[0:00] And turn to Psalm 39 in your Bibles and I think it's also going to be coming up on the screen. Now why have I chosen to bring Psalm 39 to you? Well, and Paul said would I preach on this Sunday because he's away.
[0:20] I said have you got anything in particular you want me to address and he said no. And I said where have we got up to in the Psalms? Now I don't know how many of you remember.
[0:32] But after Paul came and we were looking 13 years ago, we started doing the occasional Psalm series. That is, if we had somebody just coming to do a one-off or a visitor who asked what he should speak on, then we were working our way systematically through the book of Psalms.
[0:54] So I said to Paul, where have we got up to? He said I'll have a look on the computer. And then he came back and he said, do you know we haven't done any for the last three years?
[1:08] But if you want to do it, it's Psalm 39. So we're here. Psalm 39. And we're going to do something that, well I've done it but other people don't do.
[1:23] And that is we're going to read responsibly. I'm going to read the first part of the verse and when I stop, you carry on with the rest of the verse.
[1:33] And wherever that is. Why read this way? Because Hebrew poetry is written that way. Whereby you have similar things contrasted or distinguished in the lines of the Psalm.
[1:51] Hebrew poetry does not rely on rhyme and meter like poetry in the English language does. But it relies on contrasts and comparisons.
[2:04] So I will read the first part of each verse and you respond with the second part after I stop. So Psalm 39 and verse 1.
[2:15] I said I will guard my ways that I may not sin with my tongue. I will guard my mouth with a muscle so long as the wicked are in my presence.
[2:29] I was mute and silent. I held my peace to no hell and my distress through the verse. My heart became hot within me.
[2:42] As my knees of fire burns, then I spoke with my tongue. O Lord, make me know my end and what is the measure of my days.
[2:56] Let me know how pleasing I am. Behold, you have made my days a few hand breaths and my lifetime as nothing before you.
[3:07] Surely, O Lord, surely a man goes about as a shadow. Surely, for nothing, there are in someone.
[3:22] Now you eat soft blood, and first of the blood we will cry at them. And now, O Lord, for what do I wait? My hope is in you. Deliver me from all my transgressions I am mute, I do not open my mouth Remove your stroke from me When you discipline a man with rebukes for sin Hear my prayer, O Lord, and give ear to my cry Hold not your peace at my tears Look away from me, that I may smile again Well, well done
[4:24] I think you made a good job of the responsive reading And as we approach Psalm 39 Like all Psalms, we should be asking some questions What is the context of this Psalm?
[4:46] It says it's the Psalm of David But how was David, what sort of a situation was he in When he wrote this Psalm? I've actually studied through the whole of the Psalter And sought to classify the Psalms And the vast majority of them The writer is up against it The vast majority, he's got some problems A whole different variety of problems encompassed But usually in the Psalms The King David or whoever the Psalmist is Is in difficulties and so is turning to God In this world, in this world In this world you will have tribulation Life is not a bed of roses You don't become a Christian to get an easy life Prosperity gospel is a lie
[5:47] Christians, the saints, New Testaments and old Have known affliction As we remember, they know today In those countries we were praying for And that's no different here We will see something of David's affliction The second thing to know about the Psalm is Remember all scripture speaks of the Lord Jesus Christ All scripture testifies to him So, we are looking at this Psalm As a Psalm of David But where does he also perhaps speak to us Of David's greatest son Jesus of Nazareth Son of David King not of Israel But King of Kings Where do we learn and what do we learn Of the Lord Jesus Christ here Now, you won't be able to take everything here And apply it to Christ
[6:49] But I think we may see a few things And lastly We apply this to the context of David We see how it applies to the Lord Jesus Christ And as we go through the Psalm And see what David is doing Then of course there is the application to ourselves First of all we find out what it means to David How it may speak of Christ And then what is it saying to us And as most of us go through difficulties in our lives And as I said It's not a bed of roses Here a Psalm where the Psalmist is in difficulties Will indeed speak to us Now, as well as going through in the past When I went through the whole Psalter And see what the context of each Psalm was I also tried to look and see Was there a verse or a line Which was the central thought in the Psalm And I have to say
[7:50] That I don't think The translators of the ESV Got it right When they gave this Psalm the heading What is the measure of my days I am going to concentrate On What I am sure Is the central thing And which is This will be central in my application For you this morning And that is the second line of verse 7 My hope Is in you My hope Is in you And for a Christian The hope is not A vague wish About something you don't know Is whether it's going to happen or not Like My hope is the Union will continue Or my hope is the Scots will vote yes Who knows But a real hope We will see Is in King Jesus Not in any human king
