Speaker 1: 0:05

If you've been with us at Westtown, we have been this summer going through the songs of summer, as we've been going through the book of Psalms, looking at Jesus' playlist, if you will, the hymn book that Jesus would have sung from in worship, looking at the different types of Psalms that there are and how they aid us in being able to understand how to live by the wisdom of God, which simply means applying God's law to the everyday situations of life. And last week we began in Psalm 80. We're going to pick up in Psalm 80 again this week to conclude it. Psalm 80 is a Psalm of lament, and a lament is offered to God when there's some type of complaint going on in life. It may be feeling oppression from foes, it may be feeling the discipline of God, it may be some kind of national or personal need that you cry out to God with the difficulties that you're experiencing. And we took a look at a number of those last week from the context of how certain situations or symptoms may manifest themselves in our lives that indicate we need to be restored in our relationship with God. That's the lament part of the Psalm and most Psalms of lament, and on a note of hope, and so that's what we're going to look at this morning is that if we feel like we have been distant in our relationship with God, how can we be restored? So that's what we're going to take a look at this morning in Psalm 80. Now, praying this on a national level, like the people of Israel would have done, where they may have felt their need to be restored with God, is what we would call, today, revival. Now, you may have grown up in an area where people put signs outside their church that said revival this Friday, saturday and Sunday, and such and such a preacher's coming, and the emphasis was evangelism. Well, revival is not something you can announce in advance. It's not something that's predictable, if you will, but rather revival refers not to an act of evangelism per se, but a work of God in and among his people, bringing them back to himself and helping them to grow. So we could define revival, then, as an extraordinary work of God, where he reanimates much of the church by his power. But we don't have to wait for a national movement of the Spirit of God to be restored and our individual walks with him. Personal renewal is possible. So last week we looked at the symptoms of when restoration is needed. This week we're going to look at the solution of how we can be restored and our relationship with Christ from Psalm 80.

Speaker 1: 3:02

Word of the Lord. This is from Psalm 80 to the choir master. The title says according to Lilies that was probably the tune of the song a testimony of Asaph, one of the chief musicians in the temple. A Psalm Give ear, o shepherd of Israel, you who lead Joseph like a flock, you who are enthroned upon the cherubim, shine forth before Ephraim and Benjamin and Manasseh, stir up your might and come to save us. Restore us, o God. Let your face shine that we may be saved. O Lord of hosts, how long will you be angry with your people's prayers? You have fed them with the bread of tears and given them tears to drink in full measure. You make us an object of contention for our neighbors, and our enemies laugh among themselves. Restore us, o God of hosts. Let your face shine that we may be saved.

Speaker 1: 4:05

You brought a vine out of Egypt. You drove out the nations and planted it. You cleared the ground for it. It took deep root and filled the land. The mountains were covered with its shade, the mighty cedars with its branches. It sent out its branches to the sea and it shoots to the river. Why, then, have you broken down its walls so that all who pass along the way pluck its fruit? The bore from the forest ravages it and all that move in the field feed upon it? Turn again, o God of hosts, look down from heaven and sea. Have regard for this vine, the stalk that your right hand planted, and for the sun, whom you made strong for yourself. They have burned it with fire, they have cut it down. May they perish at the rebuke of your face, but let your hand be on the man of your right hand, the son of man whom you have made strong for yourself. Then we shall not turn back from you. Give us life and we will call upon your name. Restore us, o Lord, god of hosts, let your face shine that we may be saved.

Speaker 1: 5:13

Now, as I mentioned last week, we took a look at the symptoms that we can examine ourselves to see whether or not we need restored in our relationship with God and to refresh your memories. Or if perhaps you weren't here, I'm just gonna list them very quickly. And that is that we know that we need restored in our relationship with God when we sense His dwindling presence in our lives. We are not aware of God's presence among us. We also know that we need restored when we experience, or we offer to God, displeasing prayer and we talked about some of the characteristics of how prayer can be displeasing. We also saw that we know that restoration may be needed in our walk with the Lord if we're experiencing His displeasing providence, in other words, that we are drifting from Him and, as a Father, he's disciplining us that we might come back to Him. We also saw how a dishonoring reputation, if the way in which we're living or speaking brings dishonor to the name of God, that we know that we bear the marks of needing restored in our relationship with Christ. And then, finally, if there's a sense of declining power, where we lack a power to resist temptation, where we as individuals or the church fail to have an influence in the area where God has placed us, those are all marks of when we may need restored in our relationship with God.

