A Call To Worship God As We Consider Death - Psalm 71 - Celebration Of The Life Of J. M.
Psalm 71
In you, O Lord, do I take refuge; let me never be put to shame! In your righteousness deliver me and rescue me; incline your ear to me, and save me! Be to me a rock of refuge, to which I may continually come; you have given the command to save me, for you are my rock and my fortress.
Rescue me, O my God, from the hand of the wicked, from the grasp of the unjust and cruel man. For you, O Lord, are my hope, my trust, O Lord, from my youth. Upon you I have leaned from before my birth; you are he who took me from my mother's womb. My praise is continually of you.
I have been as a portent to many, but you are my strong refuge. My mouth is filled with your praise, and with your glory all the day. Do not cast me off in the time of old age; forsake me not when my strength is spent. For my enemies speak concerning me; those who watch for my life consult together and say, “God has forsaken him; pursue and seize him, for there is none to deliver him.”
O God, be not far from me; O my God, make haste to help me! May my accusers be put to shame and consumed; with scorn and disgrace may they be covered who seek my hurt. But I will hope continually and will praise you yet more and more. My mouth will tell of your righteous acts, of your deeds of salvation all the day, for their number is past my knowledge. With the mighty deeds of the Lord God I will come; I will remind them of your righteousness, yours alone.
O God, from my youth you have taught me, and I still proclaim your wondrous deeds. So even to old age and gray hairs, O God, do not forsake me, until I proclaim your might to another generation, your power to all those to come. Your righteousness, O God, reaches the high heavens. You who have done great things, O God, who is like you? You who have made me see many troubles and calamities will revive me again; from the depths of the earth you will bring me up again. You will increase my greatness and comfort me again.
I will also praise you with the harp for your faithfulness, O my God; I will sing praises to you with the lyre, O Holy One of Israel. My lips will shout for joy, when I sing praises to you; my soul also, which you have redeemed. And my tongue will talk of your righteous help all the day long, for they have been put to shame and disappointed who sought to do me hurt.
One of my favorite books has a quote that I would like to share with you. The author himself struggled with a very long terminal illness and through his struggle he sought to provide comfort to us all as we contemplate our own mortality and death. The author provide hope to us when he makes this analogy, “The little infant that is sent into this world, so strange to it, has everything provided for it by the One who sent it; those who are sent by the same One into another world shall not be worse off.”
Notice four things about this quote that can help give us hope as we consider our mortality.
God is sovereign and providentially cares for us
This is a strange world for many reasons
We need to contemplate and acknowledge God’s provision throughout all of life
We are to expect something better in the life to come if we have put our hope in God’s salvation
God is Sovereign and providentially cares for us
This author reminds us of some very important truths to consider if we are to have hope as we contemplate death, even our own death. First, he reminds us that God is sovereign and He has providentially provided life to every person who has ever been conceived and who has ever been born. It is the LORD who sends children into this world and He makes provision for them from the beginning of their lives till the end of their life.
Do you believe in a sovereign creator who providentially gives life to all people? Have you come to realize that there is a sovereign God who has provide for you more than anyone else ever has or could? Some might say, my parents have done more for me than anyone! Yes, they have done a lot. Jon and Jim often testify to all that their father Jim did for them, but God does more.
Psalm 27:10 says “For my father and my mother have forsaken me, but the Lord will take me in.”
Jesus said in Matthew 7:11, “If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him!”
In Psalm 71 David confesses that he believes that God has given him life and provides his care. This causes him to praise the LORD. He says, “Upon you I have leaned from before my birth; you are he who took me from my mother's womb. My praise is continually of you.”
David also says in Psalm 139, “For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother's womb. I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well. My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately woven in the depths of the earth. Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them. (13-16)
One of the things that we need to do to have hope as we contemplate our death is that we need to acknowledge that there is a Creator who is sovereign and who cares for His creation. He begins to care for us at conception and He continues to do so even in our death. Acknowledging this reality gives us hope.
