"Our deepest problem answered"

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So if you would like to turn in your Bibles to Psalm a 130, it's on page six two four. A song of ascents. Out of the depths, I cry to you, Lord. Lord, hear my voice. Let your ears be attentive to my cry for mercy.

If you, Lord, kept a record of sins, Lord, who could stand? But with you, there is forgiveness so that we can, with reverence, serve you. I wait for the Lord. My whole being waits, and in his word, I put my hope. I wait for the Lord more than watchmen wait for the morning.

More than watchmen wait for the morning. Israel, put your hope in the Lord, for with the Lord is unfailing love, and with him is full redemption. He himself will redeem Israel from all their sins. Thank you, David, for reading that. Good morning.

My name is Abray, one of the members here at Hope Church. Do keep your Bibles open to to that passage, and we'll be referring back to it as we as we go along. After Bart did the the old age talk of kind of wishing that I had actions to this to this sermon. But unfortunately, I've I've got no actions, but we'll try to make it as interactive as possible. We are taking a very short break from our series in the book of John looking at Psalm a 130.

Now, Psalm a 130 is part of a collection of Psalms called the songs of ascent, which you heard David mentioned at the start of the reading. There was a collection of 15 Psalms, which are historically sang by pilgrims on the road to Jerusalem a few times a year, maybe three times a year for things like Passover or Pentecost. And so they sing these songs, and they go all the way to Jerusalem. And then the idea is that when you get to the temple, people think that there were 15 steps up into the temple, and each of these Psalms would have been sung as the priests ascended these steps to the temple. So we're going to be looking at one in particular, Psalm a 130.

So as we do, let's pray together for God's help. Our heavenly father, we thank you so much that we have your word here, and we ask that as we look into the Psalm, please, Lord, open our eyes to see you more clearly and the things that you have done for us through the Lord Jesus Christ. We ask this in your name. Amen. Let me start by asking a question.

What occupies your mind and your heart the most? What keeps you awake at night? What do you want God the most to change about your life? It could be anything from health or finances. It could be work or relationships.

We all have these sort of issues in our lives, and and no doubt these are not unimportant things in our lives. And I think what the Psalm does is challenges us to ask the question. What if our biggest worries actually show us that we've misunderstood what our deepest problems are? None of these things are not important, but what if the the most important things are in our lives sometimes we actually neglect and What if the things that we desire the most cannot give us a satisfaction that we are looking for So the psalmist confronts these things our deepest needs and shows us that where we can find the true hope and true joy. So let's walk along with the psalmist and all the pilgrims as they go on their way to Jerusalem.

So picture the scene. The Psalmist is very likely a priest and like anyone else, he's got his issues in life, probably maybe health and finances and family relationships and the and the like. But a few times a year, maybe even once a year, he puts that to one side and because there's something even more important that he has to think about that takes up his mind, his imagination. So he gears up, he makes preparations, loads up his donkey, and perhaps with a dozen other pilgrims or maybe even hundreds, they set off on their way to Jerusalem. So four points this morning that we're going to look at, and they follow the psalm because the psalm is four couplets.

So we'll look at it that way. So out of the depths, look with me in verses one and two. Out of the depths, I cry to you, Lord. Lord, hear my voice. Let your ears be attentive to my cry for mercy.

Now, it's a bit of a bleak start to the depths. It doesn't sound like a nice place to be, and and it's not. That's the the the points that Cyrus is making. Now the depths are associated with waters, with the sea, ocean, that's sort of that's sort of picture. And in the Israelite mind, the water is not where they want to be.

The Israelites, I kind of think of them like my mom. My mom's people are from very much an agrarian culture in the middle of Nigeria, so they they just don't like water. Like, my mom does not want to be anywhere near water. And this is what the Israel Israel Israelites are like. They are an agrarian culture, so water for them is a place of death, chaos, turbulence.

