[SPEAKER_00]: You are listening to audio from Citizens Church located in Plano, Texas.
[SPEAKER_00]: For more information about this ministry or to give to this ministry, please visit citizenschurch.com.
[SPEAKER_00]: Amen.
[SPEAKER_00]: Good morning.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like Aubrey said, my name is Corey.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm one of the pastors on staff.
[SPEAKER_00]: It is good to be with you this morning.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you are new, we are glad you've chosen to be here with us this morning.
[SPEAKER_00]: Maybe this summer is your chance to kind of look into a new church or to church in general.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's good to have you here.
[SPEAKER_00]: If citizens is your place, you're home.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's good to have you here with us this morning.
[SPEAKER_00]: We have been in a summer series in the song Book of the Bible called the Psalms.
[SPEAKER_00]: As we talked about the first two weeks of this series, the Psalms like the rest of Scripture point us directly to Jesus.
[SPEAKER_00]: I love a good playlist.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you love music, you love them too.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's fun to think about the progression of the playlist.
[SPEAKER_00]: Back in the day, we used to call it a mixed tape.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, a lost half the room.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then it was burning CDs, not literally burning CDs.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right on the chart, thank you.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know who that laugh laugh was, but thank you, like writing on the title, the titles of the songs and Sharpie on your CD.
[SPEAKER_00]: How great was that?
[SPEAKER_00]: And you put them in your visor.
[SPEAKER_00]: To the early days of iTunes, and now I share a playlist with my ninth grade son, that's really fun.
[SPEAKER_00]: Or I will hit up the college life team for somebody really cool to make me a playlist.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's really helpful on Spotify because Apple music is gross.
[SPEAKER_00]: This last week, I wandered into Bleakers office to talk about the passes that we're in this morning.
[SPEAKER_00]: And he goes, dude, have you seen my throwback playlist from the decades, like from the seventies that today of all the worship stuff?
[SPEAKER_00]: And he literally walked me through.
[SPEAKER_00]: He made album art for each one.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was incredible to see all these playlists.
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, by the way, if you want a great playlist, Blicker has a famed Yacht Rock playlist.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's for you.
[SPEAKER_00]: You should ask them about it.
[SPEAKER_00]: I love a good playlist.
[SPEAKER_00]: You guys, our passage today is a biblical playlists of sorts.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's called the Hello.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, so if you haven't already opened up in your Bible the Psalm one eighteen, want you to turn there now.
[SPEAKER_00]: Psalm, chapter one, thirteen, two, one, eighteen are called the Halele, the Hallelujah songs.
[SPEAKER_00]: They were sung by God's people at Passover's or a minor of all that he had done over the years.
[SPEAKER_00]: Psalm one, thirteen and one, fourteen were sung before the Passover meal, one, fifteen and one, eighteen after.
[SPEAKER_00]: They were telling a story.
[SPEAKER_00]: They were about the Exodus from Egypt and later they were sung and light of the deliverance from exile and Babylon.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, these were very important songs to the people of God.
[SPEAKER_00]: And like every great playlist, though, there's that one song that is your favorite.
[SPEAKER_00]: Psalm one, eighteen is that for me.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like the best song in the playlist.
[SPEAKER_00]: It speaks of both suffering and victory.
[SPEAKER_00]: It speaks of trials and future hope.
[SPEAKER_00]: And while you may not know this, this song is indirectly referenced in the New Testament and the gospel narratives.
[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus, likely, saying this song with the disciples, check this out.
[SPEAKER_00]: In Matthew chapter twenty six, it's really incredible.
[SPEAKER_00]: You can picture this, you can picture Jesus in the upper room with the disciples.
[SPEAKER_00]: He was gathering there to introduce them to communion.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was the night before all things would go crazy.
[SPEAKER_00]: Twenty four hours later, and he would be betrayed, arrested, condemned, and crucified.
[SPEAKER_00]: So during the meal, he's introducing communion to them and seeing him as a replacement.
[SPEAKER_00]: his body and his blood rather than the passive or lamb is the new covenant.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then in Matthew twenty six and verse thirty it says this little statement that you may have never seen before.
[SPEAKER_00]: It says and when they had sung a him they went out to the Mount of Olives.
