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In today’s message Mike Masters, pastor of New Voice Church, speaks to us about contentment.
Scripture: 2 Samuel 12:7-8
Nathan then said to David, “You are the man! Thus says the LORD God of Israel, ‘It is I who anointed you king over Israel and it is I who delivered you from the hand of Saul. I also gave you your master’s house and your master’s wives into your care, and I gave you the house of Israel and Judah; and if that had been too little, I would have added to you many more things like these!
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I would have lost heart, unless I had believed that I would see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. Wait on the Lord; Be of good courage, and He shall strengthen your heart; Wait, I say, on the Lord! – Psalm 27:13-14 NKJV
When you are required to “wait” it means that you are caught in the middle of something beyond your control. The truth is we spend a lot of our lives “caught in the middle” in some way or another. Thankfully, the Bible teaches us that our lives are caught in the middle of God’s redemptive plan. David found himself caught in the middle of receiving the promise of God but not seeing its fulfillment. David learned the great lesson that learning to “wait on the Lord” brings great blessings into our lives.
What did it mean for David to be caught in the Middle?
David had been anointed by God to be King of Israel, but the crown and the throne were not yet his. David spent at least seven years in the wilderness and over ten years passed before he experienced the of God’s promise.
Waiting is not about the suspension of meaning and purpose. It is the purpose! Waiting for God is an essential part of His plan.
The Risk Reward Factor of Waiting
Risk – I would have lost heart (verse 13)
Reward – He shall strengthen your heart (verse 14)
How Can We Avoid the Risk and Reap the Reward?
See the big picture of God’s Kingdom.
Don’t get lost in the fulfillment of the promise, but see God working in the process.
Remember, the final chapter of your story has been written.
The One you are waiting for is trustworthy.
In those moments when you are “caught” you find rest. (Psalm 16:7-11)
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David got it right when it came to some really critical things in His life. He understood that life was about learning and lessons. Therefore, he approached life from the attitude and perspective of a student. He always wanted to learn as much as he could. He knew that God’s Word in particular is the means given to teach us and instruct us in God’s Ways. But most importantly, he understood that God himself, the LORD is the Teacher.
Teach me your way, Lord; lead me in a straight path because of my enemies. (Psalm 27:11)
Three Reasons To Live Life As a Student
1) God’s University Is The School of Wisdom (Proverbs 1:9)
There is no knowing that does not begin with knowing God. (John Calvin)
Abraham went to school in a tent
Joseph got his training in a pit and then a prison
Moses studied on the back side of the desert
David went to university in a cave
2) Students Search the Depths of God’s Wisdom
Six characteristics of being a student:
A healthy cynicism toward your own wisdom
A humble sense of need
A willing and open heart
Discernment, focus, and determination
Commitment to act on what you’re learning
Resisting the temptation to think we have arrived
3) Students understand the danger life presents Psalm 27:11 – Lead me in a smooth path, because of my enemies. Do not deliver me to the will of my adversaries; For false witnesses have risen against me, And such as breathe out violence.
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Psalm 27 is prayer of great confidence before God. David begins by declaring that the Lord is his Light and Salvation and because of this he has no reason to fear. That’s an amazing statement when you consider that David is being chased by his enemies. In verses 4 through 6, David also declares his confidence in God’s powerful and protective presence. When we come to verses 7 through 11, the mood changes. We begin to hear the actual petition of David’s heart that brought about the great confidence in the opening verses. These verses reveal the depth of David’s anxiety and his desperate cry for God’s mercy to help him in a time of trouble and adversity.
God will always listen to you. Psalm 27:7-8 – Hear, O LORD, when I cry with my voice! Have mercy also upon me, and answer me. When You said, “Seek My face.” My heart said to You, “Your face, LORD, I will seek.”
You can always count on His Grace. Psalm 27:9 – Do not hide your face from me, do not turn your servant away in anger; you have been my helper. Do not reject me or forsake me, O God my Savior.
He has always promised to be our Helper.Psalm 27:9 – …you have been my helper.
He will always teach us and instruct us.Psalm 27:11 – Teach me your way, O Lord; lead me in a straight path because of my enemies.
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It’s nothing short of amazing that God hears our prayers and even more amazing that He answers them. I say that not because anything is questionable or suspect in God but because of us. We so often choose our own way and our own kingdom over His. Thankfully, prayer finds its hope, not in the qualifications of the one praying, but in the character and plan of the God who’s hearing. He answers because of who He is. He answers because of what He’s doing. He answers because He loves to see us come to Him and He loves to provide for our need.
