We Wait For Mercy

All right. Hey there's a few new faces and if I haven't got to meet yet, mines did not, I can't speak. I was in Mexico all week too much Spanish. I guess my name is Daniel. I am one of the elders here with city-parish. Normally I would be preaching, but You guys gave us the gift of being able to get away this week so this week and get a guest preacher next week. You get Joe Joe. I appreciate you filling, and, especially Sundays, when I'm gone. I feel like I'm missing out cuz I don't get to hear. And I'll try the podcast, but we're going to do something. And again, this is going to be a little different. But another Tradition at some Churches, do a standing as the word of God is red before the sermon. Something else, you guys, if you're able stay with me, it's just a way to just get our bodies prepared to hear the word, and then I'll introduce who's going to preach with us this morning. Psalm 130 another song of a sense says out of the depths I cry to you alone. Oh Lord hear my voice. Let your ears be attentive to the voice of my pleas for Mercy, if you owe Lord, should Mark inequities warlord, who could stand? But with you, there is forgiveness that you may be feared. I wait for the Lord, my soul waits in in his word. I hope my soul waits for the Lord. More than Watchmen for the morning. More than Watchmen for the morning. Oh Israel. Hope in the Lord, for with the Lord, there is steadfast love and with him is plentiful Redemption, and he will redeem is real, from all his iniquities. The word of the Lord. Does it have a seat? If you guys know when you've been a part of City Paris, long enough to know, we re turn eight here, it just a couple of weeks now, that's not true in a month, so Church plants, but we got invited to do something back in 2018, that Sue the city from Redeemer Church in Manhattan. They have a Global Network of church planting and equipping a training that they invited us to be a part of. And it was a group of church Planters from across the bay area was their, their trial. That is going on now and they've done and now, almost I think, 100 Church plants. We get to participate in some of the coaching they're still doing, but my buddy, John was one of the first people to go through that as well. And we got to start that Journey. So, I've known John since 2018, they also planted a church called the porch, in San Francisco. John is the rare breed of human that was actually born and raised in still lives in San Francisco. Not one of those texts transplants. Not, that's But John actually knows the city and you know how devoted he is to the city because she's still wearing a Giants hat. They're terrible this year. So yeah, I'm excited for you guys to just for us to hear the word from my buddy, John. So yeah.

Amion. Yep, you guys can hear me. I think the

The real reason Daniels has me pretty swell up when you're a kind of a small Church, you know and then you have some guy who churches like 2,000 people come and preach, it, embarrassing to know what I'm talking about. So he has become priests because I'm the only person that comes to your church in those. Dang. I hope all of my church get this big Sunday.

That's the real reason I'm here today. Just kidding. I love you. I'm glad to be with you. Let me open us up in prayer. We can jump into this passage together Lord. I'm grateful for your word, I'm grateful for churches all over the bay area churches all over the world who are gathering together this morning to read your word and to hear from you. I pray that you would fill this place with your spirit, give me words to say I was to just fall in love with you a little bit more this morning as we read through this song together. In your name we pray. Amen. Aren't you guys get into the World Cup? Did everybody in the world cup? Like I don't like soccer.

People are all excited about it. You know what happened? Jose 020 Draw, Something almost happened. It was the most exciting game ever, you know? I don't know, I played soccer in high school, but I've never really been into it. But this time around, I kind of did get into it.

