When the Lord is Silent Psalm 13 (May 22 2016)

All right, well, good morning, Harvest.

It's so good to see you guys out here today.

If you would turn in your Bibles right now to uh Psalm 13.

Psalm 13 is we're gonna be today, and uh we are kind of week two into our Psalm series.

The next bunch of times uh that I preach, we'll be working through uh various uh different psalms.

And again, like I mentioned last week, these are really kind of coming out of uh my own personal time with the Lord.

Just uh I spent uh recently uh a chunk of time going through not all the Psalms, but a bunch of them, and these are kind of the ones that jumped out at me in the way that the Lord uh has been kind of encouraging me and challenging me and all of that.

So I'm uh excited to um to bring that to you guys uh as well.

I'm really pumped about that.

Okay, so you guys in Psalm 13.

Um of the most unsettling things for uh any parent of young children uh is when you're at home or something like that and you call out their names and you hear nothing.

Right?

Just the just the dreaded no response.

Okay, that for a parent is uh is rattling.

And immediately you kind of go into like high alert mode, right?

Like, do did they just not hear me?

Do I need to uh yell louder or worse?

You go to like the worst case scenario.

Are they hurt or something?

Are they unconscious?

Do I need to spring into action and call 911?

Uh or or most likely, uh, hey, what are they doing wrong?

Right?

What are they doing right now?

And how am I gonna jump in and police all of this?

Um now why would I mention that?

Why would I start with that?

Well, I mention it because um as Christ followers, um, sometimes uh when we cry out to the Lord in prayer, he's silent.

He's silent.

Uh we don't get a response, at least not one uh right away.

And uh, so what do we do?

What's our reaction to all of that?

Well, we react absolutely.

We we can doubt.

Right?

We doubt.

Lord, are you there?

Do you care?

Are you listening?

We we we fear, we we question his goodness, we we get angry sometimes and we start making demands.

Lord, how dare you not answer me when I when I call out to you?

Um or maybe uh some of us, we just jump to the conclude to the conclusion that uh that God doesn't care.

He doesn't care about me.

And and so we we just kind of we kind of distance ourselves uh from him and we we drift away and we we turn to something else.

Hey, what do you do when you pray and the Lord is silent?

Okay, that's what we're gonna be kind of tackling uh here today.

All right, the silence of God, it's it's something that every single Christ follower, make no mistake, every single Christ follower deals with this at some point.

Right?

You may be new in the faith and and uh maybe you have never experienced this.

Well, well, you will.

Um and for those of you who have been following the Lord uh for a while, you know that you come in contact with this type of a situation uh quite a bit.

Quite a bit.

You pray and uh you face the Lord's silence.

And so this is what we're gonna be exploring here this morning.

So uh hopefully you're in Psalm 13 right now.

I'm gonna get you to stand uh as we go ahead and read this.

We're gonna honor the Lord as we do that.

Psalm 13, he says, uh, How long, O Lord, will you forget me forever?

How long will you hide your face from me?

How long must I take counsel in my soul and have sorrow in my heart all the day?

How long shall my enemy be exalted over me?

Consider and answer me, O Lord my God.

Light up my eyes, lest I sleep the sleep of death, lest my enemies say, I have prevailed over him, lest my foes rejoice because I am shaken.

But I have trusted in your steadfast love.

My heart shall rejoice in your salvation.

I will sing to the Lord because he has dealt bountifully with me.

God, we come before you right now confessing, just being honest about this, Lord, that we struggle when we pray and we don't seem to hear anything from you.

Lord, would you teach us um how to react in a godly way during those times, Lord?

We're gonna talk about this, we're gonna unpack it and look at some of the different things that you're teaching us and what you're doing.

But Lord, would you encourage anybody here today who might be in that season of crying out, crying out, and uh not getting anything uh in return, Lord?

Encourage, equip, strengthen us, make us stronger in Christ.

Give us a greater love for you, Lord, uh, in those moments.

Even uh a love for you that that goes way beyond the thing that we're asking from you.

And so, Lord, would you do this?

Would you encourage and challenge your people?

Uh we pray all of this in Christ's name.

Amen.

Amen.

You can take your seat.

Uh now, usually at this point, um, we would just kind of like get right into the text and start working through this verse by verse, and uh, I love doing that.

