Join us for weekly messages from C3OC’s team!
C3OC Church
Soul Music - Ps Joseph Pringle
So Psalm 103 verses one to five, it says, "Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me, no reservations, it is all that is within me, all that is within my soul will bless the Lord. All that is tough, all that is easy, all that is rich, all that is poor, it will submit to blessing the Lord. Bless his holy name, bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits, who forgives all your iniquity, not some, he forgives it all, who heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from the pit, from the pit, who crowns you with steadfast love and mercy, who satisfies you with good so that your youth, amen to all those people over 40, your youth, is renewed like the Eagles." I love it. It's a piece of America in the Bible, like the bald eagle. Generally, I just have thematic message titles. I don't know if we're going to have snazzy series hooks that are going to carry people through a series or snazzy titles, but I like to call this one soul music, or reminder to remember. Reminder to remember. Okay, soul music was a little bit better, wasn't it? Okay, cool. So, oh, my soul. It's the beginning of soul music. He writes, "Bless the Lord twice." And I don't think this is a vain repetition within his mind. Oh, let's vainly repeat this. I don't know what to write on the second line, so I'm just going to write it again. There is an intention. The Holy Spirit guides his pen. He's showing us that again and again, we have to stir ourselves up, to be reminded that we are to worship his name, that we are to bless the name of God, bless the name of Jesus, that it would be shameful for us to offer anything less than the deepest depths of our souls. How many times have we come around worship and there's kind of like that? Oh, I don't know about this today. I was driving my wife and she got on my nerves. I should have let her drive on the way to church. Sorry, that's just something we're working on in our marriage. Happy anniversary, sweetie. There are those moments within worship that we let our soul dictate how much we are going to worship God. Maybe it's the song selection. We get up and we're like, "Oh, gosh, Sean, you're singing that. I love God." Whoa, I don't like that song. I'm just going to worship a little less. That's coming with a preference towards giving praise to God. Is he worthy of praise, regardless of my preferences? Is he worthy of praise, regardless of my emotional state that I would lay that down and say, "My emotions are not a master within my world. They are not a Lord because they're terrible ones, but they are my servants, the great indicators, terrible masters." And so here he is saying twice, "Oh, my soul, bless it, bless him, bless the Lord, bless him because he is good that he would absolutely stir within him this spirit of praise, this spirit of worship." And we need that within our lives. We need to stir ourselves and spur ourselves a lot of the time. And don't lie, I mean, we need to encourage ourselves. We can't just depend on the encouragement of a sermon or of a good friend near us and don't get me wrong. Those are great, but we also need to be in a space where we can encourage ourselves, where we can govern our emotions and say, "Let's go forward." Amen? We need the spirit of God to do that too. In Romans, I believe chapter 5, it says, "The mind that is governed by the spirit finds life and peace, but the mind that is governed by self finds death." We don't need things running around in our minds. Amen? We need life and we need peace. So let's set the governor of our minds as the spirit of God. These verses so closely together saying the same thing give us the necessary cadence to regularly remind ourselves that you can bless God. You bless God when you return glory to him. When you return praise to God, we begin to bless him. We praise him. Bless is also another word for praising his name. These verses, these first two verses, Omar Sol, it's like the tuning of his harp. It's the preparation for the strumming out of what he is about to praise God for, that when he strums, there is a pleasing harmony. David is also laying out for us that talking to yourself ain't so crazy. A little bit of self-talk, a little bit of self-faith motivation that you would talk to yourself, you know, how funny is it when you see someone walking around on the street and you don't see their Bluetooth and they're kind of standing on the corner and they're next to you. When I lived in New York, it was a very common occurrence. I'm like, who is this guy talking to? You know, it looks like they're talking to themselves. But here, David is kind of saying, like, you need to talk to yourself. You need to speak faith over your world that this kind of self-talk is real and there is a reality, a real outcome from it, that we would begin to stir ourselves to a place of reminder of his good things. So David's laying out talking to yourself doesn't make you all that crazy. And he says, "Forget not these things." And then he goes on and lists off what not to