A Study in Psalms - Psalm 145

We want to welcome you to our last psalm, the last summer of psalms. We've looked at nine, this will be the ninth psalm in 10 weeks. So thank you for coming out each and every Wednesday. And I think we've saved a gem for you tonight. Now if you're Jewish, you might know a lot about this psalm, but I didn't, I'm not a Jew, Gentile, and I'll explain that a little more. But the Westminster Shorter Catechism was written in 1647, and it just has over 100 questions to teach people doctrine. And the first question in the Westminster Shorter Catechism is, what is the chief end of man?

And the answer to that question is, man's chief end is to glorify God and to enjoy him forever. Psalms 145 is a summons to every believer to practice that pursuit. So let's look at Psalm 145 tonight.

It says a song of praise of David. I will extol you, my God and King, and bless your name forever and ever. Every day I will bless you and praise your name forever and ever. Great is the Lord and greatly to be praised, and his greatness is unsearchable. One generation shall commend your works to another and shall declare your mighty acts. On the glorious splendor of your majesty and on your wondrous works I will meditate. They shall speak of the might of your awesome deeds and I will declare your greatness.

They shall pour forth the fame of your abundant goodness and shall sing aloud of your righteousness. The Lord is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. The Lord is good to all and his mercy is over all that he has made. All your works shall give thanks to you, O Lord, and all your saints shall bless you. They shall speak of the glory of your kingdom and tell of your power to make known the children of man your mighty deeds and the glorious splendor of your kingdom. Your kingdom is an everlasting kingdom and your dominion endures through all generations.

The Lord upholds all who are falling and raises up all who are bowed down. The eyes of all look to you and you give them their food in due season. You open your hand and satisfy the desire of every living thing. The Lord is righteous in all his ways and kind in all his works. The Lord is near to all who call on him, to all who call on him in truth. He fulfills the desire of those who fear him. He also hears their cry and saves them. The Lord preserves all who love him, but all the wicked he will destroy.

My mouth will speak in praise of the Lord and let all flesh bless his holy name forever and ever. Let's pray. Father, may we leave here tonight knowing more of you, more of Jesus, more of the Holy Spirit, more of the word of God. And may that shake us up that we would know what we are to do when we leave here tonight in Jesus' name. Amen. The type of psalm says it in the heading, a song of praise of David. It's the only psalm that has such a heading that says it's a song of praise. So it's a praise psalm.

And it's written by David, one of at least the 73 psalms that he wrote. It's the last psalm that David will write because Psalms 146 to 150, we don't know who wrote those. This psalm was written probably at the end of David's life. And it's almost as if he poured out his heart about everything he knew about God, everything he knew about God's attributes and the greatness of what God had done for the nation Israel. It's a remarkable psalm. We just read it one time, and I don't think you can grasp the greatness of how great it is by reading it one time.

You need to take it home and read it again and again. It has incredible synonyms and how to praise God. It has descriptions of God's attributes all through the psalm. One commentator said, there is probably no psalm of the 150 psalms that is in less need of a commentary than Psalm 145. The fact that this is an acrostic psalm in which each verse begins with the new letter of the Hebrew alphabet means that it consists of the main short self-contained statements. I mentioned, if you're Jewish, you probably know this psalm.

Is anybody raised in a Jewish home, you know, Marylees and the other? If you're Jewish, you would know Psalms 145 because you probably had to say it three times a day. Psalms 145 would be sung on the holy days in the temple, but it's also called the Asherah prayer that's recited three times a day by Jews, Hasidic Jews, Orthodox Jews, or religious Jews. That prayer is composed of all of Psalm 145, one verse from Psalms 84, one verse from Psalms 144, and one verse from Psalms 115. So Jews are supposed to say this prayer three times a day, and the rabbis say that if they do say that three times a day, it guarantees them entrance into heaven.

I thought you had to be one of Abraham's seed to get into heaven. At least I thought they thought that, but apparently you've got to be a Jew and say this psalm three times a day. At least they think that. So therefore, Psalms 145 occurs three times in the Jewish daily litigary. Psalms 145 represents the final psalm attributed to David, and it's the last of the eight acrostic psalms that we have in the 150 psalms. You know about acrostic psalms, right? Psalms 119 has 22 sections of eight verses, and in like the first eight verses, each verse begins with the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet.

