Psalm 125 | Feat. Luke Taylor

This podcast is a sermon preached by Luke Taylor at Portstewart baptist church. In this podcast Luke exegetes Psalm 125, context, explanation, application and illustration are all addressed in this podcast.

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wildfire podcast is an extension of wildfire, which has a focus of igniting men and women of God into a deeper discipleship with Christ, instilling people with a passion to radically and relentlessly pursue Christ wherever that leads.

That God's truth will spread like a wildfire.

Do you want your pen?

So I'm absolutely petrified, if I'm being brutally honest, to come and speak in my home church.

It's a privilege, it's a blessing, it's an honor.

Any time to open up God's word, wow, when I feel privileged that I was asked to do so, and continuing on in our Ascent series, which I will be speaking on, Psalm 125.

But before we begin, I just wanna posture ourselves.

Thankfully, Daniel prayed for me, but I think it's vitally important that I myself know that I am a sinner saved by grace, and of myself, I can do nothing.

And if that is what you see and what you hear this evening, then we're not gonna get anywhere, because it's God who needs to enable me, it's his spirit that needs to speak through me.

But in equal measure, it's not just up to me, it's up to you guys sitting down there.

You can sit there and you can listen, and it could be words, it could be knowledge, it could be various different things.

But rather, we want the spirit to move, the spirit that is in me will speak to the spirit that is in you.

And so I'm just gonna pray a quick prayer for you guys that the Lord will open your heart and that every individual, no matter how young, how old, the Lord can still change our thinking, can still change our hearts so we can go and serve him better in our lives.

So just pray quickly for us.

Lord, I pray the Lord that you will just turn my weakness into strength and I pray that your spirit will speak here today to the people that you wanna speak to and that all of us will be open to hear your still voice.

Amen.

So I wanna gauge the room first of all and see if we have any Batminton fans.

So I get a hand up if you're a big Batminton fan.

Okay, that's a big solid zero in the room.

Someone's embarrassed at the back and that's Dan.

He loves Batminton.

So I'm indifferent to Batminton, okay?

I'll take it, I'll leave it, but I play a bit.

And there was one time where I went and actually played with Dan and Johnny and we were playing against their auntie.

Who's older than me, I won't say age, you don't want to be offensive, but significantly older than me.

And I was going to play a 1v1 against her quickly, and I thought to myself, you know, I was evaluating, looking at my opponent, I was looking at myself, and I thought, I've got the legs, I'm younger, I'm, surely I'm more disciplined, I can get to the net quicker.

I was going through all these different variables in my head thinking about how I'm going to easily beat this lady.

I have my pride, my dignity, that I don't want to lose.

And to say I got annihilated would be an understatement.

I don't think I got one point.

I play 90 minute football matches, going up and down the wing, and I've never been more exhausted after a 10 minute badminton match, the way that Barbara ran me up and down.

And why I am saying that, if not just to embarrass myself, is this.

The simple fact was it wasn't about my youth, it wasn't about this, it wasn't about that.

It came down to one simple fact.

Barbara was just better than me.

Barbara was great, and I was not.

And so the central narrative of this Psalm is very simple and can be summarized like this.

God is awesome, and we are not.

Now, we'll be looking at Psalm 125, continuing in the Ascent Series.

And how I will be unpacking this Psalm is seen first with the psalmist's route and meant in verses one and two, then I will look at verse three in isolation, and finally four and five together.

I will be extracting three timeless truths as application for us today.

Now, why do this?

Why look at this Psalm?

Why look at any scripture?

Well, as Daniel said, all scripture is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training.

So I pray that after this, our understanding of God, it will be expanded and that we will know how we can best serve God today.

Now, before we get into the context, I just want to read the Psalm together with you.

I know we read it on the board, but I'll just read it once more if you want to turn to it.

Psalm 125, verse 1.

Those who trust in the Lord are like Mount Zion, which cannot be moved, but abides forever.

As the mountains surround Jerusalem, so the Lord surrounds his people from this time forth and forevermore.

For the scepter of wickedness shall not rest on the land allotted to the righteous, thus the righteous stretch out their hands to do wrong.

Do good, O Lord, to those who are good and to those who are upright in their hearts, but those who turn aside to their crooked ways, the Lord will lead away with evildoers.

