Alright, thank you and good evening. Are you still grinning after all the picking this morning? Please remember to pray for those who are in family camp. About 100 people are there at Camp Forest Springs. They'll be coming back in a couple of days. Let's pray that God will bless them and enrich their lives. I think we're supposed to get some rain the next couple of days. So it could be a challenging experience to be at family camp.
Let's pray that God will make it a rich time though in their hearts. I was excited recently to read that there have been some more scrolls discovered in Israel that may be compared, they think, to the Dead Sea Scrolls in terms of their antiquity and content. I suppose it'll be sometime within the next year that we'll begin finding out what those scrolls have recorded for us. I did not realize until rather recently that the Dead Sea Scrolls contained what has been called the 151st Psalm.
Have you ever heard that? Some of you aren't hearing anything even right now. Psalm 151, obviously it's not a part of the inspired Word of God, but it is attributed to David. And I thought I would bring a copy of it and read it to you tonight. Oh, hallelujah of David, the son of Jesse, Smaller was I than my brothers, And the youngest of the sons of my father. So he made me shepherd of his flock, And ruler of his kids.
My hands have made an instrument, And my fingers a lyre, And so have I rendered glory to the Lord, Thought I within my soul. The mountains do not witness to him, Nor do the hills proclaim. The trees have cherished my words, And the flock my works. For who can proclaim, and who can bespeak, And who can recount the deeds of the Lord? Everything has he heard, and he has heeded. He sent his prophet to anoint me, Samuel, to make me great. My brothers went out to meet him.
Handsome of figure and appearance, Though they were all tall of stature and handsome by their hair, The Lord God chose not them. But he sent and took me from behind the flock, And anointed me with holy oil, And he made me leader of his people, And ruler over the sons of his covenant. I thought that was interesting.
Again I say it can't be proven, I suppose, that it belongs to David, to David Salter, but it is interesting to hear those kinds of things from literature that is considered non-canonical, not a part of scripture. But we are going to look at a psalm tonight, not by David. Psalm 66, and I invite you to open your Bible there. This may be called a psalm of victory and celebration. It is celebrating some great deliverance of the people of God from their enemies.
It's impossible to go back and to place the historical context behind this psalm. Nonetheless, we share with the psalmist great joy over the victory that God gave his people. It seems to be a psalm or a psalm that was used for public worship at the temple of God. Verses 1 through 12 seem to form the first stanza, so to speak, of this psalm. It is a stanza that involves corporate worship, the people of God together worshiping him.
In verse 13, and through the end of the book, it's more personal in its nature. It's personal worship, not corporate worship. Some people think for that reason that perhaps originally these were two different expressions that have been united together, and that may or may not be the case. But you notice he begins to speak in the first person in verse 13, I shall come to thy house with burnt offerings. That gives you an idea of how the psalm breaks down.
You notice the last part of it, verses 13 through 15, speaks to God. And then verses 16 through 20, the end of the chapter, speaks to the nation about how God has answered prayer. Let's go back to the beginning. The psalmist says, shout, sing, and say. He's interested in a public testimony, a public declaration of what God has done. First he says, shout, and the word means to split the ears, means to raise noise. It means to let a mighty shout be raised in the temple, in joy to God.
It's wonderful to be joyful to God, to let our emotions fill our expressions. Some of God's people give you the impression in a worship service that they're weaned on prune juice or pickle juice or something. They just seem to be sour and unmovable and without expression. How different the worship of the Bible, where he talks about shouting in the presence of God, shouting in church joyfully to God. And he invites all of the earth to join. Sing the glory of his name.
When we see God's name mentioned, it reminds us that God is in the business of revealing himself. That's what his names were all about. His names tell us who he is and what he is like. And so the psalmist is saying that in this great act of deliverance, whatever this historical event was, whatever it entailed, God was revealing himself to his people. And so he says, sing the glory of the Lord. Make his praise glorious. The word praise is a Hebrew word for him, H-Y-M-N. Make his praise glorious.