Well, I assume in your Bible you have 21 verses, right? Okay, well, there's 22 letters in the Hebrew alphabet. We're missing the letter none, which is the 14th letter of the Hebrew alphabet. So if you have an ESV Bible or an NIV Bible, you probably have a verse in brackets after verse 13 or before verse 14. The reason that's in brackets, now your NSV and your LSV will not have it, I don't think, is because that verse there, in my Bible, ESV, it says the Lord is faithful in all his words and kind in all his works, and it has it in brackets.

That verse, many commentators believe, was added later. It's in the Septuagint. It's in some early transcripts, some manifests, but most commentators believe that was added to add the 22nd letter of the alphabet. So there's 21 letters. We're only missing one, the 14th letter, and somebody said that I cannot conclude that the gap missing the 14th letter of the Hebrew alphabet is meant to remind us that, in fact, the fullness of praise is not complete without other voices, which are not found here, and that these missing voices are those of the church and the heavenly saints in general.

Another commentator said this psalm offers praise from A to Z to God described from A to Z. It's also interesting that the Lord's Prayer, I think you all know the Lord's Prayer in Matthew 6, right? This was written a thousand years before Jesus came, but it appears that David, in the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, wrote the Lord's Prayer before Jesus did. So, for example, the Lord's Prayer says, Our Father in heaven, our psalm tonight, verse 1 says, My God and King. The Lord's Prayer says, Hallowed be your name.

Our psalm tonight, our prayer says, And bless your name. The Lord's Prayer says, Your kingdom come. Verse 11 of our psalm tonight says, They shall speak of the glory of your kingdom. The Lord's Prayer says, Your will be done. Verse 13 of our psalm says, Your dominion endures through all generations. The Lord's Prayer says, On earth as it is in heaven. Verse 21 of our psalm says, Let all flesh bless his holy name forever and ever. The Lord's Prayer says, Give us this day our daily bread. Verse 16 of our psalm says, You open your hand and satisfy the desire of every living thing.

The Lord's Prayer says, And forgive us our debts. Our psalm says, The Lord is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. The Lord's Prayer says, Lead us not into temptation. And our psalm tonight says, The Lord preserves all who love him. The Lord's Prayer says, But deliver us from evil. And in verse 20 says, But all the wicked he will destroy. And lastly, the Lord's Prayer in verse 14 says, For yours is the kingdom and the power. Our psalm tonight says, Your kingdom is an everlasting kingdom.

And the Lord's Prayer ends with, And the glory forever. Amen. Verse 11 says, They shall speak of the glory of your kingdom and tell of your power. So it's really interesting how a thousand years before Jesus gave the Lord's Prayer, David says the same thing in a more expanded version. Your outline tonight has four points. Praise for God's greatness, verse 1 to 6. Praise for God's goodness, verses 7 to 10. Praise for God's government, verses 11 to 13. And praise for God's grace, verses 14 to 21. So let's get into it.

Point one, praise for God's greatness. We have two points there. David's praise in verse 1 and 2. Here we have the why and the when of praise. Why is David going to praise God in verse 1? He says, I will extol Him. David is going to praise God because he has a personal relationship with God. You know, the word extol, we don't use that word a lot, but it means to set preeminently on high, as high as possible above all others. It's the expression of the highest possible administration because God revealed Himself to David.

In a personal relationship, David understands how gracious, how righteous the Lord is. David had a special relationship with God. And you know, no one can praise God apart from having a personal relationship with God. David's conscious of God's greatness, His goodness, His government, and His grace. Then David also knows about that this God is not only His God, but is His King, the last part of verse 1, where God is going to be his permanent rule over him. This is talking about the sovereignty of God.

It's the first reason David's going to offer praise to God, because God is both God and King. The address, O King, on the part of an earthly king, is recognition that God is the only true King, and by Him only do kings rule. David realized that God was his King, and he says forever and never. That's why he wanted to praise Him. David had learned by experience some good experiences and some bad experiences. If we truly know Jesus as King, it would cause us to bow down and worship Him. That's the why.

Verse 2 is the when. He says, Every day I will bless you, and I will praise your name forever and ever. David had an everyday view of things and an everlasting view of things. Three times this psalm says forever and ever, forever and ever, forever and ever. Not a day would pass without praise. He was looking forward to praising God forever and ever. One commentator said he wanted to be in practice when he arrived at the golden sands beyond the shining river. He did not want to start in the kindergarten of praise and learn how it was to be done.