[SPEAKER_00]: Friends, Psalm one eighteen would have been that him.
[SPEAKER_00]: It would have been this song that they would have sang together this last one in root to his suffering and crucifixion, and to the disciples' darkest and most difficult times of being scattered or denying or disbelief.
[SPEAKER_00]: These words would ring in their hearts over and over from that moment forward.
[SPEAKER_00]: Words like verse five in the passage, out of my distress, I called upon the Lord.
[SPEAKER_00]: And while they didn't know to the time when they sang this song, words like verse fourteen came to mind.
[SPEAKER_00]: The Lord is my strength and my song.
[SPEAKER_00]: He has become my salvation.
[SPEAKER_00]: They were proclaiming the rescue, the deliverance, and the victory that Jesus was about to bring them.
[SPEAKER_00]: someone eighteen gives us more than ancient words of praise, though.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like the rest of God's story, it points us to Jesus over and over.
[SPEAKER_00]: The one who endured and suffered was rejected and yet triumphed on our behalf.
[SPEAKER_00]: And because of the victory, we have in Jesus this Psalm speaks powerfully to our present, our current trials, our current difficulty.
[SPEAKER_00]: Reminding us that our hope is not what we exceed experience here in the now, but in a future that has been secured for us,
[SPEAKER_00]: by the steadfast love of Jesus.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's pray.
[SPEAKER_00]: God, as we dive in to your scriptures, your words Psalm one eighteen.
[SPEAKER_00]: I pray that the Holy Spirit would speak to us.
[SPEAKER_00]: Your word would read us.
[SPEAKER_00]: Would help us to see Jesus.
[SPEAKER_00]: What God is that your people have gathered together would your spirit move and power now?
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you for this time.
[SPEAKER_00]: I pray that you would move through the preaching of your word.
[SPEAKER_00]: Pray this in Jesus name.
[SPEAKER_00]: Amen.
[SPEAKER_00]: Psalm one eighteen is a lengthy passage twenty nine verses in all we don't cover all that this morning.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's a bit of a survey.
[SPEAKER_00]: But please know this every verse points directly to Jesus.
[SPEAKER_00]: You can throw all twenty nine verses into seventeen packs and they will all point directly to Jesus.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's worthy, the more time than we have for today.
[SPEAKER_00]: So my encouragement for you after this is that you grant this song time over your heart in mind.
[SPEAKER_00]: Maybe with someone in your house.
[SPEAKER_00]: Maybe with your home group later today or this week, give it time.
[SPEAKER_00]: The format of the Psalm itself provides some of the structure for the morning.
[SPEAKER_00]: The first eighteen verses described as Psalmist present difficulties with hope and gods rescue and help the author would speak about the anguish of these things that people would hate him.
[SPEAKER_00]: He talks about being surrounded all sides and being pushed down.
[SPEAKER_00]: He talks about being fearful even to the point of death.
[SPEAKER_00]: But verse is nineteen to twenty nine, describe the Psalmist future hope.
[SPEAKER_00]: All that God would accomplish and continue to do to bring rescue and salvation and favor.
[SPEAKER_00]: All by the steadfast love of God that endures forever.
[SPEAKER_00]: So let's go to the passage.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's go to the passage.
[SPEAKER_00]: As you read this Psalm, what does it teach us to do in our present difficulties?
[SPEAKER_00]: I think there's two things if you write stuff down, two things.
[SPEAKER_00]: Repeat.
[SPEAKER_00]: And remember, verse, these verses are full of repetition.
[SPEAKER_00]: The author of Psalm one eighteen does what every parent in the room does to repeat himself over and over and over again.
[SPEAKER_00]: Just like our kids, you need us to say the same things over and again, we need to hear the truth about God on repeat.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it's trial and suffering that a friend of this Psalm is a character and action of God.
[SPEAKER_00]: Look at all of these repeated phrases throughout the first half of the scripture.
[SPEAKER_00]: has steadfast love and doers forever multiple times.
[SPEAKER_00]: The Lord is on my side.
[SPEAKER_00]: He says twice.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's better to take refuge in the Lord.
[SPEAKER_00]: He says twice.
[SPEAKER_00]: The Lord is my helper.
[SPEAKER_00]: He says twice.
