Songs for the Soul Pt.4 | Simon Grubb

Welcome to Songs for the Soul: Uncertain and Doubting Welcome to the Abundant Life Church Tales podcast. Thanks for taking the time to dive into God's Word with us today. For any more info, you can find us at abundant.org dot AU. Speaker 2 Cool. It's well if we haven't met. My name's Simon. It's fun to be here today. Thank you for also being here. We're going to spend a bit of time today talking about Songs for the soul. So we're in the middle of this series on the book of Psalms, which has been really good. It's actually pronounced Pasalms, if you weren't aware. Yeah, it's frenetically spelt. So yeah, today we're looking at book 4 of Psalms. So Psalms is divided up into five books. We're up to book 4, so we must be making some progress. Hurray. And today we're looking at A Song for When I'm Uncertain and Doubting. There's a couple of other, there's been a few other messages in the in the series already. Laura did a good one on Psalm 23. I had to go through it again because I was borrowing her slide template. I was like, oh man, she said some smart stuff. So I go back and listen to that one. But then there's some cool stuff coming up as well. Matt was really good last week, talking about confusion and disappointment. He borrowed a bunch of cool song lyrics and say that inspired me to borrow a bunch of different ones. But Matt's Alden, he likes old man's like You too. And I'm a I'm an elder emo, so you get lots of 2000s punkin emo today. Anyway. Yeah, Disho's in for an Alex Roots says. Amen. Yeah. But yeah, we've also coming up. We got the seniors takeover next week, the legends, which will be awesome. I love hearing Gary do his thing. I hope we get all of the oldest songs as well, but with extra. Yeah. Are you singing? Yeah, he will. Yeah. Disho's bringing the strong game. But then coming up, we've also got, I think, Sam Twigs coming up. And Terry's coming up. No, not for ages, anyway. Yeah, Laura's gone anyway, so stick around. They're going to be lots of good stuff. But today, yeah, we're talking about book 4A Song for when I'm uncertain and doubting. And so my, it's my primary goal today, I guess to encourage us, you know, to sit with our uncertainties and our doubts and to be honest, before the Lord, we're not going to, you know, like it's, it's not. Yeah, that's basically my goal. So you guys keen to be encouraged or do you want to leave feeling worse? If you want to leave feeling worse, go now. If you, if you're up for a bit of encouragement, hang around. Let's pray, shall we, Lord? Thank you for the privilege it is to be here. And thank you for your presence with us, Lord. We take a minute to acknowledge that you were here before we showed up and that you want to meet with us much more than we've ever wanted to meet with you, Lord. And so, yeah, we just take a minute to thank you for that, for your goodness to us. And yeah, we just asked that you would speak today to people. The truth belongs to you and the mistakes of mine. Amen. Processing Doubt: A Profound Religious Experience Cool. So we're going to, we're going to start with a bit of a flashback to 2007. And so back in 2007, I was 18 years old. I was playing in bad punk bands. I was more or less a, a youth pastor, almost close to it. And there was a whole bunch of things happening. I just finished year 12. The year before we'd seen a whole bunch of interested, I've mentioned in year 12 and here we still are. So that's fun. Yeah, there's like we saw a whole bunch of kids in in our college year 11 and 12 come to Jesus. Over that couple of years, a lot of things have been happening and there's a lot of hyper Pentecostal experiences happening around Launceston in 2007 at the time. So I've kind of come in, in and out of this church universe super into it. I was given church. I was in then a million hours a week and also working at a bookshop and running, running punk shows on the side. But yeah, so I guess I was full of the unfounded confidence and certainty of youth. Thought I had a whole bunch of stuff figured out. And back in the day, you kids will like anyone under the age of about 20 won't be familiar with this concept, but there used to be a place called ACD Store. And So what would you know if you were a, if you were keen to listen to some music, you have to go down to the CD store and buy ACD. And so as a niche music listener, sort of a person, I was excited because the CD was coming out called Come Now Sleep by one of my favourite Christian hardcore bands called As Cities Burn D shows in for this one. But so yeah, this is kind of interesting thing was time with Christian rock music or whatever. And anyway, we won't unpack all the theology of that and whether it's good or bad. But so I go down to the CD store and I buy this CD and I bring it home and I'm living in like my parents' house and I'm in like a loft bedroom with kind of weird triangular walls. And I've inherited my brother's old CD system. It looks like the stuff at your house, Dave, Big old system. And so I put this CD