Let us Praise the Majestic Name of God
Notes
Transcript
Introduction
Introduction
Anyone like to singing in the car?
What brings us to sing, even in the hardest of times?
Why do you sing praise songs God?
Psalm 68 is written by King David and praises God for being king. God is pictured with some intense imagery. He is the King who rode majestically before the Israelites as the came out of Egypt through the wilderness and into the promised land. This is a song that you can picture is being song by the people as a ritual procession into Jerusalem and up to God’s house.
As we look at this some, we see three ways that David celebrates God starting generally with triumphs of God, then moves more specifically with celebrating the journey from Egypt to the Promised Land. As David closes his song, David looks at how God has established himself among his people.
READ
PRAY
Let us praise him for who he is Vs. 1-6
Let us praise him for who he is Vs. 1-6
We really need to picture what David is picturing here. As David is writing this song he is picturing back to when Moses led Israel out from Sinai with the ark of the covenant, the foot still of God’s throne on earth, going before the people. In Numbers 10:35, Moses would say this every day:
And whenever the ark set out, Moses said, “Arise, O Lord, and let your enemies be scattered, and let those who hate you flee before you.”
When the ark would come to it’s resting place after travelling with the people of God, Moses would agsin cry in verse 36:
And when it rested, he said, “Return, O Lord, to the ten thousand thousands of Israel.”
Imagine that, with every step, every day of Israel wondering in the desert, they would hear those words being cried from Moses. But now, David is bringing up the ark to it’s resting place on Mount Zion, completing the exodus several hundred years after it began. In Psalm 68:1 we see David is announcing with confidence in God the same thing that Moses announced many years before:
God shall arise, his enemies shall be scattered;
and those who hate him shall flee before him!
but he also prayers with that second part of the verse: and those who hate him shall flee before him! So when David saw that the ark was coming home, to it’s dwelling place with God’s people, it proved one very important thing: Moses’ prayers had been answered and gave a strong incentive for new generations of the people of God to call on him for salvation.
The Praise that we see here comes out of facts of who God is, what he has already proven himself to be, giving a hope for the future.
It’s with this looking at who God is, that David is completely confident that God will do what he said he will do. David uses pictures to describe the overwhelming power of God:
As smoke is driven away, so you shall drive them away;
as wax melts before fire,
so the wicked shall perish before God!
How often are you discouraged by the apparent power of those who seem to be against God?
BUT when God arises, these forces, these threats are like smoke that disappears with a strong wind or like wax melting before a hot fire.
Times will be hard, but what does this show those who are in Christ? For those who trust God, we don’t need to be disheartened by what we see in this word and it’s apparent power. God, the creator of the universe, has pledged himself to our protection and care.
Think about the imagery this brings to God’s people: When Israel faced the uncrossable Red Sea as God was bringing them out of Egypt to the Promised Land, what did God do? God made the passage through the waves so that they would cross on dry land. As the Egyptian chariots sped toward God’s people with bows drawn, What did God do? God drowned them in his wrath.
John Calvin put it this way:
There is no such strength in our enemies as we suppose how easily God can overthrow the machinations of our enemies. - John Calvin
Really, is there anyone who can stand against God? It’s completely pointless to stand against. It’s like “smoke” or “wax.” God answers his peoples prayers for vindication as those who are the enemies are driven away but the righteous shall be glad...
It may look like he is asleep or laying still, and letting all the haters out there do what ever they want. But there will be a time when he rises. When God rises, the enemies scatter. David is reminding God’s people that God’s power over thier enemies is like wind to smoke, and fire to was.
But this is a greater picture of what Christ accomplishes on the cross. He will defeat his enemies and has done just that: Sin, death, and hell know the terror of his arm. Our confidence in victory is found in his victory.
The enemy is anything but solid; the invisible God anything but absent.
For you and me, for those who are in Christ, what does this mean for us? In Christ we have a greater reason for confidence than those who were in David’s time.
“We see Jesus, the appointed atonement, clothed with glory and majesty, and before his advance all opposition melts like snow in the sun: the pleasure of the Lord shall prospoer in his hands. WHen he comes by his Holy Spirit, conquest is the result; but when he arises in person, his foes shall utterly perish.” - Charles Spurgeon
Nothing will stand before our God. He scatters his enemies who are ours. He does the work. We don’t scatter enemies, he does. We don’t do the judging of the nations, he does. We wait in patience for what God will do. But not only does he scatter his enemies, but with a tender hand he reaches out to gather his people in safety and comfort. Did you catch that in verse 5-6?