He wanted to graduate from earth with the highest honors in the subject of praise and arrive in heaven to take place at once with the worthies on the other shore. You know, I keep a diary on the psalm I read every day. I write down the verses I study, but I know a lot of people keep diaries of their praise. I think I'm going to start doing that. How many songs I sing a day? How many choruses I sing when I study? Because the Bible tells us in the New Testament that we're to pray without ceasing. We're to give thanks in all circumstances, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus.

Hebrews 13.5 says, Through Him, that's God, let us then continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God, that is the fruit of lips that acknowledges name. MacArthur Study Bible says a note about that verse in Hebrews 13.15. It says, As you see all through the book of Hebrews, Old Testament sacrifices were extremely important under the old covenant. Under the new covenant, which we're under, God desires praise and thanksgiving of his people rather than the sacrifices of animals. Since New Testament believers are called priests, they need to offer up praises, offerings of praise continually, daily.

You know, we praised him just a little bit tonight, right? Notice the synonyms in verse one and two. David says in verse one, he's going to extol the Lord. He's going to bless the Lord. In verse two, he says, I'm going to bless the Lord and I'm going to praise his name. David also says he's going to praise them every day forever and ever. You know, I'm not going to have much application tonight at the end of this psalm. I'm going to give you some takeaways as I go through it. And the first takeaway tonight is that we need to praise him more and more.

I mentioned this because we've talked about a few other praise psalms in this summer, but we need to start now because that's what we're going to be doing in heaven. The last time the word praise is in the book, the Bible, it's in Revelation 19 verses four to five. And this is us. We're going to be part of the 24 elders when we're in heaven. And it says, and the 24 elders and the four living creatures fell down and worship God who was seated on the throne, saying, amen, hallelujah. And from the throne, a voice came saying, praise our God, all you, his servants, you who fear him, small and great.

So the last time in the Bible in Revelation, we have the word praise. It's a command for us to praise him. We're going to be doing it in heaven. So the takeaway tonight, we've talked a lot about this, this summer is the need to praise God more and more. Let's look at sub point B David's theme of praise.

Now I didn't have, I didn't have space to write down there, but there's actually four areas to praise him. David's going to praise him for the greatness of God's person in verse three. David's going to praise him for the greatness of God's power in verse four. David's going to praise God for the majesty of God's purpose in verse five. And then in verse six, he's going to praise him for the greatness of God's providence. So sub point B sub point of B one is the greatness of God's person. This is the verse that we had the song tonight when we just sang Psalm 145 from the, I love this song.

And it first came out by the group city of light. You can buy it on iTunes if you want, but this, the song we sang tonight is based on that verse three and look at verse three carefully.

Isn't it wonderful says great is the Lord and greatly to be praised. And his greatness is in searchable. It's all about the greatness of God's person. Okay. So the word great is mentioned in three forms, three times in verse three, David is talking about Yahweh, the great, I am the God whose name is unpronounceable to the Jews, the God who met Moses in the burning bush. No human mind can comprehend him. He's the God revealed himself in three persons as the father, the son, and the Holy spirit. He is God who is without beginning or ending of days.

He's eternal, uncreated, self-existing with David. We all must fall down and worship at his feet. The second thing, David's going to praise him for the greatness of God's power in verse four.

This verse says one generation, she'll commend your works to another and she'll declare your mighty acts. The Jews would all know someone 45. They would say it three times a day. I'm not sure we know it that well. So we don't praise him enough, but he mentions at the end of verse four, your mighty acts and notice verse three talks about your greatness.

He ends verse four with your mighty acts. Verse five. He says your wonderful works verse six. He says the power of your awesome deeds. And then in verse six, he talks about God's greatness. Again, consider the world we live in, how wonderful it is in creation, how beautiful, clean, and refreshing it was. Genesis one says God saw that it was good. He saw that it was very good, but it was man and his sin that helped destroy and put man in a fallen state. But when you consider the universe and look up the stars, when you consider the work of God's hands, did this happen by chance or accident?

