It's All In How You Look At It | Psalm 73:21-28 | John Joseph

Amen, thanks Jeremy. Well, good morning station Hill. So good to see you guys. I'm excited to have this opportunity to gather around God's word and to hear him speak to us through his word this morning. If you are visiting with us today, we just wanna let you know how much we appreciate your presence here. You know that there's lots of churches where you could be, where you could worship the Lord and hear the gospel preach. So the fact that you've chosen to be with us really does mean a lot to us. And we would love to connect with you. If you're interested in that, I wanna direct your attention to the connection card that's in the back of the seat in front of you, you can fill out that physical card and drop it in the box that's at the front door on your way out today. Or if you are technologically advanced and inclined, you can pull out your phone, scan the QR code, and just fill it out directly on your phone. Either way, we would love to know some ways that we can pray for you. Ways that maybe come alongside of you and serve you. And then we'd also love to maybe share a bit more about who we are as a church. I wanna go ahead and invite all of you to open your Bibles this morning to Psalm 73. Psalm 73 is gonna be our text that we're considering this morning. If you're using the Bible that we provided, you'll find it on page 511. If you're not familiar with navigating the Bible, when you get there, I want you to look for the big bold number 73. That is the chapter Psalm 73 that we're gonna be in. The smaller numbers that come after it are the verse numbers. We're gonna be looking at all of the verses of Psalm 73 this morning. Well, it was a snowy winter night in Vienna, Austria in 1823. In a darkened home to servants, stand outside their master's chamber door, calling for him to open. But from behind the door, they can hear the old man's voice anguished, crying out the same name over and over and over. Mozart, Mozart, forgive me. Mozart, forgive your assassin. Then suddenly there's a loud crash. They're fearful for their master's life so they break through the door and find him lying on the floor. They realize he just attempted to take his own life. So they rush him to the hospital. Doctors are thankfully able to save him, but because of his actions, he's placed under the care of doctors in a psychiatric hospital. He's envisited by a priest who comes to give the man a chance to confess his sins. But instead of confessing, the man asks the priest if he's trained in music. The priest puzzled, tells him, "I know a little, studied in my youth in Vienna." The man's face lights up. He's excited. He says, "Oh, well, then, you must know this tune." And he begins playing on the piano in his room. After hearing the tune, the priest says, "I can't say that I know it." What is it? The man is insulted, stricken. It was a very popular tune in its day. I wrote it. So he tries again, playing one of his most famous pieces, reliving the joy of it. You can see it on his face as he plays in that it's original setting in the concert he played in the opera. The man hears it and turns to the man, the priest hears it and turns to the man and says, "I regret. It's not too familiar." The man is crushed. He says, "Can you recall no melody of mine? How is the most famous composer in Europe? I wrote 40 operas alone." And then, almost casually, the man plays another tune and the priest recognizes it immediately. He even starts humming along. [singing] Oh, yes, I know that. Oh, that is charming. I didn't know that you wrote that. At that, the man's face falls. And he responds, "I didn't compose that. That was Mozart. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart." If you've seen it, then you know that's the opening scene to the movie Amadeus. One of the most devastating portraits of the destructive power of envy to ever hit the big screen. From that opening scene, the man, Antonio Salieri, tells the priest how he loved God as a young man. And he prayed earnestly and promised God that if God made him a great composer, he would devote his whole life to God. And it seemed God answered his prayer for a time. He became very famous. He was the most decorated composer of his generation. A court composer to the Emperor of Austria. He wrote 40 operas with wealth and fame and influenced that most musicians of his day could only dream about that was until Mozart showed up. Mozart was the opposite of Salieri. Brasch, vulgar, wildly irresponsible and wildly immoral. And yet to Salieri's dismay out of this man who cared nothing for God, came the most beautiful music anyone had ever heard. And when Salieri heard Mozart play something inside of him broke. He couldn't fathom by God would choose someone as immoral as Mozart to give such a stoun in gifts to. He angrily asked, why him? Why not me? I was the faithful one. I kept my promises. I lived the clean life and you gave your gifts to him. And the movie shows how Salieri's envy slowly destroyed him from the inside out until at the end of the movie, there's nothing left but a bitter old man in a psychiatric hospital still indicted God and still envious of Mozart. I bring up Amadeus because today in Psalm 73, we're gonna meet another man who was