[SPEAKER_00]: The right hand of the Lord has done glorious things.
[SPEAKER_00]: He says twice.
[SPEAKER_00]: What it is, what is incredible about each of these repeated phrases is the fact that the Psalmist, this author, is focusing and pointing all of his attention on God's character
[SPEAKER_00]: instead of his circumstance.
[SPEAKER_00]: They point to God's love and nearness and security, and they help and strengthen in desperate times, the Psalmist embeds timeless truths about God repeatedly.
[SPEAKER_00]: in the words of the song.
[SPEAKER_00]: This leads him the midst of difficult circumstances to say what verse fifteen says.
[SPEAKER_00]: Glad songs of salvation are in the tense of the righteous.
[SPEAKER_00]: They should lead us to do the same thing.
[SPEAKER_00]: Repeating the truth about God should make our hearts glad.
[SPEAKER_00]: over and over again.
[SPEAKER_00]: It should make our hearts glad.
[SPEAKER_00]: Church, this is one of the reasons why we're repeating old songs in the month of July.
[SPEAKER_00]: I love this month when we sing these songs, our throwback month of July each year.
[SPEAKER_00]: As we repeat these old songs once again, they tell our hearts timeless truths about Jesus.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's so much more than just nostalgia.
[SPEAKER_00]: We get to repeat the truth about Jesus through songs we've sung over the years.
[SPEAKER_00]: I want to try something.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm really nervous to even try it.
[SPEAKER_00]: to Marcus did this once, and this will probably be the only time I'm going to do it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Something I told myself I would never do in a sermon, I'm going to sing.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I'm going to sing something I want you to respond.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I bet you'll know how to respond because you've repeated this so many times already.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, two people are going to sing.
[SPEAKER_00]: What can wash away my sin?
[SPEAKER_00]: Nothing but the blood of Jesus.
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, man.
[SPEAKER_00]: Hey, come on.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_00]: He's not here, but don't tell J.man how well that went.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, I don't.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't want him to.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_00]: Friends, when we sing these songs, we sing over and over again, and we repeat, it takes us to places.
[SPEAKER_00]: Man, when I sing that song, I think about my childhood and the church.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think about learning about Jesus as a little boy.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm gonna repeat these things.
[SPEAKER_00]: When I sing the song, Hosanna, by Hillsong United, I recall the discipleship we came with students where God saved over a hundred kids.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's what I recall.
[SPEAKER_00]: I remember when the song Cornerstone was released,
[SPEAKER_00]: When I sing, when I sing cornerstone of this day, I just love it.
[SPEAKER_00]: I have a video of my Google photos of my oldest son when he was a little boy when it came out wearing my hat, my watch, singing the song of this and our living room.
[SPEAKER_00]: Not too long after that moment though, the beauty of that moment, my wife and I enter into a season where experience loss and suffering through miscarriages.
[SPEAKER_00]: That song on repeat, on repeat would remind me of how steady and constant God was in our loss.
[SPEAKER_00]: When I sing that song now it hits different.
[SPEAKER_00]: Every time we have to repeat the truth about Jesus.
[SPEAKER_00]: And here's why that matters in trial.
[SPEAKER_00]: When we repeat these truths found in this passage or in the scriptures in general, because we have the tendency to forget, to get lost in our trial, which is easy and understandable.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's easy and understandable.
[SPEAKER_00]: I have a years old battle with panic attacks.
[SPEAKER_00]: I hate them.
[SPEAKER_00]: They're terrifying.
[SPEAKER_00]: Thirty minutes can feel like thirty days.
[SPEAKER_00]: They're awful.
[SPEAKER_00]: And some of my tendencies in the middle of that panic is forgetfulness.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's an amnesia.
[SPEAKER_00]: I forget what God has done for me in Jesus or it's fear that this is insurmountable and that nothing is going to change it.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is bigger than Jesus himself or I start to forecast what ifs fill my heart in my mind.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then my wife who's usually around for them reminds me of the truth of Jesus.
[SPEAKER_00]: She repeats them over and over again in my fear.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's so easy to forget.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we repeat the truth about God as the Psalmist did as Jesus did and the disciples did when they sang this song.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is what our gathering here in this place on Sundays is so important.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's what we put so much value in our home groups.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's in these gatherings where we repeat and we rehearse the truth of God together.
