The Table

He makes me lie down in great pastures.

He leads me beside still waters.

He restores my soul.

He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name's sake.

Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil.

For you are with me, your rod and your staff and comfort me.

You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies.

You anoint my head with oil.

My cup overflows.

Surely, goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life.

And I shall dwell in the house of the Lord.

By the way, it is great to have everybody that's in the room with us this morning.

My name is Russ.

If I hadn't had a chance to meet you, and if you're watching with us, whether it's uh uh for uh every week experience or maybe for the first time, it's great to have you guys that are at home worshiping with us.

Today we're looking at one specific verse out of the 23rd Psalm, and it says this it says, You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies, which might describe thanksgiving for many of us this next week.

See, let me if you think I'm saying something funny, you need to laugh.

See, see, the first the 915 crowd got that, and it and and it was it sounded so much more fun when I said it in the first service, um, because that is a reality of my of my Thanksgiving table growing up.

You never knew what was gonna happen.

So, so this is on my mother's side.

We would gather and there would be these large gatherings, and you never knew what was gonna happen, what somebody was gonna say, and what somebody was gonna throw.

I'm and I know there is no joke.

My grandmother is the sweetest lady, probably the person outside of my wife that has been the greatest example of somebody following Jesus.

But but we were at a Thanksgiving family gathering, and somebody threw food across the table, and I thought she was gonna come unglued.

She said, not in my house, not at my table.

And so we joke a little bit, but here's the reality.

This Thanksgiving is gonna be different for many of us.

I don't know about you, but our family has had lots of discussions about how we're gonna handle the normal gatherings that we've been having for years and years and years.

I've got college students that are coming home and and and and and am I gonna take these college students that have been around 5,500 people, 5,500 other college students, and and we don't know who they've been around that may have been asymptomatic or or had symptoms or whatever.

Am I gonna take them and to my mother-in-law's house or to my mother's house and risk?

And so a lot of us are having some of these conversations about how different thanksgiving might be this year because everything's different this year.

And so here's what we've got to remember is it's really not about just gathering to eat.

It's about a spirit of thanksgiving and being thankful for the goodness of God.

We just sang the song, and and and it's really something that we need to deal with.

How good is God?

And I'm I am begging my wife, can I at least get some of my mother-in-law's turkey dressing?

Even if I don't go to her house, can I have some of that?

And can I can I enjoy that at least a little bit?

I'm so thankful every year for that blessing.

But what is it that you're thankful for?

What is it that we need to be thankful for in the difficult year that 2020 has been?

Let me tell you something.

God is still good.

And there is a lot that we can still be thankful for.

Jesus is on his throne.

Jesus is Lord, and listen, we know how the story ends, regardless of what this year holds.

We know how the story ends, and we can be thankful for that, right?

Amen.

And so thankfulness is something that seems to be, it seems to be something that's been pushed aside this year because there's so many distractions, and we've got to be reminded of what we're thankful for.

I I mentioned, I mentioned my wife just a second ago, and I think of the blessing that God has given me in a woman that walks with Jesus and then puts up with me and that has been just a model parent to our kids.

I think of just the fact that God's provided a roof over my head, and I've never had to worry about having a place to stay and a place to live.

And I think of the fact that I've never had a day that I've gone hungry.

I mean, all the blessings and all of the things that God has provided, we could talk about the blessing of having my kids and the fact that they all have put Jesus as Lord of their life, and they put their faith in Jesus, and they've received the gift of salvation that Jesus provides in his life and his death and his resurrection.

And so they're walking with Jesus, and and and and I don't have to worry about a job.

I don't know that I've ever had to think or had anxiety about a job or income.

I mean, there's been financial issues, but but many of us take a lot of these things for granted, and even this year, we need to focus more on how good God is and how He provides for us than ever before.

And to be honest with you, it's easy to have an Eeyore.

Yeah, I don't know if you know who Eeyore is.

He's the guy that wants to pour cold water on every good thing that anybody says.

I mean, somebody comes up with a good idea, or somebody comes up with something good to say.

Well, what can we whine about?

Yeah, we we you we you you've got those kind of people that it doesn't matter how good it is, we're gonna sulk, or we're gonna pour cold water on somebody's joy, or we're gonna try to, we're miserable, so we're gonna take everybody down our path of misery with us.

And here's kind of the big idea I want to focus on this morning as we think about the 23rd Psalm, we think about this verse 5.