faithful to God, a worship leader over God's people, over the whole nation of Israel, who struggled with that same envy. A man who'd given his life to serving God who was also appalled at how people who didn't care about God seemed to be prospering. All the while he and his faithfulness and righteousness was suffering but unlike Salieri, what we're gonna find out is that this man, Asaph, wasn't ultimately destroyed by his envy, something stopped him. Something opened his eyes and showed him what his envy had been hiding from him all along and for our benefit he wrote down what it was that he saw, that helped move him from an envious earthly perspective to a humble, heavenly perspective. And that change in perspectives and the thing that caused it is gonna be the focus of our time this morning. We're gonna hear about it as we read and consider our text. I wanna invite you to stand with me in honor of the reading of God's Word. We are gonna be looking at all of Psalm 73 today but I'm gonna open our time by reading verses 21 to 28. So you wanna look down to the very last stanza of the Psalm where I think it really kind of succinctly summarizes what the whole Psalm is about. I'm gonna read this and then after I read, I'm gonna say this is God's Word. I would love for you to respond by saying thanks be to God. Here we go, Psalm 73, verses 21 to 28. Asaph writes, "When I became embittered and my innermost being was wounded, I was stupid and didn't understand. I was an unthinking animal towards you God. Yet I am always with you. You hold my right hand. You guide me with your counsel, and afterward you will take me up in glory. Who do I have in heaven but you? And I desire nothing on earth but you. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart, my portion forever. Those far from you will certainly perish. You destroy all who are unfaithful to you, but as for me, God's presence is my good. I have made the Lord God my refuge." So, I can tell about all you do. This is God's Word. - Thank you. - Pray with me. Heavenly Father, we testify with ASAP. Your presence is our good. It's so common for us to struggle with envy in this life. Help us to see how foolish that is. Show us in your Word all that you have provided for us. The abundance you have provided for us so that we would be filled with heavenly humility, giving thanks for you. You are the great portion of your people. We pray this all in Jesus mighty and matchless name. And all God's people said, amen, friends, you can go ahead and be seated. If you're taking notes this morning, I don't have a big idea for us. Like I normally have. I'm gonna hide that big idea until a little bit later in the service. We're gonna kind of work our way towards it. But what Psalm 73, so beautifully captures for us, is a change in perspective. ASAP moves from an envious earthly perspective to a humble, heavenly perspective. Those are gonna be our two points this morning. And we're gonna pay careful attention to what it was that caused his change in perspective. 'Cause that's where we're gonna see the real connection to our lives today. So let's go ahead and look first at ASAP's envious earthly perspective. I want you to notice in verse three, ASAP shares openly about a struggle that he had with envy, verse three. For I envied the arrogant, I saw the prosperity of the wicked. Some of your translations may put the word when in there to show the connection between his envy. I envied the arrogant when I saw their prosperity. He's envious of the prosperity, the abundant prosperity, apparent prosperity of people who don't follow the Lord. An envy, it's important for us to note. It's different from jealousy. Jealousy is wanting what somebody else has. Envy isn't just wanting what someone else has. It's hating the fact that they have it and becoming bitter towards them because they do. And you can just feel the envy and bitterness come through in this Psalm, right? He envies how they live in comfort. Look at verses four and five. They have an easy time until they die. They eat well. They don't experience afflictions. Basically life is easy for them and I'm the one serving the Lord and my life is hard. What gives God? But then you can see how his envy causes him to begin hating them for what they have. Notice in verses six to 11, how he catalogs all of the reasons that they don't deserve the prosperity they're experiencing. They're prideful and violent. They consistently plot evil. They mock and oppress people and worse than all of that in verse 11. They mock God himself and his envy drives him to a place of bitterness, bitter at the world and bitter at God, bitter because the wicked are prospering. All the while he's experiencing the pain of sacrificial serving God with his whole heart and mind and strength, why is this happening to me? I should be the one receiving the blessings. Why are they prospering? Notice how palpable his bitterness is. Look at verses 13 and 14. Did I purify my heart and wash my hands in innocence for nothing? Like am I following you and trying to keep your commands for nothing? What good is it to follow you if you're just gonna heap difficulty and affliction on me? I've done everything you've asked me to do. I've been pursuing righteousness and trying to follow you in verse 