The idea of glory in the Hebrew language is that of weight. It means to give weight to something or to someone. To esteem them, to give honor to them. And so that's what he is saying. Sing the glory of his name. Make his praise glorious. Give God weight for who he is. Esteem him highly. And what he has done for his people, and give proper weight to that in your minds. Don't forget it. Say to God, how awesome are thy works. Boy, there's a word that is caught on in recent vocabulary. Awesome.
Awesome. Well, it's not a bad word at all. It is a word, however, that in Scripture is used frequently of God when it's used. Son of man, how awesome are thy works. You see again in verse 5, who is awesome in his deeds toward the Son of man. In the previous Psalm, verse 5, by awesome deeds thou dost answer us in righteousness. These words are related to a verb found down in verse 16 where he invites us to come and hear all who fear God. That verb means to hold in awe.
So the idea behind awesome is that of one who brings fear. One who brings terror or dread. Not in a negative sense, but in a very positive sense. Someone who is positively terrible because his presence brings terror. Someone who is positively dreadful because his mighty acts, his glory is so great that it creates within our human hearts that response of reverence before him. So God's acts, his works are said to be awesome because of the greatness of thy power.
Thine enemies will give feigned obedience to thee. Does anybody know what feigned means? What's that? Pretended not genuine obedience. The idea seems to be that God's great power is so awesome that his enemies will bow before him even if it is not genuine. Doesn't that kind of tie together with what Paul says in Philippians chapter 2 that every knee shall bow and every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ is what? Is Lord. To the glory of God the Father.
Whether it be things in the heavens, around the earth, or under the earth, every knee, every tongue will be involved. And for that matter, during the millennial reign of Christ when he comes back to reign upon the earth, there will be those who will give feigned obedience to him. In other words, outwardly they will go along with his kingdom reign. But in their hearts, they will not be obedient to him. They will not serve him.
And that's why at the end of that thousand year period, Satan is loose for a period of time in order for those who have given feigned obedience to be exposed and revealed because there will be those who will follow him at the end of the thousand years and go to their judgment. So the psalmist is saying here that God's great power is such that his enemies, if not genuine obedience, will at least give a feigned obedience to him.
When it says they will give feigned obedience, I think that the NIV says cringe before thee. Is that what your NIV says? You will cringe before thee. But the same idea. All the earth, he says, will worship. This word, worship, means to bow down, to lie prostrate before God. All the earth will worship thee, sing praises to thee. They will sing praises to thy name. And so there is this rousing chorus. You can almost hear it accompanied by banjos and guitars and dobros and fiddles.
I mean, they are pulling out the stops here in singing praise to God and then pause, seal. Think about that. Think about it. Think about what you have just sung. And then the invitation, come. Come and see the works of God who is awesome in his deeds toward the sons of men. Now he is going to give us some examples. He turned the sea into dry land. What a simple statement. Just a few words. What an amazing act of God. This is the most significant act of God in all of the Psalms.
Over and over again it is pointed to as the power of God. And of course he is talking about the time when Moses stretched out his arms, holding the rod of God over the sea as God told him to and the sea parted. God said, Moses, this is what you are to do. As for me, I am going to harden the hearts of the Egyptians. You are not going to see them anymore. They are gone. They are out of here. They are not going to bother you any longer. And so Moses held out his arms. That was his part.
God caused that water to separate. Would you like to have been there? You have seen Charlton Heston do it, haven't you? Compared to today's movies, to go back and see what was done in 1956, it doesn't quite make it, does it? But would you like to have seen the real thing? Well, there are people who have explained that by wind that came. And perhaps there was a great wind. Take a mighty powerful wind apart an ocean, apart a sea. God by His power demonstrated what He could do.
It is holding the water back. And the bed was dried out. And the people of Israel walked across it, whatever the distance. Most likely a good distance. And then when they had gotten across, the waters covered the Egyptians. What an amazing, awesome deed. And it caused another song, didn't it, in Exodus 15, as the people of Israel danced and sang on what God had done for them. Well then in verse 6, the psalmist goes on to say, they passed through the river on foot.
