Bless the Lord (Psalm 103) Mr. Dalton Vetter

Good morning to those who do not know me. My

name is Dalton Vedder and I am the ministerial

intern here at Fairview. My job normally is to

follow Kenny around and follow his example, but

today I have the honor and the pleasure of actually

getting to bring to you the word of God. And

it's a very special day to get to do that. Today

is one of those days that my grandma would call

it a cup of plenty. It's a cup full of blessings.

We had the teaching of the word this morning

in Sunday school. We get to come and sing and

glorify the Lord now after service. We get to

attend a beautiful wedding. And then we get to

celebrate later today, 240 years of Fairview

as we plan for the full celebration. And then

we get to come back tonight for an evening service

where we get to praise the Lord again and hear

from his word. It is a cup of plenty. It's more

than we deserve. But but sometimes we feel like

we lack that cup of plenty and we desire it We

have times in our lives and we even see it amongst

our couple plenty today of grieving and suffering

and of struggles But whether it's a day full

of blessing or season of your life full of blessing

or a season of your life filled with trials What

will ultimately learn this morning from Psalm

103? that we always have a cup of plenty and

So if you'll turn with your Bibles to me to Psalm

103 We're going to talk about praising the Lord

and blessing the Lord for all the good that he

does for us But before we read through the chapter,

let me go ahead and pray and ask for the spirits

help in doing this our Lord and our God We praise

you for you who you are You are the God who forgives

iniquities, who heals our diseases, who redeems

us from the pit. You lift us up so that we soar

on wings like eagles and you renew our strength

when we are weak. Lord, we ask your help this

morning to understand everything that you have

hidden in your word for us today. Lord, help

us to praise you through the reading and preaching

of your word this morning. Pray all of this in

Jesus' name. Amen. So Psalm 103 of David bless

the Lord. Oh my soul and all that is within me

Bless his holy name bless the Lord. Oh my soul

and forget not his benefits Who forgives all

your iniquity who heals all your diseases who

redeems your life from the pit? who crowns you

with steadfast love and mercy, who satisfies

you with good so that your youth is renewed like

the eagles. The Lord works righteousness and

justice for all who are oppressed. He made known

his ways to Moses, his acts of the people of

Israel. The Lord is merciful and gracious, slow

to anger and abounding and steadfast love. He

will not always chide, nor will he keep his anger

forever. He does not deal with us according to

our sins nor repay us according to our iniquities.

For as high as the heavens are above the earth,

so great is his steadfast love to those who fear

him. As far as the east is from the west, so

far does he remove our transgressions from us.

As a father shows compassion to his children,

so the Lord shows compassion to those who fear

him. For he knows our frame. He remembers that

we are dust. As for man, his days are like grass.

He flourishes like a flower of the field, for

the wind passes over it and it is gone, and in

its place knows it no more. But the steadfast

love of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting

on those who fear him and his righteousness to

children's children, to those who keep his covenant

and remember to do his commandments. The Lord

has established his throne in the heavens and

his kingdom rules over all. Bless the Lord, O

you his angels, you mighty ones who do his word,

obeying the voice of his word. Bless the Lord,

all his hosts, his ministers who do his will.

Bless the Lord, all his works and the places

of his dominion. Bless the Lord, O my soul. So

as the beginning of the Psalm states, this is

a Psalm of David. Now, normally Psalms are tied

to a specific event or time in Israel's life

and we know why they're written and why the psalmist

is talking about what they're talking about.

