Lord, we acknowledge right now that we can only gather because of Your worthy name. We can only come before You because of Your worthy name.
Lord, we pray this morning that You will continue, through Your Holy Spirit, to open up Your Word to us, and, Lord, that we would grow up in You; that we would see You more clearly; and, Lord, that that would lead us to worship. Amen.
This is new territory, in the second half of a message, so y’all bear with me. We’re going to do a little bit of review, just for any folks that weren’t here last week, and then we’ll start back into the Psalms that we were looking at.
Last week, we started looking at the first book of the Psalms, which includes Psalm 1 through Psalm 41. In that book, in those Psalms, we were looking at David and his walk in salvation.
I should go back. I think the title was Salvation: Are We Growing Up? Or are we standing still? Or maybe are we backing up? Our salvation surely doesn’t change. Are we changing?
In the Psalms, David many times will, especially in these first ones, have a need. He will ask the Lord concerning a need, and then he will wait. The Lord will give him an answer; He will meet him. And then, most times, David will worship.
And as we are walking, when we ask questions, when the Lord answers us, does that lead us to worship? Where does it lead us? Where do we go?
We talked about a few words in these Psalms, and I said, if you like any of these words, you may like reading these Psalms.
The first word was the Lord—God. The last two weeks, now, to start this portion with the Psalm with the word “the Lord” in it, yeah, didn’t have any. You got it? Okay. But that’s okay.
I also said that we look at these words: I, my, or me. How many times David says, “I, my, me”? “What’s happening to me? Lord, answer me. Lord, hear my prayer. Lord, protect me from my enemies.”
That was the next word: enemy or enemies. We should all be very clear on who our enemy is. Thank God we’re not king and having to have enemies of the nations, but we’re also dealing with our enemy, Satan.
And the last word was salvation. Are we growing up?
We stopped last week with Psalm 25, and I want to read a couple of verses out of Psalm 25 that we didn’t look at last week. I was going back over this, and these few verses really jumped out.
And I think, with this morning’s worship—I hate to say the flow of worship—the river flowed. We thank God for that.
Psalm 25:6:
Remember, O Lord, Thy tender mercies and Thy lovingkindnesses;
For they are from everlasting.
Remember not the sins of my youth, nor my transgressions:
According to Thy lovingkindness remember Thou me,
For Thy goodness’ sake, O Lord.
He’s asking God, “Remember not the sins of my youth, or my transgressions. According to Thy lovingkindness, remember Thou me, for Thy goodness’ sake.”
I don’t know how many of y’all had patented sayings of grace at meals when you were growing up. I remember my uncle had one every time, a very quiet, very humble approach. It always ended with, “Save our souls, for goodness’ sake.”
And man, there it is right there in the Book. I couldn’t believe it: “For Thy goodness’ sake.” Save our souls. That struck me as I was reading yesterday.
Good and upright is the Lord:
Therefore He will instruct sinners in the way.
We talked a little bit last week of learning, of being taught. We know we’re still sinners. We better know we’re still sinners. The Book says right there, “Therefore He will instruct sinners in the way.”
We are saved. The blood has covered our sins. Are we willing to be taught in the way? Are we willing to be instructed by God? We talked last week about, are we willing to be patient, to be instructed by the Lord?
Psalm 25:9:
The meek will He guide in justice;
And the meek will He teach His way.
Well, we know we’re sinners, and the verse before this one said He will teach us, instruct us. Are we meek? Do we have the meekness of Christ’s character changing us from the old man into meekness?
The Book says, “The meek will He guide. The meek will He teach His way.”
All the paths of the Lord are lovingkindness and truth
Unto such as keep His covenant and His testimonies.
For such as keep. Are we such as keepers of His covenant and His testimonies? As God’s people, we’ve got to be. We need to be. He desires us to be.
For Thy name’s sake, O Lord,
Pardon mine iniquity, for it is great.
He has pardoned our iniquity. If we know Him, He has pardoned our iniquity, even though it’s great.
What man is he that feareth the Lord?
Him shall He instruct in the way that He shall choose.
There we go back to being taught, instructed. Do we fear the Lord? It’s a loving fear. It’s a respectful fear. It’s not a fear of hurt or danger. It’s a fear of placing God in the right place in our lives, making sure He has the first place, making sure that in our actions and our thoughts and our deeds, we fear the Lord.