Well, this river he's talking about is the Jordan, isn't it? Before it was the Exodus. Here it's the conquest of the land. Then the people of Israel being encamped on the east side of the Jordan needed to cross over in order to begin the conquest of Canaan. And God prescribed how were they to do it. And the priests began to step into the water and the Jordan River parted. Now that was an amazing thing. See, it was not quite like a sea, no? That's true.
So think here is water, fresh water running down from Mount Hermon through the Sea of Galilee down into the Jordan Valley to the Dead Sea, rushing on its way to its stillness and evaporation. And apparently in flood stage, as the Israelites were prepared to go over it, it is a small river in the dry season, but it can in the flood season leave its banks, be a powerful current. And here God stopped the water. Who knows what happened upstream? We're not told.
If the water backed up as it was coming down, how that was handled by God, but God stopped the water and His people were able to pass over the river on foot. How awesome. God's deeds toward the sons of men. He says, there let us rejoice in Him. I don't know about you. I've never seen water part in the sea. I've never seen a river stop so I could cross over. But hasn't God done some awesome deeds in your life and in mine? It may not be quite in the same category as this.
Have you seen God answer a prayer on your behalf? Have you seen Him deliver you from the attack of the enemy? Preserve your life? Bring healing to you? How awesome are the deeds of God toward the sons of men. Let's rejoice in Him. For He rules by His might, says the psalmist, forever. Look at Psalm 145 and verse 11. Similar to how God revealed Himself to Moses when He revealed Himself so graciously to him.
It is good for us to remember that nations and governments, administrations and congresses come and go. Documents guaranteeing liberties are exalted by one generation, undermined by the next. But there is one administration that is over all of them and is over all of time. It began here at the very beginning, it continues right now, and it will be forever. That is the kingdom of God. That kingdom has been expressed in different ways to men. Now it is invisible.
Now it is in the hearts of His people that the Lord reigns and expresses His rule. But one day, as we indicated earlier, and as you know, the Lord is going to express that rule differently, He is going to visibly rule upon the earth. And that kingdom that will last for a thousand years will not end, it will go on and on and on into eternity. His is an eternal kingdom, as even the psalmist agrees. God rules by His might forever. He sits on a throne that is above every other throne.
God is above the Oval Office, no matter who sits there. And it says in verse 7, going back to Psalm 66, His eyes keep watch on the nations. His eyes keep watch on the nations. Here's another Psalm that says something similar, Psalm 11. Verses, beginning in verse 4 I think it is, Psalm 11, yeah. The Lord is in His holy temple. The Lord's throne is in heaven. Notice the mixture of the temple image with the throne. God has no problem mixing church and state. Did you know that?
God's reign is a theocratic reign, which means He directly rules over men. He is in His temple, that's where His throne is. I'm not saying that we ought to follow that here in the United States, but I think we've gone the other direction a little too far. The God has no problem. He's in His temple, the Lord's throne is in heaven, His eyes behold, His eyelids test the sons of men. God is watching always. Now does God have eyes? Well the Bible says He does, but that's an expression isn't it?
God is spirit. He doesn't have a body like you and I have. God is different than we are. He is above us. He is holy. When it says He has His eyes see, it means that He does see. He is aware. Nothing passes Him. Did your mother ever say to you, or your children ever say to you, you must have eyes in the back of your head? Mothers know, don't they? Oh yes, they know. They know. Imperfectly but they know.
So God knows perfectly and it says that His eyelids test the sons of men, which may mean that God's eyes are pictured as squinting, looking hard, so as not to miss a single thing and God doesn't. His eyes keep watch on the nations, it says in Psalm 66. I'm glad God keeps eye on the nations, aren't you? I'm glad He keeps watch on the nations. God knows what's going on in Bosnia, in Croatia, Serbia. God knows what is happening in every part of the earth. There is nothing.