But this is one of those Psalms that seems to

have no event tied to it. It's a Psalm just of

pure praise, of pure worship, of encouragement

to our souls. And maybe this is towards the end

of David's life as he sits and reflects on all

that the Lord has done for him and for the nation

of Israel, looking forward to all that the Lord

will do. I think that's maybe the safest place

to assume that the psalm has taken place, David

reflecting on his life, because this is a psalm

of praise, but it's a psalm of praise that comes

out of reflection. And that scene in the beginning

of chapter one, because David begins the psalm

with a personal reflection and praise in verses

one to five. David says, bless the Lord, oh my

soul. The word bless here is actually the word

for praise, but it's not just the generic act

of worship of praising, but it's a act of praise

that comes out of thankfulness for all that the

Lord has done. It's an honoring the Lord. It's

very similar to actually the beginning of our

Lord's prayer telling the Lord that his name

should be hallowed and David tells his soul to

praise the Lord, but it's not just his soul.

It's all that is within him. David is pulling

on the Shema here the national chant of Israel

that says the Lord your God is one and you shall

love him with all your heart with all your mind

with all your soul and with all your strength.

David is telling his whole person to worship.

He's encouraging it to worship. And this is what

we have to do as believers in times where we're

struggling. We have to follow David's example

here and encourage our soul in worshiping. And

David continues on, telling his soul again to

bless the Lord and not to forget the Lord's benefits,

to not forget the good of the Lord. Now, forgetting

here does not just mean a casual, oh, I forgot

what the Lord did. But it actually means no,

I know of the cross. I know what the Lord has

sacrificed I know how the Lord has has sustained

us as a church and how he sustained the nation

of Israel But I will choose to ignore that it's

a willful forgetting But the psalmist here is

telling his soul do not do that Remember the

good of the Lord And then David tells us why.

He tells us five attributes that the Lord has

that we must remember. Or five who's that David

will say here. The Lord is the Lord who forgives

all of our iniquity. This benefit is the greatest

benefit. It's the chief benefit. Without this

benefit from God, none of the others matter.

Calvin says that reconciliation with Him, with

God, is the fountain from which all other blessings

flow. And what we'll see here, too, is that the

forgiveness that God gives is through His Son.

This is actually a Messianic Psalm that points

us to the future and to the Messiah. It's talking

about the God who plans and the Son who accomplishes

and the Spirit who applies. And so David begins

with forgiveness for sins because it's the most

important thing of all. It allows us to come

into covenant, to come into relationship with

God because otherwise we are sinners separate

from God who cannot enter his presence. While

close to forgiveness is healing, God is the God

who heals from our diseases. Jesus actually makes

this comparison in Mark chapter two, handling

the paralytic man. Man's friends had taken time

to lower him through the roof to get him to Jesus,

and this man is laying in front of Jesus, and

Jesus does not say, I'm healing you, get up and

walk. Jesus actually says, your sins are forgiven,

now go. And Jesus gets questioned about it, and

Jesus just says, well, what is easier, for me

to say your sins are forgiven, that he knows

you will have no guilt, or to tell him to get

up and walk? There is a close tie to forgiveness

and healing from all our diseases and We don't

always have immediate relief in this life but

we do look forward to a day when Christ will

come again and there will be no more weeping

and there will be no more death because we are

forgiven and Then we're healed and we're healed

internally as well from the disease of death.

