The Church of Eleven22 - Wk 2: What is Man That You are Mindful of Him?

Episode Date: May 1, 2022

3 When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, 4 what is man that you are mindful of him, and the son of man that you care for him? – Psalm 8:3-4 Our lives are for Your glory. How do we leverage all of our lives (family, vocation, culture, etc.) for Your glory?

Listen, as a gator, it's hard for me to cheer for FSU, but I mean, if the tomb's empty, then anything it's possible. Way to go, Nina. Hey, welcome. We are starting today. We'll continue today our series in Psalms. Last week, we kicked off really a summer-long series. We'll be studying the book of Psalms until the fall, until saturated.

Pastor Jobi kicked us off with Psalm number one. We talked about the Word of God and a love for the word. of God. And if you right now, if you'll text to 4-4-11-22, 4-4-1-2, if you'll text the word Psalms to that number, each day you will get a link and the link will send you to a Psalm of the day. There's 150 Psalms and each day you'll get a link to the next Psalm and with it will be a recording of somebody from our congregation reading that Psalm to you. And so each morning you can wake up, you can get that, you can hear the Word of God and we would soak ourselves in the Word of God. I think over 5,000 people have signed up for that every day,

which is amazing to think about that 5,000 of us every day are letting the Word of God just soak deep down into our hearts and into our souls. You know, the book of Psalms, it's divided up, there's 150 of them, it's divided up into five books, which kind of goes along with the first five books of the Bible, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. And there are Psalms for for every season of life. There are Psalms for being happy, there are Psalms for being sad, there's Psalms they call them imprecatory Psalms,

which are like, go get them, God, that's my enemy. Psalms they call Psalms of Ascent, which are what they would sing when they were going up to the temple to worship God. One of the things that I love, there's two things that I really love

about the book of Psalms. One of them is just that. It's the honesty of the book of Psalms. that in it it just isn't one of those things where you have to come in here and check your emotions or check the things that have been going on

at your life at the door and you think, well, I just got to lay all that down. Have you ever heard that? Just lay it down and come in and worship God. And the book of Psalms is going to give us language to be able to bring all of our life and be honest and lay it before God. And if it's going great to worship God through that,

and if it's going terrible, to worship God through that. And I love that honesty in there. The other thing that I love about the book of Psalms is the historical nature of it. I mean, some of the Psalms were written by, one was written by Moses, David, Solomon. They stretched back almost 3,500 years.

So think about this. Psalms just means song. It's like the hymnal. It's the worship lyrics of the people of God. for thousands and thousands and thousands of years. Which means when we come in here, and I love when we sing a new song. The Bible tells us, sing a new song to God.

But there's something really special, like when we began worship today, and we sang Psalm 8, that's Psalm written by David, that's the one we're going to look at today. It's written almost 3,000 years ago. To think about, for 3,000 years, billions and billions and billions of followers of God have been singing that song in worship to God.

And you get to join in that. And there's something that just anchors it deep down in our soul, doesn't it? There's something that just solidifies who we are and where we are. And this isn't this, you know, it's not a cult. It's not a new idea. The people God have been worshipping for thousands of years like that. So I brought this out. I just, today I want you to see the Psalm.

This is, if you have a journal, it's laid out exactly like what's in your journal or you can grab a Bible and go to the, go to the book of Psalms and go to Psalm 8. If you kind of open up the middle of your Bible and then turn left a little bit, you'll get there. But I just want you to see it because it's poetry. And it's important to be able to see the poetry of the Psalm because it's not just what it's said, but how things are said that are really important. And so this psalm starts out. It says, oh Lord, our Lord.

Now listen, these are two different words that are in here. This first Lord is the name of God Yahweh. It's the name that God gives himself when he meets Moses and he says, go tell Pharaoh to let my people go. And it's, who should I say sent me? And he says, tell him Yahweh, or I am who I am, or I will be who I will be. meaning God is the sovereign, eternal, never beginning, never ending, always existent God.

Oh, Yahweh are, and this is Adonai, which means king of kings and lord of lords. So he's saying, oh God, you the eternal God, the sovereign, the forever God, you are the king of kings and the lord of lords. and you sovereign God are not just the king of kings and lord of lords. You are our king of kings and lord of lords. You're our king of kings, and the question that we have to wrestle with is this, is he really our king of kings? Is he your king of kings? You see, God's not just a concept.

He's not just an idea. He's not just a philosophy. God is a deeply personal God. There's no such thing in the Bible as a private faith in God. It's deeply personal. It's just never private and it's collective. It's not just your faith in God. It's our faith in God.