on, and I'm expecting to get yelled out. But then the opening track of this record is called contact. And it starts really slow. And it starts with these words. It says hearts aren't really our guides. We are truly alone because God ain't up in the sky holding together our bones. I remember when we used to speak. Now I'm starting to think that your voice was really mine, bouncing the ceiling back to me. God, this can't be. Could it be that all we see is it? Is this it? Why don't you come down to heaven? Once you come down, why don't you cut through the clouds? Why don't you come down? And so this stopped me in my tracks. At 18, I had this profound experience in my room of just not knowing how to process those feelings of doubt and uncertainty and just being. I've heard, I've heard lots of worship songs. I've had lots of Joel Houston's Whoa. Oh Jesus, yeah, Hands in the air, Everything's good. I've heard lots of other songs from this other sort of universe, you know, coming from listening to punk and alternative music about struggling with sin or depression or self loathing and all these things. But a song that's so clearly spoke to doubt was so new. It felt so like I just never heard anything like it before in my life. And I had, and I guess it was for me, like I'd given so much of my time and energy into making the church work and writing songs and doing all this stuff. And I have this moment of like, oh man. Like it was so interesting to hear something that I'd pushed away so many times. That little lingering doubt of what if all these things I've hung all my life on are wrong? What if I'm wrong about stuff? What if I've missed it? And I guess this is what good art does. Hey, a song can be amazingly brave. And so, and it's interesting in that song, the doubt is balanced by this longing. This is like when you come down heaven while you meet me where I'm at. And it's just incapacity to bridge that gap. But I'd had a lot of religious experience, you know, like I'd been was talking. We, we went to Cradle Mountain last week with some old friends of mine and we were laughing about this time where we showed up to play. He's a bass player and I was a guitar player. We're both young whippersnappers and we showed up to, I think, called Youth United. You ever go to any of those, Laura? I remember hearing Andy Harrison speaking one of those. He was from this church back in as a young whippersnapper as well. But yeah, we, we showed up to this Youth United thing and there's this guy used to lead worship and he was from the Ultra Pentecostal church in Launceston. And we played an A chord for 45 minutes. There was not like that, was it? There was no set list. There was no D chord. There was only A for 45 minutes and we were like, oh man, you know, like the Spirit moved and stuff happened and we were, I'd had all of these amazing Pentecostal experiences. I'd seen miracles, I'd seen my friends come to the Lord. I'd seen lots of stuff happen. But to sit in my room and to rumble with doubt, that was a profound religious experience that was completely new to me at the time. Diving into Psalm 103: A Song for Uncertainty Anyway, so we're going to jump into Psalms today. I'm going to read you guys Psalm 103. I liked what Matt did making us all read it together last week, but I think this one's too long, so I'll go. And you guys can shepherd. But yeah, I guess this song, this doesn't really set out to express doubt necessarily in the same way as that's that one I was just talking about. But I think it gives us a few angles and a few ideas to sit with when we find ourselves dealing with doubt and uncertainty. Is that cool? All right, deep breath. It's for me, not for you. Just here we go. Psalm 103. Praise the Lord, my soul, all my innermost being. Praise His holy name, praise the Lord my soul, and forget not all His benefits. Who forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases? Who redeems your life from the pit and crowns you with love and compassion? Who satisfies your desires with good things so that your youth is renewed like the eagles, The Lord works righteousness and justice for all the oppressed. He made his ways known to Moses, his deeds to the people of Israel. The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love. He will not always accuse, nor will He harbour His anger forever. He does not treat us as our sins deserve, or repay us according to our iniquities. