one thing?

Right?

Why that?

Like, like shouldn't we shouldn't we actually maybe just try and put more effort and and and more energy into all of those balls that we're trying to juggle, all of those plates that we're trying to spin?

Trying to fix all of those problems and handle all of those situations that life is throwing at us?

Like on one hand, maybe you're kind of thinking this a little bit in your mind, on one hand, doesn't it almost seem maybe even a little irresponsible here on David's part?

You know, to just kind of push his responsibilities off to the side, you know, and focus on the Lord more.

It kind of feels like a bit of a hippie mentality, David.

Really?

You're just gonna selfish.

He seems a little bit short-sighted.

It takes his eyes off of you know all of those fires that that need to be put out in his life and all the all the responsibilities and demands that are on him.

Won't those fires just rage hotter?

Maybe you thought that about your own life.

I think we all do.

You know, we all get kind of stressed and overwhelmed by the busyness and by the demands and all of that, and we try to figure out how am I gonna put more attention into this?

We just get more and more overwhelmed by it.

Well, first of all, no one here is is advocating for abandoning our responsibilities.

Okay, can we make that clear?

All right, this isn't to suggest here that David just needs to stop going into work.

You know, just just you know, just stay home.

You know, just live in this constant state of alone time with the Lord, and you know, just grab your journal, David, and a you know, a pen and a quill and your harp and your lyre, and get into a room, just you and the Lord, just let Israel burn all around you, and that's what's gonna bring glory to God.

No, that's not that's not what anyone's saying, that's not what he's saying.

This is really getting at here is that when you and I, we we prioritize being near God, okay, and and resolve to go hard after that one thing.

What it does is it actually reframes the rest of life for us.

It puts all of our problems and all of our responsibilities and the difficulties, all of that into perspective where they belong.

David didn't ignore his problems and the very real challenges that he was up against.

In fact, it was the opposite.

He acknowledges them openly.

I mean, how many psalms?

I've never counted them up, but how many Psalms do we know of that that David, where he wrote them and he's just like, my life is a disaster, right?

And he's just very open about all of that.

And there are some where he's really struggling, and some where he's in a you know a little bit better place.

Right?

So he all he acknowledges this.

He's not trying to hide it, and and we shouldn't either.

Shouldn't run away.

But because he was pursuing and and enjoying in this psalm, you know, a closeness to God, his problems, his situation, it was all reframed and it was all they were all right-sized.

Right?

They no longer consumed him and led him to, you know, we've all been in this place, that dark place of you know, anxiety over our life and and even despair.

When we go hard after the Lord, our our our problems and our challenges, they don't they don't disappear.

They don't go away.

I w I I wish they did.

Right?

But a sense of calm and and and peace can begin to flood our hearts when we're near Him, which allow us to tackle all of these things, to tackle all of life, really, from this position of trusting God with all of it.

Our problems, again, may not go away.

In fact, they might even get worse.

And again, we're certainly not saying that it's right to abandon our God-given responsibilities, but at least when we're searching after this one thing, we can have a strong sense that the Lord is with us.

We have a stronger, stronger sense of his love for us, and then he's strengthening us in the middle of all of these things.

And so, hey, as you kind of think about your own life and as you take stock of where you're at in terms of being near God, would you say that, yeah, I'm close to him?

Can you legitimately say that right now?

Can you say that there is a growing intimacy in your walk with him?

Is that the number one priority of your life?

Or have you kind of gotten sidetracked and distracted from all of that?

Maybe even just over the last this past summer?

Have you found that you've kind of you know pushed him off to the back burner?

You know, what are the areas of your life, as you really think about this, that that you need to kind of give some attention to and shore up so that you can draw near to him again.

Now we're gonna have a list of different areas of our life that are gonna come up on the screen and we're gonna go through these and unpack these a little bit, but before we even throw the first one out, can I just tell you this?

The goal here is to simplify.

Okay, so as you're gonna look at eight things, one of the real dangers I think here is like this is actually stressing me out even more.

Because any one of us, we're gonna look at all eight of these things and be like, man, I have a long way to go in all of those.

Right?

And I absolutely feel the exact same way.

So here's the thing a friend of mine really challenged me on this uh very recently.

