Kennystix's podcast
I Will Go to God, My Exceeding Joy
The following resource is from desiringgod.org. The Scripture passage for tonight's sermon is from Psalm 43. That's page 470 in the Pew Bibles. Psalm 43, "Vindicate me, O God, and defend my cause against and ungodly people, from the deceitful and unjust man, deliver me. For you are the God in whom I take refuge. Why have you rejected me? Why do I go about mourning because of the oppression of my enemy? Send out your light and your truth. Let them lead me. Let them bring me to your holy hill and to your dwelling. Then I will go to the altar of God, to God my exceeding joy, and I will praise you with the lie of, O God my God. Why are you cast down on my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God, for I shall again praise him, my salvation, and my God." That's great together. What shall I render to the Lord for all of His benefits to me? I will lift up the cup of salvation and call upon the name of the Lord. I call upon you, Lord, that these now next five months would be the best months in the history of this church. Grad I pray that there would be more souls saved, more authentic worship, more prodigals come home, more marriages put back together and become beautiful again, more boldness in witness granted, more missions mobilized, more justice spread, and your name exalted better than ever. It would be just like your Lord to do it. So show yourself strong. I pray in these next five months, gather your people here. May the remnant show themselves mighty in the Lord. Now I ask for your help in this word that I would be faithful to it, that I would not speak a miss or mislead anyone, but learn with them what you have to teach here in Psalm 43 for our souls. I ask this in Jesus' name, amen. There are three reasons why this text is the text for the message. The last message that I get between surgery and sabbatical. First reason, it has proved to be, I think, the most precious and powerful text in these last weeks for me personally. Second reason, it defines the ultimate goal of life, and I like to preach about ultimate thanks; and third, it helps practically people who feel distant from God that perhaps he has rejected them. So for those three reasons, it's worthy of our attention. But before I go there, let me pause to take a moment and thank you very deeply from my heart, from Noel's heart, for all your prayers and cards and gifts and emails and meals and visits. If you need encouragement that God has answered prayer, then let me encourage your heart for a few minutes. Number one, I think I'll just mention four in a list of dozens, but number one, I have not felt forsaken by God. I have not felt rejected by God. I have not doubted his control or his wisdom or his goodness in any of this. Cancer is a great and good gift to me. I could not view it any other way, and getting it is from his all-wise, all-ruling, all-loving hand, and that piece of soul is not natural, but supernatural, and therefore I thank you for your prayers. Number two. Noel and I are deeply one in this embrace of God's sovereign goodness. Few things mean more to me than to be able to take my wife's hand and bow together and say, "As one, Father, we accept this from your hand. We submit to your sovereign will. We trust you. Have your way with us." Only one thing. Only Jesus Christ be magnified. To be able to say that, hand in hand, with a deep amen coming from your wife's soul is for me one of the mountain peaks of marital joy. Number three. I have experienced zero pain before, during, after this surgery. Discomfort, soreness, sure, nothing I would put in the category of pain, and that has been an undeserved mercy God has handled me with soft gloves. Number four, Dr. Kahneman sat me down on Wednesday and walked me through the pathology report and said Gleason score six confirmed, presence of cancer confirmed, right, left side, five percent of the prostate compromised. We took it out, nothing in the lymph nodes, nothing in the vesicles. They drew a little diagram, 94 percent, 6 percent, and he said, "People with these numbers, this surgery, 94 percent of them are cancer free in 10 years and 6 percent aren't. And inside my soul, this quiet, happy response. Thank you, Lord, for that. I know at the bottom of my heart, and I'm happy to be there, that whether I'm in the 94 percent or the 6 percent is totally in your hands, where I am happy to rest, not in the odds." So that's four reasons why you should go home tonight and feel we did not pray in vain. And there are more, but we have a sermon to preach, and so please open your Bibles again to Psalm 43, and we want to look at the most important goal of life, and I especially want to look at practical strategies to help people who feel distant from God, or that God has rejected them. Psalm 43, verse one describes what is going on in the psalmist's life, and verse two describes what is going on in his soul. Verse