But my favorite part of the World Cup was not the actual soccer. My favorite part was seeing all of the people from around the world, Europe in places Coming to America and just having a blast, like all the videos of the Scottish dudes taking over Boston. Did you guys see this? One of my favorite things to was when we were, when I was watching games, and when I've seen these videos, was I noticed the singing. Did you notice how much these dudes get drunk and sing? Right. We're not really a singing culture, right? The closest, I don't know. I guess when I go to Giants games, which I still do a lot, what are they still do with it? Don't Stop Believing, everybody gets up and sings. Don't Stop Believing, I don't know. It's just tough to get excited cuz the Giants are so terrible right now and I hate Journey so but that, you know, like the crowd gets up and sings American nobody's really into it. But Mandy soccer fans, they can sing. The soccer fans are pretty cool. There's something really amazing about watching thousands of people singing the way that they do end at the World Cup. They're celebrating in their singing. What are they? Celebrating two? Things are celebrating how much they love the nation. That you least got his fans or whatever. The other thing that they do though is when they make fun of a player, have you seen them do this? How did they write this? How do they all know the words to this song to make fun of some guy's mom or whatever? You know it's fascinating to me this part of this part of soccer culture is hilarious during the game. If they win, they walk out of the stadium and they saying that the Scots like I said, you know I don't know if this was true but I saw something that said there's a bunch of bars in Boston that ran out of beer, you know, that these Gods took over Boston, drink all the beer, they would they be in the bars and they're singing in the singing. Tells us a lot about these guys, that tells us a kind of where their hearts are at what they value. And what do they value soccer, their nation? That sort of thing. If you look at the beginning of the song, we're going to be today. The before the before verse one, it says, in my version that says my soul Waits the Lord, so I'm 130 a song of a sense.

A few times a year in ancient Israel. Pilgrims from all over the land of Israel. They would head to Jerusalem for one of the festival's or I think of a couple that they would go for Passover Booth Pentecost. They were few of these and they would they would go to Jerusalem, is at the top of the mountain, never been there. But this is whatever it right? So this throng of pilgrims they would be walking up this giant Hill together and as crazy as it sounds, I don't know if you heard about this 2000 years ago, they didn't have airpods, they didn't have a Nintendo switch, there was nothing. I mean, they're just walking with nothing to do no smartphones. So, what are they saying? They went. This guy's in Boston walking around the streets of Boston, but they weren't singing. Hilarious songs about some opposing soccer player. They weren't thinking about Scotland or soccer or anyting. They saying, the what do we call? The Psalms of ascent? It's a collection of items like 15 songs where you would sing me songs as you're walking. To Jerusalem for one of these festivals with his huge crowd of pilgrims. So this was the song book for walking up this hill, and the songs were meant for this traveling, and this weary people to ready their hearts as they're coming into this Festival to Worship the Lord, right? So it's, it's a way to get themselves ready to for Passover booze or whatever it is. They climbed toward Jerusalem, step after step note. After note, line after line these Psalms, we're teaching them how to approach. The throne of God, they were coming up to the temple. This is what they were doing. They were trying to remind themselves who he is there. Trying to remind themselves who they are, what he's done and why they've come to Jerusalem to worship. And so we're going to read one of these Psalms together today. What I don't want to do is just automatically jump this straight to us. Okay. What can we learn from the song? Like try to imagine yourselves one? Jewish folks walking up to the temple, what would it be like to come up to the city of Jerusalem? Maybe for the first time to see The Gleam of the temple as you're approaching and you're trying to get your heart, you know, ready for the Lord, ready for this Festival, you trying to experience God in a special way. That's what this song is about. That's what this song was meant to do for the people of God when it was originally written. And I think it does a great job of doing that for us as well. So let's take a look. I'm going to what kind of walk through this song and yeah, let's just take a look at it first one. It starts with this out of the depths, I cry to you. Oh, Lord. Now, when the song that says here he starts, he says, out of the depths he's painting a picture, The Depths were a terrifying place in the ancient world is what he's talking about. Here is drowning. That's the image here is drowning and then it hits me, especially hard, cuz I don't know about you guys, but I grew up in, like the heart of San Francisco. I'm a city kid. I did not know how to swim until I was in my mid-twenties. And I am still a terrible swimmer. I like a good diving board, you know I like jumping but as soon as I hit the water Panic starts, I'm pretty sure something. I'm just going to drown in a 7. Ft pool in front of a lot of people is how I'm going to go, I am a terrible swimmer, it's all these images. Hit me, especially hard right there, the death. But in the ancient world, to the sea was a terrifying place, it represented chaos in danger and death, and if you were in the Deep of the water, the idea was you're not getting yourself back out. And that's why this image of the depths like this shows up over and over and over again in the Old Testament. Think about Jonah, you guys know the story of Jonah and the sinking into the depths after he's thrown overboard. He says, the water is closed in over me. The Deep surrounds me, right? So, this is not just all, I'm out swimming and I'm underwater. This was an absolute helplessness. There's another spot in Psalm. 69, save me. Oh God, for the waters. Have come up to my neck. I sink in deep mire. There is no foothold. So that's Image of kind of flailing around and which is just me. Swimming is six and a half feet, but like just flailing around trying to trying to find, somewhere to put your foot in the kickoff, and do whatever. And you just know and you're sucking and water and somebody who's completely overwhelmed and thinking and absolutely cannot rescue themselves. Now as we'll see