He said, Hey man, what are some of your goals over the over the fall?

He said, How many do you have?

And I said, Well, probably, you know, around a half dozen or so.

He's like, hey man, one or two.

One or two.

Bite-sized chunks here.

If we try and take on too much, we're probably not gonna do real great at any of them, and we're gonna feel even more down about it all in the end.

And so I would really challenge you with this here, as we go through these eight things, pick one or two areas and resolve to use them as a means or a vehicle to help you go hard after the Lord this fall.

These are all areas that, you know, when neglected, will cause us to function in a sub-op at suboptimal levels and limit our ability to really go after the Lord hard.

All right, so with all of that being said, let's look at the first one here: the word.

Yeah, that we could start with some kind of low-lying fruit here.

I think uh we would all understand, and you certainly heard me say it before, that uh getting in the word of God and scripture intake and reading our Bibles, studying our Bibles is a great avenue of knowing the Lord, understanding who he is, drawing close to him, going hard after him.

And the idea here is not to guilt trip anybody into really anything.

That's a lousy motive for lasting change.

But for you, uh perhaps you kind of know this, like, man, I I've just put the word of God aside.

You know, I've I've spent a lot of time this summer just kind of resting and relaxing and entertainment and pleasure and all of that kind of thing.

And I haven't really studied, and and I know that I'm far from the Lord.

I'm not very near Him.

And so maybe the Word of God for you, you need to make a commitment or a resolution here today.

Resolve, go after that.

Single day, I'm gonna get in God's word, even if it's 15 minutes.

I'm gonna open it up, I'm gonna study it.

Maybe for you it's it's it's picking, you know, one book of the Bible.

I'm gonna I'm gonna try and master that this fall.

I'm gonna spend all my time in Ephesians, and I'm gonna go over it with a fine-tooth comb.

I'm gonna read it multiple times.

I'm gonna get a commentary to help me, I'm gonna really try and study this and learn this and understand what Paul was saying in that.

That's just an example.

Or I'm gonna read the entire New Testament before the New Year starts.

Maybe for you, you you read the Bible, and that's not that's not really the issue for you, but you you find that your study of it or your retention of it is is a little bit shallow.

And so for you, maybe it's you know employing a method like the soap method.

You ever heard that before?

Soap stands for scripture, observation, application, and prayer.

And so it's like you know, reading, reading the scripture, getting into it.

That's the S.

The O is observation, it's observing and trying to learn and understand.

What does this mean?

What is this, what is this saying?

How do I understand this?

And doing some further study in that.

The application pieces, what is this saying to me now?

What do I need to do?

Is there something I need to change in my life?

Is there something I need to act upon?

And then P is the prayer part.

We're gonna pray, Lord, would you transform me in this way?

In the thing that I have read, that the section that I have read this morning or today, would you make this more true and more real in my life?

See, that's just kind of a simple across stick that really helps us just kind of glean some more out of the scriptures.

The word, that's the first one.

Second one here is prayer.

Prayer.

Have you sensed that your prayer life is just dry?

You know, and it's not enough communication with the Lord, and you've kind of gotten away from that and you've filled up your quiet time, your alone time with just other things that are not necessarily bad things, but they're getting in the way of this.

And it's maybe just a simple commitment to, you know what, on my way to work in the car, not gonna listen to music.

It's again, not let's say that music's bad.

I'm not gonna listen to a podcast.

I'm just gonna pray.

I'm gonna use that time to pray for my day.

I'm gonna pray for my family.

It's on the go train on the way downtown, whatever it might be.

There's a time you're gonna carve out to pray.

Maybe that's an area you need to go hard after.

Maybe for you it's this third one, it's it's worship.

And certainly this includes, you know, singing and that, but I'm kind of talking about our entire posture of worship.

You know, and maybe for you, you're you're you're not one that expresses your love for the Lord and exalts him and ascribes worth and glory to him from your heart with your words.

And so you need to kind of focus on that and think through that.

And maybe it comes down simply to preparing better for our times of worship here on Sunday mornings.

You know, I often wonder, and I know it's just so easy for us to really come in on Sundays and just be ice cold.

Right?

