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Psalm 103:1-22
“Psalm
103, let’s read through it, and then we’ll back up and look at it. Certainly a Psalm that I think everybody here
should know. I remember as a young
Christian, getting saved out of the world, just reading the Bible for the first
time, different things just kind of blowing my mind, Romans, different
things. But I remember
when I got to Psalm 103, it just blew my mind, I couldn’t believe what I was
reading, just one of those Psalms. Spurgeon says that Psalm 103 is so filled with grace and glory, that
it’s a whole Bible, just this Psalm. So,
it tells us it’s a Psalm of David. It
says,
A Psalm of
David.
“Bless the LORD,
O my soul: and all that is within me, bless his holy
name. Bless the LORD,
O my soul, and forget not all his benefits: who forgiveth all thine iniquities; who healeth all thy diseases; who
redeemeth thy life from destruction; who crowneth thee with lovingkindness and
tender mercies; who satisfieth thy mouth with good things; so that thy youth is renewed like the eagle’s. The LORD executeth righteousness and
judgment for all that are oppressed. He
made known his ways unto Moses, his acts unto the children of Israel. The LORD is merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and plenteous in
mercy. He will not always chide: neither will he keep his anger for ever. He hath
not dealt with us after our sins; nor rewarded us according to our
iniquities. For as the heaven is high
above the earth, so great is his
mercy toward them that fear him. As far
as the east is from the west, so far
hath he removed our transgressions from us. Like as a father pitieth his children, so the LORD pitieth them that fear him. For
he knoweth our frame; he remembereth that we are dust. As for man, his days are as grass: as a flower of the field, so he
flourisheth. For the wind passeth over
it, and it is gone; and the place thereof shall know it no more. But the mercy of the LORD is from everlasting to everlasting
upon them that fear him, and his righteousness unto children’s children; to such
as keep his covenant, and to those that remember his commandments to do
them. The LORD hath prepared his throne in the heavens; and his kingdom ruleth over all. Bless the LORD, ye his angels,
that excel in strength, that do his commandments, hearkening unto the
voice of his word. Bless ye the LORD,
all ye his hosts; ye ministers of his, that do his
pleasure. Bless the LORD,
all his works in all places of his dominion: bless the LORD,
O my soul.”
Introduction
What
a beautiful song to sing, to commit to memory. It’s one of those places you should know well, should be worn in your
Bible, a place to go when you’re having one of those days, when you’re cast
down, things are difficult in your life, what a great place to go. One of the ancient authors I read, hundred of
years old, said “This is soul music.” I thought ‘That’s a funny thing for somebody hundreds of years ago to
say,’ and indeed it is. You want to
take note of certain things in here. We
have “to bless the LORD,
bless his holy name” a
number of times. Same thing at the
ending of the song, “bless, bless, bless, bless,” you’ll see it a number of
times. You want to take note that it
says “all”, that it’s inclusive, “all that is within me,” “all his benefits,”
“all thine iniquities,” “all that are oppressed,” “all his hosts,” “all
places,” “all his works,” I think nine times we have the word “all” in
there. That’s encouraging. The word “Jehovah,” capital L, capital O, capital R, capital D in your translations, is in
there eleven times, and that’s his covenant name, it’s interesting, throughout
the entire song. And three times we have
this interesting phrase “them that fear him,” verse 11, “them that fear him,”
verse 13, and “them that fear him,” verse 17, repeated, placed before us. So, this remarkable song,
written by David. And I am
assuming, and most scholars agree, that this is something written later in the
life of David. “Bless the LORD,
O my soul: and all that is within me, bless his holy
name. Bless the LORD,
O my soul, and forget not all his benefits: who forgiveth all thine iniquities; who healeth all thy diseases;”
(verses 1-3) David came to know that through his failings, you think of the things this man
went through, with Bathsheba and Uriah, and Nathan, the curse that came upon
his house, with Absalom, and then killing Amnon, who had gone into Absalom’s
sister, his half-sister and raped her, just his house was in disarray. You think the things that were difficult,
talk about a dysfunctional home, and yet David never the king that he was
earlier in his life, never the father that he was earlier, because he was
emasculated, how could he challenge anybody about murder or about immorality,
it was all of those things where he himself had crossed the line. But he becomes a much better Psalmist. His later Psalms are filled with grace, they’re filled with the truth of God’s forgiveness
that he’d have never known as a younger man. I’m not prescribing his path. But
he was a man that finally had to say “Create in me a clean heart, and renew a
right spirit within me,” ‘create,’ ‘bara,’ ‘in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth,’ ex-neleo, bara, creating something
from nothing.’ And he was at
that point in his life, so broken down, so guilty, so stained with sin, that he
had to say ‘LORD, create in me, something from
nothing, create in me a clean heart, do a supernatural act LORD, my heart doesn’t need
counseling, it doesn’t need to see a shrink, it doesn’t need to go to an
analyst, I need a new heart, create in me a clean heart.’ And so much of that, I think, comes across
here, as David, under the inspiration of the Spirit, puts his quill to the
page.
“Bless The LORD…And
Forget Not All His Benefits”---What Are Those Benefits?
How Do You Feel About Ingratitude?