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is His love for those who fear Him as far as the east is from the West. So far He has removed our transgressions from us. As the Father has compassion on His children, so the Lord has compassion on those who fear Him, for He knows how we are formed. He remembers that we are dust. The life of mortals is like grass. They flourish like a flower of the field. The wind blows over it and it is gone, and its its place remembers it no more. But from everlasting to everlasting, the Lord's love is with those who fear Him, and His righteousness is with their children's children and those who keep His covenant and remember to obey His precepts. The Lord has established His throne in heaven, and His Kingdom rules over all. Praise the Lord, you his angels, you mighty ones who do His bidding, who obey His word. Praise the Lord, all his heavenly hosts, and you his servants who do His will. Praise the Lord, all His works everywhere in his dominion. Praise the Lord, my soul. There you go. We got there. How'd you guys go with that? Was that good? King David's Life and the Structure of Psalm 103 Cool. So this Psalm was written by King David. Is anyone familiar with King David? Cool. He's one of my favourite biblical characters because it's just not boring at all. You read the story of David, a lot happens. He starts out as a poor shepherd boy and then he becomes this soldier with all these amazing tales of heroism and then becomes this national hero and then becomes apparent that God's going to make him king. And so he becomes an outlaw while the then king tries to hunt him down. A lot of stuff happens. And then he becomes king and a whole bunch more stuff happens. But basically his life was 0% boring. And he was described Scripture as a man after God's own heart. And I love his writings, I guess. And for a long time, Jasper's middle name's David, and that's a nod to King David. And so, yeah, it's David wrote about 1/3 of the Psalms that are in the book, and he wrote a lot of the best ones, I think. Not that you get to rank which scriptures are good and bad, but I'd do it anyway. It's a song of praise and there's a whole bunch of songs of laments in the Psalms. Lots of songs which explore lots of different stuff. But but this isn't a song of lament, it's a pretty pure straight up song of praise. I came across this regarding this when I was prepping this week from Alexander McLaren. He said because it is thus purely an outburst of thankful joy, it is more fit to be pondered in times of sorrow, which I thought was interesting. I'm so in this Psalm, we've basically got 5 stanzas. We've got any poetry nerves out there? You know what a stanza is? Group of lines. So it's basically we've got 22 verses, which is the same amount as the letters in the Hebrew alphabet. Apparently it's 22 letters, but it's not an acrostic poem like Psalm 119 is. So it's divided into 5 stanzas, the 1st 5 verses, the second five, and then three groups of four verses. And in each different sort of set of stanzas, it's a different idea. So what we're going to do today, we're going to take one verse and one sort of key idea from each section of the Psalm, and then we're going to dive in a little bit deeper, see how that links in with the rest of Scripture and some other stuff, and we'll kind of look for some practical applications as we go through. Is that sound good? Cool. All righty. Oh, I found this from Spurgeon while I was looking at this this week as well. He says there is too much in the Psalm for 1000 pens to write. It is one of those all comprehending Scriptures, which is a Bible in itself. So we're going to skim the surface of this one today. There's a million things in there and you can go and dig it. And the Spurgeon commentary is like as long as your arm on this one, which is fun to read, but here we go. Cultivating Gratitude: Remembering God's Many Blessings So the in verse 2 of Psalm 103 says, praise the Lord my soul and forget not all his benefits. So I guess #1 is that we easily forget. I was laughing at myself this week of work. You know what I'm good at? Pouring myself a coffee, forgetting where I put it. Then like every day at work, almost every day, the 1st 5 verses of this Psalm deal with God's goodness as received, as received by David on an individual level. So David wrote this Psalm toward the end of his life, and by the by this time he'd been through a lot. He'd lived on the run for years at a time. He'd been hiding in caves, he'd been elevated to king. He'd had all that bad business with Bathsheba. He'd gone through the death of his son. He'd had crazy family dramas play out in an incredibly public way. He was well aware of his own shortcomings and his frailty and just how much he didn't have it all together. But we also see in David a keen awareness of God's wild goodness and favour ought out on his life. Again and again we see these couple of verses. Who forgives all your sins? Who heals all your diseases? Who redeems your life from the pit? Who crowns you with love and compassion? Who satisfies your desires with good things so that your youth is renewed like the eagles. We see this in a lot of David Psalms. He reminds himself of all the amazing blessings and favour that God has poured out on him. And in our distracted age, we're a bit prone to lose the thread of God's goodness and his blessings on us. I came across this and Ronald Rohizer, He said God can be very present in an event, but we can be so preoccupied and focused on our headaches, heartaches, tasks, daydreams and distracting restlessness that we can be oblivious to that presence. I'm certainly guilty of this like 1 area