So, O Lord, our Lord, how majestic, how wonderful, how glorious, how royal is your name. And if I'm honest and you're honest, whose name are we really living for most days? Most of the time it's my name and my fame and my renown. Oh Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth? You have set your glory, your glory. The glory is just the weight of God.

It's imagine if you took a scale and then you took all the characteristics and all the attributes of who God is, you took his sovereignty and his power and his love and his mercy and his justice and his holiness and his goodness. And you piled all those things up. If you were to weigh each one of them and add them all up, they wouldn't add up the sum of those things wouldn't be enough to be the totality of who God is. The totality of who God is is is His glory. His glory is the greatest thing there is. There's nothing greater than the glory of God. He says, oh Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name

in all the earth? You have set your glory. Look at this, above the heavens. Look, the earth can't even contain the majesty and the glory of God. It's so great and it's so wonderful, and it's so incredible, that it has to have the heavens, all of the universes, to begin to even put on display the glory and the majesty

of who God is. Now here's what I want you to see. This right here, verse one, all the way down to verse nine, are exactly the same. Oh, Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth? And then it ends with, oh, Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth? all the earth. This Psalm is bracketed by this declaration of the majesty and the glory of God

that from top to bottom, beginning to end, start to finish. This entire Psalm is about displaying the glory of God. And just like this Psalm is all about displaying the glory of God from top to bottom, beginning to end, start to finish. So our lives are to be about displaying the glory of God from start to finish, top to bottom, beginning and end. All of our life is to display the glory of God. There is nothing greater than that. First Corinthians 1031 says, whatever you do, whether you eat or drink, whatever you do, do it all to the glory of God. The Westman Catechism is a teaching tool. It was written about 500 years ago in England.

And it's kind of these question and answers about the faith. And parents would use it to teach their kids the faith. And the first question that's asked in the Westminster Catechism, it says, what is the chief end of man? What's the highest end, the goal of man? And it says the chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy him forever. But here's the question.

How? How does little me and little you? I mean, we're just blips on the radar, if we're really honest. The amount of time we live, we're just specks on this planet, not to mention throughout all of the universe. How does little me and little sinful me glorify a God whose glory and majesty can't be contained in all the earth and the heavens? How does little me, how does insignificant me, how does sinful me begin to bracket my entire life

and sing the glory of God and whatever I do? Well, look what he says. He says, you have set your glory above the heavens. You have established strength from your enemies. When I look at the heavens, the work of your fingers, the stars, and the moons, which you have set in place. What is man that you're mindful of him? son of man that you care for him, yet you have made him a little lower than human beings, and you have given him, and you have put, do you see this?

Six times this little phrase you have is repeated over and over and over again. Things that are repeated are important, right, parents? I mean growing up, I remember my dad. I would hear it all the time. Shut the door. What are we? Air conditioning in the neighborhood? or I already said it once today,

you'll hear around here, if you come very often, you'll hear if the tomb is empty. Why do we say that? It's not just because it's a catchy phrase, it's because it's important. The resurrection is the centerpiece of the Christian faith.

I asked my daughter, if I said anything, if I repeated anything over and over again, and she just laughed. We were traveling last week, and she laughed, she said, oh yeah, dad, every night, we'll sit down, we'll have dinner, we'll get done,

and then we'll say, who wants dessert? And you'll say, no, that's fine, I don't want any. And then they'll go get dessert, and they'll bring it over, and you'll sit down, and then you'll get a fork, you'll go, I'll just have a bite. So I guess just having a bite is like my important, really important thing. But over and over, this is again, and six times you have established. And the idea here is, look who the active agent in this entire Psalm is. every action that goes on in this psalm is God.

God, you have set, you have established, you have set, you have made, you have given, you have put. Do you know what you call it when God does everything and we receive it? Do you know what it's called when God does all the work and we get all the benefit? That's called grace. That's grace. The grace of God is when God does all the work, he pays all the price, we get all the benefit, we get all the goodness, we get all the love, all the mercy, all the acceptance. When God does everything, when you have God, and God is glorified by His grace.

God is glorified. Amen. God is glorified. That was your chance too. You just missed it. We're going to get out of the mouth of babies here in a second. God is glorified by His grace. That God would do everything for us is glorifying to him. That he would provide everything for us.