He
begins by saying, “Bless the LORD,
O my soul:” and
not just the soul, notice, “and all that is within me, bless his holy
name.” (verse 1) to bless means “to kneel before, to give worship to,” just what you would think that it
means, to bless the LORD, not just, Jesus talked about
those who honored him with their lips, but their hearts are far away, when he
rebuked the Pharisees and Sadducees. David here says “Bless the LORD,
O my soul: and all that is within me, bless his holy name. Bless the LORD,
O my soul, and forget not all his benefits:” (verses 1-2) I don’t know if I’ve ever
learned “all of his benefits.” You know,
we have a short memory sometimes. I
don’t know if we could remember “all of his benefits,” as we think through
them. But what we do, is we look, God
has saved us, God has washed us, he’s cleansed us, he’s renewed us, he’s taken
us to his banqueting wall, he’s forgiven, he’s done all of these things. And then we get a flat tire, and all that’s
gone. All of eternity immediately got
erased, you know, by some “thing.” Charles Spurgeon says, you know, “We
write our blessings in the sand, and we engrave our complaints in marble.” You’re laughing, and I’m laughing, because
God told David, ‘Ya, David, write it down, David, Bless the LORD O my soul, forget not all his
benefits, because the thugs you’re writing to are just like you are. When they’re gonna be reading this in Calvary Philly thousands of years from now, they got the same
problem you do.’ We easily have short memories
when it comes to these things. And look,
how do we feel about ingratitude? How do
you feel?…he says ‘he forgives all of our iniquities, he heals all of our diseases, he
redeems our life from destruction, he crowns us with lovingkindness and tender
mercies, satisfies your mouth with good things, your youth is renewed like the
eagle’s’ you think of what it says here he’s done, how do you feel when
you’ve just invited, you know, you’ve invited somebody over for dinner and they
don’t say thank you? [I know how this
feels, there’s four people in my life I’m close to, helped them out in various
ways, and two of them never, ever say thank-you. All their kids do, go figure. I know they’ve been through a lot of crap,
and I understand, but it still hurts.] How do you feel about ingratitude, when you do things for people, and
they don’t say ‘thank you,’...I do this,
I do that, and do this, and do that, and then this person invited this person
over instead of inviting me over,’ you know, I hear all these things. [That’s exactly what happens to me. But its part of my service in the Lord,
helping out, so I can’t take it personally, it’s part
of shedding the light of Christ. How
other people act is between them and God, and it’s all in God’s hands]. Not from this church, this goes on and on in
other churches [laughter]. How do we
feel about ingratitude? Isn’t it
interesting, I think the Lord has much deeper feelings than we do, the Lord,
human feelings are born out of being created in his image and likeness. He says ‘David,
go on, put it to the page.’ “Bless the LORD, O my soul,” again, “and forget not all his benefits:” (verse 2) there are days when
we need to remember, and we need to think about those things, undoubtedly.
What Are Those Benefits We’re To Be Grateful For?
And
look where he begins [in describing “all of his benefits”], “who
forgiveth all thine iniquities;” circle “all,” you should be looking at
these “all’s,” “who forgiveth all thine iniquities;” interesting, the word “forgiveth” there, the only time
this word is used in Scripture, is specifically when it talks about God’s
forgiveness of our sins. It’s not
applied to anything else. “who forgiveth all
thine iniquities” “iniquities” speaks of the twisted part of your being,
the things internally that aren’t right. Look, and look what he’s talking about, he says, “Bless the LORD,
O my soul, and forget not all his benefits: who forgiveth all thine” the grammar rule here is interesting, is he
speaking of his soul? “all thine
iniquities,” his soul’s iniquities, “who
healeth all thy diseases,” again, the pronoun has to refer back to
the noun, “the soul,” he’s talking about “soul diseases,” he’s talking about
“the iniquities that are within, the twistedness,” you know Jesus said ‘it’s
what comes forth from the heart that defiles a man.’ Internally is adultery, and anger, and lust, and greed, and bitterness, and all those
things. Anybody here know what I’m
talking about? ok. And you feel like God is gracious to you in
regards to those things? Or do you listen
to the devil constantly beat you up over those things? Look, we should be those who fear him, it
says that three times, and we should have reverence in regards to our God, he
is the Living God. It’s not a torturous
fear, John tells us. We’re told in Psalm
119, ‘The fear of the LORD is clean, it’s healthy, it’s good for us.’ Jeremiah chapter 2, it
says, ‘whoever has done what you’ve done, you know, people leaving the real
God to go back to idols, you’ve hewn out cisterns for yourself and you’ve
abandoned the Fountain of Living Water, what you’ve done is not good, and
you’ve left off my fear,’ he says, ‘so now your trespasses are going to correct
you, your sins are going to reprove you.’ God says ‘To walk in awe of me, of who I am, is a
good thing, not a torturous thing,’ we’re not groveling before
him. He says here “as a father pitieth his children,” (verse 13a). But what an
interesting place to start, because that opens all the other doors, “who forgiveth” listen, ‘all
your iniquities, all of the twistedness within you, all of the things that go
on in your heart and mind that you don’t want everyone else to know about, all
of the things the enemy convinces you you’re the only one that sits here on
Wednesday night, everybody else, they float out of here, really, you’re the
only one, with that stuff that goes on.’ Listen, this is where the
door opens, “Bless the LORD,
O my soul: and all that is within me, bless his holy
name. Bless the LORD,
O my soul, and forget not all his benefits:” (verses 1-2) let’s start here, ‘who
forgiveth all your iniquities, all of the twistedness, all of the perversion
within,’ You know, we don’t act
out on it, we’re Christians, but there’s that traitor that dwells within, we
