The Great Invitation
Pastor Matt Bell
Sermon Summary
Pastor Matt’s sermon on Psalm 27, titled “The Great Invitation,” presents David’s prayer as a call to live all of life before the face of God. He shows that David’s confidence begins with the Lord as his light, salvation, and stronghold, which drives out fear and exposes every false refuge. David’s central desire—to dwell in the house of the Lord and gaze upon His beauty—becomes an invitation for Christians to seek God’s face continually, now fulfilled through Christ, who has opened access to God’s presence. The sermon urges believers to live Coram Deo, with a constant awareness of God’s presence in every part of life, and to wait on the Lord with courage, believing they will see His goodness in the land of the living.
Sermon Transcript
Introduction
We are in a series, a year-long series called Year of the Bible, and we're working our way through the Bible together as a church. At the beginning of the year, in January. We produced a reading plan for all of us to be reading through the Bible together. Many of us started that journey together. And as happens typically in a Bible reading plan, there are great victories.
There's also days where you end up falling behind, that is, just how it goes. But right now, we are in the book of Psalms, and I just want to encourage you whether you started with us in January or not. whether you fell off at some point in Leviticus, or Chronicles, or all those other Bibles, books of the Bible, where Bible reading plans go to die, whether or not that happened to you, right at the beginning of your handout, you can see the chapters that we're going to be reading this week. And we'll be in the book of Psalms now for another 5 weeks or so.
And Psalms is just a great book of the Bible to jump into at any point of the year, at any point in time. and just read a few chapters of the Word of God each day. So I really want to encourage you, let's be reading the book of Psalms this week. I have a really bad habit of thinking that whatever passage of scripture I'm studying is the best passage of scripture in the whole Bible.
And that happened again to me this week as I was studying our chapter that we're looking at Psalm 27. So if you have your Bibles, you can open to Psalm 27. As I was reading and studying Psalm 27 this week, I was just in awe, just in awe of the word of God, and how many layers there are and how deep it is, and how you can follow this little trail and that little trail, and pull on this little thread, and it takes you here, and it takes you there, and I was just amazed. I was thinking, this has to be my favorite psalm.
Psalm 27 is the best psalm in the whole Bible. And then I had to settle myself down a little bit and just remind myself, this happens every single week, whatever passage of the Bible you are studying. But Psalm 27 is our passage this week. I am just so in awe of what the Lord communicates to us in his word through Psalm 27, I pray that the Lord would help me to communicate it to you in a way that's beneficial to you this week.
Scripture Reading: Psalm 27
And we'll start this morning. Let's start just by reading through the whole psalm together. So I invite you to stand with me as we do here at Christ's King Church. As we read the word of God together, we stand to honor the word of God, to remind ourselves that this isn't just any book, that this is the holy Bible. It's separated, it's set apart. It is the word of God.
Amen. And so it says at the beginning of David, The Lord is my light and my salvation. Whom shall I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life, of whom shall I be afraid? When evildoers assail me to eat up my flesh, my adversaries and foes, it is they who stumble and fall. Though an army encamp against me, my heart shall not fear. The war rise against me, yet I will be confident.
One thing I have asked of the Lord, that will I seek after, that I may dwell in the house of the Lord, all the days of my life. To gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to inquire in his temple. For he will hide me in the shelter, in his shelter, in the day of trouble, he will conceal me under the cover of his tent. He will lift me high upon a rock. And now my head shall be lifted up above my enemies all around me.
And I will offer in his tent sacrifices with shouts of joy. I will sing and make melody to the Lord. Hear, O Lord, when I cry aloud, be gracious to me and answer me. You have said, seek my face, my heart says to you, your face, Lord, do I seek. Hide not your face from me. Turn not your servant away in anger. O you who have been my help, cast me not off, forsake me not, O God, of my salvation.
For my father and my mother have forsaken me, but the Lord will take me in. Teach me your way, O Lord, and lead me on a level path because of my enemies. Give me not up to the will of my adversaries, for false witnesses have arisen against me, and they breathe out violence. I believe that I shall look upon the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. Wait for the Lord.
Be strong, and let your heart take courage. Wait for the Lord.