You know, it's a very insulting thing to argue God out of his own creation as evolutionists do. They don't praise him when they do that. They rob God of his glory, but we need to praise God for his mighty acts, for his mighty acts in the Bible and for his mighty acts in creation. Verse five is the majesty of God's purpose. He says on the glorious splendor of your majesty and on your wonders works. I will meditate proper praise of God comes from proper knowledge of God. David will consider who God is and what he's done.

David was awed by the wonder of God's ways. There are numerous instances of God's intervention in human affairs. In the old Testament, God's wondrous works were often manifested by his judgment. God intervened in judgment at the flood. He intervened in the overthrow of Bible. He intervened at the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. He intervened to deliver Israel from Egypt. He intervened to lead Israel to the promised lands. In the New Testament, God intervened at Calvary. God's wondrous works were manifested by Jesus throughout his life.

They were manifested at Calvary when the earth shook, when the sun turned to darkness, and they were especially manifest when Jesus rose from the dead. They were manifest on his grace and his love in turning the shame of Calvary into a symbol of salvation from sin. Notice David says, I will.

Last week, we looked at Psalm 101 and 10 times. It said, I will, I will, I will. Well, this Psalm, four times, David says, I will. And what's the first I will here?

I will meditate. We looked at Psalm 77 a couple months ago, and ASAP wrote Psalm 77. And in Psalm 77, 3, ASAP says, when I remember God, I moan, I will meditate my spirit faints. Then ASAP says in Psalm 77, 6, let me remember my song in the night.

Let me meditate in my heart. Then in Psalm 77, 12, ASAP says, I will ponder all your work and meditate on your mighty deeds. So here in verse five, it's the last time the word meditate is mentioned in the book of Psalms. And this is our second takeaway.

We've talked about this before from our study this summer in Psalms is that we New Testament believers need to meditate more upon God's word. If David is going to meditate upon God's word, how much more do we, we need to take a time away from the noisy world, the busy world, the crazy, simple, sick world that we live in and meditate upon God's word. You know, our meditation is not like the Hindu, not like the Buddhists who chant and try to empty their mind and think about nothing. The Christians meditate and they fill their mind with God's word.

It's not enough just to hear God's word on Sunday or Wednesday. It's not enough just to read it. It's not enough to study it. You need to memorize scripture and you need to meditate upon it. You know, I mentioned before, many times I write down a little verse, is there an area? And the one I used a couple of months ago was Proverbs 12, 25. I get anxious about my daughter and bills and things about that. But Proverbs 12, 25 is a verse that I will meditate upon. And I don't know what area you're struggling with.

I don't know what trial temptation, but is there, is there a command you need to obey in the Bible? Is there a sin you need to confess and get right with God? Is there a habit to correct? Is there an example to follow? Is there an area to release to God? Is there a specific action you need to take? Is there a person that you need to forgive? Is there a danger to avoid? Is there a change that you need to make in your character, your conduct, or your conversation? Hearing, reading, studying, memorizing, and finally meditating upon that will help.

So that's our second takeaway is that we need to increase our meditation upon God's word and especially the Psalms.

So the fourth point in verse six is the greatness of God's providence. He says, they shall speak of your might, of your awesome deeds, and I will declare your greatness. In verse five, David meditated upon God's great works. And now in verse six, he's going to tell the world about it. In his own experience, David had seen God's providence at work. Many times God had delivered David from his enemies because the people of Israel were special to God. He defended them and fought for them. But when they sinned against him, he judged them and chastised them.

You know, we need to recapture the fear of the Lord. I'll talk more about that when we get down to verse 19 and 20. But we need to recognize God is the God who judges sin. And I think a lot of us have forgotten about the greatness of God's holy judgment. You know, we get to know God. How do we get to know God? We get to know him through his word. We get to know him through his word, and we get to see him through the work in his world. Psalms 29, we looked at a couple of years ago. When you read Psalms 29, it's all about the greatness of God in the storm.

Psalms 106 is all about the greatness of God in the history of Israel. Let's go to point number two, praise for God's goodness.

So we go from praising God for his greatness to praising God for his goodness. And one commentator said, greatness without goodness would make God a selfish tyrant. Well, goodness without greatness would make him willing but incapable of acting. Whatever God thinks, says, does, plans or accomplishes is good, because God is good. Psalms 100 verse 5 says, the Lord is good, his steadfast love endures forever, and his faithfulness to all generations. The equivalent of that is James 117 in the New Testament, which says, every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, whom there's no variation or shadow due to change.

