The World’s Greatest Love Letter

Today on Summit Life with J.D.

Greer. The main message of the Bible is not, here are some practical tools that can fix your life. It is the story of his love for you. What you hold in your hands is not a book of commands or heroes. It's the worlds and universes greatest love letter. Have you ever read it that way? Have you ever read it as God's statement of love, his love letters to you? Welcome back to another week of solid biblical teaching here on Summit Life with Pastor J.D.

Greer. As always, I'm your host, Molly Vidovich, and I am so glad that you're with us today. Okay, so when you pick up a Bible, did you know that you're actually holding 66 individual books written by more than 30 authors over a span of thousands of years? And yet, miraculously, it all tells one story. That's the subject of a new teaching series that we're kicking off today on Summit Life titled The Whole Story. Over the next few months, we're going to go from the beginnings in Genesis to the conclusion of the story in the book of Revelation, hitting most of the major events in between.

But before we get to Genesis, Pastor J.D. is kicking off the study with a quick stop in the book of Psalms. He titled this message The World's Greatest Love Letter. Today, we are going to spend some time on the greatest love poem that's ever written in human history, Psalm 119.

Psalm 119 is the longest chapter in the Bible, 176 verses. It is a love poem about the Bible itself. We do not know who the author of this poem is.

Our best guess is Ezra, who wrote the book of Ezra in the Old Testament. But I hope that you see that it is significant, listen, that the longest love poem in the Bible is not about marriage, it's not about children, it's not about mountains, it's not about sunsets or good health, it's about the Bible. Because the author understands that the greatest beauty that God has put on the earth is not found in romantic love, it's not going to be found in nature, it's not going to be found in children. The greatest beauty that God has deposited on earth is in that book you hold in your hands. Jewish people have for years used this Psalm, Psalm 119, as a part of their Rosh Hashanah celebration, their New Year's celebration.

So how appropriate for us to be able to open up with this same Psalm. Charles Spurgeon said that every preacher should memorize this Psalm in its entirety. And Blaise Pascal, the philosopher I quote a lot, had the whole thing memorized.

William Wilberforce, who stopped slavery in the Western world, he had it memorized. I will not tell you if I have it memorized or not. But you guys know how humble I am, and I would never want to show off if I had memorized it. So I'm just going to act like I'm reading a few verses when you know I'm really quoting it all from memory, okay? And then I'll give you a brief four and a half reflections on the verses that we read. These are not all the verses in the Psalm, but these kind of represent to me the main things that the Psalmist is trying to say. So Psalm 119, here we go, verse nine.

How can a young man keep his way pure by guarding it according to your word? Verse 11, I have stored up your word in my heart that I might not sin against you. Verse 14, I rejoice in following your statutes like one rejoices and winning the lottery.

That's my translation. Even though princes sit plotting against me, your servant will meditate on your statutes. Verse 41, let your steadfast love come to me, O Lord, your salvation according to your promise.

Then shall I have an answer for him who taunts me, for I trust in your word. Verse 72, the law from your mouth is more precious to me than thousands of pieces of silver and gold. Verse 89, forever. Forever, O Lord, your word is firmly fixed in the heavens. Your laws endure to this day for all things serve you. Verse 99, I have more understanding than all of my teachers for your testimonies are my meditation.

I understand more than the agent, for I keep your precepts. Verse 105, your word is a lamp to my feet and a light unto my path. 109, I hold my life in my hand continually.

It means I hold my life lightly, but I cling to your, I do not forget your law, I cling to it with all of my life. 111, your testimonies are my heritage, my inheritance, what I'm looking forward to. Forever, for they are the joy, the delight of my heart. Verse 116, sustain me, my God, according to your promise.

And I will live. 133, keep steady my steps according to your promise, and let no iniquity have dominion over me. 176, the last verse in the Psalm, I have gone astray like a lost sheep.

Seek your servant, for I do not forget your commandments. Let me give you four and a half reflections on what I think the Psalmist is trying to show us and the things that he says or she says about the word of God here. Number one, if you're taking notes, the Bible is revelation from God. The Bible is revelation from God. Throughout this Psalm, the author refers to scripture as testimonies from God, statutes, law, precepts, rules, commandments, and word from God. Nowhere in scripture, nowhere in scripture, not one place has scripture talked about as enlightened human thoughts about God.

It is God's revelation come down to us. And that is one of the most important things that you can learn about the Bible. You see our culture relegates this book, the Bible, as one collection of enlightened thoughts about God. And it might be a good collection of enlightened thoughts about God, arising from certain cultures and Western tradition, but every religion has its own contribution to make.

And we are going to be smarter when we learn from everybody. That is not what Jesus, nor is it what the prophets or what the writer of this Psalm believes about the Bible. Jesus believed that when the authors of the Bible wrote, they spoke with the very voice of God. In Mark chapter 12, for example, Jesus quotes a passage from the Old Testament that is clearly written by David, but he doesn't open it by saying, David said, he opens it, Mark 12, 36, by saying, God said. You say, well, but how can something written by a fallible human being like David, how could it actually be the word of God?

Theologians compare it to the virgin birth of Jesus. Jesus was both human and divine. The human part of Jesus meant that Jesus was limited in his power.