As you read something like this, we're supposed to ask. Okay, what is the depth? What is this song? Missed going through? Maybe he's sick, maybe he's being persecuted. There's a lot of those songs, maybe he's overwhelmed by life circumstances. Maybe this is one of those songs where David is running around the desert and saw was chasing him around, you know, there's like a bunch of those song, Maybe it's one of those but it has wearied will see you in verses 3 and 4. He makes it very clear. The depths he's describing are not something an external force on the outside of him. These deaths are inside of him, he's drowning under the weight of his own sin. He's drowning under the weight of his own iniquity in the what that does to him, the, the deepest Waters that he's facing in his own life, are the storms of sin, it's the sin within him. So what does he do with this? Send out of the depths I cry to you? Oh yeah, way notice what he doesn't do. He doesn't hide. He doesn't pull the Jonah. I am going to God wants me to let you know. I'm just going to leave. I'm going to go. Imma try to get away from God. He doesn't make excuses. He doesn't just pretend that everything is fine and dandy. He doesn't try to rescue himself. He cries out to the Lord. But he calls out not to just some higher power or some generic God, he uses God's God's name and he has to be this way. This is all you guys use Proclaim, right? Yeah, yeah, Proclaim terrible ribeye bunch of Christians. You can tell Just kidding.

Anyway, Proclaim doesn't copy the small-caps. When I know we have the same problem at our church, but when you see all small caps in the ESV anyway, that means he's using the word Yahweh. He's calling out the Covenant name of God. He says, out of the dumps I'm sinking and I'm crying out to God's personal name that he told us because we're his people. That's what this Amma says. He cries out to his Covenant. Got to the one who has promised to rescue him from this predicament. So verse to look at it says oh Lord hear my voice. Let your ears be attentive to the voice of my pleas for mercy. So what's interesting is he says at the end of verse 11 verse 1, he says, out of the depths I cry to. You owe Yahweh, right? That's the name for God. But then here he switches it. So the second verse to, we switch this to the word out on I so that the, the song is changes the name that he uses for God. This, this idea here is like, the, The Sovereign, Lord, that's what he's going for. So that's fitting because