1st Principle(Luke 11:9-10)
God answers our prayers even when we are not so good. So ask, seek, knock!
2nd Parable(Luke 11:11-12)
Even sinner dads know how to give good gifts!
2nd Principle(Luke 11:13)
How much more will God give to us what is truly good‘?
Why does God want to give us the Holy Spirit?
So that God Himself is living in our hearts.
Through the Holy Spirit we can hear God’s voice feel God’s presence, and know God’s will. Because of the Holy Spirit, or hearts are forever connected with God the Father who is in heaven.
Psalm 27:8 – When You said, “Seek My face,” My heart said to You, “Your face, Lord, I will seek.”
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In the wilderness of trouble that David faced, he was pressed to make one of two choices: Either find God in the midst of His trouble and experience the power and depth of intimacy and peace through His presence; Or stubbornly refuse to allow God to reach to the brokenness of his heart, and find his own God-replacements. David’s two choices are still the only ones we have today. The wilderness of trouble is where David learned how much he needed God.
Trouble teaches us how to give our hearts to God in lament
A lament is a passionate expression of grief or deep pain. It refers to the expression of mourning or sorrow in the midst of great loss. David’s laments were many times complaints offered to God. David wasn’t complaining to grumble. He was complaining to understand.
Trouble is meant to show us the safety and protection of God’s House Psalm 27:5a – For in the time of trouble He shall hide me in His pavilion; In the secret place of His tabernacle He shall hide me;
Trouble teaches us only God is the sure foundation of our life Psalm 27:5b – He shall set me high upon a rock.
The wilderness of trouble teaches us to worship Psalm 27:6 – And now my head shall be lifted up above my enemies all around me; Therefore I will offer sacrifices of joy in His tabernacle; I will sing, yes, I will sing praises to the Lord.
At first glance the wilderness does not appear to be a place of worship. It feels more like a place of hunger, thirst pain, disappointment frustration, anger, guilt, etc. Here is the key. Our worship begins by giving voice to God of all those emotions that we are carrying through the wilderness.
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To be sure David was a dreamer just like the rest of us. Here he is just a young man… barely 16 or 17 years old. And the prophet of God tells him he is going to be the next king of Israel (1 Samuel 16:11-12). You have to know that promise captured David’s wildest and deepest imaginations. A shepherd boy becomes a King?? This is story book stuff! If he wasn’t a dreamer up until now–he just became one. But in the wilderness experience David is confronted with his greatest need. It’s not the fulfillment of his dream, but it’s his need for the reality of God’s presence and power in His life. This is God’s plan, His purpose, His desire… call it His dream for everyone of us. God is not against our dreams. ln fact I believe He gives them to us. But our dreams must be filtered through God’s dream. His dream must become our dream. And so the question is, “What is God’s dream?” I believe David summed it up in his words, That I may dwell in the house of the LORD All the days of my life. (Psalm 27:4, Ephesians 4:1-6)
God’s Dream is His House the place of His presence and His people
The Tension of Living In Community
More than any before us, an American today believes “I must write the script of my own life.” The thought that such a script must be subordinated to the grand narrative of the Bible is foreign one. Still more alarming is the idea that this surrender of our personal story to God’s story must be mediated by a community of fallen people we frankly don’t want getting in our way or meddling with our own hopes and dreams.
The Cost of the Dream Genesis 15:17-18a – And it came to pass, when the sun went down and it was dark, that behold, there appeared a smoking oven and a burning torch that passed between those pieces. On the same day the Lord made a covenant with Abram.
Matthew 27:46b – “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?”
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You know it is pure grace when we get it right because so often we get it wrong. No, I don’t mean that we are always committing gross sin. And don’t mean that we always being tempted to question our faith in Christ or question whether ministry is really worth it. Getting it wrong is much more subtle than that. Getting it wrong is not about the big, dramatic, consequential moments of life. Getting it wrong is much more about the little mundane moments of everyday life. And that is critical, because most of life is actually about the “little moments”. David got it right in the little moments of his life and we see expressed in Psalm 27. In fact you could say that verse 4 is a manual for getting it right.
Psalm 27:4 – One thing I have desired of the LORD, That will I seek: That I may dwell in the house of the LORD All the days of my life, To behold the beauty of the LORD, And to inquire in His temple.
Being a “one thing” person
Amazingly, David’s “one thing” isn’t safety, or vindication, or victory. It isn’t power, control, or retribution. Even under personal duress, the “one thing” that David wishes for is to be in God’s house, standing in His presence, taking in the glory & beauty of the Lord.