14. All you've done is reward me with hardship. I wonder how many of you can relate to Asaph and relate to what he's experiencing and thinking. I wonder how many of you've done everything you were supposed to do and yet you look around at the people who haven't and they seem to be doing better than you. And so you respond like Asaph does, right? This isn't fair. I've done everything I was supposed to do. I deserve the prosperity they're enjoying. It should be mine, but all I have are hardships. Friends of that, cry has ever come out of your mouth or you've just set it in your head. That cries actually a warning sign. That cries actually evidence that envy has gotten further into your soul than you realize. And that's important to note because once envy is at work in you, it begins doing damage to your spiritual life that you really can't even see. Like the way envy distorts reality. Do you realize that envy distorts reality? For instance, do you notice in verses four and five, he says that the wicked have an easy time in life and don't experience hardship? Friends of that, that's not true. I bet if you went and talked to the Gentiles that Asaph is talking about, they would have given you a list of their hardships. I got this going on, this going on, this going, I can tell you from my own life, the better part of my 20s, all of my 20s. Well, in fact, until I was 30 and the Lord opened my eyes, I didn't follow them at all. But in my 20s, I was the wicked dude. Asaph was talking about out there partying, not caring at all about the Lord, defying the Lord openly, living however I wanted to. It might have seemed like, man, that guy's just partying doing whatever he wants. I can tell you, I was stricken with afflictions. Life was meaningless, I had no joy, right? I had constant problems in my life. But when you're envying a person from the outside, it distorts reality. Envy works like an Instagram filter on other people's lives. Every time we look at someone who's prospering, Envy lays the perfection filter over everything we see. So we walk away assuming, well, their life is perfect. Nothing bad ever happens to them. It's just to me that bad things happen. It distorts reality. But also, it erodes and robs us of joy. Look at verse 21, you just, it's palpable. I became embittered. My innermost being was wounded. It's like he's describing a gaping spiritual wound in his soul that just can't be bound up, can't be stitched up, can't be just walking around bitter because what other people have, that he doesn't have. Envy had completely robbed his joy and replaced it with bitterness. This is why Tim Chalice noted that Envy is unique among the sins in that you never enjoy it. Do you ever think about this? Pretty much all the other sins? Well, there's a little fleeting joy in there, a little taste of joy before the pain comes. But Envy is pain from first to last. My wife used to say this quote, I'm not sure who said it. But Envy is like drinking poison and hoping that the person you're envying dies because of it. You're only harming yourself. It is pain from first to last. Envy just produces bitterness because you'll constantly find people who have bigger homes, nice or vacations, kids who don't struggle like yours, marriages are seamless, bodies that don't fail, careers that just keep on climbing even though yours seems to be stuck. And Envy makes sure that you see them. Make sure that you see every single one of them until the only thing you can feel about your own life is that it isn't as good as theirs. That's what's happening to ASAP. And that's what happens with envy. But here's something else that we need to see. It's that envy isn't just something we feel towards the people out there who don't follow Jesus. The most painful envy in our lives is often usually the envy we feel towards the people sitting right next to us in this room. The people we serve shoulder to shoulder with in the church. And if you've ever experienced this, then you know exactly what it's like. It's like hearing about the friend. A friend at church that you serve alongside of who just got pregnant, and you've been trying for years to get pregnant, but can't. It's the family in your life group whose kids are walking with the Lord while yours aren't. It's the couple whose marriage looks like the one that you wish you had. And instead of rejoicing with them, something inside of us goes quiet or cold, maybe turns bitter. No, you wouldn't dare say it out loud if you're honest. "You'd have rather have not heard about their good news." I want you to know, I'm not standing up here pointing fingers this morning, every single pastor I know, including me, deals with this. Why do they get to speak at the conference, and not me? Why did he get invited on that podcast, and not me? Why do I keep getting overlooked? These are like my actual thoughts. These are the things that go, but this is a sin that all of us struggle with to one degree or another in front of the way that we beat it is by bringing it out into the light and talking about it. What have you even noticed? Now, remarkable, this psalm is, ASAP is the worship leader of the people of Israel. And he said, "I am going to write a psalm about my own envy that I want the whole nation to sing about." ASAP was envious