God knows what's going to happen in Peking. He's watching that very carefully. God knows what's happening in Washington in the next year. He keeps watch over the nations and remember, He rules over it all. He's sovereign. He's sovereign. So it says, let not the rebellious exalt themselves, because that's what they tend to do. Those who are rebellious are those who are in revolt, those who are stubborn. We might say those who are apostate, who have fallen away.
In what sense have the nations, the pagan nations, fallen away? We could understand more easily perhaps if it said Israel fell away. But He says here that the nations have fallen away. Interesting. It seems to me He's giving us a summary of Romans chapter 1 where He says that all men have knowledge of the true God originally and then turned from that willfully, suppressing the knowledge of God. They didn't want to deal with God. They worshiped the creature, not the creator, became fools.
The pagan nations have apostatized. They have fallen away from the knowledge of God. We have been deeply involved in the ministry of the Linettes in Taliabu. Most of you will recall the story that these Taliabu people in their traditions passed down from generation to generation believed in a creator God whom they called Yoh. Remember that? Yoh. How interesting to hear that sound and to realize it's similar to the name Yah, Yahweh.
And their traditions tell how their ancestors did something wrong, something bad. They don't know what it was. But because of what their ancestors did, Yoh cut them off from life and they die now. They experience death. And throughout these dozens, maybe hundreds of generations of people on Taliabu, they have died wondering how they can get around this blockage to life that Yoh put there. And it's a marvelous story, which I don't have time to recount the whole thing tonight.
But they believed that some of their ancestors were able to get away from Taliabu, or did get away from Taliabu before other ancestors disobeyed Yoh. And that these ancestors who had sailed away on the sea didn't die. And so they decided to send a message to their relatives across the sea believing that if those people across the sea knew that they on Taliabu were dying, and after all Taliabu was the center of the universe, if they knew that the Taliabu people were dying, they would send help.
And so there was a time many, many decades ago, in 1985, a man was still living on the island, who when he was a little boy saw the elders of the tribe build a raft. And on that raft they laid a dead body, one of their people. And they put twigs and leaves and anything they could think of that would identify this raft as being from Taliabu, all around it. And then they did a rain dance. And rain came. And rain washed that raft down the river into the sea.
And for decades, no response, no response. And then in the 1960s a witch doctor, a shaman, gave a prophecy to his people. And he said several things. He said, there will come a time when all of the seasons of fruit on this island, instead of happening sequentially, will come together and the fruit will all be harvested at once. And he said, there will come a time when there will be yellow pigs that will root up the jungle, destroy it.
And he said, there will come to you someone from over the sea who will tell you how to have life. And that was the thing, their ancestors, and they had longed for all of these years. And you know the story that our missionaries, the Lennetis, arrived on the island. And when they arrived they found that indeed the seasons of harvest had changed. Lumber companies had come to the island with their yellow caterpillar bulldozers, began bulldozing the jungle up.
And the people were watching this and remembering. And then the person from the coast came with the Lennetis up the river to where the Taliabu people were. He was not a Christian. He did not know the traditions of the people. Of course the Lennetis had never heard them and did not know what had happened until years later. But when the man introduced them, he said, these people have come from across the waters to tell you how to have life.
And the people's eyes got as big as saucers because they recognized that very language had been used by this witch doctor. I don't understand that, but it happened. You see now these people in Taliabu, where did they come up with this idea of a creator? Where did they get up this name God in life and death and these concepts? They're pagans, they're the nations. Well they are the nations, among the nations, as our ancestors as well, who knew but fell away, apostatized from God.
They were rebellious and exalted themselves over God and for that were judged. Bless our God, O peoples, and sound his praise abroad. Who keeps us in life and does not allow our feet to slip. To keep us means to establish us. It's the same word as make back in verse 2 where he says make his praise glorious. Here he is one who makes us in life, who establishes us in life and does not allow our feet to slip.
