A Worship-Filled Life

Well, good morning, church. Good morning. Well, I don’t know how you cannot be pumped up and excited after that. That was awesome, wasn’t it? Those people have done.

They just kicked it out of the park. I love hearing people just praise the Lord and we’re going to continue that as we share the word. And if you have not met me before, my name is Mike Laramie. I’m part of the preaching teaching team here at Eastgate. And Pastor Gary should be in Uganda right now.

Should be. And if you hadn’t heard, we had to cancel the trip this year because of the Ebola outbreak that’s in Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo. So there’s a travel ban and our team was not able to go this year. So would you join me? I want to pray for Pastor George Mobonye and all their team there who are still ministering during that time.

So let’s pray. Father, I do pray for Pastor George Mobonye and all of those in Kisoro, Uganda, Kisoro Baptist Church and all the 27 churches or more that he has planted in the last several years. His ministry has been thriving. But Father, this is a threat against him. You know, against him and you’d people.

And so, Father, I pray against this illness and I pray that this would be an opportunity for you to show your glory in Uganda and throughout southern Africa. We pray blessing upon Pastor George and his staff. And I pray this in Jesus name, Amen. So, yeah, I’ve been to Uganda. My wife and I, Cindy and I have been to Uganda.

A number of you have been out there and it’s a fantastic trip. I highly encourage that. If you get a chance to go, please go. You’ll see a modern day Paul in Pastor George. He is a church planter and he is all about it.

He’s an apostle. You got to meet him. He comes here every once in a while. Next time you hear him coming here, you want to meet Pastor George. He’s great people.

Today we’re continuing our sermon series entitled Built Different. And that phrase kind to describe someone who maybe physically or mentally is just a little bit different from other people. You know, you might say something like that person’s cut from a different cut of cloth, you know, or maybe, you know, you know, that one’s a beast. I don’t know that I’d want to use that all the time. You know, like I heard a comedian once say, you know, she was a softball player and the last thing she wanted to be called was a beast.

You know, who wants to be the enemy in her favorite movie, right? You know, Beauty and the. You don’t want to be the beast, right? But maybe it’s this idea of being countercultural, going swimming against the stream of the current culture. That’s what we’re called to.

We should be built different. So those of us who are in Christ are built different because our lives are built on Jesus Christ alone and not of this world. So our series is based upon six concepts that we’ve pulled from Romans 12:1 and 2. Let me remind you of that serious theme verse. Now.

Romans 12:1 2 says this. I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect. And so today we’re going to concentrate on that concept of spiritual worship and we’re going to dig into Psalm 63 in order to do it. Now, the Psalms are a great place to do that, right?

Because most of the psalms were meant to be set to music and they would be recited. They are forms of praise that date back millennia. That’s what the Psalms are for. And Psalm 63 is one of those most loved Psalms. Fourth century church father John Chrysostom once wrote that it was decreed and ordained by the early church fathers that no day should pass without the public singing of this psalm.

So the early church fathers said that we should be singing this one every day, Psalm 63. And so in the first service, I challenged Pastor Steven to put Psalm 63 to music so we could east gate ize it, you know, so we could do it like we just did. I think it’d be awesome. He’s already kind of struggling with it, though. You know, it’s going to be a tough one.

That’s a tough one to put to music. I’m saying, hey, you already got the lyrics written. You just go ahead and go, right? Write the music. That’s the hard part.

So we really want to dig into this now. We talk about worship a lot in the church, right? But there’s some confusion as to what it actually means. What does worship actually mean? Many people reduce worship to singing, and it certainly includes singing.

But worship is not just a 15 to 20 minute time where we all stand and clap our hands and sing songs. That is not the sum total of worship. Worship is an orientation of life. Worship is Something that we is something of the way that we live. It’s far deeper than just singing, but singing is certainly, like I said, it’s a good part of it.

Now, the question is not whether we’re going to worship, but what is it that you are going to worship? See, all of us worship, okay? What every human being is already a worshiper. The question is not whether we worship, but what we worship. Something is going to sit at the center of your life and it’s going to shape everything that you do.

And that is something that you would worship. What we worship then takes control. What we worship takes control. It determines how we spend our time, what we invest our energy in, what we sacrifice for, and where we place our hope. Whatever we sit at the center becomes the engine that either drives us on or crushes us under its weight.