know that from studying Scripture. We
still have that sinful nature, it tortures us. You go to sleep, when you wake up in the morning, it’s standing next to your bed, waiting to jump back on you again. ‘Who forgives ALL of your iniquities,’ listen, “who healeth all thy diseases;” my soul, all of thy diseases,’ you
know, God doesn’t heal all of our physical illnesses. He will when we step into eternal life,
ultimately. We have wonderful people
here in church, of course, that are struggling with illness. Ah, my wife goes to a doctor, downtown, great
doctor, he’s always telling me ‘I’m
saving a spot for you, I’m saving a spot for you, I’m saving a spot for you,’ and finally he said ‘When are you going
to come see me?’ and I said ‘When I’m
sick.’ [laughter] I said, ‘Look
at it this way, sooner or later we all need a doctor, and sooner or later we
all need a pastor, so our paths are destined to cross.’ He just high-fived me and was quiet after
that. But, people, you know, nobody dies
of good health. James Dobson says his
mother’s tombstone said “See I told you I
was sick.” God designs a remarkable
system of course, we’re here. How many
times have we been sick, and our physical frame has within it an immune system,
remarkable things go on, you wish your house or your car would do that. Don’t you? Because it that were true, every couple years my house would just paint
itself, the color would just come back, or if somebody scraped your car or you
had a fender-bender, you just park it in the garage and in a few weeks it was
all better again. We do live in a
remarkable throwaway container. But he
says “who healeth all thy soul’s diseases,” anger…listen, there isn’t anything wrong with anger in and of
itself. Anger is necessary. If you see someone raping your daughter,
doing something, anger is the proper moral emotion. If you really love that person, you better be
angry, you better do something. Anger is
right when it’s righteous anger in the right places. But our anger turns to bitterness, hatred,
unforgiveness, you flip out in the house, you get tired of patching sheetrock
and gluing chairs back together again, and you know. That’s not the way, it’s a disease of the
soul, hatred, lust, greed, the soul always wanting, wanting, wanting, and the
soul can’t be satisfied, it’s immaterial. “who forgiveth all thine iniquities; who healeth all thy
diseases;” (verse 3) listen, those things internally, if we stay in God’s
Word, you yield to his Spirit, Christ in his grace, through his blood, is
active in our lives. We’re not deists,
who just believe God’s out there somewhere. We know God’s our Shepherd, he’s our Bridegroom, he’s our Father, he’s intimately involved in our lives. And when we go to him in the name of Jesus,
he is just and loving, and will heal the diseases of our soul also, and gets
glory for his Son by doing that. I think
we should pray for physical healing, we see that sometimes in the church, but
it’s speaking of something different here.
Four More Benefits To Be
Grateful For
“who forgiveth all thine iniquities; who healeth all thy diseases;
who redeemeth thy life from destruction;” aren’t you glad? You know, the Jew would think of being redeemed from slavery in
Egypt. The New Testament word for
redemption means to be bought out of the slave-market. “he redeemeth thy life from destruction; and he crowneth thee
with lovingkindness and tender mercies;” (verse 4) that’s not something
physical or outward, that’s something that happens within our hearts. We sit alone with him. You sit there in those days, and all of a
sudden the Word rises off the page, God’s presence is real, the tears stream
down you face, and you realize, ‘You know what, he has crowned me with
lovingkindness and tender mercies, in my heart, in my being.’ “Who
satisfied thy mouth with good things; so
that thy youth is renewed like the eagle’s.” (verse 5) Difficult verse, first of all, let me say that physically, he does
satisfy my mouth with good things, you can tell [sound of him patting his
stomach], I have a food-blister. He does satisfy my mouth with good things,
and every time I say grace, I remember there’s people
all over the world that are starving, and I’m getting ready to stuff my face
again. I asked God to bless, sanctify
that food, and then to strengthen my physical frame with it. But this is an interesting verse, it says “who satisfieth thy mouth with
good things;” this is a word
that’s always translated “ornament” or “jewelry.” It’s only translated “mouth” twice, and
that’s in the Book of Psalms. I think
because it’s talking about the soul, and what the soul speaks, what the soul, I
think the ornament of what Christ has done within us, is expressible, it’s like
a jewel, it’s like an ornament. And the translators translated it here in
this verse “who satisfieth thy mouth
with good things;” you know, the
ornamentation of our lives, like we’re studying in Ephesians, that your are his poema, his workmanship, you’re his canvas,
you’re his display to a lost world. Here
it’s ‘he
satisfies us with his ornament in some way of good things,’ and then
finally revival, ‘so that our youth is renewed like the eagle’s.’ It’s not talking about the eagle molting, in
the grammar, it’s just the eagle, the way he rises up, he causes our soul to
soar again. One author I read said ‘He
takes us from the courtroom, forgives all our iniquities, to the hospital, he
heals all of our diseases, to the slave-market, he redeems us from destruction,
to the throne-room, he crowns us with lovingkindness, to the banqueting hall,
satisfies us with good things, to the tent, and then our youth renewed like the
eagle’s.’ I could use some of
that, I don’t know about you. [Actually,
I received some renewal at our Messianic Jewish Shavuot service where we had a
healing ministry evangelist show up. Some of us present received real healing from God, which renewed some of
us, me for sure, like the eagle’s. God
can and does renew us in this way as well as in the spiritual sense as well,
which is the more important form of renewal. But physical renewal is nice too.] At 63 I could use some of that youth renewed like the eagle’s there,
some of that old revival. And then, you
know, we all can use this, “forget not” we get amnesia, as soon as a little thing goes wrong, our memory of good things
