Let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith.
David was a hunted man, chased among the rocks of the desert, a man who knew his only hope was in his God. His writings in the Psalms describe a man who learned to thirst for God like he thirsted for water. Today, a look at the ways God uses to draw us to that kind of thirst. From the Moody Church in Chicago, this is Running to Win with Dr. Erwin Lutzer, whose clear teaching helps us make it across the finish line. Pastor Lutzer, today you'll take us into Psalm 42 for another lesson from the Psalms, a lesson on being really thirsty and on desiring God. You know, Dave, this is so exciting because we know that when we come to Jesus, he offers us living water and our thirst can actually be quenched. But there's a verse in Isaiah that talks about false religion.
And for all those who are listening who say, oh, I'm into spirituality, but I don't believe anything significant about doctrine. This is what happens when you have a false religion. It says that you are like a person who goes to bed thirsty, dreams he is drinking, but waking up thirsty still. Goes to bed hungry, believing that he is eating, wakes up hungry still.
All of the other wells are dry. That's why here at Running to Win, we are so deeply committed to making sure that we always hold high the words of Jesus and the promise of Jesus because he indeed does give us life and he quenches our thirst. And David understood this even in the Old Testament. Let me ask you a question. Would you consider becoming a partner to this ministry? You can do that. Many of you already are partners, but we like to think of endurance partners as people who help us, who hold our hands, who become a part of the Running to Win family. And at the end of this broadcast, I'm going to be giving you some contact info.
Meanwhile, let us listen to God's word. Back in 1968, I and a number of other students climbed to the top of Masada on what Josephus referred to as the Snake Trail. Masada is a fortress near the Dead Sea. It was actually the winter home of Herod the Great, had fortifications up there for many, many years, for many, many centuries.
Today, tourists go to the top of Masada being carried, of course, electronically in cable cars. But in those days, the most important way to get to the top was to walk hundreds and perhaps thousands of feet. And it was about 110 degrees and we had water with us, but soon that ran out. And it was the only time in my life and the time that I usually refer to when I think of thirst. Sometimes we say that we are thirsty, but have you ever had burning, raging thirst?
In fact, days later, I was drinking fruit juice and water to help my body make sure that it regained its fluid and its equilibrium. David said, as the deer pants after the water brook, so my soul pants after you, O God. And we don't understand that in today's society.
What was this guy's problem? Why was he wanting God that badly? The fact is that we are all born thirsty. Physically, we are born thirsty. We come into this world thirsty, wanting to drink. Spiritually, we are also born thirsty. As one scholar says, we have within us a raging, inextinctible thirst and we all have it. And we're all seeking to satisfy it somehow in some way all the time. But because we're sinners, we satisfy this thirst in the wrong way. These longings, these God-given desires become perverted. For example, God has given us the desire for a relationship. We are born to want to connect with others.
That's part of our heritage as human beings. And so what do we do? We sometimes connect with the wrong people and we connect in the wrong ways. The desire for intimacy is strong. And so you find those who fall into various forms of sexuality. What they're really doing is they're seeking relationship. They're seeking a God-given desire, but they're doing it in the wrong way. Not only that, but we all seek for meaning. We want to connect with the infinite. Because there's something within us that says that if you want to have meaning you have to be plugged into what is eternal. The other day on the news I saw somebody who builds sand castles.
And not just castles, but all kinds of beautiful sculptures. Every day he begins again and anew in the sand and then the tide comes and washes it away. And then he begins again the next day. There's a part of me that admired him because he was willing to do that, but there's another part that says surely there's more to life than that. And there are many of us who instead of seeking for meaning, knowing that that meaning can only come in a relationship for God, we are building sand castles that time is constantly washing away. And at the end of the day we have nothing to show for it. We all desire emotions. We are born with emotions. With these emotions we are supposed to love God and others, but we take these emotions and we end up making sure that we love ourselves and we get it all wrong because we begin to seek inward kind of satisfaction instead of looking to God. We have a desire to make good choices and we use the will that God has given us to make wrong choices, selfish choices. Conscience is a gift of God to keep us on the right path and it is in effect standing judgments on all of our actions and saying this is right and this is wrong, but what do we do with conscience? We override our conscience. We learn to manage our sin. We learn to manage our rebellion and so we do our own thing, conscience or no conscience. What's characteristic of us as human beings left to ourselves? First of all is that fulfilling all of these needs are first of all they are very self-directed.