The problem is, is that most of us place weight on things that were never designed to carry it. Our job, money, our hobbies and pastimes, perhaps our children, politics, maybe even our sexual identity, all of that stuff can take the center. These are all good things by themselves, but they were never designed to be the ultimate thing, the thing that was meant to be worshiped in the center of your life. Instead of helping us. These things eventually will crush us.

They’ll leave us empty. They’ll leave us restless and tired. So the real question is not are you worshiping? The question is, is what you are worshiping able to take the weight of your life?

There’s only one person who can. That’s Jesus Christ. And in Psalm 63, we’re going to see what it looks like when a life that is anchored in the worship of the only one who can take that worship will do to our souls. We’ll see what Psalm 63 has to say about that. In Psalm 63, David was in a barren wilderness and he expressed his desire to live a worship filled life.

And his greatest desire was not for comfort or for safety, but the presence of God. See, we too can live a life like that. Just as David modeled in the wilderness, we can live a life filled with worship. Well, how can we do that? How can we live that life filled with worship?

Well, the text is gonna give us three marks of a worship filled life. So if you would read with me, join me in Psalm 63. We’re gonna read verses one through eight. Psalm 63, verses one through eight. A Psalm of David, when he was in the wilderness of Judah.

O God, you are my God. Earnestly I seek you. My soul thirsts for you. My flesh Faints for you as in a dry and weary land where there is no water. So I have looked upon you in the sanctuary, beholding your power and glory because your steadfast love is better than life.

My lips will praise you, so I will bless you as long as I live in your name I will lift up my hands. My soul will be satisfied as with fat and rich food. And my mouth will praise you with joyful lips when I remember you upon my bed and meditate on you in the watches of the night. For you have been my help. And in the shadow of your wings I will sing for joy.

My soul clings to you. Your right hand upholds me. May God bless the reading of his word. Amen. We’re looking here for three marks of a worship filled life.

And here’s the first one. That’s the heart that seeks God. The heart that seeks God. I start off and I read the prologue to the psalm. And I did that on purpose because I want to set the stage for what David is doing as he writes this psalm.

He is in the wilderness of Judah. And most commentators figure that this was the time where David was being chased out in the wilderness during Absalom’s rebellion. Absalom was one of David’s sons. And he decided, you know what, it’s time for me to be king. And he wanted to be king, and he started this rebellion.

David ended up getting chased out of the capital city and he’s running for his life with his mighty men in the wilderness, in the wilderness of Judea. Many commentators think it’s probably near Ein Gedi, which was near the Dead Sea. So he’s in a very dry and barren land. Okay, so think Nevada, think Arizona. Okay, think very dry, no rain, no water.

Okay? That’s where he is. But look at what he does. His first words as he writes the psalm is, God, you are my God. God, you are my God.

He starts with God, but there’s a really interesting thing in there if you actually look at the Hebrew underneath, because he actually says, elohim, you are my El. Elohim, you are my El. Elohim is the plural name for God. Okay? That’s in the Hebrew.

This is again, all the Jews that are reading this are reading this as Elohim, plural. That’ll preach right there. Okay? I don’t even. We’re not even have time to go there, but that’ll preach.

That is the word that they would use to describe the mighty creator of the universe, God, Elohim. It’s the plural Name. And he’s saying, this mighty king of the universe, this God of Gods, King of kings, creator of the universe, is my God, little G, God, my God. You can see he takes this attitude of profound reverence and prostration and. And he immediately pivots it to that of relational intimacy.

Oh, God, you are my God. You know me. You are my God. That’s how he starts his praise. He recognizes who the praise is for.

God, you are my God. In verse one, he says, he seeks you, I seek you. He says that means to search, to look for earnestly. Right. Right away, the worshipful Christian will seek God early and often.

Like there’s this unquenchable desire. Like, I gotta find this. That’s what David is saying. This isn’t just going, oh, yeah, I looked kind of like yesterday. I was looking for a sauce in the fridge and I couldn’t find it.

And so I ended up eating my dinner. And my wife goes, it’s right here. Okay. Yeah. Where is it?

I don’t know. You know, that’s not that kind of seeking. Okay. This is an earnest, actually eyesight, open seeking and desire to see it. And you can see how he seeks it because he says in verse one, my soul thirsts.

My soul thirsts. What’s the soul? In the Old Testament, especially, the soul is that sum and totality of who you are. That’s your emotions, that’s your desire, that’s your personhood. That’s who you are.

