Introduction
I have been
reading the book, "You Lost Me" by David Kinnaman. It is a book about
why young people are leaving the church and in some cases the faith. Kinnaman
says that, "Wrestling with faith is an enduring feature of the transition
to young adulthood…" In other words, we have probably all gone through
such a time. However, he also says that, "…it is a particularly urgent
dilemma for the Christian community because of the profound changes to the
emerging generation’s social and spiritual context…" In other words, there
are things happening in our world which are having a more significant impact
today on how particularly young people are viewing faith and the church.
Of course
there are many young people who are faithful and highly involved in church and
in God's mission, but there are others who are leaving and he identifies three
broad categories of young people who have grown up with Christian influence,
but now wrestle with it or have left it. He calls some of them nomads and says,
"For these young adults, faith is nomadic, seasonal, or may appear to be
an optional or peripheral part of life. At some point during their teen or
young adult years, nomads disengage from attending church or significantly distance
themselves from the Christian community. They … put their faith on the shelf
for a time. Most, however, do not discard it entirely." He comments
further, "The second category of dropout consists of young people who
leave their childhood or teen faith entirely. This includes those who deconvert
(including atheists, agnostics, and those who say they have no religious
affiliation) and those who switch to another faith." The third group he
calls exiles and describes them in this way, "For our purposes, let’s
define exiles as those who grew up in the church and are now physically or
emotionally disconnected in some way, but who also remain energized to pursue
God-honoring lives."
In the book,
he identifies some of the reasons which are leading to this exodus. Some have
had such a poor experience in church that it is not surprising that they are
gone. Others have struggled to reconcile their faith with the prevailing
worldview. As I was reading this book, I found that I could name young people
whom I know or have known in each of these categories. Whenever someone leaves
faith, this concerns me. When people wrestle with faith, it does not concern me
as much, but it does create an opportunity to have good conversations with them
about their doubts and questions. At one time or another all of us wrestle with
questions and doubts about the truth of Christian faith. Therefore, this
morning, I would like to talk about this and encourage all of us to think about
why following God is the best way to go and think about what it means to be
faithful. Psalm 37 will
guide our thinking this morning.
The Psalm
is also recognized as wisdom literature which means that it is much like the
Proverbs in that it shows us the best way, the wisest path of life.
I. Following God is the Best
One of the
key themes of this Psalm is an encouragement to follow God. The encouragement
comes in the form of demonstrating why not being faithful to God is a bad idea
and why being faithful to God is the best way to go.
A. Faithlessness is a Bad Idea
Those who
do not follow God are identified in the Psalm as "the wicked."
Although we could interpret this to refer to those who do really bad things,
from the perspective of the Psalmist it appears that there are only two
categories. Those who follow God and those who reject God and those who reject
God are those who are identified as wicked.
The message
of this Psalm is that this is a bad idea because those who reject God and His
way won't last. Please take note of the expressions in this Psalm which
communicate this idea. Verse 2, says that wrongdoers "will soon fade like
the grass." Verse 9 says, "For the wicked shall be cut off." and
verse 10 "the wicked will be no more." Verse 20 also says, "…the
enemies of the Lord are like the glory of the pastures; they vanish – like
smoke they vanish away." Verse 35 gives an interesting perspective when it
says, "I have seen the wicked oppressing, and towering like a cedar of
Lebanon. Again I passed by, and they were no more; though I sought them, they
could not be found."
The message
of these verses is consistent throughout. Those who do not follow God, who
reject God and His people and who live in ways that are disobedient to God will
not last. The consequences of rejecting God sometimes come in this life. People
who reject God's way and follow a self centered way often run into trouble. For
example, greed usually does not produce abundance, violence usually is returned
with violence and there is no honor among thieves.
Furthermore,
even if someone who rejects God prospers all their life, in the end, they will
not experience the eternal life which God intends for those who follow Him. The
Bible is clear that only those who follow God will inherit the full and eternal
life which God gives to all who love Him.
Therefore,
this Psalm teaches that if you reject God and His way, you are getting into
something that has a short shelf life. It won't last! When you go shopping, you
may be careful to check the best before dates on things like milk because it
has such a short shelf life. Rejecting God is like that.
B. Obedience Leads To Blessing
On the
other hand, you don't check the shelf life on many other things like canned
goods because they have such a long shelf life. In a similar way, following
God, in fact, has no shelf life. It is always fresh and good and lasts forever.
In this Psalm, there is only one consequence that comes to those who reject God
and that is that they won't last. On the other hand, the passage declares
numerous blessings which come to those who follow God.
