[MUSIC PLAYING] This is the Commission Church online. Welcome to our podcast. We want to be a church who brings heaven on earth with the word of God and the love of Christ. I pray this week's message blesses you. You know, as I was reading and as I was preparing the word for today, I was just challenging my heart with Psalm 63. And that's kind of where I want to go with the study of God's word for today. So I might go slow today, but I want to teach a little bit. Is that OK? Can we learn the word of God? In Psalm 63, David is writing this beautiful Psalm. And as I was studying this word, I said, man, I think it would be appropriate to do something that I did when I was growing up in my church. We would read Psalms together, and I've not done this in a long time, but I want all of y'all to stand up to our feet. And we're going to read the word together. We're going to do a throwback Bible reading. If that's OK, is that OK? If you have your Bibles with you, open your Bibles to Psalm 63. Just want to change it up a little bit today. If you don't have your Bibles with you, look at the screens. I want to encourage you. We're a Bible-based, Bible-learning, Bible-teaching church. So please bring your Bibles with you to church when you come. Also, bring a notebook. Take notes when you are in church. It will bless your heart. Here's what we're going to do. We're going to read in response. So I'll read verse 1. I want you to read verse 2. I'll read verse 3. You read verse 4. And we'll go odd, even, odd, even in that order. Is that good? Everybody understand the rules? Let's go. Oh, God, you are my God. Earnestly, I seek you. My soul thirsts for you. My flesh feigns for you. As in a dry and weary land where there is no water. Because your steadfast love is better than life, my lips will praise you. Go to the next slide. My soul will be satisfied as with fat and rich food. And my mouth will praise you with joyful lips. For you have been my help, and in the shadow of your wings, I will sing for joy. But those who seek to destroy my life shall go down into the depths of the earth. But the king shall rejoice in God. Can we all read this together? But the king shall rejoice in God. All who swear by him shall exalt. For the mouths of liars will be stopped. Father, would you speak to us through this word? We give you praise in the glory. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. You may be seated. I love teaching from the Psalms whenever I get the opportunity. The Psalms are an expression of praise. The Psalms are expressions of pain, of healing. There are different expressions that you can find in itself through the reading and the studying of the Psalms. Although penned by different poets and authors over time, one author that stands out and that teaches us a lot from the Psalms is King David. There are many Psalms that he pens or songs, as we could call them, that he pens when he was a lowly shepherd boy. And then there are Psalms that he pens when he is a king. Some that he pens when he's sitting in his palatial precincts and others that he pens as he is in the wilderness. The image that you probably have of the poetic King David is probably one where he's dressed in his kingly robes, reclining in his palace, and writing these songs that we sing today. But unfortunately, this particular Psalm is not one like that. It's not a song of reflection where David is sitting in his palace or on his throne and recounting the blessings of God or recounting the goodness of God. This particular Psalm, and you can go back to verse number one, you will see in its inscription, it says it is a Psalm of David, and he writes this when he was in the wilderness of Judah. If you study the life of David, you will find that there are two times that David finds himself in the wilderness predominantly. Number one, in 1 Samuel 20, David was anointed to become king. Samuel has passed on the anointing on him and said, you are going to become king. King Saul, who is the reigning king, loses it, and he wants to kill David because he does not want David to take over as king. David, instead of fighting him back, David knows that his time has not yet come, and using judgment and discernment, David decides instead of fighting, he would flee. David picks up everything he has. He is fleeing from Saul, and he ends up in the desert. He ends up in the wilderness as the last attempt of life and self-preservation. Second, in Second Samuel chapter 15 and 16, you will come across this passage of scripture where his own son, Absalom, has stolen his kingdom from him. David has lost his kingdom. While he's still king, Absalom has overthrown him. He has won his generals and his people over, and he has said, I am now king, and he has even threatened to kill his own father's life. And David, instead of fighting, David is now fleeing. There are moments in David's life that you see that David was a warrior. He raised warriors to stand around him. In none of these situations, I don't think David would have been weak