Seeing God While Waiting
Notes
Transcript
Intro:
I have a growing list of “I will never—that I end up doing”
“I never want to be a “screen preachers”—but here we are; these are interesting days
This is the final message in the Summer of the Psalms
—When I get back after Labor Day, the plan is to go into a Series called Deep Discipleship (Matthew’s Gospel)
-----
*Becoming a Christian is utterly amazing, isn’t it.
--We give our life to Jesus, the burden of sin falls off, and we finally feel free and live with a completely clean conscience
--We learn to read the Bible and pray and there is ever-increasing joy that stays with us all the days of our lives
--Our sins quickly get put to death and we grow by leaps and bounds
--We live in deep contentment in the all the varying seasons—singleness, marriage, parenting, empty-nest, bereavement
--We find all the wisdom to navigate even the most complex issues in life
We connect and commit to church family and find or closest friendships;
—where we discover our spiritual gifts, use them to serve the body and see the church thrive in making disciples and reaching the lost
And we do al of this walking very humbly, always giving thanks to God and putting every inclination of pride to death
If only that were true
That’s a very promising view of being a Christian—but it’s far from the reality most of us experience
--The Christian life is really a mixtures of highs and lows; ups-and downs.
--Our growth is never a straight line up.
--We struggle with sin; sorrow overwhelms us; we may wonder how effectively we use or gifts; contentment seems like a deep struggle
—And sometimes we may even have doubts about our forgiveness
**If that’s your experience, then it sounds more like the 150 Psalms in the Bible
some highs, but many lows--pain, mixed with praise, weeping, rejoicing
**The main mark of a Psalm-writer is not a well-put together life; the main mark is seeing God in the dips and valleys of Life—which is called faith
Now this Psalm has a few themes in it: forgvivness, hope, and waiting…waiting seems to stand out
Waiting
That word does not comes easy—we don’t like to hear it
—At an appointment: wait
—You will be put on a waiting list
—Probably worse are the prayer requests that God has not given a sold no, but “wait”
Psalm 130 is marked by intense distress and intense waiting
INTENSE DISTRESS (1-4)
INTENSE DISTRESS (1-4)
We have not idea of the exact situation, but know it’s written deep emotional distress; situation chaotic—
“Out of the depths”
Depth’s are used to describe “near despair” (desperate)—or flooding terror
In Isaiah we see the metaphor used when God brings people out of distress—looking back to the Exodus
Was it not you who dried up the sea,
the waters of the great deep,
who made the depths of the sea a way
for the redeemed to pass over?
—Two things will not help you in the depths: self-help, or self pity
You need God in the depths.
Like the prayer from Jonah
When my life was fainting away,
I remembered the Lord,
and my prayer came to you,
into your holy temple.
Apply: Questions for us What sinks us to the depths? “What makes us feel bad?”
It it how we taken God casually?
Quote (recently heard): “If the chief end of man is to glorify God, the chief temptation of man is to exalt self.
**The things that make us feel bad are usually tied to us, not God
(V3-4) We find what put this guy in the depths: iniquity (guilt)
Our society is moving away from guilt as a feeling, even a word people use. People rarely, if every schedule an appointment with the pastor or counselor because they feel guilty—usually some other problem or identity issue
Yet the reality of guilt is not something we can brush aside—-it throws people in the depths
Distress is met with mercy
The cry is for mercy “pleas for mercy” V3—If you should make iniquities (keep a record, tally up)…who could stand
In other words, if God’s main, ultimate desire was to tally up sin, keep is in our guilt—-what hope would we have?
God’s desire to shower mercy on a people not worth, but for his praise!
That’s told in v4: There is forgives so that God may be feared
That actually sounds strange—fear does not seem like the outcome of forgives we would expect.
We would think: With you there is forgiveness so that we may be free
Doesn’t forgiveness equal freedom?
What’s this whole fear thing? The OT God of wrath? No
It describes the heart of spiritual health
“Christians can delight themselves in the overwhelming majesty of the Creator…contemplating the splendor of God and so stoking our fearful wonder at him is at the heart of Christian health —(Michael Reeves, Rejoice and Tremble)
Gospel/Apply:
Though a main theme today is waiting—one thing y’all need to know: you don’t have to wait for God to forgive you. God’s forgiveness is not a waiting game.
But God does not say: wait on my forgiveness. No, he offers now for all who cry out in distress.