1. Blessing in This Life
One
blessing is that life here and now is good. Verse 3 says, "Trust in the
Lord, and do good; so you will live in the land and enjoy security." Verse
11 says, "But the meek shall inherit the land, and delight themselves in
abundant prosperity." Verse 34 repeats this theme once again when it says,
"Wait for the LORD, and keep to his way, and he will exalt you to inherit
the land; you will look on the destruction of the wicked."
2. God's Presence
The second
blessing is the promise of God's own presence accompanying us on our way. There
are several wonderful statements in this regard. Verse 5 says, "Commit
your way to the LORD; trust in him, and he will act." In Verse 23 we read,
"Our steps are made firm by the LORD, when he delights in our way…"
We are also encouraged by verse 39 where we read, "The salvation of the
righteous is from the LORD; he is their refuge in the time of trouble."
This adds encouragement
in that it shows us that even when we don't experience blessing all the time in
this life, we still have the presence of God to comfort and encourage us.
3. Long Term Blessing
The final
blessing is that all of this is assured as ours for the long term. Whereas we
saw that the wicked won't last, the path of the righteous is long lasting and
goes even into eternity. We read in verse 18, "The LORD knows the days of
the blameless, and their heritage will abide forever;" The same message is
found in verse 27, "Depart from evil, and do good; so you shall abide
forever."
As we read
the Psalm and take note of these things, there is good reason for encouraging
each other and anyone we meet to follow God's way. It has so much more to offer
and it is the best way to go in this life. And when life is looked at through
the long lens of eternity, it becomes clear that living a God honoring life is
the best way to go.
II. The Way of Following God
If this is
evident, the next question becomes, "What does it mean to live a God
honoring life?" Verses 3-8 give a wonderful description. As we reflect on
these, I am doing so with two perspectives in mind. One is as an encouragement
to examine our life to see if we are living in this way. The other is to
consider the example of our life. It is my belief that those who watch us,
including the young people in our lives, will be encouraged to follow God if
they see in us a living and active faith such as described here. So besides
being encouraged to follow God in this way, we are also encouraged to live this
way so that we can give an example of faithfulness that is attractive and
convincing.
A. Do Good
Verse 3 has
a very concise statement about what it means to be faithful. It says,
"trust in the Lord and do good." From this verse we learn that
faithfulness involves doing good which means obedience to God. The question
which follows is, "What is good?"
One of the
problems is that Christians in various places have sometimes tried to define
"good" by things that are external. If we say that something is good,
but an examination of life and a study of Scripture reveals that it really has
nothing to do with being good, then we are living in legalism and people see us
as "holier than thou."
When I was
young I once found a deck of playing cards. My parents wouldn't let me keep
them. At the time, I learned that playing cards were on the list of things that
were not good. Later, things changed and my parents played games with playing
cards. Clearly this was not in the list of things that were "not
good." I am so glad that we have mostly left behind such external rules
about what is good and what is not good. However, that still leaves us with the
question "what is good?"
According
to this verse, we find that the things that are good are those that are
associated with trust in the Lord. If our doing good arises out of a desire to
look good to others or to earn favor with God, that is not the kind of goodness
that arises out of trust. The kind of goodness that arises out of trust is the
kind that acknowledges that our hope is in God, His forgiveness and His grace
to accept us. It responds to that grace by seeking in every way to do that
which responds with gratitude and a desire to be the holy people God has called
us to be.
It is in a
trusting relationship that accepts the Word of God as God speaking to us, that
we will discover those things that are good. Some of the things that we will
discover is that doing good includes such things as loving our neighbor, not
judging another person, caring about another person enough not to gossip about
them and so on.
If we live
in that way, we will live consistently and genuinely and our lives will also be
an example of true faith rather than religion or legalism. Such faithfulness
will be attractive to others and will invite them to also consider following
God.
B. Delight in God vs. 4
Verse 4
adds another dimension to faithfulness when it calls us to take delight in the
Lord.
God invites
us to respond to all the good things He has done for us. He has called us His
children, He has forgiven our sins, He has accepted us, He has given us life.
He leads us through life. He has given us eternal life. He gives us His Spirit.
He blesses us with a community of brothers and sisters who care about us.
We sometimes
respond to all this goodness of God by becoming distracted by all the things
that this life offers. For example, we love our sports teams and we love our
recreation. We delight in our vacations. We are thankful for all the money we
make or we wish we made more money. Jesus warns in Matthew 6:24 , "You cannot
serve God and wealth."
Faithfulness
to God means that we will delight in the Lord. Not that we won't go no
vacations or engage in sports or enjoy music or many other things, but our
delight will be in the Lord. If we delight in the Lord, we will have a smile on
our face when His name is honored. If we delight in the Lord, we will have
tears of joy in our eyes when we see what God has done. When we delight in the
Lord, difficulty, persecution and illness will drive us into His arms. If we
delight in the Lord, we will look forward to the day when we will see Him face
to face.