And then we’re going to jump down to Psalm 25:14:
The friendship of the Lord is with them that fear Him;
And He will show them His covenant.
Thank God, we have a secret. God has lots of secrets. We haven’t even begun to experience the secrets of God, His ways that we can’t even comprehend because we’re still hung in this earth.
The secrets will come to those that fear the Lord, that He may make known His covenant to them.
And lastly, we did talk about Psalm 25:15 last week:
Mine eyes are ever toward the Lord;
For He will pluck my feet out of the net.
We talked about getting hung in the net. Are we keeping our eyes on the Lord? So when we do get caught in a net or a struggle, is He able to rescue us? We need to pray that He will rescue us. He will. He will. He promised that.
All right, let’s look at Psalm 26. That was the review.
Let’s look at Psalm 26:7-8:
That I may make the voice of thanksgiving to be heard,
And tell of all Thy wondrous works.
Lord, I love the habitation of Thy house,
And the place where Thy glory dwelleth.
Here goes David again: “That I may cause the voice of thanksgiving to be heard, and declare Thy marvelous works.” Do we have a voice of thanksgiving? Are we able to give a voice of thanksgiving?
If we are, we’ll be able to declare His marvelous works. Are we thankful for what God’s done for us? Are we continually aware of what God’s done for us?
It sure seems David was. David had a constant awareness, no matter what was going on, of what God had done for him and was prepared to do for him.
That’s another thing David had a lot of: faith. Do we have faith? Is our faith being built up?
I find myself struggling with—I don’t think it’s lack of faith—but the amount of faith. I don’t think any of us lack faith, but how big is the faith that we have, or that we allow the Lord to build in us? I’ve got faith, but sometimes we wonder about how much faith we have. But God has done it.
“Lord, I have loved the habitation of Thy house, and the place where Thy glory dwelleth.” Where does God’s glory dwell? It’s not in a house or building. It dwells in each one of us. It is Jesus Christ.
Are we aware of Him dwelling in us? Do we rejoice? Do we give thanksgiving? Do we love the house of the Lord? Do we love what God has done? Do we love what has begun to be built on the Rock?
Do we remember that the Rock, our Lord, is part of the house—the main part, the full part? Sometimes I think that we try to run along without the Cornerstone being in place when we start. I know I do.
And the Lord teaches me to hit the brakes, back up, get the Cornerstone back in place, then proceed. I think that’s real important when we’re studying the Word: that the Lord, that the Holy Spirit, would remind us of the Cornerstone; that the Word is the living Word. Jesus is the Word.
The Cornerstone has to be in place in our hearts and minds, and then the Holy Spirit has to be working in us for us to see this Word.
I was hanging a lamp yesterday down in the basement. I’ve got a shop, and I need bright light real close to where I’m working. So anytime we go to garage sales and yard sales, and I find one of those lamps that swings out and moves around, I’ll buy them and put them up. I’ve got them all over the place.
Well, last night I was putting up a lamp. You wouldn’t, by my appearance, think, “Well, he’s a neat guy”—not neat cool, but neat as in neat and orderly, clean. If you go to work, you can see how clean I am. At work, everything’s clean. At home, everything’s clean except my chair and the little table beside it.
Well, last night, as I was putting up a lamp, I was talking to the Lord, thinking about these verses and what He would show me for this morning.
You guys—or ladies—have a container of screws, nuts, bolts, every description, every size, every kind you can think of. Well, I wanted all four of the holes I had drilled in the base to have matching screws. I didn’t want them to be odd. And it’s just the old shop. Nobody’s going to see it. Nobody knows. But that’s the way I work.
My father used to take his container of nuts and stuff and get on the concrete and roll them out so he could see everything. Well, that’s an idea. There could be, I don’t know, 300 pieces spread out.
Well, I thought about that, and right before I thought of my dad pointing that out, I thought of the Word. I thought, “Wow, where’s the Word? We’ve got the Word. Do we just throw it out on the sidewalk and kind of look through it, get it all spread out real like that?”
Then I started doing it the way I do it. I looked through the little container and moved the stuff, and obviously they fall back in the hole where they were. And I’m doing this, and I go, “There’s one I like.” I pulled it out, and it fit perfectly. “All right, I know what that one looks like. I’m going to lay it down here. I wonder if there are any more in there.”