Speaker 1: 6:42

Now, that was the lament part of the Psalm that we saw last week, but, as I mentioned, psalms of Lament almost always end on a note of hope, and that's what we seek to look at today is the solution of when restoration is needed. So to be restored to the Lord, asaph tells us, the first thing that we must do is we must request God's power to restore us. That is the tenor of this whole Psalm. Right, the people are laid low. They have no power in and of themselves to change their circumstances or to change what appears to be a very angry face of God's providence towards the people as a result of their sin. But they know that God is kind, he's merciful, he's eager and willing to forgive. So they cry out to God to change them and their circumstances and restore them and their relationship with him. In fact, in verses one and two, it is God's reigning power as a king that is in view. Here he says give ear, o shepherd of Israel, you who lead Joseph like a flock, you who are enthroned upon the cherubim, shine forth before Ephraim and Benjamin and Manasseh. Stir up your might and come to save us.

Speaker 1: 8:10

And at times it may not strike us of the importance, but we really should be praying regularly about our spiritual lives, not only in terms of self-examination and seeing where we may need to improve, but asking God for help when we feel weak. Lord, I don't feel like reading my Bible today. Would you help me, lord? I know it's been a few days since I've prayed and I really should, and I don't feel like it. Will you change my heart, please, so that I might come into your presence in prayer? Lord, I'm afraid to tell my brother or my sister or my classmate or my coworker about you, but I know that I should Help me overcome my fears so that I can. We should constantly be mentioning our walk with the Lord in prayer, seeking his power so that we might follow him more closely. We have this recurring frame in Psalm 80, verse three, verse seven, verse nine Restore us, oh God, let your face shine that we might be saved. The next time he mentions it it's oh, god of hosts, and then it's oh Lord, god of hosts. You see, he's building upon the name and the character of God in his power as creator and the faithful covenant, keeping God, the leader of the armies of heaven, to come and to help him to be restored and the people of God to be restored.

Speaker 1: 9:42

While ago we had been on vacation and Connie has lots of plants and she's got a green thumb, and we came back and one of our plants that sits about this high was completely drooped and wilting. It was just laying all over the sides of the planter and we thought it was gonna be a goner. But Connie watered it. We went to bed and we got up the next morning and the plant had perked up. Now it was starting to stand more tall. It wasn't green yet. That was gonna take a little while for that to happen.

Speaker 1: 10:12

That plant certainly couldn't have changed its own circumstances, but receiving a drink of cool water was something that helped to revive it, and when we may be feeling very weak in our spiritual lives and like nothing can revive us, we should pray and ask the Lord to send his spirit to be at work within us. In fact, isn't that how Jesus taught us how to pray? And John excuse me in Luke, chapter 11, where he repeats the very common phrase ask, seek and knock and you will receive? He goes on in Luke, chapter 11 and he says what father among you, if your son asks for a fish, will instead give him a serpent, or if he asks for an egg, we'll give him a scorpion? If you, then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him.

Speaker 1: 11:10

So begin here when you feel the need to be restored. Begin here, asking God to restore you, to give you the power of his spirit. He's a good father and he will grant that prayer to those who ask in faith in the name of Christ. But as if continues, not only do we need to ask the Lord to give us his power to be restored, but to experience the restoring grace of the Lord, we must repent of our sin. That recurring refrain restore us, oh God. That occurs in verse three and verse seven and in verse 19,. That word restore can be translated turn us back. That's what the picture of repentance is. We're off going our own way, but then we realize we need to change course and go God's way and pursue his path.

Speaker 1: 12:08

But he mentions in the context of this prayer again the need for God to be at work. So that repentance is not a work that we perform, if you will, it's a grace that God brings about. He mentions in verse 14, turn again, oh God of hosts. Look down from heaven and sea. Have regard for this vine, then we shall not turn back from you. Give us life and we will call upon your name, so we're not gonna have time to go in in great detail.