Opening Prayer
Father, we do thank you for your word. It is so precious to us. Lord, I pray that these would not just be words on a page, but Lord, that they would be words spoken from you, from your heart to our heart. Lord, that it would, that hearing from you today, hearing from your word, would change us, would, would mold us, would shape us, into the people that you have called us to be.
God, we thank you for your son. The word made flesh. who dwelt among us. who pursued us, who has laid down his life for us to save us. Lord, it's through him that we can do all things. With your help, we can do anything. Without you, we can do nothing. But with God, all things are possible. Help us, Lord Jesus. Let us glorify you in the name of your son, and seek to do that every day.
It's in his precious name we pray. Amen. You may be seated this morning.
Sermon Introduction: The Greatest Invitation
I wanted to just walk through this psalm together and I'm going to use 4 questions as sort of guideposts and signposts along the way as we make our way through this psalm 4 questions for us to consider and to ponder. In this chapter, in Psalm 27, we see David's approach to living, how David lives his life. His worldview, the way he sees life. And I think there are some things from this that we need to learn on how we should live our lives.
on his philosophy that we should adopt and implement in our own life. I've titled the sermon today, the greatest invitation, the greatest invitation. And as I said, there's 4 questions that I want to draw your attention to, to help us organize ourselves as we walk through the Psalm together. And the 1st question is this, who is your light? Who is your light?
Question 1: Who Is Your Light?
David begins this psalm, this prayer, this poem to the Lord by saying, the Lord is my light. And my salvation.
The Lord is my light. So who is your light? The Lord was David's light. Who is your light? Who is the light of your life? It might be wondering, what does that mean? What does that mean for someone or something to be the light of my life? David says, the Lord is his light. What does he mean by that? Your light is what illuminates your life. What shines into your life.
People put it this way in our modern language, they will say things like, that's my North Star. Have you ever heard someone say that? That's my North Star. That's the direction that I'm heading. That's the thing I'm orienting myself around. To say, the Lord is your light is to say that he is what illuminates your life. He is the light by which you see everything in your life.
Another aspect to this is, you could say, your light is what brings you joy. What brings you joy? What brings you joy, it lightens your countenance, doesn't it? You can be having a bad day, a dark day, a sad day, and then you hear some good news or something in particular that brings you joy, and what does it do? It lightens your countenance. It illuminates your life. So you can say, what is your light?
It's what brings you joy in life. As I mentioned, the North Star, you can also say that your light is what gives direction to your life. It's what illuminates your path. David says, the Lord is my light. Can you say this about the Lord? Can you say that it is the Lord that gives direction to your life? It is the Lord that illuminates your path, that it is the Lord that brings you joy.
Ultimate joy. That it is in him and him alone that you are seeking after joy. Is the Lord your light? Can you honestly say that? You know, this is the starting point, not only of this psalm, But the starting point for everything that flows from this psalm, and there's some really wonderful things in this psalm. But none of them will be experienced in our life if the Lord is not our light.
If the Lord is not the one that we are searching after, seeking after orienting our lives around, the guiding principle of our life, All of the wonderful things in this passage flow downstream from this. The Lord is my light and my salvation. Now, what if he's not? What if the Lord is not your light?
What if you are examining your heart even in this moment, and you're searching your heart and searching it honestly, and you have to say no? As I look into my heart, as I look into my life, there is something or someone else that is guiding my life. There's something or someone else that I'm orienting my life around, and it's not the Lord. What then?
Number one, you have to be honest about it. Be honest about it. Don't lie to yourself. Don't deceive yourself.
Be honest about it. And then take it to the Lord. That's the 1st step. Take this to the Lord. Confess it to him, Lord. There have been other things and other people that I have been seeking, pursuing above you. I have had a different light. I've been living my life according to a different rule book, a different plan, a different play, a different orientation.
Lord, I need to confess this to you. And I need to ask you for help. If you will do that, The Lord will not turn you away. He will never turn you away. It says a broken and contrite heart, he will not despise. If you go to the Lord in honesty, Truly, Bring it to the Lord. He will receive you, and he will help you.