enough to fight the battle that he was about to fight. But yet, in a moment of meekness, M-E-E-K, N-E-S-S, he lays down his sword, he lays down his fight, and instead he resolves for flight. The word meekness is the word that connotes the ability that one has to wield his sword, but yet chooses to sheath it instead. David, in the ultimate demonstration of meekness, sheeds his sword and decides to run from these two situations. Both of these times, the Bible says David flees to the wilderness. Now, we don't know exactly which wilderness David is talking about over here, but by the language that David is using in the Psalm, and from the understanding from different writers and commentators, we kind of are going to assume that this is the latter fleeing the way he is fleeing from his son, Absalom. Why? Because you understand that in some of the verbiage he uses. Now, all of this matters, and why does it matter? Because the wilderness experience is an experience that the Christian needs to understand fully if the Christian needs to understand their relationship with God. The wilderness is where you experience hardships. The wilderness is where you experience down times. The wilderness is where you experience dry spells. The wilderness is where you don't get all the pleasures of the world will give you. In one sentence, the wilderness is where your experience does not meet your expectations. You expect to do certain things. You expect to be in certain places. Can you put that slide up? It is where you want to be in certain places where you feel like God is taking you to some places. But I want you to write this down. Wilderness is where your experience does not meet your expectations. And some of us are probably in a Saul-induced wilderness. And some of us are in a wilderness that is induced by an Absalom, where in the Saul-induced wilderness, whatever you are looking forward to is taken away from you. He was going to become king. But that particular aspiration and expectation is stripped away from him in a moment. And here he finds himself in a wilderness. Some of us are in an Absalom-induced wilderness where what you have is taken away from you. So one wilderness is where what you want to be is taken away from you. What you need is taken away from you. Your goals and your dreams and your aspirations are stripped away from you, and you find yourself in a wilderness of need and want. And you're wondering why you're there in the first place. And the second wilderness is a wilderness where what you have and what you're in and the blessings that you are in is stripped away from you overnight. Anybody find yourself in a wilderness today. Anybody has ever found themselves in a wilderness in your life. These are the two wildernesses that Christians often find themselves in. Wilderness is where you don't expect to be, where everything you had was just taken away from you. You had it in your grasp, you had it in your reach, and yet it was stripped away, and you were driven to tears, you were driven to pain, and you find yourself in solace, you find yourself in loneliness. The Saul wilderness is the loss of what could be, and the Absalom wilderness is a loss of what once was. And in that wilderness, be it whichever category, we see David crying out, and he's making a statement. I want you to go to verse one. The Bible says, David says this, he starts off, and he says, "Oh God, you are my God." Believer, I want to start with this today. Brother's sister, that's listening to me. Remember, no matter what wilderness you are going through, the Christian needs to resolve that without the knowledge of God, you will never be brought to a situation that you will never be brought to a desert that you have found yourself in. David knows for sure that without the knowledge of the sovereign God, he wouldn't be where he is. I want to remind you church today, no matter what your wilderness looks like, I pray that you will learn to praise God in your wilderness, just like you praise God in the palace, just like you praise God when you killed Goliath, just when you praise God when everybody was praising you. Just like you praise God when you got that promise from God that you will become this, and you will do this, and you will do that. Just like you thank God for his goodness, even when you walk through the value of the shadow of death, could you, as a believer, and as a Christian, still stand up and say, "God, you are still my God." It hasn't changed. It takes a lot. It takes a lot to be able to believe in the goodness of God even in the midst of no goodness. In the midst of negativity, in the midst of dryness, in the midst of a desert, can I still have the ability, he says, "My God," it's important to remind yourself of the sovereignty of God during times like this. Even though those who loved him had forsaken him, he is still God. Even though my own son has turned on me, you are still my God. The word reminds us, although everybody may leave you, or forsake you, I will never leave you, I will