HONEST TO GOD (2007)

HONEST TO GOD Psalm 139:23-24 August 12, 2007 Given by: Pastor Rich Bersett [Index of Past Messages] Introduction The honesty plant is found primarily in Europe. This is a picture of “lunaria annua,” the annual version of the plant. It is believed by some to have magical powers. It got its name in the 16th century, probably because the mature plant bears seed pods that resemble the full moon. (It is also known as the Money Plant, because the pods look like silver dollars.) The other thing about the seed pods is they are translucent, nearly transparent. Hence the idea of “honesty.” I bring this plant up as an illustration of the way in which God wants us to deal with Him. He wants us to be truthful, clean through, without the hint of hiding anything from Him or ourselves. Often I find myself in the awkward place of hiding something from God—or, at least thinking I am successfully hiding it from Him. It’s a foolish practice, trying to hide our weakness or sins from God. He knows all about it as soon as we did it, as soon as we thought it or felt it. David said, “Lord, you have searched me and you know me.” (Psalm 139:1) Let’s dig a little deeper into Psalm 139, because there David gives praise to the Lord for His nature—the things about God that make Him God. The first quality of God he is struck by is God’s omniscience—His all-knowing-ness. The most powerful computer in the world is currently the IBM BlueGene/L, housed at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California. It can perform 280 trillion calculations a second! But that's nothing compared to the computer they're trying to put together at the Department of Energy's Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. It's called The Roadrunner Project, after New Mexico's speedy state bird. Components for the computer began arriving in the fall of 2006, and 36 moving vans full of equipment will be needed to complete it. By the time it's finished in 2008, the computer will fill a room the size of a hockey rink and consume as much power as a small town. Its goal is to be the first computer to break the "petaflop" barrier—to do a quadrillion calculations a second. How fast is that? It is roughly a billion times faster than today's generation of desktop computers! Even more mind-boggling than these feats is that the human brain processes information even faster! Some scientists estimate that the brain carries out 10 quadrillion operations a second—10 times faster than a computer the size of a hockey rink! But supercomputers and human brains combined are for God like reading the back of a cereal box. He created the very concept of intelligence! Isaiah 55:9 says, "As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts." And here is the most incredible thing—He spends His time studying us! Read Psalm 139:1-6. The next characteristic of God’s nature is His omnipresence. Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there. If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast. If I say, ‘Surely the darkness will hide me and the light become night around me,’ even the darkness will not be dark to you; the night will shine like the day, for darkness is as light to you. (Psalm 139:7-12) The science teacher gave the children an assignment the day they finished their unit on Africa. They were to write an in-class essay their favorite wildlife of the Serengeti. One little girl took only 2 minutes, laid her pen down and sat with her arms folded. Curious, the teacher walked to her desk and read the single sentence theme: A gazelle is very fast, but God is already there!   David marvels at the mysterious reality of God—He is already precisely everywhere. Please remember, though, this is not pantheism—the belief that God is IN everything, everyplace. Experiencing a resurgence in America is the patently false belief that God is IN everything, and therefore everything is a part of the God force or God-presence in the world. David’s remarks, nor any other Bible passage, teach nothing of the sort. He is affirming that everywhere at all times God is near to guide him and hold him fast (verse 10). Thirdly, God is omnipotent. If the Milky Way galaxy were the size of the entire continent of North America, our solar system would fit in a coffee cup. Even now, two Voyager spacecraft are hurtling toward the edge of the solar system at a rate of 100,000 miles per hour. For almost three decades they have been speeding away from Earth, approaching a distance of 9 billion miles. When engineers beam a command to the spacecraft at the speed of light, it takes 13 hours to arrive. Yet this vast neighborhood of our sun—in truth, the size of a coffee cup—fits along with several hundred billion other stars and their minions in the Milky Way, one of perhaps 100 billion such galaxies in the universe. To send a light-speed message to the edge of that universe would take 15 billion years. The Bible boldly declares God made it all AND sustains it all with precise movement and force. Blaise Pascal in his Pensees wrote: Read Psalm 139:13-18. “The greatest single distinguishing feature of the omnipotence of God is that our imagination gets lost when thinking about it.” David praises God for His omniscience, His omnipresence, His omnipotence and His judgment. Verses 19-22: If only you would slay the wicked, O God! Away from me, you bloodthirsty men! They speak of you with evil intent; your adversaries misuse your name. Do I not hate those who hate you, O Lord, and abhor those who rise up against you? I have nothing by hatred for them; I count them my enemies. Now, there’s an interesting passage of scripture! What is David doing—being so negative, so hateful, so honest? I mean, ‘I hate them and count them my enemies’?! Is that any way for a patriarch to talk? A couple of observations here: 1) David is being honest with his feelings, and he does so elsewhere in Psalms. Psalm 69 is quite colorful: May their eyes be darkened so they cannot see, and their backs be bent forever. Pour out your wrath on them. (vss 23-24) Then there are the tender words of Psalm 109: 9-12 May his children be wandering beggars; may they be driven from their ruined homes. May a creditor seize all he has; may strangers plunder the fruits of his labor. May no one extend kindness to him or take pity on his fatherless children. These are referred to as the “imprecatory” psalms, where God’s judgment is called down on His enemies. 