gets jarred. It’s always been that
way. The children of Israel, in their
journey in the wilderness, they get bummed out because they’re tired of
manna. It was like 40 tons, between
80,000 and 90,000 pounds that had to fall every day, to feed minimal, the
people. And then they said it tasted
sweet like oil, like honey, I could go for some of that. They said ‘We’re tired of this manna, mannacote, you know, manna-splits, we’re making all of
this stuff, we just can’t eat manna anymore. We miss Egypt, we miss the leeks, the garlic, the cucumbers, the flesh pots,’ I’m thinking ‘Are you kidding me! They were
throwing your male children into the river, they were whipping you, making you
make bricks, the task-masters whip you, what do you remember? garlic, we wish
we had some garlic, the good old days, back in Egypt, getting whooped, getting
kicked around, getting our kids killed, those were the good old days.’ We do that too, as soon as something goes
wrong, ‘What’s the deal, Lord?’ You’re not gonna get over all the physical
diseases, one of them is going to take us down sooner or later, or a bullet or
something. But internally, what he does, he
forgives all of our iniquities, he deals with all of our twistedness, he heals
our bitterness, and our greed, and our hatred, and our lust, he heals our soul
diseases. He redeems our life from
destruction. He crowns us with
lovingkindness and tender mercies. He
satisfies our mouth with good things. And our youth is renewed like the eagle’s. Don’t forget his benefits,’ David
says.
‘He Executes
Righteousness & Justice, He Makes His Ways Known To Us, What He’s Like’
“The LORD executeth righteousness and judgment for all that are oppressed.” (verse 6) “judgment” should be “justice” there, “The LORD executeth righteousness and justice for all that are oppressed.” Man, I would like to get a
President like that. Wouldn’t you? And a Congress and a Senate like that. I mean, I’ve been alive since the 1950s,
every guy whose ever come in said he’s gonna do this, I don’t think anybody’s done it. “The LORD executeth righteousness and justice for all that are oppressed.” (verse 6) Look, “He
made known his ways unto Moses, his acts unto the children of Israel.” (verse 7) Somehow
in the, what this Psalm really resonates with, as you become familiar with it, ‘is
his ways.’ David is speaking
from that position. It says “He made known his ways unto Moses, his
acts unto the children of Israel.” (verse 7) look,
it says, “The LORD is merciful
and gracious, slow to anger, and plenteous in mercy.” (verse 8) It tells us in the Book of Exodus that Moses said, ‘Now
therefore, I pray thee, if I have found grace in thy sight, show me now thy
way, show me thy way.’ And then
it says ‘The LORD, when he passed before him,
proclaimed ‘the LORD, the LORD God, merciful, gracious,
longsuffering, abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy,’ Look at verse
8 here, “The LORD is merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and
plenteous in mercy.” You know, it says ‘he made known his ways unto
Moses, his acts unto the children of Israel,’ they saw the Nile River
turned to blood, the water in Egypt, they saw the frogs come up onto the land,
the lice, they saw boils, they saw Goshen in light while the rest of Egypt was
in blackness, and they saw what happened on the Passover night, the firstborn
in Egypt dead, and the families crying, and because they had the blood on the
doorposts and lentils the angel of death passing over, God saying, ‘When
I see the blood, I will pass over.’ They
came out of Egypt with a strong arm, they saw the Red Sea part, you can
imagine, fed from heaven by manna. The
children of Israel, to them he revealed his acts. And yet they complained, ‘You brought us out here to kill us, there’s no water,’ just you would think ‘Come on, man.’ But Moses says, ‘You know what, I want to know
your ways, I want to know who you are.’ He wanted something different. You know, Kathy, and the kids, you’re around someone long enough, you’re
close enough to them, and the guys on staff, you get
to know their ways. That’s vastly
different. My oldest daughter, 34 now,
three kids, four kids, and I love her the most, out of the four, because of how sassy she was, growing up. She’s all gristle, she’s tough, God knew she
was going to have twins. She’s
perceptive, she works hard. She senses
things, she’s a remarkable girl. My
second one, Mike, who was born a couple years later, I love him the most out of
the four, because of the depth that he has. And was 16 and had read through all of Wiersby,
all of the commentaries, I would see him sit and listen to the Word. God’s done a great work in his heart. Still waters run deep. He got years of a head start on me, I wish
that I was the reader that he is, there’s depth, and beauty. My son Josh, a miracle. The reason I love him the most, he’s bright,
he’s upright, he chooses wisely, he’s a comrade and a friend, he sacrifices to
make peace, no ambition to push anybody else aside. Anna, my baby, 24, the reason I love her
most, because she would just, I think she’s got a prophetic gift. She would sense things, she would say things
to me, just kind of always hooked up, she knew that
day I got up if my heart is broken or rejoicing, just we had that connection,
just great sensitivities. And each one
of them have a way. My wife, to a large degree I’ve broken the code, you know, ‘Honey, do you want to go to the mall with
me?’ that’s not what she’s asking me, I’m not gonna answer that question,
that’s code, it’s ‘Honey, I’m going to
the mall, the day will end better if you go with me.’ [laughter] She has a way. I’ll ask her about traveling, and she would
never hold me back, she’d say ‘Ya, you
can go,’ that’s not what she said, I know what she said, I know, I broke
the code, she said, ‘You can go, don’t
come back, but you can go.’ Look,
you love someone, your hearts intermingle. It’s a gift from God. It’s a gift
from God. [Comment: the spirit-in-man within the woman and the
man who are couples, married, even living together in a long-term relationship,
intermingle, combining. The apostle Paul
brought this out in Corinthians. It’s
like you become mentally connected via the very spirit software that gives you
your mental intellect and reasoning power.]
