Solos

Transcript

This transcript was generated automatically from the audio and may contain small errors.

Good morning. As we've been looking at our series, Psalms, the Rhythm and Verse, we've looked at how the Psalms carry both. They carry the verse and the rhythm. The verse would be the truth that we rehearse through the Psalm. So an example of that would be Psalm 1-2. His delight is in the law of the Lord, and on His law He meditates day and night. So this idea of meditation on truth, it transforms us. And this is the verse. So it is to say that the Psalms and really all of scripture has a gist. It has a meaning. It has something for us to meditate upon, these timeless truths that God uses to transform us. That's the verse. But it's not just God's law or God's word. It's also, there's also a rhythm. There's an emotion, a perspective to it, where we walk in a rhythm of humility or of respect for God. We walk in a rhythm of wisdom. Psalm 18:6 discusses this.

It says, In my distress I call upon the Lord. To my God I am crying for hope. From his temple he heard my voice, and my pride in him reached his ears. This should show us a rhythm of God's tenderness toward us. not just reading God as tender, it's understanding it. It's feeling the tenderness of God as we read it. So through that, through the verse and the rhythm lens, we've been looking at the different books in the Psalms. So Psalms Book 1, Book 2, Book 3, Book 4, Book 5, and they're not all divided equally. So Psalms Book 1 was 1 through 41. Psalms Book 2 was 42 through 72. And so those are big old chunks. Today is one of the smallest books, Psalm Book 3. And to study Psalm Book 3, we're going to be looking specifically at Psalm 79. Now remember, for every Psalm's book that we want to study, we're going to pick one Psalm out of that to study all the Psalms.

And don't be confused. You know, there's a lot more to Psalm Book 3 than what we're going to look at in Psalm 79. And really the other places we're going to hit. but we're trying to get a sense of all of them. And so instead of reading all Psalm 73 through Psalms 89, we're just going to stick to one. So we also find one word to sum up all of book three psalms. And that word today is going to be solo, right? Solo. And so we're going to be remembering that idea of solo. We try to make all of our words musical, so Saul's book almost microphones. Psalm 2 was chorus, and so today is going to be so level. Alright, so what I want to do is I want to read Psalm 79 out loud, and I'd like to stand as we do it. So I know it might be a little weird, but for you, if you're home, you know, if you're able, go ahead and stand up. And if you're in your bed, you can get out of bed to stand up.

If you want to stand on your bed, they'll go right on ahead. Let me read Psalm 79 out loud. Oh God, the nations have come into your inheritance. They have defiled your holy temple. They have laid Jerusalem in ruins. They have given the bodies of your servants to the birds of the heavens for food, the flesh of your faithful to the beasts of the earth. They have poured out their blood like water all around Jerusalem, and there was none to bury them. We have become a taunt to our neighbors, mocked and derided by those around us. How long, O Lord, will you be angry forever? Will your jealousy burn like fire? Pour out your anger on the nations that do not know you, and on the kingdoms that do not call upon your name, for they have devoured Jacob, and laid waste his habitation. Do not remember against us our former iniquities. Let your compassion come speedily to meet us,

for we are brought very low. Help us, O God of our salvation, for the glory of your name. Deliver us and atone for our sins, for your name's sake. Why should the nation say, Where is their God? Let the avenging of the outpouring blood of your servants be known among the nations before our eyes. Let the groans of the prisoners come before you, according to your great power, preserve those doomed to die. Return sevenfold into the lap of our neighbors, the taunts with which they have taunted you, O Lord. But we, your people, the sheep of your pasture, will give thanks to you forever, from generation generation, we will recount your praise. Okay, Psalms 79, may God bless the reading of his word. You can be seated or lay back down, whatever you're doing right now. From the outset of Psalm 79, we get the sense that severe trauma has overtaken God's people. It's real. You look at verses 1 through

It's really all over. You know, the nations have come into your inheritance. They defiled your temple. They've laid Jerusalem in ruins. They killed your servants. They've left them unburied. We've become a lab in stock. Book three is, the majority of it is composed of a group of Psalms called the Psalms of Asaph. Asaph. And the Psalms of Asaph run Psalm 73 through Psalms 83. And most of them speak about a national tragedy of some kind. And here's another example from Psalm 73. It says, verses 7 through 8, They set your sanctuary on fire, they profane the dwelling place of your name, bringing it down to the ground. They said to themselves, we were utterly subdued them. They burned all the meeting places of God in the land. So although we don't know exactly if it's talking about one specific event or several events, we know that there was a period in the history of God's people, it was about