[8:52] Or politician And David needed that hope So Central verse of the Psalm Verse 7 Second line And we will be concentrating on that But what's the context Well I read We had Chris read to you From The second Samuel Because In there I think Is Perhaps one Of the context Situations As to why David's up against it We are not certain Because We aren't told As we are in some Psalms When this was written In the introduction We are just told It's to The choir master To Jedethon A Psalm of David It's thought that Jedethon might have been One of the leading musicians And they might have Named the tune After him We don't know It's not important But what was David's
[9:54] Situation Well He was in a difficult one The wicked Were in His presence He was distressed Trouble was boiling up Within him When he Didn't speak He didn't want to speak To the wicked Lest They Had Caused To think That he was failing As a follower Of God And a king He was in such A difficult situation That he wanted God to tell him How long is this To go on for Is this going to Characterize The rest Of my life Long Or Short So David's In this difficult Situation And I One of his Difficult situations And it Is pertinent Here Was this one Where his Favourite son Absalom Was killed
[10:54] In battle And Ammon Was Been half Brother To Absalom And Ammon Had lusted After Absalom's Sister And he Inveiled her Into his presence Pretending he was Ill and she could Nurse him And then he'd Rape her And having Rape her He chased her Away And Absalom Was livid But instead of Going to his Father the king David So that justice Should properly Be done What did Absalom do He murdered His half Brother Ammon And David It seems Did Nothing Really About it Because Absalom Was able To Lead Some of the People Away From David Absalom had been
[11:54] Banished for a while By his father But he hadn't Really Had the punishment For what he'd done And then he led a Rebellion Against his father And in fact Most of the people Went after him But when David Men Engaged in battle They defeated Absalom And David had said He didn't want Absalom harmed But his soldiers They killed Particularly on Job The general's instructions They killed Absalom And when the news Was brought back As we heard David was Heartbroken Oh Absalom Absalom My son Would that I died in your Praise And that We didn't read it But if you read The next chapter That did not Go down well Of course With David's Supporters So I think It's fair to say That There were aspects Of David's Family life
[12:54] That was A mess And because There was sin In his family And there was Also sin In David In the way That he did Or didn't Deal with the Problems in the Family But here At the beginning He says That he was Keeping quiet Because There were some Wicked people Around him We don't know Who they were Or any details Of it But David said I'll guard my ways That I shouldn't Sing With my Sin With my tongue I'll guard my mouth With a muzzle As long as the wicked Are in My presence I was mute And silent I held my peace To no avail Avail And my distress Grew worse Metaphorically David sort of Put a gag On his mouth The word muzzle I think
[13:55] Might have some Unfortunate Connotations To us If not Mad dogs A certain Football player No it's a gag It's not to Stop biting It's to stop Speaking And why didn't David want to Speak Well he was So troubled And he didn't Want to speak To people Who might take Advantage of him The wicked He wanted He just wanted To keep it all in But you know How it is When you're Bothered about Something Keeping it in Very often Is just Too much If you keep It in You might Blow the fuse As it were Blow the escape Valve You want to Speak But to whom Does David Speak He turns And he speaks To God Just one little
[14:55] Thing before we Go on to To his Speaking to God Remember Jesus When he Was silent Not Exactly The situation Like David David's We were going To find out Due to his Sin But Jesus Was due To bearing Our sins But Jesus Was silent He opened Not his Mouth Like the Sheep Before Shearers Is done For he Was suffering In our Place But back To David Here What does David do Well The good Thing is He doesn't Talk To those Around him He doesn't Try and get Any pity From anybody Else No He talks To God And that's It When we are Troubled Talk to God Or talk to Christian Counselors Those you Would trust In the Lord But David He talks
[15:56] To God And you Might find It a bit Strange What he He asks He asks Basically How long Am I Going to Live Or how Long Am I Going to Suffer Like this Oh Lord Make me Know my End And what Is the Measure of My Days Let me Know how Fleeting I am Behold You have Made my Days A few Handbreaths And my Lifetime Is as Nothing Before you Surely All mankind Stands As a Mere breath Surely A man Goes about As a Shadow Surely For nothing They are In turmoil Man Heaps Up wealth And does Not know Who Will Gather The writer Of Ecclesiastes Said Vanity Of Vanity Is All Is Vanity It's All Meaningless The Psalmist Elsewhere Says Man's Days Are Three Score Years And Ten And Further Than That If he Gets To Four Score
[16:56] It's Agony And Grief That Still Seems Looking at The Evidences Of Geriatric Medicine Often To be The Case When You Get Past 80 I'm Quickly Looking Around To see If we've Got Anybody Here Who Is We Do Have At Least One Member Of The Congregation Who Is But He's Not In This Morning Okay But You know Wanting to Know the Number Of Our Days We're Told We walk By Faith And Not By Sight So You know We're Not Going To Be Told How Long We've Got Unless Unless Some Doctor Pronounces Sentence Upon Us And Even Then It Can't Be 100% Relied Upon And You know That's One of The Things We Really Don't Know We Really Don't Know And
[17:57] But David Is Asking Not So Much Because He's Curious As He Wants An End To The Present Sufferings Hence Hear What Some Call An Outburst To God Make Me Know My End What Is The Measure Of My Days Let Me Know How Fleeting I Am Behold You've Made My Days A Few Hand Breaths You know Not An Arm Length!