But today, before we get into all of that, I want to go into some of the some of the reasons why God might be silent uh when we pray out to him.

You ever wondered this?

Because if God really is all-powerful, and do we agree that he is?

Yes, we do.

At least we say that for sure, then why would he delay in answering us?

Why would he do it?

He has the ability to come quickly and to answer, and of course, for some for sure, uh sometimes he does that.

Um, but what's his what's his purpose in all of that in in the quietness?

Now, you could probably chalk up the reason for God's silence uh to two kind of main categories, all right?

And uh here they are.

Either we're doing something wrong, okay, maybe we're approaching it wrong in some way, or or perhaps he's trying to teach us something before he gives us the answer to that prayer request.

And so I'll give you just a kind of a couple of examples here why God might delay in answering us.

First one, uh, we're uh we're asking for the wrong thing.

We're asking for the wrong thing.

Is this ever you?

Uh James 4, verses 3 says this you ask and do not receive because you ask wrongly to spend it on your passions.

James 4:3

Okay, is this you?

What's the thing that you're asking for?

Is it something that's that fits within God's will?

Is it something that you absolutely need?

Or is it something for you that's kind of self-centered?

There's self-centered uh motives in your heart.

You just want this thing.

Maybe it's to make your life more comfortable.

Uh maybe it's just to give you that thing that glorifies yourself and not Jesus.

Maybe you're asking uh for the wrong thing.

Here's another reason.

We doubt.

It's another reason why the Lord might be silent.

Uh James again, verse uh chapter or chapter one, verses six to eight, this is what it says.

It says, But let him ask in faith with no doubting.

For the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind.

For that person must not suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord.

He's a double double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.

Listen, when you when you pray to the Lord, when you're asking him for things, you're asking him for his blessing, uh, do you believe that he can answer you?

Do you believe that he will answer you if it's according to his will?

Or are you just kind of praying and going through the motions of saying the words, but it but in your heart you're doubting?

Like, I don't I don't I don't think he's good enough.

I don't I don't think he can do it, I don't think he's all powerful, I don't think he cares about me, all that kind of stuff.

Okay, do you doubt?

Okay, it says there in James 1 that we can't suppose to receive anything from the Lord if we're doubting.

We need to pray prayers of faith.

Here's another reason why he might delay.

We're in sin.

Okay, we're in sin.

That's unrepentant sin.

It's some kind of sin that we're not willing to deal with and repent of and uh and hand over to the Lord.

Psalm 66, 18 says this if I had cherished iniquity in my heart, the Lord would not have listened.

The Lord would not have listened.

Is there some kind of sin in your life?

You've been praying for something, you've been asking the Lord, maybe it's for if it's been for a long time and you're not getting that.

Well, is it because there's some area of your life that you're not willing to let go of?

I'm holding on to it tightly.

Maybe it's some area of purity.

Are you sleeping around?

Are you sleeping with uh with some other girl?

Are you living with somebody who's not your spouse?

Could be some other area that you're not willing to repent of.

We can't expect the Lord to answer us if we're not willing to submit our lives to him, but so many of us want our cake and to eat it too, don't we?

I want to live my life the way I want, and I want God to give me stuff.

Right?

That's how we approach it.

Here's another thing, another reason why you might delay.

He's teaching us patience.

Patience.

Um, how good are we in that area, right?

We struggle.

Hebrews 10, 36 says, for if uh for you have need of patience, that after you have done the will of God, you might receive the promise.

Okay, we need patience.

We are like maybe this culture more than any other, I don't know, is the instant gratification culture.

How many of us like flip out if our phone doesn't like load our emails immediately?

Right?

You realize this?

It's why we own microwaves.

I don't want to put my food in the oven like a chump.

I want it now.

I want it like 30 seconds or sooner.

Right?

Instant gratification.

We need patience.

We need that.

We need to develop spiritual patience.

And that's what the Lord wants to teach us sometimes in the silence.

How about this one?

He's teaching us persistence.

Persistence.

I love Luke 18, 1 to 8.

I won't read it all, but it's the parable of the persistent widow.

I think sometimes what the Lord's trying to draw out of us is how badly do you want that thing you're praying for?

How badly do you want it?

Do you pray and I didn't get the answer like today, so I'm just gonna give up.

He wants persistence.

He wants you to keep coming and keep coming and keep coming, like the persistent widow.