And again, maybe we haven't been in the Word of God, you know, this week, and there's other areas that have just been really stressed, and we've got our mind off of the Lord, and we come in here and we're not we're not really ready to sing, and if we do, it's more just kind of words, and I'm following along with what it says on the screen, but it's not coming from my heart.

Maybe you need to commit to, you know what, I'm I'm gonna pray, I'm gonna prepare for Sunday morning, that my heart would be in the right place.

Do you realize we only have like an hour and a half, two hours together each and every week?

It's an important time.

When we're not preparing for this, we're missing out on a huge piece.

We really are, and it takes us a while.

A couple of real simple ways that you can prepare for Sunday is study the passage in advance, even read it over.

Know that, hey, we're gonna be in the Psalms, and we're gonna be in Psalm 27, verse 4, and you're already kind of thinking it through.

Psalms 27:4

You're already ready for what I'm about to say, and well, how do I know what you're gonna be preaching, Pastor?

We can get on our mailing list, and every Thursday around 4 o'clock, we we send out an email to you and we tell you what the message is gonna be about, and here's some of the announcements coming up and some of the events that you need to prepare for and plan for.

Get on that list if you don't have if you're not on it.

A couple of other real kind of simple things to prepare yourself for for Sunday is come rested.

Like how many of us we stay up like crazy late on Saturdays and we're just exhausted, and we we drag ourselves in here and we're just not we're not sharp.

Right?

See how simple that is, but so important.

Here's another one.

You knew I was gonna say this.

Come on time.

For the love of Pete, come on time.

Right?

I mean, this is one that we we've just gotten like real bad at.

Right?

And we start the service off, and it's like three people sitting here.

Right?

And this is just a bad habit.

I mean, if we if we did this when it came to our work life, we'd all be fired.

Right?

Our boss wouldn't really put up with that.

I'm not trying to hammer you on this, but listen, it's it's so important.

Do you realize how much prayer and how much how much work goes in from our worship team and and and from our leadership and our staff to preparing a service that's going to exalt and glorify God.

Everything is chosen very carefully and very intentionally.

And yet some of us come in, you know, three, four, five, twenty-five minutes late, you're missing everything.

And you wonder why you come away sometimes, you're like, I didn't really get a whole lot out of that.

Because you're showing up late, it's it's a problem.

I would also say this, again, just really practical here.

Have your Sunday morning tasks prepared beforehand.

I was talking to somebody in our church this week who was sharing that you know, his mom used to literally lay out his clothes for him on Saturday nights and he could just get up and put those on.

I think that's genius.

Right?

It's brilliant.

How many times are we are we late to church just because we haven't scheduled ourselves properly on a Sunday morning?

We slept in late?

We haven't thought through what are the kids eating, we haven't picked their clothes.

We haven't done any of that.

Maybe for you it's using the time in the car with the family on the way into church.

Just pray.

Pray for me, please.

Pray for yourselves, pray for our church that the Lord would do an amazing work.

That He would prepare your hearts.

That's really the point of this.

Lord, would you prepare my heart so that the soil is fertile and that I would receive whatever it is you have for me?

Here's another one.

Bring your Bible.

Bring your Bible, man.

That's what we're about.

Right?

Opening up the scriptures.

Don't just sit there and listen to me.

Open up the Bible, have it with you, whether it's on your phone and it's an app, whatever it is, and look at this.

Part of what we're doing during a sermon is we're we're teaching you how to exegete a passage.

We're teaching you how to study it, we're teaching you how to how to understand it.

So have it open and be looking at it as we're going through this.

These are all, I think, relatively simple but very important things to prepare our hearts that we can become fiery worshipers of Christ.

Here's the fourth one.

Community.

I don't know, is this an area of your life that you need to shore up a little bit this full?

Maybe you're kind of an individualistic person.

I mean, our whole culture is completely built on that.

And you like to kind of do things your own way, and you kind of you're a lone wolf a little bit, and you like to be on your own, and you don't really, you know, you're fine without people, and you kind of feel that way.

Maybe you're an introvert.

I get that, I have a lot of that, a lot of that in me.

But listen, you need community, and try as you might, you can't deny it.

You need the encouragement, or you need the support of other believers here.

You need you need some accountability.

You know, some of you you're gonna want to make some commitments here this morning, but you don't want to tell anybody.