of discontent in my life. Content my whole vision and I can forget the many benefits that God's poured out in other areas of my life. There's been times this year when I've complained about to God about struggles in business, all the while ignoring my healthy children and my warm house by the beach and healthy food in my belly and the golden sunlight that pours into our neighbourhood every day. It's it's we forget his benefits. We get stuck on that one little thing. I'm not a therapist, so take this with a grain of Salk because I don't know anything. But I'm convinced that the two most important habits in my life to safeguard and develop good mental health are cultivating an appreciation of beauty and deliberate practise of gratitude. Those two things, man, like those two habits have been so helpful for me over a period of time. And so it's I don't think you can take mental health for granted in this era every you know, I'm having conversations with this stuff almost every day with different people. Beauty and thankfulness. That's my that's my prescription as an unqualified Dr Anyway, we'll keep talking about the Bible as an unqualified pastor. I love this from Philippians 4 verse 4 to 9. It says there, there we go on your feet. Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again, rejoice, let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. Do not be anxious about everything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with Thanksgiving, present your request to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable, if anything is excellent or praiseworthy, think about such things. Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me or seen in me, put it into practise and the God of Peace will be with you. Man, I ate a blood orange for breakfast this morning. I love that niche citrus stuff. Makes me feel thankful to the Lord. Just weird ones. Find different ones anyway, the small little things I like, the more that we're thankful for the little things we notice, then we thank God for them. It becomes this. It builds up momentum inside us and we become more thankful and more gracious and better people to be around. Hopefully. Understanding God's Compassionate Anger and Discipline Let's keep trucking on #2 God's compassionate anger. Verse 9 says He will not always accuse, nor will he harbour his anger forever. Now basically have to credit Tim Keller for this whole line of thought here. I'd stole it all from Tim, but he died, so he can't come and sue me about it. So we're good. But yeah. So Tim Keller basically notes this idea that God as a parent, he's not negligent, but he's also not abusive. He's his anger is compassionate anger and that's different from payback anger. So maybe if you, if you have a kid, like Laura's got little kids who's got kids under 5, you know, like they do annoying stuff and like, so payback angle, like your kid embarrasses you in public, so you embarrass them or your kid, you know, makes you angry, so you shut them in their room and make them angry. That's payback anger, which is different from compassionate anger, which you know, like, which is how God treats us. A good parent doesn't just say anything goes, do whatever. Children need boundaries and they need to be clear. And so when Eleanor was small, is she still here? Is she going to footy? She's going to footy good because she'd be embarrassed. When Eleanor was small, she used to hate brushing her teeth. It was just like every twice a day as a giant, there would be just an argument about it. I'd have to figure out some game to make it happen or whatever. She just never wanted to brush her teeth, never ever. But then that stubbornness in her didn't produce a like an unbridled blind rage in me, most mostly depending on how much sleep I'd had. But it did call for a certain firmness, like as a parent for her own goods, she needs me to be firm about that because she needs teeth. Because without teeth, you can't eat. And if you don't eat, you'll die. You know, there's some cause and effect. And so I'm yeah, no, like as her parents, she requires me to be firm of her firm on her on that. And so I was and, and but am I still mad about all the, all the tantrums and the carry on and the don't want to brush my teeth now? Like, of course not, you know, like I don't harbour that anger forever. And neither does the Lord harbour anger against us forever. Because whenever he's angry with us, there's always, it's always driven by compassion for us, wanting the best for us. And you don't want God to have no, you don't want him to not care because this is the thing like we need him to give Proverbs 3 verse 11 to 12 says, my son, do not despise the Lord's discipline. Do not resent his rebuke because the Lord disciplines those he loves as a as a father, the son he delights in. Laura preached this message about Psalm 23 three weeks ago, two weeks ago and to kick it all off. So go listen now if you haven't. But this, this is verse 4 of Psalm 23. It says, even though I walk through the darkest valley, I will