It's not really the place you want to be. It's not the place where you find God. It's quite the opposite. And remember, these pilgrims are traveling up to Jerusalem, and the thing about the geography of the place is that regardless of what direction you come at Jerusalem, you're always traveling up because Jerusalem is built on a hill. So they're going up to Jerusalem, and then when they get there, they go up to the temple mound or the temple complex.

And when they get to the temple, you go up again to some steps, and that's where you meet God. So get going... Getting to God is is a is a process of ascending up. So if God is up there, and the psalmist is saying he's in the depths, he's basically saying to us that he's as far away from God as he would ever want to be. He separated from God.

This has... This is there's a distance and this is his way of effectively defining what sin is. Sin is that separation between us and God. So so look, we'll jump very quickly to verses three and verse eight. In verse three, he says, if you Lord kept a record of sins, Lord, who could stand?

And in verse eight, he says, he himself will redeem Israel from all their sins. So this is about sin. This is about him being separated from the Lord. And so this is not perhaps some people might take the depths of these, you know, some problem that he might face in his life like health or money, but this is not that. This is him being separated from God, and he's in anguish because of it.

But he doesn't remain there, and we know this because he's on his way to Jerusalem. He's trying to resolve the problem. So he approaches God, But why does he feel like this? Why does he feel this sense of separation? Well, I think there there is a sense that the closer that you approach God, the more that you feel your sin and the weight of your sin.

And this is what holy... Holiness is like. Holiness shows us our sin more clearly. It's like one of those adverts, which thankfully are not on TV anymore, but there's some variation of them, whether that's Purcell or Ariel, one of those detergent brands. Some guy walks along, and he thinks that he's got a white T shirt, and then another person who's actually obviously washed with Ariel or whatever comes along, and he...

And then the the first guy goes, oh, you know, kind of that kind of thing. Or another example, you might think that you've got white teeth, and then you stand next to an American, and then you go. Oh gosh. And it's that sense of contrast. Right?

That's that is it it shows us exactly how sinful we are the closer we approach God. We see the weight of our sin. Then the psalmist sees the weight of his sins and he laments. And and we we we do very often compare ourselves to other people. Right?

We, you we say, I'm not that bad or, you know, I'm not. So usually, especially on the Internet debates, I'm not Hitler. Well, no one's Hitler. Right? But that's not the standard.

The standard is not Hitler. The standard is the perfect Lord Jesus Christ, and no one meets that standard, and the the psalmist knows this. And what is his response? He doesn't try harder. He doesn't, you know, get involved in a 12 step program.

He cries out to the Lord. He's not attempting to rescue himself, but to look for a rescuer, to depend on the Lord. And so he continues on his way, and let's continue with him as he sings this song. Our second point, who could stand? Look with me at verses three to four.

If you, Lord, kept a record of sins, Lord, who could stand? But with you, there is forgiveness so that we can, with reverence, serve you. Now he talks about standing in God's presence and this imagery of standing has is associated with two places. Firstly, the temple. Like we say, this psalmist is almost certainly a priest.

So he's he is quite literally walking on the way to Jerusalem so that he can quite literally stand in God's presence. And the priests we know in other verses in the Bible, the Leviticus, they had a whole ritual that they had to go through in order to stand in God's presence. You couldn't just simply just waltz in there. It would be quite deadly, in fact. So they had to go and cleanse themselves ritually, which is a picture of the holiness.

It's a picture of them being able to stand in presence of a holy God. So the so the psalmist will probably have this in mind that he had to be made holy. So the second place that standing is associated with is the courtroom. So you imagine yourself in a court. The arguments have been made.

The jury has deliberated. The judge looks at the defendant says, please rise, and then a sentence is handed out. Guilty, not guilty. That's another image of standing, and this is what the psalmist again is referring to because God will judge his deeds. So in in verse three, he says, if you, Lord, kept a record of sins, who...

Lord, could stand? And it's a rhetorical question, but I think Romans chapter three verses 10 to 12 gives us an answer to this question. It says, Paul writes here. He says, as it is written, there is no one righteous, not even one. There is no one who understands.

