"A plea for guidance"

Psalm 25, and it's on page 5 5 6 in the church Bible. In new lord, my god, I put my trust. I trust in you. Do not let me be put to shame name, nor let my enemies try and pover me. No 1 who hopes in you will ever be put to shame, but shame will come on those who are treacherous without cause.

Show me your ways, lord teach me your paths. Guide me in your truth and teach me for you are god my savior, and my hope is in you all day long. Remember, lord, your great mercy and love for they are from of old. Do not remember this sins of my youth in my rebellious ways. According to your love, remember me for you, lord, are good.

Good and upright is the lord. Therefore, he instruct sinners in his ways. He guides the humble in what is right and teaches his way. All the ways of the lord are loving and faithful towards those who keep the demands of his covenant. For the sake of your name, lord, forgive my iniquity, though it is great.

Who then are those who feel the lord. He will instruct them in the ways they should choose. They will spend their days in prosperity, and their descendants will inherit the land. The lord confides in those who fear him. He makes his covenant known to them.

My eyes are ever on the lord. For only he will release my feet from the snare. Turn to me and be gracious to me for I am lonely and afflicted. Relief the trouble of my heart and free me from my anguish. Look on my affliction and my distress and take away all my sins.

See how numerous are my enemies and how fiercely they hate me. Guard my life and rescue me. Do not let may be put to shame for I take refuge in you. May integrity and uprightness protect me because my hope lord is in you, deliver Israel or god from all their troubles. Good yet.

Please keep the passage open in front of you. Psalm 25, and, let's pray together. Heavenly father, we praise you and thank you for your word. Thank you. It is true, and it is good.

And it is here to instruct us and teach us. And so we pray you'd help us to be ready to listen and ready to learn and ready to apply your word to our hearts. Carmen. So this morning, we are continuing our series in Psalms, and we have been looking at some Psalms to help us to engage with the lord in the different circumstances of life. And with the different emotions that they bring, whether from the deepest depths or whether the greatest joys.

And next week, we're gonna look at Psalm a hundred and 45, and which is 1, which is just undiluted praise. Have got. But this week, we look at Psalm 25, and it is a great place to turn when you're feeling like you just don't know what to do. It is a psalm that people often look to in those kind of circumstances, a place to look to, to ask god to, to guide them. Now we see towards the end of the psalm.

If you've got the psalm open in front of you, you'll see the situation A bit of the situation that David was in. It's King David, who was King of Israel, who wrote this Psalm, and you can see the sort of situation that he was in. So let's look again. Verse 16 to 19. Let me just read those verses for us.

Turn to me and be gracious to me for I am lonely and afflicted, relieve the troubles of my heart and free me from my anguish, look on my affliction and my distress. And take away all my sins, see how numerous are my enemies, and how fiercely they hate me. Well, you can see there is situation. It's not a good situation, is it? It's a bad situation.

He's surrounded by his enemies. He says they fiercely hate him. He's under attack, and he's feeling it emotionally feeling the anguish, feeling the affliction of this. And it seems in the summit, he doesn't know quite what to do, what the next step should be. And if you look at verse 15, it says my eyes are ever on the lord for only he will release my feet from the snare.

That that's what that translation says. Other translations say, that he will pluck my feet out of the net. In other words, David is saying, yes, lord. You can you can rescue my feet from the net, but there are nets out there. There are snares out there, and I don't know where they are.

That's the nature of these kind of nets. You could imagine in a film, you know, the kind of scene that you might have someone walking through a woodland, and you've got ominous music in the background as they walk through and their foot treads on a net, and the whole thing envelops them and lifts them up high into the air, and they're trapped and they're helpless. And David is saying, That is what it feels like at the moment. There are snares out there. There are traps out there.

I don't know where they are. Well, there are many times when we don't know what to do in life. And when we fear that there could be hidden nets. If you're a parent, you know that feeling. Recently, obviously, we've had new births within the church family.

Isabelle, born to Sam and Starla, and how how were you saying? Keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, keep, yarm, keep, keep I don't know what to do. Moments of feeling like I, you know, what do we what are we supposed to do with this? Particularly if they just won't stop crying. I wake you up in the night.

You're just desperate for sleep, and you go, what what are we supposed to do? And those feelings continue throughout parenthood, don't they? If if you're a parent, you know. The feelings of what do we do when they ask about this? When they demand that.

What do we do when they demand they want they need a smartphone? They've gotta have 1. What do you do? I don't know what to do, you think? Or they ask for sleepovers, and you think, I don't know.

Is now the right? Should we say yes? Should we say no? You just don't know. And what you're fearing is that you might make decisions now that further down the track, you go, oh, well, maybe there are nets along that path.