And when you and I live our lives where we don't try to say, I have, I have, I have, I have, I have, but God, you have, you have, you have. That glorifies God. this is the thing that sets Christianity apart from every other world religion. Every other world religion is a God, look at me. God, I have, I have to pray, I have to take a trip, I have to give a certain amount of money, I have to read a certain amount of things, I have to memorize, I have to do. And Christianity is not I have, but God, you have.

and when we live our lives in a posture where we embrace and we love and we depend on the grace of God, God is glorified. When we say, God, if you don't, I can't, that glorifies God. And here's the good news. We can't do anything for ourselves. even our best works are like filthy rags which means here's the good news you are a candidate for grace

and if grace comes into your life and God does all the work in you and you love it and you embrace it and you enjoy it and you depend on it then your life sings oh Lord our Lord how majestic is your name in all the earth and then he says

out of the mouth of babies and infants you have established strength right here this word is literally power you have established a power a singular power because of your foes to still this word is sabbath god you have established a power because of your foes to still to cause to cease to stop to put an end to the enemy Do you know who the enemy is? John 1010, Jesus says, the enemy comes to steal, kill, and destroy. The enemy is Satan. 1 Corinthians 15, Paul teaches us the last enemy to be defeated in the resurrection of Jesus is death.

What is the power, the singular power that God has established that will cease, that will put an end to the death and sin and Satan. It's the gospel. Romans 116 says, for I am not ashamed of the gospel. It is the power of God to salvation. The gospel is the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. It's that you and I were created in a perfect right relationship with God.

That's Genesis 1. Genesis 3 comes along, and Adam and Eve and all of humanity ever since then has said, you know what, God, thank you for creating everything. I think I will handle things on my own. I think I will be king of kings and lord of lords of my life. I know me better than you know me. I'll do this my way. Thank you very much.

And we stiff arm God, and we actually become enemies of God. and God in his goodness sins his son Jesus Christ born as a baby grows up living a perfect life never sinning never stiff arming God and in doing that

he lives the life that you and I should have lived and then at about 33 years old some soldiers take him nail him to a cross and him on the cross he dies the death, actually, that you and I deserve to die. The Bible says the wages of sin is death, and you and I are sinners,

and you and I deserve the penalty for our sin, but the good news of the gospel is that Jesus came and he died in our place for our sins and then was raised from the dead. And when he was raised from the dead, that power that raised him from the dead put death to death. It put an end to the penalty.

It caused it to cease and distill. And that last enemy, death was defeated when Jesus was raised from dead. And that's the gospel. And the very gospel glorifies God. It honors God. It sings, oh, Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth.

And look, it doesn't need it. any help. It is so powerful. It's doing just fine by itself. It can come out of mouth of babies and infants. This is what this means. That the eloquence of our speech is not as important as the object of our speech.

The power's not in the eloquence, the power's in the object. And listen, I worked really hard on that little saying and some of you went, mm, you're like, I'm a tweet. And there's an irony. I was out taking a walk the other day and I was thinking about that. And I'm like, oh, that's good. I should say that. And then God was like, excuse me, your cute little phrase about how I don't need any help with this. God doesn't need our help because he has all the power in the gospel. And he's glorified by it. Paul actually says in 1 Corinthians, I'm glad that I didn't come preaching with all of this power

and eloquence, because if I came and preached in power and eloquence, I would have drained the cross of Christ of its power, which is such good news for you and me. Because here's what it means. It means you can take your friend who's far from God out to lunch and sit down across some table from them and you've been praying for it right and you're thinking oh right here's my shot here's my shot here's my shot and you're waiting and you kind of work up and you and inside there's something in there in us that thinks I have to get this right I got I got to explain it here's my one shot I'm not giving up my shot and then you start to speak and it just sounds like something coming out of the mouth of a baby doesn't it just bl bl bl bl and you're like I work so hard on that or you do you do

a great job and then they're just like, hey, could you explain how God became a man? And you're like, uh-oh. But the good news is, here's what you can say to them. Listen, I don't have all the answers. I'm going to fumble over all of my words. I'm probably going to have to go back and look some things up and come back and tell you the answer to those things. But here's what I do know.

God raised Jesus from the dead. And it stopped something in my life. and I found peace and I found rest for my soul because of what the gospel did. And that is good news and that glorifies God. His grace glorifies God and this gospel glorifies God. And then he says this, when I look at your heavens,

the work of your fingers, the moon, the stars, which you have set in place, literally, you've kept it in place. what's man that you're mindful and the son of man that you care for him yet you made him a little lower than the heavenly beings and crowned him with glory and honor you've given him dominion over the works of your hands

and you put all things under his feet all the sheep look at this all the sheep all the oxen all the beasts of the field all the birds of the heaven all the fish of the sea and whatever whatever passes along the paths of the sea God is glorified and his

grace, God is glorified in his gospel, and God is glorified in his creation. He's glorified in the vastness of his creation. He says, when I look at your heavens, the moon and the stars, like black holes seeing the majesty of God, shooting stars, seeing the majesty of God, a sunrise out at the beach sings the majesty of God. It's just last weekend out in Montana preaching at one of our church plants. And the Saturday before I preached,

the pastor and I, my daughter drove up, you can't even get into glacier right now. There's 30 feet of snow on the road. I know. So we drove up the back, the North Fork. We drove up the back of it. And you kind of, when you drive into Glacier, you go in and you look up.