“One thing” people make a focused impact
We are a nation and culture of multiple-choice. We love our access to mass information, endless choices and keeping or options open. We don’t want to miss anything. Experiencing life is the idolatry of our culture.
God’s house is the best plan for your life
David gets it right. His quest is for a life that’s shaped and directed by a daily worship of the Lord. David knows who he is: a creature created for worship.
Learning to recognize true beauty
The amazing beauty that surrounds us every day was designed to be sign beauty. All of the beautiful things that we see, touch, taste and hear every day, were designed to be signs that would point to the ultimate beauty that can only be found in the One who created them. So, when you’re looking at the beauty that surrounds you in the physical world, it requires that you look beyond the signs to the stunning beauty of the God to whom each sign points. Only his beauty can give you hope, strength, and peace. Only his beauty can give you life.
Dealing with our sight problems
The most important vision is seeing with your heart
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Psalm 27 is an amazing psalm. It is a Psalm of worship, faith, commitment, trouble, pain, beauty, hope and patience. Most believe David wrote this Psalm during the early part of his time as a fugitive. He is being chased enemies, shut out of the house of God and separated from family and all that is comfortable. Just as we see in so many of the Psalms, it is the wilderness struggles of David’s life that become the occasion of deep intimacy with God. David responds to the hardship and adversity of the wilderness turning to God. And so the Psalms are prayers of lament and songs of worship.
David gets it right!
He realized we live in a terribly broken world filled with sin, danger, calamity and enemies on every side.
Psalm 27:2 – When evil men advance against me to devour my flesh, when enemies and my foes attack me they will stumble and fall. Though an army besiege me, my heart will not fear; though war break out against me, even then will I be confident.
The Psalms are prophetic and they point forward to the coming of the Messiah. Many of the words which David wrote in the Psalms are echoed in the life and sufferings of Jesus Christ the Psalms we see Christ and His Cross!
Compare Psalm 27:2 and Colossians 2:14-15
“When my enemies and foes attack me, they will stumble and fall” (Psalm 27:2) “He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.” (Colossians 2:14-15)
The Cross became the ultimate place of the enemy’s stumbling!
He stumbled:
an Heaven (Isaiah 14 and Ezekiel 28)
in the Garden (Genesis 3:15)
at Bethlehem (Matthew 2:12)
in the Wilderness (Luke 4:1-13)
throughout Christ’s ministry (Luke 10:9)
at the Cross (Colossians 2:14-15)
Because Jesus has defeated our enemy
We can choose faith and not fear!
We can offer forgiveness rather than revenge or despair!
We can tum tragedy into triumph!
We can find God’s presence anywhere at anytime!
The book of Proverbs – Proverbs is “wisdom” literature
philosophical wisdom
practical wisdom
truisms not promises
principles more than methods
Proverbs is all about wisdom (Proverbs 4:7) - wisdom, understanding, instruction, knowledge
Wisdom is not “intellect” but “life smarts”
The wisdom of Proverbs is anticipated in Jesus (Colossians 2:3)
Wisdom is living your life under the Lordship of Christ
Reproach has broken my heart and I am so sick. And I looked for sympathy, but there was none, and for comforters, but I found none.
Isaiah 61:1 – The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me, Because the LORD has anointed me To bring good news to the afflicted; He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, To proclaim liberty to captives And freedom to prisoners;
1. The People Who Knew Rejection
Jesus Luke 22:59-61 – After about an hour had passed, another man began to insist, saying, “Certainly this man also was with Him, for he is a Galilean too.” But Peter said, “Man, I do not know what you are talking about.” Immediately, while he was still speaking, a rooster crowed. The Lord turned and looked at Peter. And Peter remembered the word of the Lord, how He had told him, “Before a rooster crows today, you will deny Me three times.”
Joseph Genesis 37:23-28 – So it came about, when Joseph reached his brothers, that they stripped Joseph of his tunic, the varicolored tunic that was on him; and they took him and threw him into the pit. Now the pit was empty, without any water in it. Then they sat down to eat a meal. And as they raised their eyes and looked, behold, a caravan of Ishmaelites was coming from Gilead, with their camels bearing aromatic gum and balm and myrrh, on their way to bring them down to Egypt. Judah said to his brothers, “What profit is it for us to kill our brother and cover up his blood? “Come and let us sell him to the Ishmaelites and not lay our hands on him, for he is our brother, our own flesh.” And his brothers listened to him. Then some Midianite traders passed by, so they pulled him up and lifted Joseph out of the pit, and sold him to the Ishmaelites for twenty shekels of silver. Thus they brought Joseph into Egypt.