What he's doing is he saying not only are you the Covenant God that you're all? So you're the powerful God who can actually do something about this predicament that I've found myself. So he says, oh Lord hear my voice. Let your ears be attentive. I like that. Of course, God doesn't literally have ears. This isn't anthropomorphism where God is. He doesn't feel like God describes himself in human terms so that we can understand something about his character. And I love how much of this the hands of the Lord that I let me know. Whatever how much of this kind of they call it, be Legends, call, it got condescending, how much of this we see in the Bible? Because it shows us a lot about the heart of God and who he is. He doesn't expect us to come up to him and to figure things out and work our way up. The psalmist, cries out to him. And even in the language that uses he's using the language that God uses to describe himself. God says, look, I know that you My majesty and being and everything that I am. You never actually going to understand me your created being and I'm on create it's what I'm going to do is I'm going to come down to your level. Going to come down to describe myself in ways that you would understand, so it does not have ears know, but what the psalmist is saying, is he's using this language to say, please hear me. When I speak to you. And goddesses, of course, I hear you. And this is what he's doing. He says, I'm pleading for Mercy to the, to the voice of my pleas for Mercy. That's what he asks for. He doesn't, this isn't the Prosperity Gospel. He doesn't say, look, I've done this for you and now you owe me that we have, we have a deal. You know, if I, if I tithe and you know, whatever then then you owe me. Forgiveness know he specifically called at Mercy. He says, don't judge me the way that you should judge me because of this and that I see in my heart all he's doing this is, this is what we've got so far. The psalmist is drowning. The death in the weight of his own said as he looked at his heart, he realizes just how terribly is, what did he do? You remember the coven of the gods made with his people? And he cries out to this Covenant God this powerful God and he says Lord give me mercy. Those are our first two verses this song that she has eight versus it works in public. So there's two two two. You know. So the next one that owns just a little this is what he says if you are Lord should Mark iniquities oh Lord. Who could stand? he does look, if you kept a record, If you kept a record of everything, the Thomas is. Now telling us what it is. That is the the depths of what he's going through. It's in, right? It's not suffering. It's not sickness, it's not persecution. It's his own sin. And he said, look, if you kept a record, that's what the idea they're mark means. Like if he was just writing it all down, nothing and which is true, nothing escapes. God's attention, which is as terrifying thought, every sinful, thought that you And everything you thought every careless word every selfish motive. How many times have you done the right thing for the worst reason? You know boy, I I hope these people appreciate how well I'm playing on the worship team, you know, like it's all about me. I've done that every Act of rebellion that you've committed. God sees it all and all over the Bible. It tells us that God will bring every Wicked sinful deed into judgment including the hidden things. By Jesus talked about this is all over the Old Testament God doesn't forget he doesn't Overlook God sees it all. And so what the song that says, if you write all this stuff down and you remember all this stuff who could stand the answer is obvious, no one not, the worst center would not be able to stand before the judgement of God but also not the world's most respected pastor. That's me. Not Daniel, by the way, just kidding. Not the nicest neighbor, not the most faithful church member if God only judged us, according to what we deserve, every one of us would be condemned.

Psalm 143 says, no one is living righteous before you I'll pick up the steam in Romans a bunch. There's none is righteous. No not one. All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. Every one of us has a record that we cannot erase. Every one of us is in desperate need of a savior. Every one of us could probably identify with the song at the beginning of this song, I'm drowning in my sin that's how pervasive my stand is in my life. So the question is does God keep a record he remembers everything is he writing this down and someday you're going to die, you're going to stand before him. You're going to have to answer for every single one of these things and you're going to figure out a way into heaven. Now look what he says verse for, but with you there is forgiveness that you may be feared. Wow. What a breath of fresh air that verse is with you. There is forgiveness that you may be feared. I'll tell you a story when I was in sixth grade quite a while ago. We got about halfway to the are little more than that and right before it was right before spring break you do so is that like March or April or something? I had 35 to tensions. They still don't do detention anymore. Now you know we had to do for detention by the way we had to dig a hole.