There are three things that we can praise God for his goodness there. Praise God, verse 7, for God's goodness is abundant. Verse 8, God's goodness is compassion. And verse 9 and 10, God's goodness is universal. So first off, verse 7, God's goodness is abundant.

It says, they shall pour forth the fame of your abundant goodness and shall sing aloud of your righteousness. In his goodness, God gave man the dominion over the earth, using him and employing him, the riches God placed in the world, Genesis 128. But when man sinned, man ceased to be a king and became a slave of sin. Today, you look around the world, man is ruled by his own selfish desires, but God is still good in his care of creation and his love for us. I love that word. It says abundant goodness.

It reminds me of Jesus' words in John 10, 10, the thief comes only to steal, to kill and to destroy. I came that they may have life and they have it abundantly. Matthew 5, 45 makes it clear that not just the Christians get abundant goodness of God, the non-Christian says, for he makes the sun rise on evil, on the good, and sends rain on the just and the unjust. Because God is good, he has to punish sin. Because God is righteous, he always does what is right. You know, at the judgment seat of Christ, at the great white throne judgment, everyone will be forced to acknowledge for all eternity, the fact that God's moral goodness is good, even if they're lost in eternity.

Let's look at verse number eight. God's goodness is also compassionate. You probably recognize this verse. The Lord is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. David is quoting that famous passage from Exodus 34, verse six, that says the Lord passed before him and proclaimed, the Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness. You know, it's a goodness that reached out warmly in mercy and compassion to the lost.

It's a goodness that holds back God's righteous anger as long as he may. He is not good because we deserve it, but he's good because he's a merciful and compassionate God. When we realize this, that our hearts should be filled with praise to God, but too often we get pride. Pride is the greatest enemy of praise. We get the idea that God ought to bless us. There's a lot of false teaching about prosperity theology that's in our world today. We think that we deserve his blessings and then only we can praise him for it.

But God is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, abounding in love and steadfast love. Let's look at point C.

God's goodness is universal in verses nine and 10. Notice here in verses, starting with verses nine through the end of the psalm, you're going to see the word all, all, all in Hebrew.

It's there 17 times. My ESV Bible, it's 15 times and yours is probably either 14 or 15, all about everything. Okay. God's blessings are universal. The greatest manifestation of God's mercy was that Calvary, not just mercy, but the King James version. I don't usually quote the King James, but I like what it says. It doesn't say mercy. It says tender mercies. Anybody still using the King James here? Does your say tender mercies? That makes you think about not just mercy, but tender mercies. And it reminds you of the story in Luke 15 of the prodigal son.

Remember that God is the hero in Luke 15 in that story. Okay. Mercy would have satisfied. Mercy would have granted the son's request. If he was just a servant, that's what the son came back. Just let me be a servant.

Father, let me be a servant. But the father said no. But tender mercies seated him again as a son. Tender mercies called for a ring, called for a robe, called for a feast and called for music and dancing. Tender mercies are what made the father wait from day to day for the boy's return. Tender mercies made that old man run and meet his son. Tender mercies did not place him in the barn or the kitchen, but replaced him as the father's son. You know, all God's works in creation and redemption shall praise him.

Revelation 411 says, worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power. For you created all things and by your will they existed and were created. So the third takeaway for our summer in Psalms tonight is real simple.

That if you're not already, and many of you are reading one Psalm a day, you need to get busy and start reading one Psalm a day. If you can handle one proverb a day, that would also be good because you'd be reading two books of the wisdom literature. But if you, at the end of two years, you will read through the book of Psalms five times and you're going to learn a lot about prayer, a lot about praise, a lot about meditation, and I promise you it'll change your life. But too often we're focused on our problems, our troubles, our needs, our sorrows.

But, you know, as you read the Psalms, you see something every time you read it, especially in David's Psalms. David will state the problem. David will then cry out to God. Then he will praise God for his great works in the past. And then finally, he just praises God.

So he begins with his troubles. But by the end of his Psalm, he's praising God. That's why you need to read one Psalm a day. And I know you think most of them are long. No, most of them are six, seven, eight verses. Not a lot of them are long. Let's look at point number three, praise for God's government, verses 11 to 13.