one, vindicate me, O God, and defend my cause against the ungodly people from the deceitful and unjust man deliver me. So what makes this psalm, a crisis psalm, is that he has enemies, and they are making his life oppressed and miserable. These are ungodly folks, whatever they're doing, we don't know, but he's feeling threatened and oppressed and in the dark, and now he describes his soul in verse two. For you are the God in whom I take refuge, why have you rejected me? Why do I go about mourning because of the oppression of the enemy? Now what's most striking about that verse is that his soul is divided. It's divided, and one of the reasons, I'll show you that in just a minute, but let me say this, a divided soul is a really common experience in the psalms. It's the reason that Psalm 86, 11, prays, unite my heart to fear your name, meaning my heart split, part of it's going one way and part of it's going the other. Verse two, he begins, you are the God in whom I take refuge, that sounds really hopeful, and the next line, why have you rejected me? Why do I go about mourning because of the oppression of the enemy? It looks like part of his heart is now taking refuge in God. God has not let him go, he hasn't let God go, he's talking to him. But then he says, why have you rejected me? I think when he says, why have you rejected me, he means, why do you turn you back? He's like you've turned you back, and let my enemies get the upper hand in my life and make me so miserable. You're my refuge, I've fled to you a hundred times, I'm flying to you now. How come you let the enemy have the upper hand? There's darkness around me, and I'm mourning, and I'm oppressed, and I don't understand where you are. Now I think that is a common Christian experience. I think that from experience, I think that from the Bible. Remember the words of the man in Psalm 9, I'm not Psalm 9, Mark 9. I believe, help my unbelief, there's a divided heart. Paul in Romans 7, 19, the good that I would do, I don't do, and what I don't want to do, that I do. There's a divided heart, these two eyes. I want to do it, I don't do it. Well, who are you? I'm both. So let's look at such a common experience, as I think it is. Let's look at how this man responds in Psalm 43. The grace of God has kept him from going so far as to despair or not to want to change. He has not gone so far in his disillusionment with the presence of God that he's thrown it away. He hasn't gone that far, and that's a grace, and I hope none of you have gone that far. I expect there are people pretty close to that in this room who have walked in here almost at the end of your patience with God, and have said, if he doesn't show up soon, I'm just going to give up, and I deeply hope that this is an appointed message for you and that doesn't happen to you. He starts in verse 1, "Vindicate me, O God, defend my cause." In other words, he's crying out against his circumstances. Defeat them, vindicate me, show that I'm in the right, and these are ungodly enemies. Act, elevate me, put them down. Now that's not a wrong prayer. It's not wrong to pray, "Lord, deliver me from people." It's not wrong to pray, "Lord, deliver me from natural disaster." It's not wrong to pray, "Lord, deliver me from cancer." Those are good prayers, but they're not the main prayer in this song. He's done with that very quickly and he never comes back to it. He's got much bigger issues to deal with than that. The reason I say they're bigger and I think they're deeper and more significant is because you know, to pray, vindicate me over my enemies does not require you to be a Christian. Everybody wants that to happen. The devil wants that to happen. Doesn't take any spirituality whatsoever to pray that prayer. Expect me above my enemies is perhaps purely natural. There's nothing about it in and of itself that makes it a worthy prayer. The devil would pray it, non-Christians would pray it, anybody gets desperate enough they'll pray that prayer. But the next two strategies in this song, the devil would never do and an unbeliever would never do. That's why I call them deeper and more significant. In other words, it's not wrong to pray, vindicate me, but once you've prayed it you haven't done anything that says you're a Christian, that the Holy Spirit is in you. That might be coming from the Holy Spirit, it might be coming from pure self-exaltation. These next things, you do these, you know you're a Christian. The first thing I have in mind, only have two in mind and we're going to deal mainly with one and stick the last one on the end. He speaks to God in verses three and four and he asks God to lead him not out of trouble but to God so that he will experience God as his exceeding joy. The devil never prays like that. Neither do unbelievers, neither do pretentious believers who go to church out of duty, they do not pray this way. And the other one is in verse five, he not only speaks to God pleading