[SPEAKER_00]: over and over again.
[SPEAKER_00]: So we sing these words and we pray these words and we read them and repeat them and repeat them.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then things like Psalm, excuse me, Philippians four and verse eight says this, it's finally brothers, whatever is true and honorable, whatever is just and pure, whatever is lovely and commendable, there's anything excellent, there's anything worthy of praise, think about these things, repeat these things in our sorrow and our suffering, the author of this Psalm calls us to repeat.
[SPEAKER_00]: But he also calls us to remember.
[SPEAKER_00]: The close of the first half of the Psalm is verses seventeen and eighteen if you look at it.
[SPEAKER_00]: The Psalmist says this, in light of all the suffering and sorrow that He and His people have endured.
[SPEAKER_00]: He says, I shall not die, but I shall live.
[SPEAKER_00]: In account the deeds of the Lord, the Lord has discipline me severely, but He has not given me over to death.
[SPEAKER_00]: The Psalmist is not crazy, he's not deluded, he knows that every human being will encounter and into their mortal life.
[SPEAKER_00]: He's speaking about the victory that Israel had over hardship.
[SPEAKER_00]: That Israel had over those who made them slaves.
[SPEAKER_00]: He's reminding himself in the reader that in the middle of it all, God was present and helping and near time and again, it's a hinge moment where confidence in God's salvation begins to break through.
[SPEAKER_00]: He's having a moment or realization.
[SPEAKER_00]: versus seventeen or eighteen are just the words of the Psalmist has after victory over enemies.
[SPEAKER_00]: We see them differently today as we remember Jesus.
[SPEAKER_00]: Seventy and eighteen stand as a gospel heartbeat in the very middle of the Psalm declaring that suffering is not the end.
[SPEAKER_00]: That death is not the victor and that God's faithful love and life will bring praise again.
[SPEAKER_00]: The Psalmist speaks from a place of deep suffering and divine discipline yet he declares confidently that death will not be the end of the story.
[SPEAKER_00]: This echo is the very heart of the gospel.
[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus endured suffering and death for our sin, but he rose to life.
[SPEAKER_00]: In him, we two are promised life.
[SPEAKER_00]: We are promised life spiritually now and physically in the resurrection to come.
[SPEAKER_00]: In our sorrow, and in our suffering, we have to remember Jesus.
[SPEAKER_00]: Second Corinthians four, sixteen and eighteen says it like this.
[SPEAKER_00]: So we do not lose heart.
[SPEAKER_00]: Their outer self is wasting away.
[SPEAKER_00]: Our inner self is being renewed day by day.
[SPEAKER_00]: For this light and momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison.
[SPEAKER_00]: It as we look, not to the things that are seen, but the things that are unseen, for the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.
[SPEAKER_00]: I remember the last days of my grandfather very, very well, call them Papa.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's my dad's dad.
[SPEAKER_00]: He was a very kind and gentle man.
[SPEAKER_00]: And while Alzheimer's slowly stole from his body in his mind, his longing to be with Jesus from manned.
[SPEAKER_00]: I remember my dad and I went to visit him in the nursing home one time, not too long after his wife of sixty-four years have passed away.
[SPEAKER_00]: There was a lot of crying.
[SPEAKER_00]: And in his tears, you kept saying, I want to go home, I want to go home.
[SPEAKER_00]: My dad said, that, do you are home?
[SPEAKER_00]: And I will never forget what my papa said, because he corrected my dad quite strongly.
[SPEAKER_00]: He said, I'm not talking about this place, boy.
[SPEAKER_00]: He said, I want to be with Jesus.
[SPEAKER_00]: Come home.
[SPEAKER_00]: He never forgot.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so we help to remember friends in our suffering, the call of God in this passage is to repeat and remember the character and the action and the presence of Jesus in our lives.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's leads us to the second half of the passage in the song of Jesus that speaks to our future hope after recalling God's past faithfulness and rescue the song that moves towards a climactic moment of worship and hope, a celebration that ultimately points us once again to Jesus.
[SPEAKER_00]: So when we sing this song of Jesus, has hold our future hope, how does it encourage our heart and minds?
