Psalm 71- He Has Done Great Things (Talking with God, 9)

INTRODUCTION: My Granny drove a powder blue, 1979 Ford Gran Torino with a dark blue hard shell canvas top. She had a license plate on the front that said- Let me tell you about my grandchildren.

Something pretty great happened to me last week- I got my first granddaughter! This is Eleanor- Ellie Bloom. She was born on August 12 at 9:25 pm, 7 lbs, 15 oz. 19.5 inches long. Isn’t she beautiful?

This is Ellie with her brother Asher. You can tell he loves his sister. The week Ellie was born, Becky & I were on grandparent duty most of that week while mom & dad were in the hospital. We took Asher to meet his teacher for kindergarten, got snow cones, bought toys, all the things. Being a grandparent is the best. Here’s all the grandparents. It makes you wonder- why can’t we just have grandkids first?

It’s not natural. It’s not the design. We need to experience life first before we can impart life’s lessons to others. That’s where the psalmist of Psalm 71 finds himself, he’s got life experience, he’s ready to impart life’s lessons, but someone is standing in his way, & if they get their way, he will not be able to pass on his wisdom to the next generation. What does he do? He prays.

Psalm 71:1-9, In You, O Lord, I put my trust; Let me never be put to shame. 2 Deliver me in Your righteousness, and cause me to escape; Incline Your ear to me, and save me. 3 Be my strong refuge, To which I may resort continually; You have given the commandment to save me, For You are my rock and my fortress. 4 Deliver me, O my God, out of the hand of the wicked, Out of the hand of the unrighteous and cruel man. 5 For You are my hope, O Lord God; You are my trust from my youth. 6 By You I have been upheld from birth; You are He who took me out of my mother’s womb. My praise shall be continually of You. 7 I have become as a wonder to many, But You are my strong refuge. 8 Let my mouth be filled with Your praise And with Your glory all the day. 9 Do not cast me off in the time of old age; Do not forsake me when my strength fails.

Psalm 71 is unique among the psalms because it’s obviously written by an older person (5-6, 9, 17-18). This is a person who, if they are not yet elderly, can see it from where they are, i.e., a senior saint, & they want to make a difference for the next generation. They want to leave a legacy of what great things God has done for them.

I’ll bet you want that too, to leave a legacy of what great things God has done for you. It’s great to tell people about our grandchildren, it’s greater to tell our grandchildren about Jesus. If we’re going to leave a legacy, let it be this one:

A Legacy of how God has SAVED Us, vss. 1-8.

This psalm is a prayer of lament that switches to praise by the end. It seemingly draws from other Psalms– 22; 31; 35; 40 to express the requests of this particular psalmist, who is anonymous. I must confess that in my own prayer life, I often draw upon the psalms or other texts to inspire & inform my own requests. I encourage you to do the same thing. It’s not plagiarism to pray God’s own words back to Him.

In the immediate context of the psalmist’s life, what he wants to be saved from (delivered from) is a wicked, unrighteous, & cruel man. His prayer of trust is about how he takes refuge in God. Refuge- hidden lair, dwelling place, a shelter from danger or hardship. Strong- made of rock or stone, i.e., his rock & fortress (Petra); “to which I may resort continually.” Resort- to enter, or come into, a place of retreat, to run into. God should not be our last resort, He is our first refuge.

God is his refuge because God can be relied upon. Hope- expectation, his grounds for trusting in God. He can hope in God because he has relied (trust) upon God since his youth & God has never let him down. God has upheld him since birth, therefore God is someone to depend upon, to rely on, to put trust in with confidence.

The psalmist rejoices in God. In his current circumstance, he is a wonder- sign, miracle, a marvelous event manifested by God. Every person God has ever saved is a wonder, a miracle of God’s supernatural intervention in the heart of a dead sinner that raises them to new life in Christ. Because of God’s saving grace, we bring Him praise & glory. This psalm is a prayer of running to God, relying on God, and rejoicing in God. It is a legacy of how He has saved us.

A Legacy of how God has SUSTAINED Us, vss. 9-16.

Psalm 71:9-14, Do not cast me off in the time of old age; Do not forsake me when my strength fails. 10 For my enemies speak against me; And those who lie in wait for my life take counsel together, 11 Saying, “God has forsaken him; Pursue and take him, for there is none to deliver him.” 12 O God, do not be far from me; O my God, make haste to help me! 13 Let them be confounded and consumed Who are adversaries of my life; Let them be covered with reproach and dishonor Who seek my hurt. 14 But I will hope continually, And will praise You yet more and more.

The psalmist has a testimony of salvation that began in his youth. God has upheld him throughout his life, but now that he is old, he appeals to God to not let him go; to not discard or abandon him when his strength is failing. Why does he need God to hold onto him? Because he has enemies, adversaries who plot to take his life, they think God has abandoned him, & now is the time to take him.

When the Apostle Paul had a similar circumstance in his life, an agent of Satan that wounded him, he prayed 3 times for God to take it away, but the Lord said, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness” (2 Corinthians 12:9). Paul concluded then that it is better to take pleasure in hard things- infirmities, reproaches, needs, persecutions, & distresses for Christ’s sake, “For when I am weak, then I am strong” (2 Cor 12:10).