that God would make God his exceeding joy, but he speaks to himself. He says self, look at verse five, he's preaching to himself, "Why are you downcast, oh my soul, why are you in turmoil within me, hoping God?" The devil never preaches to himself that way. The saints know how to go after God and the saints know how to preach to themselves. So learn now, young Christian, carnal Christian, fake Christian, learn now what it means to be a Christian. Let's take the first one. First strategy, these are strategies for what to do if you feel distant from God or that he has forsaken you or rejected you. These are what the psalmist is doing. Let's read verses three and four. Send out your light and your truth. Let them lead me. Let them bring me to your holy heel and to your dwelling and then I will go to the altar of God to God, my exceeding joy, and I will praise you with the liar, oh God, my God." Now that's an amazing prayer. It reveals much rich spiritual experience with God. It is vocabulary, his view of reality, the sequence of his thought and where it's going, the God-centeredness of his goal, his acquaintance with the sanctuary, the emotional outcomes that he anticipates. All of it reveals a man who has lived with God, knows God, has gone deep with God. And so even that kind of man can have a divided heart. Why have you rejected me? I'm taking refuge in you. Even that deep and rich, a walk with God can experience this. You notice here now, not a whiff anymore of praying for vindication over his enemies. That's okay. That's just not the main issue in life. Being proven right at work, escaping Katrina, tsunami, being healed of cancer is not the issue. The issue is, what is your exceeding joy? That's the issue in life and death and life forever. Fight the battles that matter most. This is why in my little star article, I don't waste your cancer. And at one point, I said, when you talk about beating cancer, mainly mean loving God, not getting well, mainly, mainly, no, mark yourself. As a Christian, the devil wants to get well. It's not a spiritual longing, it's a natural longing, and it's okay. It's just not the main issue, we're all going to die. I didn't think it so much about that, I wish I had time to ponder that with you right now. I'm 60. How long will I live? By the time, say, 20 years ago, by my dad's 86, that's 26 years from now for me. I don't know how many people in this church are going to be dead in 26 years. We got to walk all those people to the grave, we can walk them all to the grave. Some of them are going to be two years old, 26, 72, 91, and we're walking together to the grave. The main battle is, what are we doing on the way and through and after some main issue here in verses three and four? He's left that first issue, vindicate me, oh God, about my enemies. Of course, that's right and good, and it's going to happen in the age to come decisively, but oh, don't spend your efforts there. We got a battle to be fought, and that's not it. Now this prayer has four stages in it, and I want to get inside this great man of God. I want to be like him, I want to learn from him, would you come and learn from him with me? Let's just be learners here. We're all babies compared to these great men of God in the Bible, I think. We're all babies, and we just go there and learn, just get inside his skin now. And soak a little bit about what it's like to be a deep man of God in conflict. Stage one, verse three, send out your light and your truth, let them lead me. So he stage one in this prayer is he confesses, I need God to lead me, and the reason he needs God to lead him is because he's in the dark. When you're in the dark, you need somebody to take your hand and walk, it's just a place where there's some light, or you're going to fall in a ditch. He's feeling in dark. He doesn't understand where he's looking around, he's not seeing God, he's in the dark, and so he's crying. Sin light, sin light, he knows he's in the dark, he knows he needs a leader, he knows where light is to be found, and he pleads for light to come in to his life. Now keep in mind, he's a divided soul. He says, I take refuge in you, and yet he feels like he's in the dark, that just, that shouldn't be, right? Psalm 1830 says, he is a shield for those who are refuge, who take refuge in him. Does it run away from them? What's going on with this man is he's saying, I know God is the source of light, I know God is the source of truth, I know that God is my refuge and I don't feel it. I stand down here and pray hundreds of people over the years. One of the most common requests looks and sounds like this, Pastor John, I know God is real, I know he's my Savior, I know he forgives sins, I know he gives peace, and then the pastor, I don't feel it, that's almost the top concern, people that come to pray, that's where he is. I think that's where he is, objectively, I've got this, I've got this, subjectively, it's not working, it's