And then we had then we would come back. I got a lot of attention. So then we would fill in the hole and then we would dig another hole. That's what I did. So, anyways, I mean, I had more than I was a terrible kid. I had more than one detention per week and then one day I was in PE class and I don't know how this ended up happening, but I had to like morbidly obese PE teacher. Big dude. And he was mean to, you know, and one day, he said to me, I was I was a punk twelve-year-old or whatever and I was horsing around or doing something in the punishment in PE was yet to do push-ups. And I made a joke about I'll do a thousand. If you could do one or something like that, and I got another guy member that and that was like past attention. Like that was crossing the line, a twelve-year-old, being that rude to us to a teacher. So, he sent me to the principal's office and I sat down with the principal. And I got my 36th attention and the principal's name was a guy named dr. Bowman. And he was an old school principal this dude, I mean, this is the mid-90s and foaming was like, pretty close to retiring at that point, I think. And like, I missed the age where they were paddling kids, but I had teachers who had paddled kids United me, and he had the paddle on his desk and has speed holes in it. And I mean, like this guy, this guy was serious. I was serious about punishment, and he sat me down and he said, look, you and your two friends are basically cancers on this school and he goes, you're all like this is the end because one more detention for any one of the three of you guys and your, spelled in your out. So I had at that point, I think it was 36. I take it that number wrong, but I'm pretty sure that's what it was. And I remember the rest of that year Teachers watching me like a hawk and I had to be on my best behavior. And I remember the eyes of teachers cuz I was the kid that they were like why I hope this kid gets kicked out. You know, I was a good student but I was a terrible kid. Do you know? And I remember that feeling just dr. Bowman, everybody just wanting me waiting for me to slip up to get that last attention. My two friends did not make it, they both got detention. So they both got in trouble, one more time and they both got kicked out. And I think I made it by the skin of my teeth. I did make it by the wayside. Now, can I tell you something last year, in church, with a guest visit? And it's like this old guy, and I went over to him and I introduced myself like pastors doing, I guess blocks in a, I'm Johnny's like, you don't, you don't recognize me no idea who this guy is because I'm dr. Bowman. And I looked through the wrinkles and I was like, that is dr. Bowman, he was having lunch with like one of my old classmates that he was nice too and like I was telling him yet, John's a pastor now and I went to like a Christian School, you know? And I think this was a like I got to see this for myself sort of a situation.