There is blessing in his presence.

If there's nothing else, there's blessing in the presence of God.

There's blessing.

And so that's what what this psalm is about that David wrote.

King David wrote this psalm.

And so, as we've done each week, can we just read the whole psalm together?

It's only just a it's only a handful of verses.

And y'all mind if we stand again?

I know that you you may get tired of this, but uh we we may not do this again after we finish this series.

But let's just do it and let's read it with some passion out loud, all together, everybody together.

Here we go.

The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not warrant.

He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside still waters, he restores my soul, he leads me in paths of righteousness for his name's sake.

Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me.

Your rod and your staff, they comfort me.

You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies.

You anoint my head with oil, my cup overflows.

Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever.

You guys have a seat.

We are looking at one specific verse today, and it's that verse that I quoted part of it.

It says, You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies.

You anoint my head with oil, my cup overflows.

And if you notice that David is speaking first person here, the beginning of the psalm, he says, is third person.

He says, The Lord.

He doesn't say you.

He says, the Lord is what?

My shepherd.

So it's personal, and so I always want to ask the question, can you say with David, can you say it with me, the Lord is my shepherd?

And so the first part of the psalm is is is written in this second person kind of kind of kind of look, but but it shifts gears in a couple of verses, and it begins to say, instead of talking about the Lord, he says, you, you, he says, you prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies.

You anoint my head with oil, my cup overflows.

David is writing this psalm, King David.

We know who King David is, most famous king, the most well remembered, the most revered king of Israel, still to this day.

And he writes this, not from the perspective of being the shepherd, because we know that King, when King David shows up in 1 Samuel, he shows up as the little boy that they called in from the field who was the shepherd of the sheep.

And so you would think he would write it from the point of being the shepherd.

No, David writes this psalm from the perspective of he is the sheep and his heavenly father is his shepherd.

And we know as believers and followers of Jesus, Jesus is the good shepherd.

And so he writes this perspective.

We are the sheep.

It's important, and he is our shepherd.

He is our heavenly shepherd.

And I've shared this over the last few weeks.

You you've got to just understand a few things about sheep that are pretty important, right?

If you're if you're watching online, I hate to I hate to say it, but but there's there's three things about sheep, and if we're if we're saying that this is the from the perspective of us being sheep, there might be a little bit of likeness to these three things with us.

The three things about sheep.

Sheep are stupid.

Number one, they're just not smart animals.

You've never been to a circus, you've never been to a show, you've never been to any production where a trained sheep did any tricks.

Dogs, yes, horses, yes, seals, whales, dolphins, never a sheep.

You know why?

Because sheep are stupid.

And sheep are also just dirty.

They're dirty, they're just dirty animals.

I mean, you you imagine a sheep.

I've seen sheep.

My brother owns sheep, so so, and that's in Walton County, but you go to the Middle East where it's just dusty and dirty, and they can't take care of themselves, they can't cleanse themselves, they they they have insects and gunk and infection, and it's just, they're just dirty animals.

They have to be cared for.

They have to be clean.

There has to be somebody outside of themselves that cleans them.

So, so so the third thing is they're defenseless.

They cannot protect themselves, they can't defend themselves.

There are always predators that want to attack sheep, and they can do nothing of themselves to protect themselves.

And so we are like sheep.

We're not the smartest people in the world.

Isn't it interesting how how we want to do what's right, but we can't just get it right?

And Paul talks about this in Romans 6 and Romans 7.

He says, I don't do what I want to do and end up doing what I don't want to do.

And he and he and he has this almost dual personality, and we're just we're just we're not that smart.

We're not capable in and of ourselves to do what's right.

And we're and we're dirty, we're just we're we're sinful.

We're creatures that are that are infected by sin.

We're enslaved.

We we can't do anything in and of ourselves to cleanse ourselves, and so we need something.

We need a good shepherd that will clean our hearts up.

And we're defenseless.

We can't do it ourselves.

We are defenseless.

The enemy attacks us and wants to harm us, and we need a good shepherd that will protect us.

So he says, You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies.

You anoint my head with oil, my cup overflows.

What does this mean for us?

And so last week we talked about uh the valley of the shadow of death and how sheep would be led by the shepherd through the valley to the next mesa, to the next precipice, to the next table, to the next field.