fear no evil for you are with me, your rod and your staff, they comfort me. Now, I was looking up a couple of things about this when it talks about a rod a shepherd back in ancient Near East would carry like a 60 centimetre long piece of heavy wood full of like embedded with iron. And it was it was a defensive weapon. So the giant stick full of metal was what they'd use to hit the wild animal around the head that came for the sheep. All right, or thieves or whatever they needed to have a good effective weapon. Exodus 15 says the Lord is a warrior, and so he defends us with the rod. But then the staff was a longer stick with a curve in it, and that was used to correct and got a sheep because we're talking about a mountainous territory. And if the sheep strays off the thin path and falls off the Cliff and dies. And so the the correction of the staff could be quite assertive. You know, you might be a sheep and get a whack over the back of the head and be pulled back quite assertively with the staff, but it's nothing compared to being hit with the iron bar. So like, yeah, the, the correction of the Lord is kind, it's compassionate, it's generous. And I think it, it's, he saves the rod for our enemies, but he gives us the staff. And so it's, I guess it pays to remember if you find yourself struggling and repeating the same sins over and over again or stuck in this loop, God's not at the end of his tether with you. He's fine. He's, you know, his, his, his anger lasts a moment, but his favour lasts a lifetime. And this is the verse in Psalm 103 that says the Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love. That is the most cross referenced little phrase in the whole Bible. It pops up again and again and again and again. It was originally Moses. It pops up in a bunch of different Psalms all through the New Testament. The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love. And it's not for no reason that the Bible continues to remind us that that's what God's character is like and his anger exists for a reason. It's a similar function to when a toddler is reaching for the hot stove. Sure, he kicked on. His anger lasts a moment. His favour lasts a lifetime. It's funny, I can't hear that verse in anything except Matt Redmond's accent. He had a song with that line in it. And it's not his British accent. Just gets me every time. Embracing Our Fragility: God Knows We Are Dust All right, we'll keep moving #3 so we're fragile and that's OK. Verse 14 says, for he knows how we are formed. He remembers that we are dust. Anyone held a handful of dust lately? We got any gardeners among us? Not me. Dust falls apart. This is what it does. It's there's a reference in this Scripture to Genesis 2 verse 7 where which says then the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life and the man became a living being. So we are one part breath of life animated with the spirit straight from God and we are one part dust. We're a big mix of the two things and because of that, God just doesn't expect us to have it all together. It's like part of our nature to not have it all together because we're formed from dust. I live near the beach and there's a bit of structural crossover between dust and sand, right? And the sand dunes down at Lauderdale Beach, like they're, they're always being formed and reformed by the weather, the constant moving of the wind and the tide and the waves. And so if you go down there now and then you go back in a month, shape of some of those dunes will be different. The shape of the beach will be different, whether or not it's covered in seaweed or whatever. All of these things, they change over time, the gradient of everything. They're constantly changing little bit by little bit. And, and we're like that too. We're constantly changing. We're always being reformed and fashioned by the forces of nature and life and by the hand of God in our lives. Did you guys know? I love this weird fact. Every seven years your body is made of completely different atoms than the seven years before you cycle through. You're a completely new person every seven years. We're just in the constant state of change. And God is so much bigger and grander and more magnificent than we can ever really imagine or understand or wrap our little heads around. So our idea of God needs to be constantly changing too, as he kind of reveals different things about his nature. It needs to be constantly growing and evolving and expanding. And so that's a process of change and being broken and reformed. It's just that's part of what it's like to be made of dust and it's just OK. The next verse of the Psalm highlights how transient and temporary our existence is. It says the life of mortals is like grass. They flourish like a flower of the field. The wind blows over it and it's gone. That's in contrast to God is painted in Scripture and again as being unchanging, consistent and eternally reliable. In the New Testament, James describes God as the Father of heavenly lights who does not change like shifting shadows. So