[18:21] Just A Few Hand Breaths My Lifetime Is Nothing! Before You A Thousand Years Is A Day In Your Sight And What Am I Lord I'm Just Nothing Any Human Being A Mere Breath We're Like Shadows One Moment We're There The Sun Goes Behind A Cloud And The Shadow Has Gone And What's The Point Of All The Effort That We Put Into Well The Book Of Ecclesiastes Is All About That Man Heaps Up Wealth And Does Not Know Who Will Gather The Story Of The Men Watching The Funeral Of The Rich Man Passed The Rich Man Had Been Very Rich Indeed And The One Man Said To The Other How Much Did He Leave And His Friend Said All Of It That's How It Is For What Do We Gather And
[19:22] You Know I Have To Say As One Gets Older You Do Think About! Expectancy These days I often look at the hymns we are singing To see how long the hymn writers lived This is a most remarkable one Because there are three hymn writers on the sheet quoted today Who all managed to live longer than me As to where I've got up to And I'm interested in genealogy!
[19:58] He passed My two grandfathers One who died in his fifties And one in the early sixties So You know That's one thing that genealogy should teach us That we are frail We are indeed But we don't know The future is uncertain David cries out that God would Would tell him something about it But then He goes on to much Firmer ground And we'll come back to this The centre of the psalm David says Oh Lord For what do I wait?
[20:34] For you to tell me the answer? No My hope is in you My hope is in you And what do I want you to do? I want you to deliver me from all my sins David is thinking As we should think when troubles before us Have we Contributed to it?
[20:55] Some things come because trouble comes out of the ground As sparks fly upwards Some events and natural disasters and things Or illness we know May come because well They just come The man born blind Jesus said he wasn't Because of his sin or his parents' sin But that the glory of God Should be displayed But we ask ourselves First of all Has this happened Because of something A consequence of something That I've done Or God's used it to discipline me David therefore asks to be delivered From all his transgressions He doesn't want To be the occasion For non-Christians Being scornful David says I've kept quiet Because I know That you Lord God Are working In this situation And I would ask you To spare me
[21:55] To remove your stroke From me I am spent By the hostility Of your hand He really did feel That he was Under the cosh And he knew He didn't deserve Any better He was a sinner Failed to discipline His family As I said He was an adulterer He was a murderer And yet he knew God's love And God's forgiveness But he says Very often God In your providence You do take away from us What we most Love David He lost Absalom Didn't he And some other children So when you Discipline a man For sin You discipline a man With rebukes For sin You consume Like a moth That watches Dear to him Have you ever had A moth In your wardrobe They are wicked You don't know
[22:55] That they're at work But you come As I did You take out A nice sports jacket And there's holes And then you take out Your favourite sweater And you can never Wear it again The moth Quietly Consumes Consumes The clothes Dear to us But it says God says It says that God May be working Like a moth To discipline us Taking away The things We most Delight in And anyway All the things That are in this world All the people Here today Gone tomorrow All mankind A mere breath But David We're going to go Back to it He has Hope in God And he goes on To pray to God Oh Lord Give ear to my cry Hold not your peace At my tears Elsewhere As Psalmist says God Scores up Our tears In his bottle God sees
[23:56] And God Cares David David Pleads I'm a Sojourner With you I'm I'm a Temporary Resident I'm not here For long Life Is short I'm a guest Like all my Fathers All of us Will pass on He asks God To look away From him That he may Smile again And what he Means is Lord God Remove if you Will This chastening From me Before I die And I'm no more The Hebrews Had very little Knowledge Of the afterlife We are in a much Better position Since the resurrection Of the Lord Jesus Christ To know What the future Is about A future with Christ forever And ever And a new Heavens And a new Earth So David Is troubled
[24:56] David calls out In prayer And David Relies On his God Of course we can Think about our Saviour How he was so Troubled for us Bearing our sins Up to and onto The cross Of Calvary How he endured Not just God's chastening As David did But all the Punishment That was due For our sin He suffered In our place Bearing the curse For us But We go back To the central Thought David says My hope is in you And that's what I want you To remember We're just going To finish off With some Things that the Scripture Tells us About hope What is A real Solid And certain Hope And a sure Foundation You may Be able to Follow some Of these Although I Might be going A bit fast