He says, that very nature of my being thirsts. And he. He uses thirst instead of hunger. That’s an interesting thought. Think about that for a second.

How long can you go without food? About 30 days. How long can you go without water? About two or three. Okay.

My soul thirsts for God. My soul thirsts. It is a deep biological necessity. It is so important to David, and he seeks it so earnestly that he’s thirsting and he’s in a dry and barren land. He’s in the wilderness of Jesus Judea.

He knows what physical thirst is, but he says, my soul thirsts for you. John 7:37. Jesus speaking. Jesus stood up and cried out, if anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink. Jesus understood this concept.

He was the living water. He’s talking about soul quenching water, not just the drink that’s in your cup. In the morning, every morning I get up, first thing I do, I’m thirsty. I go straight downstairs and I get a 16 ounce glass of water and chug it. You know, maybe you do the Same thing, you know, but that’s not what we’re talking about.

This is waking up first thing in the morning, you get a 16 ounce jug of God. I’m searching for that right now because I need it. I need it so bad. I need it so much that in verse one, he says, my flesh faints, I am fading, my strength is fading. I need God so badly that I’m searching for him like that.

In verse 2, David calls to mind the sanctuary. Now for those of you who are biblical students, remember that when David was king, there was no temple. Yet Solomon is the one who built the temple. Solomon is David’s son. He built the temple.

There was no temple. There’s still the Wilderness Tabernacle. There was the tent that moved around during the 40 years of wandering in the tent desert. So there’s still that set up. Okay?

But the Wilderness Tabernacle, even though there’s not a temple building, there was still corporate worship. And this is what David is talking about. He certainly, he said, God, you are my God. He can certainly meet with God in the desert one on one. But what’s he really missing?

He’s missing that corporate worship, that gathering of God’s people, that time that they can offer behold the Lord together and they can sing together, they can pray together, they can worship together. That’s what he’s missing. He’s missing the glory of God that we can only see when we gather together as a body of Christ. Look at what he writes in Psalm 27 as well. He says something very similar.

He says this one thing I ask of the Lord, this thing I seek most is to live in the house of, of the Lord all the days of my life, delighting in the Lord’s perfections and meditating in his temple. That is the earnest desire that David has. He’s not just, not only wants to, he’s not only seeking after God individually, he’s seeking after this corporate experience in which you are all participating right now.

I wonder if we’ve lost that longing that David has. I wonder if we’ve lost that. You know, for many Christians today, church has become one appointment on their calendar. One appointment among many. Right.

You know, if nothing else is scheduled, I’ll make it at the 11 o’ clock service or 9:15 or whatever, you know, whatever I can make, you know, if I can make it great, you know, but if there’s anything else going on, sorry, church that’s not going to make. Or maybe community group, you know, same thing, you know, Wednesdays are tough. Me or, well, Tuesdays are tough for me. Or whatever day it is that your group meets, you know. Yeah.

You know, if there’s nothing else going on, then I’ll come. You know, maybe that’s. Maybe that’s what we struggle with, you know, because as the weekend gets busy, church is the easiest thing to sacrifice. You know, Barna has done a bunch of research, and he’s constantly researching the state of the church. And in his latest study in 2025, he found that the average person who calls themselves a Christian and calls himself a regular church attender attends 1.6 Sundays a month.

1.6. That’s less than two Sundays a month considering themselves that, hey, I belong to the body of Christ. That should make us weep. It should make us weep. It makes.

I tell you what, you know, most of you know that, you know, my job takes me away many weekends. The last time I was able to be with you, I was actually in the park. I have not been able to be with. And it pains me. I hate it.

I hate being away on a Sunday, you know, it’s not merely an attendance issue. It’s an affection issue. It’s not an attendance issue. It’s an affection issue. I’m not here to say, okay, I want you to come here more.

That’s not what I’m saying. That is not what I’m saying. What I’m saying is you. You know, you don’t have to convince someone to pursue what they treasure, right? You don’t have to convince them, like, if your grandkids are coming over, you’re gonna rearrange your schedule and make that happen, right?

If. You know, I love the Hurricanes, man. Carolina, Hurricane, Stanley cup champs. Woo. You know, I didn’t get to see a single game because I was working.

But you know what? We got WI FI in our airplanes. And you better believe I was watching that. Okay, only in Cruz, right? Only in Cruise, but, yeah, I was following it.