Speaker 1: 12:41

But what does it mean to repent? Usually we have these images of a fiery preacher preaching fire and brinstone saying repent you, dirty sinner. Well, what does repentance mean? Well, there are four parts to repentance and one primary result. We'll just go through them very quickly. To repent means that we experience a conviction of sin, and this is often where the spirit of God moves in work to bring, to initiate that work of restoration within us. Now we can feel bad for all kinds of different reasons. We can feel shame over what we have done, and that's not what the Bible means about conviction of sin. It may include that, but that's not the primary aspect of it. We may feel bad that we got caught and we're in trouble. That's not what the Bible means by conviction of sin.

Speaker 1: 13:37

A biblical idea of conviction of sin is that we are grieved that we have offended God by things that we've done or left undone or things that we've said, so on and so forth. We realize that we have committed an offense against God and we are deeply grieved over that. It is the relational component, if you will, to knowing and following Christ. We realize that we have offended God, we have transgressed his law. Which leads us to the next component that in addition to being convicted of our sin, there's a confession of sin, where we acknowledge before God that we have done wrong.

Speaker 1: 14:23

This idea of confession in the Bible is aligning ourselves with the standard of God. Where we thought perhaps our way was the right way, we now, before the Lord, stand and say your way is right, what I did was wrong. I am aligning myself with your purposes, and so if we realize that we've done wrong, then we need to ask for forgiveness, we need to ask to be cleansed, and so we ask the Lord to cleanse us according to his righteousness in Christ. We don't have anything that we can produce on our own that God would forgive us, that he would restore our fellowship with him when it's been broken by our sin, but rather we see the perfection of Christ, his righteousness, his holiness, that he fulfilled God's law on our behalf and then paid the penalty for our breach of it by dying upon the cross. That's what we celebrate in communion.

Speaker 1: 15:22

When we gather around the table this morning, we realize we have no righteousness of our own, but we cling completely to Christ's righteousness and holiness. And so then, if we are convicted of our sin, if we confess it, if we seek cleansing in Christ, then we must also commit to turn away from that sin. You know the old saying it's easier to ask for forgiveness than it is for permission. That really shouldn't be our attitude in our walk with the Lord. Certainly, god is eager to forgive, but we should be concerned about holiness. We should be concerned about pleasing Christ, not because we think that by doing so we earn His forgiveness or we earn His blessings, but in recognition of what he's done for us, restoring our relationship with Him, giving us new life, empowering us by His Holy Spirit. We want to express our gratitude and love to God by obeying His commandments. That's what Jesus said, right, if you love me, you will keep my commandments.

Speaker 1: 16:34

And then, when those things are in place, the conviction of sin, the confessing of that sin, seeking cleansing in Christ and committing by the power of God not to follow in that path. That leads to the celebration part. Like we read in verse 18, we will call upon your name. That's a reference to worship, that we will delight in what God has done and we would seek to live so that we would please Him and all that we do. That's what the Bible means by repentance. Now, when I was a boy, if I did something wrong and I knew that I had a fess up to it, I would go to my mom and I would tell my mom what I did wrong because mom was less strict. Notice, I didn't say lenient, but mom was less strict than dad was and she was more merciful.

Speaker 1: 17:29

Why do we repent? Romans chapter two, tells us that it is the kindness of God that leads us to repentance. And when we understand that we have a God who is willing and eager to forgive, who will receive us mercifully and cleanse us in Christ, we are motivated to go to Him and repent of our sin. So certainly, we request God to empower us to be restored. We repent of our sin. But Asif continues and mentions that to be restored to God, we must reason with him, that is, we must plead our case. And this is in verses four through 16 in this passage.

Speaker 1: 18:14

Now you might be thinking well, what do you mean by plead your case, or to reason with God? Well, you remember, after the Moses went up on Mount Sinai and the Israelites were down at the base of the mountain and they were getting impatient. You know where's Moses? Why is this taking so long? Did he die? What's going to happen to us? So they gathered up all of their gold, they melted it down and they created this calf. And they fell down and they worshiped the calf.

Speaker 1: 18:41

And God, understandably, was very angry at their sin and their rebellion after he just so graciously rescued them out of their bondage in Egypt. And so he said that he was going to discipline the people severely. And Moses began to plead before God and he starts to present his case as to why God should be merciful. Now, it doesn't mean that God changed his mind. God is not a man. Scripture says that he should change his mind. And we're not trying to impress God by the force of our logic that he would answer our prayers, but rather, when we begin to state our case, we are showing our earnestness, we are showing the basis of our motives in prayer and we are pleading before God, praying his promises that he would move and act. And so that's what Moses does. He says Lord, you just rescued these people out of sin and bondage in Egypt. You're not gonna forsake them now, are you? What about the nations of the world. What are they gonna say? God, did you just bring these people out into the desert to kill them? And so then Moses intercedes, claiming the promises of God for the people of God. And that's what we do when we pray, seeking restoration.