[25:56] For all of them But I will Read to you Job Chapter 13 And verse 15 Job confesses Though he slay me Though God kill me I will hope In him Yet I will argue My ways through His face Job Job Did not listen To his wife There is a time To listen There is a time Not to listen To a wife When the wife Says first God and die It is not time To listen So Job said Though he slay me Though I have Lost my wealth I have lost My children I have lost My health Though he slay me I will hope In him And we are Called To have Not just the Patience of Job But also The hope Of Job Psalm 42 Favorite psalm For anybody Who has problems With depression
[26:57] Psalm 42 How does it end And how does It's partner Psalm 43 End Why are you Cast down Over my soul And why are you In turmoil Within me Hope in God For I shall Again Praise him My salvation And my God No matter What your Troubles are No condition Is permanent This too Will pass What will not Pass Hope in God You will Indeed Again Praise him One of the most Confiting verses About this Although it might not Be the easiest To find Is in Lamentations Chapter 3 21 But when I Find it And read it To you You will Be familiar With it Jeremiah Says in Lamentations 3 21 But this I Call to mind And therefore I have hope The steadfast
[27:57] Love of the Lord Never ceases His mercies Never come To an end They are new Every morning Great is your Faithfulness The Lord Is my portion Says my soul Therefore I will hope In him We have a God Of steadfast Love A great God Of faithfulness Therefore Our hope Is in him We move on To the New Testament For a few Verses It's very Interesting That when Matthew Is writing In his Gospel He quotes Isaiah In Matthew 12 12 When he Was talking About Jesus Being God's chosen Servant The suffering Servant Of Isaiah And What does He say Matthew 12 20 A bruised Reed He will Not break A smoking Wick He will
[28:57] Not quench Until he Brings justice To the Nations And in His name The Gentiles Will hold Salvation Is not just For David's Family David's Tribe Or his Nation The Jews In the name Of the Suffering Servant Jesus Christ In his Name We The Gentiles Non-Jews Will hold Our hope Is in the Name of The Lord Our help Is in the Name of The Lord But also Our hope In the name Of the Lord Who made Heavens And the Earth Maybe Finished Just a few More And Romans Chapter 8 Verse 24 Romans 8 24 Says Well I'm Starting from 23 Not only the Creation But we Ourselves Who have The first Fruits of The Spirit Grown Inwardly As we Wait Eagerly For adoption As sons The redemption
[29:57] Of our bodies For in This hope We were Saved Now hope That is seen Is not hope For who Hopes Through what He sees But if we Hope For what We do Not see We wait For it With patience What are we Waiting for The fullness Of our Salvation Begun Now Not yet Completed But we We do Have that Blessed Hope And teaching About that Blessed hope Paul then Can call The Christians To action And in Romans 12 12 He says Romans 12 12 Rejoice In hope Be patient In tribulation Be constant In prayer That's what We are to do Rejoice That we have Hope That will help Us to be Patient In difficulties
[30:59] In tribulation We'll be strengthened By being Constant In prayer And so Paul Goes on He's writing To the Ephesians And he writes To the Ephesians About hope It's all the way Through here In the Scriptures Ephesians 1 18 Ephesians 1 18 Says He's praying That Paul's praying The Ephesians Would know The riches Of Christ's Glorious Inheritance In the saints And what is The immeasurable Greatness Is power Towards us Who believe According To the Working Of his Great might That he Worked in Christ When he Raised him From the Dead And seated At his Right hand In Heavenly Places So Paul Says Have your Hearts The eyes Of your
[31:59] Hearts Enlightened That you May know What is The hope To which He has Called you We are Called to A hope In Christ Even in Colossians 127 Paul talks About Christ In us By the Holy Spirit The hope Of glory Writing to The pastor Epistles To Titus Titus 2 13 And Paul Writing to Titus Takes The perspective Right to The last Things When the Lord Jesus Christ Will Return So Titus 2 13 He says Concerning Hope That we Are waiting For our Blessed Hope The appearing Of the Glory Of our Great God And Saviour Jesus Christ Who Gave himself For us To Redeem Us From All Lawlessness Well Our time Is gone I could Go on With more Verses About hope And if you Want a couple More I can Give them To you But what I
[33:00] Want us To see From this Psalm Is this Life Is not Easy There are Troubles But we Have a Recourse The world Doesn't have A recourse To our God In prayer And he Will comfort Us He will Strengthen Us He will Give us True Hope Because the Future Is assured In him In his Son And his Return Do you Have this Hope Do you Know this Hope If you Don't The only Hope for You Is to Turn from Following Your own Way Believe On the Lord Jesus Christ And in Him You will Find True Hope For Tomorrow Amen