Jesus said, blessed are the poor in spirit. For theirs is the kingdom of God. We have to recognize if the Lord is not our light, And he should be. I need to go to the Lord with that. I need to confess it to him. And he will help begin to reorient our lives. We sang it this morning. There's a 100 different ways to express this sentiment. David's doing it this way in this poetic term of light, but we sang the song this morning.
Lord, rain in my life. It's the same thing. It's the same thing. Is there an area of your life where the Lord is not reigning over? where you are reigning over that area of your life, where you are not submitting your life to his word in that area. In that area, he's not illuminating your life. You're not allowing the light of his word to shine into and permeate your life, that you might thereby walk in that path that he has laid out.
Is that the case? Take it to the Lord. Confess it to the Lord. Ask him for help. You know, sometimes, many times when we are living in this way, where there's an area of our life where he is not reigning, where he is not our light. We feel that conviction of the Holy Spirit, but we also, at the same time, listen to the condemnation of the devil. And so we feel ashamed, we feel embarrassed.
We don't want to take it to the Lord because we know better. And we're afraid that the Lord is going to rebuke us, be angry with us, turn us away. But the Bible tells us that perfect love casts out all fear. That there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Take this to the Lord, and he will receive you. He will receive you, you will receive your sin.
He will pay the price for it, and he will give you the help that you need. Everything flows downstream from this. The Lord is my light. And my salvation.
We can't seek salvation in any other place than the place by which he has provided it in his son Jesus. We cannot seek salvation in things. We cannot seek salvation in other people. We cannot seek salvation in material possessions, in our bank account. We can't seek salvation in our own good works, and good efforts, and good deeds. Truly the Lord must be our salvation.
As we trust in him and the work of his son Jesus, the blood that he shed to pay the price for our sin. And as we do this, if the Lord is your light and the Lord is your salvation, Then comes this next statement. Whom shall I fear?
If God is for us, who can be against us? If the Lord is your light and the Lord is your salvation, you have nothing to fear. He goes on to say, the Lord is the stronghold of my life. Of whom shall I be afraid?
In verse 3, he says, though an army encamp against me, my heart shall not fear. Three times in these first three verses, David mentions the word fear. But every time that he mentions them, that word fear, it's in the context of not being afraid. Whom shall I fear? Of whom shall I be afraid? My heart shall not fear. Why? Because the Lord is his light and his salvation.
Because the Lord is his stronghold. The place that he runs when trouble comes. The one who is protecting him, the one who is keeping him, the one who is guarding him is the Lord. If it is the Lord who is protecting you, who can touch you? No one.
And if no one can touch you, because God is protecting you, we have nothing to fear. No one to fear.
The Lord is the place where David runs when he is in trouble. David had armies that were chasing him. I don't know what you've got going on in your life. But there's not an army out there waiting for you.
David was often in very real trouble. His life hanging in the balance. Not knowing if he would survive the next day, and he says, the Lord is where I run. The Lord is my stronghold. I'm not, he says, I'm not looking to the walls of this city to protect me. I am trusting in my God to protect me. The Lord is the place that I run. And because of that, when trouble came, he wasn't afraid.
The armies encamped against him, though his enemies came, he says, to eat up my flesh. Man, that's really graphic. says, I'm not afraid. I have no reason to fear. Because God, God is watching over me.
Where do you run in times of trouble? Who or what is your stronghold? for your life. What are you seeking after when hard times come, difficult times come, difficult days come? Where do you turn? Turn to the Lord. Let him be your light in your salvation. Let him be the stronghold of your life. Remind yourself of his providential care and his sovereign protection and watch your fears melt away.
Remind yourself, it's God who's watching over me. It's God who's protecting me. It's God who will deliver me and watch your fear. Vanish. Watch your worries and your cares and your anxieties. Fade into the background. Listen, when fear comes and worry comes and anxiety comes, that's not coming from God. That's the enemy using some situation in your life to lie to you.
And to tell you, God's not watching over you. God's not going to protect you. God's not going to deliver you, and he's not going to do it because of this in your life, that in your life, because you did this when you were 14 years old.
The enemy uses the events in our life to lie to us. It's why we need the word of God. We must remind ourselves. No, the Lord is my stronghold. The Lord is my deliverer. The Lord will set me free from this affliction. The Lord will bring me through to the other side. Remind yourself of the truth of God's word.