Speaker 1: 20:03

And this Psalm shows us how that's done. There are a couple of different aspects of it. One is we relate our present distress as God's people. This is what we see the writer doing in verses four through six and then verses 12 and 13. He mentions things like God, why are you angry at your people's prayers? You have been feeding them the bread of tears. They are a congregation of content. They are an object of contention among their neighbors. And he begins praying, relating their problems and their distress to God, seeking his mercy. Now, of course, this all happened as a result of their own sin. They're bearing the consequences for their rebellion, but they're appealing to the Father, asking him to remember mercy and to see their distress and answer them, especially because the second component they recount God's past mighty acts.

Speaker 1: 21:09

That we read in verses eight through 11. That speaks about bringing the Israelites out of Egypt as a vine and planting them into the promised land where they grew and they flourished. And the writer is appealing to the Lord, saying you've been merciful in the past, be merciful again. Restore us, oh Lord, god of hosts. He prays and so we can appeal to the work of God in Christ in our lives and especially on the cross. Lord, you've made us your children through the work of Jesus. You've adopted us as your sons and daughters. Here are distress as you have moved and work in the past. Lord, will you restore us again? And then he goes on and he mentions the requests that God would remedy the situation in verses 14 through 16. He appeals to the Lord to look down from heaven and see, to have regard for the vine and to so bless again and to restore the people.

Speaker 1: 22:16

The Apostle John in 1 John, chapter 5, says this is our confidence that we have toward him, that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. And if we know that he hears us and whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests that we have asked of him. And sometimes the enemy gets in there right when we have failed, when we have fallen, to try to make us think oh, god's not gonna forgive you again. You've prayed about this time and again and again and again. And here you are. Do you think God's gonna forgive you? Do you think God's gonna use you on all of the accusations, all of the junk, all of the shame that we may bring upon ourselves? And yet our God is a God who moves to restore his people and therefore we should take great confidence and praying that the Lord would restore us. And then finally, we see that to be restored to the Lord, we must rely on his deliverer, that is, we must rely on Christ. We know on this side of the cross.

Speaker 1: 23:27

And verses 17 through 19, he mentions the ground of his hope for restoration Does not lie in himself, does not lie in the people of Israel, but, as verse 17 says, let your hand be on the man of your right hand, the son of man whom you have made strong for yourself. Now, these are references to the Davidic dynasty, to the king over the people of God that would lead the people before him. But all of host kings stumbled and failed themselves. They were ones who are in need of being restored. They pointed to another king from the line of David whom God promised would come and restore the people fully and completely, and that is the Lord, jesus Christ, and it is by Christ. It is according to his merit. It is in his name that we have confidence that we go to the Lord in need of restoration, that he will restore us. And so the writer mentions the purpose of being restored into this new commitment in verse 18. Then we shall not turn back from you. Give us life and we will call upon your name.

Speaker 1: 24:48

One of the beautiful things of this Psalm is that it employs two metaphors to describe God, and those metaphors comprise two of Jesus' I am statements in the Gospel of John. You know, like Jesus says, I am the way and the truth and the life. Well, there are several of those sayings that Jesus mentions, and one of them he refers to himself as the shepherd. You might notice, in verse one, the people of God began the prayer to give ear. Oh, shepherd of Israel, you who lead Joseph like a flock, the Lord is the shepherd of his people. The only other Psalm that mentions the Lord is the shepherd of Psalm 23 that most people know. The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not be in want, but Jesus used that metaphor to describe himself in his ministry To us.

Speaker 1: 25:44

In John, chapter 10, we read Jesus saying I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, just as the father knows me and I know the father. I lay down my life for the sheep and I have other sheep that are not of this fold. I must bring them also and they will listen to my voice. So there will be one flock, one shepherd. How do we know that God will restore us? Because Jesus, the son, lay down his life on our behalf to reconcile us and restore us to God. That's what we celebrate when we come to this table today that we are forgiven through Christ, that the grace that God makes available and free is for us to receive by the power of his spirit, and therefore he will continue to lead and guide and provide.