not connecting. He knows, this psalmist knows, that the cause of his problem is darkness, and so he's blind to something. He wouldn't be asking for light if that weren't the problem. In the darkness he can't see something and not seeing, he's saying, I feel rejected, he's not seeing and so he feels rejected. Paul prayed for us this way, do you remember Ephesians 1, 18, may the eyes of your hearts stop and ponder that term, not these, these, may the eyes of your hearts be enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which he called you. Now they know the hope, they know the hope, here, Jesus coming back, new bodies, forgiven sins, counted righteous, forever joyful. We know this, and they don't feel any hope, and so he's praying for them, may the eyes of your heart have light so that you know, experientially know, that's what this psalmist is praying, sin forth your light, I need light because I just feel rejected right now, and I know it's my problem, please Father, have mercy and illumine the darkness that is blinding me to your reality, presence, beauty, satisfaction and making resentment and anger and bitterness and the world look very attractive, please let there be light in my life, he's not praying for physical light, physical light enables physical eyes to see physical objects, that's not what anybody needs, blind people see so much better often than seeing people. We need spiritual light to enable spiritual eyes to see spiritual things, that's how you get saved and that's what the saved soul needs to be renewed over and over again, light here, spiritual light, spiritual apprehension so that the clouds fly away from the beauty of God, my exceeding joy and he looks like what he really is again, oh God, send out your light, why does he had and truth, I think it's because that's what you see when the light comes, truth and met, Hebrew means what's substantial, what's real and the big issue in the world is people think what is real isn't real and what looks real and isn't is real, he's pleading to let that happen to me, let light come so that I can see truth, substance, reality for what it really is, namely you in all of you, all of your joy, that's stage one in his prayer, stage two, that light and truth from God would come and bring him to the holy place, to the holy dwelling, verse three in the middle, let them bring, let this truth and light bring me to your holy hill and to your dwelling and then I will go to the altar of God. So after he says God what I need is light in my darkness, he knows exactly where he needs to be, he needs to be at the altar, what happens at the altar, blood happens at the altar, anybody reading Leviticus, good night, what a bloody book, oh it's so good, refrain after refrain after refrain the blood is stolen, the bull is slit, the hands go on the head, a toman is made, forgiveness is given over and over and over again saying Christ, Christ, Christ screaming that it's coming and it has come, on this side of the cross we know where the altar is, Hebrews 1310, we have an altar from which those who serve the tabernacle may not eat, namely Christ crucified and risen, and heaven above we have a strong and perfect plea, a priest, a lamb, an altar, he's everything, he fills it all up, so what this psalmist is saying in advance of Christ is let the light come and I know what it's going to do when it comes but let it do it, it's going to reveal my sin, it's going to help me feel what a needy, morally bankrupt person it is, even my words, where are you O God, are shot through with sin and unbelief, know how I need to know my sin and I just want to be at your altar because if I feel sinful anywhere else, I'm a goner, but at your altar, at your altar there's hope for me, get me to the altar, God please, don't let me go anywhere else, the devil is telling me to go away from you, I just want to get really close to where the blood is spilt and where the mercy seat is and where you come down into your kind of glory, I want to get really close there so that I know my sin, I know your grace, I feel forgiven, that's step, stage two, stage three, then verse four, I will go to the altar of God to God, my exceeding joy, the final goal of the Christian life is not the forgiveness of sins, that's a means to the final goal who is God himself experienced as our everlasting exceeding joy, God is the gospel, I love this verse with all my heart, I live here not because I know this daily, but because I want to know it daily and I hope you want to know it daily, hope you pray this way daily, oh I wish we had time to unpack the Hebrew, but if I started talking Hebrew I would lose everybody, but the implications of this little phrase, exceeding joy, that's the best we can do in English, gladness of my rejoicing, joy of my joy, joy of my gladness, let me just put it in a sentence I think, Father what I want is that light would come, banish all darkness, reveal reality, get