How badly do you want it?

How badly do you want do you want him?

That leads us to the next reason why he would delay.

He wants to deepen your desire for him.

He wants that to happen.

Psalm 37, verse 4, it's very familiar.

Psalms 37:4

We focus on the second part of it, but here's the first part.

Delight yourself in the Lord.

Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart.

Again, sometimes I think I referred to it in prayer, but sometimes we so badly want that thing.

We want the Lord to save our kids.

Right?

We want that financial blessing.

We want something more than we want Jesus Christ Himself.

And the Lord's like, you got the whole thing flipped around.

And so the silence is so that he can teach us and draw out this desire for him first and foremost.

Do you want him more than you want the thing?

Another one.

He wants to humble us.

He wants to humble us, which takes us to greater depths of intimacy, brings us to greater depths of trust.

And sometimes we've just got pride in our lives.

I mean, we all do.

It's the root of every single sin.

We've got pride.

And sometimes when we have, we have to wait, he's developing that patience and that persistence, but he also wants to humble us.

Maybe we're too demanding in the thing that we want.

And we think that we deserve it.

I think about Job, right?

And you guys know the story of Job.

Everything was taken from him, and he was a righteous man.

It wasn't because of sin in his life, but what was what kind of came up through the whole thing is he's crying out to the Lord, he's got a little bit too demanding.

Lord, I need how how dare you not answer me, Lord, I need this.

And by the by the end of it, Job kind of stepped in and kind of set him straight a little bit.

And Job was brought into greater depths of intimacy.

Sometimes that's what the Lord wants to do when he's making you wait.

He wants to go deeper.

Last one here that I wrote down, anyways, there's probably more reasons.

Why would God delay in answering us?

How about this?

Uh, because he's God and he can do whatever he wants to do.

Right?

How about that one?

I think again, sometimes we get kind of into this, like I'm on the same level of gu as God, and I can tell him what's up, and I'm gonna demand all of these things, and I'm gonna get upset and throw a fit if I don't get those things.

Again, kind of Job went through a little bit of that.

He got really upset, he got kind of pride and arrogance came up, and the Lord kind of came down at the end of that book and said, Where were you when I created the world?

You know, speak if you've got an answer.

And Job was like, I get it, I'm the worst, right?

Like he was humbled.

He's like, Lord, I get you can do whatever you want.

You don't have to explain anything to me.

You are God, uh, and I am not.

Okay, but all throughout scripture, all throughout it, we see examples of God delaying a response to his people as they cry out to him.

We've talked about Job already in Habakkuk chapter 1, verse 2.

Habakkuk 1:2

He says, How long, O Lord, um, how long shall I cry for help?

And will you not hear?

Multiple times in the Psalms we see David cry out in this way, Lord, how long are you gonna let me kind of hang here forever?

He pleads with the Lord like this.

Jeremiah constantly calling out to the Lord, Would you help me?

Would you answer my prayer?

Listen, again, if you are a follower of Jesus Christ, this will become familiar territory for you.

It really will.

It's important that we talk about this and we and we think about it.

What how do we handle this kind of a situation, right?

What's my response?

What's my what should my attitude be?

How should I think rightly about all of this?

How should I approach the Lord in these kinds of times and handle these situations in a way that is godly, in a way that that pleases the Lord?

Again, what should I do when I pray and the Lord is silent?

Okay, well, here's the first thing if you're following along, you got notes there.

Um it's that I will pray even harder.

I will pray even harder.

Take a look at verse one as we unpack it all.

It says here, uh, How long, O Lord, will you forget me forever?

How long will you hide your face from me?

How long must I take counsel in my soul and have sorrow in my heart all the day?

How long shall my enemy be exalted over me?

Okay, when you pray to the Lord and you just get silence, do you give up?

Do you give up?

Do you give up?

Do you quit?

Do you just pack it in?

Well, notice here in these uh two verses here that four times, okay, four times here, David asked the question, How long?

How long, O Lord?

Which indicates a couple of things.

That first of all, I think it indicates that he's he's already spent time praying for this request, that he would be delivered from his enemies.

That's the context here.

He's already prayed that before writing this psalm.

Do you get that?

Because in this psalm, what he his approach is like, Lord, what's the delay?

Okay, what's with what's with the silent treatment?

You know, I've been asking you over and over again, uh, what's with the lack of answer?