Anyway, I tell you that I grew up in and I like very strict Christian, kind of upbringing, you know, I didn't believe I was a little bit older, but I grew up with this idea that I think God's a lot like dr. Bowman. I think God is like those teachers after I got that, 36 detention. Just walking around with a clipboard waiting for me to mess up one more time. Waiting for number 37. So that he could drop the hammer. I grow kind of afraid of God. You know what I mean? And I bet a lot of you, I'm kind of had that picture to God is waiting for you to cross some invisible line so that he can finally stop wasting his time with you so he can finally give up on you. But that's not the picture that we see in the Bible and it's especially not the picture that we see that this storm is here is giving us. He's he's he isn't afraid that God is looking for an excuse to get him. He's amazed that God even with this record against us and we none of us have any hope at all. He's amazed that with God. There is forgiveness with you, there is forgiveness. That's the surprise of Psalm, 31 30. It's not the god, notices, our sin. It's the surprise is what he chooses to do what he chooses to do with Sinners. And what he chooses to do with Sinners is not what I would do with Sinners. It's not what you would do with centers. That's what him would he in his infinite? Mercy and Grace does with Sinners? It's pretty amazing. Are they keep going to look at verse 5. He says, I wait for the Lord, my soul Waits, and in his word, I hope. Now, waiting is one of the great themes. Throughout the scriptures, think about it, Abraham waited for the son that God had promised him. Well, sort of way to Abraham that not a great way to this guy named Israel. Waiting for deliverance. From Egypt, David, waited for years before becoming King, the people spend so much time. Waiting for the Messiah. Write the disciples right after the, the resurrection. Right before the Ascension, I love this there, like I think they're pretty excited. Ready to go. What did Jesus tell him to do? Don't do anything yet. That's what he says, just go back to Jerusalem and plate. I'm like, a, let's start planning, you know what I mean? Let's get the old, get the bubbles out and start drawing stuff, and we're figuring out what's going to happen next. Says nope. Nope, go. And just wait for the spirit today, right? As a church were waiting for the return of Crisis. This waiting is such a theme in scripture. But here's the thing, though, also waiting is not just when the Bible talks about waiting, it's not a passive activity. If not go, sit around and do nothing. That's kind of what we think of, when we think of waiting, go sit on the beach. And, you know, I have a margarita and just wait in our, I don't know but waiting and scripture is sort of. This is living with a confident expectation. That God will keep every promise that he has made things about getting yourself, ready, the Bible. Never talked about for this like the Bible never says, just do nothing. That's not what we're supposed. That's not the call here, that's not what this waiting. That's not what this waiting is. This waiting? Look at it closely. Let me find it again here with I wait for the Lord, my soul Waits, and in his word, I hope so. This waiting is tied specifically to the word to the word of God. And as he engages in that word, he's filled with with hope. I love that word. Hope throughout the Bible. It's this. His confidence. And his hope is not built on positive thinking. It's based off of the promise of God specifically waiting and hoping go together in the Bible throughout scripture. This biblical hope is not just wishful thinking. It's confident expectation that the Lord is going to do the things that he has promised, we use the word hope different in our in our language than I think the Bible uses the word, hope we say, I hope the Giants will win. They're not going to win you guys, stay or terrible but I don't know what's going to happen. I'm pretty sure they're going to lose. But I hope, I hope that they went, I hope the weather is nice tomorrow or we going to, we will see what happens. That's something that's not the kind of hope the Bible talks about the the hope that the Bible talks about is more grounded. It's more solid. It's, I know something is going to happen and I'm not and I'm not just like kind of open and deleting I'm at, you know, I don't know. I think I I know the Lord is going to do the things that he's promised. I think of it like this is the illustration. I would like to use this kind of is a kid going to sleep on Christmas Eve. You're not. You you remember that feeling going to sleep on Christmas Eve? Now I'm a parent. It's like a gashed. What? I got to get up at 5 a.m. now and these kids are going to be all over you. No different when you're a parent but when your kid, man, you go to sleep and there's this expectation tomorrow going to wake up and there's going to be present in the whole. You know, it's going to be so much fun. I like I know something exciting is going to happen tomorrow because my parents have promised me that this exciting things going to happen. I seen it happened in the past. I remember Christmas last year, I can't imagine a scenario where I wake up and there's no Christmas tomorrow. So it does kid goes to bed with this hope, right? And this this like it's like an active kind of thing. God has spoken to his people. He's made promises and every time that he spoke and he has proved faithful and he wants his people to remember that. He has always been faithful. There's a thing they did in the Old Testament that I love God would like when the battle for people are you know for the people and he would say, hey do you see that giant rock over there and the people of go yeh yah, the nice-looking Rock. And God would say go get all the dudes in church, you know, and do that. Amish thing where they move a barn. You know I've ever seen this by the way, it's fantastic. If you ever got 20 minutes to kill, just go on YouTube and type in the Amish Barns and just enjoy yourself. Anyway, get everybody together and you go and you just going to lift the rock up and just everybody's going to push it together and then just push it on its side in a way that it would never like an unnatural way. So this giant rock now is like cleaning up with, you know, it's like this and then every time you walk past that rock