One
of the great plagues in our culture and our society, are fatherless homes,
families broken. Again, google on Ted Talks, Together Alone, and watch this whole sociologist from M.I.T.
talking about mobile devices. She said
we have a generation of kids, they were the first generation of kids to come
out of school, they run to their mom and dad, and their mom and dad were doing
this [keying into their mobile devices, ignoring their kids], and he said, now
those same kids, they’re young adults, and they’re getting even, because their
parents are trying to talk to them, and they’re doing this [the same thing]. And it is a great gift that God gives us,
human beings are different from the beasts of the field, you can look in
someone’s face, you can perceive things about them, you can tell by the look in
the eye, the tone of the voice, it’s a gift. It’s supposed to be cultivated, and all of that’s being destroyed. We’re alone together, we have facebook, and
it ain’t a face, and it ain’t a book. This is a face, and this is a book, and when there’s a huge solar flair
and all those things crash, there will still be faces and books. My encouragement is to spend some time in
faces and books, because then you get to know somebody’s ways. Isn’t it interesting, “He made known his ways unto Moses,” Moses knew something of the LORD and of his heart, David too at
this point in time. David at this time
could say ‘Don’t forget his benefits, who forgives all of the twistedness inside
of us,’ David’s saying, ‘I went through those days.’ David had the right perspective, ‘Sacrifice
and offering thou hast not desired, but a broken and contrite spirit thou wilt
not despise,’ because there was no sacrifice for murder, there was no
sacrifice for adultery, both of those were capital crimes, he should have been
put to death. But he realized ‘But
a broken and a contrite spirit thou wilt not despise.’ And when David thinks of Moses, he said, ‘You
know, he made his ways known to Moses, his acts to the children of Israel, his
ways, the LORD is merciful, he’s slow to
anger, plenteous in mercy.’
What Kind Of Dad God Is
Toward Us
Look
at verse 9, “He will not always
chide: neither will he keep his anger for ever.” “chide,” that’s
“accuse,” “He will not always accuse,
neither will he keep his anger for ever.” (verse 9),
he’s not going to harbor anger forever, we should bless him for things he
doesn’t do as well as for things he does do. Here it says he’s not always going to accuse, and he’s not gonna always
harbor his anger. But we think of him so
differently. Listen, can we believe that
when we read that? He’s slow to anger,
he’s merciful, he’s gracious, he will not always accuse. It doesn’t say there isn’t anything to
accuse, it doesn’t even say, you know, there’s enough of the human nature here
that when the accuser of the brethren comes, and the Devil accuses us before
the throne of God, the Devil don’t need to make stuff up, we give him enough
ammunition. He doesn’t like make up
phony stuff about us, he just accuses us telling the truth about us, we give
him enough ammo. But it says here, the LORD, he’s not going to always do
that, and he’s not going to harbor his anger. How can he do that? Look in verse 10, “He hath not dealt with us after
our sins; nor rewarded us according to our iniquities.” Aren’t you glad? Aren’t you glad? Because some of you sit here tonight and
you’re condemned. You’re growing in
grace and in the knowledge of Christ, here you’re thinking ‘He’s not always going to harbor things against me,’ but you don’t
understand what I did, Pastor Joe.’ Well that’s why I told you to read the next
verse, because I don’t care what you did. “He hath not dealt with us after
our sins; nor rewarded us according to our iniquities.” That’s not the way he deals with us. It says, clearly, 1st Peter,
Revelation chapter 13, that the Lamb was slain before the foundation of the
world, before God put his hand to the work and created the world and the
universe, he already knew the end from the beginning, and Christ [the
pre-Incarnate Yahweh] offered himself before the world was formed, your sins
were already paid for before human history rolled out. So he doesn’t deal with us according to our
sins, he doesn’t reward us according to our iniquities, look how it describes
his mercy and his love here. “For as the heaven is high above the earth, so great is his mercy toward them that
fear him.” (verse 11) says the Holy Spirit,
writing through David. “As far as the east is from the west, so far hath he removed our
transgressions from us.” (verse 12) Look, this, David’s laying out
the inconceivable, you know, how high, ‘as the heaven is high above the earth, so
great is his mercy towards those that fear him,’ How high is that? How high are the heavens above the earth? Draw a vertical line, you know, you’re gonna
go through the atmosphere, you’re going to go through the stratosphere, you’re
going to go into outerspace, you’re going to go through the edge of the our
solar system, you’re going to go into our galaxy, you’re going to go out of our
galaxy, you’re going to go to other galaxies, you’re going to go to the edge of the universe, [which is to
the very edge of Space-Time if you
can imagine that], you’re going to go past that---How high is that? “As
the heaven is high above the earth, so great is his mercy toward them that fear him.” (verse 11) That’s the vertical that the
Holy Spirit is telling us about his love. Look, and then he says “As far as
the east is from the west, so far
