Renew- Seeking After God

Jesse Cook

Renew 2023 • Sermon • Submitted a year ago

Psalm 63:1–11

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In this sermon we will be looking at being renewed by seeking after God.

Notes

Transcript

Introduction:

As we continue with our worship of the Lord this morning, let us take a few moments to prepare our hearts to encounter the Living God as we read and study His word together.

Let’s pray together.

90% of the time, I like to start off my sermons with us going to the Lord in prayer. I think that it is a good practice to do even in your own personal reading time with the Lord. This is what I do every time before I open up God’s word for my morning devotionals because I know that I need Him to understand what is being said. But not only do I need His help to rightly understand what is being said, but I also need His help to rightly apply the Word to my Life.

John Piper provides a helpful acronym for us to consider when it comes to approaching God’s word. Let me share it with you this morning:

IOUS.

Incline (Ps. 119:36)

36 Turn my heart to your decrees and not to dishonest profit.

Open (Ps. 119:18)

18 Open my eyes so that I may contemplate wondrous things from your instruction.

Unite (Ps. 86:11)

11 Teach me your way, Lord, and I will live by your truth. Give me an undivided mind to fear your name.

Satisfy. (Ps. 90:14)

14 Satisfy us in the morning with your faithful love so that we may shout with joy and be glad all our days.

This should be our prayer as we approach God’s word. I want to share this with you so that you know that it is just not some little formality that we go through at the beginning of the message. NO. Our desire should be to draw near to the Living God and asking Him to help us understand His word so that we can be changed!! That is our Aim when we open His Word. We are worshipping, drawing near, and seeking to grow.

Body:

As we think about these things, I want to invite you to open your Bibles to Psalm 63 with me this morning as we continue on with our sermon Series: Renew.

We need renewal in our lives right now. We need to take some time at the beginning of the year, do a self-evaluation and realign our hearts. This is what this series is about. We want to seek Renewal and the ways in which Scripture teaches us to refresh our hearts.

Let’s Read Psalm 63 together.

1 God, you are my God; I eagerly seek you. I thirst for you; my body faints for you in a land that is dry, desolate, and without water. 2 So I gaze on you in the sanctuary to see your strength and your glory.

3 My lips will glorify you because your faithful love is better than life. 4 So I will bless you as long as I live; at your name, I will lift up my hands. 5 You satisfy me as with rich food;, my mouth will praise you with joyful lips.

6 When I think of you as I lie on my bed, I meditate on you during the night watches 7 because you are my helper; I will rejoice in the shadow of your wings. 8 I follow close to you; your right hand holds on to me.

9 But those who intend to destroy my life will go into the depths of the earth. 10 They will be given over to the power of the sword; they will become a meal for jackals. 11 But the king will rejoice in God; all who swear by him will boast, for the mouths of liars will be shut.

There is so much in this Psalm that we could talk about this morning. But what I want to do in the time that we have is walk through this Psalm together piece by piece and meditate on what is being said.

Before we dive into this Pslam, let us setup the context. If you are looking into your Bibles, right under where it say’s Psalm 63 you are going to see a little description that reads: A Psalm of David. When he was in the Wilderness of Judah.

Now we don't know exactly which time in the Wilderness this might be pertaining to, as he had done this twice in his life. The 1st time was when he was running from King Saul, and the 2nd time was when he was running from his own son.... but of which were out of fear for his own life.

Like, I know that we have had it hard this past year… but it is not like David had it easy. I don't care who is chasing you and you have ran away to the wilderness for safety.... that is a hard life. That is a time in your life that you need renewal. You are needing the Lord bad if you are in this kind of place....and yet this is exactly where we find the man of whom it is said was a man “after God’s own heart.” He is alone. He is running out of fear. He is out in the wilderness....and I am sure that many of you feel that way this morning.

But let’s look to see where David turns in his circumstance. Look at verses 1-2 with me.

Listen to the personal nature that David speaks with here in these verses concerning God. God is not a far off distance being for him…NO. God is near and is personal to him. David can say “My God.” This is not just some god who set the world into motion and is now sitting back watching the world go by....NO. God is personal and David knows Him.

But not only does David know Him.... David has a desire for Him. David is eagerly seeking Him. David is thirsting for God. Look at the imagery that David uses.....my body faints or you.....in a land that is dry, desolate, and without water..... can you picture what that would be like?

Picture yourself out in the desert. 120-degree heat. The sun is beating down on you. You have been walking for MILES. The only thing that you see is tumbleweed and lizards. You are getting weak and tired. You are afraid that your body is going to give out at any moment from complete and total exhaustion. The only thing that you are wanting in that moment is water and rest. Nothing else matters.