And you better believe I saw all the highlights. Okay, we will rearrange our schedule for a playoff game maybe. Perhaps you’re following the World cup right now and, you know, and that’s really big for you. I hope you enjoy it. I’m not a big soccer fan, but I get it.

I get it. You know, I’ve been in countries where the World cup is a big deal. Okay, I get it.

Do you miss the gathered worship of God’s people when you’re absent? Do you miss that? Do you long to sing with the saints? To hear God’s word preached to Pray with his people to witness baptisms, to celebrate the Lord’s Supper, to celebrate the youth going to camp with 60 kids. That’s awesome.

That’s awesome. Do you long to be there? Or has church become a religious obligation instead of a holy delight? The answer isn’t simply, I need to go more. That’s not.

Again. That’s not, don’t hear me that way. The answer is this, Lord, restore my delight in you. Restore my delight in celebrating with other believers. Cultivate my love for Christ so deeply that I can’t imagine.

Imagine willingly being apart from them on Sunday or on Wednesday or whenever you meet. Cultivate your love for you so much that I cannot imagine being apart from other believers. See, believer, we’re here to seek the Lord with all your heart. Deuteronomy 4:29 says, but from there you will seek the Lord your God, and you will find him. If you search after with all your heart and with all your soul, he will allow you to find him.

If you seek him, you need to look for him. Jeremiah 29:13 says, you will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. Jesus also echoes this in the Sermon on the mount. In Matthew 6:33, he says, Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. You see how important it is to seek after the Father now?

Several times when I was on active duty in the Air Force, we would go to Las Vegas. I would go out to Nellis Air Force Base. There’d be an exercise. Perhaps you’ve heard it, it’s called Red Flag. And we’d.

There was one. Our opportunity would come up every six months. I love the flying out there because it’s first rate. It’s fantastic. We’re dropping live weapons and there’s adversaries and there’s like, huge numbers of airplanes.

I love that stuff. It was a lot of fun. So every time they’d come up and go, all right, we’re going to Red Flag. And I go, I want to go. You went last time.

Look around. All right, you can go. So I’d go right now. One of the things I didn’t like about it is, you know, running herd over a bunch of fighter pilots as the dd, because guess who was that was me, you know, running the casinos. Come on, can we go home now?

It’s midnight. I want to go to bed, you know, because I’m the only one sober, right? Come on, let’s go. Come on. Herding cats.

You know, that kind of scene. What would normally happen, though, is on the Saturday, because we’re there for two weeks on the Saturday, I would go out to a place called Red Rock Canyon State Park. And for those of you who’ve been out there, it is fantastic. It is gorgeous. And we went out to Vegas last fall, my wife and I, and I got to show her where we used to go.

And this state park is a great place to. To spend some time. Okay. There are trails that you could walk just like this, you know, because it’s pretty easy all the way through climbing to. You need equipment like straight rock face, everything in between.

So you can do all of it. But it’s gorgeous. Red rocks everywhere. Fantastic. But did I mention it’s In Nevada?

Yeah. 7% humidity, 115 degrees. It’s hot and dry. Okay, so this one time I went there in my backpack. I don’t had two bottles of water.

Some of you can already figure out what went wrong, right? We were about halfway up the hill, I finished my second bottle and I went, maybe we should head back to the car, you know? So we started walking back to the car. About halfway back to the car, I stopped sweating. For those of you who know anything about physiology, that’s not good.

Okay, that was really bad. I finally got to the car and I had to drink a couple quarts of water to even start being thirsty. That was not good. Okay. I probably was close to dying.

Not smart on my part. We need water. Even here with 95% humidity, most of the time in the summer, we need water. See, we don’t casually consider water. Let me think about water.

You don’t politely include water in your plans. You desperately need it. As human beings, we need it because our lives depend upon it. See, see, some of you have included God in your life. You know, hey, you know, whenever, if it’s all right, you know, we’ll include him in there.

Now, see, we don’t include him in our life. We misunderstand that predicament. He is not a source of life. He is the source of life. He needs to be a first priority.

We need to seek him first. Have you made following Jesus your lifelong pursuit? See, the world offers all kinds of pursuits that might feel satisfying at the moment, but they can’t satisfy the soul in the long run. They promise fullness, but they leave us empty. Have you felt that inner thirst that nothing else seems to quench?