Peace be upon Israel.

As already mentioned by those who have gone before me, these are Psalms of Ascent.

Four of these songs are attributed to King David.

To Solomon is one, and the other remaining ten are anonymous.

Jews traveling to and from Jerusalem for one of the three main annual Jewish festivals traditionally sang these songs on the ascent or the uphill road to the city of Jerusalem that was situated on a high hill in the mountainous region.

And I say that because it's vitally important to your understanding this Psalm.

Now verses one and two say, those who trust in the Lord are like Mount Zion, which cannot be moved but abides forever.

As the mountain surrounds Jerusalem, so the Lord surrounds his people from this time forth and forever more.

This leads us to timeless truth number one.

The unchanging and all surrounding nature of God makes God's people immovable.

The psalmist is saying that those who trust in the Lord will be as immovable as the mountains.

That's what he's saying, plain and simple.

Trust is the key focus of the psalmist here.

Now, these Psalms of ascent required the psalmist to recollect the memories and history of liberation from captivity, from Babylonian captivity and Assyrian captivity.

The authors of these Psalms had seen firsthand the implications and consequences of not trusting in God, and that was captivity.

Now, one of my favorite verses from the Old Testament is Proverbs 3, 5, which reiterates the importance of trust.

Trust in the Lord with all your heart, lean not on your own understanding, in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight.

Now, in the psalmist context, the idea of a father would have been a less applied title used to describe God.

So the metaphor of a child and father and the trust needed there is not the most apt metaphor for me to use when concerning trust here.

But rather the psalmist was highlighting how we, as God's people, trust God as our king, as our father, as the creator of the cosmos who sustains all creation at all times.

That is how we are to trust.

That is who we are to trust in, with all of our heart.

Now I want you just to take a big deep breath with me for a moment.

Everyone together.

Oh, beautiful, so relaxing.

We trust God to supply every breath that we take and we trust God when he should decide when is our last.

I highlight this because trust is a muscle that constantly needs exercised.

And therefore the psalmist is exhorting us to exercise this muscle of trust here in verse one, highlighting one implication of putting our trust in God as we become immovable from the expectations, stresses and pressures of this world.

The greatest illustration of trust in God was during the ministry of Jesus.

Remember, whenever Peter took that step of faith and trust out into the ocean, but inevitably he began to sink.

What was being illustrated there was this timeless truth highlighted by the psalmist here.

We must all trust in God in order for a relationship with God to take place.

God manifested himself in human flesh through Jesus so we could trust in him and become like Mount Zion which cannot be shaken but will endure forever.

And in the latter part of this verse it says which cannot be shaken as I've already highlighted.

The psalmist through beautiful imagery highlights the implication of what will come when we trust.

See, we are not people who are like sand, ever shifting and unstable.

Neither are we like the sea, restless and unsettled.

Some people are like the wind.

They are uncertain, inconsistent.

But believers, followers of Jesus Christ, saved, redeemed and atoned for, are like a mountain.

They are strong, they are stable, they are secure because of Christ Jesus, our Lord, and the trust that we have in Him.

You see, just seven Psalms earlier, it was prophesied that Jesus would be the cornerstone, the rock and the foundation to which we, the church, would be built upon.

And we live in the fulfillment of that today.

We trust in Jesus Christ, the cornerstone, the foundation.

That is why we, as a people, when we trust in Him, are immovable.

Then in verse two, we see what was once used to describe God's people when we trust in Him, is then used by the psalmist to describe the immutability of God, that is, His unchanging and steadfast nature.

It says, as the mountains surround Jerusalem, so the Lord surrounds His people, both now and forever more.

The psalmist is saying that the Lord surrounds His people forever, the same way that the mountains surround Jerusalem.

Mount Zion is a literal mountain based on the westernmost part of the two mountains on which the city sits.

It was mountains like Moriah and Zion that made Jerusalem difficult to attack.

God's people within Jerusalem had the constant and steadfast certainty that this layer of protection would be there morning and night.

Mount Zion stood firm.

The steadfastness of God is illustrated time and time again.

God stands firm, and so we stand firm.

How can we be assured of such a liberating promise that the Psalmist is highlighting here?

Well, in Matthew 28, our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ, said, I will never leave you nor forsake you.

God will never leave you.

He will draw close to you when you draw close to him.