And also here, the the repetition, all of that here, as he asks that question over and over again.

He's not giving up, is he?

He's not asking once or twice or three times.

I mean, we see four here.

I think it's a good picture of just keep going.

David's prayer was relentless.

Right?

He wasn't letting go of all of that.

He just kept coming and coming.

He continued, he he continued to ask, he did not give up.

There was no quit in him.

The longer the Lord delayed the response, the harder David prayed.

The deeper that he dug in.

Can you say that that you have that same type of resolve?

Can you say that here this morning?

You know, I'll be honest with you, I'm a little bit concerned with the fact that too many Christ followers quit on prayer way too quickly.

Way too easily.

We don't put up a fight.

We don't realize that this is a battle here.

We don't realize that we've got to be a little bit tougher in all of this.

And I think what quitting on prayer really reveals, whether we realize it or not, is a certain shallowness about our faith.

Right?

It is.

We're shallow there.

And it shows uh a certain immaturity in our walk with Christ.

It shows that when the rubber meets the road, maybe our theology isn't as strong as we think it is.

Maybe our beliefs about prayer um don't really line up with kind of how we actually live and how we respond when the going gets tough.

Right?

Maybe we can talk a good game and we talk about how without prayer nothing else matters, and we've got those things that just kind of flow off of our tongue, but deep down, do we actually believe that God is strong enough to answer our prayer?

That God really hears us?

Do we believe that He is good?

Maybe it's something else for you, I don't know.

But what does your lack of prayer indicate about you?

What does it indicate about your maturity, about your theology, which is a which is what you believe about God?

What does it reveal about your beliefs about prayer?

And hey, let me encourage you, as I believe this psalm does, when you really look at it, to really double down on your prayer.

Right?

When it gets tough and and you want to give up and you want to quit and you're not hearing anything, uh keep going.

Okay, don't give up right away.

Don't allow discouragement to force you into bailing.

Because, hey, listen, think about it this way: you have no idea what kind of blessing might be right around the corner.

You have no idea what kind of intimacy the Lord might be drawing you into.

You have no idea how he might be trying to expand your relationship and deepen it and do something amazing, or give you that answer in a way that it's way beyond what you were even asking.

You've been asking for something good.

He wants to give you something incredible.

Right?

Keep praying.

Pray hard.

Okay, what else should we do?

Even when we pray and the Lord is silent, here's the second thing.

Be honest about my anxieties.

Be honest.

Now, one of my favorite things about the Psalms, I seriously love this.

We see it elsewhere in Scripture too, is that the Psalms they really show that God's not afraid of our brutal honesty.

Don't you love that?

I mean, that should give us um, that should give us joy, that should give us a big sigh of relief all of here uh here.

He gives us tons of room to express how we really feel and what we really think and and all of that.

You know, the struggles, the the discouragement with all of it, the fact that we can get down, our doubts, the disappointments, the fear, the pain.

The Lord welcomes our our gritty honesty.

I love that.

When we're just straight up and honest about where we're at.

And again, I hope that's a breath of fresh air to you.

It's now it's not licensed to just vent and spew all kinds of nonsense at the Lord and and freak out and spaz.

It's it's not about that.

I hope that's obvious enough, but it is about being honest.

It really is.

If you're down, if you're discouraged, if you're hurt, if you're doubting, just be real with him about all of that.

Because sometimes I think we can we can kind of approach the Lord with uh with the less than honest, stiff upper lip.

Right?

Well, this is what mature Christians do, and I'm gonna be I'm gonna be strong and I'm gonna fake it.

Right?

I'm gonna pretend that I'm you know, we we we posture ourselves, even with the Lord, even in prayer, as being kind of tougher and stronger than we really are.

And we're not actually being honest about where we're at, and we're pretending, in some ways, we're kind of lying about all of that with the Lord.

You think he's gonna bless it?

No, because it's it's it's pride.

Right?

At the root of all of that, it's pride.

And maybe the Lord's trying to teach you in the middle of silence about humility and to be honest about your anxiety.

And that's really what we see here in David.

Take a look at verse 3.

He says, uh, consider me and answer me, O Lord my God, light up my eyes.

And so you can see here that he admits just freely, he's like, I'm in a dark place, right?

Light up my eyes.

I can't I can't see clearly here.

I'm down, I'm discouraged about all of this.