when he desired what the wicked had, and not just the people of Israel, but for time and eternity until Jesus returns. ASAP wrote down in this psalm about his own struggle with envy, friends, this is a picture for us of how important it is for us to bring these struggles out in our lives, whether it's in our life groups, we're talking about these things, or with close friends from the church. You don't need to hide envy away in your heart, it's something we all struggle with, and I really want to press in and just say, "We shouldn't hide envy away in our hearts because of how destructive and dangerous envy is." Go back to verse two, notice what ASAP says. He looks back at his struggle, and he says, "My feet had almost slipped." That's Old Testament linko 4. I almost walked away from the Lord. That's how dangerous the struggle was. I became so overcome with envy that I almost walked away from the Lord. So embittered towards him was, "I, just so I can have what the world seems to have." Envy seems like such a small thing, but friends, it has devastating consequences. It's like a little spark that if you give them fuel, it can turn into a fire, and then even into a raging inferno and all underneath the surface of our lives. It's like the coal mining town of Centrelia, Pennsylvania. This is just a remarkable story. Centrelia, Pennsylvania. You go back to 1962, it's more of a rural town, but there's, I don't know, a couple thousand people living there. Well, they got a landfill, and the landfill had filled up, and they were trying to figure out what to do with the garbage in the landfill. So they did what was pretty common, they burned it, set it on fire, right? So it burns, it burns, you know, there's a lot of stuff in the landfill, so it takes a little while. Burn's through, and then the firefighters are deployed, it's time to put it out, so the firefighters come, hoses, put it out. Fire doesn't seem to go out. They come back on another day, try putting the fire out. There's not going out, using up all their water supply. Come back another day, fire's still burning, they're putting it out, putting it out. What they failed to account for was that the landfill had been built on top of an old coal mine shaft, and a little bit of trash that was burning, fell down into the shaft, lit an entire coal scene, igniting it, and I kid you not, you can look this up online, Centrelia Pennsylvania is still burning today. Over those years that it first started burning underground, people remained there, tried to make a life there. Pretty soon it became apparent, they're not going to be able to. Our sinkhole started opening up, highways split, smoke literally rising from the ground, trees dying. The place became uninhabitable, such at today, Centrelia Pennsylvania is condemned, nobody lives there. You can see pictures of it online. That is a picture of what Envy can do in our souls. All fire can catch the whole thing and just make our lives uninhabitable. Filled with bitterness, that's why it's so important that we think about bringing this into the light, but friends there is good news here also. Psalm 73 does not end with ASAF walking away from the Lord. It ends instead with him remembering God's goodness. So the question we have to ask is, how does a man who's slipping regain his footing? How does a soul that's catching fire get put out? We want to look at how he moves from this envious earthly perspective to a humble heavenly one. I want you to look at me at verses 16 and 17. ASAF writes, "When I tried to understand all of this, it seemed hopeless." He's worn out. He can't make sense of it. He can't figure out why people who reject God seemed to flourish while he suffers for following God. But then the next word comes and everything in the Psalm changes. When I tried to understand all of this, it seemed hopeless until, if you write in your Bible, I want to encourage you to underline, circle, or highlight that word until everything changes in the Psalm right here. When I tried to understand all of this, it seemed hopeless until I went into the sanctuary of God and then I understood their destiny. The sanctuary of God refers to the tabernacle and later the temple. It was the place where God dwelled among the Israelite people. And it was coming into God's presence in the sanctuary that gave ASAF a new perspective on his envy of the wicked. The question we need to ask is, what is it about the fact that ASAF came into the presence of God in the sanctuary that gave him insight into the destiny of the wicked, the destiny of the people that he has been envying? I think, even though it's not stated clearly in the Psalm, that it was because that in the sanctuary he was reminded of the judgment that the wicked would one day face. And he's thinking to himself, why am I envying that? Why would I want that? Temporary blessing? The prophet of man, Jesus says to the whole world and yet lose his soul. What am I doing? Envying that. And I think the reason that the sanctuary would have reminded him of God's judgment is because as an ancient Israelite came through the main entrance of the sanctuary and it's outer gates, there were multiple gates that you had to walk through, multiple courts to show that there is a progression in drawing to and coming