Our Eyes Look to the Lord
Summer in the Psalms • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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This morning we begin our summer sermon series through the Psalms. This summer will be our sixth summer going through approx. 10 different Psalms or portions of a psalm, based on the Revised Common Lectionary.... a layout of Bible readings for each Sunday based on the Christian calendar. And one of the reasons we like to follow the lectionary is because then we don’t simply pick Psalms we like or are familiar with, but also ones we don’t read often.
Well, this Sunday, is one of those Psalms. In my 24 years of preaching, I’ve never preached this passage....and I’m pretty sure I’ve never heard anyone else preach on it either. And yet, it’s a beautiful text that contains a great deal of wisdom and encouragement for us today.
So, let’s read it together.... ESV version not NIV and I’ll say why as I begin reading.
A Song of Ascents. 1 To you I lift up my eyes, O you who are enthroned in the heavens! 2 Behold, as the eyes of servants look to the hand of their master, as the eyes of a maidservant to the hand of her mistress, so our eyes look to the Lord our God, till he has mercy upon us. 3 Have mercy upon us, O Lord, have mercy upon us, for we have had more than enough of contempt. 4 Our soul has had more than enough of the scorn of those who are at ease, of the contempt of the proud.
Over these past six months it has been a great joy watching my two grandchildren, Max and Millie, grow and mature. It’s amazing how much you can learn from infant children. [Mention sharing a home with our daughter Colleen and her husband Kevin] One thing that I’ve learned, or been reintroduced to since raising my own children is actually something quite closely related to the opening verse of our text.
The psalmist begins with a confession of trust; “to you I lift up my eyes.” And you know what? Infant children teach us something about that. Often when I present Max or Millie with something new, maybe a new toy, or a utensil, or some other thing that they haven’t seen before.... before they take it, they look into my eyes… in fact, often when they are confronted with some new experience, maybe something that they find a little bit unsettling or intimidating, they will look into my eyes, or Kim’s, or if Colleen or Kevin is nearby, they might look for them. They want to look at someone they know and trust, and gain some sense of reassurance or permission or confidence.
I think that something like what the psalmist does when he begins his prayer.
“To you I lift up my eyes”
You see, the psalmist recognizes this most important truth.
Much of our lives in some way, is about SERVICE. And if we are truly going to live meaningful lives, we need to begin by looking to God.
And not just any God, but to the God who sits enthroned in heaven.
Now it’s important to hear what the psalmist says.
“If we are going to live meaningful lives of service, we need to begin by looking to God.” God is the Master; he is the Ruler; he is the Lord of our lives, and so the posture we ought to have is to lift up our eyes to him....to set our attention on Him....to fix our devotion and loyalty upon Him.
Now too often in our world, and sometimes in our own life we get that reversed. And what I mean by that is this: We don’t think principally of our lives as intending to serve God, rather, we often live as though it’s primarily God’s task to serve US.
Religion is something we turn to when we feel the need. It makes my life better. It brings benefits. In that sense God is “useful.”
I like how one person captures this tendency:
“We go to a local branch office [sometimes called a church] and direct the clerk (sometimes called a pastor) to fill out our order for God. Then we go home and wait for God to be delivered to us according to the specifications we have set down.” (adapted, Eugene Peterson) (LOITSD, 62)
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But Peterson goes on to say, this is not the kind of God we really want. Do we really want the kind of God who is more like a tool for helping us fix our lives, or a puzzle that helps us figure out our lives? Or do we want a God who knows us better than we know ourselves? Someone who knows our hopes and dreams as well as our fears and anxieties. Someone who knows our guilt and our shame and still loves us and desires a relationship with us.
This is the God we lift our eyes to. The One who is enthroned in the heavens.....who is above all, who knows all things, and can do all things.
2 Behold, as the eyes of servants look to the hand of their master, as the eyes of a maidservant to the hand of her mistress, so our eyes look to the Lord our God, till he has mercy upon us.
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Till he has mercy upon us? Is that what you expected?
Notice what the psalmist doesn’t ask from God when his eyes look to him!
He does not pray, “Give me what I want”
He does not pray, “Reward me for my goodness so that my neighbors will think highly of me.”
He does not pray, “Be nice to me because I’m a good person.”
No, the psalmist prays..... have mercy on us, O Lord, have mercy upon us.
You see this prayer comes from a deep recognition that God who revealed himself in history to Abraham Issac and Jacob, then later through Moses, and Samuel and David and Isaiah and many others, this God was not like the gods of the neighboring nations, gods who battled each other, who promoted violence, who competed with each other..... He is wholly other.
He is not an angry judge who desires to punish us whenever we get out of line. Nor is God like a police officer who’s always telling us what to do and making sure we keep the rules.
He is a God rich in mercy. He is like a Father who intends good for His children and wants what is best for them; and even when, perhaps especially when that child doesn’t really know what’s best for themselves. God is like a Shepherd who cares for his flock and protects them and brings them to places of provision. He is like a Potter who fashions and shapes our lives into a beautiful clay vessels that is fit for service in His kingdom.