Abide in him, and he promises to make his dwelling among us.

The Bible says, I am the Lord and I do not change.

I am the same yesterday, today, and forever.

What remained true for Israel and the psalmist here remains true for us today.

God is everlasting and steadfast.

Timeless truth number one is trust in the unchanging and all surrounding nature of God.

This makes God's people immovable.

Now in verse three, we see a progression into our timeless truth number two.

Evil will never prevail because of the work of Christ.

In verse three, it says, the scepter of the wicked will not remain over the land allotted to the righteous, for then the righteous might use their hands to do evil.

So the psalmist is saying that the righteous, those made holy by God's mercy, have been given or allotted land by God through his mercy.

And that wickedness will not remain or stay in this land that has been given to them.

And the reason why God will ensure that wicked shall not remain over the land given by God is because the remnant, that is those set aside by God, would succumb to the wickedness and they themselves would begin to do this evil.

Look at it, the reason why the land allotted to the righteous shall not be given away is lest the righteous stretch out their hands to do wrong.

It is a mercy from God that he preserves the righteous land that he has given to these people.

The scepter of wickedness could have been manifested in various different ways, but in this context, the wickedness is most likely the neighboring nations.

Now, we may not have the same insight into what it means to be threatened by neighboring nations today, although that seems to be rapidly changing.

But Paul reminds us in 2 Corinthians 10,4 that the wickedness we face is not as visible or material.

Rather, it says, the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but are mighty in God for pulling down strongholds.

There is always an eminent threat of this three-pronged sword that is the world, the flesh and the devil.

Now, contrary to what you see, I do play football, although I don't look it.

I also am 21, although I don't look it.

So you can imagine me whenever I run out onto the pitch against all these giants, all these men.

And I remember the first ever appearance I had in men's football saw me run out to the pitch as a sub.

I used to wear goggles that stretched round my neck, and I used to be about this height.

I looked like a nerd.

I don't look like a footballer.

I wouldn't intimidate anyone, not even a five-year-old.

But I walked out onto the pitch, and I knew, I knew that people were not expecting me to do much on the pitch.

I knew that people weren't anticipating that I was going to be any good or that there was any threat, because my own teammate said, who is this guy right here?

Okay?

Okay?

Now, he used a few other swear words in there, but I won't say that.

And he knew that I wasn't going to be a threat, of course, but in order to convey the principle, I ended up scoring and getting man of the match in that match.

And why do I say that?

Because, see, we often are oblivious as God's people to the threats that surround us.

We often undermine the threats or ignore them.

But we are God's soldiers.

That's why God gave us the armor of God in Ephesians 6.

But then once we actually make the progress in accepting that we are in a battle and that there are these things that can shake us and move us, we forget that the battle has already been won by who?

Jesus Christ.

In Romans 8.38.39, it says, For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities, nor powers nor things present, nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any creature shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus, our Lord.

You see, in this passage, it's saying that wickedness shall not remain where the righteous are.

Holiness and wickedness can never co-exist.

We are God's people, described in the New Testament as holy temples.

And so wickedness cannot remain.

Hence the process of sanctification, whereby every day God renews and restores us through his spirit, all of which was made possible by Jesus.

We know that the wickedness shall not remain in this land, allotted to the righteous, that's what the Psalmist is saying here.

But he's highlighting an important truth, is that where God is, where holiness is, evil shall not prevail.

Timeless truth two, evil will never prevail because of the work of Christ.

Now, if you will turn with me to the last verses, verses four and five, we are introduced to what I think is another timeless truth.

Timeless truth number three.

God is sovereign, just, and holy.

Now, it's vitally important that we read this passage in its context.

It says in verse four, do good, O Lord, to those who are good, and to those who are upright in their hearts.

But those who turn aside to their crooked ways, the Lord will lead away with evil doers.

Peace be upon Israel.

The psalmist is requesting that the Lord do good to those who are good, but those who are sinful will be banished and therefore clashed with these evil doers.

Notice the differentiation between the preceding verse and this one.

One is an imperative.

Look at verse 5.

It says, But those who turn aside to their crooked ways, the Lord will lead away with evil doers.

But then we see in verse 4, it is a request.

Do good, O Lord, to those who are good.

Why is this?