There are snares along that path. That you say yes to 1 thing, and then further down the road, it comes back and bites you. And you think, well, what about the school that we send our children to if we send them to that school? What if they then end up in a bad crowd? Or what if in our disciplining of our children, what if we're too harsh and they rebel?

What if we're too soft? And they just go wild. What what are we to do? And of course, that's just parenting. There are a whole load of other problems that we have in life as well, where you think I don't know what to do.

Where should you live? Should you move? Should you stay where you are? Should you change jobs? Should you keep the 1 you've got?

What should you do? And down those paths, there could be nets, there could be snares, lord. I I I don't know. Well, we'd need to turn to Psalm 25. And Psalm 25 gives us 3 things to pray and 1 thing to do.

When you don't know what to do, 3 things to pray, 1 thing to do. First, 1 the first thing to pray. I trust you, lord. First 1, this is where the son begins. Interesting.

David doesn't start with his situation. He starts just with a declaration of lord, I trust you. First 1, in you, lord, my god, I put my trust. I trust in you. And, well, literally, it's a I lift up my life to you.

I lift up my soul to you. Lord, I put it in your hands. I trust you. With enemies surrounding, snares about, lord, I trust you. Now we might be tempted, you might be tempted to put your trust in other things.

When we don't know what to do, we might well seek security in other things. And we can see those things. If you think to yourself, what are the things that that will bring your anxiety level down. What are the things that you might be tempted to put your trust in? Well, there are things that if they happen, you think, well, okay, this is something that will reduce my anxiety.

If my child gets into that school, everything will be alright. If I can buy my house, pay off the mortgage, then everything will be that bit safer. If my investments go up, I'll be alright. It makes you feel like maybe the nets aren't out there so much. The snares aren't out there in quite the same way.

And so we usually put our trust in those things. Now those things aren't bad, and you can be praying about those things, but David is saying, lord, I trust, first and foremost, in you. And then he talks about shame, He says, do not let me be put to shame nor let my enemies triumph over me. No 1 who hopes a new will ever be put to shame, but shame will come on those who are treacherous without cause. First David says, don't let me be put to shame.

Now that being put to shame would be, he's saying, don't let my decision to put my trust in you backfire on me. Don't let me downgrade. And put in my trust in you, but don't let me down. If it all goes wrong, everyone will think I've been foolish. And he immediately makes that declaration, then no 1 who hopes in you will ever be put a shame.

No 1 who puts their life in god's hands will, in the end, find out I was foolish to have done so. You won't get to the point of thinking you were wrong to put your trust in god. People may ridicule you for it, and things may be difficult for a stretch. In fact, it may get harder because you put your trust in the lord. But in the end, you will be proved right for having trusted in god.

And this is what we see in Jesus as well. This Psalm written hundreds of years before Jesus was born, it it points us to Jesus as does all of the old testament. Ultimately, the Bible is all about Jesus. And when the passage is about King David or written by King David King David as King of Israel sort of acts like a tribute band for Jesus. A tribute band, you know, they they play.

They look a lot like the real thing, sound a lot like the real thing, but they're just not the real thing. King David similarly looks a lot like the real thing sometimes. Not all the time, but it looks a lot like the real thing, but just isn't quite the real thing. The real thing is Jesus, and he points us to Jesus. And Jesus trusted in his father.

Trusted in god. And in some ways, looked that looked a foolish move. Didn't it? He was mocked and ridiculed. And when he was on the cross, The teachers of the law said, he trusts in god.

Let god rescue him now for he said, I am the son of god. They thought Jesus was foolish for trusting in god. And yet Jesus's trust in god was proved to be absolutely right. 3 days later, he rose from the dead, triumphing over his enemies, and showing god's total trustworthiness. You are right to trust in god.

And though people may ridicule you for it, though the world may be against you, the lord promises that in the end, your trust in him will always prove to be right. So as we go through circumstances, where we say lord, I don't know what to do. First thing to say is lord, I trust in you. Second. Teach me lord.

Second thing to pray. Teach me lord. First 4. Show me your ways, lord, teach me your paths, guide me in your truth, and teach me for you are God, my savior, and my hope is in you all day long. David then says, lord lord show me the way.

Show me the path. Teach me. Lord, I wanna go your way. So show me that way. And again, this is right for us to pray as well, isn't it when we're faced with circumstances?

We don't know what to do is say, lord, lead me. Lord teach me. But I wonder how you expect the lord will answer that prayer. I was asked that once when I was talking to someone. There was an issue that, I was needing the lord's leading on, lord's guidance on.

I remember thinking, well, the person to talk let's talk to a charismatic Christian about that because they they're more into this than than than we are maybe. So I talked with him and said, you know, there's an issue here, and I I need to seek the lord on this. And he quite wisely then said to me, how are you expecting the lord answer you. How do we expect the lord to answer us? When you've asked the lord for guidance in the past, have you expected a voice, a sign, a feeling, a sudden conviction, A burning bush, suddenly to appear, and the Lord to speak to you.