all of that to say, God's just not surprised by our struggles and he's he's not lookout. That's open too. He's not shocked by our lack of apparent progress. He's not offended by your doubts. He doesn't expect us to have it all together. He knows we're dust. He knows we're dust. I love this lyric. It says we're not half as bad as God is Good. You guys going OK? It's very quiet today, except for Laura, but that's OK. I don't mind it. Quiet. I'm a quiet guy. Church could be more quiet. That'll be fine to me. All right, we'll keep going. The Prize of Knowing God: Father, I Belong to You So #4 we belong to the Lord. So verse 17 of this Psalm says, but from everlasting to everlasting, the Lord's love is with those who fear him and his righteousness is with their children's children. So there's a sense of verses that God know, like the David knows that to know God is the prize. To know God makes everything else. OK, back to Philippians. This is Philippians 3. Verse 7 to 9 says, But whatever, whatever what gains to me, I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them garbage, that I may gain Christ and be found in Him. I was listening to some some guys talk about the Bible this week and they're talking about that word that's translated as garbage. It's almost more like a swear word like it's almost like a steaming pile of human waste is more like maybe a closer translation and we consider them garbage that we may gain Christ and be found in him. I think it's it was so worth a quick note when we look back at that verse in Psalms and it says the text says when we those who fear him, I think it pays to think of that fear of God like the best, the best thing I've ever come across is electricity. So electricity is dangerous and it deserves a deep respect. PowerPoints are not to be trifled with, but electricity opens up some amazing possibilities. There's a sense of wonder and awe with that as well. So when it says those who fear God, we're not talking about those who come to God with sheer, unbridled terror and who are afraid. But there's a deep reverence and a respect and an understanding that the Lord is not to be trifled with. The Lord's love is with those who fear him. I came across a prayer and I was listening through this book, the memoirs of a gentle Brendan Manning. Has anyone read any Brendan Manning? Penny's nodding, maybe. Yeah. Brendan Manning is a loose unit, but he was a yeah, he read, he wrote this amazing book. And in his book I came across this prayer and it says this, it says, Father, I belong to you. So in the book he encouraged the reader to pray this one line prayer repeatedly, you know, for a few minutes regularly, daily for a period of a few weeks, and to see how that transforms your relationship with God. And so with a sceptical little chuckle, I said sure, all right, whatever. I figured I'd give it a go. And then it's funny, like over a period of a few weeks, lo and behold, Dang it, Brennan, it's become a mantra that's really kind of defined my years so far. Father, I belong to you. It takes the pressure off us to sort everything out because it just doesn't make a difference whether I succeed or fail in my own little projects. And it doesn't matter whether I get it right all the time or not. I belong to the Lord. Live or die, succeed or fail, famous or obscure, rich or poor, I'll just do the best that I can with what he's given me, and whatever happens, I'll fall into his arms at the end of it all. I belong to the Lord, as we see in verse 11 of that Psalm. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for those who fear Him. And there's an interesting little parallel in there to Isaiah chapter 55, which says in verse 8:00 and 9:00, For my thoughts are not your thoughts, and neither are your ways. My ways declares the Lord, as the heavens are higher than the earth, so my ways are higher than yours. So God's love and commitment to us is of a totally different sort and quality to our commitment and love back to Him. He holds us and He will forever hold us, regardless of how together we have it, regardless about whether our theology is correct or not, or our behaviour is correct or not. He holds us anyway. One more song lyric. This sounds to me without you. For the you this show. We have all our beliefs, but we don't want our beliefs. God of peace, we want you. Praising God with Our Whole Soul and All Creation Cool, we're get, we're getting through it. I'm short today, huh? That's good. I'm I'm learning to write less words as I prep #5 We're only one part of God's wider Kingdom. So in verse 22 it says praise the Lord, all his works everywhere in his dominion. Praise the Lord my soul. So the last verse of the Psalm ends with praise the Lord my soul, and that's a mirror of the first verse of the Psalm, which also says praise the Lord my soul. I think it's an interesting little side note here. So if you read the Dallas Willard book called The Renovation of the Heart, he talks about this idea that the soul is like our whole being. So the soul is your body, your