Father of the fatherless and protector of widows
is God in his holy habitation.
God settles the solitary in a home;
he leads out the prisoners to prosperity,
but the rebellious dwell in a parched land.
Oh man, our God is gracious. He stays true to his character. God is tender toward those who are most afflicted. He takes those who seem to have nothing of a faithful father and when they turn to him in faith, God gives them a fatherly love, affirmation, and provision that they need. Look at the widows, our world may cast them off, but God take. Notice of them for protection. Look at the state of Israel, they were slaves in a land that wasn’t theirs, so God brings them to the promised land, blesses them prosperty that goes beyond thier imagination.
This character of God is no different for God’s church. Our God is unchanging. He is the same God in the Old Testament as we see in the New Testament. God makes the church today a place where castoffs may find acceptance and where the fatherless and widows find a family. In the gospel of his Son, God grants freedom to those imports signed by sins and blesses the souls of believers with eternal life.
Application: If I have an proper understanding of who God is. What he has done for us. That should change how we interact with others, especially those who are in this church. There is a reason why Jesus says they will know you by your love for one another. Look at what God has done for you. He didn’t have to. He is well within his right to judge us all for the sin we have done against him, yet he plucked you out, cleaned you up, and by what Christ has done on the cross, made us his. So that anyone who repents of their sin and believes in the Gospel, that Christ has died for thier sins and rose again, will be saved.
Thses few verses show us another amazing truth about God: He is might and gracious to save his people in all places and at all times. God’s plan of salvation calls for the wicked to be destroyed, while God’s humble people are exalted with Christ. God has pledged himself to overcome every opposition to our salvation. Look at what he has done to the guilt of your sin: he has removed it by sending his son to die on the cross. God just doesn’t leave us there with a removal of our guilt and shame before him, he sends the Holy Spirit who empowers us for faith and godliness, until that day when those who are in Christ will reign with Christ as coheirs.
It’s this that causes David calls God’s people to worship in verse 4, because our God is worthy of all praise.
Sing to God, sing praises to his name;
lift up a song to him who rides through the deserts;
his name is the Lord;
exult before him!
For those who are in Christ, we are not just called to worship Christ, but to be like him. We need to be people of God’s Word and prayer. If you are in Christ, you should be fathers to the fatherless, friends to the friendless, the protector of widows, and healers of those with broken hearts. How does this look You may ask? Adoptions children who lack a home, intervening to help in crisis pregnancies, or tutoring at-risk youth. We live in a city were there are many ways we can show the tender mercy of God, celebrating with joy the amazing grace that he has shown to us.
Transition: As we see who God is as one who stands and the wicked flee from him like smoke being driven away, we see God not for only who he is, but we praise him for what he has done.
Let us praise him for what he has done Vs. 7-18
Let us praise him for what he has done Vs. 7-18
For the rest of this song, David shows God’s great saving work. It points our eyes from our circumstances changing our perspective so that we can then praise God with certainty of what he will do in the future. He is God with us.
Vs. 7-10 God marches from Sinai. david points people to how God led his people through the wilderness. Not only did God give them a place to live, but made it fruitful. David gives us a collage of pictures from. He exodus that provets God’s blessing in guiding and caring for his people.
Even more than that, in verse 9 to 10, God provides for the needs of his people.
What David really wants us to see this morning, is that God’s saving blessing are with his people even when we will have troubles in this life. God dwells with his people, he is with them. Yes, it would have been hard for God’s people to walk through a desert As he was discipline them. But God disciples and trains his people for hte sake of thier high and holy calling, making them walk through that time. But through all of that, God was with his people, personally guiding and tending them.
Vs. 15-18 David ends off his forest half of his song with words that the apostle Paul quotes in Ephesians 4:8 to talk about Jesus ascending to heaven after his resurrection. Paul points is that the ark of the covenant’s journey out of Egypt through the desert, in the company of God’s very tired people, was a picture of Jesus brith as a man and his life of poverty and weakness on the way to his return to heaven in the glory of his resurrection and ascension. Christ cast downt he curse of sin, set aside the judgement of the law against his people, and even led death into captivity, so that it is no longer able to harm his blood-bought people.