Notice here in verses 11 to 13, it says kingdom four times. Okay. So the emphasis here is on God's kingdom. I think it also says dominion once, which is about God's kingdom. David is going to praise God for his righteous rule in this world. You know, there's a lot of people today that think God isn't ruling and reigning in our world because it seems like Satan is everywhere you turn. There's some people who teach that in the past, Jesus was a prophet. In the present, Jesus was a priest and the future Jesus will be a king.

But that's not true Bible doctrine. Jesus Christ is enthroned today. Ephesians 1, 19 to 23, Christ must reign. That's first Corinthians five.

I'm sorry. First Corinthians 15, 25. And Jesus Christ is the king priest in Hebrew seven, one to 10. The governments of the world do seem to be under Satan's control. And first John five, 19 says the whole world is under the control of the evil one.

But the government of this world is still in God's hand and God's government. So God's government, God's kingdom is glorious in verse 11 and verse 12 says they shall speak of the glory of your kingdom. David was the king of Israel, but David knows there's a greater kingdom to come or the whole world in the universe. We have a glorious God. His glory is everlasting. He can do anything. God cannot do anything that is not glorious. Everything he does is glorious. We cannot understand what he's doing in this world right now, but God on his throne is working all things for our good and for his glory.

Greater if we kingdoms will come and go and maybe even the United States, but God's kingdom is forever and it's full of glory and glorious splendor. It says God's kingdom is also powerful. The end of verse 11 says, David's going to tell of your power. David knew about the power of God. His kingdom will be established in power. You remember our study in the book of Daniel when Nebuchadnezzar in his pride was walking around his palace and he said, is not this great Babylon, which I have built by my mighty power as a royal residence and for the glory of my majesty.

And what happened in Nebuchadnezzar? Boom, God took his power away. And God can do that to any earthly king, any kingdom, any ruler today. God took away Nebuchadnezzar's power. And then later, after being humbled for seven years, Nebuchadnezzar acknowledged God's power, God's kingdom, and God's dominion. So David is the king of Israel, but he knows God is the king of the universe. And in the future, there's going to be a complete renovation of the earth. This month I was reading first and second Peter, and I love it in second Peter chapter three.

It says three times, maybe my ESV says dissolve, dissolve, dissolve. God's going to dissolve the earth in the heavens. God's going to, it says destroy in your NASB, destroy, destroy, destroy. Don't care about climate change. God is going to destroy it. It says three times in second Peter three, but then God's going to rebuild a new heaven and a newer, that is real power that we're going to see someday.

Number three, God's kingdom is eternal. He says in verse 13, your kingdom is an everlasting kingdom and your dominion endures through all generation. What God does lasts forever. His kingdom in this world may seem weak and failing. We often think it does, but it will endure after the kingdom of men disappear. One day, Jesus will set that kingdom up that will never be destroyed. Uh, in Daniel two 44, Daniel is talking to the king and he says, and in the days of those kings, the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that shall never be destroyed nor shall the kingdom be left to another people.

It shall break in pieces, all these kingdoms and bring them to an end. And she'll stand forever. That's God's kingdom. Then and only then will we experience the full revolution, excuse me, the full revelation of God's power in glory. All right, let's get to the best part of the song praise for God's grace. Point four versus 14 to 21. It's really interesting to see how David exalts the attributes of God. He starts with the greatness of God, with the goodness of God, with the government of God. And finally he gets to the grace of God.

He's a great God on the throne. Yet he's a God who's near bus. And he's concerned about our needs, our hurts, our wants. So point a sub point eight, God is gracious to those who fall. So you may have in your NIV or any, uh, ESV Bible that verse I mentioned in brackets, but ignore it. It says the Lord upholds all who are falling and raises all who are bowed down. You know, of all the people in the Bible, consider all the people in the Bible who fell into sin yet were restored. And David's probably the one example.

We talked a lot about this last week, right? But you know, when you read first Kings, you have the story in first Kings 12 about in a time of war, when Kings go off to war, David stayed in Jerusalem.