I reached in, and I was going through like this. “Ah, there are no more near here.” I went over and thought, “Well, I wonder if I can find another kind.” Ah, there’s one that looks like that one. I pulled it out. I missed it.
When we read the Word, are we just going along, or are we picking it apart? Are we studying it piece by piece? Are we going back through it, and back to it, and back through it? Are we reading it, chewing it, going back and reading it and chewing it? Are we looking for the little things?
All of y’all, I’m sure you’ve been reading the Word, going along, the Holy Spirit’s with you. You read a verse and, man, “I have read that verse a hundred times, but I never saw that before.”
I bet I moved my finger a hundred times through that little section looking for that screw that looked the same, and there it was. But I had to spend the time digging through it and looking.
Do we dig through and look for what’s in the Word, what the Lord has for us? I was really encouraged last night down there with my nuts and bolts. I just felt like if we ask the Lord to do that for us, He will. And how much we need to be digging in the Word.
Well, I never found three that matched. I found two, so they went on the top two holes, and I found two that were alike on the bottom two holes. The lamp got hung, but it’s got nothing to do with the screws or what they look like on the end. It’s got everything to do with what those screws do when they’re in place.
Do we have the Word in place in our heart so it can do its job? That we pick through it and chew it together, individually, as a group.
We can be familiar. “Well, I know the verses because I know the chapters. I know the books of the Bible because of the kids’ song.” Matthew, Mark—the Book. Thank God, they get it.
Then do we open it? Do we read? Do we sift through? Do we turn it up and ask the Lord to pick out those little things?
I found that was really encouraging. When you start picking, there’s a lot of stuff that’s the same. It’s repeated a lot because we need to hear it a lot.
And we find that with David and these Psalms. How many times, when we were looking at Psalm 25, was the word instruct or teach there? It was there a bunch of times, even right in a row. He’s trying to get us to hear something.
Are we listening? Are our eyes open? Are we awake?
Psalm 27. I don’t know if that was more review or not. I don’t think it was.
Psalm 27:1:
The Lord is my light and my salvation;
Whom shall I fear?
The Lord is my light and my salvation. That’s a statement of fact. If it’s not a statement of fact in your life, ask the Lord to come into your life and shine His light on you.
We need that extra light as His people. We need all the light we can get. We need to have people getting saved. We need to be shining our light.
There are all kinds of techniques to shining our light. Some of us shine a light with a red muffler over it, so it’s there, but it’s a little protected. Some of us may not shine it at all. Some of us shine it, and we look for more power to shine it brighter.
I don’t think God’s interested in the degree of how much light. He’s interested in, are we doing it? Are we letting our light shine? Are we letting people see our salvation?
Thank God there’s some that have a God-given gift for evangelism, to really share the gospel, the saving grace of Jesus Christ. Thank God there are those that pray in hidden places for what God is trying to do in His church. And thank God for everything in between.
Are we part of that? Thank God, we hope we are.
Psalm 27:9:
Hide not Thy face from me;
Put not Thy servant away in anger:
Thou hast been my help;
Cast me not off, neither forsake me,
O God of my salvation.
He’s not going to forsake us. It’s taken care of. Jesus paid it all.
These are lots of things we’ve heard before. We’ve heard, “Jesus paid it all.” How many times have we sung that song or heard that little term? Is it a living reality in our lives? Jesus paid it all, every day. Do we dwell there? Where is our habitation?
Psalm 28:6-8:
Blessed be the Lord, because He hath heard the voice of my supplications.
The Lord is my strength and my shield;
My heart hath trusted in Him, and I am helped:
Therefore my heart greatly rejoiceth;
And with my song will I praise Him.
The Lord is their strength,
And He is a stronghold of salvation to His anointed.
There David is again, blessing the Lord. He’s heard his calling, his crying. God hears us.
I think that comes down to: are we calling? Are we crying? Are we asking? God is there. He will answer us. Are we allowing ourselves to reach and pray and ask for the riches that are in our Lord? Or are we trying to get through on our own?
Are we trying to just keep on digging in the sand, keep on digging, keep on pulling? Do we start with asking the Lord when something comes up? Is that where we start? Is that where we end up after we’ve tried to do it ourselves?