never forsake you, says the Lord God almighty. The Bible says, "Because I live, you shall also live." That is my God. I want you to listen to me. Sometimes when all you have is God, you realize all you need is God. I'm gonna say that again, and write this down. Sometimes you come to wilderness experiences where you realize that sometimes all you have is God, and it's in those moments that God leads you to, that you begin to realize and understand that because of all you have is God, all you need is God. Sometimes God has to take us to moments like that, where we are stripped away of everything this world offers to us. Yeah, you could fight the situation you're walking through, or you could flee the situation you're walking through. Sometimes God takes us through self-preservation modes. He changes gears for us, and he changes our steps, and he orders our steps in order for us to walk through the darkest of valleys. But remember that God's hand is in it, and he is directing you into those places, because he wants you to realize that moments of despair, all you need is his presence, and his grace, and his love, and his mercy. And I want to remind you, when you can trust in God in those moments, he will guide you through those deserts. He says, "Oh God, you are my God." There's so much of surety in that. There's a blessed assurance in that statement, power in words is something that we just don't hear about, just here and there, we hear about it often, we hear about it every day. Declare over your life that your God is your God. He says earnestly I seek you. My soul terse for you. I want you to hear me. He doesn't say, "God, you are my God," because he's found him, because he feels him, because he understands his presence. He's in a desert experience, and a desert experience. You don't feel God. You don't experience the presence of God, and he's saying, "God, what am I doing?" Even in my desert experience, I'm gonna acknowledge you, and yet I am going to what? I'm gonna seek you. It's in your desert experiences that you will feel God closer than any other time before, but that doesn't stop you from seeking him more, because the more you seek him, the more you find him. I really wanna teach this this morning. The Bible says, "My soul terse for you. "My flesh faints for you as in a dry and weary land "where there is no water." David is using two illustrations that he knows his listeners will understand, and is trying to demonstrate just how serious it is for us to go hard after God. Yeah, I'm titling my message today, hungry for God, because I want us to understand why we need to be hungry for God, and how our hunger can change to blessing. He says, first of all, that he feels like he's gonna die of thirst. That's kind of like the insinuation that we're getting from what he's saying. He's saying, "My soul terse for you, Lord. "Have you ever been so thirsty that you thought "that you were gonna die unless you got something to drink? "I don't know if you've ever been there before." It's probably after you play some basketball, or after you ran, or you did a workout, or some of you all are looking at me weird, they're like, "We don't do any of that stuff." I've been in those situations where you're like, "If I don't get water at this very moment, "I am going to collapse." And it's crazy when you do drink water. It's like, it's all over you, falling all over the place, and your clothes are wet, because you are that thirsty. Have any of us been this serious about our pursuit of God, and I want you to see the words that he's using, and he's like, "Man, I'm dying for thirst. "That's how I need you right now, my God." When he's taken away from people, when he's taken away from Netflix, and when he's taken away from his job, and his identity, because the things that give you identity, like him being a king, and him being a father, and him being a husband, and him being all of these roles that he's in, that the daily life and the grind requires you to step in and fulfill, when all of that is taken away from him, he senses this need for him to understand that he becomes hungry for the things of God. Has going hard after God become as important to us, like water is to someone dying of thirst. Maybe we're not thirsty enough yet. Maybe we're comfortable. Maybe we're okay with those slight sips of water. The other illustration that he uses is the pursuit of God. It's like someone starving to death. He's like talking about this deep hunger, and you and I probably know this, and I talk about this every time I talk about fasting in prayer, and I say that man can live without food for more than 30 days, that's not a problem. We have food that's stored inside that can sustain us for at least 30 days. Yeah, we'll get weak, we'll get weary, but we can go without food for 30 days, but you can live without water for more than 10 days. Or three days, when you're in a dry climate, like David is in at that moment, in the wilderness, three days is the max you can go without water. And David's probably