And I love how he's not trying to hide it or cover up where he's really at, his emotions and all of it.

Keep going.

He says, He says, Lest I sleep the sleep of death.

He confesses his fear.

A man confessing his fear.

Imagine that.

Right?

He's like he's like, when are you just gonna come in and swoop and provide the protection and the relief that that I am that I'm cray uh craving here and praying for?

Keep going, he says.

He says, Lest my enemies say I have prevailed over him.

Lest my foes rejoice because I am shaken.

He doesn't want his enemy to win.

He's honest about that, right?

He's honest about it.

He doesn't want his enemies, God's enemies, to see him afraid, to see him shaken is the word that he uses here.

So I mean, you see the authenticity, right?

You see the sincerity of his prayers.

There's no covering up his feelings, there's no hiding it, trying to look tough, trying to look like he's got it all together, where he's like, I'm the king, right?

And people need to see that strength.

And I'm gonna just pretend that I've got it all forget.

No, he's not doing any of that.

He's honest.

He's just free and clear about what he's upset about, what's causing him this anxiety and this worry, this worry.

Hey, when you cry out to the Lord for a need, any need, and you wait for him to answer that prayer, you know, and as the as the tension and the pressure and the anxiety and you know, all of that begins to mount, uh, do you bring those things to the Lord?

Do you do that?

Or do you just kind of allow that anxiety and that worry and that fear?

Do you allow that to rule the roof?

Do you allow that kind of stuff to drive you?

And lead you.

Or do you just put up with it?

I'm not gonna, I don't need to bring those things.

Are you even aware that you can bring those things to the Lord?

He's got the strength, he's got the capacity to handle all of it.

We don't.

A lot of Christians just let their anxiety have its way.

A lot of people do.

Bring it before Christ.

He wants to take those things from you.

He wants to help you work through those things.

And he wants to provide relief in his timing when he says it's the right time.

You'll grow closer to the Lord as you do that, as you develop this relationship with him, and as you get to know him more, and you'll be doing what 1 Peter 5, 7 says.

I love this.

Cast all your anxieties on him because he cares for you.

Do you cast all your anxieties on him?

Let's be honest about where we're at.

When I pray and the Lord is silent, third thing, what else am I gonna do?

I'm gonna trust him in the heat of the moment.

I'm gonna trust him in the heat of the moment.

Verse 5, take a look.

He says, But I have trusted in your steadfast love.

Now, one of the most powerful words in all of Scripture, I think, and you see it in lots of different areas, is that word, uh, but, right, you see it there, and I think it's so great because it always marks a transition, a transition.

And I mean, up to this point, you see David in Psalm 13, he's just pouring out his heart.

He's like, This is where I'm at, and how long, O Lord, and how long must I have sorrow, and I'm not doing well here?

Would you throw me a bone, please, Lord?

I'm begging you.

You see all of that.

But then all of a sudden he starts to, he starts to turn.

He flips the script and all with that little three-letter word, but he's saying, Lord, I don't know what's up with this delay.

You know, I don't know what's going on from your end, and I'm freaking out here.

But, okay, but I will trust you.

I will trust you.

And that's what he says.

He says, I have trusted in your steadfast love.

Now, here's what I really love about this psalm.

This is one of my favorite parts about it for sure.

Okay, he's he's about to worship the Lord.

We're gonna get to that here in just a second.

Okay, but he he expresses trust to God and worships before, okay?

Not after, but before he gets his prayer request answered.

Don't miss that.

He don't miss that.

He's like, I will trust you.

At this point, even to the towards the end of the Psalm here, he doesn't have the answer.

His enemies have not been smokten, right?

He is not, he doesn't have that answer yet.

He's like, but you know what, Lord?

I'm gonna trust you.

I'm gonna put my stake there.

That's awesome.

Right?

That's incredible.

And you see, it would have been easy for him, okay, to trust the Lord after being delivered from his enemies.

Right?

And I wonder if that tends to be kind of the sequence of events for us.

Lord, I will trust you, but it's only gonna be after you give me that thing.

Right?

I'm gonna cry out to you, it's gonna be difficult, I'm gonna have anxiety, I'm gonna have doubts and fears and anger and all of it, and then once you give me the answer, then I'll be like, oh yeah, now I trust you.

Right?

You see how much easier that is?

The challenge is to trust before we get the answer.