I think the Lord desires us to start there. Actually, I know He does. I may not know it as a reality in my life, but I do know it because the Book says it. Forgive me.
“The Lord is my strength and my shield; my heart trusted in Him, and I was helped. Therefore, my heart rejoiced, and with my song will I praise Him.”
The Lord is their strength, and He is the stronghold of salvation to His anointed one. We are all anointed.
Years and years and years ago, my brother shared on us being priests. I can remember that thing like it was yesterday. I’m sure some of y’all, without saying the brother’s name, know that message that was shared here.
I think it changed my wife and me. We have a position that has been given to us. We are priests now.
If we can find a way for the Lord to change us to be able to live where we have been positioned, our lives will be a lot easier. Do we live there, or do we talk about it? Are we reaching for it? Are we desiring it? Or are we saying, “That’ll come later—maybe when the kingdom’s set up, maybe after the Lord returns”?
Sometimes I think of the race we’re on, and whether we put things off. “I’ll learn that later. I’ll get it later. The Lord will come back, and then it’ll all be taken care of.” There’s going to be a whole lot of teaching done after the Lord returns, for all of us.
But I think David’s example is that he wants to be taught now while he’s alive. He needed that teaching. He needed that changing in him then. Now, we need that change now.
I think that we’re maybe handicapping ourselves if we don’t take up the position God has given us now on this earth. We’re going to learn it. We’re going to get it now or later.
I know some of y’all heard me talk about when I think about the race we run being on the track. When John thinks of the track, he thinks of the guy that knocks him out of the way or bumps him off, shoulders him.
I think of the track, and I’m running hard as I can go. There’s no problem with the breathing. I’m not tired. I’ve got plenty of energy. But there are hurdles on the track, and I don’t jump well.
So God sends a hurdle. Down the track we’re plowing through there. We’re reading the Word. We’re praying. We’re thanking God. “Shun, shun”—there comes that hurdle. “I’m going around that rascal.”
Get right back in line, get right back in your lane. Boom, as hard as you can go to the next hurdle. “I’m going around that rascal.”
Well, God puts those hurdles in our path so we will grow up, so we will be changed, so we will be conformed to the image of Christ during this time in history—not when time stops.
Are we willing to go ahead and jump the hurdle, and pray that God will keep our knees or our dragging foot from catching it and throwing us in the floor? We fall on the floor, we get up. God’s there to grab us.
I almost think we don’t ever hit the floor, but I know it feels like it. But God knows—the Lord knows—way more than we do the pain we feel. He knows way more. We feel some pain; we feel some hurt. It’s way bigger for Him.
He cares so much. He cares so much for us. He cares for our salvation. He cares for us growing up. He cares for us running the race.
Are we availing ourselves to all that God intends for us to have during this time in history—in the time of our personal walk with the Lord, in our walk with the church, with the body of Christ, in this nation, and in the time of what’s going on in the world?
Do we think about that? Are we part of it? I think we should desire to be.
Once again, just what I read: Jesus, our strength and our stronghold, our salvation—the salvation to His anointed one. Does that lead us to worship? Everything we’ve talked about just now, does that lead us to worship?
Psalm 30:1-4:
I will extol Thee, O Lord; for Thou hast raised me up,
And hast not made my foes to rejoice over me.
O Lord my God, I cried unto Thee, and Thou hast healed me.
O Lord, Thou hast brought up my soul from Sheol;
Thou hast kept me alive, that I should not go down to the pit.
Sing praise unto the Lord, O ye saints of His,
And give thanks to His holy memorial name.
I think that’s what we just talked about. Verse one: the Lord delivered us. That’s a fact. Verse two: the Lord has healed us. Through salvation, that’s another fact. Verse three: the Lord has saved us from hell.
What have we been saved from? We’ve been saved from something so dark we can’t even speak of it. We have been saved by our Lord Jesus because He was willing to go to the unspeakable places on our behalf.
Does that lead us to worship? Boy, yeah. It does me. It does me.
Worship His holiness. Worship Him because of who He is. Worship Him because Jesus is the Son of God. Worship our heavenly Father because He is our heavenly Father.