2) David gets an “A” in wanting to defend God’s name and His righteousness. The wicked guys have gotten away with their godless schemes far too long, he says, and it’s time for God to act! Anxious for justice and to vindicate God’s name, he prays curses on his enemies. Does David get an “F” in loving his enemies? Some think this is an honest look at the feelings of a man who loves God and is reacting to the evil around him. 3) The word “hate” used by David needs to be softened. The real meaning of the term is “reject” or “ignore” even “resent”. So what David is doing is vehemently (and colorfully) declaring whose side he is on. C.S. Lewis wrote, “The ferocious parts of the Psalms serve as a reminder that there is in the world such a thing as wickedness and that is hateful to God.” And Alexander McClaren said “Perhaps it would do modern tenderheartedness no harm to have a little more iron infused into its gentleness, and to lay to heart that the King of Peace must first be King of Righteousness.” Let me add my personal thought on this. I do not believe God is offended when we say to Him what is on our hearts—even if we are wrong or misguided. He loves honesty. He who said in Psalm 51:6 I desire truth in the inward parts honors our being forthright with Him about things like evil and injustice, much more than He respects our coming to Him in indignation over being mugged and saying insincerely, “Lord I just love that robber! And my feelings for him right now are just for his happiness and prosperity!” If you are very angry about some form of evil or injustice, there may be no better place for you to vent than in prayer before the only One who already knows how you feel, and who loves you so much that He died for you while you were still a sinner. Lastly, David writes about God’s Scrutiny. And this is what we have been coming to all along. Verse 23 says, Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. Please take note that, along with his unvarnished honesty, David demonstrates here his deep and sincere faith. 1) He invites God to probe his heart, to “know” him. By the way, when God searches our hearts, it is not for Him to find something out about us—He already knows our hearts. Rather, it is for our own discovery of what’s in there. Our natural souls want to hide, guard those secrets—Don’t look in the basement! But the person who is bent on becoming what God wants him to be does not shrink from such revelation. He aggressively asks God to expose his heart, his sin, his weaknesses, so he can deal with them and grow into deeper fellowship with the Lord. 2) David knew his own inadequacy—that he was even incapable of assessing his own heart. Knowing that the wickedness of man’s heart is deceptive and often self-masquerading, this man after God’s own heart invited the omniscient Lord to help him discern. Self-diagnosis is foolish and dangerous. The apostle Paul would say, I do not even judge myself. My conscience is clear, but that does not make me innocent. It is the Lord who judges me.  [webmasters note: 1 Cor 4:3-4] 3) It is a regrettable tendency in us to NOT come before Christ daily and invite His Spirit to investigate the dark recesses of our heart. It is so much easier to just ignore the embedded wickedness in our hearts, hiding from God instead of seeking His help. The wise disciple welcomes the scrutiny of God and is glad to have the searchlight of truth do a whole system scan of his life. When you resist this regular inspection you are left to deal with sin’s damaging effects all on your own. You struggle with guilt, hiding, substandard worship & service, and an acquiescence to superficial religious behavior (so you can at least “look” good). I want to spend the last few minutes of this teaching to a consideration of this concept of inviting and accepting God’s scrutiny. I believe we can find in these final verses four levels of submission to God’s scrutiny. 1) VINDICATE ME – verses 19-22 The first is the level where I come to God primarily for Him to vindicate me. In verses 19-22 we heard David’s tirade against the wickedness of the evildoers around him. But look a little closer and you’ll see David making a case not only against the wicked, but a case for himself. Read Psalm 139:19-22, emphasizing the “I” of David. See David comparing himself favorably with the wicked, who by contrast are bloodthirsty, hate the Lord and speak with evil intent against Him and are His enemies. I’m not suggesting that David was lobbying for his own righteousness, trying to curry favor with God on the basis of his righteousness. But there is a strong hint of David saying, I’m on Your side, Lord. This is perfectly natural, and we do it all the time. But what does it say about us when we feel the need to continually remind God that our hearts are right? It might suggest a wavering trust in God’s omniscience—a need to confirm that our heart is right, just in case God didn’t notice. Brothers and sisters in Christ, let us strive to rest in the confidence that God knows our hearts. 