forget. Do not forget all his benefits. There might be some benefits that we lose recognition for that we begin to forget about because we don't marvel so often at them. And we need to be in a place where we can pick them up and begin to marvel at these benefits that God gives us. It's easy to forget things. As life goes on, as things go up and down in our worlds, as stress comes, and chaos begins to ensue, we can forget things, right? Okay, you guys are all, you're remembering everything. But the older I get, the more I forget, I was like, did that really happen? You know, my testimony also includes a pretty wild few years of drug use and alcohol abuse that burnt a lot of connecting things to memories. There are songs that I have sung 400,000 times and I forget the words. I'm in the middle of it. I'm like trying to remember it. But how awesome is it when you hear a song? So for instance, in my childhood, there's these memories, great memories of growing up in our house. And every time I hear Van Morrison or I hear the Rolling Stones, it takes me back to this laughter that is through the house as I'm going to sleep of my parents laughing with people and this kind of party happening outside and it's like a sweet memory comes back. Does anyone have those moments? You smell something or you taste something or you hear a song and it takes you back to a moment. For better or for worse, it just brings back that moment and that memory to the front. David is calling us to search for those moments that we would begin to seek out all of these benefits that you have received. In receiving Christ, you receive forgiveness for all our iniquity, the healing of all of our diseases with a scene or unseen that these benefits are active within us still to this day and we have received from them in the past. And he says that all our energies should be called out. God's all cannot be praised with less than our all. All of his benefits deserve all of our praise, not just partial, not just on my Wednesday worship time, not just on the Sunday Christian karaoke moment, but all of his benefits deserve nothing less than all of our praise. That not so much as one of these divine dealings should be forgotten. They are all beneficial to us. They are all subjects for praise. So it is so important for us to recall and recount the blessings that he has poured out on us so that we remain faithful to the mission that he is placed in front of us. Forgetfulness is the enemy of your faithfulness and will limit your fruitfulness because a seed that grows has to remain. So our faith has a foundation and that foundation is the known revelation of Jesus Christ, of his goodness, of his love, of his mercy for us, and the knowing and understanding of the benefits that we have received. And so we need to create patterns in our life to remind ourselves. We need to get spiritual disciplines within our walk that continually remind ourselves of these benefits. Listen, the enemy comes to still, kill, and destroy, to steal, kill, and destroy. He's not kind of a brazen thief. He's not a stupid thief. He has perfected his craft. Generally, if we have something valuable, we kind of lock it away in a place. We may not pull it out so regularly because we kind of forget about it, right? I tend to think that if we don't supply praise and we bring out and look at these benefits on a regular basis, they kind of begin to sit back in our safe. You know, and it's just back here. But the thing is, is that he is such a good thief that though it might be valuable to you, you don't know if it's gone because the thief would come in and he takes it. He's not going to rob your house that you wake up and go, "A robber just came in." He might steal something that is so valuable, yet you have no care for it. So to continually pull this out and say, "I need this," because after he steals it, he's going to try and destroy it. And after he tries to destroy it, he doesn't want it to be risen again. He wants to kill it. And so we have to remain within this, these patterns that remind ourselves of his benefit. So I want to give us four things, and this is not an exhaustive list of ways to remind ourselves. I want you to think what would work personally for you also in being reminded of these incredible benefits that he has flooded us with. So the first is praise. Number one, praise. Praise is your gratitude expressed. It's what you are grateful for within you expressed. Now, it can also be counted as just an expression. Towards God, it would be our gratitude expressed. But I think that we might spend a little more time praising our problems, because praise is coming out of our mouth. It is a spoken word that we are saying, "God, I'm so grateful for the salvation that you have bestowed on me." Oh, for the work of your blood that has redeemed me and produced a new life within me. So when we begin to think about it, are we kind of praising our problems a bit more than we are praising the God who can bring solution? Because it's real easy for us as humans, we have a great tendency of thinking of all of the hard times of the past and