And you see here how David just expresses his mature faith in Christ.

He's like, He's like, Lord, I know that you know all of my concerns.

I mean, you know that I'm shaken to the core here, but I trust you.

I know that you are good.

I know that you love me.

I know that you're at work here behind the scenes, and I can't see what you're doing, and I may never get all the reasons and the answers.

I may not see it all unfolded for me.

And you know what?

That's okay.

I know that you promised me a good result, and that you're gonna give me what I need when I need it.

I trust your plan, Lord.

I trust your timing.

I trust you to do as you see fit.

That is what the Lord, uh, that is what David is saying here as he prays.

Okay, David, David trusts God in the heat of the moment, not after the heat passes.

The answer is they haven't come yet.

Again, his enemies are still there.

The threat of death is very real.

It's DEF CON 5, all of these, wrestling with everything.

But what he's doing here is he's giving us a glimpse into the depth of his relationship with the Lord.

That he's got there, the intimacy that he has here, and he takes action in the heat of the moment by exercising faith.

He entrusts himself to his God, to his wise and loving God, no matter the result.

Right?

We know that God, we know that God rescued David from his enemies time and time again, but David doesn't know.

He's like, what if this is it for me?

What if it, what if my enemies exult over me and they kill me?

It could have happened.

Right?

Everyone dies at some point.

David doesn't know what the result is gonna be here.

But he leaves it all in God's hands, doesn't he?

Do you and I have that same kind of trust in God?

The next time you go through a Psalm 13 type scenario in your life, will you trust God in the heat of the moment?

You know, or will you continue to go back to all the hand-wringing and stress and all of it only?

There's gonna be some of that mixed in, you're gonna have to wrestle all of that out with God for sure.

But will you trust him before you get your answer?

Whatever that answer might be.

Do you believe that God's got this?

Right?

He's got me, he's got the whole world in his palm.

He'll take care of it.

Or maybe that's you right now.

Maybe Psalm 13 is your world as we speak, and you've been crying out to him for for days.

Maybe it's way longer than that.

Maybe it's been like weeks, months, years even.

And the Lord He's He's been pretty silent about it.

Will you trust him today?

Will you trust him?

Will you believe that he is good?

Will you believe that he is having you go through this for your good?

Will you believe that he saved you from sin.

He saved you from death.

He's got eternity planned for you.

So he's got this situation too.

He's got it all.

He has so much that he wants to teach us in these kinds of seasons, doesn't he?

He wants to show you that there's a much bigger picture going on here than that thing that you're asking for, the thing that, and you might not be aware of that.

He's got a greater purpose in your life for all this.

He's trying to accomplish that in you.

He wants to give you a better perspective on the situation.

So will you submit to him and his process?

Will you trust him today?

Will you allow God to teach you about crucial things like humility and perseverance and patience and desiring what's most important and knocking down some of that idolatry?

Will you let him chip away at the things that need to go?

They need to go in your life.

They're not bearing fruit.

Things like fear and doubt and unrepentant sin.

Will you allow the Lord to make you a mature disciple in all of this?

This is the big picture.

He's not just stringing you along, man.

He's not just like dangling you around and laughing the whole time.

I love messing with him.

No, that's not what he's doing.

He's trying to make you more like Jesus.

And it's these situations, this time of silent prayer, it's the difficult seasons, it's the trials that he accomplishes his greatest work.

Trust him in the heat of the moment.

Last thing.

When I pray and the Lord is silent, I will remember my salvation and worship.

I'll remember my salvation and worship.

Take a look at the last half of verse 5 there, 5B.

It says, My heart shall rejoice in your salvation.

I will sing to the Lord because he has dealt bountifully with me.

Now, this is of course him kind of continuing this whole shift as he kind of cries out to the Lord in prayer.

He puts his trust in him.

You see his mind shifting and his attitude changing.

And you know, again, he doesn't have the answers that he's looking for.

He's still in limbo, he's still waiting, all of it.

Silences the answer so far for him.

And so what does he do in the meantime?

He reminds himself of his salvation, doesn't he?

He's like, I rejoice in your salvation.

Do we do that?

Do you do that?

Do you remind yourself of the gospel?

Do you remind yourself of what Jesus Christ has done to rescue you from sin and death?

To bring you into a new relationship with him, where he wants to change you and make you different.