200 years, and it was after there was a huge civil war. So just like we had a civil war in America, God's people, Israel, they had a civil war in their land. So So there was the Northern Kingdom and the Southern Kingdom. The Northern Kingdom was called Israel, the Southern Kingdom was called Judah. And so at first in 723 BC, the Northern Kingdom was captured and really it was laid to waste. It was captured by Assyria. And then about 120 years later, 605 BC, the Southern Kingdom was captured in exile in the Babylon. Kingdom was pretty wiped out, the Southern Kingdom exiled the Babylon and just a few years later, about 20 years later, the temple is destroyed in 586 BC, the temple is destroyed. And then lastly, what's left of the Southern Kingdom, they're in exile until 530 BC. Now normally I'm not busting out dates of 723 BC, but what I I want you to get the gist of is that all that happened in less than 200 years

from 723 BC to 530 BC If you're living in Israel at that point With over the past over a period of 200 years that is major trauma One after the other this is this is eight generations of God's people subjugated Travesty after travesty they have leaders failing them. They have countries invading them They are burning the invaders are burning their heritage to the ground. They are taking family members off They're the family members. They're losing them to war famine starvation Captured it is traumatic and the trauma is severe. God's people are decimated. They're shaken to the core And this is a trauma that you just kind of don't get over. This is something that the Psalms of Asaph actually handle in detail. And on the other side of this trauma, God's people are not the same. God's people are kind of walking in a different rhythm. And when you look at these Psalms, the rhythm of these Psalms of Asaph are different.

They're not quite the same. And we get a sense in verse 5 of Psalm 79. I know we read all of them. But look at verse 5, it says, it says, how long, O Lord, will you be angry forever? How long will your jealousy burn like fire? And that question, that sentiment, is all over Psalm Book 3, all over. So I'll give you a couple of them. Psalm 74, 9 through 10. We do not see our Psalm's. There is no longer any prophet, and there is none among us who knows how long. How long, O God, is the foe to scoff? Is the enemy to revile your name forever? So it's this complaint. And here it is again, Psalm 77, verses 7-9. Will the Lord spurn forever and never again be favorable? Has His steadfast love forever ceased? Are His promises at an end for all time? Has God forgotten to be gracious? Has He an anger to shut up His compassion? These are serious questions that they're asking.

One more, and I don't want to lay it on too thick, but I really want you to get their frustration here. Psalms 80 verses 4-6. O Lord God of hosts, how long would you be angry with your people's prayers? You offend them with the bread of tears and given them tears to drink in full measure. make us an object of contention for our neighbors and our enemies laugh among themselves. God's people are dealing with major frustration and they're going solo. God's people are going solo because there is a major breach of trust going on. This isn't a small thing. This is 200 years. This is feeling left behind. And in music, the idea of a solo isn't bad or good, unless somebody can't sing and then it's really bad. But the idea here is that people, God's people are going solo, and they're doing that by openly taunting His faithfulness, openly wondering if they should trust Him at all.

They're resenting Him, and they believe that they're on their own. They're kind of packing their stuff up and they're like, you know what? God, we blame you for this trauma, and we don't know why you won't stop it. They were wondering aloud, like it says in Psalm 77, has his steadfast love forever ceased? Has God forgotten to be gracious? And that question, has God forgotten to be gracious? That says it all, in my opinion. That's kind of the summary of it all. And what we see, it's as if God's people have established boundaries for him or like lines that he shouldn't cross and you know essentially God would never allow this and they kind of Drew that line right so if it would be like if we said you know God loves me he would never take my job away if God loves me I won't have marriage issues if God loves me I won't struggle with trust issues from that pain of long time ago if God loves

me then I'm going to be married, then I'm going to be successful, then I'm going to have kids, then I'm going to have successful kids. If God loves me, I won't suffer in this particular way. Whatever way that is for you. If God loves me, this won't happen. And so what you have is God's people during this long-term trauma of 200 years, God allowed bad things to happen to them, things that they didn't think what happened, like the temple being destroyed. And after enough times, after enough, you know, proof that God wasn't worried about crossing their lines, they felt like God broke trust with them. And so they just blamed God and they went solo. They went on their own. For those who have walked away from Jesus, it is rare, and I've met a lot of people that have, it's rare for them to say, yeah, I I walked away from Jesus because of all this proof that he didn't exist or that he wasn't

real. Often times, often times, it has to do with these lines that they thought that God wouldn't cross. You know, if God loved me, then why did he let my marriage fail? If God loved me, then how was I so hurt by this group of people? How was I so hurt by this church? If God is good, then why did He send my mom to hell? If God is good, why would God let my child die? God, why would He let my parent die? Why would He let my grandparent die? And what we do is we made these lines that God shouldn't cross.