wondering, Lord, why am I in this wilderness? And some of you all are probably looking at the wilderness situation inside of you, that you're walking through, and you're wondering Lord, what did I do to deserve this wilderness that I'm walking through? But I want to remind somebody today, God sometimes directs people to the wilderness to heighten their hunger, so that you can realize that when you're stripped of everything else that makes you hungry, 'cause sometimes man, we crave for relationships way too much. We crave for company way too much. We crave to be with people way too much. We crave to do things way too much. Am I talking, some of us are so addicted to work, and that business that's making you so much of money, that God's like, sometimes I have to take you through a valley and take you through dark times, and take you through a desert experience sometimes, so that I can take you closer to where you can develop a hunger for the right things. This is making sense? I was talking to this guy the other day, man. He's dating a girl that I know, and he's not a Christian. She's a believer. She really wants to marry this guy. I said, "Pastor, please talk to him, "I've been trying to minister to him," and there are things that he believes in, and he's looking for answers, and he's not against it, but there's something that he told me. He said, "Pastor, I really want you," told me her name, and said, "I really want you to pray for her." I said, "Okay, I want to hear this." And he said, "She is making an idol off me. "She is yielding to idolatry, "and she's making an idol of me. "And she's treating our relationship like an idol "to where I think and I believe that she shouldn't be." And I'm like, "This is coming from a non-believer, "a man that sees a Christian woman "that is treating their relationship like an idol." And sometimes God will take away relationships from your life. He will strip relationships from you, he will strip things that you consider as an idol. It could be your job. I've been through these conversations with so many people where people have lost their jobs, and it is your identity, and it is who you are. You live, you breathe, you talk. Everything about you is your job. For other people, it's those friendships and those toxic relationships. Everything about you is there. You're with them, you're all about them. Your whole life revolves around them. Outside of them, there is no definition of you and no identity that you have. And God's like, "Man, sometimes I gotta do some harsh things "of stripping off some things so that your identity "can not be wrapped up in idolatry, "but your identity can be restored to relationship with me." Do you know that God is craving that? That God wants to know you, that God wants to love us, that God wants to have an intimate relationship with us? And sometimes God is gonna direct people to the wilderness to heighten that hunger. Look at the Israelites. They were taken to the wilderness, why? Because God wanted them to know what it would be for them to rely on Him. God takes Moses for 40 years into the wilderness, 40 years. God takes David into the wilderness. God takes his own son, Jesus, into the wilderness. And you know what Jesus' biggest test was? What he was supposed with the question in Jesus' response and says, "Man shall not live by bread alone." He understands that it's not hunger for the things of the world. He knows Jesus sets his example and says, "Get thee behind." Man, food and water are just these potent symbols, but Jesus manifests as a bread of life in the source of living water. And he says, "I am here to fill you up, and I am here to give you everything you need." He is drawing us into a personal, intimate relationship where he wants you and me to get into intimacy with Him. And sometimes it's painful circumstances and situations that start up a hunger within us church. The good times teach you nothing. They're enjoyable, but they're rarely formative. So yeah, the good times are great, but they're not teaching moments in anybody's life. They don't teach you anything. God allows us hunger so that we can draw closer to Him. This is what the Bible says in Deuteronomy chapter eight, verses three to five, and he humbled you and let you hunger and fed you with manna. No, listen carefully. I am not preaching heresy here. This is what the Bible says. This is the words of God. God says, the Bible says this, and he humbled you. God humbled you and let you hunger. Someone say he allowed you to go hungry. Wow, God, are you that mean? Are you that sadistic? No, I allowed you to go hungry, but not only did I allow you to go hungry, but he says I fed you with manna. You wanted what the Egyptians wanted to give you. You wanted those onions and that garlic and all that stuff that's gonna give you stinky breath, but I said, I'll feed you with heavenly food and he gives him manna from heaven. Now, of course, we understand this is an allegorical reference to food from God, heavenly food, and for you and for