And watch your worries and your fears fade into the background. If you find that you are overcome with fear and worry and anxiety, Could it be that you have a different stronghold that you have taken up safety in? Could it be that you are running to a different place of safety? Could it be that you are living your light, life according to a different light? That you have placed your ultimate trust in something or someone else.
Everyone else will fail you. But he will never fail you. He will never leave you. He will never forsake you. Make him the stronghold of your life. Who is your light? May we say it is Christ and Christ alone. Amen?
Question 2: What Is Your Prayer?
The 2nd question I want to ask you is what is your prayer? What is your prayer? We see David's prayer here in verse 4. He begins by saying one thing I have asked of the Lord. And that will I seek after. One thing he has asked of the Lord. Now, we know that David asks many more things of the Lord than one thing.
In fact, I can count even in this psalm, at least 8 other things that he asks for. If you have your Bibles open, you can see just a handful of them. In verse 7, he says, hear me, O Lord, be gracious to me. Answer me. These are all requests. He says, hide not your face from me. Turn not your servant away in anger. Cast me not off. Teach me your way, lead me on a level path.
Give me not up to the will of my adversaries. These are all requests of the Lord. So how is it that David can say, he's only asked one thing of the Lord and then goes on to ask 8 more things of the Lord? What does he mean by this one thing? What David is saying by saying one thing I've asked of the Lord, he's saying, this is the most important thing to me. That's what he's doing.
He's underscoring this. It's like he's, you know, if you're crafting an email, you're bolding it, you're underlining it, you're italicizing it, you're making it in big fun. Don't miss this. That's what David is doing. They didn't have bold and underlined. So he has to use language to underscore his words. And so he's saying, one thing I have asked of the Lord.
He's saying, this is the most important thing. Another way of saying this is, Lord, if you only answer one thing, Lord, if you only answer one of my prayers, let it be this one. Let it be this one prayer. And so what is this one thing? What is this most important request that David has? I'll be honest, I think it's quite surprising. One thing I have asked of the Lord, and that will I seek after.
that I may dwell in the house of the Lord, all the days of my life.
His one prayer, his most important request that he brings to the Lord, he says, is God, I want to be in your house? Every day. I want to be in your presence every day all the days of my life. What a prayer. What a prayer.
Now, if we had to all say, I have one prayer that I want the Lord to answer for me. And I asked you this question before I brought you to Psalm 27. Or if you looked at your last week of your life, and the petition you brought before the Lord the most, what would that one prayer be?
I would be willing to bet a million dollars, even though I don't have a million dollars, but if I had a million dollars, I would be willing to bet a million dollars. that not one of you, your most important prayer and your most frequent prayer, this last week was, Lord, please have them open the church every day of the week. So I can go to church every single day. I would be willing to wager a whole lot of money.
that not a single soul in here prayed that prayer. this week. In fact, I'd even be willing to wager that at least one of you this morning, on the way to church, actually prayed, Lord, Please let the sermon be a little short today. One thing I'm asking of you this morning, that Pastor Matt would be brief. this morning.
If we look at our prayer life, the things that we pray for, And then we look at David. and his life. Even as enemies are encamping against him, even as those the people are coming against him. He says, Lord, the most important prayer to me. Lord, the one thing that I am after, the one thing I've asked of you, the one thing that I'm seeking after, the most important thing, Lord, that I would be able to dwell in your house.
All the days of my life. This is the same man who would say, Better is one day. In your courts, in your house. than a thousand. Any other place.
The David would trade a thousand days. anywhere else. Any other place. to spend one day, in the presence of God. to spend one day in God's house.
I think if we're being honest with ourselves, we would all say, That's not the philosophy by which I'm living. my life. I've never even considered this as a guiding principle or philosophy for my life. Your church is only open one day a week, so how could I even do it?
Just think about it for a moment.
Think about what David is saying. He wants to spend his days in the presence of God.
Is that how we want to spend our days?
One thing. To be with you. To be with you, Jesus. Let every day of my life be a day I spend in your presence.
Why does he want to do this?
Why would David, the king? who had, to us, what we would consider nearly unlimited resources. Why is this his most important priority? Well, he tells us, He says, I want to do this so that I may gaze upon the beauty of the Lord.