Well, why is that?

Because if or when I fail, I don't want to have to talk to somebody about that.

I don't want someone to hold my foot to the feet to the fire.

But we we need it.

And not just for these things, too.

We need community just you know to have fun.

We we need to get to know people, we need to be able to laugh.

We need to have we need to have a good time.

All of that is very, very important, I think.

Here's the fifth one, and again, this is we're starting to get real practical here.

Nutrition.

Really?

You're talking about nutrition?

Yeah, man, I am.

How many of us just feel so sluggish and we're tired all the time and feels like we're sick constantly.

It's because we don't eat well.

And I'm the last person who can you know just stand up here and claim that I know everything about nutrition.

I get there's a ton of confusion about there or what the you know the best way of eating is and and all of that.

And you know, my my aim, my goal, it's not to tell you exactly how to do it by any means, but but all of it to say just you know, you need to think about that.

Eating however you want, whatever you want, whenever you want.

It's just it's not good for you physically.

Right?

This this is probably not news to you.

We need to think about that.

When we don't think about our nutrition, we're not gonna be at our best to pursue the Lord and to follow Him.

We're not gonna be able to go hard after Him because we're exhausted all the time and we're sick all the time, and we just want to rest and we just want to recoup, and our and then the flame of our heart, the passion for the Lord just starts to dim a little bit because we're we have we have to recover all the time.

For some of us, it's stress eating.

It really comes down to discipline about some of these things, or it's comfort eating.

And trust me, I know that you know, talking about food, it's such a sensitive thing for people because for some it's the overeating thing, and for others, it's not eating enough, and it's food problems and issues with that, and body image stuff, and might be anorexia or bulimia, it might be some of those things.

And so I understand it.

We're trying to be sensitive here and understand that, but I think we really need to talk about these things.

I think we need to be that practical, church, not over-spiritualize some things and under-spiritualize others.

We need to think about our nutrition.

Here's another one, number six, fitness.

Fitness.

I think these all these things all go hand in hand, but I mean there have been so many studies done about how we just live these sedentary lifestyles.

You know, and we you know we sit in the car on the way to work, and then we sit at a desk all day at work, and then we sit in the car on the way home from work, and then you know, I'm kind of tired because I probably didn't eat well.

So I lay down on the couch, right?

We we just we don't move, and this is really not good for us.

And it might be something as simple as you know, building a walk into your routine.

Going to walk every day.

It's amazing how something as easy as that is so beneficial to us.

It's maybe something like running and trying to do that.

I hate running with a passion, just making that clear.

Maybe something like getting a gym membership and lifting heavy things.

I think that's really good for us.

Here's another real practical one, number seven, sleep.

Sleep, I kind of touched on it really briefly, but I'm not really talking about you know, those issues that some of us have had.

I certainly had it.

I've even talked a little bit about it here before, but I'm not talking about like waking up in the middle of the night stressed about life and some of that stuff.

I've gone through that.

That's that's hard, that's really difficult.

I'm talking about really the bad habits surrounding our sleep.

You know, again, we go to bed way too late, we've got screens in front of our face constantly, and so our brains are buzzing.

You know, and no wonder we can't get into deeper sleep, and no wonder we don't want to wake up and get with the Lord, and no wonder we sleep in and we're late for everything.

It's because we have just brutal habits around sleep.

And I remember about a year ago, I was kind of like studying this and looking into this, and I started, you know, actually just kind of shutting my phone off and shutting the screens off and going to bed.

I think it was like 9, 9:30, 10, somewhere in there.

And I remember waking up, just being like, oh my goodness, this is what it feels like to be rested.

I just felt incredible.

I was like ready to tackle life by the throat.

And then, of course, I've kind of fallen back into some bad habits, so maybe you can tell which one I need to focus on.

Here's the final one, real practical again.

Finances.

Finances.

Is this an area that's hindering you from going hard after the Lord?

It could be.

And maybe for you it's something as you know relatively simple as you have no budget, no family budget, no personal budget.

You haven't really calculated what is my income and what are my expenses.

And because of that, you're constantly stressed because you know your money is always running low.

And am I gonna have enough to be able to pay my bills?

And you've never put that into place, or you have a budget, but you don't stick to it.