hath he removed our transgressions from us.” (verse 12) That’s the horizontal of
it. And again, it’s wonderful he doesn’t
say ‘as far as the north is from the
south,’ the earth is 8,000 miles in diameter, 24,000 miles in
circumference, so if I started at the South Pole, I could travel 12,000 miles
to the North Pole, and once I got to the North Pole, I start heading south
again. I go 12,500 miles south to the
South Pole, then I start heading north again. And it says, that’s as far, if he said ‘North and south as he can remove my sins from me,’ that would be
12,500 miles. He’s gotta get my sins
more than 12,500 miles away or I’ll find some way to hook up with them
again. That’s how dumb I am. But if you go east, how far do you go east
before you start to go west? Do you go
12,500 miles east before you start going west again? No, you go east forever. You never go west. You go west, you never go east, you’re going
west forever. He’s removed your
transgressions from you as far as the east is from the west, that is
immeasurable, the height of it, immeasurable, the breadth of it, immeasurable,
inconceivable, his love towards us. ‘He
hasn’t rewarded us according to our sins, he hasn’t dealt with us according to
our iniquities, that’s why he doesn’t always accuse, that’s why he doesn’t
harbor, even what’s true about us, for as the heaven is high above the earth,
so great is his mercy towards us, that’s immeasurable, inconceivable, towards
them that fear him, that reverence him, and as far as the east is from the
west, those two never meet, that’s how far he’s removed our transgressions from
us, never to be found again, never to be brought together again.’
How Immeasurable Is God’s Love For Us?
Now
look, he does something remarkable, he takes us in verses 11 and 12 from the
immeasurable and the inconceivable, he brings us to verse 13 to the completely
familiar. He says ‘I know you can’t conceive of the
heights of the heavens, the distance between east and west.’ Now he brings us into the world that
we all know, “Like as a father pitieth his children, so the LORD pitieth them that fear him. For he
knoweth our frame; he remembereth that we are dust.” (verses 13-14) You know, in any semblance of a real family, “like as a father pitieth his children, so
the LORD pitieth them that fear him. For he
knoweth our frame; he remembereth that we are dust.” (verses 13-14) you know, any of you that raise kids, you see your kid, you see your kid going
through something, you see your kid feeling afraid sometime, they’ve done
something wrong, you don’t want them groveling, a father pities his children if
he sees that. How many times when our
kids were little, they get one of these viruses, they get one of these things, they always get something. They just always had something when they were little, always. And you sit in the bathroom with them, you
got them in the bath tub, they’re shaking, and finally you’re saying ‘Lord, give me the fever, just take the
fever from them, give me the fever, I can take Tylenol, I can sleep with a
fever, I can’t sleep with a kid with a fever! I mean, you do it for selfish reasons, but you’re thinking, ‘I’d do it for anything, give me the
fever! Give me the sickness, take it off
the kid and put it on me! As a father pitieth his children, take the
sin off of them and put it on me! Take
the transgressions off of them and put it on me! Take the punishment off of them, and put it
on me, as a father pitieth his children.’ He takes it from the immeasurable, the
inconceivable, and he brings it down to something that we should know. “Like as a father pitieth his children, so the LORD pitieth them that fear him.” Look, “For
he knoweth our frame; he remembereth that we are dust.” (verses 13-14) “frame,” it’s the same root of the word
that’s used in Genesis 2:7 when it says “he
created us” ‘he knoweth the forming of us, the creation of us, he knows our frame,
and he remembers, though we don’t, that we are dust.’ He formed Adam of the dust of the
ground, he knows what we are, he knows what we’re made of, he knows the soul-sickness that’s within us. His love for us, try this, it’s higher than the heavens, you can’t measure that. It’s ‘he removes our transgressions from as far as the east is from the
west…no, no, no that’s inconceivable for you, let’s do this, like as a father
pitieth his children, so the LORD pitieth them that fear
him. For he
remembereth that we are dust, he knoweth our frame, he knoweth that we are
dust.’ Do you believe that? Look, I think of John chapter 4, Jesus comes
to Jacob’s Well, the guys go into town to get some
grub. Jesus is sitting by the well, and
of course the woman comes to him from Samaria. And he says to her, ‘Do you have anything to drink?’ She says, ‘How is it, you a Jew, you’re
asking me, a woman of Samaria for something to drink?’ He said, ‘If you knew
who I was, you’d have asked me for something to drink, I’d have given you
living water.’ She said, ‘Really, you
ain’t got no bucket, you ain’t got no rope, the well is deep.’ He said, ‘Whoever drinks of that well is gonna thirst again, but whoever drinks of the water that
I’ll give him, will never thirst again.’ ‘Sir, give me of this water to drink.’ He says, ‘Alright, go get your husband. You really want to drink the water I’m talking about, go get your
husband.’ ‘Sorry, I don’t have a
husband.’ ‘I appreciate you telling the
truth, you’ve had five, and the guy you’re living with now ain’t your husband.’ ‘Sir, I believe you’re a prophet!’ What he was saying to her was ‘You’ve