near to the presence of God in the temple. So as ASAF entered into that final gate and the temple building lay in front of him before he would have been able to enter into that building, he would have had to walk by bronze altar to show anyone who's going to come into the presence of God must have an sacrificial offering to cover their sins, sin brings death, the blood of the sacrifice is cleansing and allows us to come into the presence of God. And what he would have encountered when he saw that bronze altar, he would have encountered the animals being offered as a sacrifice for sin, for the sins of the people on top of that altar. And sees the place where sin is punished, his whole perspective begins to change. Look at verse 18, "Indeed, you put them in slippery places. You make them fall to ruin." The same wicked people that he was envying just a few verses earlier. Now we see some differently, he doesn't see their wealth, he doesn't see their comfort, he sees where they're headed, he sees people standing on slippery ground racing toward judgment. And in that moment his envy starts to die. But there's something else about that altar that we can't miss. You see the same altar that testified to anyone who approached it about God's judgment against sin, that same altar also testified about God's mercy to sinners. Because every animal sacrificed on that altar symbolized that the worshipper sins like ASAP, his sins had been covered. The blood on the altar wasn't just a warning of judgment for sin, it was a gift and testimony declaration of mercy." It said, "You're sins have been paid for. You're forgiven. You can come near. So as he enters the sanctuary, he sees God's judgment of sin on one hand and on the other hand he sees a declaration of God's mercy towards him. He sees where the wicked are headed and he sees what he's been given. Rescued from that same destiny and as those two things come into focus, his entire perspective shifts from an envious earthly perspective to a humble, heavenly perspective. Look at verses 21 and 22. You've got to love the humility here. He says, "When I was struggling with bitterness and envy, I was stupid. I was stupid and I didn't understand." I was like an unthinking animal towards you. Y'all remember when Nebuchadnezzar was on top of his palace and he was like, "I am great." And God was like, "No, you aren't." And he became a beast of the field and he went out and literally ate like an animal from the grass of the field. Asaf is like, "I was like Nebuchadnezzar. I was like an unthinking animal. My envy of people had more than me. I just didn't recognize. I've forgotten about your judgment against sin and I have forgotten how merciful you have been to me, how abundantly you have provided for me." This is Asaf's way of saying, "Man, Lord, I was so dumb. I am so dumb." And the reason that he says that is because envy is a form of doubting God. Envy reveals doubt in God's sovereignty. It's like Asaf was saying to God, "God, I don't believe the circumstances that you've ordained for my life or the ones that I should have." I know you're sovereign, but I beg to differ. I don't believe you have a sufficient reason to not give me what I deserve. But then when he comes into the sheer awesomeness of God's presence in the temple, he sees how misinformed his bitterness was. Okay, I am like an unthinking animal before you. More than that, envy reveals doubt in God's goodness, not just his sovereignty. It says to God, "I don't believe that you're good because if you were good, you would give me what I wanted." And you must not be good because if you're giving good things to the people that I don't don't think deserve them and you've without them for me, who does deserve them? And that's why he says, "God, I was stupid, stupid for doubting your sovereignty. You're the one who has sovereignly blessed them with prosperity and you will be the one who sovereignly judges them for how they use it." And more than that, I was stupid to doubt your goodness because I realize now that I've come into your presence that I would be under the same judgment for my sins were not for your provision of a sacrifice on the altar for me that allows me to come into your presence. You have already provided abundantly for me and I see now that I already have all that I need. This is ASAP is just another version of Job. Remember Job? 40 chapters coming at God. Why? Why? Why? Why not this? Why did this happen to me? 40 chapters. And then finally God shows up. And what does God essentially say to Job? He says two things. Job? I'm sovereign? Job? I'm good. Example. Example. Example. Example. Example. Example. Example. Example. Example. Example. Example. Example. Example. Example. Example. Example. Example of God's sovereignty and goodness for two whole chapters and by the time God is done, what does Job do? What can I say? You are sovereign. You are good. You provide. Why am I envy? And hope you can see why Psalm 73 is such a powerful antidote to envy in our lives today because it shows us that we don't overcome envy by trying harder. We overcome envy by coming into God's glorious presence in his sanctuary where we're reminded of his judgment on sin and his mercy toward sinners. And where dear Christian is that sanctuary today? It is