remember? Oh yeah, that's the place where God won the battle for the people. I dislike the Ebenezer stones from Samuel, you know, this is the idea, you know that from come now fount here I raise my Ebenezer. This is what we're talking about God. And every time you go by that rock, remember I did that for you, then and I promised you that I'm going to do this for you again in the future. This is the kind of waiting that the Bible is talking about when he says I wait on the Lord. He's not saying I'm going to sit around. I'm going to see what happens. He says, I'm going to look at the the faithfulness of God. And I'm going to hope in the faithfulness of God coming forward, and I'm going to live in the place in between these two times workout was faithful, right? This is what Biblical. This is, what Biblical waiting is about what he says a 60 cuz it again. Anytime you repeat something like this repetition in the Bible means, especially look at this part. So he says, my soul waits for the Lord, he says it again. This waiting is important when is an illustration more than Watchmen for the morning, more than Watchman for the morning. So he reaches for the strongest illustration that he can think of, I'm waiting, like a Watchman for the morning, so imagine standing guard on the city wall or something all night. And I've never had one of these nights. We're just like the way. I cannot wait for the morning camping. Maybe I'm going camping this week and I'm excited. We're going camping, I hate camping camping. The worst was when we sleeping on the ground to come on. I have a bed you know, that mean we're going camping this week and I'm excited though because this time we're going my brothers in the families. We all go camping every year this year. We're going to the Santa Cruz mountains. Where there's no Bears ever been camping, where there's bears. Terrible now. Have you ever been to Dad who's camping when there's Bears? You know what I mean? Like if the Bears going to eat, somebody is going to be maybe like I guess I'm at this. Bear comes at the family I guess. I'm fighting a bear Revenant style, you know what I mean? So we've been camping in Tahoe in some other places where these are just kind of walked through the campsite. Like, and everybody else is not screaming, or I don't understand people. These things are huge and they'll eat your face. You know, the bear leaves at one time, I called the ranger to, at the campsite, we're at, and he came over and he starts shining his flashlight up in the trees, and I was like, it was a bear, like, I know, they run up the trees and they hide while you're sleeping, and I was like, that's why I never leave the city, you guys is terrible. Right. So then, you know, the Bears come through, and then everybody goes to sleep, and then I'm just sitting in my tent, like, wide-eyed watching for the Bears. Can't wait for the morning. That's the illustration that he pulls from. Just that, you know, you're up all night and you just waiting, I cannot wait to see the sun. Start to rise over the horizon. That's it. Like that kind of active waiting. That's the kind of waiting he's talking about now. He keeps going over 7. So the song is now switches the tone of this in these last two verses. So is real hope in the Lord. So remember they're singing this song. As they walk up the hill to Jerusalem. So, the tone now has shifted sort of. At the end of this song from an individual lament everything up till now has been, I wait, I cry my soul Waits that sort of thing, but now the psalmist has. It seems like the idea is you're supposed to be singing this and thinking about this yourself and thinking, about your sin and thinking about the Forgiveness of the Lord in the faithfulness of the Lord to you personally. But then you remember, oh yeah, wait, I'm walking up this hill with hundreds of thousands of people and we're heading into Jerusalem and you look around and you see that, you're part of this community. And so the call now is for each other. They're just called to the to see the Forgiveness of the Lord to see the faithfulness of God. Oh, Israel. Hope in the Lord. Right? That's not just good advice. It's it's telling each other. Oh yes. This is not just for me. Part of what I'm supposed to do. Here is remind you guys that this is for you as well. This kind of faith has always been a community activity. One of the things I think the American Church does the worst is were so wrapped up in our, you know, my individual rights and me and me and me. This is like the, the water that were swimming and we don't even know how much is formed us, but it's interesting to see how it goes back and forth in this song from me to the community to be enough to the that back and forth and look what it says. So is there a hope in the Lord? There's a command for with the Lord. There is steadfast love with y'all way. Their steadfast love, that's that beautiful Hebrew word has said, it's more than love. It's God's like loyal Covenant, never giving up kind of love for his people, right? So like the way I always describe a marriage laws almost so you can There's all sorts of love in our culture. We use this word way too much. But, you know, like two folks dating can say, You know, I love you. I love you too. Great. You know, we've seen that but when you stand in front of everybody that, you know, and you make a vow and you say, I'm going to be with this person until one of us kicked the bucket. You know I've done it right but like this is how much I love this person in front of everybody. I am making this coming, I'm having this valve. That's what God says he's done for us. That's that word steadfast love. I don't just want to love you like a boyfriend and girlfriend ever. You like we're married. That's what God is saying. This Covenant loyal love that I'm never going to abandon you. I'm never going to give up on you and he says end with the Lord. There's plenty full Redemption. I love that phrase to we had that Daniel, put that in there, the communion stuff. I thought that, you know, this idea of plentiful Redemption, I love that. In other words, God has more forgiveness than he knows what to do with. His grace is not running low, his Mercy is not almost empty. I put I don't know. I feel like spending as much time as I do with Believers and just knowing my own heart. Don't we always They're often live as if God has a limited supply of forgiveness.