We talked about what happened last week, right? He fell into sin of Bathsheba. But when you come to the book of Chronicles, you read the same story. It doesn't mention Bathsheba. Why is that? Because Chronicles is written from God's perspective. God has already forgiven David. So God does not need to rehash the story of Bathsheba in Chronicles. The same thing with the most wicked King Manasseh in Kings. It says he was the worst king. He even put his kids through fire and killed them. But when you read Chronicles story of Manasseh, it tells us that Manasseh came to know the Lord.

So David knows that at times he was falling down, at times he made a mistake, but God raised him up when he humbled himself and asked for forgiveness. Psalms 55, 22 says, cast your burden on the Lord, and he will sustain you. He will never permit the righteous to be moved. And first Peter 5, 7 says, casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you.

Maybe you think you're falling now, maybe you're going through some trouble. We've talked about this in Psalms 88 and different Psalms this summer. God is so gracious to you. Even if you fall, he will forgive you. You just need to repent of your sins and get right with him. Number two, God is gracious to the hungry.

In verses 15 to 7, he says, the eyes of all look to you and you give them their food at the proper time. You open your hand and satisfy the desires of every living thing. The Lord is righteous in all his ways and kind in all his works. The Jews were an agricultural people, so they depended on the rain and the promises of God. And the Lord here, David says, the Lord will satisfy the desire of every living thing. Many times in Israel's history, there would be famines, and usually it was because Israel's sin or God wanted to test them.

But I lived 18 years in India, in Thailand, and Asia. And the whole country, they just eat rice three times a day. You give them potatoes in your house, they'll go home and eat rice. But it's amazing, though, when you drive through, it's beautiful. Rice patties are just beautiful. Maybe you're from Nebraska or Oklahoma and you see corn and you see wheat, but all you see is rice. When you think about rice, it's this magnificent crop that God has given. It feeds four to five billion people of the world that we live in.

And it's not an easy crop to grow. They got to wait for the rains. They got to plant a little bit. Then they got to transplant it. Then they got to husk it. It's a lot of work. But God is so gracious, not just to believers, he's gracious in his common grace to billions of people around the world. Even those people who believe in false religions, God's common grace is good to them, that he gives them food to eat. I love verse 17. It says, The Lord is righteous in all his ways and kind. What a beautiful world.

We've got in verse 20, I think it is the word love. But here you've got kind. God is not only great, he's not only good, but he's kind. Okay. Let's look at verse number 18.

God is gracious to those who pray. It says the Lord is near to all who call on him, to all who call on him in truth. So we began 10 weeks ago with Psalm 91, and we called that the Dial 911 Psalm, right? And we told everybody, you need to be dialing 911, not just for emergencies, but all day throughout the day, every time you hear something bad, or every time you hear something going on to pray. Here in verse 18, it says, Call twice. Maybe you don't see, feel, or understand the greatness and graciousness of God, because you're not talking to God, because you're not praying to God.

Charles Spurgeon said, nine times out of 10, falling away from God begins with the neglect of private prayer. And I think that's so true. We've given you the ACTS model of prayer, A-C-T-S. You probably know that if you've been through our Fundamentals of the Faith class. That's a model prayer. A stands for adoration. C stands for confession. T stands for thanksgiving. S stands for supplication. Really easy to pray that, right? But then we have the Lord's Prayer, which we mentioned earlier. You have three things in the Lord's Prayer you pray to God about, and then you have three things you pray about yourself in the Lord's Prayer.

Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be your name, that's number one you pray to God. Your kingdom come, that's number two.

Your will be done, on earth as in heaven, that's the third thing you pray to God. Then you pray about yourself. Give us this day our daily bread, one. Forgive us our debts, as we've forgiven our debtors, that's two. And number three, lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil, that's the third thing.

So there's a model there. So learning how to pray is not hard. You can use the ACT model, you can use the Lord's Prayer model, but how about Psalm 145 model? Why don't you start praying about God's greatness? You may not be a Jew, but I still like to think about the party in the Red Sea, the 10 plagues. I love the 31 battles of Joshua. There's so much we can praise God for. You can praise God for creation when you go out. I'm done with this. Hopefully when I get back from Uganda in a couple of weeks, I'm going to take some road trips and you get to see God's greatness.

Then praise God for his goodness. Has God been good to you? Of all people in the world, we Americans should be praising God for his goodness. Praise God for his government. You may not like your government, but there's a righteous government coming soon. And then especially praise God for his grace. And you might want to begin here by confessing your sins, being holy with God, but then praising the grace because your works can't save you, but only God's grace can. So you've got another model to pray here.