That I could just... marvel at.
God's majesty, God's glory. that I could just be there with him.
In his presence.
He says, then notice, for he, he says, will hide me in his shelter in the day of trouble. He will conceal me under the cover of his tent. He will lift me high upon a rock. These are the things that happen in the presence of God. Protection. Concealment, exaltation.
This is why David wants to be in the presence of the Lord. because he knows that in that place, he will be safe. He will be safe. And so it is with us. In the presence of the Lord. Protected by the Lord, we are safe from all of our enemies and all of our foes.
And this is why David, for all of his flaws, and faults, and failures, and sins, of which there was ample evidence in the Bible. This is why David, for all of that, in spite of all of that, He is regarded as a man after God's own heart. Not because he was perfect. But because the Lord was his light. This is what David was seeking after.
Question 3: Who or What Are You Seeking After?
Which brings us to our third question. from the Psalm, who or what are you seeking after? We know what David was seeking after. Who or what are we seeking after?
One thing I have asked of the Lord, and that will I seek after.
In verse 8, David says, you, speaking to the Lord, you have said to me. Seek my face. My heart says to you, your face, Lord. Do I seek? This is why I've titled this sermon The Greatest Invitation. Because God has given to his people. the invitation for us to seek his face.
David says, you have said to me, seek my face. The Lord has said to us, seek my face. God has given us the invitation to seek his face, to come into his presence. Is there a better invitation than this?
You can look for your whole life trying to find a better invitation. But truly, you will not find it. You will not find a greater invitation than this. There is no greater invitation than the one from God to his children that we might seek his face. Never has someone so high, invited someone so low, to have an audience with them.
It really is astonishing. when you think about it. I don't know if you know this right now or not.
But the spurs are in the playoffs right now. I don't know, I don't know if you knew that. You did not think I was going there.
So there's all these news stories about the Spurs and everything going on with the Spurs right now. And I've been a lifelong Spurs fan. My dad was a Spurs fan. I remember going to games at the Hemisphere Arena. Yeah, okay. We know what that's about. My dad used to tell me stories about the iceman, George Gervin. Oh, I wish you could have seen George Gervin play.
So there's all these stories about the Spurs right now, and I read this story about this particular group of fans called the Jackals. I don't know if you've heard anything about the jackals. The jackals are 83 Spurs fans that were hand selected by Victor Wimbanyama himself. to form this group of fans, And he offered to them, after hand selecting 83 of them, to attend the whole season, Every one of the home games and the playoff games, For $1,000.
$999, which comes out to $24 a game. And they are in direct communication with him on what cheers to do at what time of the game, and he's giving them feedback on the way that they're cheering and the way that they're dressing, and it's this very tight knit group with Victor Wimbanyama, he hand selected these guys, and I was reading this story this week, and you know what I thought? Man, that'd be a sweet invite. Man, to be invited to be a part of the jackal?
Wow. What a gig. You know, it's a lifelong spurs fan, and maybe you're not a Spurs fan, maybe you're not a sports fan. 'm sorry. I'm sorry, but I'm certain that you're a fan of something or someone else. Maybe a poet, an artist, a musician, a songwriter. Imagine being invited into their inner circle, and when they would write a new song, they would send it to you 1st and say, hey, what are your thoughts on this?
Or you get an advanced copy of their latest novel to read before anybody else. What an invitation. Just imagine, you know, somebody that you love and admire from a distance, somebody high and above you that you would have no, you know, opportunity to meet in life, and yet they invite you into this inner circle. And it's so interesting to me. I was reading this story about the jackals and I was just thinking, man.
I want to be a jackal.
I'm reading that on, you know, one browser tab, and then on my another browser tab, I have a commentary on Psalm 27.
And at some point, the Holy Spirit, for me, sort of, you know, connected the dots in my mind that were so far disconnected and said, hey, uh, There's a greater invitation that's been issued to you. by somebody infinitely greater than Victor Wimbanyama. He invited them to 41 home games, but... The King of Kings has invited you into his throne room. Every day.
And because you were so filthy, he came and shed his blood to clean you up. to wash you, to make you acceptable, to clothe you with garments that are fit to walk into the presence of a king. He's made every provision for you. He's made a banquet table in his presence to feast on his goodness, to gaze upon the beauty of his holiness.