But you know I'm talking about like when we send another drop comes out of the bucket of forgiveness and eventually that bucket is going to be empty and God is going to look at me and he's going to say well you used it all up and from here on out you're on your own, you don't have to earn your way back in. So then I start earning it like God ran out of forgiveness for me, that's not the god of Psalm 130. The god of the Bible. It's not the god that we see here. There's no shortage of Mercy with him. There is plentiful. Redemption, there's no limit to his grace and he has, theirs is confident promise he will redeem Israel from all his iniquities. This Redemption is for the people of got the psalmist ends, the song, By calling the believer almost to look up to the Lord. It was just as beautiful truth. He will redeem is real. Look how different that is from verse 1. Look at the tone. How is out of the depths I cry to you? Oh, Lord, I am drowning in sin. That's how he started. And how does he end it?

And he will redeem Israel. Like absolutely confidently will redeem Israel from all of his iniquities. All of them all the wrong. Not just some of them. What are the sweetest promises in the Holy Bible? He will redeem Israel from all his iniquities. Not just the sins before you became a Christian. Write all of this in The Sims that you're most ashamed of. Depends, nobody even your spouse knows about. Maybe it's the sense. Everybody knows about the sins, you've confessed a hundred times. Christ's Redemption is greater than all of them. I never get tired of this sentence. He's a better savior than you are a sinner. And you know what? You're pretty good Center. Right, we're all pretty great at this, but his Redemption is bigger than even that.

What a beautiful song. Let's kind of us trapped us out then. I grew up at, you know, when I first became a Believer was kind of towards the end of high school, maybe 18 somewhere near her house, like a senior maybe. And when I first became a Believer, I had this was the impression I had, okay? As I get more spiritually mature, And as I grow in this face that for 18 years now, I thought was bologna. But now I've come to see this, this Lord is real. And as I get older, though, what can happen is I'm going to start feeling a lot better about myself. This is what I thought and I thought to myself, I got to put up with this guy for a few more years, but then eventually I'll be Pastor John and Pastor John is going to be awesome. I just how 18 year old John thought about 40 something year old. John is going to be amazing but that's not really the way it works. What ended up happening was through. All the normal means of Grace, the normal ways that God works. I was able to put a lot of that eighteen-year-old John foolishness aside and I was able to pick up a, you know, with the Lord's help and sanctification in the church, working with me as able to take us in and pick it up and go. I don't like you anymore. I don't put you over here and I picked it up and I and II set it over here and then I came back and then I realized all that that sin was doing, was blocking my view of another sin. You know, like the sin was deeper in my heart than I ever realized.

part of the process of sanctification was not only getting rid of some of these Tunes, but it was giving me a new eyes to see these other things that I never really saw before, and that seems to be the pattern that I've seen with mostly verse Not that we get worse is that we see our sin more clearly, as we come close to Jesus items, easy to look great in the dark night clubs are probably dark? I don't know, I've never been to a nightclub, but I imagine, right? Is my nightclubs are dark, but as I came into the light, all I saw was blemishes as I looked, you know, when I do stuff in front of that mirror with all the lights on top of, you know, unless shining interface boy, you can see everything. Don't you feel like verse 1? A lot out of the depths of the depths of my sin? I cry to you. Send exhausting. Right. Don't you feel that? Like, there's a lot of tiring things in our lives. Work is tiring at the go all the time, and I got to get right. But here's the thing with work, a few years, a few weeks a year, you get to go to Cancun and sit on the beach that you get to take a little vacation from it. Or is it another? You know, whatever. I don't know. I got to go camping cousin vacation. Anyway being a parent is exhausting right? I got to feed these kids every day you're killing me here with this, right? But once a month to get a date night, somebody from church watches. The kids are you ship them off to Texas or we do that, to ship them off to Grandma's house where you get a little bit of break, but with sin, The sin in my heart. There's no vacation. There's no mother-in-law to watch that baby. There's no respite every morning that I wake up. There's two in my heart. And the war on sand in my life. And I'm imagining that a lot of you feel this too, is exhausting it can wear you out. I feel just like this on this time, I'm drowning Paul talked about this to enrollment, he says, for I do not understand my own actions for what I do start for. I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing that I hate a few verses later for. I do not do the good, I want, but the evil I do. What I do not want, is what I keep on doing.