We certainly can rejoice in worship when we think of what He’s done for us. But do we worship just because of who He is—the perfect Lamb, the perfect Son of God? That that would bring us to worship.
Psalm 32:1:
Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven,
Whose sin is covered.
The only little note I wrote down there beside that verse was, “Only Jesus could do this.” Only Jesus could give us our salvation. Parents can’t do it for their kids. Kids can’t do it for their friends. Grandparents can’t do it for their grandchildren.
Each one of us has been saved because of what Jesus has done, and nothing else. Does that bring us back to worship? Do we rejoice when we think of that?
Psalm 34:22:
The Lord redeemeth the soul of His servants;
And none of them that take refuge in Him shall be condemned.
Do we live in that? The Lord redeemeth the soul of His servants. None of them that trust in Him shall bear guilt.
I know this is repeating, but there it is again. We’re going through the Psalms; there it is again.
None of them that trust in Him. Do we trust in our Lord? Do we trust that He knows what’s going on in our lives? Do we trust and depend on Him, and allow Him? Do we want Him to be in control of what’s happening in our lives?
Is that where we live? Or do we want to have our lives, and then, when we come to Him, trust in Him? Well, we want to read the Word that we get something out of it. When we hear a teaching, that we get something out of it. Or is it all based on Him?
Do we start with Him every time, with Jesus? God certainly does.
Do we start with Jesus every time we think of our hearts, our troubles? Do we start with Jesus when we decide to worship? Or do we think with our emotions and say something because it emotionally makes us feel good? Or are we saying it from a heart that is thanking Jesus for what He’s done?
Where do our thoughts start? Where do they dwell, and do they dwell there continually?
Psalm 35:9:
And my soul shall be joyful in the Lord:
It shall rejoice in His salvation.
There’s the word for us. We need to be joyful and rejoice in His salvation. “My soul shall be joyful.” Oh, that the Lord would have our souls be joyful.
That’s what He has died for us for: to bring us joy, to wash away this world and replace it with His joy.
Is that what is happening as we walk with the Lord? Is joy replacing the sinful, fallen nature? Or are we still fighting around that sinful, fallen nature and grabbing joy as we can, picking it out of there? Or is that nature being replaced with joy?
That we could have it replaced with joy.
Psalm 37:39-40:
But the salvation of the righteous is of the Lord;
He is their strength in the time of trouble.
And the Lord helpeth them, and rescueth them:
He rescueth them from the wicked, and saveth them,
Because they have taken refuge in Him.
There’s another repeat—just what we’ve been talking about in the last two or three Psalms. There it is written right down. I don’t even have to say anything, I don’t think. I can just read it, and it says everything that the Lord wants us to understand and get out of this Scripture as we’re digging through.
Are we getting that? Are we digging through and finding that little piece that matches? If I was lining up lamp screws to match each of these alike verses to these Psalms, I’d have a whole bunch of nice things just alike, because He’s repeating it over and over and over again.
Are we hearing it? I hate to say getting it, because that’s Kenny’s thing. But are we hearing it? Is it changing us? Is the Word of God, as we read it and study it, changing us, or is it just adding knowledge?
God help us if all we’re doing is adding knowledge. If we’re not being changed by this Word, forgive us, Lord. Change us, Lord.
Are we praying, “Change us, Lord,” as we look at Your Word? Are we asking the Lord to teach us to rely on the Holy Spirit each time we open the Book? We certainly need to be.
Psalm 38:3:
There is no soundness in my flesh because of Thine indignation;
Neither is there any health in my bones because of my sin.
This is a great verse. I mean, I guess it depends on how you view what great verses are to you.
We have got to find the peace of God and replace the guilt of our sins.
If we are drug down daily by our sin in our life and guilt, that’s one of the tricks of the enemy: make us guilty for what we’ve done wrong, even though we know we’ve been saved and it’s forgiven.
That’s about the only thing the devil has left to do once he knows our salvation is secure. He can just mess with us so we stay messed up about our guilt.
We have got to allow the Holy Spirit and the blood of Jesus to take that guilt out of us, and then it be gone. If we don’t, the enemy will catch us in a net. We talked about that verse back in Psalm 25.
If we can allow the Lord to erase completely and flush that guilt out of us continually—we are sinners—but are we confessing that sin and moving on, and not getting bogged down in it?