And then when God does cross those lines, We take that as our justification to dismiss God. That is the scenario that I've seen most people who reject God. That's the scenario I've seen them walk through. There's these lines that God shouldn't cross and God crossed them so then they cross God. And if we're honest, all of us Christians, Christians included, we've all had times where we felt like God didn't hold up His end of the bargain. And so in Psalm's book three we have these questions that when we read Psalm's book three and I would invite you to do this, you read those those Psalms and you feel it. You feel, oh how long oh Lord are we gonna let this continue? Many have asked that question in light of a lot of the social unrest that we're dealing with right now, how long will you let this go, God? And in Psalm Book Three, those are great questions,

and it really gives a voice to those questions, but that's not the only thing that's in Book Three. It doesn't end there. In Psalm Book Three, there's actually a long response by God, several places. In Psalm Book Three, God takes those questions to heart, and He gives an answer. For example, Psalm 81 verses 11 through 13, God's saying, but my people did not listen to my voice. Israel would not submit to me. So I gave them over to their stubborn hearts to follow their own counsels. Oh, that my people would listen to me, that Israel would walk in my ways. Psalm book 3 is not just full of those questions that we're asking in response to pain and frustration and disillusionment. It also has a lot of God's responses to those things. God responds to this blame. The most pointed response to this blame is at the center of the psalm of Aesop. So the middle psalm of 73 and 83, the middle psalm of Psalm 78.

Psalm 78 happens to be the second longest Psalm in the whole Psalter, in the whole book of Psalms. Only Psalm 119 is the longest, and that has 150 verses. Psalm 78 has 72 verses, so we're not going to read that all together here. But we're going to read some excerpts, but it is helpful to know that Psalm 78 is a detailed indictment of how God's people consistently and blatantly betray them. It is a painful exploration into what God's people, just how they lashed out and how they acted even toward His grace. So we're going to read two different parts in Psalm 78. Verses 40 through 43 says, how often they rebelled against Him in the wilderness and grieved Him in the desert. They tested God again and again and provoked the Holy One to Israel. They did not remember his power or the day when he redeemed them from the phone, when he performed his signs in Egypt and his monarchs in the fields of Som.

Verses 55-58 is another excerpt from Psalm 78. It says, He drove out nations before them, he apportioned them for a possession, and settled the tribes of Israel in their tent. Yet they tested and rebelled against the bow of Saigon, and did not keep his testimonies, turned away and acted treasurously like their fathers. They twisted like a deceitful bow, for they provoked him to anger with their high places, which are, I know it's idol worshipes, when it says high places, they provoked him to anger with their high places, they moved him to jealousy with their idols. Psalm 78, you know, all 72 verses of it, it lines out all the ways that God's people went solo, of how how they rebelled against him, they received grace, even in the midst of that rebellion, only to rebel more. So they went solo, God retreated them graciously, and then they went solo again, and oftentimes

it was worse. So they packed going solo on top of going solo. And in many ways, in many ways, Psalm 78 is God taking their question seriously. So their question in Psalm 77, has God forgotten to be gracious? And God's plain answer to that is, no, I'm still gracious. But you turned away from my grace. Just because we spurn what God gives us freely, it doesn't mean that God didn't give it. Just because that grace is coming from Him and we are ignoring it. doesn't mean that he's not gracious. And it's almost like someone married to an alcoholic. And maybe after years, after years of drunken rages, years of verbal abuse, of these highs and lows, the one who is sober, the one who's not alcoholic, is deeply hurt, they're angry, they're cold, they're bitter. And maybe finally one day, that drunk spouse comes to their senses. And they get clean and sober, and they're kind of looking around at their life, and they're going,

man, why are things so hard in my life? I'm clean and sober now, why are things so difficult? Why are my children estranged from me? Why is my life painful? Why is it hard for my friends to talk to me? And it's like the sober one finally sitting down, looking them in the eye and saying, It was you. This is your fault. Your actions have actually caused this turmoil. Remember when you did this? Remember when you did that? All of these things have eroded relationships with people. Now look, that's painful. That's painful to even discuss now. It's very necessary.