me, we need to understand the depth of this, right? Which the Bible says, which you did not know? Nor did your fathers know that he might make you, make you know that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord. Your clothing did not wear out on you and your foot did not swell for 40 years. Know then in your heart that as a man disciplines his son, the Lord, your God, disciplines you. Intimacy with God sometimes comes through discipline. It's your God slapping you on your wrist. To God cutting you down on your knees sometimes. To you experiencing pain and relationship sometimes. Because all of us have this propensity to lean into the things of the world that draw us closer to it. But the desperation for growth is more intense in pain and in struggle. Through pain comes this perseverance that you and I see that God says, I can grow you through this. I can develop you through this. But when we get complacent, God puts us in places where we start learning the key to hunger. And I want us to understand this church. If you're not hungry, I want you to ask the question to yourself, why am I not hungry for God? Why am I not hungry to wake up in the morning and lean into the word of God and study the word and pray as I should? Why? What is it inside of me that is not causing me to be hungry? For those of y'all who are in a desolate place today, in a dry place today, in a wilderness experience today, my, this message is for you. And I want you to listen in carefully. If you find yourself in a dry barren land, cut off from life's milk and honey, do not waste this season. Listen carefully, do not waste this season grief. You know, give grief, give sorrow, give tears their place. But you know what the word says in Psalm 25, 10? It says this, all the paths of the Lord are steadfast love and faithfulness. Underline that word all. That means the good paths, it means the scary paths, it means the uncertain paths, it means the negative paths, it means the fearful paths, it means all the things, the closed doors, the open doors. Someone say all paths. All paths. You will never find yourself in a situation where you take a path and God is not with you in it. It could be the wrong path you took, but God says I will never leave you nor forsake you. It might have been a wrong decision that you made, but God says in all paths, my righteousness will be, come on, am I talking to somebody? He never takes his eyes off you. But if you ever happen to be in his path, know that he orders the steps of the righteous praying earnestly and saying, God, let me find myself in your path. Let your word be a lamp unto my feet. And all paths means even those ones that take us through the desert. Even those ones that take us to the valley of Baca. Even those ones that give us tears, unsurmountable. Even those ones that give us a broken marriage. Even those ones that you had to walk along where you lost a child. Even those ones that you walked along where you thought that was the relationship that God has in store for you. Even that one that you lost your job. Even that one that you went through so much of death. Even that one. Even in that, the Bible says, the Lord is steadfast and is love and is faithfulness. I don't know who needs to hear this today, but I wanted to remind you, be hungry for God today because in your dire path that you're walking through, in this wilderness experience, his faithfulness is not seized. He is the still unchanging, loving God that he was yesterday today and he will continue being the steadfast and loving God that he is. Take heart. It's just another day, another opportunity. His steadfast love has brought you here and he will never leave you nor forsake you. If you're in Christ, God has not brought you into this desert to starve you. He's brought you here to teach you that man does not live by bread alone. That's all. The lesson that you are going to learn from this wilderness experience is the same bread that fed you outside of the wilderness. The same money that you kept getting outside of the wilderness. The relationship that gave you identity outside of this wilderness. You don't have to live only by that. You live by the power and the presence and intimacy with God. Some of us get carried away so far that we allow the identities that surround us in this world to define who we are. And some of us with the loss of the job goes our identity, with the loss of that child goes our identity, with the loss of this or that goes our faith. God's like, you know what? Begin to understand, as the Christian begins to understand the revelation of this, that God orchestrates deserts into your life. And for some it'd be shorter than the others and for others it'll be longer than the others. God doesn't give you a rule of thumb when as far as longevity is concerned, but he says stay faithful because I am faithful. Is this helping somebody? I gotta move on. My hardship is a gift and that's why in the West, y'all and I've been thinking about it all week and I look at the hunger