There is no one who seeks God. All have turned away. They have together become worthless. There is no one who does who does good, not even one. Tell us what you really think, Paul.

It's a rhetorical question, and and the psalmist knows the answer to that because if the perfect God is the standard, no one lives up to that standard. If he opened the records of all of our sins, all of our actions, even just what we did, perhaps even just this morning, who would stand? We never... We can never measure up to his standard. But the psalmist says in verse four, there is forgiveness.

Verse four, he says, but with you, there is forgiveness so that we can with reverence serve you. Now, it's a it's a bit of an odd... Don't know what you were thinking, but I thought it was a bit of an odd thing to say because he says there is forgiveness. I mean, you might think the next sentence is so that we can love you, but that's not what he says, does it? He says so that we can with reverence serve you.

And if you look at the older translation of the NIV, and if you look at other maybe more literal translations, it says something more like, so therefore, you will therefore, you will be feared or that you are feared, which again is probably an even stranger combination of things. So what's the... What's this link between forgiveness and fear? Why would you put the two things together? And I think maybe one way of thinking about it, if you imagine yourself in front of some natural sort of scenery, something quite spectacular to say, the Rocky Mountains or Mount Everest or the Highlands or the fjords in Norway, the natural human response to that is awe.

You can't even help yourself. You just go wow when you see these these kinds of scenes. It's a sense of awe. And similarly with God, when God forgives this holy God who should be judging us, it is a wow moment. We we we have that reverence or fear as the Bible calls it.

And that fear is what leads to obedience. Because ultimately, the psalmist wants to be in God's presence. He can't be in God's presence if he's not holy, if he's if he is disobedient. So he wants to be made holy so that he can be obedient and and be in God's presence and serve him. And for us, we'll see later, we'll come back to this theme that comes through the power of the Holy Spirit in us.

The Psalmist continues on his way, so let's walk with him. The third point, waiting for the morning. Look down at verses five verse five. I wait for the Lord, my whole being waits, and in his word, I put my hope. Now waiting is very much a theme of life and certainly for Christians, it is very much our theme of life as we wait for the Lord Jesus Christ.

And we wait for all kinds of things. We wait for your deliveries, medical appointments, adulthood, customer service, classic. Some people might be waiting for the seventh end, and whatever it might be. But waiting shows us that we are not in control. We're not in control of things.

That's why we have to wait. I mean, if if I could if I could have things my way, one thing I would change is that I wouldn't have to wait for transportation and you ever, I would just walk out my front door. I wouldn't... I would not have to run to the train station like I do 50% of the time. I would just walk into the train station, up the stairs, back down to the platform, and there, which is wonderfully, the train is just waiting there for me.

All the passengers is like, oh, here's Adbury. Conductor says, oh, mister Este, please. Can I take your bags? The doors close, and off the train goes to the wonderful world of one London Waterloo. But that doesn't happen, obviously.

I, like everyone else, have to wait, and sometimes I have to run, so I don't have to wait for the next train. But waiting produces in us all kinds of things like anxiety and fears and anger. But here, the psalmist shows us how he waits. He shows us two two ways he waits. Firstly, he waits desperately.

In verse five, he says, I wait for the Lord. My whole being waits. His whole being. What does that mean? Well, picture a man in a in a desert.

Perhaps he hasn't had a drop of water for a few days. He is being beaten down by the sun. The sun's reflecting off the heat off of the sand back in his face. He's so tired. He's probably on all fours at this point, crawling, and everywhere around him is just miles and miles of sand.

And he is on his last legs, and just out of reach, sees an oasis, water. And you can imagine for this man, every cell in his body will be reaching out almost quite literally for that water. That's what the psalmist says. This is this is how he's waiting for God. He's desperate for God.

He's desperate as he says later on in in verse five. He says in his word, I put my hope. His word is what he's hoping for. He's desperate for that word. And what is that word?