Well, the psalmist is requesting, petitioning to God that God may be good to those who are, number one, good, and number two, upright in heart.

The psalmist knew, just because you were these things, it did not automatically follow that good and blessing would be guaranteed.

Although that was and is the normative pattern presented in the Bible, do good and the consequences of those good actions would reap good, the broken nature of us and the world makes goodness and blessing towards us a request as opposed to an imperative.

Look at Job, he is the prime example presented for us in the Old Testament.

A man described as being upright, a man described as being good, meeting the criteria.

And so we should find that the natural implication of that or effect is that good is then placed upon Job.

Blessing is placed upon Job, his life and his family.

But what do we see?

We see the opposite.

Job loses everything that he held so dear.

Job, his family was lost, his source of income was lost, his reputation among the people was lost.

Job lost everything.

But yet if he evaluated his life and searched, he would say, I'm following God.

I'm being obedient.

I look at my life and do I deserve such things?

I'm blameless.

I'm upright.

I'm good.

And he requests to God that good be done.

He looks at the normative pattern.

He looks at the Psalms that were created by these people.

The accepted knowledge of that time is, Lord, do good to those who are good.

That is the request, but yet it is not what Job received.

And so many of us in here today, we can relate to such a truth, can't we?

We go through things in our life.

We are maybe going through things sitting in here where we think that we are good, that we are blameless, but yet everything seems to be going the opposite way of blessing, right?

And so often you may have been sold the lie that whenever you become a Christian, blessing is the security.

That's what you'll get every second of every day, but yet it's not.

Although we may be good and upright, through the request language, the psalmist implies that this does not mean you will have automatic blessing.

And this is reaffirmed whenever Jesus says in John 16, in this world, you will have trouble.

Or in 1 Peter, it says, do not be surprised at the trials that come your way, but instead rejoice.

Don't be surprised.

Now again, to relate it back to the context of the psalmist, in Jeremiah 29, 11, it recounts that beautiful verse that so many of us know, but yet is taken out of context.

For I know the plans I have to prosper you, to give you a future, a hope, a success.

This is what the Lord is saying to his people of Israel.

But yeah, at the same time, the Israel would have to go through captivity in Babylon, in Assyria, Assyria and Babylon.

This is the captivity that they had placed.

And so do you think the people of Israel were saying to themselves that this is what the Lord wants?

He wants blessing, he wants us to prosper, he wants us to have success.

But yet look at where we're at, we're in captivity.

We see the principle again, that blessing is not guaranteed just because you are good and just because you are upright.

You see, God wanted to provide success and blessing for his people.

Don't get that mixed up or confused.

That is God's motivation for his people, that we might all grow closer to him, that we might experience blessing.

That is what God wants.

Do we not see it in creation?

But what happened?

Us, sinful humanity, robbed ourselves of that.

You see, the Lord wants to provide blessing in our lives, and like the psalmist, we can request, but we should never develop a false teaching that the Christian life is blessing guaranteed, and should always remember, like the psalmist, do good, oh Lord.

We should request and never be prideful and say to the Lord, you owe me this, God, because the Lord owes you absolutely nothing, except justice that sees us separated from him placed in hell.

If you want justice, that's where you'll end up.

But because of Jesus, we see that justice is enacted and he takes upon our sin.

And we see that despite the trials, despite the difficulty, and though we may face difficulty, we can always be assured that the Lord is still good and has blessed us.

And we can always realign ourselves with the gospel.

That is what Jesus did for me and you.

The psalmist realigns himself with the initial imperatives he began with.

Verse five, the Lord will banish.

But those who turn to the crooked ways, the Lord will banish with the evil dears.

You see, the psalmist concludes by going back to the only guarantee that we have, the justice and holiness of God.

When we are faced with gunmen going into schools, tyrants starting wars, drugs running rampant in the streets, people who are trapped in violent marriages, those who rape, kill, destroy and lie, we can be assured that the justice and holiness of God remains firm.

The Lord will banish the evildoers.

In fact, anyone who sins, anyone who walks the crooked path, you see, I was recently in Africa, and we were on our way into the capital city of Dakar, and I was with a squad of 16 players, and naturally what happened is we got into ourselves, our little groups and had our little conversations and chats, and we were in the train station within Africa, and I seen my fellow squad members walk on ahead into the train, and I was with about four other guys, and I thought to myself, you know, I wonder if anybody actually needs help finding the train, you know what I mean?