That’s where we need to land. Hard times are going to come, many of them when we don’t have the strength to handle them on our own, that’s when we trust God to sustain us. ILL: You’ve heard of the early Christian martyr Polycarp, a disciple of the Apostle John, & Bishop of Smyrna (1 of the 7 churches of Asia). Polycarp lived from about AD 69–156. Polycarp was an old man when he was arrested during Roman persecution. His friends urged him to flee, bribe officials, & avoid trial. But Polycarp allowed himself to be brought before the Roman proconsul. The proconsul tried to persuade him to save himself: “Have respect to thine age… Swear by the genius of Caesar… Swear, and I will release thee; curse the Christ.” To this demand, Polycarp gave his famous response:

“Eighty and six years have I served him, and he has done me no wrong; how then can I blaspheme my king who saved me?” His testimony sounds a lot like Psalm 71:15-16, My mouth shall tell of Your righteousness And Your salvation all the day, For I do not know their limits. 16 I will go in the strength of the Lord God; I will make mention of Your righteousness, of Yours only.

In God’s sustaining grace, we have not yet tested the limits of His righteousness or salvation. We’ve never even gotten close to the end of them, not in our experiences or explanation of them. How can we even begin to express the greatness of His sustaining grace? Only by His strength that we are able to go & to do & to be & to speak of Him.

A Legacy of how God STRENGTHENS Us to serve the Next Generation, vss. 17-24.

Psalm 71:17-24, O God, You have taught me from my youth; And to this day I declare Your wondrous works. 18 Now also when I am old and grayheaded, O God, do not forsake me, Until I declare Your strength to this generation, Your power to everyone who is to come. 19 Also Your righteousness, O God, is very high, You who have done great things; O God, who is like You? 20 You, who have shown me great and severe troubles, Shall revive me again, And bring me up again from the depths of the earth. 21 You shall increase my greatness, And comfort me on every side. 22 Also with the lute I will praise You— And Your faithfulness, O my God! To You I will sing with the harp, O Holy One of Israel. 23 My lips shall greatly rejoice when I sing to You, And my soul, which You have redeemed. 24 My tongue also shall talk of Your righteousness all the day long; For they are confounded, For they are brought to shame Who seek my hurt.

Here we finally see the great desire of the aged psalmist. He has a lifelong testimony of God’s saving & sustaining grace. Now, in the latter part of his life, he asks God to not leave him until he shares God’s power and strength to this generation and the one to come. His desire highlights the great need for senior saints in the church to pass along their God experiences to younger generations, whether they are your grandchildren, or someone else’s.

Three ways you can serve the Lord as a Senior Saint:

You can PRAY for Revival. Vs. 20

You can PRAISE the Lord. Vs. 22

You can PROCLAIM His Righteousness. Vs. 24

If you are praying for revival, it needs to start with you. To “revive me again” (20) is what the psalmist expected God to do for him. Shane Pruitt, the National Next Gen Director for the North American Mission Board (SBC), wrote a Bible study for Gen Z (1997-2009) called “Revival Generation.” A couple years later, CBN released a documentary entitled “Revival Generation: Gen Z Turning to Jesus.” At the time there seemed to be evidence of a wide-spread revival happening among college aged-young adults. Since then, the data has not borne this out (at least in regular church attendance), & another generation has emerged- Gen Alpha (2010-2025). The Revival Generation isn’t the latest generation, it’s the ones that came before it.

The latest generations need to see the greatest generations praising the Lord (22-24). If you play an instrument, play it for Him. If you sing a song, sing it for Him. Join the choir, get on stage, work with the kids ministry or youth group and teach them how to play, sing, & praise. My greatest desire for this church is that we be a disciple-making church. One of our values is to have a developmental mindset, preparing the next generation to serve the Lord (Titus 2:1-8).

You might be thinking- I’m too old now, too tired now, I did my time, besides they won’t listen to me. Proverbs 16:31, The silver-haired head is a crown of glory, if it is found in the way of righteousness. If they quit listening to us, it’s because we quit talking about Jesus. We have younger generations who have not received the Lord, because we have older generations who have never told them about Him.

ILL: awesome illustration last Sunday night, when Pierce Meadows was with us talking about CEF & GNC. Imagine yourself holding a candle that represents how much time is likely left in your life. If you are older, it might be a pretty short candle; middle aged- a little longer; young adult- a little longer; teen- a little longer; a child- the longest (4-14). If we reach those younger generations for Christ, think how long their candle can burn for him.

God has done great things for us, no doubt. He has saved us & He has sustained us. But better than both of those things will be if He strengthens us in our old age to serve those in the next generation. It’s great to tell people about our grandchildren, it’s greater to tell grandchildren about Jesus (they don’t have to be yours’).

Maybe God is calling you to do that? To volunteer with our kids, youth, young adults, or young families. We have areas of need in all those places. Maybe he’s calling you to serve with GNC once a week, for 2 hours, during the school year. Maybe he’s preparing you for our next sports outreach ministry to kids. There’s lots of ways God can use you to reach the next generation. Will you do it?