Nothing worse than out playing in the mud in your four-wheeler, and you go somewhere where you think, “I may not be able to get through that hole, but I’m going to try.” And you bog down. Usually what bogs down is the front end because the motor’s there. Well, so you’re bogged.
There are different techniques to get you out of the hole. Well, when you’re really bogged, then some other guy will come and try to help you. He hooks to you, and he gets bogged. I’ve had as many as three bog together when it’s as hard as one.
So if we are bogged down by our guilt that we won’t allow the Lord to flush completely away, we start bogging down other people. We can be the stumbling block that the Word says we’re not supposed to put down.
Are we causing other brothers and sisters to stumble because we are dwelling in guilt that, in reality, the Word says we shouldn’t even be dealing with? It’s gone. Don’t let us all get bogged down and drug down into that hole.
When they were building 295—I was too young when they were building 64—we could go out and run the four-wheel-drive trucks up and down that. The road wasn’t there yet; it was just dirt and hills.
It had rained and rained. We were out, and everything was muddy. My buddy had an International Scout. It was a good truck. We were flying down through that open road, going as fast as we could. Your head’s hitting the ceiling, and you’re loving it. We jumped, we drove, everything—and boom. Immediately there was mud at the windows on the truck. Immediately it started to sink.
I remember we were miles from home. Couldn’t get the truck out, in the middle of the night. They had to go home, and we had to walk miles. I went home, took off all the clothes outside because they were muddy.
We let ourselves get bogged down that far, and we walk away. We go home. We say, “Lord, You’re going to have to help us. How are we going to get out of this hole?”
Well, we went back the next day, when all the big, heavy earth-moving equipment was out there. You could still see the top of the truck. I’m not kidding you—the top of the truck was all you could see.
One of those heavy earth-moving pieces of equipment was driving through there. You know how timid you are: “Could you help us get that truck out?”
“If you’ve got $500, I can help you.”
That’s what he said, the man driving the equipment. He didn’t care about our truck. The devil doesn’t care about our worries, our troubles, our problems. He loves that.
“What if I don’t have $500?”
“Then it becomes part of this highway.”
“Don’t bury it. I’ve got to go home. Mike had to go tell his father, ‘We buried the truck.’”
“What do you mean, you buried the truck?”
Gave him the $500, and we towed that truck out. Took a couple thousand more to get the motor back. It was a disaster.
Do we let ourselves get bogged down in the things that God has already completely erased from history? That we could—that we would. I know we should.
Don’t let us get bogged down. Lord, please help us.
Psalm 38:15:
For in Thee, O Lord, do I hope:
Thou wilt answer, O Lord my God.
David was sure of it: “Thou wilt answer, O Lord my God.” He doesn’t say, “Maybe You’ll answer.” He says, “He will answer.”
We have that same loving, kind Jesus who is going to answer us. He will answer.
Have you got something that’s long, that is an extended hurt in your life, extended pain for over a length of time? He will answer.
Lots of us have things that can drag us down. If we can take the joy and know God will answer—God will answer in His time. Can we wait for His time? Can we be content and wait for His time?
Psalm 38:20-21:
Forsake me not, O Lord:
O my God, be not far from me.
Make haste to help me,
O Lord, my salvation.
“Be not far from me.” Sometimes we’re deceived into thinking that we are separated from our Lord by our sin, by our circumstances, by anything the world can throw at us.
But David says, “Be not far from me.” Our Lord is right there.
Thank God, we don’t live—or we don’t try to function—in a belief that we have to get to a building for the Lord to be there for us. The Lord has released us from so much because He is there, close to us all the time.
What a handicap we would put ourselves in if we thought we had to get to a building to receive help from the Lord. Oh, Lord, forgive us. He’s right there for us every time, all the time, wherever we are. Wherever each one of y’all are right now, He’s there.
Thank God. Thank God.
He’s there, close to us. And if He’s there close to us, do we let ourselves communicate with Him like He’s close to us? We need to. He’s right there.
Do we live a life communicating with God? Do we live a life communicating with our Lord? David did. Every time you look, I mean, the whole way through these Psalms, he’s communicating with God. And I would think a lot of the times it was out loud, with a voice—not quiet, but out loud.
“Lord, hear me. Save me from my enemy.”