I mean, you've heard me say it before: the importance of preaching the gospel to ourselves, right?

Reminding ourselves of the gospel, because the truth that Christ has saved us accomplishes some powerful things in our hearts.

I think sometimes we under we undermine that.

We think that the gospel is for like harvest kids, it's for Sunday school, it's for it's for rookies and new believers.

No, it's for all of us.

It changes our thinking and our mind as the Holy Spirit works in us.

It accomplishes some powerful things.

I got two of them here for you.

Okay, first of all, it reminds us of what's most important.

We've kind of hinted at that already today, but it reminds us that we are Christ's and He is ours.

You know, we may not have, again, answers to what we're crying out to the Lord for, but we do have eternal life.

Do you minimize that?

Do you forget about that?

You'd be like, yeah, whatever.

Okay, it gives us perspective when we realize, oh yeah, like I was heading towards judgment and death, eternal separation from God.

And he's been so gracious and loving to rescue me from that.

I'm gonna continue to trust him.

I'm gonna continue to understand that he will do this in his timing.

He's another powerful thing reminding ourselves of the gospel does.

It leads us to joy when happiness is hard to come by.

Right?

When you're grinding through prayer and it's and it's difficult, um, happiness disappears.

Okay, because happiness is dependent on our circumstances.

Life's going along good, we're happy.

Life's going along terribly, we're unhappy.

The amazing thing about joy is it's given to us from the Lord and it transcends our circumstance.

We can have joy even in the middle of great difficulty.

And we see here that David is actually able to worship in the middle of his life being threatened.

He says, My heart shall rejoice.

Look at that word.

Rejoice.

There's actually joy there.

He says, I will sing to the Lord.

He's like, I'm not gonna mumble out a bunch of lame words.

I'm gonna actually sing.

There's gonna be joy in this.

There's gonna be passion.

Even though life is excruciating right now.

David finds joy and he worships.

Okay, reminding yourself of the gospel isn't some make busy work task that you're supposed to do.

It will infuse you with new life and new joy.

It will give you greater perspective.

It will accomplish amazing things in your life.

It will actually transform you.

Now, maybe you're sitting here today and and you're new to this whole church thing and you would admit, you know, I don't I don't know Jesus, I don't know what you're talking about.

Having a relationship with God, what is that all about?

Well, you need to know that God wants to transform your life.

He wants to change you, he wants to bring you into a depth of a relationship that we're reading about here that David has with the God of the universe.

He wants to change your perspectives and your motives, he wants to give you new desires, he wants to do all of that, but you need to understand there's a starting point.

And the starting point is coming into a relationship with God.

You can't have all the benefits of knowing God if you don't first know him.

And what the Bible tells us over and over again, the gospel tells us, is that we can only come into a relationship with God when we've at first admitted that we have sin in our lives that has blocked us from being in a relationship with God.

It has ruined any opportunity to do that because God is a holy God, and he can't just pretend that sin doesn't exist and sweep it all under the rug.

He has to deal with it because he is good.

If he didn't deal with sin, he wouldn't be a good God, he wouldn't be worthy of worshiping.

So would you admit that today, that you've got sin in your life, that you've got pride?

You may not, you won't.

You won't, you're not gonna see every aspect of your sin all at once, but but do you understand that you've got sin, that ultimately is against God, it's against your creator.

And would you understand that God has made a way for you to be in a relationship with him?

That was by sending his son Jesus to the cross to die in your place.

That's what you deserved because of sin.

That's what I deserved because of my sin.

But Jesus took all of the wrath of God, all of the punishment, all of it, all of it on himself so that we could walk away free.

So, A, it's admitting that you're a sinner.

You can do this just between you and the Lord.

You can do it as you're sitting here and then asking him to be your savior.

That's how you can know the God of salvation.

I want to encourage you to do that today.

And as you do that, you're gonna be in day one of this amazing transformation as God begins to do an incredible work in you.

And hey, if you have done that here today, please come tell me about it afterwards.

Come talk to me, because I'd love to like give you a high five and pray with you.

Right?

Awesome, awesome thing.

Most important decision you'll ever make.

Okay, again, so David, he remembers his salvation, he worships the Lord, which again shows us kind of like the love that he had for God, the depth of faith that he had in him.

And then I love that last part of verse 6 here.

Don't miss this.