So our lives are redeemed from the pit We no

longer look forward to a day of punishment, but

a day of celebration and joy before the throne

of God, because we are forgiven and we have been

healed. And on that day, we will be crowned with

steadfast love and mercy. As children of God,

we're told in Galatians that we are sons, and

if we are sons, we are then heirs, we are royalty

to the throne of God. And we're given God's steadfast

love and mercy. Steadfast love is a key aspect

of the psalm. It's a Hebrew word, hesed. And

if you listen to Reformed and Presbyterian pastors

for very long, you'll hear this word come up

often. Especially as they go through the Old

Testament, they will always stop and pause. Because

steadfast love contains so much. Steadfast love

points to the covenant, the bond and blood, the

contract that we have between us and God. That

as long as we follow him and obey his commandments,

that we will receive his blessing. And it's actually

a covenant of grace because it's not us who are

doing the commandments. We do follow Christ,

but it's Christ who accomplishes the commandments

of God, the works of God, and allows us to walk

in them. So the steadfast love is an active and

an ongoing love. It's one that there's a close

bond, a contract tied to it. And with it comes

the mercy of God. And out of that steadfast love

and mercy being crowned, we are satisfied with

the good things of the Lord. The Lord satisfies

us in ways that we will never understand. There

are times when everything should be hectic, but

it's not. And there are times where even amongst

the chaos we can find some good. Because it's

the Lord who gives us grace and gives us mercy

beyond anything we can find. And finally, it's

out of all of these things that the Lord renews

us like eagles. He strengthens us. We're at the

250th anniversary of America. And of course,

closely tied to America is the bald eagle. Because

it's a symbol of strength. And maybe some of

you have taken time to go to Dollywood and they

actually have an eagle sanctuary, an eagle habitat.

And I remember going and seeing those eagles

for the first time, and I understood why America

had picked this bird as a symbol of strength,

or why the psalmist would pick this bird as a

symbol of strength. An eagle is bigger than most

dogs, and they can live for years. They live

30 or 40 years. And they soar through the sky,

and there's no other bird that can touch them.

And that is what the Lord does for us. We have

a heart of wickedness, of sinfulness, but he

takes it and he gives us a heart of life and

he gives us his strength, so that we can praise

him. But then the psalmist moves on here, talking

about the attributes of God, to now he's actually

going to talk about the works of God. He doesn't

just praise God for who he is, but what God has

done. And so we'll see that in verses six through

10. There's a national reflection. and praise

that David gives. David, after thinking on the

Lord, begins to think of Israel and what God

had done to the nation. He begins by saying the

word, the Lord works righteousness and justice

for all who are oppressed. If we were to simplify

this and make the translation a little bit more

literal, it would actually say God does works

of righteousness and works of justice for the

oppressed. This is an action phrase. And David

is thinking of Israel at this point, of Egypt,

thinking of this nation in captivity who are

being oppressed. They were in slavery, but then

the Lord freed Israel from Egypt and brought

them out of that place to be with them, to dwell

with them, to teach them his commandments. And

so the Lord found justice, but the Lord didn't

just find justice for Israel. He finds justice

for all the oppressed, all those who have suffered.