Do we allow ourselves to communicate with our Lord like that? I bet you do when you mash your finger with a hammer. “Oh, Lord.”
Do we say, “Oh, Lord,” when we’re dealing with a little private sin that nobody else sees?
At work, you’ve got this thing: no profanity. That’s crazy. No profanity.
I heard a guy once use vicious profanity. Well, he’s gone, man. Their policy is profanity: you’re out of here. He was further up in the ranks.
This is not—I’m not squealing on work. I’m squealing on how we try to deal with the things that we do wrong in our lives.
“Well, he really wasn’t saying it towards anybody. He was kind of saying it to himself because of the situation.”
That’s like saying, “I’m going to go over here and sin, but it’s okay because of my situation.” He didn’t curse at someone specifically, so it’s okay if he uses that language.
Man, that’s a deception. Are we going to allow ourselves to be tripped so that we can let it slide a little bit?
We talked last week a little bit about, “I don’t speed.” I caught myself twice this week—almost speeding. Cruise control.
You think, all right, the speed limit is 55. Watching that thing, watching the road, it’s dead on 55. Let go of the button, move the foot, it drops to 50. Y’all, maybe mine’s broke.
All right, try again. Back up to 55. Push the button again. Take your foot off the gas: 60. How did it do that?
Let’s not let ourselves get caught on cruise control. It’s not reliable. Now, I’m talking about in here, in our lives. I’m not talking about on the car. But it’s not reliable. Cruise control is deadly.
Let us not be caught on cruise control, just going along, everything’s fine. But then, when something drops in front of us, we forget how to hit the brake.
Let us be practiced in how to hit the brake when we are about to step into the sand. We always have a moment before we do it. “Man, I could have hit the brake and stopped it.” Even if you slide in sideways, you’re still catching it with the corner and not head-on.
Don’t get on cruise control where we go, “Everything’s beautiful,” and just driving, driving.
My wife’s brother and sister are home from being missionaries overseas. Anything that’s not here is overseas. You got parents or friends like this: overseas. I don’t know where it is, but it’s overseas. They’re missionaries overseas.
They came home through Japan. They’re in the States now for a year. The oldest son’s name is Titus, and he’s going to be going to Grove. He’ll be a senior with Laura. Y’all remember to pray for Titus—not because of Laura.
He’s come back now. This is his third time back. They go for four years, come back. He’ll graduate from high school this year, and the plan is he’ll stay to go to college. So he’s got some huge life changes coming. If you think of Titus and Laura, pray for them.
They said they rode on the super train in Japan. Somebody will probably have to correct me, but that’s okay. They said it was something. “How fast?” I said, “How fast does it go?” “Three hundred eighty kilometers.”
How fast is that? I thought, well, kilometers must be really a lot. It was 180 miles an hour on this train, on this super train.
They said there were only like nine cars. When a train goes in front of us, it’s chugging along, and even our fast trains, you can see the people and see what they’re doing and read the words and everything.
They said when these things passed, it went—and it was gone. You never saw it coming. You heard it go, and it was gone. It was moving that fast.
They said they got on one of these things and rode for three and a half hours, and were still going around this city in Japan. There are that many people in that kind of space. There were still buildings and everything. They never got to the country.
I was amazed. And now go back: don’t put ourselves on cruise control, and don’t get ourselves going so fast that we miss what the Lord’s trying to do in our life. That was the point of that aside.
We can cruise control, or we can go way too fast and miss what the Lord’s trying to do. That’s not how we do that; we don’t do that on purpose. I see myself do that on purpose.
I think this is where we’re going to end. I think the Lord’s gotten to me here, and I didn’t even know it. Thank God.
Let’s read Psalm 41:4, and I’ll finish, Lord willing. The last one, Psalm 41. I skipped Psalm 40, didn’t I? That’s okay. It’s all the same—don’t worry about it. So I’m saying it’s not the same. It all needs to be picked through.
Psalm 41:4:
I said, O Lord, have mercy upon me:
Heal my soul; for I have sinned against Thee.
That’s a prayer. Is that our prayer?
“As for me, I said, O Lord, be gracious unto me.” How gracious has God been to each one of us? It’s immeasurable. We won’t even know till we get there, and we may not know then because we may not have gotten enough light so we can see it. But it’ll come.