It doesn't mean we're flippant with it. means that we maybe reluctantly take on that role where we begin to walk someone through that rebellion. Or maybe we patiently listen as someone walks us through our own rebellion. The central issue in Psalm book 3 is that God is walking his people through their rebellion and saying, look, look what you did here look what you did here look what you did here Psalm 78 the middle Psalm that's the detail the diamond it highlights it highlights not that not that God's people were trying really hard to follow him and falling short man you know they just try and they couldn't quite do it that's not that's not the account we get in Psalm 78 and Psalm 78 is full rebellion. It is hubris. It is taking advantage of God's kindness and mercy and grace. It is full on rebellion and in response, God punishes his people and they begin to see what life is like without God's

protection, without his favor. And then to use a different illustration, it would be like a parent with a rebellious child where the parents cry lots of ways to get them to turn away, lots of ways to reform them. And finally, finally after years of pleading and grace and extra tries and all of that, the parents finally do something drastic. Finally they do something drastic and they kick the reguised child out of the house. And the hope is that if I kick them out, it wakes them up. The hope is that it finally sends the message that something needs to change, that we love you. But what we see in rebellious children is if that doesn't wake them up, that everybody's child is typically telling everybody that will listen, hey man, I was just doing my thing and my parents kicked me out, can you believe that? and they show no understanding. The rebellious child shows no appreciation

for all that was done to them. They just blame. They just can't believe that somehow they have been treated unfairly. They have been kicked out of their own house. They can't believe. Look, in our pain, in our frustration, it is very tempting to think that God is unfair. It is. When something doesn't go our way, when something, when we don't get the job we're going for, when when our money issues begin to pile up, it seems like God can seem like God is being unfair. But the reality is that God is always gracious. To put it another way, God is always more than fair. If God were fair, I mean all of us would be in the ground. We'd be dead in our sins and physically dead because we have rebelled against God. God is always gracious, exceedingly gracious. And we're guilty a little bit of looking at God like the parent of a gregarious child, and we're kind of taking on that gregarious persona and we say,

Man, how could God let that happen? How could God allow that? And what we miss, what we miss is seeing all that God held back, all that God used to be gracious toward us. We're missing all of the grace. We don't see it. We don't understand it. We don't appreciate it. We don't take the time to look at that. All we can say, all we can ask is how could God let that happen? I realize, look, it can seem harsh on any level. It can seem harsh for God to blame his people. If it feels harsh, it looks harsh. Because the reality is, God can blame everybody for everything they do. Nobody's without guilt. We looked at that last week a little bit. And God's grace, if he's going to be gracious, it has to start somewhere, right?

And truly, if God only blamed people, none of us would have a life to stand on. But it is right here, it is on these frustrations that we see in Psalm 79 verse 5 and in other places in Psalm Book 3, it is in these frustrations where we say, O Lord, how long, how long will you let that happen? That God actually invites us to speak our hearts to Him, And to say, I'm so sad about this, I'm so frustrated over this, I want to see this change, either in me or in other people, or whatever. And what God wants us to do is to persevere through that, to stay on it, to keep asking. And then when we do that, we come to see God's faithfulness. It doesn't mean we get every prayer answered. It doesn't mean, you know, life ends in rainbows and unicorns. It doesn't mean that everything's, you know, happy or even good. But it does mean that God is faithful, even in our pain and our frustration.

That it's on those points that God wants to meet us, speak to us, teach us, grow us, help us to become more like Him. One last point on Psalm Book 3. And really, this point helps us keep it all in view. And in Psalm Book 3, like I said, it's made up of the Psalms of Asaph first, and that's Psalm 73 through 83, but the whole book three goes all the way to 89. And when you see an 89 at the end of the book is an answer to this question, to this really this deep worry

that God would revoke His promise of deliverance. You see what John promised his people was that a king would come and deliver them We know that that team has come in Jesus and he has delivered God's people not just Israel as a nation But anybody that calls in the name of the Lord that Jesus has delivered us from the true evil from sin from sin slavery and the power of sin But when we stop down at the end of book three in Psalm 89, when we stop down there, we see there is a real fear that that king will never come, that they've messed up too bad and that God's going to revoke his promise. And what we see at the end of Psalm 89, which is the very end of book three, is a beautiful ... This is God talking to his people. I'll just read it. It's verses 28 through 37. So it's a bit of a chop, but just read it and really feel it. This is a lot of rhythm right here.