It's God's word to him. I forgive you. That's what he's waiting for. I forgive you. So like us, he may have all kinds of things going on in his life, but the most important thing for him is God's forgiveness.

Not for his circumstances to improve, of course, that's important, but God's forgiveness is the most important thing. He's waiting to be satisfied, waiting to be with God. Secondly, he's waiting expectantly. He waits by casting his mind forward to what's to come despite not having it right now. So in verses one and two, he talks about the depths, so being separated by God.

He uses a picture of of space distance and here in these verses, he talks about being separated in time. So today, he wants forgiveness, but he hasn't got it yet, but he's waiting for that. And He uses if we look down to verse six. He says I wait for the Lord more than watchmen wait for the morning more than watchmen wait for the morning So this picture of the watchman is one of a guard a soldier standing on the city walls looking out while everyone's asleep in their beds. You're not worrying about anything, but his job is to make sure that no one goes into the city unnoticed.

So he has to sound the alarm if if that was what happened. So for him, the watchman, it's a time of stress, high anxiety because everyone's lives are dependent on you. You have to watch the city. And therefore, for the watchman, the morning, of course, that means, yes, your job is now finished. You can go home.

But it's a time then for him for... Of rest and and safety. But notice this picture, he chooses it very specifically. The watchman is waiting for the morning. The morning always comes.

It's not the watchman's job to to kind of rush on the dawn. The sun rotates around his axis. We get day and night. The morning will come. It happens it happens every day, I'm told.

And he says, likewise, God's forgiveness will come if we wait. It will come in God's time. So the waiting for for this psalmist is painful. We don't want to minimize that. It is actually painful, but it's not hopeless.

But you see contrast this with verse four. In verse four, he talks about getting forgiveness. So so we might expect the Psalm to just end there. He's gotten forgiveness, but then he's wasting again. So...

But we remember we say the psalmist is on his way to Jerusalem with with these pilgrims because they're trusting that the Lord will forgive. So again, the waiting is painful, but it is not purposeless. The psalmist is at the point of desperation, but he knows the Lord will answer. And so he continues on his way, so we follow along. Fourth point, redemption.

Look at me at verses seven and eight. Israel, put your hope in the Lord for the... With the Lord is unfailing love and with him is full redemption. He himself will redeem Israel from all their sins. Again, redemption is probably not an image that we are familiar with in our modern days and times, but in the Old Testament, people would sometimes sell themselves into slavery or would be made slaves.

And in most cultures around this part of the world, you could buy back your freedom from from a slave master. So a slave would sometimes earn their way. Not... It didn't happen very often, but usually, they would expect someone to redeem them, someone to buy their freedom back. Another party, a willing party.

And verse eight talks about being redeemed, and and this redemption here is a freedom from sin, slavery to sin. So the psalmist is looking forward for not just him, but the entire people of God being redeemed from sin. And the reason God does this is because he loves his people. So the start of the psalm, we saw the the psalmist crying from the depths, and at the end of the psalm, celebration of the Lord's full redemption for his people that's coming. And again, redemption is not about a better life or circumstance now, but one day everything will be made perfect.

And this redemption frames how he sees his life and how the people of God will see their life in in in him. So now we leave the psalmist, perhaps at the foot of the temple steps, perhaps even waiting to enter into God's presence. What does this mean for us? So the psalmist is kind of left waiting at the end of the psalm, expectant, but confident. How is this hope secured for the psalmist?

How is this secured for us? Well, the answer is the one who entered the depths on our behalf, and that is the Lord Jesus Christ, of course. So four things that he does for us, and these Echo what we've already read in in this Psalm. The firstly, cried for us. See, our Lord cried in his anguish.

He cried, my God. My God. Why have you forsaken me? He cried when he took our punishment for our sins so that we might live. So because we should really be the ones who are crying out from the depths, we should be crying forever.

We should be separated from the Lord forever. But because Jesus cried out, we can cry out. We can cry out, and he will listen. He will answer. Secondly, Jesus won our forgiveness.