You know, we know sometimes what it’s like to chase achievement or relationships or comfort or success, and it comes up dry worship is not a weekend activity but a lifelong pursuit of the only one who can satisfy the soul. That’s the first mark of a worship filled life. Let’s look at the second. It’s a mouth that praises God. A mouth that praises God.

So here we’re looking at what David is doing as he responds, as he sought after God, he is now starting to praise him. And the first thing he praises God for is his steadfast love in verse three. His steadfast love. This is the Hebrew word chesed. You got to use a little phlegm, you know, chesed, okay?

It is translated variously as loving kindness, goodness, mercy, favor. Does this sound familiar? This is the Old Testament form of the Greek word agape. This is the unconditional love of God, the chesed in the Hebrew. This is showing favor on those who are unworthy.

As David thinks about the love of God, it calls to mind a biblical commentator from the he 18th century. His name was, let me see, what was his name? You don’t care? Thomas Brooks. Like you’re going to look him up.

Okay, Thomas Brooks. But he said something really cool. He said this, he said, you know, no man sets so high a price on the sun as someone who’s been locked for months in a dungeon, right? So if you’ve not seen the sun for months, okay, I met a former submariner here between services. He didn’t see the sun for months.

And I bet you when he got to port he was awful happy to see the sun, right? Or if you have a dry and parched land, you know, and you finally see rain, that’s the kind of response that we have to the love of God.

In verse six. I’m sorry, in verse four, David says, I will bless you as long as I live. And then he also has three different statements in verses 3, 5 and 7. He says, My lips will praise you. I will praise you with joyous lips and I will sing for joy.

These are all things that he’s using his tongue, his mouth for. He is praising God. This is a loud thing. And remember, he’s writing this in the desert. He’s got every reason to complain, right?

He’s thirsty. He doesn’t have any food. He’s being chased by his son who’s trying to usurp his throne. He’s living in the desert. What is his response?

He praises God. See, praise is a choice. So even when you’re in dire circumstances, or maybe it’s not so dire. Let me share real quick. A couple weeks, maybe a week or so.

Ago. Most of you all know I’m an airline pilot and I’m based up in Boston, so I have to commute up there, which means I thumb for a ride and see whoever’s got an empty seat. I get to work and then come back. I was trying to come home, and there were three successive flights I tried to get on. Hey, can I have a ride?

Nope. Sorry, Foal. Can I have a ride? Nope. Sorry, fo.

So three successful flights, and I didn’t get on any of them, which meant I was stuck in Boston for another night, and I was going to take the first flight out in the morning. I was like, dang it, because I want to get home. You know, I don’t want to be up there. And I was all kind of. And then this.

This bolt came out. And I think God was just saying, you got a great job. You know, you’ve got a great. You got a job that most people would really kill for. You know, you got a great job.

You got people that rely on you. You know, this is really a small thing. So you don’t get the great home tonight. I was like, praise God. You’re right.

You’re right. Small thing, okay. Most of you are probably struggling with things far worse than what I just described. But that’s just a small example of how we can choose to praise God even in circumstances that we wouldn’t want to. David sings for joy.

So certainly we are commanded to sing, but it’s not just singing. It’s shouting, shout for joy. It’s speaking, it’s murmuring for joy. It’s thinking for joy. Okay?

All of the types of use of your mouth, lips and tongue could be used to praise God. Psalm 19:14 says the words, let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight. O Lord, my strength and my redeemer. Everything that is of us should praise God. So how do we praise Him?

Is it just when things go well? We’re really good at that, right? Hey, I just got an A in my test. Praise God. Okay.

Yes, you should do that. Absolutely. But you know what? Hey, I got a C in my test, and I really studied Praise God.

Right? That’s a little harder to do. We’re still to praise him in those kind of circumstances. But it’s not just. We don’t just praise God by saying those things about him or to him.

You know that we can praise God by building other people up. Do you know that we can praise God by the edifying words that come out of our mouths. You know, how often is it that we might tear people down? And then the next Sunday we’re in here praising God. Do you have a work mouth and a Sunday mouth?

You know, do you have Monday through Friday where you speak one way and then on Sunday morning, hey, brother, how you doing? Careful. I’ve been there, right? Careful. Let’s build people up with our.

With our mouth. Let’s also not detract from the Lord by our speech. Let’s do that. Look, in verse four says, I will bless you as long as I live. David is saying something curious here.