Nah, not dismissing those things. Obviously, the Lord does guy has guided people in the past in those ways. And there are examples in the Bible of the Lord guiding in incredible ways. And I've had enough people say to me, you know, the Lord clearly spoke to him and said to me to go and do this, then I go, well, I I can't dismiss that. I just think those things are rare.

They just don't happen a lot. And even those people who would say, yeah, the lord clearly guided me in this kind of way, will say, well, it doesn't happen every day. Most circumstances, it doesn't happen. It's the accept And it's interesting when David says show me your ways, he says teach me teach me your paths. How does the lord teach us?

We have his word. And we think, yeah, but that's that's not what I want. I need you to tell me, lord, which school to send my child to, which, you know, decision to make right now. I need you to to to and this doesn't tell me. See, the lord doesn't give us an IKEA instruction manual, which if you've tried putting IKEA things together, he might be quite relieved about, but he doesn't give us an IKEA in an instruction manual for life.

Those babies who were born didn't come out with a manual with them to say, okay, now the decisions you should make are this, this, this, here you go. Here's here's your word for that child. And there's no book in the Bible, which is the book of Bart to say, you know, first do this, and then do that. Now this decision. You do that.

But yet, this book, the Bible is totally sufficient. It has all you need. It is not exhaustive, but it is sufficient. And this is the way the lord teaches us his paths. It has commands in it that we are to obey.

It has wisdom, and it has lots of stories. And our task is to immerse ourselves in it Sunday by Sunday, in gospel communities, day by day, as you read god's word, to absorb it, to soak in it until you can say, as the psalmist of psalm 119 says, your word lord is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path. It does lead us. It does guide us. We've just got to soak ourselves in it.

So we can pray, lord, I trust you. Lord, teach me. Third, remember me, lord. Now when David says to the lord to remember him, he isn't saying, Lord, I think you might have forgotten me. I'm here.

Remember me. No. When the Bible talks about the lord remembering something, it is remembering with the purpose of then taking action. So it talks elsewhere about the lord remembering certain people. And what it means is that he's then going to do something for them.

It's not that he'd forgotten them, but it's it's that he's now gonna take action on the basis of something. So it's a bit like if you were to, again, take a take a, go with a child and you're gonna cross the road, and you say remember to look both ways. You're not expecting the child just to go, oh, yeah. You're expecting them then to take action on the basis of that. So too, with the lord, and in this bit where David says remember me saying, not just call me to mind, but take action on the basis of something.

So he says verse 6, remember lord your great mercy and love for they are from of old. Do not remember the sins of my youth and my rebellious ways. According to your love, remember me. For you, lord, are good. So David says, don't remember my sin.

In other words, don't act on the basis of my sin with an uncertain future. Not showing what I'm sure what's gonna happen next. Same lord. I trust you. Lead me, guide me, but don't, don't treat me on the basis of my wrongdoing, my sin.

But rather remember your mercy and love, deal with me on the basis of your character. And the terms in verse 10, where it says, if you just cast your eyes down a little bit, it says all the ways of the lord are loving and faithful. Those words are covenant words, saying the lord is loving and faithful in accordance with his covenant, and a covenant is a promise. A binding promise. And so what David is saying is, don't remember me according to my sin, but remember me according to your promise.

Your covenant that you made. You promised to be loving and to be faithful to your covenant. So act on the basis of that. Deal with me on the basis of that promise. It's quite a bold thing to say, isn't it?

For David to say, yes, I've done a whole load of bad things. I've done a whole load of things wrong. But god, don't now treat me according to those because if you do, as I go forward, down these paths that I don't know what to do, I should, by rights, fall in every trap that there is, fall in every net that there is. I should If you're gonna treat me according to my sin, it should all go badly. But he says, don't deal with me on the basis of that.

Deal with me on the basis of your promise. And that's really significant for us too because we talked about this last week, a couple of weeks ago. We are sinners too, and we need to recognize our sin before god. It is right to own that sin to say, look, this is who I am, but also to say, lord, don't deal with me according to that, but deal with me according to your covenant. And what is that covenant for us?

Well, it is the covenant made through Jesus that Jesus described for us, explained for us the night before he died when he talked about the covenant in his blood for the forgiveness of sins. And so we too can come before the lord and say, lord, as I go forward, don't deal with me according to my sin, but according to your covenant, through Christ, that my sins are forgiven. And therefore, do you see what difference that makes as you look to the future and go, lord, I don't know what's happen. I don't know what's gonna come. But deal with me according to your covenant, and god always does.

He keeps his covenant, and that means whatever comes to you, whatever is down that path that you go down. It will never be god's punishment for your sin. It will never be that if you're a Christian because your punishment has already been taken by Jesus at the cross. Sometimes people talk like that though. When bad things happen, they say, oh, it must be because I did something wrong.