This is not an uncommon expression in the Psalter, but we find a similar phrase in Jude, the 24th verse, when it says that he will keep you from stumbling. God knows how to do that and will present you faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy. God is able to keep us from stumbling. To stumble is not merely to trip, it is to place oneself into danger. This last week Dave Bly and I drove over to the Word of Life Church in the inner city of Minneapolis.
They were having a food distribution and we went over to get some. No, not really. We went over to observe it and to talk with Pastor Mark Jefferson, this wonderful fellow. Pastor Mark is an unusual guy and one of his ministries is to work with motorcycle gangs, bikers. He and some others from a gang here in Minnesota called the Sons of Thunder, a Christian group, went to Sturgis, South Dakota a couple of weeks ago to minister to the, are you ready for this, 700,000 bikers who showed up.
It is Sodom and Gomorrah all over again. If I lived in Sturgis the rest of the year I would leave for that week. He told about how they would minister to these bikers, drunk on drugs and lewd and how God preserved them. He said that on the way back they were at Wall, South Dakota. Anybody ever heard of Wall, South Dakota? Who hasn't, right? They stopped at Wall, South Dakota. They were not riding their bikes, they were pulling them on trailers.
They pulled in to guess and guess and once they had stopped they realized there were other bikers who were there and they were from another gang which is a criminal gang, the Sons of Silence I think is their name. They are very angry that the Sons of Thunder have chosen that name and they have told them change your name or we are going to kill you. And now they pulled right into this gas station, they are surrounded by the Sons of Silence who recognized them as the Sons of Thunder.
And one of the men in his group, one of the men of Pastor Mark's group began to be circled and these guys were walking around him, taunting him and just waiting for something to happen and Mark said to him, some of the other Sons of Thunder then came and stood with him and they decided not to confront because they were outnumbered and the whole scene was not one they wanted to be involved in and so they began to back away and Mark said to the guy, he said, keep your feet, don't stumble.
And then he went on to explain to us, to Dave and I, he said if you fall down in one of those situations they begin to kick you and to beat you and as long as you are standing on your feet you have got a chance but if you fall down, if you stumble you are in big, big trouble, you can't get back up and they will come close to killing you if not kill you by beating you. Well you see that's what the psalmist is talking about. It's not just slipping on the steps.
He's talking about keeping your feet for safety. He does not allow our feet to slip. He says for thou hast tried us O God, thou hast refined us as silver is refined. God has brought us into the net. Does somebody have the NIV? What does it say there on that verse 11? What is it? That has brought us into prison. This is an interesting word. I was doing some research on this yesterday and not having studied Hebrew.
It's a little tough for me and yet the word means a mountain stronghold or a prison and the Hebrew word is the word Masada. Some of us have walked on Masada in Israel. It means a mountain fortress. Here it is used as a metaphor for a place of stress or a place of alienation being cut off. If you're in a mountain fortress you're up there. You're away. You're cut off. What he says is that God has in a sense cut them off, brought them into a place of distress.
Thou didst lay an oppressive burden upon our loins. Thou didst make men ride over our heads. We went through fire and through water. So he expresses in these picture words what it was like in whatever event this was he's talking about when the nation was in deep trouble. Yet, thou didst bring us out into a place of abundance, a spacious place. Wherever they were tight, pressed, and God delivered them and it was like being able to breathe again.
He says I shall come and now he begins this personal worship. He says I shall come into thy house with burnt offerings. A burnt offering is that which goes up in smoke and it signifies the total consuming of whatever is offered. I will come into thy house with a burnt offering. I shall pay thee my vows which my lips uttered and my mouth spoke when I was in distress. You might call this a foxhole vow. He was in distress. Oh God, get me out of this and I will. He says God I will do it.
I will pay my vows. I shall offer to thee burnt offerings of fat beasts with the smoke of rams. I will make an offering of bulls and male goats. So he expresses here what offerings he will bring to God which will all be consumed. He says come and hear all you who fear God, who hold God in awe, who know his awesome deeds. I will tell of what he has done for my soul. It's good for us to do that. It's good for us to tell others what God has done for our souls. I cried to him with my mouth.