[SPEAKER_00]: I would say three things.
[SPEAKER_00]: Versus this because of Jesus, we are never separated from God.
[SPEAKER_00]: Psalm one eighteen nineteen thirty-one says this open to me the gates of righteousness that I may enter through them and give thanks to the Lord this is the gate of the Lord the righteous shall enter through it thank you that you have answered me and become my salvation for the ancient Israelites the gates of righteousness symbolize their entrance into
[SPEAKER_00]: The temple, the place where God dwells, His presence and favor and blessing.
[SPEAKER_00]: But for the follower of Jesus, this verse points us, points us to the ultimate gate, Jesus himself.
[SPEAKER_00]: In John XIX, Jesus said, I am the gate, whoever enters by me will be saved.
[SPEAKER_00]: Christ alone can open the gates of righteousness for we the unrighteous.
[SPEAKER_00]: We cannot know nor be near God without Jesus.
[SPEAKER_00]: The victory this song comes for those who trust in Him.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because our sin, we are those who should be destroyed.
[SPEAKER_00]: We are not the righteous who enter the gates, but in Christ, we become the triumph at once and have access to the most holy place we can be near God.
[SPEAKER_00]: For by grace we have been saved.
[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus made a way for us to be with God again.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is the good news in this passage.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because of Jesus' death and resurrection, the way into God's presence has been permanently open for those who believe.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's wide open.
[SPEAKER_00]: And now our future hope is rooted in the promise that we will one day dwell with Him forever.
[SPEAKER_00]: One day dwell with Him forever.
[SPEAKER_00]: Surmonize me, Romans, eight, thirty, and thirty, nine.
[SPEAKER_00]: For I am sure
[SPEAKER_00]: love Paul's words there.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am sure that either death in our life, in our angels, in our rulers, in our present things, or things to come, in our powers, in our height, in our death.
[SPEAKER_00]: Nor anything else in all of creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
[SPEAKER_00]: Beloved, if Jesus is your Lord, no sin or sorrow or suffering, can keep you from Him.
[SPEAKER_00]: Secondly, because of Jesus, we have a firm foundation.
[SPEAKER_00]: Look at verses twenty-two to twenty-four.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you're wondering where this came from in the scriptures, here it is.
[SPEAKER_00]: The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is the Lord's doing.
[SPEAKER_00]: It is marvelous in our eyes.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is the day that the Lord has made, let us rejoice and be glad in it.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you don't know an ancient architecture, the cornerstone was the first stone that was laid.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was the corner of a foundation.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was carefully chosen and precisely placed.
[SPEAKER_00]: Everything else was aligned to it.
[SPEAKER_00]: It determines shape, it determines stability, the direction of the entire building.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, while theologians are kind of out on why exactly this almost mentioned that in this place right here in verse twenty two, here's what we do know.
[SPEAKER_00]: Israel's story was one of rejection and rescue.
[SPEAKER_00]: Time and again, God would take what was cast aside, his people in slavery, exile defeat, and raise them up and restore them by his strong hand.
[SPEAKER_00]: But now, in full clarity, we see one-eighteen in these verses, twenty-two, twenty-four, ultimately is pointing once again to Jesus, the stone that the builders rejected.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, he refers to this verse in Matthew and Mark in a Luke Peter proclaims it and acts and again in his own letter.
[SPEAKER_00]: We spent the better part of a year going through first Peter as a church.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was fortunate to get to preach on those actual verses.
[SPEAKER_00]: Verse six says this in verse Peter chapter two says as the scriptures say I am placing a cornerstone in Jerusalem chosen for great honor and anyone entrusts in him will never be disgraced.
[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus is the perfectly chosen and placed stone by the Father and all of life now finds its shape and its security and its direction in Him.
[SPEAKER_00]: Here's what that means for us.
[SPEAKER_00]: Verse Peter two and verse five says this, says you are living stones that God is building into His spiritual temple.
[SPEAKER_00]: Even in trial he's making us into something beautiful together.
[SPEAKER_00]: Good is that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now for those who believe Jesus is our cornerstone He is given us a firm foundation of place to build our lives on in this chaotic and difficult and unpredictable life.
[SPEAKER_00]: There are times where everything feels like sinking sand.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is true regardless of season or station.