They are very selfish. Second, we sometimes resort to the passions of the body and give them primacy rather than the intellectual pursuits and the value and the rationality of the soul. The simple fact is that we make a commitment to our emotions and our desires and then we marshal all of our intellect to justify those desires and to make sure that life comes out the way we want life to be. What we forget is that really what we're seeking for is God. Pascal, you remember the great mathematician and French philosopher said there once was in man a true happiness of which now remains to him only the mark and the empty trace which in vain he tries to fill from his surroundings but these are all inadequate because the infinite abyss, he's talking about our thirst, the infinite abyss can only be fulfilled by an infinite and immutable object that is to say by God alone. And Augustine said in the confessions, oh God, thou has made us for thyself and our hearts are restless until they find they're all in thee. That's why Luther said that it is impossible to sin deliberately unless we first of all think wrongly about God because what we are doing is we're saying I want to fulfill my desires, my way in rebellion against God because my way is better than his.
And it's this that made George McDonald say rather boldly. He said when a man knocks on the door of a brothel, he is actually seeking God. He's seeking God in the wrong place.
Now let's look at the text. Psalm 42, David is seeking God as well. David is thirsty and he's going to God. Why does David go to God? What is it that drove him to the Lord his God? Why was it that he finally came to his senses and said only God can meet my needs? He says as the deer pants for streams of water so my soul pants for you, oh God. My soul thirsts for God for the living God.
When can I go and meet with God? Thirsty for God. What drove David?
Well I think the answer is first of all he was pursued by his enemies. He says in verse three, my tears have been my food day and night while men say to me all day long, where is your God? And then he goes on to say in verse 10, my bones suffer mortal agony as my foes taunt me saying to me all day long, where is your God? I want you to know today that our enemies drive us to God. If you've been pursued by enemies, if you've been wrongfully sued, if you have been involved in contests in which people want to seek your harm whether physically or at work and you discover that you've got all these enemies around here whose day would really be made if you were to fail, it drives you to God.
Remember this that your friends can only take you so far, your friends can only take you to your potential someone has said. Only your enemies can take you beyond your potential. So thank God for your enemies. If enemies were not good for us, God would not allow us to have to put up with them. So thank God for your enemies because what happens is the the supports that we have suddenly no longer are there and we must flee to God and we say God I desire you because there's this sense of loneliness, there's this sense of alienation, there's this sense of helplessness, God help me and then we pursue the almighty God.
So that was part of the reason. Another part is because of the withdrawal of God's presence. Listen to what he says, verse five, why are you downcast all my soul and why so disturbed within me?
Put your hope in God for I will yet praise him my Savior and my God. David was going through a time of emotional bankruptcy. It was a time when it appeared as if God had withdrawn from him and God does sometimes withdraw his presence from us. That is his felt presence. And he does that so that we might learn to depend solely and totally upon him when the emotions no longer can be relied upon where we must walk simply by bare faith. Because when the Bible says we walk not by sight but by faith, it doesn't mean just physical sight, it even means emotional sight. So there are times when we are despondent, there are times when we cry out to God in despair and God does not seem to be there. And those times are set up by God that we might pursue him more passionately and more intimately. David's having this little talk with himself.
It's the kind of dissidence that you and I experience. We know in our minds that God is with us. But our souls, our emotions are not catching up with our theology. Yeah, yeah, God is with us. We know all the promises.
We've sung all the songs. But why am I so downcast, oh my soul? So he talks with himself.