He's issued this call to you to seek his face. And hear you're fantasizing about what it would be like to be a jackal.
We have been issued such a marvelous and glorious invitation, but so often it goes unanswered. The invitation is stuffed away, hidden from sight, put in the junk drawer of our minds, ignored and forgotten. What a tragedy.
How brokenhearted would I be to find an old email in my junk filter from Victor Wimbanyama? Hey, you want to be a jackal? Ah, I missed it. And yet every day. This invitation. to be in the Lord's presence.
How much greater, how much better. May this not be true of us, that this invitation is forgotten, that it's ignored and hidden away. May we, like the psalmist, say, your face, Lord, do I seek? Hey, we answer the invitation. to seek the face of God.
What does it mean to seek the face of God? We sang it this morning during our prayer time. Lord, I seek you. What does that mean?
There's this phrase, this Latin phrase, that encapsulates what it means to seek the face of God. I know you didn't come expecting to learn Latin today, but it's ice cream sundae. It's also Latin Sunday. I don't know how you say ice cream in Latin. Somebody can look that up, but it's this Latin phrase, you may have heard it before. It's called Korum Deo. Coram Deo, C O R A M, D E O, Coram Deo.
It means before the face of God. Before the face of God. What does it mean to seek the face of God? What does it mean that David says, I want to be in your presence. I want to be in your house every day. I want to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord. What is he talking about?
He's talking about living life with the constant awareness of God's presence in our lives. See, David, in his time, he had to go to a physical place where the glory of God dwelt. He had to go in Jerusalem. The capital city, where the temple was, to the temple grounds. He wasn't high priest, he couldn't go into the holy of holies, but he could be near and adjacent to where the glory of God dwelt.
But all of that is done away now that Christ has come. The veil has been torn. Christ through his own body, the veil of his flesh has opened up for all who are in him, the presence of God throughout all the whole earth. So that wherever you are, you can experience the presence of God. Wherever you are, and even the body, now, for believers is the temple of the Holy Spirit.
But even though we carry the Holy Spirit of God with us, even though God's presence is with us and is everywhere all the time, so often we go through life unaware. We're not living life, Koram Deo. We not living life, beholding the face of God in the presence of God. We just wake up, put on our shoes, get out the door, go about our day.
And live our lives like a pagan with good morals from the book. That's not the Christian life. The Christian life is to live Coram Dale before the face of God, living your life with the constant awareness of God's abiding presence. Let me give you an example. We're in the year of the Bible. We're reading through the Bible.
You can, if you want to, read the Bible like any other book. You can open it up, you can read the words on the page, you can close it. Or you can read the Bible with the awareness that God is speaking to you. From his heart to you or heart. And if you've done much Bible reading, you know there's a difference. You know there's a difference. You know there's a difference in, well, it's Tuesday.
What are my chapters I got to read this week? Because I said at the beginning of the year that I was going to read the Bible. Let me just knock this out so I can check it off the box as some religious duty. You can do that. Or, when you open the word, it can be a face to face meeting with Christ himself. The invitation is open to you. Do the words on the page change?
No. It's the same words on the page. So what changes? It's the orientation of our hearts that must change. It's the receptiveness to the voice of the Holy Spirit in our life that must change. We live all of our lives in the presence of God wherever we go, but are we aware of it? You remember Jacob when he fled from Esau, He lay down and slept, and as he slept on that night, the heavens opened and God came down from heaven and visited with Jacob that night, and he woke up.
And what is it that Jacob said? He said, wow, behold, The Lord was in this place. And I was not aware. Let that not be us. Let us be people who live ever, Coram Deo, live ever before the face of God, seeking the face of God, seeking to live all of our lives with the Lord as our light. The Lord, the one illuminating our path in constant awareness of his abiding presence.
Let me ask you something. If you live that way, what would it do to your marriage?
Let me ask you another way. If when you got home, Jesus Christ was sitting in your living room. Would it change the way you interacted with your spouse?
If you don't say yes, you're either a liar, asleep, or dead.