You're like you feel real good that you've got you know this app that helps you figure it all up, but then you never look at it.

You never put you know, input your expenses in all of it, or for you it's just like really foolish, not very well thought through expenses, and you don't save.

And you just kind of blow your budget in in really bad ways, or when it comes to finances, maybe it's something like you know what, you're not working hard enough, and you're not providing for your family in the way that God has called you to, and because of that, your finances are causing constant stress in your marriage.

Constant stress.

And no wonder you're so distracted from spending time and being near it the Lord because this thing is just this raging inferno constantly, and it's impacting you, it's impacting your spouse, it's impacting your kids, and what you can do.

What are the areas of your life that you need to shore up?

Again, don't try and tackle all eight of these.

What's the one?

Maybe the two.

And you know what?

I like enough's enough.

I'm gonna stop letting these areas kick me in the teeth and drag me away from nearness to God.

I'm gonna go after it because these are gonna help me get after this number one priority.

Let's not allow this to slip away from us here.

Where we continue in these same bad habits in this cycle that just keeps drawing us away.

Let's make getting near Him the priority again and really go after it.

Again, not just some flash in the pan commitment that flames out in a day or two or a couple of weeks, but each and every day until the very end.

And that right there is the second point this morning.

Every day until the end.

Take a look at our verse again, verse four.

He says, one thing I have asked of the Lord, that will I seek after.

Okay, we covered that part.

Here it is.

That I may dwell.

Dwell.

You know what that word dwell means, right?

It means to live, right?

It means to stay, to inhabit something.

Right?

Your home is your dwelling place.

You go there, you live there, spend a lot of time there in your home.

Right?

He says that I may dwell in the house of the Lord.

Okay, the house of the Lord, which is which is what you know, Levitical priests did.

They were in the house of the Lord or the tent of meeting or the tabernacle all the time.

Right now, this isn't to say that David literally wanted to become a priest.

Don't take this too literally there.

What he's really getting at here is what a guy named Derek Kidner says.

That David wanted to enjoy the constant presence of God, typified by the priest's calling.

David longed to have the richness of close personal intimacy with God, just like the priests were able to enjoy.

He's like, man, I want that.

I long for that.

Now I love this next part of the verse.

How long did David want this intimacy for?

Was it just until his problems were solved or until God answered his prayers and finally gave him the thing that he wanted, and then he could just go back to those other priorities that he'd kind of been putting aside?

No, it says this: all the days of my life.

All the days.

David wasn't using God here to just get what he wanted, only to push him back into the fringes once he got that thing that he was praying for.

No.

David understood what Asaph actually wrote in Psalm 73, verse 28, but for me, it is good to be near God.

Psalms 73:28

I love that verse.

It's actually my life verse, because I need that reminder constantly.

If being near God is what's truly best for you and I, then why would we ever want to push them away?

Why would we ever want to exchange that pure goodness of his presence, of nearness for something that's that's less than that, something that's less good.

David's tasted and seen that the Lord is good, right?

He wrote that in Psalms 34, verse 8.

Psalms 34:8

And so now because he's tasted that, he's developed an appetite for the Lord now.

He wants the Lord's presence continually.

He knows that nothing else satisfies, and so he wants it all the days of his life.

He doesn't want to settle.

You can tell he wants consistency in this, he wants to dwell in that place.

He wants longevity here as he continues to make God's nearness his his ultimate priority.

Because again, as we think about this here in our own individual context, we all know how easy it is to be pretty hit and miss in in terms of consistency and being steady and these daily habits that lead towards greater intimacy with God.

And how you and I tend to so easily make other things, often very good things, a priority over God.

Okay, so what are those things for you?

And what adjustments do you need to make here today in this week?

Consider kind of deeply and and and kind of come up with a game plan here and commit to changing.

Right?

In order to achieve a kind of a healthier balance and a proper order of priorities, where we're being near God.

That's clearly number one in my life.

For some of you, it might be hard to hear some of these things, but I think some of us maybe need to consider our careers and really think about the vocation that we're in and the job that we have.

Is it killing you?

Yeah, but man, I'm making good money.

Is it worth it?

Is it drawing you away from the Lord?