Vs. 18 Lord God may dwell there John Newton put it this way:
“Surrounded as we are with enemies and difficulties, we plead, against every accusation and threatening, that our Head is in heaven; we have an Advocate with the Father, a High Priest upon the thrown, who, because he ever liveth to make intercession, is able to save to the uttermost. This is all our ple, nor do we desire any other.”
Application: David again reminds his people of who God is. O God, when you went out before your people. God preserves his people - even as a remnant. The desert, Sinai, the defeat of Sisera (Judges 4:7), the arrival in Canaan, and the displacement of bloodthirsty enemies are al events in which God moved heaven and earth to prove that salvation comes from the Lord.
When I come to praise God. It’s not a blind faith. It could be tears, it could be through laughter, but all praise comes from a growing understanding of who God is. The more I know him, the more I want to praise him.
I believe I have talked about this before, but I struggle with depression. When I was younger, it was a big issue for me and lead me down some dark roads. I also love music, always listening to something. Even when i was younger i was, but I began to notice that much of what I was putting into my head were encouraging the very things I was struggling with. As God used that struggle to refine me I began to see that if I am to continue to struggle with this, I need to combat it with a greater truth. In the midst of doubt, in the midst of doubting that God is good, in the midst of doubting that God is working out all things for the good of those who love him. In the midst of life’s struggle, how do I fight that?
If we look at the history that David is showing us, is how he brings together this ragtag band of warriors from a weak and persecuted people to execute the plan. God surrounds himself with orphans, widows, outcasts, prisoners, poor, unwise, and weak sinners, Christ will bring humiliating defeat to hell itself.
Transition: As the psalmist brings the singers to the climax of the song with the high mountain, the consequences of
Let us praise him because he is with us Vs. 19-35
Let us praise him because he is with us Vs. 19-35
Vs. 19 daily bears us up. God cares for his people and is constantly in touch with their needs. In Isaiah 46:1-4, Isaiah points out how the idols of other people can’t care for their worshipers, but our God can.
Vs. 20 God of salvation. God saves his people from sickness and from death in battle. In Jesus Christ His people learn that he, by his ressurection, delivers from death by obtaining eternal life for them.
THE GOSPEL MOVE VS. 19-21
28-31 David gives the people a song, telling about the future victory of God.
Vs. 29 Because of your temple. It’s because of God chose Jerusalem as a special place of his dwelling during that time that it is a place of prestige.
SO WHAT?
SO WHAT?
Why do you sing praise songs God? What brings you to praise?
BI: We praise God because he protects weaklings and pursues nobodies like you and me
As the Christian looks to heaven and then we begin to realize that our Saviour is there in glory and power, wit's authority granted him over all things for the church, we should have the same joyful peace and satisfaction that David had. With Jesus at the Father’s right hand, God is with us. With Jesus eternally presenting the wounds of his atoning death for our sins, our forgiveness is forever secure. We have been adopted as God’s children in Christ, we will forever have God’s fatherly love and protection, and with Jesus who intercedes for us, our prayer will be recieved.
Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.
Listen to me, listen closely, are you with me? If God proved his saving commitment to David through the exodus, HOW MUCH MORE HAS GOD PROVED THE SUFFICIENCY OF HIS GRACE FOR US THROUGH OFFERING HIS SON TO DIE FOR OUR SINS?
Stay with me here: If you believe in the truth that Jesus died, rose again, and ascended to heaven for your salvation, just like how David rejoiced as the ark came to Mount Zion, that believe will change everything about your live. We will want to have close communion with God, who has not only made his home among us, but actually comes to dwell in us through the Holy Spirit whom Jesus sends. Think about this, the baby who was born in some town called Bethlehem, who grew up, living a sinless life, grew up, who suffered and was forsaken for our sin, is now enthrowned as the Lord of glory. Through faith, how can we not rejoice in serving the call of Christ. We serve Christ, knowing that he is here with us now and that one day we will be with him soon. Soon Jesus will descend one last time to take us to himself so that we may ascend with him to dwell in the house of our Gof.
BI: We praise God because he protects weaklings and pursues nobodies like you and me.