and I look at where are we? Like why do we struggle when we go through times of wilderness? That's why in the West I feel like we have to choose hardship in following Jesus. Like I want some of us to embrace the wilderness. David's outer wilderness reminds him of his inner wilderness. And that's why I'm going with this because his circumstances and his physical situation is reminding him of how he needs God more and more on the inside. Like I want us to take a minute and I want you to look around you. Like is everything bright and green and growing and reproducing in your life? Are souls finding God at our altars and our church? Are our altars throng with people at the end of a service? Are people being delivered? Are sinners forsaking their sins? Are they turning back to God? Like are lives being changed by the power of the Holy Spirit? If not, it may mean that we're really in a dry and a weary land. We're walking through a wilderness and this wilderness experience. God is prompting us and saying guys, draw closer to me, come closer to me. Man, I got a lot of verses to go. Verse two, so the Bible says this. So I have looked upon you in the sanctuary, beholding your power and glory. He says, so I've looked upon you in the sanctuary. Be holding your power and your glory. Usually David will look at the sanctuary or the tabernacle as they had it back in the day. And the usual things that they would see would be the washing and the cleansing and the animal sacrifices and the rituals. But David does not have his eyes on any of these things. But when you take your eyes of these religious things, he's in the desert experience where he doesn't have a direct visual of any of these things that distract him. And when he doesn't have a direct eye on these things, his eyes are completely on. God, yes, it's possible for the stuff of church to distract you. Yeah, it's possible. For serving to distract you. Your friendships with people in church to distract you. Your community to distract you. All of these things can take place because the first thing that you think about when you look at the tabernacle or when I say church or relationship with God is so many of us have defined our relationship with God with what you do in church. Y'all, no, no, no, no. The relationship with God is not about what you do and the boxes that you check off. I am glad you serve. I am glad that you lead. I am glad you preach. I am glad you teach. I am glad you pray. I am glad you teach our kids. All of that is great. I am glad you open doors. I am glad you smile at people. I am glad you make coffee. All of those are products of your discipleship. But if you root your discipleship and your relationship with God on the things that you do, you'll find yourself in a wilderness experience where without those things you don't have a relationship with God. 'Cause for many of us, if we don't wake up in the morning and we don't serve in a Sunday morning, that you don't have a relationship with God. But God's like, I have to take you into the wilderness sometimes so that your eyes will be away from the altar and the brazen altar and the sacrifices and all of that stuff that you do to where your relationship is one, then you gaze upon the eyes of the Lord and that's all that matters. And me and God, God and me, this moment in the wilderness, let me treasure this because you will never get it anywhere else. Jesus, help me Lord. He says, Lord, my eyes are on you. I look up to the sanctuary and my eyes are on you. Why? Verse three, because your steadfast love is better than life. My lips will praise you. Verse four, so I will bless you as long as I live in your name. I will lift up my hands. Worship team, you guys can get ready to come up in a bit. You know what the Bible says? It says, the steadfast love. The word used over there in Greek, sorry, in Hebrew is the word loyalty. The word loyalty. Where's David standing? David's standing in a moment of abandonment. In a moment of deception where his own son has deceived him, betrayed him. He has lost all sense of loyalty, the one that had to be loyal to him has left his side. And it's in that moment he begins to understand the loyalty of the Father God. Know that had to happen to you. Those people had to be disloyal to you. Those people had to stab you in the back. Those people had to leave you. Those people had to walk out on you. Yes, you had to lose that opportunity, that job, that situation, it had to happen because sometimes you feel like loyalty is defined by the people that you're surrounded by. And God's like, no. Quit depending on people and trusting on people more than you trust in your God. Write this down. We don't follow God for a better life. We follow God because he is better than life. And that's exactly what David is trying to tell over here. He's telling to tell us, he's trying to convince us, he's trying to pour into us and saying, "Guys, God doesn't offer a better life to you. "He is better than a life." Everything that you thought your life was. Like