It's definitely some verse, but it's also some rhythm. Just feel this with me. This is God talking to his people. It says, my steadfast love, I will keep for him forever this coming King, and my covenant will stand firm for him. I will establish his offspring forever and his throne as the days of the heavens. If His children, if His children forsake my law and do not walk according to my rules, if they violate my statutes and do not keep my commandments, then I will punish their transgressions with the rod and their iniquity with stripes. But, in verse 33, I will not remove from Him my steadfast love or be false to my faithfulness. And just so God's clear, He keeps going, I will not violate my covenant or alter the word that went forth from my lips. Once for all I have sworn by my holiness, God says, I will not lie to David. So David's the one who's who's lying will have the

king that Jesus comes from. Verse 36, his offspring shall endure forever his throne as long as the sun before me like the moon it shall be established forever a faithful witness in the skies. God assures his people, he says look up Is there suns or moon? Then my promise is still there. My promise will come to fruition. What I have said will happen, even if it looks bleak, even if it feels far off, even if you think you have done something so terrible that I would actually revoke my promise for it. Now he says, if they violate my statutes, I'm going to punish them. And that's what Jesus tells us, right? We know in our relationship with the Lord when we mess up, right, that there will be consequences for that. Jesus is going to discipline us as sons because he loves us, right. He wants us to grow in holiness.

However, God's promise of salvation, right, we have God's promise of salvation, but Sometimes we worry because we are keenly aware of our own failures. We worry that we've done something that will make God revoke his promise. That we've done something so bad that we're second-class Christians or third-class, that we don't belong. If Christianity was a plane, we would board last. We are not among the elite. We are so keenly aware of our failures that we think we have done something to betray God so badly that He would renegotiate the promise, that He would go back on His Word. But here's what I want you to hear. I want you to know it. I want you to feel it deeply. God's promises do not depend on our full cooperation. And I really want you to hear that. I really want you to just have that in your head that God issues a promise of salvation to all who call upon, to all who are going to be vulnerable, to all who lay their lives

down, right? It's not to everybody who's perfect. It's not to everybody who says, hey, God, I want to follow you. And then they have trouble figuring out what that looks like. That's not what God says. God issues a promise that does not depend on our full cooperation. In fact, it is God's promise in actuality that makes us obedient by giving us a new heart. God's promise makes us obedient by changing what we love. He changes us from the inside out, and He Himself says, this is a slow process. It's the act of sowing and reaping. It's the act of growing fruit and harvesting. That takes a long time. You know, if you're a farmer, you get this sense that it takes a while. Most of what people are calling for right now on social media, in the news, wherever, is for people to change their behavior. But really what we need is a change of heart. And I get it. Sometimes we need to alter our behavior.

I understand that. But what I'm saying is that in scripture, what we see is that if you change your behavior without changing your heart, that change of behavior won't last. The heart is going to push out that behavior maybe in a different way, maybe in a more socially acceptable way, maybe in a less socially acceptable way. I don't know, but what I do know is that that right there, that sentiment is the opposite of the invitation that God gives. The invitation that God gives is, I'm not waiting for you to get it right, I'm not waiting for you to change your behavior. Give me your heart, 100%. Give it to me, and I will change what you love. I will turn that over. I will make you new on the inside out. This is the promise that Jesus gives us. This is what Jesus asks us to do. And if you want to do that, you can visit our website, www.soutburleson.church. There's a card that you can fill out, like a virtual card, and that'll go straight to

me and I'll text you back or I'll call you back, email you back, whatever you want. You can indicate it on that card how you want to be contacted. I would love to walk you through what the next steps are for that invitation. Let's pray. Jesus, we thank you so much for the ways that you invite us into a relationship with you, that you ask us to come before you and not to be perfect, but to be humble, to be vulnerable before you and your promise that you will change our hearts. Jesus, we love you. We thank you that you have given us these songs. You've given us things to meditate on in the verse and you've given us a rhythm of life to walk in through these songs. I pray that we would walk in humility. and it's your name of your friend.