And they would walk through that literal Hebrew would be the darkest dark through the valley.

Some of you have been there.

You know what it's like to walk through a dark valley.

But the good shepherd is always moving us, he's always taking us somewhere, he's always wanting to take us, and a good shepherd, based on the season, always wants to get his sheep to a lush field where they can eat fresh grass and feed themselves and nourish themselves and take care of themselves.

And so literally they're walking from one mesa, and mesa is a is a Spanish word for table, and in this this biblical sense, a table would have been a fresh field in a high place, safe from the valley and from the predators, but with fresh grass, and so you go from field to field, mesa to mesa, table to table.

And a good shepherd would always lead the way.

The shepherd goes before the sheep.

And so the shepherd would take his his sheep and and and come to the edge of this fresh field, this table.

And he would take the sheep and he would bed them down.

We read in a couple of verses earlier where he makes us lay down.

He makes us rest.

And he would bed them down, and he would walk into that field, and he would look and search and scrutinize and make sure he put eyes on every little corner of that field.

Because there were enemies.

One of the common enemies to a sheep is this beautiful little plant called a comas.

A commas.

It can be blue, it can be white, and and they're absolutely beautiful.

But they are as poisonous as they can be.

And a little lamb or a sheep can, before you know it, take a bite out of this comas, and it looks great to the eyes, but as soon as they bite it, the poison enters their body, and shortly after they eat it, their whole body is paralyzed, and they become stiff, as stiff as a board, and they will fall over and they will die.

And a good shepherd knows what to look for.

When he goes in front, he beds down the sheep, he walks through the field, he scours every square inch, and he sometimes will even get down on his knees to make sure he pulls up every poisonous plant that potentially could harm the sheep.

You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies.

And he shares about how many of these fields, these lush fields, have tiny little holes all through the field, and they're hidden by the lush grass that has grown over the hole.

But inside of the hole are these deadly, poisonous adders, these snakes.

And so a sheep unknowingly can walk into this field, and without a good shepherd guiding and leading the way, the sheep can begin to graze, and up out of that hole, that adder will come and nip that sheep or that lamb on the nose.

And shortly the poison and the venom from that snake will go through their body and it will kill them.

And so a good shepherd carries with him a flask of hog's oil.

And he'll go through the field before the sheep are allowed to enter the field, and he'll take that hog's oil and he'll coat the edges of all those little holes.

Why does he do that?

He does it so the adders cannot gain any traction and come up out of the ground and nip at the bodies or the noses of those little lambs or those sheep.

And so literally, a sheep, as it grazes in the field, is eating while its enemy is just inches away.

You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies.

The Good Shepherd is proactive.

The Good Shepherd leads the way.

The Good Shepherd protects us from our enemies.

And so I want to take a few minutes that we have remaining this morning, and I want to focus just a second, especially as we enter into this week of Thanksgiving, about the significance of the table, as it relates to us in this meaning, but I want to bring it to a personal application in our own life.

The table.

He preached a great sermon, but before he preached a great sermon, he denied Jesus.

And so I think of the beautiful meal that was shared.

And I know it wasn't around a table, but it was a meal that was shared between a betrayed Jesus and a restored Peter.

He was forgiven.

He was restored.

He was loved.

He was redeemed.

And it's the table that God wants to invite you to join him at.

And the table represents his presence and it represents his peace.

And so the Good Shepherd gives us and invites us to have a seat at the table of redemption.

I love how the New Living Translation says this same verse, Psalm 23, 5.

He says, You prepare a feast for me in the presence of my enemies.

And so the Good Shepherd prepares a feast for us.

It's not just a, it's not a snack.

It is a full-blown feast.

And it is not just about one day out of a year.

It is a daily opportunity that we have to come and to partake of the presence of God.

Day after day after day.

But he says, you prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies.

What are the enemies that keep us from coming to this table?

What are the things that keep us from experiencing what I'm talking about?

One of them would be busyness.

Just time.

It steals our intimacy from God.

It takes away from us from sitting down with Jesus and enjoying the presence that He wants us to have with Him.

What's another enemy?

It's when we allow the spiritual enemy to have a seat at our table.

You really do know that there's a devil and that there are demons, and that the world that we live in, that is a physical world, and where we can see things, we can touch things, that there is just real, another world that's just as real, if not more real, that runs parallel to the world that we live in, and it is a spiritual world where their enemy is real, and there is a devil, and there are demons, and they want to ruin your life, they want to steal your joy, they want you to live without hope and without any peace.