This is a strange world
Secondly, if we are to have confidence when we consider death we need to recognize that this world is strange in many ways. Creation screams out that life is temporary. It is but a vapor and a cloud. It is strange to a baby because everything is new; but it is also strange because a child is born into a world where there is sin and death. The world was not originally created with these things present. God created all things and gave them life and there was no sin and death. There was no sickness, no tragedy, no evil and no wickedness. But through the sin of Adam these things entered into the world and this world became very strange and it increases more and more. In fact, the apostle Paul reminds us that this creation is groaning for the day when Christ returns and He establishes His kingdom and makes all things right (Romans 8:22-23).
All creation groans under the reality of sin but God did not leave us with any hope. He did not turn and walk away and ignore our desperate situation. No, He provides everything we need practically and spiritually. He provides for us in temporal ways and also in eternal ways. He provides for us physically, emotionally and spiritually. David often acknowledges in Psalm 71 that God delivers him from his enemies (4,10,13,24).
David acknowledges this in Psalm 71:15-17 when he says, “My mouth will tell of your righteous acts, of your deeds of salvation all the day, for their number is past my knowledge. With the mighty deeds of the Lord God I will come; I will remind them of your righteousness, yours alone. O God, from my youth you have taught me, and I still proclaim your wondrous deeds.”
In fact, David testifies that from the beginning of his life until he penned this psalm God had been faithful to him in all these ways. He says in Psalm 71: 5-7, “For you, O Lord, are my hope, my trust, O Lord, from my youth. Upon you I have leaned from before my birth; you are he who took me from my mother's womb. My praise is continually of you. I have been as a portent to many, but you are my strong refuge.”
We need to contemplate God’s provision throughout all of life
We see then that if we are to have hope as we contemplate death we need to believe that God has been faithful to provide for every need we have especially our need for salvation from our sins and from our guilt. Do you believe that God has been faithful to provide these things to you?
If we are to have hope as we approach the day of our death we must also consider that God gives gifts to us by His grace and not by our merit. And we must believe that because of this God does not stop providing for us when we need it the most.
David prayed this prayer in Psalm 71, “Do not cast me off in the time of old age; forsake me not when my strength is spent.” I love that David prayed this prayer. In Psalm 71 David confesses that God has been gracious and faithful in his life but he must have wondered if that might end when he would loose his strength and vigor. But God is merciful and gracious to us. He does not stop providing for us when we are old and gray and when our strength is gone.
David also says, “O God, from my youth you have taught me, and I still proclaim your wondrous deeds. So even to old age and gray hairs, O God, do not forsake me, until I proclaim your might to another generation, your power to all those to come.”
Notice that when David was but a youth who was full of vigor, strength and power God had taught him to acknowledge and proclaim God’s wondrous deeds and not his own. If you meet a person who boasts of their strength, their power, their goodness and good works, you can be sure that they have not learned the lessons that God would be teaching them. God provides for us when we are strong and when our bodies fail us. This truth has often encouraged me when I considered Jim Moe. Jim was weakened in almost every way over the last five years but God does not cast such people away! He gives us the graces that we need in those moments! Praise The LORD!!!
We are to expect something better to come in the life to come
The author says, “...those who are sent by the same One into another world shall not be worse off.” If we are to consider our mortality and our death with hope we need to remember that for those who have taken refuge in the LORD the world to come is far greater than this one. David put his hope in the LORD. He says in Psalm 71:1-3, “In you, O Lord, do I take refuge; let me never be put to shame! In your righteousness deliver me and rescue me; incline your ear to me, and save me! Be to me a rock of refuge, to which I may continually come; you have given the command to save me, for you are my rock and my fortress.”
There is no comparison between the world we experience here and the one that we can experience if we have repented of our sins and believed upon the LORD Jesus Christ. The apostle Paul says, “For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us.”
David says in Psalm 71: 19-23, “Your righteousness, O God, reaches the high heavens. You who have done great things, O God, who is like you? You who have made me see many troubles and calamities will revive me again; from the depths of the earth you will bring me up again. You will increase my greatness and comfort me again. I will also praise you with the harp for your faithfulness, O my God; I will sing praises to you with the lyre, O Holy One of Israel. My lips will shout for joy, when I sing praises to you; my soul also, which you have redeemed.”
My friends, do you have this hope as you consider your mortality and your death? Is your mouth full of praise to the LORD for His grace and mercy? Do you speak far more about His works and provisions than you do of your own?
Tonight is a night to consider these things and discover that even when we are confronted with the reality of death we can have hope! Don’t waste this moment!