[SPEAKER_00]: You find yourself in a life.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is where we are.
[SPEAKER_00]: Beloved, if you are in Jesus Christ, if you are your Lord, you always though have a place to stand.
[SPEAKER_00]: and people to stand with you, the church.
[SPEAKER_00]: Ephesians two says this.
[SPEAKER_00]: So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with saints, with the saints and the members of the household of God.
[SPEAKER_00]: Built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because of Jesus we always have a place to stand.
[SPEAKER_00]: Lastly, thirdly, because of Jesus we have a purpose.
[SPEAKER_00]: Look at verse is twenty and twenty nine.
[SPEAKER_00]: He says, you are my God and I will give thanks to you.
[SPEAKER_00]: You are my God.
[SPEAKER_00]: I will extol you.
[SPEAKER_00]: I will praise you.
[SPEAKER_00]: I will give thanks to the Lord for He is good, for His steadfast love and doers forever.
[SPEAKER_00]: The author of this song of Jesus finishes with an incredible moment of personal praise and public proclamation.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's all pointing to our purpose in Jesus.
[SPEAKER_00]: He says, You are my God.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is the language of relationship.
[SPEAKER_00]: He says, You are my God.
[SPEAKER_00]: There was a Scottish missionary and physician that seemed to be common, and the eighteen hundred's named David Livingstone, upon passing in the middle of the night.
[SPEAKER_00]: His sons found him in the morning, kneeling next to his bed and a candle and the Bible.
[SPEAKER_00]: He had written these as last words in his journal.
[SPEAKER_00]: He said, my Jesus, my King, my life, my all.
[SPEAKER_00]: To thee, I again dedicate myself.
[SPEAKER_00]: My Jesus, the words of relationship.
[SPEAKER_00]: And now we dedicate our lives to this life for Jesus.
[SPEAKER_00]: Our great purpose in life is to be with and to become light Jesus and enjoy this relationship with Him.
[SPEAKER_00]: John seventeen three says, and this is eternal life that they know you, the only true God in Jesus Christ whom you have sent.
[SPEAKER_00]: And while this language of verse twenty eight was really intimate and personal of relationship, it was never ever meant to be private.
[SPEAKER_00]: Love this good has to be shared.
[SPEAKER_00]: It has to be proclaimed.
[SPEAKER_00]: Friends, this is the way that I feel about my wife of eighteen years.
[SPEAKER_00]: The relationship I have with her is like none other.
[SPEAKER_00]: I use words like he said here.
[SPEAKER_00]: I go like, she's my wife.
[SPEAKER_00]: She is my best friend as she is being loved by her being in life with her is so good.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I love introducing people to her.
[SPEAKER_00]: I want people to know her.
[SPEAKER_00]: I want people to experience life with her.
[SPEAKER_00]: And this same way, we live to tell others of the steadfast level God.
[SPEAKER_00]: The level God we have in Jesus.
[SPEAKER_00]: Do you remember that word from last week?
[SPEAKER_00]: If you were here last week in Psalm thirty two, we talked about this word has said, the steadfast love of God that is used in verse twenty nine.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's used again here in Psalm one eighteen.
[SPEAKER_00]: It says for those who trust in Jesus, they have this kind of love.
[SPEAKER_00]: The love of God that's for us in Jesus' unwavering and unconditional and it's unchanging.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is the message of God's people.
[SPEAKER_00]: The step-ath love of God that we enjoy is to be offered to others.
[SPEAKER_00]: Regardless of circumstance, we find ourselves in, we have great purpose in this life to enjoy him and to make him known.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is where we find ourselves blood.
[SPEAKER_00]: In the middle of our deepest pain, our highest shall we cannot forget our purpose and Christ.
[SPEAKER_00]: His steadfast love is both our means and our message.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because of Jesus, we are never separated from God.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because of Jesus, we have a firm foundation.
[SPEAKER_00]: And because of Jesus, we have purpose.
[SPEAKER_00]: So in light of all this, in light of everything that Psalm one eighteen does to point us to life in Jesus, what can we do?
[SPEAKER_00]: I think there's two primary ways that we can respond to Psalm one eighteen as we draw to a close.