Okay, he says, I will sing to the Lord, but then this part, because he has dealt bountifully with me.

You notice that?

Worth underlining for sure.

Okay, what that part shows us here is the immense blessing.

Okay, the immense blessing that comes from having an experience of walking with the Lord.

Right?

As you have this relationship with the Lord, and as that develops, and over the months and years that you know the Lord and grow in him, you've got this experience building up, don't you?

And there's huge blessing in all of that.

He says this, he has dealt bountifully with me.

David, because of all the years that he spent walking faithfully with the Lord, did he have his down points?

Absolutely.

Did he have his ups?

For sure.

But because of all of that, he's able to look back into his past.

He's able to draw back on those experiences, on the answered prayer as he's looked back on the history there.

On the times where he was, you know, a lonely shepherd boy.

He's in a field all by himself for weeks at a time, no one else there.

He's lonely, he's praying to the Lord, Lord, would you comfort me?

And the Lord answered those prayers.

What about the times where he's in the field?

He's got to pray for courage to fight off wild animals that are attacking the flock.

He had to fight like bears and lions, the scriptures talk about.

He's just a kid.

He's like, Lord, I need courage, I need help with all of this.

The Lord came through.

And of course, the very well-known story is him fighting Goliath.

Again, he's just a kid.

He's like, Lord, I need courage.

I need you to come through here.

I'm fighting this giant, this huge guy with a sword and all kinds of armor.

All I've got is a couple of pebbles and a piece of leather that I'm gonna whip around.

Lord, I'm gonna need you.

Right?

And David, in an instant here, as he's crying out again for the Lord to protect him, as he's done so many times all throughout his life, he can in an instant draw back on those memories, back on those experiences, and remind himself that God is faithful.

God is faithful, that God has dealt bountifully or generously with him before.

And he knows, because God is faithful, that he will continue to do that.

Right?

And I know that the Lord's gonna answer.

There's such peace, there's such stability, there's a calmness that happens when you've got that experience.

Some of you guys have that experience and you can lean into it, and it's powerful.

Some of you are new in the faith and you don't quite have that experience yet.

Know that as you trust the Lord, do it now.

He's gonna build up that experience, he's gonna build that strength in you, that trust in the Lord, that love and that joy in him.

You're gonna go through something in your family, you're gonna go through something in your marriage or with your kids, a work situation, something incredibly difficult, and you're gonna pray, and you're gonna pray hard, and you're gonna be able to look back and say, But the Lord taking care of me so much every step of the way in his own timing, of course he's gonna do it now.

It's awesome when you get to that place.

No questions asked.

God will do it.

I love that rock solid confidence that the Lord will answer.

Do you have that?

Do you have that?

As you cling to Him, as you seek by God's grace to be to be faithful.

Lord, I want to hold on to you.

I want I want you to do this your way.

You will grow.

And you'll see the answers come in time.

We need to be patient.

We need to hold fast to the Lord.

We need to confess the pride.

We need to confess the anxiety, the demand, Lord, do it now.

No, he does it when he wants to.

He does it when you're ready.

And if you don't have the answer yet, it means you're not ready.

Will you allow him to do what it takes in your heart, in your life, in your marriage, in your faith, whatever it might be, to get to you to the point where he can answer you and give you that blessing that you crave, probably far beyond the blessing that you were even hoping you would get.

Keep holding on.

Keep praying.

Don't give up.

Let's pray.

God, we uh come before you now not giving up on prayer.

Lord, not giving in.

Lord, not quitting.

Because we know that you uh want to develop some things in us, Lord.

And I know every individual here is in a different place.

Everyone's situation is a little bit different than the next person's.

But Lord, would you meet, would you meet each one here in a way that encourages them, that lifts them up, that it that blesses them?

Lord, I pray that you would have your way in your church.

I pray that you would have your way in Harvest Bible Chapel Newmarket, Lord.

Would you do it?

Would you strengthen us?

Would you make us mature?

Make us like your Son Jesus, Lord.

Give us great joy in you, Lord.

I pray that we would be able to rejoice in our salvation, even in the middle of the most difficult season.

Lord, would we do that?

And we can do that because you are good.

And so, God, help us now.

As we worship, Lord, would we worship from our hearts?

Would we worship with passion?

Would we lift high the name of Jesus Christ?

We pray all this in his name.

Amen.