Can you picture that in your mind?

That is how David is “expressing his desire for God. He says that he is “eagerly” seeking him. David wants God so bad....so bad that nothing else in life matters in that moment. God is the only thing that He wants.

Can the same thing be said about you? Do you Desire God like this, or has He been more of an add on to your life? Is Christ your GREATEST desire? More than money, fame, or food? More than anything that this world has to offer you… IS Christ your Greatest Desire? We have to ask ourselves these questions if we are going to realign our hearts.

How did David fix this longing? Look at verse 2. So (that is the purpose clause here. Verse 1 shows us a problem, and verse 2 provides us with the solution) I gaze on you in the sanctuary (the place of worship) to see (or behold) your strength and your glory.

What is David doing here? From the context, we would have to say that he is remembering a time when he was in the sanctuary, but we don't have to fixate on the details because they are Hnot the point. The point here is that David is turning to Worship. He desires God so... He turns to Worship. He is looking to God to see His strength and His Glory. He is satisfying his desire by just seeing God.

And this is what we see happening in verses 3-5. Look there with me.

Look at how and why David is engaged in worship.

He says that his lips.... meaning what is coming out of his mouth, will glorify God…meaning declares how awesome and Great God is.... BECAUSE His FAITHFUL LOVE IS BETTER THAN LIFE. Do not miss this for you. You can praise and worship God because His love for you is SO GREAT... SO FAITHFUL…despite how much we mess everything up and go astray… God’s love NEVER EVER GIVES UP ON YOU.... in fact God’s love is so GREAT that it is better than LIFE.

I know that many of us would think… yea…anything would be better than the life that I am living right now. Life is not great. Life is not fun. Life is anything but pleasant right now.... if only life was ________ then I would be ok.

But again, we are missing the point. David does not have in mind his current circumstances either. Look at verse 5… “You satisfy me as with right food; my mouth with praise you with joyful lips.” What David has in mind when he says that God’s love is better than life.... he is not picturing his life on the run… he is picturing the “good life.” The life that we all think would make us happy. The life of ease and good food. David says..... NO God satisfies me… not stuff.. not the things of this world… GOD HIMSELF DOES THAT FOR ME....and because David is so convinced that God alone can satisfy his heart… David blesses the lord, He lifts his hands to the Lord in surrender....he sings songs of praise with joyful lips because he knows his God.

But David’s relationship with God is not confined to worship services either. Look at verses 6-8 with me.

For David, worshipping God is not only a Sunday morning activity, but this is a way of life for him. He is thinking about God of all hours of the day.... even when he is going to bed at night. God is always on his mind.....why? Because God is his helper....and he is yours too…dont forget that. Your help comes from the Lord.

How many of us spend the night worrying about we are going to fix and how solve different problems that we are facing in life? Our minds naturally run to thinking about and worrying about these things. But instead, we can run to the God of the Bible with these things and know that He is going to take care of them.... as He sees best.

This should cause us to be like David here and just know that we can follow close to God because His right hand is the one holding onto us.

When we have surrendered ourselves to God and are trusting him to take care of the problem or situation we can have peace. This is what we see here at the end of the Psalm. Look at verses 9-11 with me.

For the longest time these verses seemed to come out of nowhere to me when I would read this Psalm. David is talking about his desire for God and everything and then… BAM..... it turns into David talking about people trying to destroy his life. Like, it did not make sense to me.... but I think what is going on here in the end of the Psalm is David is coming to terms with what is happening in his life at that moment.

David has seen and experienced God in his life. David knows how much God has been there for him. David know that the only thing that is going to satisfy him is God. And David knows that the only thing that can keep him safe is God....so here at the end of the Psalm David is giving everything to God. He is trusting God to do what God does best and that is to do what is right and protect His people. David is trusting God.. and because of his trust for God… David is going to praise Him for it.

Conclusion:

As we think about this Psalm for our own lives, and we think about what this means for us for Renewal, I want to boil it down to one main point for us this morning:

Main Point: Seek After God

If you are going to have renewal in 2023, then you must make it a priority to seek after God this year. Now, we will be speaking about different ways in which we can do this in our lives over the next few weeks, but from our text today one of the ways that we see this lives out in our lives is that we

Seek After God Through Worship.

Worship is not just an activity that you do on Sundays. Worship is a way of life. Is about living a life that is surrendered to God. It is about trusting Him. It is about wanting Him above everything that this world has to offer....because as the text said… His faithful love Is Better than life. Do you know that this morning? Do you believe that this morning? What things in your life do you need to give up this morning to start seeking after God? What things are standing in your way?

Start your renewal journey today. Lay aside those things that are keeping you from Him....and come seek Him.