Is it drawing you away from keeping the main thing the main thing?

I get it, it it's it's tough to think through this stuff.

A lot of people make career changes for reasons like, you know, we want to, you know, get a bigger property and a bigger house and you know, move where it's a little bit cheaper, and I want to kind of wind down a little bit, and I want to be able to have more time, but do we ever make career changes because you know it might the career we're con we're in right now might be having a negative effect on my relationship with the Lord?

Do we have a the courage to kind of think about some of these things?

How about just in terms of entertainment and pleasure and fun?

Again, not the first time we've discussed that.

But is our pursuit for those of uh of those things?

Is it squeezing the Lord out?

Things again, like, you know, Netflix and satellite and social media and various hobbies that we might have, and it's you know, different house projects that we really enjoy, or you know, maybe for us, some of us, it's the cottage or the vacation home.

It could even be friends, right?

Good, good and great friends that we just we've prioritized, right?

And again, these are great things.

None of these things are sinful inherently at all.

They can be great blessings from the Lord.

But the idea here is don't let what's good become the enemy of what's best.

You've heard that before, right?

Maybe for you it's it's some of those things.

Here's another one, and this is gonna sound a little bit backwards, but but maybe even it's even family.

Maybe family has become the idol for you.

And it's all about being together as a family.

It's all about the kids.

And and and frankly, at the end of the day, maybe we've got these these child-centered homes where it's supposed to be a Christ-centered home.

But everything is about running around for the kids and making sure we get the kids to this, that, and the other thing, and it's kids, kids, kids, kids, kids.

And again, is hockey sinful?

No, like I'm not I'm not saying that.

But I think some of us maybe need to think through some of this, right?

Yeah.

And be willing to maybe make some adjustments because they're they're taking us away from our from our number one priority.

I mean, let's really be willing here to lay these things before the Lord today.

Really ask the question are these things distracting me from him?

From this number one priority?

Is there something that needs to go?

Really, honestly.

Is there something that just needs to be readjusted so I can be nearer to Christ?

Again, I get it.

It's really hard to surrender these things and think these through.

And some of you are probably angry at me right now for even suggesting some of this.

I can live with that.

But listen, sometimes the reason that these things are so hard to let go is because they've over overtaken our hearts.

And they've become our our heart's greatest desire.

That's the problem.

That's what I'm trying to say.

Look at these things.

Have courage here, invite the Lord into this.

Allow him to reorder these priorities for us.

Listen, as we grow closer to Christ, as we make these difficult choices and make these changes in our life, guess what?

You're never gonna regret it.

I was talking with John earlier this week.

He's like, man, when you spend time in God's word, you're never like, man, I wish I just slept in.

You know, I wish I scrolled Instagram a little bit more instead of reading the scripture.

You never regret it.

Even if you didn't get everything out of it that you that you really hoped for, and the you know the heavens didn't open and you know, doves floated and all that kind of stuff, even just being with God.

You're like, man, that was good.

I needed that.

Last thing here.

The number one priority of my life is to be near God.

So I will resolve to go hard after this one thing each and every day until the very end, as I revel in the beauty of the Lord.

Look at the last part of verse four there.

It says this, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to inquire in his temple.

Yeah, there's just no question here.

I mean, it's very obvious that David was enamored with God.

He's enamored with him.

He was completely taken by his splendor, by his magnificence, right?

He says to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord, his goodness, his power, his holiness, his glory.

To inquire in his temple.

Shows that David, he couldn't wait to be near the Lord.

He was drawn to him, he was compelled by God's very essence, right?

His character, his deeds.

Bottom line here is that David made the nearness of God, his pursuit, his number one priority.

Why?

Because he really wanted to.

Right?

It was his desire, legitimately.

Right?

Desire is really the thing that's been brewing under the surface of every single thing that we've been talking about here this morning.

Again, you can see that David sincerely wants to be close to God and he wants God close to him.

Listen, I'll ask you a very simple, but I think it's a profound question.

When was the last time you really actually truly wanted to be near God?

Like, really?

When did you want his presence close?

Right?

I asked that question because I think so much of what makes up for North American Christianity these days is duty rather than delight.

Right?

So many of us brought ourselves here because it's, well, it's Sunday morning.