David 1Samuel 17:28-29 – Now Eliab his oldest brother heard when he spoke to the men; and Eliab’s anger burned against David and he said, “Why have you come down? And with whom have you left those few sheep in the wilderness? I know your insolence and the wickedness of your heart; for you have come down in order to see the battle.” But David said, “What have I done now? Was it not just a question?”
1Samuel 18:6 – It happened as they were coming, when David returned from killing the Philistine, that the women came out of all the cities of Israel, singing and dancing, to meet King Saul, with tambourines, with joy and with musical instruments.
1Samuel 18:7-11 – The women sang as they played, and said, “Saul has slain his thousands, And David his ten thousands.” Then Saul became very angry, for this saying displeased him; and he said, “They have ascribed to David ten thousands, but to me they have ascribed thousands. Now what more can he have but the kingdom?” Saul looked at David with suspicion from that day on. Now it came about on the next day that an evil spirit from God came mightily upon Saul, and he raved in the midst of the house, while David was playing the harp with his hand, as usual; and a spear was in Saul’s hand. Saul hurled the spear for he thought, “I will pin David to the wall.” But David escaped from his presence twice.
Psalms 142:4 – Look to the right and see; for there is no one who regards me; there is no escape for me; No one cares for my soul.
Psalms 6:6-7 – I am weary with my sighing; every night I make my bed swim, I dissolve my couch with my tears. My eye has wasted away with grief; it has become old because of all my adversaries.
2Samuel 19:4 – The king covered his face and cried out with a loud voice, “O my son Absalom, O Absalom, my son, my son!”
Psalms 55:12-14 – For it is not an enemy who reproaches me, Then I could bear it; nor is it one who hates me who has exalted himself against me, and then I could hide myself from him. But it is you, a man my equal, my companion and my familiar friend; we who had sweet fellowship together Walked in the house of God in the throng.
2. The Problem with Rejection
Psalms 55:4-7 – My heart is in anguish within me, And the terrors of death have fallen upon me. Fear and trembling come upon me, And horror has overwhelmed me. I said, “Oh, that I had wings like a dove! I would fly away and be at rest. “Behold, I would wander far away, I would lodge in the wilderness. Selah.
3. The Pit of Rejection
1Samuel 30:6 – And David was greatly distressed; for the people spake of stoning him, because the soul of all the people was grieved, every man for his sons and for his daughters: but David encouraged himself in the LORD his God.
Psalms 3:1-6 – LORD, how are they increased that trouble me! many are they that rise up against me. Many there be which say of my soul, There is no help for him in God. Selah. But thou, O LORD, art a shield for me; my glory, and the lifter up of mine head. I cried unto the LORD with my voice, and he heard me out of his holy hill. Selah. I laid me down and slept; I awaked; for the LORD sustained me. I will not be afraid of ten thousands of people, that have set themselves against me round about.
Psalms 55:22 – Cast thy burden upon the LORD, and he shall sustain thee: he shall never suffer the righteous to be moved.
Jeremiah 30:17 – For I will restore health unto thee, and I will heal thee of thy wounds, saith the LORD; because they called thee an Outcast, saying, This is Zion, whom no man seeketh after.
Genesis 45:1-4 – Then Joseph could not control himself before all those who stood by him, and he cried, “Have everyone go out from me.” So there was no man with him when Joseph made himself known to his brothers. He wept so loudly that the Egyptians heard it, and the household of Pharaoh heard of it. Then Joseph said to his brothers, “I am Joseph! Is my father still alive?” But his brothers could not answer him, for they were dismayed at his presence. Then Joseph said to his brothers, “Please come closer to me.” And they came closer. And he said, “I am your brother Joseph, whom you sold into Egypt.
Genesis 50:20 – “As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good in order to bring about this present result, to preserve many people alive.
Isaiah 53:3-5 – He was despised and rejected by men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief; and as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not. Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his stripes we are healed.
Psalm 27 is an amazing psalm. It is a Psalm of worship, faith, commitment, trouble, pain, beauty, hope and patience. Most believe David wrote this Psalm during the early part of his time as a fugitive. He is being chased enemies, shut out of the house of God and separated from family and all that is comfortable. Just as we see in so many of the Psalms, it is the wilderness struggles of David’s life that become the occasion of deep intimacy with God. David responds to the hardship and adversity of the wilderness turning to God. And so the Psalms are prayers of lament and songs of worship.
re: Psalms 69:20