And even Christians will talk like that, as if what's happening is a punishment for what they did. But you've got to realize it, according to the covenant, that cannot be the case. And therefore, all that comes your way is only ever going to be something that comes from the loving hand of god. It doesn't mean it's going to be easy. It doesn't mean there's no suffering ahead, but it does mean it all comes from the loving hand of your heavenly father because that's the covenant that you are a part of if you're a Christian.

There's a hymn, which, an old hymn which kind of expresses this attitude to the future, which says this. You fearful saints, fresh courage tape, the clouds you so much dread are big with mass see, and shall break with in blessings on your head. Now as you look ahead, you see the clouds, the darkness, you think it's all gonna go horribly, but it will all, in some way, involve blessings from the lord. We can trust him for the future. So 3 things to pray.

I trust in you, lord, teach me lord, remember me lord, and then 1 thing to do. Be the kind of person, the lord guides. Be the kind of person the lord guides. I'm just gonna read verses 8 to 12 for us, and I want you to spot what kind of person the lord guides. Actually, I'm gonna go down to verse 15.

Verse 8 to 15. So as I read it, what are the what's the kind of person the lord guides? First 8. Good and upright is the lord. Therefore, he instruct sinners in his ways.

He guides the humble in what is right and teaches them his way. All the ways of the lord are loving and faithful towards those who keep the demands of his covenant. For the sake of your name, lord, forgive my iniquity, though it is great. Who then are those who fear the lord. He will instruct them in the ways they should choose.

They will spend their days in prosperity, and their descendants will inherit the land. The lord confides in those who fear him. He makes his covenant known to them. My eyes are ever on the lord for only he will release my feet from the snare. Who is it that the lord leads and guides?

It's sinners. It's the humble. Those who keep the demands of the covenant, which can't be sinlessness because David's already said he's a sinner, and it's those who fear the law. The emphasis here is on being humble before the launch. That's the kind of person the lord leads, the kind of person the lord guides.

Not those who are perfect, not the self righteous, not the arrogant, the bold, but the humble. It is those who come before the lord empty handed. And in fact, that is the only attitude we can come to the lord with. First 14, it says the lord confides in those who fear him, he makes his covenant known to them. That's saying, the only people who come into the covenant with the lord, are those who fear the laws?

Those humble before him. And you need to know that. If you aren't yet a Christian, if you're exploring Christianity, who is it? Who comes to the lord? Who is it?

Who can come into relation with the lord. It's those who fear him. Now that's not terror, but it is an awe of god. It's not those who think they deserve to come in. But the humble, those who know their sinners, those who fear the lord, those are the people the lord welcomes it.

And you have to come to the lord in that way with nothing but your sin. And the lord welcomes you in. And that is also the kind of person the lord leads and guides. And there is a promise here that those people, he will lead. He will guide them.

How does he do it? Well, you know there are 2 kinds of guide, don't you? You go to a, a site, you know, I don't know, a stately home or something like that. There are 2 kinds of guide that you could have. There's the kind of guide, which is a map.

You could pick up a guide, and it tells you the route, tells you exactly where you where you should go. And we want the lord to guide that way to say, look, here's your guide. That's your guide for life. There you go. This is the route you should take.

But that is not the way the lord promises to guide us because there's the other kind of guide, isn't there? There's the person who stands there and says, I'll take you around. And that is the kind of guide the lord is for us. Someone has said guidance is something more something the lord does rather than the lord gives. It's something he does rather than gives us.

In other words, he doesn't give us the map. He guides us by walking with us. Through life. And therefore, very often, we see god's guidance more as we look back on life, rather than as we look forward. As we look back on our lives, we will look back on many times when we said, I have no idea what to do.

I don't know what to do, lord. And we prayed, and we said, lord, I trust you. Teach me. Remember me. And then we tried to be the kind of person the lord guides, and we go, but lord, you didn't tell me exactly what to do, but as I look back on life, you'll go, but the lord guided me every step of the way.

He took me exactly where he wanted me to be, and he walked with me through it all. So when we don't know what to do, when we think, lord, I just don't know. I there are traps ahead of me, traps down the path for me, for my family. What do we do? Well, we pray to the lord.

You say lord, I trust in you, teach me, remember me, and then be the kind of person of the lord. Guides. Let's pray. Heavenly father, we thank you again for your word. Thank you.

It is a lamb to our feet and a light to our paths, and we pray, please, that you would help us. In those times where we just don't know what to do, help us to trust in you, knowing that you are totally faithful, totally trustworthy. Help us to pray to you, to teach us and to show us your paths. Father, thank you that you do remember us not according to our sin. But according to your promise, according to your covenant, and then help his father to be humble before you, and to be the kind of people who you lead.