this one verse is the anchor for this entire Psalm. God is good even when the pain is real, y'all. You might be walking through a painful situation, but remember, God's love is better than life. And that's good life or bad life. It can be tragedy, it can be sickness, it can be that porn in your flesh, but God has steadfast love. And what is that? I kind of just wanted to break this down for us to understand and not close. Is this something that you've wanted in your life more than life itself? Have you ever been in that situation where you're like, "Man, only if I can have this one thing." That promotion, that spot on the starting team, that guy that you really like, that gal that you think is perfect for you, that car that you've always wanted, that dream job, a contract that would make or break your company, that weight loss goal, and what would you do to get there if you're determined you would do anything to get what you want? Anybody been there? You would give it your best effort, you would focus all your energy on it, you would think about it day and night, you would devise a plan, you would devise a strategy, and you're gonna make sure you're gonna get it, you will talk to anybody that's willing to listen, that you can get on board with you, and you will stick with it until you accomplish it. That's what happens when you're hungry for something. We all have these kinds of pursuits in life. They are what we love. They are what we live for. Why? Because they make life worthwhile. I'm not arguing with you. But what would happen if we put those same pursuits that we put into things, into pursuing this God that loves you, and has the steadfast, unconditional, pursuing love for you? This reciprocation of this steadfast love. When you and I can reciprocate that love, y'all, the hound of heaven will meet its match, not even close, I'm not telling you, but at least he will look at you and I, yearning to meet with him, yearning to walk with him. Why? Why? Can we just pause? Why would Jesus look at the blind man and say, "Do you wanna see?" Like, think about it for a second. Like, "Duh, Jesus?" What do you think? Yeah, I want, but I'm still gonna ask you because I wanna see if you want it as bad as I want it. 'Cause yeah, I wanna bless you. I wanna pour myself out into you. I want you to experience everything I got, but you, if I just give, give, give, give, give, and you don't see a need for it, if you don't ask, that's what the Bible says, ask and she'll be given, not gonna show me open. Seek and usual, there is this beauty in saying, "I got the hunger, I got a thirst." That Jesus just responds to. So you will find throughout the gospel that Jesus will go and meet people and say, "What do you want? "What is it that you want? "Do you wanna be healed? "What is it?" Because Jesus says, "Man, I know what you want "and I'm willing to give it to you, "but I need to know if that's what you want." Instead of TV, I say that, but I wanna clarify. If I wanna exegetically study this word for its true meaning, which we should, the Bible is not talking about the love that I, it's not my love for God that is more precious than life, but his loving kindness to me is more meaningful than life. You're saying, "God, what you have to offer me, "your steadfast love." That word love, just just bear with me. That word love is the Hebrew word for the word, has said. Use more than 450 times in the Old Testament. Has it love is this word that is hard to translate because it could mean mercy in Genesis and it could mean loyal in Deuteronomy? And for Samuel, it could mean faithfulness and in Second Kings, it could mean kindness because there was this one word that would encompass all these feelings of affinity. But most commonly, theologians suggest the bridging of two words, like steadfast love, faithful love, loving kindness, that has to do with this word, has said. And that defines God in saying, "Yah, you want to know what kind of love I have for you?" The love that is one that is steadfastly loving, which means the level and the intensity of the love that I have for you doesn't change with circumstance, doesn't change with what you do and what you've not done. It's not a merit based love. It is a love that keeps giving and giving and giving and giving and giving. Even though you don't earn it, even though you don't want it, it just keeps giving. It's the faithful kind of love. You know what that means? It's the kind of love that shows up even when you don't. It's the faithful kind of love. It's a love that you think that God will not love you because you did this and this and this, yet he still shows up in the garden of Eden and he says, "I has said you, Adam Eve, where are you?" I'm sure God's not going to show up today. I'm sure God's upset with us. We just sinned. We just did exactly what God told us not to do, yet the hesed love, the loving, faithfulness. God, loving, faithfulness of God still shows up and says, "I'm here, where are you?" I kept my end of the bargain and I showed