refusing the testimonies of his goodness. That cynical outlook beginning to churn within us begins to come in our speech. James says the tongue is like a rudder. It's very powerful. It steers the ship, even though it might be big, the big ship, the big ship of life, the big ship of purpose. Where is my rudder going? Where is the rudder setting a course for one degree can be miles, hundreds of miles off from the destination. So we want our praise to be one of gratitude that is remembering all that he has done. Thank you for the forgiveness. Thank you for the healing of all diseases. Thank you, Father. And the way that we can do that is instead of storing up cynicism and all the problems. And we need spaces to talk about these. I'm not saying, you know, just have faith talk from now on. No, no, no. I'm not saying that. Don't read it wrong. We need spaces to talk about what we're currently facing. But in those personal times as well, well, man, the inventory of my heart is going to be the good things of God. For the inventory is what I'm going to draw upon. I want to Costco Hall of all of the good benefits that I can go in and I'll be like, yeah, I want that. I'm going to say, give me that super-sized perfect box, whatever it is. Oh, my gosh, a cheese block that is the size of a semi-trailer. Yes, faith. I want that cheese block of faith. Stuff the shopping cart. Bring me that flat pack one. And you've got to inventory that stuff. The good thing about inventories, you know, when you're getting low on something as well. So these check-ins that you go, oh, man, what is my mouth praising at the moment? What is my mouth speaking about to my friends when I'm relaxed and all of this? What is the common theme that is within my speech? David says, sing a new song to the Lord. And I think that's a deep revelation that we can all grasp, which is the question, well, what is the tune I'm singing now? What is my tune? And if it's not a tune that's in harmony or singing a beautiful melody, then maybe I need to change my tune. I'm going to do that. I'm going to change my tune. The gossip would be far from my mouth. That slander and evil talk would be far from my mouth. I'm going to fill it and equip it with praise that we would remind ourselves continually of the gratitude for God and of all of his benefits. Amen? So we build that inventory. You got it? We've got to build that inventory. We've got to seek it out. What are the benefits of my salvation? Go and ask yourself those questions. Write them down. Okay, number two, testimony, testimony. These are the reasons or sorry, the patterns that we can create within our worlds to remind ourselves of the good things God has done in your worlds and the good things he is continuing to do, our testimony. Be the best storyteller in this church. What that takes is personal practice. Don't wait for the moment. I know some of us like to prepare in a bottleneck, but let's get prepared in this, that you would write down your testimony. I would say write down a 10-minute testimony and write down like a three-minute testimony. Write down a three-hour testimony while you're at it. Why not? But do you remember your story when Jesus came into the midst of it and he changed your world? Okay, yeah, I do. Now can I talk about it? How can I talk about it in its potency? In 1 Peter 3.15, we're given this instruction, always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. Do this with gentleness and respect. So we have to create that story and be prepared with it. That means I am pre- paired with it. In the pre-game, I am paired with my testimony so that I can speak it in the moment. Right? We don't want to learn the plays while the game is unfolding, although sometimes that does happen. But in the things that we can prepare for, let's get prepared with it. So I encourage each of us to write down our testimony. Write it down. And there's a good little equation that I would use. How it was, what happened, and how it is now. You talk about how it was in the shortest form. You talk about what happened in the middle longest form. It's the second longest form. And how it is now is your longest part of your testimony. So that you also can remind yourself in hard days, oh man, I've got it written down. I'm going to look at this. That's what he's done. Though my faith might be low today, this is going to lift my faith. He has done this. Oh my gosh. And what about my friend who practiced their testimony with me? So you guys can get together and talk about your testimonies together. And let me say, you don't have to be a Colombian drug lord that all of a sudden got saved and his life was completely transformed. He got out of the mafia and he served 25 years in prison. He got out and that's a testimony. You don't have to have that. You don't have to have your testimony as yours and some of the best testimonies. Man, I wish my testimony was I met Christ at a young age and I followed him until today and I'm going to follow him tomorrow because of this, this, and this. Man, his benefits that I understood and took on and put into motion in my world, oh my