Psalm 30 - Joy in the Morning

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0:12 For the rest of us, we have like maybe five or six weeks here left in the church here. Remember that the church has a historic calendar that it follows that starts with Advent. The season of Advent is the four weeks that lead up to Christmas and that is intended to be a season of preparation where we remember because Christ came once, it means he'll come again. And that kicks off the start of the year. So that's like the last Sunday in November, right after Thanksgiving starts the season

0:43 of Advent and that begins the church year. So right now we're in like the last six weeks of the church year before we start talking about Advent. And I was looking at how to use those six weeks for us together and I was back at the Election Area. Remember that the church has a historic assignment of readings. They'll give an Old Testament, a Gospel reading, a New Testament reading, and a Psalm for every week of the year. And there's been various iterations of that in the Lutheran church.

1:15 There's like a one year cycle and a three year cycle. The one year is the oldest. It goes back hundreds of years. So I like looking at that one. And as I was looking at the six weeks we have left, I thought it'd be fun just to spend six weeks in the Psalms. I don't know how yours like school year or calendar year is going. But I'm like in a season where I feel like I'm wanting to center to ensure that I kind of finish the year well. I'm in a spot where I'm remembering some of the goals that I set for myself at the beginning of the year. And the idea of leaning into the Psalms to end out the church year was like exciting to

1:50 me. And so this week we have Psalm 30, which is the one they assigned and it's pretty cool. We read it for our call to worship. I printed it out for you because during the worship set we're going to do a responsive reading. So after the message, if you didn't grab one, go grab one. And on the back side of that is a responsive version that Carolyn, Michael, lead us through. But we're looking at Psalm 30 and we're going to spend six weeks in the Psalms and just a reminder about the Psalms. The Psalms are pretty a contextual, meaning, you know, when we look at the Old Testament,

2:25 a lot of the first part of the Old Testament is narrative and we have historic tradition about where these Psalms, these stories came from. Moses writing the Pentateuch, the Torah, the first five books of the Bible and then the kings and chronicles, chronicling the journey of the people of Israel in the promised land and then the prophets commenting on the king. So we have context for a lot of narrative context for the Old Testament, but the Psalms

2:56 are these things that are kind of a contextual. We don't really know the context in which they are written. Sometimes we can guess by what they're talking about and maybe there's a tradition about who wrote it. But the interesting thing about the Psalms is that there's a neat number, 150, it's a pretty clean number. And they don't seem to be arranged chronologically at all. It's not like they're kind of from beginning to end. They're not grouped by authors. The best guess on how the Psalms are grouped is that they're grouped liturgically, meaning

3:27 like how the church would have used these Psalms. So we think that the Psalms, the 150 Psalms are the hymnbook of the people of God, that these are the things that have been copied the most, that people might not have all the scriptures, but they would have the Psalms. There's a lot of evidence that in the first century when Israelite kids would go to school, both boys and girls, men and women, the very first part of school they would go, the most important knowledge they would gain from a school was the knowledge of the scriptures,

3:59 and they would always start with the Psalms. And the way they learned in the first century is they would memorize. And so there's a lot of evidence that suggests the kids at the beginning of school, the main thing they did was memorize all 150 Psalms. Not bad. I've got roughly zero memorized. I can name little bits and pieces of lots of them, but I don't have one top to bottom. Part of the reason they cite this is if you look at Mary's Magnificat, remember when Mary

4:31 gives birth to Jesus, we think she's pretty young, maybe 13, maybe 15, she's pretty young, and that's how they gave birth in those days. But when she prays the Magnificat, she makes up a prayer to God, but when you read the Magnificat, it's got all these quotes from the Psalms. And it looks like what happens is when the kids, all of them at the beginning, memorize all 150 Psalms, it becomes the language in which they talk to God.

5:02 It becomes the way that they think about the God. Here's this old Latin phrase in the church, lexorandi, lex credendi, meaning as you say or worship, so you believe. And so the things that you say over and over and worship have this recursive effect of shaping the way that you think. And so they were very clear at the very beginning when they're raising their kids in the church to pay attention to their prayers of their kids, to pay attention to the songs of their

5:34 kids, so they like the Psalms, all 150 of them, and they would memorize all of them. We don't have to memorize them because we can just call it up on our phone, right? It's always with us. We don't memorize anything. But the Psalms are still worth looking at, I think, and for me they're very encouraging, but I wanted to set the stage there to remind you what we're looking at. This is like a prayer. In Psalm 30 there's some debate, like if you read the heading, maybe in your Bible it

6:05 will assign it to David. People assign a lot of the Psalms to David. You remember he would play the harp, he could sing really well, and so he and his court wrote, some people think that all the Psalms that were ascribed to David were actually ones he took credit for, but the people in his court wrote, which would be consistent with a king, that he would take credit for what someone else did. The other idea when you read the Psalms is that maybe it's king Hezekiah. Remember king Hezekiah was a good king, a young king, and he has a little problem, and