He was extolled with my tongue. If I regard wickedness in my heart, the Lord will not hear me. But certainly God has heard. He tells us here that if we cherish or treasure, if we look upon wickedness with enjoyment in our hearts, he says God is not obligated to hear us. God will not hear our prayers. But he goes on to say that was not true with him. That was not his case. He says God has heard. He has given heed to the voice of my prayer. He says God has pricked up his ears. God has listened.
God heard me. And then he says blessed be God who has not turned away my prayer nor his loving kindness from me. This word loving kindness as you know, we've looked at that several times this summer. It is somewhat equivalent to God's grace. It is God's love acting in mercy toward us. It is his covenant faithfulness looking after us. Ultimately it is God's unchanging goodwill toward his people that motivates him to do what he does. Ultimately that's the case.
But also the psalmist tells us God responded to his prayer. God responded to his prayer. And so we have here a psalm of celebration. God delivered his people but it was because the psalmist prayed in one sense. And so I'd like for us to conclude by just gleaning from this psalm some thoughts about prayer. In the first place to whom is prayer directed? To God. To the God who does what? Who reveals himself by what he does. The God who rules over the nations of the earth. The God who keeps watch.
That's who we pray to. We are not praying to a God who is ignorant and unaware of our circumstances. A God who does not know. God fully knows exactly what is taking place. And it is to him that we direct our prayers. Secondly, prayer gains God's attention and secures his action. He says I lifted my voice to God and he pricked up his ears and he heard me. And God intervened. God did something on my behalf. What a wonderful, wonderful God we serve to do this.
Thirdly, I noticed that prayer can be thwarted by sin. There's sin in our lives. If we are cherishing sin in our hearts, he says the Lord will not hear. So we need to be careful of sin and realize what it does to us and how it hinders God from working in our lives in answer to prayer. And he says in this Psalm that prayer is intended to reveal God. That's what God is doing when he answers prayer. He's not acting on a whim. God is revealing himself.
God wants to make himself known to you and to me in our experience, in our lives. He wants to make himself known to others. And so prayer is intended to reveal God. And finally, prayer is a cause or an occasion for witness to others. Come and hear, he says. Come and see. Bless our God, ye peoples.
And so we ought to use our prayer life as one of our means of testifying to others, to let them know we're praying and to tell them when God answers and how God answers and give him glory because in that way his name is made known to others. A Psalm of deliverance, celebrating God's victory. And may we reflect this Psalm, reflect it in our own lives as we experience God in our goings in and coming out. Let's pray.
It's a good time for us to examine our prayer lives, isn't it, as we look at this Psalm? Because while ultimately it is God's loving kindness, it is God's nature, God's name that provokes him to intervene, to do what he would do, to act in history. God also on a human level responds to our prayers. It is good for us to examine ourselves to see if our prayers are what they ought to be.
Father, I suppose there's no way to humble any of us more quickly than to begin talking about prayer, not what we know about it, but what we're doing with it. I pray that you will encourage us in our prayer lives. Lord, if there is sin that is hindering, we pray that you will bring us under conviction, make us aware of what the issue is, bring us to the point of repentance. I pray, Father, that we will be quick, as was the psalmist, to cry to you.
We thank you that in the midst of our lonely times, when we seem shut up in a prison or in a pit, but when we are heavily pressed, that you know our circumstances. For if you watch over the nations, how much more so do you know our circumstances? It amazes us, Father, that you delight for us to come and talk to you about them, that you truly care. The part of what you're doing in the midst of that is trying us, refining us as your precious people.
Father, some of my brothers and sisters here tonight, I myself, we're in trial. We're in the furnace. What we pray is that you will do the refining that you see is good for us. Oh, Lord, in your time intervene and answer. And do it in such a way that we will see your name revealed and bring glory to you and shout and sing and say to others, this is what God has done for my soul. We pray these things in Jesus' name. Amen.