[SPEAKER_00]: First,
[SPEAKER_00]: For those that would be here this morning, you've come here and you would say, I don't really know if I know Jesus.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know if I know this Jesus that the Psalm is speaking about.
[SPEAKER_00]: I pray that your response will be one of belief.
[SPEAKER_00]: At this morning, you would trust in Him.
[SPEAKER_00]: God has made a way for you to enter into relationship with Him through Jesus.
[SPEAKER_00]: Your sin and your suffering and your trials cannot keep you from Him.
[SPEAKER_00]: He has more mercy than you have sin.
[SPEAKER_00]: He wants you with him.
[SPEAKER_00]: I hope you had trust in his steadfast love in this morning.
[SPEAKER_00]: If your life is built on any other foundation besides Jesus, I pray that you would come to him and build your life on him.
[SPEAKER_00]: I pray that God's steadfast love would captivate you this morning.
[SPEAKER_00]: Would you trust and believe?
[SPEAKER_00]: Secondly, for those who know Jesus, we can behold.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's a lot here that should make our hearts burn with passion for Jesus.
[SPEAKER_00]: It should compel us and propel our all and our adoration for Him.
[SPEAKER_00]: I hope that just the reading of the few verses of Psalm one, eighteen this morning has stirred your affection for Him.
[SPEAKER_00]: Has reminded you of what He has done as you've repeated the truths of God over and over this morning.
[SPEAKER_00]: I pray that His steadfast love for you will capture you again and again and that it would move you to proclaim His steadfast love wherever your feet go today, wherever you would go.
[SPEAKER_00]: So please, church, I pray that you would respond to the reading of God's word.
[SPEAKER_00]: That you believe at the true behold.
[SPEAKER_00]: In closing, I wonder if you would imagine something with me.
[SPEAKER_00]: And if you would go to a place with me in a for a moment.
[SPEAKER_00]: Imagine this.
[SPEAKER_00]: Imagine being in the quiet upper room after bread was broken, and betrayal was foretold, and Jesus led the disciples in him, this home.
[SPEAKER_00]: They sang it together, song a rescue, a rejection turned to glory, a steadfast love that endures forever.
[SPEAKER_00]: They sang unaware of how the night would unravel.
[SPEAKER_00]: Guessin' these tears, the sound of swords and the garden, the crown of thorns, across raised high, a tomb sealed in silence, but three days later.
[SPEAKER_00]: Everything changed.
[SPEAKER_00]: The stone, the builders rejected, had become the cornerstone.
[SPEAKER_00]: And sometime after that, perhaps in a quiet room, with scars now visible and joy unstoppable, they sang these words again, but they sang them differently.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is the day that the Lord has made.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let us rejoice and be glad in it.
[SPEAKER_00]: And this time they saw it, not a past deliverance, but Jesus risen and raining forever faithful.
[SPEAKER_00]: Beloved, Psalm one, eighteen is now our song to sing to.
[SPEAKER_00]: We sing in a light of all that Jesus has done.
[SPEAKER_00]: Give thanks to the Lord for He is good.
[SPEAKER_00]: His steadfast love and doers forever.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's pray.
[SPEAKER_00]: Look, I thank you for this truth found in Psalm one eighteen.
[SPEAKER_00]: I pray, Lord Jesus, as you would move in our hearts even now.
[SPEAKER_00]: God, I pray for those that I spoke to a moment ago that have yet to believe in you.
[SPEAKER_00]: I pray that they would place their trust in you now.
[SPEAKER_00]: They would build their life upon you, the corner still.
[SPEAKER_00]: All other ground is sinking sand.
[SPEAKER_00]: God, I pray this morning for those that love Jesus in this place.
[SPEAKER_00]: God, that this short walk through the Psalm has captivated their hearts and stirred their affection for you once again.
[SPEAKER_00]: Lord, help us to repeat these things this morning to ourselves and to others around us.
[SPEAKER_00]: Help us to remember what Jesus has done for us.
[SPEAKER_00]: God, I love you.
[SPEAKER_00]: I thank you for this beautiful song.
[SPEAKER_00]: Praise you, continue to have your way in us.
[SPEAKER_00]: Praise things in Jesus name.
[SPEAKER_00]: Amen.