1 John 2 speaks of the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life that want to steal and tempt you.

And it's almost as if as if he's gonna put these little blue and and and white, little beautiful comma flowers right in front of your face.

Just take a little bit of this.

It won't hurt you.

And before you know it, you have veered off the path.

1 Peter 5, 8, Peter says, be sober-minded, be watchful.

Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.

The enemy wants to get you away from the table of the presence of God.

The enemy wants you to think that there's something better and more fulfilling in this world at another table.

The enemy wants you to think that you can't, you're not, you're not good enough to be saved.

You're not worthy enough to be a part of God's family.

You don't have what it takes.

You're not smart, you're not worthy, you're not good enough, you'll never make it.

The enemy wants to whisper all kinds of things into your mind and into your head that are ungodly.

Because when Jesus breathed his last breath on that cruel Roman cross, he became the substitute for you and for me.

And when breath came back into his body in that tomb and he walked out, he proved that he had power over death and sin and the grave.

And there is hope and there is peace.

I don't care how bad 2020 can be, there is something to be thankful for.

As a matter of fact, praise and thanksgiving always usher in the presence of God.

Let's read Psalm 100.

I'm gonna let you I want you to kind of let this resonate within you a little bit.

I want you to get excited.

There's a little bit of a Pentecostal inside of me, okay?

And I get fired up sometimes.

He says, make a joyful noise to the Lord all the earth.

Serve the Lord with gladness, come into his presence with singing.

Know that the Lord He is God.

It is He who made us, and we are His.

We are His people and the sheep of His pasture.

Enter His gates with thanksgiving and His courts with praise.

Give thanks to Him.

Bless His name, for the Lord is good, his steadfast love endures forever, and His faithfulness to all generations.

Yes.

And see, see, I'm gonna let I'm gonna let some of you preach back to me.

Don't get long-winded.

No, seriously, let's just have, can we just have a moment where you share something that you're thankful for in a couple of words?

What's something that you can praise God for and be thankful for?

Who will go first?

Family! Man, let's be thankful for family.

Man, you you and what what a blessing you you guys are blessed with your family.

Who else?

Health, yes.

We have help.

Many of us are take it for granted that we have health and that we're well and that we we can get up and we can we can go to work, we can enjoy life the way we do.

What's something else?

Entertainment.

Entertainment.

I love entertainment.

I'm getting excited about entertainment.

I love, I love the types of entertainment.

My kids provide me entertainment.

Yesterday, my football provided a little bit of entertainment for me.

A team in it.

Yeah, I'm skinning my team.

But yeah, I'm I'm I'm entertaining.

What else?

Friends.

Friends?

Did you say friends?

Friends, yes.

And who said freedom?

Freedom.

Freedom.

Man, the freedom that we have.

And listen, we we I know there's tension in our country.

There's tension in a year of election, and there's there's no there's no such thing as a perfect nation or a perfect world or perfect community.

But man, we are blessed with freedom.

And even if things don't go the way that we like them to go sometimes, we we we have people that have fought and died for us to have a say in it.

What else?

Patience.

Patience.

Man, I'm glad you got patience.

Oh yeah.

Taking a hour mister.

Dads, dads need patience when there's a lot of ladies taking having to get ready in the house.

15 minutes to get from the red light going back toward the end of the air.

Okay.

I'm with you, brother.

And and I'm but I'm gonna tell you, I'm gonna pray for patience because that's how that's you live in that good.

But yeah, we uh we do.

God's giving, he gives us patience.

What else?

I have one again.

Um I was thinking of while we were talking about friends, I was thinking of like jobs.

Be think of like you're financially stable.

Absolutely.

Man, that God provides for us.

What a what a great uh mature thought.

Easton, I love you, Easton.

Easton is, man, I I love that kid.

What else?

Grandchildren.

Grandchildren.

Absolutely.

One or two more.

Salvation.

Salvation.

Food.

His love endures forever.

There's nothing that can take, listen, a lot of these things we're thankful for.

They may come and go, but man, his love endures forever.

Comfort and peace because of his promises.

Say it again.

Comfort and peace because of his promises.

Comfort and peace because of God's promises.

Absolutely.

Thank you, Steve.

Russ Butcher.

Definitely.