If you drive the North Fork, you kind of drive the outside and look down and in. and I remember getting up there and looking down in and going, this just sings the majesty of God, the moon and the stars, the vastness of it all sings and glorifies God. And it's not just the vastness that does it. It's the intricacies of God's creation that does it too. You think when a child is conceived and begins to grow in his or her mother's womb,

there comes a point. It's just a handful of weeks in where their eyes, their eye, is actually one giant eyelid. This is incredible to me. And at a certain point, their little teeny tiny baby eyeball grows this little like razor blade right in the middle of each of their eyeballs

and it grows out and it cuts open that one eyelid perfectly in half and then grows back into their eye. That sings the glory and majesty of God. That does the intricacies sing the glory of God. And the variety, look at this, the sheep and the oxen

and the beast and the birds and the fish and the whatever's. Do you realize that last year in 2021, in 2021, scientists discovered 24 new species of animals? Like, in the Gulf of Mexico, just down the road, in the Gulf of Mexico, they discovered a new whale.

They discovered a new penguin. They discovered a new lobster. Like what? How do you discover, how do you miss a whale? In the Gulf of Mexico, it's like a swimming pool. I mean, that kind of variety, God doesn't have to do that. And the fact that we are discovering more and more and more and more and more varieties of what God has created,

it just sings, oh Lord, our Lord. How majestic is your name in all the earth? And then what is man that you are mindful of him? That the creation of God, you and I, humanity, are created in the image of God, sings the glory of God. Every human being is created in the image of God. Did you see all these babies up here,

all these little kids up here? every single one of them is created in the image of God, every single one of them. From the moment of conception, Psalm 139 says, I formed you, I knit you together. There's something so tangible and so hands-on, I knit you together in your mother's womb.

From the moment a child is conceived, there is an image bearer of God that sings the glory of God, all the way until a human being's last breath. of life, the image bearers of God sing the glory of God. It's stunning. It means when you and I, just that alone sings the glory of God, but when you and I stand up for that little baby that is conceived, we're standing up and glorifying God. When we're standing up and caring for moms and dads that have no idea what they're

going to do with this little image bearer. we're glorifying God. When we say it doesn't matter what tribe or tongue or ethnicity you come from, we are standing up for those humans, and we are singing the glory of God. Because it takes all of the image bearers of God to begin to even crack the surface of singing, oh Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth.

But there's another way that this can be read. Right? You can, what is man? What's humanity that you're mindful of us? You made us, you crowned him with glory and honor a little lower than the heavenly beings. Yes, you and I are made in the image of God, but you can also read this in another way.

What's man that you would even think of us? I mean, if we're honest, scripture tells us in Ephesians, you and I are by nature, children of wrath. that what are we that God would even give us a second thought? God, God, who am I? Like the only thing I deserve to have you think about me, God, is for you to think about your holiness

and how you're going to exercise your justice, your rightful, good, perfect justice against me. That's the only thing I deserve. And that's the only thing you deserve. God, what is it that you would even think of you? me. And when you and I will humble ourselves and not claim to be Lord of our life and bow a knee to the king of kings and the Lord of Lords, when we would humble ourselves, when we would confess, to confess just means to say out loud. James says, confess your sins to one another.

Declare that you are not in and of yourself deserving of God to think anything of you and me. and then that God would take us in our humility, that he would give us that humility, that he would give us the gift of that confession and that he would give us the gift of repentance. Scripture says it's your kindness, Lord, that leads us to repentance. And when we would humble ourselves

by the grace of God and the power of God and confess our sins, and then repentance is literally being turned in a new direction, that would be going this. sway as an enemy of God and a child of wrath and dead in my trespasses and sins. And God would turn me around and give me new life and peel the scales for my eyes. They breathe new life into my body and make my dead bones come alive and soften my stone cold heart that glorifies God.