me to the altar, get me clean and then enable me to experience you as the joy in as the core, the root, the heart of all my other joys, all other joys that you have in life which are not joys in God also are empty joys, hollow joys, they will burst like a bubble someday. If you have joys that don't have God at the center and it can be joy in food or joy in family or joy in artistic accomplishment or joy in something you've built, all those are okay joys if they're not hollow joys, that is joys that have the core being joy in God so that when all those are stripped away joy is not stripped away. The only way the Bible makes sense, text after text will not make sense unless God is your exceeding joy, that's stage three in this prayer and it's an amazing stage because keep in mind this man is surrounded by enemies. Got this? This man is surrounded by enemies and he's fighting to see God as his exceeding joy. Do you do that when you are beleaguered at work? Can family dynamics come crushing in on you? Do you say this is not the main issue, he's the main issue, my soul is the main issue. Do I find my exceeding joy here am I crying out for that or am I totally consumed with his family, totally consumed with that job, totally consumed with his cancer, don't let it be, stage four, and verse four at the end, and I will praise you with the liar, oh God, oh my God, authentic joy in God overflows with praise, pianos, drums, guitars, saxophones. It's not wrong to say we were made for God, it's not wrong to say we were made for joy, it's not wrong to say we were made to praise, but it's better to say we were made to enjoy God with overflowing praise, in other words it's better to collapse them all into one. We were made to enjoy God with overflowing instrument expressing praise, life laying down praise, and all of this coming from a man whose heart is divided. That's the first strategy that I hope you will use if you feel distant from God. Go to Psalm 43, 3 and 4, and walk through those four stages, mean them from your heart. Now I close and that's all I have time to do with the second strategy, which is verse five, this is worth a sermon and maybe I'll preach it someday. Not only does he undertake the strategy of speaking to God for the sake of his soul, he also speaks to his soul on behalf of God, let's read it. Why are you downcast, oh my soul, so you got he and you got his soul, and they're talking to each other. Why are you downcast, oh my soul, and why are you in turmoil within me? Hope in God, preaching to himself, hope in God, for I shall again praise him, my salvation and my God. So here are two great practical steps you can take when you feel forsaken by God. You can preach to yourself and you can pray to God. I don't think anything is more important in your mind than to preach the gospel to yourself. It gives anything more important in your mind than to preach the gospel to yourself every day. We should preach hope and we should pray to God. Now while we're apart, that's for him, for the next five months, would you do this, would you do this? Just as the elders will see to it that the gospel is preached in this pulpit, and here's where I would draw your attention to this, Sam said I was going to draw your attention to this. That's all I'm going to do, is draw your attention to it because it's right there. I don't need to read through it. I'm really encouraged by what's on this sheet. These are the preaching plans. Mind of man plans his way and the Lord orders his steps so we don't know who's preaching. We just plan who's preaching, but that's the plan and it's a good one. The elders will be vigilant to see to it that the gospel is preached here. Now would you see to it that the gospel is preached by you to your soul? Would you say over and over again, why are you downcast on my soul? And why are you in turmoil within me, hoping God, Piper's soul, sitting there in your desk in Cambridge and being discouraged, this problem that won't yield hope in God? Rush shall again praise him, my salvation and my God. Would you do that? If everybody at Bethlehem were not only hearing the gospel from the pulpit and singing the gospel in praises, but preaching the gospel to their own soul, what might God be pleased to do? So if God wills on August 6th, we will again together praise him, our salvation and our God. Let's pray. Father in heaven, as we close, I pray that you would manifest by your spirit Jesus Christ risen from the dead, very God, a very God as our exceeding joy manifest him. Let light, sin forth light and truth into this room as we close, and as we sing Jesus, Jesus priceless treasure, source of purest pleasure, make it real, pray in his name, let's stand and sing together. Thank you for listening to this resource from DesiringGod.org. 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John Piper | When you feel divided and distant from God, feed your soul the glorious truth of the gospel.