gosh, I couldn't help but follow him because he satisfied every desire of my heart. Every testimony brings something of heaven to the atmosphere. It gives us a divine moment when things shift and are transformed because the record of God's activity is revealed. We've got to record it. We've got to write it down. The Bible is a set of testimonies of God in motion. Those testimonies are continued today. The canon is created. That's the inspired word of God. We're not adding to it. We're not trying to revise it. That's the greatest thing about the Bible. There's no revision. It's not a self-help book. It is the first edition. It is the all authority of word of God that stands in all seasons. Never withers, never fades. It'll stand forever. That is our guiding light. That is the voice of God within our worlds. You want the voice of God to guide your testimony, read the Bible. Oh my gosh, these testimonies of things happening. They're not reserved for back in the olden days. They are testimonies to bring faith within our world that God can do it again. That God still moves. That's the story of our testimony. As we hear what God has done for others, it releases faith that He can do the same for us. Your story can inspire that faith in others as well. Number three, you still with me? You getting something out of it? Incredible. Number three, the table. We have what we call our small groups, whatever you want to call it, your connect groups. We call them tables for a specific reason, because we think it's important. Throughout the Bible, it's worth noting that at the center of the spiritual lives of God's people, both in the Old Testament and the New Testament, we find a table. The table of the Passover in the Old Testament and the table of communion in the New Testament. When Jesus himself wanted to explain to His disciples what His forthcoming death was all about, He didn't give them a theory, He gave them a meal. Isn't that beautiful? He gave them a meal. And so we think it's important that as the believers, we gather around the table. We laugh around the table. You see Jesus, when He's sitting down, He's connecting with these people. Jesus was an awesome guy. So was Paul. Everyone's like, "Paul was this staunch little grumpy, but He was loved. He was so loved." And it was because these people, they sit down, they're breaking bread with one another. How can you not break bread with someone? And you're like, I love just chatting with this person. Is it what's that? Yeah, love it. You begin to form those relationships and it's in those moments that you begin talking. I love just hanging out and talking about life and our hobbies and activities, but also what's God doing in your world? What's God saying to you? What's been happening in your life? Oh my gosh, that's incorrect. Can we pray together? That I could be a part of something in the testimony on your page that you speak about? Man, I want to believe with you through these circumstances. And so gathering around the table is there's tables of discipleship that begin to be very intentional. Hey, we're going to talk about characters and spiritual disciplines and then self-governance and then leading within the kingdom of God. Let's really begin to build and disciple because it's a hard life if discipleship just happens from a pulpit. I cannot subscribe to that being discipleship. Discipleship happens on the road when you're walking side by side. Those disciples, the marker for it all, were walking with Jesus in those days they were gathering the dust of their rabbi, for they walked so closely behind that they are gathering the dust. They are hearing his voice on a consistent basis. They are open to his teaching, to correction, to encouragement, to instruction, that they would take that on board and begin moving forward. We want to be a church of discipleship, not want, we are going to be a church of discipleship. With intentionality, behind relationships, we want you to live your best life in Christ. We want you to discover the fullness of the gifts that God has given you. The table is a part of that. The table is where we have those conversations. His power is sitting down with one another and joining each other's company, having deep and shallow conversations. We don't just always have to have deep conversations. We can also come up for air. We don't always have to be whales at all times. We can be dolphins. We can skip up on the top as well. It's good. And don't reserve laughter. Let laughter happen. Laughter is medicine for the heart. Laughter can do a whole bunch for his soul. Amen? So get around people who make you laugh. My wife calls me funny. I don't think I'm that funny. I just have dad jokes. How do you make holy water? How do you make holy water? You boil the hell out of it. I'm sorry. Okay. Is that a bad word? I don't know. In America. Okay. Yeah. It's in the Bible. I am. I'm boiling the evil out of it. There you go. Okay. Number four in our last point here is we come all close. Altars of remembrance. We need to set up altars of remembrance in our journeys. In Joshua 4 after the whole of Israel