up just like I did yesterday. I don't care what you did. I don't care what you're doing. I don't care what circumstance you are in. The ever faithful, loving God has shown up into your wilderness and David acknowledges that and says, your loving kindness is better than life. Your wilderness experience will never meet its match. It will never meet its match, but I'll tell you, your wilderness experience will meet a savior who will go above it and say, I will love you more fiercely than the experience that you're walking through and I will give you strength and I will give you courage and I'll give you patience and I'll give you all that you need to walk through this wilderness experience, knowing that your loving kindness, his loving kindness, my loving kindness, God says, is better than all the circumstances of life that you walk through. So father, today. Jesus. (speaking in foreign language) I don't know if you've sensed it, but I sense that mighty move, the Holy Spirit in this place. (gentle music) I sense a healing move, the anointing of God in this place. I sense a comforting hand of God in this place. I sense it in my spirit. I sense this churning in my spirit of God saying, I want to heal. I sense the spirit of God saying, I want to move, I want to restore. I want to grow closer, I want to reach in into intimacy with you and some of y'all are just like keeping away and you're like resisting it and God says, give in my hessid love, my faithful love, my loving kindness. I'm hearing the Holy Spirit saying, my mercy is new every morning. (gentle music) Do you know what that means, Church? I just got to say this. You know what that verse means when the Bible says, his mercies are new every morning because every morning is a set of new challenges. His new doubt, his new shame, his new guilt, his new experiences that you have to walk through. (gentle music) His new accusations of the enemy is going to throw at you is new challenges that you're going to walk through in your marriages. And God says, but my mercy, my forgiveness, mercy means forgiveness, mercy means the extension of the arm of forgiveness. That's what mercy means. Mercy means giving you what you don't deserve. That's what mercy means. So he's looking at you and me and saying, you don't deserve it every day. You wake up and you're like, I did it yesterday, God, but you don't deserve it. And the word says, but his mercy is new every morning, which means yesterday's mercy is not today's mercy. Today's mercy is not going to be tomorrow's mercy. Walk in that mercy. How could we not walk in that mercy and when you're in that wilderness, open your eyes to experience that more than, you will never experience that in the palace. David, you have to, you ought to. (gentle music) So here's what I'm going to do. I'm just going to call for prayer. And I know usually we have our elders come up and pray. And if you need somebody to pray with you, they can, but here's what I'm going to do. I'm going to have the worship team just lead us in a moment of worship. And if the Holy Spirit spoke to you today, I want you to respond in some way today. And whether that be kneeling or maybe coming forward and just standing at the altar when the worship is going on and just coming to the front and just worshiping with, you could just kneel down over here. You could just surrender. You could just raise your hands and surrender and say, God, can I just submit this wilderness experience into your hands? Teach me, speak to me. Coach me, convince me. Speak life over me, God. Change my heart 'cause I need you. I need you Lord, every hour, I need you God. I need you more than anything else, God. So Father, I thank you for every person in this room, every person that needed to hear this message, I give them into your hands. Thank you for this word. Thank you for this life-changing word. Thank you because sometimes we can just preach the word for what it is and it will change our lives. And today is an example of that. I pray, God, that today will be life-changing. You told me to preach Psalm 63, so I did. I sat in the plane yesterday and I wrote down the stuff that you were telling me to talk to the church about, so that's what I did. You gave this to me two days ago and you told me to preach it, so I did. I don't know who needed to hear it, God, but the has its love of God, the loving kindness of God. It's better than life. So today we surrender, we submit. We ask that you move in this place in a beautiful and a tangible way. Every person that needs a touch of God today, God, I pray that you will fill them, that you will touch them, that you will restore them. We'll give you praise, we'll give you glory. Church, may the Lord bless you, may he keep you, may he cause his face to shine upon you, may he be gracious to you, may he lift his countenance to your direction and may he be peace, the best of all understanding. In Jesus' name we pray in everybody's city. - Thank you for listening. 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