mind, your emotions, your social connections, your spirit or your will, like that kind of the middle of you. All of those things all rolled up together. That is your soul. I thought that's a helpful way to think of it. So when we talk about to praise the Lord with our soul, that means to praise him with our whole selves. So including all the doubts and the reservations and the hang ups and the difficulties and the tensions and the insecurities and the unanswered questions, praise the Lord I myself with all of that stuff. So as we bring our whole unedited selves before God and under His dominion, we join in with the rest of creation. Like the Psalm says, praise the Lord, all his works. So last time I was up here, we were talking about hearing God through creation and we had some fun with all of that. So I won't go too too deep down that track today. But I will say this, sometimes it helps to put yourself back into context to get a bit of perspective. So that can mean showing up at church when you don't feel like it and having the humility and grace to let the person next to you that you're sitting lead you toward worship. And having that kind of sense of, well, I can borrow some faith from my neighbours and show up to church. And even though it doesn't always feel good and I feel dry, but it can also mean going outside to see what the trees and the birds and the ocean has to say about the matter. I like to get up early. I did it again this morning and to go for a run around the neighbourhood and often find myself. This is like saying Amen to the Magpies in the morning when they come out. Amen. Brother magpie trying to channel Saint Francis. I try to say it under my breath so that people don't think I'm bananas, but here you go anyway. Confessions on bananas. But yeah, there's, there's plenty of actual verses in these. Book 4 of Psalms 90 to 106. The kind of explore this sort of idea. And so we'll have a look at a couple of those. I reckon it's about time to get the band back up. What do you reckon? Yeah. All right, well, let's get them. Come on. Psalm 93, verse 3 and 4. The seas have lifted up Lord. The seas have lifted up their voice. The seas have lifted up their pounding waves. Mightier than the Thunder of the great waters. Mightier than the Breakers of the sea. The Lord on high is mighty. I love the drama. That's so cool and I love this one too. This is Psalm 96. Verse 11 and 12 says let the heavens rejoice, let the earth be glad, let the sea resound and all that is in it, that the fields be jubilant and everything in them. Let the trees of the forest sing for joy. The trees sing at the best. I reckon many of the old eucalypts around our neighbourhood have been lifting holy hands for decades before you and I showed up. And they'll keep doing it for decades after you and I are gone. And it's, it's freeing to remember sometimes that we're just not the centre of the universe. God's Kingdom is advancing, regardless of my bad attitudes or hang ups or reservations. Like the end of that Psalm says, the angels and the heavenly hosts are doing his bidding. The trees of the forest are singing his praise. And we just add our two little copper coins when we join in and say, praise the Lord O myself. So we're going to yeah, you. I always hold it here and the sound goes up here. We'll try that. Cool. It's Okay to Doubt: Come Before God with Thanksgiving Yeah, we're going to wrap up. So bit of a final encouragement. We're going to, I think we're going to pray for some people later. So we'll come up and talk about that in a bit, I guess create a bit of room and space for that. But we're heading back into a time of, of worship for now. And so maybe you've come here and you're feeling as firm and sure of your faith as ever. Maybe you feel great. Maybe you've but maybe you've got some doubts and some questions and some hang ups. Maybe you're waiting on an answer from God for guidance and what to do in a certain situation. Maybe you don't know exactly what you believe anymore and if you're in for all of this or not. And I'm just here to tell you that it's OK. And God knows that we're dust and He knows that we're moments away from falling apart at any time, even when we feel together, and that we can come before the Lord with Thanksgiving either way. And we can say, praise the Lord, I myself. All right, why don't you guys stand and I'll pray briefly to close, then we'll throw back to these guys. Thank you, Lord, that you know us, You know how we have fallen and that you're merciful with us. Lord, we thank you that you hold us in your hand. And yeah, we just asked that as we come back into your presence again, dear Lord, that you would remind us of your love for us and you'd meet us where you need to meet us this morning. And thank you, Lord, that you forgive all of our sins, You heal all our diseases, You redeem us from the pit. And so, Lord, we just start commit ourselves back into your mighty but tender care. Amen. Speaker 1 Thanks for listening today. 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