Lance said one time, we’re not going to be sitting on clouds playing harps in heaven. There’s going to be work to do. There’s going to be a lot of work to do.
“Heal my soul, for I have sinned against Thee.” I think that’s an example that we need to confess our sin, repent anytime it happens. “I’ve sinned against You, Lord. Forgive me. Here’s what I did specifically.” Leave it with Him.
Does this lead us back to worship? Here we come back to it again. Where do we end up? Do we worship our Lord?
Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel,
From everlasting and to everlasting.
Amen, and Amen.
Do we commune with our Lord continually? Do we confess our sin? Do we live in peace because we are forgiven? Do we worship our Lord?
Do we worship our Lord because of His marvelous works? Do we worship our Lord because He is the Son of God?
Salvation of our soul really is only the beginning. Are we growing up in Jesus?
Sometimes we’ll go a hundred miles an hour so maybe we don’t have to grow up. We can fill our lives with enough stuff that keeps our minds off of what Jesus is trying to do.
Forgive me. I do that. Maybe none of y’all do. Thank God.
And I live a pretty sedate life, believe it or not. I have to live a pretty quiet life. But I’ll still try to—if I can get one more tool, it’ll make a job a little bit easier. One more tool.
Do we focus on the things of this world, or do we focus on Jesus changing us? Do we focus on Jesus changing us with the goal of being able to live more abundantly in Him and in His house?
Lord, teach us. Please teach us.
One real quick illustration. I am learning to craft knives—cutting utensils, tools. I start with a piece of metal. Literally, it’s just a blank; it’s just a piece of steel that’s soft so it can be worked.
Are we soft so we can be worked? Are we pliable before the Lord? Start with a soft piece.
When you have a car accident and the steel of your car gets bent in, there are techniques to pull it out some, but you can’t ever get it true. Well, in that case, in that industry, you take and fill the void with something that bonds to the metal, and then you sand it and make it smooth.
Okay? So it’s like building a bridge over a valley. We don’t want to go down here, so we just build across it.
Well, if I’ve got that piece of steel up to that wheel and I’m grinding—look at me acting like I’m at the wheel; I’m trying not to do that—I’m grinding, and I’m watching. I’ve got a shield on. I’ve got a respirator on. It’s kind of loud, and I’m working on this steel.
If I go a thirty-second of an inch, a sixty-fourth even, I can see. My eyes are still good enough. I can see if I’ve messed up a sixty-fourth of an inch when I’m at that grinder.
But you know what? I can’t put anything to fill that sixty-fourth of an inch that I took out. There’s no putting that metal back in there. So I’ve got to turn that metal around and do the other side of the blade so it looks the same as the side that I messed up. I’ve got to take another sixty-fourth off that side.
Folks, we, as the body of Christ, as His bride, are only as good as everything leveling that piece of steel.
If we’ve got a dip, if a part of the body is hurting and it causes a dip in there, we can’t throw in and fill that void. We have all got to come down and pick that piece up. Does that make sense?
If we get that bad dip, it’s not a matter of us throwing putty in there and covering it over. That dip is still there; it’s just hidden. I’ve got to go and take that—I have got to grind the side of that steel down till that blemish is gone.
Are we functioning like that before the Lord? Are we willing to go down to that blemish, help erase it, and then move on?
I hope that illustration helps. It helps me. I stood at the grinder one day and thought of it. It came to me.
Lord, we bless You for a time to look to You. Lord, we bless You for Your Word. We bless You for the living Word. It is our Jesus. It is our hope. It is our salvation.
Lord, as we go on, we pray that we would be close to You, that You would stay close with us, that we would commune with You, Lord; that You would teach us how to ask for help from You, Lord, and as well as from our brothers and sisters.
Lord, teach us to function. Teach us to reach out.
Lord, the Book says You will reach out for us. You will answer. Thank God for that. Teach us these lessons, Lord.
Anything that has not been of You, Lord, I pray it will fall away. Anything that You have been able to share these last two weeks that is of You, Lord, I pray that it wouldn’t fall away.
Lord, we pray we would be pliable, we would be teachable, that we’d be changeable. Lord, that our hearts would long to be conformed to the image of Christ and to nothing else.
In the name of Jesus, we pray. Amen.