Just a little bit of healthy schizophrenia going on here in the text. We all talk to ourselves. I used to talk to myself a lot more.
A little less since I've been married, I'm sure. I have a friend who says he always talks to himself because he says he has just as a rule, he always wants to talk to the most intelligent person around. He's saying, why do I feel so bad when I've got all the promises of God? So I'm speaking to my soul. So why are you so downcast when God is here? Hope in God. That's another thing that made him pursue God. Of course, if we were to look at David's life, we'd discover also that the pleasures of this world that began to turn sour on him and that makes you pursue God. And guilt makes you pursue God. You see, guilt drives many people away from God. They think that God is so mad at them, why should they come into God's presence? And they do not understand that guilt is God trying to put his arms around them and bringing them back into fellowship. And that's why God rejoices when the prodigal son comes home. And we think, no, no, God will be happier if I just stay in the pig pan. No, God isn't happier. And so God pursues us in all these different ways. And if we're believers, he will not let us alone. He keeps pursuing us and say, I want you to trust me. I want you to love me. I want you to get to know me. About a week ago, my wife and I were at dinner with some friends who were involved in the construction industry for many, many, many years.
And their construction company went bankrupt because of a number of different reasons. And this man whom I've known for years sitting beside me at the table says, I just want you to know that for years I went to church, for years I did the right thing, for years I heard that I should know God. But he said, it never really penetrated me at all. And he says, now suddenly when our house was up for sale and they almost did lose their house and all of our savings were gone, he said, it drove me to God. He said, in the last two years, he said, I've read 37 books. And he says, I sit there reading books on theology and books on God. And my wife even said to me, why in the world? You don't even watch sports anymore, she said. She said, you just sit there and now you've become so boring reading all of these books.
One of the reasons she said that is because he said that he reads these books to her, so that could necessitate some negotiation. But I'm sitting watching this guy whom I knew 25 years ago, 30 years ago actually I met him. He was absolutely absorbed with the Chicago Cubs. If he couldn't go to a game, he watched the game. If he couldn't watch the game, he listened to the game, he kept up with the Chicago Cubs. Isn't it amazing how God undercuts things like Cub fans and the many different ways he does it?
He doesn't watch them anymore. David says, my soul longs for God. Now, what about God's desire for us? God's desire for us. The fact that we should know God and that we should desire him is very obvious, but does God actually desire us?
You know John Piper in his good book entitled Desiring God, a book that all of you should read. He says that the Westminster Confession of Faith, you remember, which says that the end of man is to glorify God and to enjoy him forever. It does not say the ends of man.
In other words, there are not two goals, there's only one. And the way in which that should be interpreted is that the chief and singular of man is to know God by enjoying him forever. You see, it is not just that we desire God, but wonder of wonders, God actually desires us. And that's why the Apostle Paul says that the time is coming when Jesus Christ is going to return to earth and be glorified. Jesus is going to be glorified in the saints.
And this past week I was reading the book of First Peter where it talked about those who are going to be glorified, whom God is going to glorify. God is so interested in us, we are number one on his agenda of things to take care of in the universe. And God can give us delight and he can give us joy because he himself is a happy God. You know, could you imagine trying to plug into a God who was unhappy, a God who was, and you've heard me say this before but it's got to come one more time, could you imagine trying to get to know a God who was moody, for example. A God who sometimes his emotions could not be depended upon. No, we can delight in God, in fact the Bible commands us to delight in God because God is a delightful God and desires our own individual delight. You say well isn't God upset because of the evil that is in the world? Well Jonathan Edwards answered that question this way and I believe it is biblical by saying that if you look at it narrowly, through a narrow lens, yes God is angry and God is upset. But if you look at it from the totality of where history is going and where it has come from and the ultimate glory of God, God is a happy God and God invites us to rejoice in him and the more we get to know him the more we can rejoice. You know my friend, I've discovered and I'm sure you have too that God is a very complex being. We're so thankful that his emotions are always in check, we thank him that he is a God of love, he's also a God of justice and judgment and we need to keep all of that in balance. Meanwhile I'm holding in my hands a letter from someone who is listening to us in Portuguese. This person, this woman goes on to say that she was separated from her husband for six years, she had already filed for divorce when God she said with his grace strengthened me through running to win.