This is the kind of God we want to be with. You get that sense don’t you, from the psalmist as he begins, our eyes look to you..... you will give us what we need, you will care for us, you will protect us, you are always faithful..... the psalmist looks to His God and you get the sense that he just wants to dwell with him.
A missionary by the name of Stuart Sacks who served in Paraguay shares an experience that helped him appreciate what it means simply to look to God and be with Him.
While I was serving in Paraguay, a Maka Indian named Rafael came to sit on my porch. I was eating and went out to see what he wanted. He responded, "Ham, henek met." Again I asked what I could do for him, but the answer was the same. I understood what he was saying but not its significance: "I don't want anything; I have just come near."
I later shared the incident with a local veteran missionary. He explained that it was Rafael's way of honoring me. He really didn't want anything; he just wanted to sit on my porch. He found satisfaction and pleasure just being near me.
I can imagine in the context of this psalm, the Lord asking the psalmist as he lifts up his eyes to Him, "What brings you here, my child?" the Lord asks.
"Ham, henek met." I just want to be near the Lord, the one who shows mercy....
The last few lines of the psalm bring the prayer to a kind of abrupt ending, don’t they.
3 Have mercy on us, Lord, have mercy on us, for we have endured no end of contempt. 4 We have endured no end of ridicule from the arrogant, of contempt from the proud.
3 Have mercy upon us, O Lord, have mercy upon us, for we have had more than enough of contempt. 4 Our soul has had more than enough of the scorn of those who are at ease, of the contempt of the proud.
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What the psalmist expresses is something we all experience and different times in our lives. We are called to be servants of God who is exceedingly gracious and compassionate, faithful and true. But we live in a world that remains full of contempt and pain and deceit and death.
Now we don’t know what the psalmist in particular was experiencing.
This is one of the psalm of ascent....Psalms 120-134 .... songs prayed and sung by pilgrims who were making their way to Jerusalem to celebrate on of the annual feasts....
perhaps they were being taunted as they travelled.
perhaps the psalmist was serving an oppressive master.... the Bible contains numerous examples of God’s people taunted and mocked and scorned by oppressive masters or oppressive nations.
We don’t know precisely what the psalmist was facing but the language he uses invites each of us to think of experiences in our own lives that bring some kind of adversity, discouragement, and pain.
One commentator that I read this week speaks about three different kinds of adversity that Christians can face. And the adversity he describes comes from three different kinds of people
the first he calls the “intellectually superior”....these people see the church as primitive, uncultured, and naive. As an example, they may ridicule the church on certain issues like marriage or the rights of the unborn.
the second he calls the “immorally comfortable”....these are people who embrace a lifestyle that Christians feel is immoral and they hate the idea of a moral standard and they mock Christians for presenting one.....sometimes the pressure Christians feel to go along with the culture can be very strong..... I think this can be especially true for children and young people…I know for me that was true when I was in high school....public school....
the third he calls the “spiritually hostile” For various reasons, many people hate the gospel and Christians. In rage they slander, assault, and kill believers.
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I think we can broaden the experiences of adversity even more broadly. Life brings it’s own adversity..... loved ones die unexpectedly.... illness strikes...... jobs are lost.....we experience lonliness or depressions.....
Today God invites us to lift up our eyes to him to find mercy in our time of need.
Mercy
16 Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.
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It’s very telling I think that after our Lord Jesus faced the contempt and scorn and despair of the world and took it upon himself on the cross, when he appeared to people after his resurrection he did two things: 1) he showed his scars...... 2) he announced peace.... shalom
God knows our adversity..... and invites us to look to him and find mercy.... shalom.....peace in him.
One person that I read this week drew my attention to a classic essay called “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings” by writer, speaker, and activist Maya Angelou.... a significant leader during the civil rights protests of the last century....
[mai·uh an·juh·low]
In Maya Angelou’s classic essay “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings,” we see a vignette of what it looks like to lift our eyes to God in the face of ridicule rather than lash out. Set in the South back in the late 1940s, the essay tells of a time when Maya’s Momma was taunted and insulted by a group of white girls while Momma was doing no more than sitting in a rocker on the front porch of the small grocery store they ran.
The girls said nasty things to Momma, laughed at her for being black. One thirteen-year-old girl even did a hand-stand so as to let her dress fall down. She wasn’t wearing any underwear and so she mooned Momma with her bare bottom and front. Watching her Momma, young Maya was furious that Momma didn’t do something. Yet Momma stayed calm and as Maya moved closer, she heard Momma singing quietly, “Bread of heaven, bread of heaven, feed me till I want no more.” The girls tired of the show and left eventually, and as Momma left the porch to return to the store, Maya heard her singing again, “Glory hallelujah when I lay my burden down.”
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When we lift our eyes to the Lord.... he does feed us with bread from heaven....he sends us his mercy and peace through the Spirit..... END IT LORD!
Service
1 Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship. 2 Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.