I will bless him. How do you bless God? Right? When I was teaching my kids how to pray when they were young, you know, all they did was, you know, dear God, please bless mommy and please bless daddy and bless grandma and bless grandpa and bless meme and all Uncle Mark and you know, right? Please bless.

Please bless. We’re good at asking for that. Please bless. How do we bless God? I’ll tell you.

To bless him means to kneel before him. It’s to ascribe to him the glory that is due to him. It is to serve him and to do what he says that blesses God. How many of you parents out here today, if you saw your kids doing what you. You would want them to do without you telling them that that would bless you?

Absolutely. That’s how God sees us. We can bless him by looking for his hand in our life and acknowledging his sovereign hand. And in your name, I’ll lift my hands. Guess what?

Charismatics, you know, you didn’t invent that in 1800. That goes back three millennia, right? Raising hands. That’s okay. You guys can raise hands in services.

It’s perfectly okay. You can do the, you know, the two hand, or you can do the one hand, or you can do the, you know, whatever. I don’t hope nobody sees me. You know, go ahead and lift your hands. Okay, David did it.

Okay. David’s doing it in the desert. You guys are in a nice comfortable auditorium. Raise your hands. Don’t do it because I said to do it, though.

Do it because God has motivated you and you are praising him. Acts 4:12 says, There is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men, by which men may be saved. That’s why we praise him. That’s why we praise him. We praise his name.

I remind you, let’s practice speech that continuously thanks God and acknowledges his name forever. David again in Psalm 30, verses 11 and 12, says, you have Turned for me my mourning into dancing. You have loosed my sackcloth and clothed me with gladness that my glory may sink. Sing your praise and not be silent. O Lord, my God, I will give thanks to you forever.

There’s reason enough. You’re breathing, right? You’ve woke up on this side of the dirt. Okay? Praise God.

Hebrews 13:15. Through him, let us continuously offer up a sacrifice of praise to God that is the fruit of lips that acknowledge his name. Have you thought about how powerful the tongue is? Right? It’s volatile.

It’s vital, though, right? Washington Irving said that the tongue, a sharp tongue that is, is the only edged tool that gets sharper with constant use. Scary, right? James, the brother of Jesus, writes in his letter, the tongue is a fire, a restless evil, and full of deadly poison. You know, the tongue doesn’t look all that bad, right?

It’s hidden behind pearly teeth and maybe here in the front row, maybe some braces a little bit. Right? Hidden. Hidden back there, right? But think about what you can do with your tongue.

Right? You can whistle, you know, you can yawn. Maybe I’m doing that to y’ all right now. Okay? Maybe you can yawn.

Okay. You can taste delicious, tasty food. You know, if you go to Pastor Gary’s office, he’ll hand out peppermints, if you like those. I don’t. I don’t like peppermints.

I don’t like. But, you know, you can use it for that. You know, for those in the other room, we got people who can play brass and woodwind instruments and those kind of things, and they can play the entire song without missing a beat. But then watch. You smash your thumb with a hammer or kick your pinky toe on some furniture and see what your tongue does then.

Tongue’s dangerous. Will you use your tongue to bless others instead of curse them? Does your speech reflect the character of God? Do you share gossip in the form of prayer requests? Do we actively participate in tearing down others?

See, most of us are not going to curse God actively, but we might be slandering him by how we use our voices in the presence of others. Let’s use our voices to praise God and to praise each other and to lift each other up. That’s the second mark. Here’s the third. A soul that meditates on God.

A soul that meditates on God. This is not this Eastern meditation that you may have heard of where you’re mindlessly repeating a mantra over and over and over again. That’s not what we’re talking about. We are talking about focused thinking. Focused thinking about God and his Word.

That’s what Christian meditation is. And you see, David gives us a little bit of a prescription on how to do this. He says that in verse five, my soul will be satisfied. This is to be filled, like, with rich food. Like, I mean, I love every once in a while to get a rich, juicy steak.

And I love a rib eye more than anything else, right? Why? Because the ribeye’s marbled with fat. And any chef will tell you that fat equals flavor, right? If you want to add flavor to something, add some fat in some kind of form into it and it tastes good, right?

You guys can have all the other different kinds of steak that you want to, but if I have a choice, I’m going to order a ribeye, right? That’s the kind of food that we are feeding on. When we feed on God’s word, we’re chewing on the fat. We’re chewing on the nutritious part, right? We’re really getting in there.