Speaker 1: 26:41

But the Lord's ongoing care is also seen in the other metaphor that the Psalm uses. Not only does it reference God as the vine or, excuse me, as the shepherd, but also as the vine keeper. We read this in verses eight, nine and verses 14 and 15. First of all, israel's referred to a vine. You brought a vine out of Egypt and drove out the nations and planted it. You cleared the ground for it. It took deep root and filled the land. And then, in verse 14, it's asking God to take care of the vine. Turn again, oh God of hosts, look down from heaven and sea. Have regard for this vine, the stock that your hand planted, and for the son whom you made strong for yourself. And John, chapter 15, jesus again refers to himself as the vine and the vine keeper. He says I am the true vine and my father is the vine dresser. I am the vine, you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me, you can do nothing. And so it's with the confidence that Jesus is our shepherd, it's with the confidence of his promise as the vine in whom we have life and then biding in him, that if we stray as his children, he is eager to receive us back and he will restore us.

Speaker 1: 28:07

Connie and I have very, very dear friends that we have known for a long time. They are among our best friends, and the wife in this couple was diagnosed a couple years ago with early onset Alzheimer's, and it's been so difficult for us to watch this funny, vibrant, talented and gifted mother and wife and grandmother slowly start to slip away from us. We vacationed with them a couple of weeks ago and it is truly sad to see her deterioration. But what is remarkable to see is the way in which her husband loves her.

Speaker 1: 28:51

This guy is a remarkable individual. He's his career was just as a blue collar worker he was a gearhead, but he realized, and he often said, that they were gonna carry him out of work in a pine board box because he was gonna work until the day he dropped. But when his wife became ill, he quit work so that he could take care of her. He began to be relied upon more and more by his wife, who became confused by the most simplest tasks, whether it was to try to buy something at the grocery store and not know how to give money or order from a menu when she was at a restaurant. And then she would become very fearful when he's not around. And so he gave up many of the activities that he enjoyed and loved because his wife needed him, not because of a sense of and they did not approach it out of a sense of sacrifice, but rather out of a sense of privilege to love his wife the way he promised decades before that he would love her in sickness and in health and till death did them part.

Speaker 1: 30:04

He got COVID, I guess about a year and a half ago and he was terribly sick. He almost died, in fact. He called me on the phone and I hung up the phone and I started the ball. I said to Connie I'm not talking to John again on this side of glory. He was calling to say goodbye, but his desire to be around for his wife was so great that when they intubated him and I've been told that when, if you get COVID and you're put on the ventilator, your chances of coming off that ventilator are very slim that happened to him not once, but twice. And when he emerged out of his medically induced coma, the first words on his lips were where's my wife? And he wanted to take care of his wife. His story was so extraordinary.

Speaker 1: 30:55

It was featured on the Today Show and Entertainment Tonight Because this man's love for his wife is so great. His daughters took notice, his grandchildren took notice, the neighbors took notice, and it is a beautiful picture of the way in which we should love Christ, that we would be willing to sacrifice more of our time, more of our interests, more of our treasures, because we know that Christ has loved us so dearly and we have committed ourselves to follow him. And you know what will happen? As we love Christ more fully, as we surrender more to him, those very symptoms that we said were the marks that we needed to be restored in our relationship with Christ will become the signs and the markers that we've been restored and other people will take notice. We will begin to experience more of that awesome awareness that we are in the presence of a God who is so holy and mighty and merciful.

Speaker 1: 32:02

Our prayers that one time seem to be displeasing to God will be prayers that are filled with his presence and the assurance that he does more than we ask or imagine, according to his power, that it has worked within us as we begin to realize that we've moved from a place of having a displeasing governance of God in our life to bearing the marks of his blessing, and we will become the blessings to our neighbors and others as they see the work of Christ within us.

Speaker 1: 32:35

And where we once may have had a dishonoring reputation with Christ, we will be a demonstration to others of the work of Jesus within us. Like Peter says that even though the world revows you, they will see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven. And then, finally, where we were once powerless in our walk to resist sin or to have influence in our spheres of life, we will walk in holiness and we will reflect the love of Jesus, and others will take note. May we so be restored to Christ. May we be the people who love him so deeply that we will bear the signs of people who have been restored to him. Let us pray.