He also offers real forgiveness
A small, but vital grammatical detail is the definite article is place in front of the word forgiveness (v4)
Lit: With you there is “The Forgiveness”
Which led one OT scholar to translate it “”But indeed with you there is real forgiveness”
The forgiveness is real forgiveness….it’s the forgiveness of Christ!
We either have The Forgiveness, or no forgiveness
Illus: It’s so pronounced in the Psalm that the Reformer Martin Luther called this a Pauline Psalm
In other words, we see the same message of mercy, redemption, and grace that we see in Paul’s theology in the NT
He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.
**We see the Gospel:
“Plentiful redemption”
real forgiveness
Apply: We also see what the most intense distress really is about.
The most distressing thing imaginable is to continue on with unforgiven sin
But thanks be to God there is hope in Christ Jesus of real forgiveness
Sum:
—No one has to wait for forgiveness
—But that does not mean that the life of discipleship does not require waiting, and a lot of it:
INTENSE WAITING (5-8)
INTENSE WAITING (5-8)
When I was in my early 20’s I worked for a company that made industrial cleaning supplies. They offered me a job in sales, that I ended up turning down. The main reason is I knew the tactics employed. They had two different soaps they made. The only difference was the color of dye. But the one with the gold dye was priced much higher, and I would be encouraged to sell that, even thought the product with the pink dye was just the same
As a preacher I refuse to sell you the gold-product that says: this is better, even when it’s not.
—I want to be honest that there is no fast-track, no expedited path of discipleship
**Discipleship is very much a waiting process
A common metaphor Jesus uses of the Kingdom is agriculture.
God had me cut my teeth in vocational ministry in a farming community to see how that works
If you want to see work that requires patience, waiting, trusting….go work on a farm.
The overlooked value of waiting
Waiting has always been hard…even for God’s people
—Abraham had a hard time waiting on the Lord to provide the promised child
—King Saul had a problem with patience and waiting
—Disciples were impatient with Jesus, wanting to see a visible kingdom now
But it seems like the norm is that God’s calls his people to waiting….even intense waiting
**In our day, waiting is highly undervalued and overlooked
My kids have grown up in a world where they have never had to wait for a VHS to rewind; they’v never had to wait for someone else to get off the phone
When I was a little boy my dad to see to the barber shop. If 3 men were in front of us, we waited. Now, I check into the barber on a App to avoid any wait time
Our culture is not friendly to waiting—and that impacts our discipleship (and may explain why so many of us are restless this very moment)
The waiting described is an active waiting A lot of times we think waiting is merely passive—just sit there and wait; but that’s not the waiting we see here!
Intense waiting is active waiting
Active waiting has a few elements
Hope in the Word (v5).
—It could be a hope in any of God’s promises
—But the context the hope is forgiveness(v4)
In other words, I hope knowing I have forgiveness; that I have the best thing possible—I’m at peace with God, have a relationship with him that’s not based on judgment and condemnation
Apply: discipleship waiting is dwelling on the promise of the gospel.
--Never forgetting our identity.
--Never neglecting all that Jesus has done for us.
Eager waiting “More than the watchman” (v6)
The image of the watchman: he’s the 3rd shift security guard keeping vigil
He is constantly alert
But he also waits for the darkness to lift, and the light to break through
But there is more than just metaphorical dark/light
so Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin but to save those who are eagerly waiting for him.
Apply: Our waiting is very personal—
It’s a bride waiting for the groom
it’s for the personal, visible return of Jesus Christ.
**That’s an acid test to know if you are a Christian—do you wait eagerly for the personal, and visible see Jesus?
Is your hope build on that hope?
Which brings us to a final theme—a good one to close this series: hope
(v7) Oh, Isreal, hope in the Lord
It’s a call for all God’s people—all…to hope in the Lord.
TRB friends, God calls us to hope
Apply: God’s people never escape the challenges and trials
Jesus told his disciples: in this world you will have tribulation
Discipleship is marked by hills and valleys
Yet Seeing God means living in hope
The heart of much of the Psalms can be captured in Ps 42:5
Why are you cast down, O my soul,
and why are you in turmoil within me?
Hope in God; for I shall again praise him,
my salvation
—Friends, like you I have hoped that we all past everything COVID; return to life, church life—relationships as normal
—Hope that life (my plans) would stop being interrupted
--hoped that the geo political climate would change
—hoped that more people would stop being nasty and be nice
But if those are the main things I set my hope on, my hope is set too low
Seeing God means having hope in God
—Some need renewed and restored hope this very moment
God never promises his people an easy path—but he always promises to be the very source of hope
May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.