Well the end of the story is I felt the Lord Jesus Christ resurrecting my marriage, we were reconciled and gave up on divorce, thank you. Now my friend, letters like that come to us because of people just like you. Your investment in this ministry is an investment in the lives of millions of people, thank you so much for helping us. Would you consider becoming an endurance partner, that's someone who stands with us regularly with their prayers and their gifts. Of course you need more info, I hope that you have a pen or pencil handy so that you can write this down. You can call us at 1-888-218-9337 or you can go to rtwoffer.com, that's rtwoffer.com and when you're there you click on the endurance partner button. You run with endurance the race that is set before us. Would you consider helping us?
Once again, rtwoffer.com. Time now for another chance for you to ask Pastor Lutzer a question about the Bible or the Christian life. The differences between the Old and New Testaments raise many questions such as these sent in to us from Stuart. To what degree are we bound by the Old Testament? My Baptist pastor used to say, I'm not bound by the Ten Commandments, meaning of course that Christ reiterated all of these laws except for keeping the Sabbath which as New Testament commandments do bind us. When we studied the book of Joshua in our church it provoked debate. Some argued that we should conduct ourselves just like Joshua, being prepared to kill any and all who interfered with God's plan. Others emphasized New Testament Christian love. What are your thoughts? Well Stuart, I want you to know that you asked enough questions here to occupy us from now until the end of the year.
These are very difficult questions but I need to at least comment on them and hopefully help you and point you in the right direction. First of all, your pastor probably is right that we are not under the law as a rule but nonetheless the law, even the ceremonial law, has much benefit to the Christian if we understand it and especially if we understand it in a spiritual sense. The more I think about this I see much more unity between the Old and the New Testament than I used to. But let me get to this issue of Joshua because your question is very troubling to me. You say that some in the church thought that we, like Joshua, should be prepared to kill anyone who interfered with God's plan.
Well my dear friend, if we did that we'd be killing everybody. The answer is no and then once again the answer is no and no. The way in which things operated in the Old Testament when you had a theocracy is very different than the New Testament. Now that does not mean that God has changed his mind regarding sin. That's a separate topic that I could talk about at great length.
What it does mean is that his administration is different. Today we do not stone people who commit adultery. We do not kill children who are rebellious and on and on we could go. So the point is this that Christian love however has to be tough love particularly for ourselves and then we need to be able to represent Jesus Christ to society.
You know you've asked such a tough question Stuart that I really need to end this but I want to give you a suggestion. When you think about the way in which we should live, read the Gospels and find out how Jesus lived. How did he treat people? How did he treat sinners? How did he treat those who were self-righteous? It seems to me that he should be our example and of course in the New Testament era we do recognize that there are many changes and we are under the law of Christ. Don't ever think that because it's New Testament that sin is safer than it used to be in Old Testament times or less serious.
Stuart we're just barely getting into it aren't we? Hope this helps a little bit and maybe in the future sometime in more detail I'll be able to clarify these matters. You have a good day. Thank you Pastor Lutzer and Stuart next time maybe just one question would be enough.
Thanks so much. If you'd like to hear your question answered go to our website at rtwoffer.com and click on Ask Pastor Lutzer or call us at 1-888-218-9337. That's 1-888-218-9337. You can write to us at Running to Win, 1635 North LaSalle Boulevard, Chicago, Illinois 60614.
Sometimes God withdraws his felt presence from us and we're left to trust him in blind faith. Next time on Running to Win Erwin Lutzer wraps up our study in Psalm 42 as we too learn to desire God. Plan to join us. This is Dave McAllister. Running to Win is sponsored by the Moody Church.