Praying is not hard. Okay. So the fourth takeaway tonight is when we look back at our Summer of Psalms, I hope you've learned better how to pray, how to pray more often. As our country slips into an abyss of sin depravity, we believers need to be praying and crying out to God more and more. You know, the Old Testament says we should pray throughout the day. Psalms 55, 17 says evening, morning, and noon. I utter my complaint. A complaint is a type of prayer and moan. And it says, and he hears my voice.

The New Testament says the same thing in three words, pray without ceasing. D God is gracious to those who fear him. Okay. So there's two words I'd like you to focus on in verse 19, the word fear and in verse 20, the word love. And I think they go together. They kind of seem like a contradiction in terms, right? Fear and love, but they're not fear. The Lord is at least 18 or 19 times in both Psalms and Proverbs. Who are those who are supposed to fear him? The believers, we believers, the Bible makes that clear in Romans three 18, that unbelievers will not fear God.

It says there is no fear of God before their eyes, but all true believers are commanded to fear God. One author said it is astonishing that men, while they acknowledge that there is a God should act without fear and fear it is displeasure. Yet this is their character, that fear a worm of dust like themselves, but disregard the most high. They're more afraid of man than God in his anger, his contempt or ridicule. The fear of man prevents them from doing many things from which they are not restrained by the fear of God.

They love not his character, not rendering it to that veneration, which is due to God. They respect not his authority, such as the state of human nature while the heart is unchanged. That quote is from a book that our pastor wrote about the fear of the Lord. But notice what David says in this verse 19 about those who fear him.

He says three things. He says, number one, he satisfied them. My translation says he fulfills them. You fear the Lord. God is going to satisfy you. It doesn't mean riches. It doesn't mean you get a house or expensive car, but he's going to satisfy you that you'd be contempt. Number two, it says he hears them.

You fear the Lord. You're going to keep a short account. You're going to confess your sins. God is going to hear your prayers. And then number three, it says he saves them.

And only David would know time and time again, God saved David. So we got these two words to finish our Psalm, fear in verse 20, love in verse 20, I'm sorry, verse fear in verse 19, love in verse 20. These two words seem to be a contradiction. How can I fear someone, but love them at the same time? Well, I think, you know, you might fear your father. If he's going to spank you at the same time, you love him. Somebody says it's noteworthy that in verse 19 and 20, God's people are said to both fear and to love him.

One writer comments, fear and love are inseparable elements of true religion. Fear preserves love from degenerating into presumptuous familiarity. Love prevents fear from becoming a servile and cringing dread. That quote's by John Stott. Let's move on to point E. God is gracious to those who love him. It says the Lord preserves all who love him, but all the wicked he will destroy. Okay. You love the Lord. You love Jesus Christ. You have him in your heart and you go into heaven, but all the wicked who do not love him, they will be destroyed.

So David says that God preserves all who love him. Believers who love God will devote their hearts to God. And this is where I just, my application is real simple. You're going to love God and you're going to pray more to him. You're going to praise him more. You're going to spend more time in the word of God and read a Psalm. So the, the unbeliever will not benefit of this graciousness of God. He gets the uncommon grace. He gets the rain to grow the crops, but he's not going to get this graciousness because he doesn't love God.

And David, the contrast here in verse 20, they're going to spend eternity away from the presence of God in the lake of fire. Let's close out the last verse, verse 21. God is gracious to those who praise him. Okay. So notice verse one, it says, I David, I individual praise him.

Okay. Verse one, I will praise him. Notice verse 10, your godly ones will praise him. So that's the congregation here. Verse 21, all flesh will bless his Holy name forever and ever. It's almost a repeat of the very last verse in the book of Psalms. Psalms one 50, the last Psalm, verse six says, what let everything that has breath praise the Lord. Praise the Lord. This entire Psalms. One 45 is a Psalm of praise. That was the heading, a Psalm, a praise Psalm of David. David says, my mouth will speak in praise of the Lord.

Will your mouth speak in praise of the Lord? Believers must praise the Lord now and forever and ever for the greatness of his everlasting kingdom and for the gracious ways that God responds to those who love him. No matter how inadequate our praise is now, it will become far more glorious in the heaven to come.