We haven't thought about anything along the way.

Right?

We've lost that joy, that passion for the Lord, that delight in him, that desire for him.

And it's like, well, I that's just a responsibility I have.

It's what good Christians do.

And you know, I guess I gotta get my kids here.

Why am I serving in the church?

Well, it's because you know what some leader won't get off my off my tail about it.

They keep scheduling me in planning center and I feel bad saying no.

We've lost the delight in this.

We've lost the joy, we've lost the passion.

It's not our desire to be near God and use these as avenues and vehicles for that.

My fear for us today, church, is that so many of us will merely make a cerebral and a rational commitment to prioritize God more because that's just simply the latest challenge being thrown at me from the pulpit.

Right?

Instead of, man, the Lord is incredible.

Just look at his beauty.

And just saturating yourself in that and meditating on it.

That's that's that's definitely the thrust of the text here.

Look how good he is, he is so holy.

Look at the marvelous things he has done through throughout the course of history and what he has done in my life to the point where you were just reveling in him.

Our number one priority to be near God is not just because that makes sense to our analytical minds, but because he is the only thing worthy of occupying that place in our hearts.

Everything else, it may be good, stop settling for that.

Chase after, pursue, go hard after what is best.

That's him.

That's what you need to focus on this year, that's what you need to focus on every year.

You gotta wonder, I think, as you as you read through some of this, you know, how is how is David able to have this kind of ravenous desire for the Lord as you just reveled in his beauty?

Like what made him special?

He wasn't really special at all.

I mean, we know a lot of his life, we know that he was a flawed, messed up guy.

Right?

We're in good company there.

But with David, I mean, it certainly had something to do with the presence of trials in his life.

Right?

David went through numerous difficulties, right?

From from fighting off wild animals by himself as a young shepherd boy, you know, in the middle of nowhere with a, you know, a bunch of his father's flock.

I mean, that would have been, I don't know, challenging.

Right?

That's difficult.

I can imagine crying out to the Lord in those moments.

He he, I remember those, that season of his life where he was fleeing Saul, right?

King Saul, who threw what felt like about a hundred spears at him, trying to kill him.

Right?

Chasing him into caves and hiding out.

That was hard.

He, you know, of course, defending Israel's borders.

None of that was easy.

That's just to name a few.

But here's the thing: the trials and difficulty and and pain do.

They reveal what's most important.

Trials have this amazing way of just cutting through and stripping away all of those intense desires of our hearts for earthly things to compete for our one true desire, our deepest desire.

Our desire for God.

And I've talked to some of you about this before and the experiences that you've gone through in trials.

I remember talking to somebody in our church who has gone through just immense difficulty, and some of it's health-related, and some of it's just circumstantial, and all kinds of challenges, and a lot of it is ongoing.

And what this person remarked to me is through all of it, really all I want, or what I want most of all, is the Lord.

I want Him now.

I want Him more than I want the answer to my prayer.

So many times we're praying so hard for that answer.

We want the answer, we want the answer, we want the healing, we want the fix, we want all of that.

And the Lord withholds that because he's trying to turn our hearts to wanting him more than the gift.

To want the giver more than the gift.

This is what he's doing as we go through difficulties, and so as you go through these challenges, you go through these problems, as you face what will no doubt be a busy fall, and these things are all gonna surface in your life.

Don't pray that you would be able to get out from under them.

Don't pray that the Lord would just protect you from all difficulty and pain and problems, but pray that the Lord would use these things to show you his beauty.

So that so that your heart can get fixated on that, so that you can revel in it.

Pray that he will awaken that that deep desire in you.

Do you realize that that that that ravenous desire that you have for for pleasure, that ravenous desire that you have for maybe it's money, maybe it's for material goods, maybe it's for the vacation, that ravenous, you know, heart-level, I feel like I need this.

That's really just your warped heart, you know, which has a desire for God deep down.

It's now looking for it in something else.

Pray that the Lord would would awaken the desire for him, and that would take over everything else.

That'll set all the other priorities into place.

Pray that he would awaken that, not just for yourself, but for your family, for your kids.

Pray that for our church this year.

That we would all know him more intimately, that we would all truly desire and love him more fiercely.

Really, that we would just want to be near him.