all those who need help. The Lord is their strength

and their shield. And David continues the thinking

of Israel. He says that the Lord made his way

known to Moses and his acts to the people of

Israel. This quotation here is actually almost

verbatim, word for word, from Exodus 34, which

follows the incident of the golden calf. Israel

had been brought up. brought up out of Egypt

through the Red Sea and taken to the mount. And

Moses goes up to the mountain to receive the

Ten Commandments and while Moses is away, the

children of Israel fall in the sin. They craft

a golden calf and they begin to worship and praise

it instead of the one true God. Moses comes back

down and he sees what is happening and he breaks

the tablets of stone over his legs. But then

Moses after that there's some rebuking of the

people but Moses ultimately intercedes for the

people and asked the Lord to continue to dwell

with them and for the Lord to show him his ways

for the Lord to show Moses his ways and Moses

has taken back up on the mountain to receive

the new copy of the Ten Commandments and God

tells Moses in Exodus 34 6 And the Lord passed

by before him and proclaimed, the Lord, the Lord,

a God full of compassion and graciousness, slow

to anger and plentish in mercy and in truth,

keeping mercy for thousands and forgiving iniquity

and transgression and sin, but will by no means

clear the guilty. And David here is going to

reflect on this phrase of Moses for the rest

of. the section here until the end of verse 10

and even a little bit into 11 and 12. Moses heard

that the Lord is merciful and gracious, that

the Lord is willing to forgive. The first commandment

is to have no other gods before you and the Israelites

did just that. They broke the number one commandment

and the Lord would have been perfectly just to

destroy the Israelites then and there. But no,

the Lord gave them mercy. He did not strike out

in anger and He gave them His grace, unmerited

favor. And He was slow to anger and He chose

to keep His covenant with them. Now we do know

that later in Israel's life that the first generation

would be kept from the promised land, part of

the covenant, but the Lord still was faithful

to their children and He brought their children

in. Because the Lord was slow to anger and he

gave them many many chances and he was always

faithful to his covenant But thinking of the

children of Israel the second generation David

said that the Lord will not always chide. This

actually means prosecute Say it's a legal term

to bring charges against The Lord does not always

bring charges against us even in our sin And

he does not keep his anger at us forever. And

that brings David to the conclusion that the

Lord does not deal with us according to our sins,

nor does he repay us for our iniquities. The

Lord knows that we will sin. We have sin in this

life that causes us to go against his law. But

he does not repay us accordingly. He will discipline

us, but so it's that we can love him more and

love him better. And most of all, he saves us

from death. We know from Romans 6 .23 that the

wages of sin is death. But the Lord and his son,

Jesus, does not give us that punishment, does

not deal with us accordingly. Now, sometimes

we act like the Lord does. We remember a sin,

maybe a lie, or maybe we forget to tithe or something

like that, and then the next month comes around.

and our car breaks down or a tree falls on our

house or something happens and we start acting

like the Lord is dealing with us according to

the sin. Even though we might have confessed

for getting to tithe. We hold onto it and we

cling to it and we think that there's consequences

coming out of this one situation of sin that

the Lord is just continuing to chastise us over.

But David tells us not to do that, to remember.

the goodness of the Lord that we are forgiven,

that when we confess our sins that we are forgiven

those sins and that the Lord does not hold them

against us. And then David moves on now to a

covenant reflection and a covenant remembrance.

He goes from just the nation of Israel to all

those who will come into relationship with him.

This forgiveness of sins and iniquities goes

out from Israel. For as high as the heavens are

above the earth, so great is the said fast love

to those who fear them. As far as the east is

from the west, so far does he remove our transgression

from us. It's not just those in Israel who receive

the forgiveness of the Lord. It's those who will

come to fear him, or who do fear him. and He

separates those who love Him, who follow Him

and believe in Him from their sins as far as

the east is from the west. And if you follow

that, if you're going from east to west to west

to east, it will just be one never -ending circle.

You will never reach the end of it. We will never

be able to find our sins again because the Lord

has separated them from us. And He does so because

He is a compassionate Father to His children,

verses 13 and 14. And the word compassionate

is actually God pities those who fear him. You

know, a good father or a good mother, parents

with kids, you'll understand this. That you watch

your little children, maybe as a baby, as they

try to pull themselves up on a chair for the

first time and stand up, but then they fall right

back down on their bottom. Or maybe they get

a little older and you see them start to reach

for food or reach for an object on a shelf, maybe

a toy. and they're not quite strong enough to

reach it and pull it down. Or maybe your children

aren't little anymore and they're adult children

and you're watching the decisions they make and

you're going, well, I wouldn't make that decision,

but I will walk alongside you. You have a level

of pity for them as they learn about life and

how things work. And this is how God treats us.

He understands that we do not know everything,

that we are always growing and learning and changing,

learning how to follow Him better. So he has

pity on us and he shows anyone who fears him

compassion He knows our frame he knows that we

are but dust from the very beginning and Adam

God created us out of the dust out of the dirt

Nothing special not gold or silver We were not

some angelic beings. We were made out of dirt

and given the breath of God God remembers this

and he shows us compassion. Man is temporal.

We're temporary. We have a birth date and we

have an end date. We have a day that we die.

Our days are like grass. We don't know what will

happen. We go through seasons and things change

just like the grass outside. Right now we're

in summer and the grass is green and it's beautiful.

But at times weeds come up and then we have to

put fertilizer on it to make it green again.

And so there's days of blessing, but then there's

even days where, you know, as the weather gets

colder, the grass turns brown and it looks different.

And that's how our lives are. Some days there's

days of blessing and days of mercy and it's beautiful

and things are going well. And then there's days

where maybe we're stuck in a particular sin.