6:41 a prophet comes to Hezekiah and says, the Lord just wants you to know you're going to die. It's almost like God was wanting the judgment to come on Hezekiah, and so he wanted everybody know it wasn't an accident that he died, and so Hezekiah runs, as soon as he hears that he runs to the temple and asks God, please don't kill me. And so the prophet that God had said, go tell him I'm going to kill him is not quite out of the court yet, he's been leaving the royal palace, and God tells him I go back and tell Hezekiah I heard his prayer, he'll get 15 more years of life, and so the prophet comes

7:15 back and Hezekiah lives 15 more years, and you'll see when we get into the Psalm that there's this kind of starting with this recognition of God healing him and saving him from death. So people debate, did David or Hezekiah write it? But the reason I tell you that is just to go, it doesn't really matter, it could be David or Hezekiah, but the sentiment is the same and something we might aspire to as we look at relationship with God. Okay, that's enough preamble. Let's look at Psalm 30 verse 1.

7:49 I will extol you O Lord, for you have drawn me up and have not let my foes rejoice over me. O Lord my God, I cried to you for help and you have healed me. O Lord, you have brought my soul from Shae'ol. You restored me to life from among those who go down to the pit. There's so much here that is kind of interesting. The first part when I read that and He says you protected me from the foes, you did not

8:23 let my foes rejoice over me. I'm like, I wonder if I have foes who would rejoice over me. I don't know. I remember this as kind of silly, but I can remember being younger than I am now, maybe in my 20s, taking responsibility for my financial future all on my own. It was tricky. Didn't quite know that I was always on the edge of, it's in the age where you're looking

8:55 at your bank account to see if there's any money in there at all, to see if you can pay for anything. I was in that season of my life. I remember at the time, Capital One had the commercials where it's like the What's in Your Wallet commercials, but the kind of tenor of the What's in Your Wallet commercials were there were people hunting down someone and he was running going, What's in Your Wallet? And I was like, that's terrifying because these creditors are coming for me.

9:31 I've got things on credit card and am I going to make it? And I think of the, when I read Phos, it's the first little image that popped into my mind. Maybe you have more practical foes, but whoever writes the Psalm first suggests that God has protected him from the foes. I will extol you, O Lord, for you have drawn me up and you have not let my foes rejoice over me. O Lord my God, I cried to you for help and you healed me. We've all been healed from something.

10:02 O Lord, you have brought up my soul from Shae'ol and you restored me to life from among those who go down to the pit. You see how the thanks of the Psalmist is amplifying with each little couplet? You protected me from my foes. You not only protected them from rejoicing over me, you healed me and restored me in body. You not only healed me and restored me in body, you preserved me from death. And this is what I was thinking about here just to kind of get us in a position of gratitude

10:32 I was remembering last week we were talking about Jesus' option for the poor. And I was struggling with this idea of the problem that I'm not poor. And so in what way might God be for me? And we looked back at the story of Job and realized that in the Old Testament the premise of poor is those who can't do the things only God can do. And when they start out they go, can you make it rain from the skies on the earth? Can you make crops grow up out of the ground and the food that you need?

11:05 Can you animate your body? The Psalmist is saying, I've been given life and I don't know where it came from other than from the God. And amongst sickness and difficulties my life has been preserved and I don't know how that could have happened but from the God. Now we might presume that our body can heal itself and we can protect ourselves but the Psalmist is suggesting that he cannot move through the world that way. She cannot move through the world that way.

11:37 That there is a realization that some God brought life from nothing and sustains life yet. And she realizes that as she has health and freedom from enemies it's at the goodness of God. That's where she starts. That's where the Psalmist starts for us. I will extol your alert. Okay. Verse 4. Sing praises. So now the Psalmist starts saying, I'm praising God for this. And then sing praises to the Lord, O you his saints and give thanks to his holy name for

12:11 his anger is but for a moment and his favor lasts for a lifetime. Weeping may teary for the night but joy comes in the morning. So now the Psalmist is going, I'm praising you and then she invites, he invites everyone to come praise with them and adds a little wrinkle here which is interesting. Anger lasts for a moment but favor lasts for a lifetime and acknowledges that the God gets angry. It's an interesting thing in the story of scripture.