I firmly
believe that if others, specifically our children, our grandchildren or our
neighbors see that our delight is in the Lord, they will see a faith that is
genuine and attractive and inviting. May we learn what it means to delight in
the Lord.
C. Trust in God vs. 5
One of the
ways in which the church has sometimes failed those who attend is to create a
disconnect between Sunday and Monday. Kinnaman writes in the book I mentioned
earlier, "One hallmark of the exiles is their feeling that their vocation
(or professional calling) is disconnected from their church experience. Their
Christian background has not prepared them to live and work effectively in
society. Their faith is “lost” from Monday through Friday. The Christianity
they have learned does not meaningfully speak to the fields of fashion,
finance, medicine, science, or media to which they are drawn."
As a person
whose life is focused on Sunday, I share in the blame for that. The question
which must be answered by us on Sunday is, "How will I live for God on
Monday?" Have we adequately talked about what it means to be a student who
follows God? Have we adequately talked about what it means to be a Christian
farmer, or mechanic or doctor or teacher?
The
Psalmist challenges us in verse 5 that faithfulness also includes that if you
are faithful you will "commit your way to the Lord; trust in Him."
The word "commit" is a word that has the nuance of rolling in a
direction, of going on a particular path.
The way
spoken of in this verse is our entire life. Following God is not just about
attending worship service on Sunday, as good as that is. If our way is
committed to the Lord, then when decisions are made about career choices,
career activities or retirement, the question which must guide our thinking is,
"how does trust in God lead me to commit this part of my life to the
Lord?" I was in a church the other day and over the door as you went out
of the church was a sign which reminded the people "You are going out into
your mission field." If our way is committed to the Lord, we will
recognize that we are always on mission.
When there
is a disconnect between what we say on Sunday and how we live on Monday, it is
no wonder that the next generation has little interest in following the path of
faithfulness. They have seen nothing that engages or attracts to that kind of a
lifestyle. If they see one thing lived at church and another thing lived day by
day, the conclusion they must come to is that what is talked about on Sunday
has no impact on who we really are and then it is no wonder that they choose
not to participate in church.
To commit
our way to God, in trust, is to know that God is at work in our life and in our
world. It means to make our decisions and to choose a path that is guided by
God.
D. Rest in God vs. 7, 8
The last
aspect of faithfulness mentioned in this passage relates to our ability to
answer the question, "Do we expect God to act?" There are things
which happen in life which are unexpected, unwanted and sometimes tragic. When
we are persecuted, when we become sick, when a loved one dies, when people we
love suffer and there seems no explanation for it then our faith in God is
severely tested. If it is a genuine faith, it will land back on God because it
will have found that God keeps His promises. If it is weak, this may be the
point at which faith is abandoned.
It is to
this kind of faith that verses 7, 8 direct our thoughts. There we read,
"Be still before the LORD, and wait patiently for him; do not fret over
those who prosper in their way, over those who carry out evil devices. Refrain
from anger, and forsake wrath. Do not fret—it leads only to evil."
Faithfulness
involves a choice to see how God is at work and a response to God which
expresses trust in Him no matter what. Sometimes we just don't understand, but
if we are still before the Lord, He will show Himself. Sometimes the struggles
seem to go on forever, but if we walk in faithfulness, we will continue to
"wait patiently for Him." At such a time, anger, at the situation? at
God? does not help, but leads only to evil. Waiting patiently means that we
know that God will act in His time and in His way.
One of the
most powerful influences in my life has been what I have seen in members of my
family who have gone before. Through revolution, war, being refugees, having
cancer, I have seen a faith that continued to trust in God.
A faith
that knows how to be still and to wait for God shows others a faith that is
deep and not easily moved. May we live in and exemplify such faith.
Conclusion
I remember
the song I learned when I was a child in Sunday School. "The wise man
built his house upon the rock, the wise man built his house upon the rock, The
wise man built his house upon the rock and the rains came a tumbling down. The
rains came down and the floods came up, the rains came down and the floods came
up the rains came down and the floods came up and the house on the rock stood firm."
The song is based on Matthew
7:24-27 . In that text Jesus talks about how much better it is to
follow Him.
The
invitation follows after Matthew
7:21-23 where Jesus says, in part, "not everyone who says to
me 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven…" So, if we want to
enter the kingdom of heaven, if we want to live well, now, if we want to give
an example of a true, attractive, genuine faith, then let us, do good, let us take
delight in the Lord, let us commit our way to the Lord, and let us be still and
wait patiently for Him. If we do, the promise of life is sure!
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