See, his death and resurrection wiped our slate clean. So when we are in the courtroom, we should be the ones the judge says to to you are guilty. But the judge looks at us and he sees Jesus perfect record, and he says not guilty. That judgment has happened for us as Christians, and you have been declared not guilty. All because of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Thirdly, he stood for us, and there is really only one person who's perfect, holy, righteous, who could stand in the Lord's presence, and of course, that is this perfect sinless Lord Jesus Christ, and he stood as a sinless priest for us as the priest represents the people to God. He represents us to the Lord. And very much like the watchmen, we can now stand and anticipate the morning coming. So this passage really tells us that as surely as the sun rose, you can be sure that you are forgiven in Christ. I'll say that again.

As surely as the sun rose, you can be sure that you're forgiven in Christ. So did the sun rise this morning, Hope Church? You can be sure that you are forgiven in the Lord Jesus Christ. And isn't that wonderful thing? Fourthly, he redeems us.

He brought us back from slavery to sin through the Lord Jesus Christ sacrifice. Romans chapter six verses 15 to 18 says, this is Paul saying speaking, what then? Shall we sin because we are not under the law, but under grace by no means? Don't you know that when you offer yourselves to someone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one you obey? Whether you are slaves to sin, which leads to death or to obedience, which leads to righteousness.

But thanks be to God that though you used to be slaves to sin, you have come to obey from your heart the pattern of teaching, it has now claimed your allegiance. You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness. See, our forgiveness produces obedience in us. That is that is the only way that we can be that we can be obedient to God. We have to be forgiven.

There is no other way. It is not our doing. It is through the Lord Jesus Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit working in us that we can be obedient. And this perhaps for Christians might sometimes be might feel contrary. You know, it might be countries of the way that we feel because we sin.

We still sin in this life, and we might feel that separation from God, but this is no less true that we have been redeemed. I am. It's no less true despite our feelings. But there is one day where we will see our redemption clearly. One day when we will no longer sin.

We will no longer feel that sense of separation from the Lord Jesus Christ and from from our Father. So again, this idea of of redemption being bought back, it's more than just simply someone paying for your debts, then your your account goes back to zero. It's more like that person, this king effectively, pays for your debts, account goes back to zero. He then adopts you into his family and then says, okay, I'll give you everything, everything I have. And that is the the outrageous generosity of our father.

And so whatever that we lost when Adam fell in sin, we have gained infinitely more in the Lord Jesus Christ. And if you're not a Christian here today, I will say, do as the psalmist does. The psalmist is approaching God. That's what he wants. So keep coming.

Keep coming to Hope Church. Keep listening to to sermons. Keep asking questions. Cry out to the Lord and wait for the morning because the Lord has promised that he will answer. So as we conclude, we we return to the questions that we started with.

What do we want most for God to change in our lives? And what do we believe will finally make us happy? Of course, we have many questions in life, and I say that knowing that there are all kinds of issues that are happening in this room. Some of those questions we may not we may not get the answer to in this life, and some of our desires may not get fulfilled in this life. But the Psalmist reminds us reminds us that our biggest problems and our our deepest desires will be satisfied and are satisfied in our savior.

And so with this in mind, we can look at other things in our lives, problems, whatever they might be, knowing that the biggest things has actually been dealt with. And one day, we will be perfect, made perfect, and every tear will be wiped from our eyes. So although sin looks to drag us down to the depths, the Lord Jesus Christ lifts us up to the heights with God. And we can be thankful for that. Let's pray together.

Our heavenly Father, we thank you so much for Jesus and what he has done. We thank you that in this life, though there are many issues that we come against, that we can wait expectantly, but not in a false kind of hope, but knowing the one who has made the promise will be faithful to what he has said. So please, Lord, help us to encourage one another with this. Help us to remind ourselves of what you have said that we might hope expectedly, desperately, and know that we will be satisfied in you. In your name we pray.

Amen.