12:42 Anger is not a problem. It's what you do with it. That's a problem. Both God and Jesus get angry. So anger is not an evil. It's what you do with the anger. It's what you, how you handle it. So the Psalmist recognizes the God gets anger but she's like the anger lasts for a moment. The joy lasts or the favor lasts for a lifetime. And then this famous phrase, the joy comes in the morning. I've told you guys about it before but I remember in my Hebrew class, this joy in the

13:12 morning is a recursive theme for the people of Israel. It starts first all the way back at the Red Sea because the Israelites crossed the Red Sea on dry ground at night. And then as they are crossing and make it all the way across, it says early in the morning, when the morning began to dawn, did God swamp the Red Sea back on the Egyptians and deliver the Israelites in towards the Promised Land. And this idea, it's in Hebrew, it's lift note book or early in the morning, shows up

13:48 over and over again so that it's not a surprise when the women go to the tomb of Jesus early in the morning. Because when you have early in the morning in the story of Scripture, something good happens. It's the dawn of a new beginning. God has brought the sun back yet again to dry out the rain and call up the crops and deliver the good news. And so the Psalmist chimes into this kind of ancient idea of the people of Israel that

14:18 the joy of God comes in the morning. Okay. And then it says, as for me, I said in my prosperity, I shall never be moved. This person, whoever the Psalmist is, lands on such a good place, everything is going so well. They're like, I am solid. Nothing can move me. And I think if you're in a good place, it's nice to be immovable, right? Like I don't want to be like unflexible or unyielding, but if my house is secure and

14:55 all the loved ones are with me and safe, now I'd like to be perched up here and unassailable, I will not be moved. The Psalmist is talking about their confidence in God, about the goodness of their life. The Psalmist is saying, I have no doubts or fears or apprehensions. I am secure in my faith. I will not be moved. Ever been there, Beverly?

15:26 Yeah, I don't know. Look at what happens next. Yeah, verse, I'm on verse 7, but your favor, O Lord, made my mountain stand strong. Buy your favor, O Lord, you made my mountain stand strong. Buy your favor, O Lord. The Psalmist recognizes they are secure and it is the goodness of God. And then it says, it doesn't even start a new sentence.

15:58 This is what kind of really threw me. Buy your favor, O Lord, you made my mountain stand strong. You hid your face. I was dismayed. I mean, it's like as soon as they are secure and comfortable in all things, God retreats. You know the great, the benediction we say every week, Lord, lift up His face upon you and give His countenance to you. The idea that the gaze of the Lord communicates the things that you need. And so the Psalmist says, right as I am standing by your grace, by your favor is the

16:33 mountain on which I am set secure. As soon as that happens, you turn your face away from me. What a ripoff. What a ripoff. Buy your favor, O Lord, you made my mountain strong. You hid your face. I was dismayed. To you, O Lord, I cry. And to the Lord, I plead for mercy.

17:07 What prophet is there in my death? If I go down to the pit, will the dust praise you? Will it tell of your faithfulness? Hear O Lord, I be merciful to me. O Lord, be my helper. This is the interesting, weird, frustrating thing about the God and the world we live in.

17:38 Look God feels like words are popping in my head, not capricious, not arbitrary, but certainly unpredictable, at least unpredictable. The God feels unpredictable. And at times, at this kind of time, when things are going bad, it's like, why would you let things, if you can put a secure mountain underneath me, why would you threaten me with

18:10 the pit? Why would it feel like I am slipping down the mountain into the pit? Why would bad things be happening? Why would the problems keep coming? It's like just as you figure a relationship out, it gets complex and the ground shifts underneath you. Remember? I can't remember, we see kids of all ages here, I can remember when my kids were young, like maybe elementary school-ish, people would ask me how it's going parenting and I'm like,

18:42 man, it's like some kind of spiritual practice, you know? As soon as I figure out, as soon as I think I figure out what they need from me, it changes. And they need something else from me. And it's like always trying to hit a moving target. Some of us have been married for a period of time. It's the same thing. I remember coming up to my 10th wedding anniversary and thinking, it was about six months, I saw it coming six months away, I thought there is no way I've been married for 10 years, I have not figured this out at all, you know?

19:14 I feel like I'm just getting to know this human and there's so much I don't know. I figured by 10 years I'd have marriage figured out. We're like 20 plus in. I'm figure that I'm going to round the first corner pretty soon and get into the easier section. As soon as you figure, as soon as you think you got it figured out, the job, as soon as you get the job figured out, something shifts and changes. As soon as you get your parents figured out, they get weird and shift on you.