That our humility and our confession and our repentance glorifies God. which means this you don't have to be perfect to glorify God you just have to be humble and repentant and the good news is every single one of us qualifies for needing to be humble and confess and repent which means every single one of you can glorify God like today this morning you can can glorify God. We can humble ourselves and confess our sins and repent of our sins. Now here's the last thing I want you to see. Right in the middle of this entire Psalm is this. Do you see this? The son of man. Those words in Hebrew bar Adam is what it means. They are words 41 and 42 of 76 words.

this Psalm. This Psalm is nine verses long. It's four and a half verses in. It is dead center of this thing. The Son of Man is a term that's used all over scriptures, but Ezekiel in the Old Testament loved it. He used it 93 times. And he doesn't just mean like the child of a person. When Ezekiel and the rest of Scripture uses this, most often what they're talking about is they're talking about the promised Savior, Messiah, king of God, who God would sin into this world to save his people from their sins. Then you fast forward over to the New Testament and you get into the life of Jesus. This was one of Jesus' favorite terms for himself.

He would use this over and over and over and over again. You get to Revelation, and John will say, twice, he'll say, one like the son of man is coming. Do you know who they're talking about? Jesus. Jesus, this Psalm 8 is quoted four times in the New Testament. Once in Matthew, and it's on Palm Sunday, and God literally silences enemies out of the mouths of babies and infants as they sing, Hosanna, hallelujah, God saves.

And then the other three, it's in Hebrews chapter 2, 1st Corinthians 15, and then in Ephesians chapter 1. And in all three of those, what the authors are saying, Paul and the authors of Hebrews is saying is this, the son of man is Jesus. They interpret this son of man at the center of this Psalm that is all about the glory of God. They interpret it as Jesus. Jesus is the one who glorifies God more than anyone else. Jesus at the center of everything glorifies God. The eternal existence of Jesus glorifies God.

The birth of Jesus glorifies God. The life of Jesus, the obedience of Jesus, the honor of Jesus, the humility of Jesus, the servant nature of Jesus, the death of Jesus, the resurrection of Jesus, the ascension, the rule, the reign, the return of Jesus, it is the centerpiece of all of creation. And it sings the glory of God. Jesus, at the center, glorifies God. And when you and I love the Son of Man,

when we enjoy the Son of Man, when he's at the center of our lives, God is glorified in you and me. He's glorified in you and me. And he is the answer to how all of our life can say, oh Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth? When we wonder, how does little insignificant,

sinful me make all of my life about the glory of God, the glory of God that can't be contained in the heavens and the earth, The answer is Jesus. Because if grace glorifies God, do you know how you get grace in your life? Jesus. The gospel glorifies God.

Do you know how the gospel gets into your life? It's not your work. It's not my work. It's Jesus. When we get out in creation and we enjoy creation, and I don't just mean like, enjoy it like,

oh, wow. that's a great sunset and we would go wow look at that but we would go wow god look at what you did in that or or you go out and you paddle out at sunrise into the lineup and you look out and you go god wow look at what you did you eat this amazing meal you go wow god god do you know who does all of that jesus it says in colosians that in him and through him and to him belong everything. He created everything. The creator of everything that exists is the son of man.

That's how creation glorifies God. Do you know how our humanity, our sinful humanity in humbling ourselves and confessing our sins and repenting gets to glorify God? It's through Jesus. It's because he is the perfect mediator on our behalf who takes our confession and takes our repentance to the Father. That it's him that leads us there, that even makes it possible for us. So the question for all of us today is this.

Is Jesus at the center of our lives? Do you want your life to sing, oh Lord, our Lord, how majestic, is your name in all the earth. It would come by Jesus being at the center. And the way that happens is you just say, God, I need your grace, I need you to do it all. You have, you have, you have. And I accept the gospel, what you did on my behalf,

and I humble myself, and I repent, and I confess my sins, and Jesus, I want you at the center of my life. So would you bow your heads right now? and if for the first time you would like to put Jesus at the center not the periphery not an idea but the one thing that drives everything and you want the grace of God

and you realize the gospel is good news for you would you raise your hand high right now come on raise them way up high come on I see it come on praise God he's glorified Heavenly Father thank you thank you for you being Lord of Lord, King of Kings.

Jesus, we love you. Would you come be at the center of our life? Would you be the thing that causes grace to well up inside of us and the gospel to take hold of us? Would you be the one that causes us to love you through your creation? God, would you be honored and glorified? because we don't come to you and fear or cringe away from you, afraid of what you're going to do,

but because of Jesus, your kindness leads us to repentance. We love you, God. We want all of our life to sing. Oh, Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth? We pray it in Jesus, the Son of Man's name. Amen.

Do you stand and we're going to respond together as a church as we sing this song? Some of us just, we need to love the grace that God is going to pour out and you need to just enjoy the grace of God. So let's need to come down here and we need to get on our knees and literally humble ourselves before God and confess and repent. No matter what, can we sing and love our God and honor. our God and glorify our God together. Let's sing.