drunk at that well over and over and over, you’ve had five husbands, now you’re
living with a guy, you keep drinking at that well, and you’re still thirsty,
you’re still empty.’ Ladies, married ladies, if your husband works and he loves Jesus
and he has a pulse, thank God for him. Because there’s no man on the earth that was ever
meant to meet your deepest desire. You can go from husband to husband to husband to husband, and what
you’re looking for is Jesus Christ. No
man was meant to meet that thirst, it’s unfair to put that on him [i.e. your
husband], and vice versa. Jesus says, ‘If
you’d have come to me, your thirst problem would have been solved. You’ve had five husbands, and the guy you’re
living with now, you ain’t married to him.’ And it says, ‘She goes back into town, the
woman left her waterpot, she went away into the city, and she said unto the men
of Samaria, ‘Come and see a man which told me all things that ever I did. Is not this the Christ?’ Do you understand what she’s saying? ‘Here’s God in human flesh,’ you
think he’s worried about Caesar, you think he’s worried about John the Baptist
getting killed, you think he’s worried about Herod? She’s saying, ‘Little old immoral me, little old failing at marriage me, little old with all my
broken down life and all my emptiness and all of my problems, he walked into my
life and he knew everything I ever did.’ Ye, you in this room, he knows every thing you’ve ever done,
every one of us. He knows all the times
you tried to satisfy that deep thirst with other things, he knows all of our
brokenness, he knows all of our bitterness, he knows all of our failing, and
like as a father pitieth his children, so he pitieth those that fear him, for
he remembereth our frame, and he knows, like the woman in Samaria, that we are
dust. He didn’t say to that woman, ‘Babe, if you hadn’t been so immoral, I’d
have probably taken care of you.’ [There
are legalistic churches out there that say that to people, ‘Go clean up, and then you can come in and receive Christ, but not
until you clean up, all on your own, without Christ, and then come and get
baptized and receive the Holy Spirit,’ is in essence what they say and
teach.] He said, ‘No, if you had asked, with all
of your sin, and I’ve known everything you’ve ever done, with all of your
failing, with everything wrong in your life, if you would have asked, I would
have given you living water, and you’d have never thirsted again. Because you didn’t ask, I’m gonna outsmart ya
and jam it down your throat anyway, because I love you, and I pity you as a
father pitieth his children. I was there
when you were created, and I know that you’re just dust, and you could never
conceive of my love for you, because it’s as high as he heavens are above the earth. And I’m
willing to remove your transgressions as far as the east is from the west,’ that is the truth.
‘Our Days Are Like The Grass’---The Temporariness Of Human Life---But That’s Not The End Of It All’
Verse 15, “As for man, his days are as grass: as a flower of the field, so he
flourisheth. For the wind passeth over
it, and it is gone; and the place thereof shall know it no more.” (verses 15-16) the
sirocco, the winds would blow from the south there, and it’s gone, dried up,
gone. That’s one of the little more
depressing moments in the Psalm here. This is the way life is, you get here, and you ain’t staying long. You’re like the grass, kind of grow up,
you’re nice and green, you look strong, get flowers, the wind starts to blow,
then your flowers start to change colors, and you don’t hear so good anymore,
and you gotta get glasses to see where you’re falling, and all of a sudden
you’re gone, and the place where you were, hey, you’re kids are gonna be sad
[maybe], maybe your grandkids, you’re great grandkids are gonna hear about you,
and your great, great grandkids it’s gonna go in one ear and out the
other. The place where
you are, in a few generations. So
the advantage you have now, you can make selfies and pass them down, ‘You came into the world long after I was
gone, and you need to know about Jesus Christ, I love you, I beat your mom, and
I beat your great grandmother, and I spanked them, and I taught them about the
Lord,’ you know, we do have that advantage. The point, isn’t it interesting? He says that’s the way it is with human beings, “But” great word there, verse
17, “But the mercy of the LORD is from everlasting to everlasting
upon them that fear him, and his righteousness unto children’s children; to
such as keep his covenant, and to those that remember his commandments to do
them.” (verses 17-18) Listen, “upon them that fear him,” so they
don’t die [in the final analysis, i.e. they are resurrected in the 1st resurrection to immorality. See http://www.unityinchrist.com/corinthians/cor15-16.htm] The physical frame, like the grass, is gone,
but if his mercy is on their lives from everlasting to everlasting, they
continue [Calvary Chapels believe the spirit-in-man, which is coupled to the
Holy Spirit in believers, stays conscious upon death, and goes upon the death
of the physical body, up to heaven. Other denominations believe the spirit-in-man of a believer upon death
goes unconscious, up to the point of the 1st Resurrection to
immortality, and that the dead know nothing, not ever the passage of time,
until the resurrection. So the very next
moment in their consciousness, they’re immortal, rising up to meet the Lord in
the air. To see some of these other
interpretations, which are interesting, see http://www.unityinchrist.com/plaintruth/battle.htm.]