See, God receives his glory when we meditate on his Word and really chew on it and let it richly penetrate into us. See, Colossians 3:16 says that the word of Christ is to dwell in you richly, richly, like fat and savory food. And the next step that David gives us is. I remember you in verse six. This is not some casual.

Oh, yeah, I remember, like, hey, you know what happened on Wednesday at camp? You guys would go, oh, yeah, well, this happened. That’s not what I’m talking about, okay? I’m talking about. I’m thinking back to the times that God worked in my life, and I’m actively processing it.

You know, I’m really thinking about, hey, you know what? I remember a couple years ago, I was going through a thing, and God really moved in my life and made things happen. That’s an active remembrance. This is not a casual thing. And then I meditate on you.

Now, you’re going to love this. This Hebrew word is the word haga. Haga sounds like a growl, Right, right, right. And that’s the picture. That’s the Hebrew picture.

Hagah is like a lion crouching over its prey. Like, don’t come near me. I’m enjoying this wildebeest or whatever it is that he’s eating, right? So that’s how we are to treat the word. We’re to grab it and devour it and just tear it up.

I know you guys are loving that. You’re going to remember that, right? Hagah this is the meditation that we’re talking about. You can read it back to the Lord, you can think on it, you can pray it back to him. You can think about it under your breath, in your mind.

See, we don’t just fill our minds with information as we meditate on God’s word, the Spirit takes that truth and presses it deep into our hearts. He’ll convict us of sin at that same time, but he’ll also comfort us in our suffering. He’ll strengthen our faith and he’ll transform our desires. This happens as we meditate on the promises and on the word of Scripture. Meditation is the means by the Spirit how he does that.

And as we pray through that, and as we meditate on God’s word, it goes deeper and deeper into us. And David throws a couple more things at us. In other words, he says, when I’m on my bed or I’m in the watches of the night, in the Hebrew, they divided the night into three watches of four hours from 6pm to 6am so what he’s saying is, you know, every once a while, in once in a while, when you wake up in the middle of the night and you can’t sleep and you’re laying there and what do most of us do? Grab our phone. Worst thing we could do.

You know that blue light now I know what time it is. I don’t really want to know what time it is. Oh, now I’ve only got two more hours to sleep or whatever, right? What David is saying is, in those watches of the night, meditate. What has God been saying to you?

What is the last Christian song you heard? What’s the last scripture that you heard? Or remember? What’s the last thing that a Christian brother or sister has spoken into your life saying, Meditate on that. Take that time and use it productively.

That’s what we should be doing at 2 and 3 o’ clock in the morning when you wake up for no reason.

He’s been my help. David says there’s another thing that we can meditate on. See, David is saying this from the past. He’s not saying, I’m in the wilderness, please help me. He’s saying, you’ve been my help.

Remember, David slew Goliath. David’s been made king of Israel. David has killed his ten thousands when Saul has killed his thousands, right? David has been a great and mighty warrior, leader and king. He remembers how God helped him.

He remembers the help that God had. And so he calls that to mind. And that’s what he’s doing in his meditation. And let me show you in verse 8. Here is the objective of the whole bit.

Verse 8. My soul clings to you. My soul clings to you. That’s the purpose behind the seeking, right? The praising and the meditating.

All of that is so that my soul will cling to you. This is a familiar word. This shows up in Genesis, Genesis 2:24. This is going to sound familiar. Therefore, a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.

That word cleave in the King James. That’s that. Hold fast. The objective of spiritual worship, as we seek and we praise and we meditate, is to cleave to God as a biblical marriage does, As a man clings to his wife, and as a wife clings to her husband to become one flesh with the holiest of holy, with the King of the universe. That is the objective of spiritual worship.

You are learning to get closer to him because his right hand will uphold you. See, God repeatedly tells us to meditate on His Word. And in Joshua 1:8, he says, study this book of instruction. Continually meditate. Meditate on it day and night, so you will be sure to obey everything written in it.

Only then will you prosper and succeed in all you do. And then in the beginning of Psalms, as He introduces all 150 of them in Psalm 1, verses 1 and 2, he says, blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers, but his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his, his law. He meditates day and night. We are commanded to meditate. Let’s use Christian meditation for what it really is meant for.