If Jesus followed you, I'm talking about physically. Everywhere you went, you turned around, and there he was, everywhere he went, you turned around, and there he was. Would it not change everything about your life? What's the difference?
What's the difference? It just that we don't see them. We don't see them. because we're not seeking his face. He's here. He's there.
If Jesus was sitting in your lazy boy, You get well then, we did not change what you turned this station to on your TV. Be honest.
He's there. He sees all. He knows all. You know, Adam is the one who thought his actions were hidden from God's sight. Adam thought he could sin and get away with it by, you know, sowing some fig leaves on. And we look at that, we're like, Adam, what a fool. God saw it? Hello?
And yet. There's a little bit of Adam in each of us. God knows all God sees all. To seek the face of God is to live with the constant awareness of God's abiding presence, to live in constant communion and fellowship with him. through the way he has provided his son, Jesus Christ. to make your living room his throne room, to make everywhere you go a place where God's glory can dwell.
Question 4: Are You Waiting?
The 4th question I want to ask you. And I am having to skip over some verses here for the sake of time this morning.
But the verses that are there flow from seeking the face of God as you read over those again this week, meditate on the petitions that he makes. see them as ways to seek the face of God. The 4th question I want to ask you this morning is, are you waiting? Are you waiting? You're like, yes, I'm waiting. I'm waiting for you to finish this sermon. I'm waiting for us to take communion, and I can't wait for that ice cream.
Yes, I'm waiting. Are you kidding me? That's not what I'm talking about. Let's look here at verse 13 and 14 as we get ready to close today. David says, I believe. that I shall look upon the goodness of the Lord. In the land of the living. Is that what you believe? Listen, this way of living, getting in God's presence, seeking his face, it transforms the way you see the world.
It transforms you. If you tend to be a pessimist, and I tend to be a pessimist, you know, a glass half full kind of guy, I'm like a glass 10% full sometimes. I'm just, I can kind of be that way. I could be a little bit negative sometimes. But when you get in the presence of God, it changes your outlook so that your vision for the future isn't negative. It's positive.
Why? I believe I shall see the goodness of the Lord. Why? Because the Lord is good. And I believe that because I've been in his presence. I've been face to face with him. I've been in communion and fellowship with him. I've been seeking his face and now it changes my outlook on life. And I'm believing for a better future, a brighter future, a brighter tomorrow.
I believe this is what David believes. What do you believe? Would you believe about the future? is based on what you believe about your God and who he is. He says, I believe I shall look upon the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. So he concludes, therefore, with this imperative, this command, this directive, that we should all take to heart, wait for the Lord.
Wait for the Lord. What does he mean? Wait for the Lord. Wait for him to do what?
Wait for him to answer your prayers.
When we do seek his face, when we do offer petitions to the Lord, as we see David, he offers a lot of petitions to the Lord. He concludes by just saying, God, I'm going to wait on you. I'm going to wait on you and your timing. I'm gonna put these things in your hand. I'm not gonna seek to meddle. I not going to seek to manipulate. I'm not gonna seek to say I'm putting it in your hands, but then taking it in my hands, and then make a mess of it.
I'm putting it in your hands. To wait on the Lord is to wait for him to act, and it's to anticipate him acting. It says, as we wait on the Lord, we are to be strong and let your heart take courage to encourage yourself in the Lord. Wait, he says, on the Lord. Are you waiting on the Lord this morning? Or are you seeking to to manipulate circumstances? Look, just give it to him.
Just put it in his hands. I know that's a very broad statement. You're saying, Wow, what does that exactly mean? Listen, if I get into that, we'll never get out of here, okay? So just pray about it and meditate on it. Let the Lord speak to you, okay? Amen. All right.
Conclusion: Christ Sought Us First
These four things, these four questions. that we are considering. Who is your light? What is your prayer? Who are you seeking? And are you waiting?
We can only do these things because Jesus has 1st sought us. We can't do these on our own strength. We have to do them with the help of the Lord. We have to do it with the help of the one who came to seek and to save the lost.
But because Jesus has saved us because Jesus has found us, we are invited to live in his presence. And we can only approach the throne of grace. We can only enter into the throne room. on behalf of him and his sacrifice, if we are clothed in his righteousness. And I pray, dear friends, that you are. Amen.