God Has Not Lost Track Of You In The Vastness Of Everything He Describes Here
But
if his mercy is on their lives from everlasting to everlasting, they continue, “and his righteousness unto children’s
children; to such as keep his covenant, and to those that remember his
commandments to do them. The LORD hath prepared his throne in the heavens; and his kingdom ruleth over all.” (verse 17b-19) over the enemy, over the Devil, over Moscow, over Washington, whatever it seems
like is going on out there, be assured of this, “his kingdom ruleth over all.” Everything
out there that gets us discouraged, gets us aggravated, you get aggida,
watching these poor guys trying to graze cows, and now they decide they can’t
graze their cows anymore, you watch this stuff on the news, and you think ‘What in the world is going on? Have we lost our minds, is this
an important issue, where these guys are grazing their cows? Cut me a break!’ But the Lord rules over all, he’s ruling
over the cows, the grass, the President, everybody else, so I’m not gonna worry
about it. He’s the one who ruleth over
all, even the enemy. “Bless the LORD, ye his angels,
that excel in strength, that do his commandments, hearken unto the voice
of his word.” (verse 20) “that excel in strength,” and we saw that, didn’t we, in 2nd Kings chapter 19. “Bless ye the LORD, all ye his hosts; ye ministers of his, that do his pleasure.” (verse 21) “all ye his hosts” the armies of heaven. “ye his ministers of his, that do his pleasure” Hebrews
1:14. “Bless the LORD,
all his works in all places of his dominion: bless the LORD,
O my soul.” (verse 22) All his hosts, he rules over all, all his
works, all places of his dominion, and then he ends again by saying “bless the LORD, O my soul.” Listen, God has not lost track of you in the
vastness of everything he describes here. God has not lost track of you in the vastness of everything he’s
described. “bless the LORD, O my soul” his angels, you bless,
heavenly host, you bless the LORD…you bless. David says, ‘my soul, because the day is coming
when you’re going to teach a song to principalities and powers, about
redemption that they can never sing.’ The
days are going to come when you’re going to stand in front of those angels in
heaven and sing ‘Worthy is the Lamb that was slain, and has redeemed us by thy blood
out of every kindred, nation, tongue.’ Angels can’t sing that. It says
they stand back and wonder when they look at it. The only thing that can be out of kilter now,
the angels are doing what they’re supposed to, the heavenly host, you know,
sometimes it’s our soul, bad day, we turn it around, we say foolish things
about God, and then we go to Psalm 103. On a bad day, let’s read it, let’s think about it, let’s hear what it says. In the final
analysis, you and I, never lost in the Big Picture, we’re at the center of it,
in God’s heart, as a father pitieth his children. And one day we will teach a song to the
principalities and powers that are being commanded throughout to praise him, to
give him glory, all dominion is his. You
and I will sing the song, that they will stand back and be amazed at.
In Closing
Psalm
103, let’s stand, we’ll have the musicians come, Rob or whoever’s coming,
somebody’s coming, well Jesus is coming, and we’ll sing a last song. I’m going to challenge you, listen, if you
came in here condemned tonight, if you’re a believer, a prodigal, you should
not leave that way. If you do, it’s
because you’re saying his Word is not true. And if his Word is not true, then you have nothing to be condemned about
in the first place. If his Word is true,
it’s saying here ‘Bless the LORD, O my soul, and all that is
within me, bless the LORD, O my soul, forget not all of
his benefits, who forgiveth---not 99 percent, it would be good if he forgave 99
percent of our iniquities, it’s better than that---who forgiveth ALL thine
iniquities, who healeth all the diseases of your soul, he’s merciful, he made
known his ways to Moses, we can learn not just about him, but his very ways,
he’s not someone, he isn’t like human beings, always accusing and harboring
bitterness and not forgiving. He doesn’t
do that, because he hasn’t dealt with us according to our sins, or rewarded us
according to our iniquities, because his love is not human love, it’s
immeasurable, it’s immense, it’s inconceivable. But just so that we might understand, we can
bring it down to this, like as a father pitieth his children, so the LORD pities those who fear
him. He remembereth our frame, he knows
that we are dust, and he cares. He’s
involved. We’re just transient, we’re
like the grass, we grow, we flourish, the wind blows, dries up the grass, it’s
gone. And so it seems on earth, their
places are gone. And yet, the truth is, that his mercy is upon those who fear him, from
everlasting to everlasting…and his mercy is on us from everlasting to
everlasting.’ Don’t leave condemned tonight as a
believer. And if you’ve never known this
God, if you’ve never come, I encourage you after church, get up here, we’d love
to pray with you, give you a Bible, some literature, to talk to you about God’s
love and his forgiveness. If you’re
willing to turn away from your sin, and in repentance turn to Jesus Christ,
please make your way up here, we would love to see you make that decision…[see http://www.unityinchrist.com/Does/Does%20
God%20Exist.html] [transcript of
a connective expository sermon on Psalm 103:1-22, given by Pastor Joe Focht,
Calvary Chapel of Philadelphia, 13500 Philmont Avenue, Philadelphia, PA 19116]
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