Not this mindless repetition, but this. You guys are gonna chew on it. Chew on it. Paul says in Philippians 4, 8, finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. If you get to the point where you’re like, I need to meditate and I can’t remember the last scripture, or I don’t remember the last Christian song or whatever.

How about the last time you went to the beach? Or maybe you went to the mountains, okay? Or maybe you saw a newborn child, or you were at a wedding, you know, and you saw the bride and groom pledging their lives together. Whatever is pure and beautiful. Meditate on that.

Because those are From God too. Meditate on that. Those are the things that we should be filling our life with. It’s like a cow chewing on its cud, right? When the.

When the cow eats the grass. If they ate like me, it would be. It would be like three bites and it’s gone, right? Done. That’s not what a cow does.

Cow brings it back up and chews it and choose it. He gets every bit of nourishment out of that meal. That’s what we are to do as we meditate on the goodness of God. It could also be like that song that doesn’t leave your head, right? That song that continuously loops all day.

I’m sure that’s happened to you. It happens to me all the time. Sometimes it’s a song I really don’t want to hear. Okay. And I’m trying not to think of them right now because then it’s going to loop in my head.

See, every one of us has a meditation loop. We all have it. Your mind is always rehearsing something. For some of you, it’s anxiety. You know, you’re thinking about the next big problem or you’re just worried about whatever it is.

Maybe for others it’s resentment. You know, there’s some hurt that’s out there that you’re just looping over and over and over again. Some people replay conversations that they’ve had that they wish had gone differently and it keeps looping. Others rehearse worst case scenarios that may never happen. Some people obsess over their bank account, right?

Some people obsess over their retirement, their children’s success, or maybe even like the latest headlines, it’s easy to do. And it loops over and over and over again. We become experts at meditating on our problems. But we’re so much like novices when we should be meditating on God. Let’s not be good at meditating on our problems.

Let’s be good at meditating on God, right? Because he’s got so much more for you. Whatever you continuously rehearse, your heart’s going to believe. Imagine what would happen if we spent as much time rehearsing God’s promises as we do rehearsing our problems. What if every anxious thought became an opportunity to pray?

What if every fear reminded us of a promise of God? What if every sleepless night became an opportunity to remember God’s faithfulness? See, the goal is not. I’m not telling you to pretend that the problems don’t exist. They do.

Okay? But let’s let the greatness of God become bigger in your mind than your problems. Let’s meditate on that. See, Psalm 63 shows us what it’s like for us to be built different. And, you know, even in the wilderness.

Even when David was in the wilderness, his circumstances were dry, but his soul was satisfied because his worship was put in the right place. He sought God first with everything he had. He praised God with his lips, and he meditated on God with everything that he was. The result was a life that was not merely surviving in that wilderness, but worshiping through it. See, ultimately, what David longed for, we now find in the person of Jesus Christ.

See, Jesus is the true and better temple. He’s the one in whom God’s glory is fully revealed. And through him. We’re not just invited to visit the presence of God occasionally, just on Sunday when I can fit it in, but we’re brought near and kept near by the right hand that upholds us. So the question is not just whether we admire David’s worship.

That’s not my point. But whether we’ll live it out. Let’s live out the worship that David modeled. Will we continue to chase what can’t satisfy? Or will we be a people who are truly built different, whose souls cling to God and find their joy in him alone?

Let’s pray, Father. I pray for these, my friends, as we consider how we are built different. And I pray that we would truly live a life of spiritual worship, one in which our lives are dedicated towards cleaving to you, to being close to you and clinging to you. And perhaps, you know, there may be people here in the sound of my voice. And you’ve never offered your life to Jesus.

And you don’t know what it’s like to live a life built different. You don’t know what it’s like to live a life of spiritual worship because you’ve never met him. It’s easy. Just pray with me. Jesus, I need you to be on the center and not the thing that I’ve been putting in front of you when whatever that is, Lord Jesus, forgive me, forgive me for putting something else in front of you.

I want to love and serve you always, friend. If you prayed that, it’s that simple, you started a life with Christ for others. Many of us, many of us believers who’ve been believing for a long time still struggle with this act of worship. And I want to pray for you too, Father. I pray that for me and for all of my friends here that we would love and serve you first, that we would seek after you.

That we would praise you with our voice. That we would meditate on you so that we could live the life of spiritual worship that you’re calling us to. We will forsake all the others. Help us to serve you better. I pray this in Jesus name, amen.