Amen.

Somebody in the first service said we're thankful for our pastors, and I think they were thinking about everybody else.

We have more than one pastor, but thank you.

Thank you, brother.

What are you doing for everybody here, Mike?

Sarah Swinwood.

It's not your name.

Murray.

Sarah Swinwood Murray.

Sarah, your dad.

I am thankful for him.

And I want you to know he's sitting at a table right now.

And he's experiencing a Thanksgiving that happens every day.

We celebrate it one day a year.

But what an example.

And I can tell you, he would be so proud of you and your life.

And even that stinky little boy that you married next to you, he would be so proud of y'all's life.

And I miss him.

But I'm going to see him again.

There's another table that is significant.

And it's the table that Jesus gathered around with his disciples the week before he was crucified.

And they shared what was called the Passover meal.

And Jesus took the bread and he said, This bread represents my body.

They didn't understand completely the significance at that point.

But he said, This bread represents my body that will be broken for you.

He said, I want you to eat of this in remembrance of me until I come again.

And he took the cup and he said, This cup that was full of wine, he says, the cup, the fruit of the vine, represents my blood that is spilled for you.

And he said, I want you to drink of this until I come again in remembrance of me.

And he knew it.

Everybody else at that table with him didn't understand it.

But sitting among him was an enemy that would betray him.

And so there was a table prepared for a meal in the presence of the one who would betray our Savior.

And he still said, I'm going to die.

And I'm going to rise again.

And even though that betrayer was in the room, he knew what had to happen.

Jesus was God, fully God, fully man.

So in his omniscience, in his all-knowing, he knew how he would suffer.

He knew what was going to happen at the hands of that enemy sitting at that table.

But what he did made it possible for you and I to sit at the table of the Lord's presence.

Like we do this morning.

And we take communion.

If you don't have one of these prepared, already to prepare to have communion, make sure that you have one.

If you need to, one of our ushers will help you have one.

But we're going to take communion.

We're going to partake in this activity that Jesus commanded us to partake of until he returns again.

It's the beauty of the life and the death and the resurrection of Jesus.

He took the bread and he said, This bread represents my broken body.

As he sat at that table, he said, I want you to eat of this bread and do this in remembrance of me until I return again and my kingdom, my new kingdom is established.

And so if you've never put your faith in Jesus, the Bible says that you can put your faith in Jesus, and this activity that we are engaging in together as a community of faith, it has new meaning.

It has significance.

As a matter of fact, we practice open communion here, which means you don't even have to be a member of our church.

But we do try to honor what the Lord says, which says that we don't partake of communion unless we've put our faith in Jesus.

And so would you pray with me?

Father, we come right now to partake of this bread, symbolically partaking of your broken body, and saying that we are united with you in your life and your death and your resurrection.

We are a family and we come to the table of the Lord, redeemed and forgiven.

And if you've never put your faith in Christ right now, all you have to do is to say in your heart, Jesus be my Lord, forgive me.

And I trust that what you did in your life and your death and your resurrection, it is sufficient to give me eternal life.

And so, Father, we take of this bread right now.

In the name of the beautiful man, Jesus.

We eat together.

And he took the cup.

And he said, You're going to drink of this fruit of the vine as a community and as a family until I return and usher in my new kingdom.

And do this in remembrance of me.

Remember that the blood that was spilled as Jesus was beaten and as he was crucified and as he bled, he did so our sins could be washed away.

So we wouldn't be dirty sheep anymore.

We would be restored sheep and he would become our good shepherd.

And what was just a name that was a common name in the Middle East, Yeshua, now has become the beautiful name that represents redemption and hope and peace and family.

Jesus.

And so we drink to remember together.

And the name of Jesus, it's a beautiful name.

Isn't it a beautiful name?

That's what we're gonna sing.

We're gonna sing of his beautiful name that gives us a sense of hope.

Maybe some of you feel like you're in the valley and you need the shepherd to lead you up to the beautiful table where you can feast in a fresh way.

And even though we feel like the enemies are around us, he promises us a feast right in the midst and the presence of our enemies.

And so, regardless of the circumstances, we come to the presence and the table of the Lord, and we sing of the beautiful name of Jesus.

So would you stand with me?

Let's stand together.

And Father, we come to say that you are good and you are a good shepherd, and your name is above every name, and it is a beautiful name, and we come to sing it together as a family.