19:49 You know what I mean? As soon as you get a bit of money stashed up, some problem emerges and the ground falls out from underneath you. As soon as you get the rock secure and you're like, I've made it on his, I'll stand, all of a sudden again you're going, wait a minute, why am I looking at this pit? How did things get this way? So interesting to me is that clip that we all know the psalmist is going through it and the first reaction to the psalmist is to cry out to God, which is not baffling but

20:25 a little infuriating. Because isn't the God the one who let this happen to begin with? And the problem of failure, the problem of pain, the problem of evil is one we could talk about a lot and I'm glad to do that. And also I was thinking about that and remember this famous little phrase from the Gospels

20:59 in John chapter 6. Jesus has just given this teaching to a whole crowd of people. You know at one time Jesus had like 10,000 people who would sit and listen to him. I don't know how you teach 10,000 people without a microphone but some kind of projection and proper placement before he feeds the 5,000 families. Jesus is teaching a whole group of people and he teaches something that kind of blows their mind and usually what blows their mind is Jesus gives them a glimpse of who he actually

21:33 is and they can't understand how the God of creation and life would be so approachable and accessible. They can't understand how the God who made all things would also care about them enough to be right next to them. And it kind of blows their mind and they often reject it. In the end what they killed Jesus over was his claim that God had come into human form. They're like no way. God would never do that. And Jesus gives some kind of crazy teaching like that and most a lot of people started to leave and it says when many of his disciples heard it they said this is a hard saying

22:07 who can listen to it. But Jesus knowing in himself that his disciples were grumbling about this said to them do you take offense at this? That then what if you were to see the Son of Man ascending where he was before in the Spirit who gives life, the fleshes of no avail, the words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life he's like the words I gave you that's the truth. But there are some of you who do not believe and he said this is why I told you that no one can come unless the Father calls him.

22:38 But look at verse 66 he says after this many of the disciples turned back and no longer walked with him. So Jesus said to his twelve his closest friends. Hey do you guys want to go away as well? And Simon Peter who always answers for the twelve answered him and said Lord to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life and we have believed and have come to know that you are the Holy One of God.

23:08 The disciples got this thing about Jesus that even though they don't understand him at times they don't agree with him they're like but where else will we go? You're the one who has the solution. The solid rock only comes from you. Apart from you all I get is more pit. So if I'm staring at a pit I could debate how I got here or I could turn and call to the only one who can rescue me out of it. And so he's coming back to this idea that we are poor that you can't make it rain, that you can't draw the crops up, that you can't create or sustain life and you certainly can't

23:43 redeem life from failure. You cannot. You can't repair what has been broken. You can't fix what has been done. Only God can do that. Share hearts, restore life. And so the Psalmist knows this. The Psalmist knows it because as experience for the blessing of God and ascribed it to the God. Realizing their poverty they realize when they are blessed is the favor of God.

24:14 As they slide down to the pit they call up to the only one who can rescue them. What prophet is there in my death if I go down to the pit will the dust praise you? Will it tell of your faithfulness, you are O Lord and be merciful to me O Lord be my helper and then look at verse 11. You have turned my mourning into dancing. You have loosed my sackcloths and clothed me with gladness that my glory may sing your

24:45 praise and not be silent. O Lord my God I will give thanks to you forever. I am the first one to wish that God would only give me solid mountains to stand on. I like being on top of the mountain and I would like to walk from the top of one to the top of another just like that. Boom. I would love that. I would love to only have solid mountaintops from here on forever.

25:18 And I know it is within the capacity of God to give me only solid mountaintops uninterrupted from here on forever. And I do not know why he allows the pit to keep fighting its way back into my life. Probably is partly my fault. But I bet he could fix that too and I do not know why he does not.

25:49 But this almost sells us. Sometimes he does. And the disciples tell us who else could. There is something in the deliverance of God that has captured the hearts of our people for thousands of years. There is something about the solid mountain that only God can put you on that has perpetuated

26:23 a faith through pits for thousands of years. But though for some reason in his wisdom God allows evil and failure to persist. His goodness is such that it wins out in the end. That the goodness of God overwhelms the evil of the world so that whether we find ourselves in the evil and the brokenness or standing atop his goodness we turn and praise him and say hey thank you for the greater goodness that is yet to come.

26:57 Remember me from the failure and the pit that I am in. Take me back up to the goodness that I once knew. The psalmist has all of it in there. Whether you feel on top of a mountain or down in the pit you are not alone, you are not wrong. Whether you are confident in your faith or shaken you find both of them in the psalms of our people that go back a millennia because we all know all of it. The answer of course is what the answer always is to wait upon the God to give you

27:27 the good news which he inevitably will. With the God of creation in life goodness wins the day. Provision protection wins the day. Let's pray that we like the psalmist might have the humility to receive mountaintops with thanksgiving but also the courage to call out for help in the place of the pit.

28:00 Let's pray. Hey Lord thank you for the testimony of the psalm, Psalm 30. For the way that you have come through for people, our families, our forebears, our people over the thousands of years come through again for us today. Lord as we find ourselves on mountaintops may we in humility turn to thank your favor and as we find ourselves sliding into pits may we with courage turn to you in hope.

28:34 Lord we say with your disciples to whom shall we go you have the words of eternal life. Remind us of those words today in Jesus name we pray. Amen.