across the Jordan, it had ceased to flow, Joshua commanded them to set up 12 stones that it would be remembered by generations what God has done in that moment. Places of remembrance need to be set up. So not only we don't forget, but our children don't forget that their children's children's don't forget that there are statutes within our life and altars that have been set up in remembrance of what God has done. All through the Bible, you'll see in Bethel when God had revealed a great vision of Jacob. He set up an altar. He set up an altar. He slept on the altar as well. He said he stuck his head on a rock and then he built an altar out of it. That we would go back in time and begin to record these moments, setting up altars, maybe writing them down and sticking them on a wall, that at all seasons, I will see this. I'm going to create a day with my family of remembrance that every year we remember what God has done in this day. Hey, why are we doing this? We're doing this for this reason. This is the day that pop-pop came to Christ. This is the day of remembrance when that miracle happens, that we would remember God. We have all these de-presidents day and all these other weird days and then long-standing holidays. Why don't we just create within our own calendar of events, oh man, this is the day of remembrance for when this happened that my children would continue to. David writes in Psalm 77, 11 to 15, he says, "I will remember the deeds of the Lord." Yes, I will remember your wonders of old. I will ponder all your work and meditate on your mighty deeds. Your way, oh God is holy. What God is great like our God and you are the God who works wonders. Is he the God that works wonders in your life? Well, God will remember he's saying, I went back all the way, all the way. And the reason he could go back all the way is because someone set up an altar. Someone set up a record for him to look at and go, oh my gosh, God is wondrous. His deeds are mighty. That we can do the same for our children. That we can do the same for our faith. Go by a journal and write with your hand. Don't do it typing like this. Do it with your hand. Write down all the incredible works that God has done in your life. Also in the others around you, the other stories that you know so you can remind yourself when you were in the midst of stress or chaos or even an encouragement to those around you. Testimony is not only meant to be reserved for our own faith but for the faith of those around us. Amen. Let's stand up here today. We got to grasp this and begin to implement the patterns to remember in our worlds, our purpose. If we don't, our purpose will be distorted by a void of faith. We got to keep returning to remind ourselves of his goodness, of what he has done within our lives. That God, knowing God, receiving from God is a benefit. It's not a chore. It's not something I just got to do. It is such a benefit when he pours into us. When we learn more about him, when we write it down, when we tell our testimony, when we can pray for people with the same faith and fervor as those we read about in the Bible. We need to be continually reminded of how good our God is. We need to be spurred on and stirred up consistently. We need to teach ourselves to shake off the dust and rise up clothed with praise, clothed with strength for the days ahead, a beautiful with God. The days ahead are beautiful with God. They may not always be the prettiest of seasons. Yes, there is corruption, bribery, and malice and deceit everywhere in the world. But we need to be reminding ourselves of what God has not called us to be, but who he has called us to be. How he has redeemed us, he's forgiven us, he has healed us, he has satisfied us through his glorious son, Jesus Christ. Your identity is not wrapped up and limited to your enneagram or to your personality type. It is only found in the risen son of God, Jesus, who gives liberty without reproach, who restores without invoice, and who is faithful without compromise. The living God is worth remembering. The living God is worth praising. The living God is worth living for and living with. God, O God, we thank you for your goodness. God, we come before you if we need a repent because we have forgotten that we have ceased praise in particular seasons. God, we come back to you here today that we would bless you and thank you for all of your benefits that you have forgiven us. You carried the cross we could never carry, so that we can live in a freedom that is truly free, so that we could be secure in a peace that is truly peaceful. God, O God, that we could live a life that is abundant, that is abundant, God, that is prosperous, that is blessed in the name of Jesus. Thank you, Father, that we would not cease or withhold in any day or season. I thank you that we would be an encouragement to one another. God, fill us up with your Holy Spirit here today. I thank you, Father. You are a good, good Father, with good, good things for our lives. I thank you. Your purpose would be so clearly in front of us in the mighty name of Jesus. We all said, Amen. [BLANK_AUDIO]