What about if there's somebody out there who's lost, who might miss it?

And I was looking around, and we were all seeing how we could be good Christians and aid people as best we could, and we were like, oh, there's nobody here, we'll just step onto the train.

And like a movie, the train that we were supposed to get on headed off into the distance, and we were left stranded in Africa.

I was petrified, you see, but it's funny, isn't it?

You see the way that I was oblivious, you see the way I thought to myself, I'm in a good place, I'm safe, I'm secure, I'll see if I can help other people.

But then what happened?

I was never safe, I was never on the train, and I ended up missing it.

You see, whenever we read verses like this, we can exercise that same oblivion.

We can completely miss it.

We can say, yes, the Lord, he will banish the evil-doers.

And we forget that we are the evil-doers.

Don't look for other people.

Look at yourself, focus on yourself.

You are the evil-doers that this passage, that this Psalm is talking about.

The Bible reminds us in Romans that there is no one good, no, not one.

So we will be banished because we are bad, we are sinful, we are wicked, we turn to crooked ways.

But the Israel, the Samus lived in was also bad, but yet they weren't banished, right?

But they were banished into exile.

Hence the point of these ascent Psalms, that's what it's talking about.

It's recollecting these exile memories and how they were liberated.

And the reason why they were put into this banishment was because they were sinful.

They were banished into exile so that they later might be restored.

But remember, Israel, just because they were God's chosen people, were never safe because they were sinful.

And the Lord banished them to the evildoers, that is Babylonian and the Assyrian exile.

And we too could be banished when we do evil.

God allows the natural consequence of our actions to banish us to the evildoers.

This is a wake up call.

Just because they were Israel, just because we are the church, doesn't give us a license to sin.

Yes, we are under the promise that is Jesus, but we still must live as though the promise is true, that we have been saved by Jesus.

And so we no longer have to turn to the same crooked ways.

You see, throughout this Psalm, the Psalmist, when referring to humanity, presents how everything is conditional with humanity, because they are this unreliable source.

But when referencing God, there is clear, unwavering, assertive and imperative language.

And so we have Timeless Truth number three, God is sovereign, just and holy.

That's what is important to remember in these closing verses.

We are sinful people that turn to crooked ways, and make no mistake about it, it's clear from this story that Israel turned to crooked ways, and they too were banished.

And you can be sure that in your life, if you turn to your crooked ways, if you turn to sin, the Lord will allow you to go down the natural flow of that consequence, the consequence of your own actions.

But always remember that God is sovereign, just and holy, that God is loving and wants your restoration.

He wants to do good to those who are upright and to those who are righteous.

To conclude, we have broken down Psalm 125.

We have done so by taking it into three main sections and extracting three timeless truths.

In verses one and two, we have seen timeless truth number one, the unchanging and all surrounding nature of God makes God's people immovable.

We have then seen in verse three, timeless truth number two, evil will never prevail because of the work of Christ.

And then we have seen in verses five and six, timeless truth number three, God is sovereign, just and holy.

Why have we done this?

Again, to realign and bring us full circle, it's to expand our understanding of God and how we can best serve Him on this earth.

How, whenever we have discussed this passage here this evening, what have you learned about God, the Creator and Cosmos of our universe?

And what have you learned about the Christ-centric nature of the passage?

That is, how does it point towards Jesus Christ and the fulfillment of His ministry?

That Jesus, one example, is the cornerstone, the foundation.

That is who Jesus is.

That's who God is.

That's what the psalmist is talking about.

And that immovability of Jesus Christ, our foundation, makes God's people immovable.

That's just one way we can apply that text to our lives here this evening.

But one of the main takeaways from this passage, and what I want to leave you with, can be best summarized by a quote from Brian Taab.

We have a glorious king exalted to heaven's throne.

We have a merciful high priest who helps us in our need.

We have a coming champion who will enact true justice and end all wars.

Jesus Christ is the hope of all the earth, the joy of every longing heart.

Come, Lord Jesus.

May we be an immovable people, as the psalmist is talking about.

May we know that the Lord is just, holy and sovereign and will deliver us from evil.

They're the central and core truths of Psalm 125.

Pray with me.