in and through the person and work of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. What does John say? John chapter one. The word became flesh and tabernacled, templeed, sanctuaryed among us. Jesus, this is why Paul says in him, the fullness of God was pleased to dwell. He is the place where we go today to be reminded of God's sovereign goodness, but he's not just the sanctuary friends. Consider the altar where the sacrifices were offered at the sanctuary. That altar was a shadow. It was a type pointing forward to the true altar of the cross where the true lamb of God would be offered for the sins of the world. And friends, when we come into God's presence through his sons shed blood on the cross, we're reminded like ASAP was of God's judgment on sin and God's mercy towards sinners at the cross, at the cross, God's justice and mercy meet. So friends, if you're here today and you're not a follower of Jesus, I'm so glad that you're here. So glad that you get to hear the gospel and hear God's word. I think what I would want to say to you is that if Psalm 73 is just describing wicked people, people who do evil, that's just the Old Testament way of saying from an Israelite perspective, these are just people who don't follow Yahweh. They may even be kind in their own lives. We don't worship Yahweh. What Psalm 73 is testifying to us and what the New Testament repeats is that all of us have turned from God. All of us are essentially the wicked people that ASAP is describing here under God's judgment for sin. And God has promised that there's a day coming when we will be held accountable for the way that we have lived our life apart from him. But that same God who promises to judge sinners also extends his mercy. The same God testified that God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son to die on that wooden cross so that whoever believes in him would not perish but experience and come under God's mercy to sinners. And that is a call to you today from Psalm 73. Come to the true sanctuary. Come to Jesus Christ. Come to see how he laid down his life for you and how he rose again from the dead so that you would know if you put your trust in him, you will be forgiven and cleansed and brought into God's kingdom. He would become your portion forever. That's the message of Psalm 73 for you today. But for those who've trusted in Jesus, I want you to know everything ASAP experienced in the sanctuary, we get to experience in Christ, only way, way better. So my question for you all today is if we already have all of that in Christ, what do we need to be envy yourself? God has already given us all that we need for life and godliness. He has lavished his grace upon us in Jesus Christ, abundantly providing for all that we need. So the question, what do we have to be envy yourself? What does your neighbor have? That's better than the Son of God. What does your coworker have that's better than coming into the very presence of God? What does your fellow believer have in this church, what gift do they have that's better than being adopted by the creator of the universe? Friends, every time envy rises up in our hearts, it's not just envy, it's forgetting. It's forgetting what God has already given us. Forgetting what we've already been brought out of, forgetting that the one who hung on the cross has given us infinitely more than the thing that we are staring at and envious of the cure for envy isn't trying harder. It's remembering better, coming into the presence of God better. So remember, Salieri, sitting in the asylum at the end of his life, convinced that God had played a cruel joke on him, convinced that the gifts went to the wrong person. He died in Diting Heaven. Friends, every single one of us is just one step away from that bed, one unchecked envy, one refusal to walk back into the sanctuary, one season of not remembering what we've already been given. That's all that it takes. But thanks be to God, we don't have to end up there because we have a sanctuary to walk into. We have a Savior to look at and worship and we have a Father who has already given us more than this world could offer. Look at how Asaph ends his Psalm, verses 25 and 26. This is full circle. Whom have I in heaven but you? And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you. My flesh and my heart may fail. "But God is the strength of my heart. "God is my portion forever." Friends, the Lord is your portion forever and through Him you have all that you need. Amen. - Amen. - What a great truth to be reminded of. I need to be reminded of that. Friends, I wanna give you just 120 seconds right there in your seats to spend time praying to the Lord, to respond to what you've heard in God's Word this morning. Two questions that you might consider asking yourself to guide you through this time. First one is, what do I need to repent of or turn away from? Maybe there is some envy that you're struggling with that you need to work on and go to the Lord and ask for prayer, ask for His help even now. Second question, what do you need to do in response? How can you come into the presence of God each day through His Son Jesus and respond to me, reminded about all that God has given you? Take the next two minutes right here in prayer and then we will close up.