1 John 3 says, For God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything. Dear friends, if our hearts do not condemn us, we have confidence before God… (verses 20-21) 2) ILLUMINATE ME – verse 23 There is a level deeper than seeking God’s vindication. In verse 23 David prays, Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. In the first verse of this great Psalm it says, O, Lord, you have searched me and you know me. Two quick observations here: first, it is God’s will and His way to search the hearts of His children. Again, this is not for His benefit, because He already knows, but it is for our benefit that we invite His scrutiny. We benefit because He affirms what is right and good and He lovingly reveals what needs correction. After all it is not only the will of the Father, but also the will of His devoted children, that we grow past our spiritual hindrances. Second, when David says, know my ANXIOUS THOUGHTS, he uses the Hebrew word saraph. That word refers to anything that is disquieting to the soul. He prays, Lord, do a crime scene investigation—study all the evidence in my ravaged heart and find the things that keep me from your peace and rest. Our anxieties have a way of keeping our minds focused less on the Lord and more on the lesser issues. Here is terrific news – you can turn to Him, invite Him to scan the hard drive of your heart and remove the viruses of anxiety. 1 Peter 5:7 says, Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you. Let Him illuminate your heart, to reveal and expel all anxiety. 3) CONVICT ME – verse 24a But anxiety isn’t the only blight that can be found in the heart of the believer. In verse 24 David asks the Lord, Lord, while you’re in there, search for anything you find offensive, because if You don’t like it, I don’t want it in there. See if there is any offensive way in me… Have you ever been surprised by your spouse who says there is something she wants to talk with you about, and you sit down and listen to her tell you about something you do that really bugs her? Recently Charlotte made it clear to me that I should stop pressing so hard against my teeth with the electric toothbrush. I was wearing the thing out and smashing the bristles on the brush pre-maturely. I assured her that I wasn’t. She insisted I was. I studied my brushing carefully and discovered I was, in fact, pressing too hard. What happened was she looked into my habits and found some offensive way in me, brought it to my attention, I was eventually convicted, and now I brush ever so gently. While Charlotte’s search was not necessarily “invited,” the Lord is honored when I, like David, invite Him to see if there is any offensive way in me. I want to strongly suggest that we should regularly and intentionally invite the scrutiny of the Holy Spirit into our hearts. And that for one clear purpose: to find offensive ways in us that we have been overlooking, and to convict us to change. Charlie Steinmetz had one of the greatest minds in the field of electricity that the world has ever known. In his day no one knew more than he. Steinmetz built the great generators for Henry Ford in his first plant in Dearborn, Michigan. Once everything was in place, the assembly line worked like clockwork. Thanks to the electrical genius, cars began to roll off the production line, and the profits began to pour into Ford's pockets. Things ran along smoothly for months. Suddenly, without warning, everything ground to a halt. Ford Motor Company went dark. One mechanic after another was unable to locate the problem, much to Ford's frustration. They were losing money. Finally, he contacted the brain behind the system. Steinmetz showed up and immediately went to work. He fiddled around with some switches and a gauge or two. He tinkered with this motor and that one, pushed a few buttons and messed with some wires. He then threw the master switch, and lights blinked on, engines began to whirl, and things were back to normal. A few days later Henry Ford received a bill from Steinmetz for $10,000. Although Ford was a rich man, he couldn't believe it. Paying such an exorbitant amount of money was out of the question, especially for what appeared to be such a small amount of work. He returned the bill with a note: "Charlie, isn't this bill just a little high for a few hours of tinkering around with a few wires and switches?" Steinmetz rewrote the bill and sent it back. It read: "For tinkering around on the motors: $10. For knowing where to tinker: $9,990. Total $10,000. Henry Ford paid the bill. The Holy Spirit knows where to tinker. What a worthy prayer for the genuine disciple of Jesus: Lord, please train your searchlight on my heart. Vindicate me concerning everything that, by Your grace, is right. But illuminate all the corners of my life and reveal what is not right. Convict me of my need to change in the power of Your Spirit. 4) LEAD ME – verse 24b Finally, the prayer ends with David asking for God to faithfully lead him, from that point on, in the way everlasting. If we will apply ourselves to the spiritual discipline of inviting the Lord to search us, know our hearts, illuminate and convict us, we can be certain that we’ll understand His leading. We want to avoid the sins and pitfalls that allow anxious thoughts and offensive ways into our hearts. God has given us all we need to be led by Him. Bob Mumford used to tell about a certain harbor in Italy can be reached only by sailing up a narrow channel between dangerous rocks and shoals. Navigation is very hazardous and, over the years, many ships had wrecked. To guide the ships safely into port, four lights were set on four huge poles in the harbor. When the four lights are perfectly lined up and seen as one, the ship can safely proceed up the narrow channel. If the pilot sees two or three lights, he knows he's off course and in danger. God has also provided four beacons to guide us. The same rules of navigation apply--the four lights must be lined up before it is safe for us to proceed. The four harbor lights of his leading are: 1. The Word of God (objective standard) 2. The Holy Spirit (subjective witness) 3. Circumstances (divine providence) 4. Trusted others in the body of Christ. (spiritual confirmation) Together they assure us that the leading we’re receiving is Godly and, if followed, will accomplish God’s purposes in and through us. Honest to God   [Back to Top]