We're temporal. We're even called a flower of

the field. Flowers of the field can be beautiful.

But they can also be food for animals. Or if

you think back to Hurricane Helene, those flowers

can be ripped out of the ground and misplaced.

They can be tossed to and fro by the wind and

forget where they belong. But the Lord is in

contrast to this. When we're temporal and we

have a birthday and a death day, the Lord is

eternal. He is from everlasting to everlasting.

And his covenant is from everlasting to everlasting.

He tells Abraham this in Genesis 17 seven, I

will establish my covenant between me and you

and your descendants after you throughout your

generations for an everlasting covenant to be

God to you and to your descendants after you.

and then thinking of Christ to accomplish the

forgiveness of sins, in Hebrews 1320, the writer

says, now may the God of peace, who brought again

from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd

of the sheep, by the blood of the eternal covenant,

equip you with everything good, that you may

do his will, working in us that which is pleasing

in his sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be

the glory forever and ever. Amen. What the writer

of Hebrews tells us there is actually essential

to what the psalmist is saying here because the

psalmist will go on and say that all those who

keep the covenant the Lord will give his righteousness

to. But it's Christ who actually helps us keep

the covenant. It's by his spirit. It is the spirit

working in us that causes us to be pleasing in

the sight. And that's true whether it's Old Testament

or New Testament. The Lord has always given his

spirit to help believers keep his covenant so

that the Lord can be faithful to it. And the

Lord is not just faithful to us, but he's faithful

to our children. The righteousness of the Lord

goes to our children's children, all those who

remember his commandments. And we can have confidence

in this and we can praise the Lord for this because

the Lord has established his throne in the heavens.

It is above all, it sees all, it knows all, and

his kingdom rules over all. There's nothing that

God does not have his hand on. And so David returns

to praising the Lord after this reflection to

a final praise. And it's almost identical to

the beginning, but instead of just his soul,

he begins to include others in it. He begins

with the angels, the mighty ones who do his word,

the faithful angels that sit before the throne

of God. The psalmist is commanding them to bless,

to praise the Lord, to be thankful for all that

he has done. They're the highest beings that

we can think of outside of God. And then David

moves to blessing the Lord, all his hosts. This

is all of creation. God created all things just

like he created man. And now David is commanding

this creation to praise the Lord, to praise their

creator because he is good, he forgives and he

heals and he works righteousness. And David includes,

the psalmist includes the ministers in this,

the believers before the throne of God who have

done his will and been faithful and are standing

face to face with their creator. But the word

ministers here also includes us. who are faithful,

we're commanded by the psalmist to come in and

praise and to bless the Lord and to remember

all that he has done. Bless the works, bless

the Lord all his works in all the places of the

of dominion. We are to praise the Lord everywhere

we go. Everything in the Lord's dominion is to

praise him. And then David concludes with telling

his soul once again to bless the Lord, oh my

soul. By doing this David is almost starting

the cycle again He can go back to verse 1 and

recount the works that God has done in Israel

and the forgiveness that he gives by his covenant

it's a never -ending cycle of praise and We should

model this in our own lives today, but even as

we go out from here We should constantly reflect

on the works of the Lord and be driven to praise

him I want to say that one more time, because

if you get nothing else from the sermon, this

is what I want you to remember. You should constantly

reflect on the works of the Lord and be driven

to praise Him. In doing the psalm, I was reminded

of an old hymn. Count your blessings. And I think

it's fitting for this psalm, but also for the

events today. The very last stanza says, are

you ever burdened with a load of care does the

cross seem heavy you are called the bear count

your many blessings every doubt will fly and

you will be singing by the days go by so some

days like today it's very easy to see our cup

of plenty and other days it's much harder but

what we're told is to reflect on the lord and

to praise him and the lord will strengthen us

and the Lord will forgive us and give us his

grace so that we can praise him and be in fellowship

with him. Let me pray.