He limited himself. He didn't fly everywhere he went. There were certain kinds of knowledge he limited himself to, but he was also 100% divine, which meant that Jesus was 100% free from error and sin. Well, the same is true of the word of God.

The word of God that you hold is 100% written by humans, but it is also 100% divine, which means it is absolutely perfect and free from error. I know it is popular today to say, well, I believe in Jesus, but not all the stuff that's written in the Bible. Listen, I'm gonna tell you as humbly and clearly as I can, if you say that, you don't really believe in Jesus because Jesus saw himself as only the explainer and the fulfiller of scripture, never its corrector. In fact, Jesus said Matthew 5 18, that sooner would heaven and earth pass away than one syllable out of the Bible become untrue. Now, of course, you have to learn how to interpret the Bible. You gotta know when the Bible is speaking metaphorically. You have to learn which laws the Bible says do not apply to us anymore.

And we're gonna get into that. But for now, what I need you to see is that Jesus thought of that book that you hold in your hands as absolutely perfect. For it to be wrong would be like saying to him that God was wrong because the book was 100% divine. It was the word from God. Here's how the writer of the Psalm says it verse 89, forever your word is established in the heavens.

Not it's being edited and improved. It's been established in the heavens forever. The Bible is a word that comes down from above, not a consensus of wisdom that rises up from below.

And here is why I belabor this, because you gotta decide whether that is true or not. That is the most important question you're ever gonna consider about the Bible. Is the Bible actually what Jesus and the prophets and the apostles said that it was? Because if it is, that changes the way that you approach it. It means that you accept it, even the parts that make you mad and that you disagree with it, because it's a word from God. And you don't pick and choose the parts of the Bible you like like it's a salad bar that you're constructing your own meal from. God is the judge and he's the one that's right. And we're like, well, he and I disagree.

He's right and I'm wrong, right? If on the other hand, this is just a collection of human ideas about God, then have at it, sift through what, take what's helpful and leave what's not helpful. But whatever it is, you gotta choose which one you believe it. Is it what Jesus said it was, or is it just a collection of human ideas?

Here's number two. Number two, the Bible is life-giving law. The Bible is life-giving law. The word law that the Psalmist uses throughout the Psalm, like verse 72 that we read a moment ago, just means straight edge.

Literally in Hebrew is what it means, straight edge. Like something you would use to measure a piece of cloth or construct a building. If you don't have a standard measurement for those things, then you end up with chaos.

I mean, imagine if everybody could redefine inch or pound. God's law is the straight edge by which we measure all things in life, that which is good, that which is bad, that which is right and that which is wrong. Now I realized that that also is anathema to our culture because our culture cherishes the idea that ultimately, the one who makes the best decisions about what's right and wrong for me is what is deep inside my heart. But how are you to determine what inside your heart is good and what is bad? And you cannot say that everything in my heart is good. Nobody says that. Nobody says that. I'll give you an example.

Tim Keller says this. You got to imagine two young men in their early twenties. They are walking down the street, but one of them lives in 800 AD in Viking, Norway.

And the other one is a young professional in downtown Durham in 2016. They have two impulses in their hearts. Both of them. One impulse is, I want to go back to the shop where that guy just insulted my honor and I'm going to murder him. The other impulse is, I want to have sex with another man.

Both of them come from inside of him. In the first culture, they would say, obey the first, obey your honor, but shun the second. Whereas our culture would flip it and say, shun the first, but obey the second because that's the real you.

Now, the point of that is not to say those are moral equivalents. The point of that is to say, you know that just because something comes from deep inside your heart, doesn't make it good or healthy or wise. Why would you say that everything that our culture believes is going to be right, whereas everything previous cultures believe is wrong?

Could you put down your arrogance for just a second and have a little historical humility and realize that 100 years from now, your kids and great-grandkids are going to make fun of somebody else? You're going to make fun of some of the stuff you believed. And realize that the only way that you'll have the straight edge of going through life is to found your understanding of right and wrong, not based on what everybody else around you think or what's in that dark heart of yours, but you base it on the illuminated word of God. The Bible ought to, listen, the Bible ought to contradict you and make you mad.

If it doesn't, you're not really reading it. In fact, if it doesn't ever make you mad, all you're doing is taking some of your own preconceived ideas of right and wrong and deifying them and calling that God. And you're just worshiping yourself. The Bible makes me mad sometimes. And I know that I'm like a professional Christian and it's my, but it still makes me mad. It's just what it means when it comes from a word from God that is super cultural and beyond us, it contradicts us because God is God.

Look at this, I love this. Psalm 119, 99. I have one understanding that all my teachers for your testimonies are my meditation. I understand more than the age if I keep your precepts. Let's talk about liberals for a minute.

All right, hang with me. Liberals like progressive wisdom. They always want to be on the right side of history. So it's always the future. That's where the wisdom is. Conservatives, by contrast, oh, they like the wisdom of the past. That's where the word comes from. We want to conserve all these great things from the past. Which one is better?

Well, trick question, right? When you are shaped by the word of God, you're not really going to be a true liberal or a true conservative because you're going to critique the past. You're going to critique the traditions of the aged and you're going to critique the future, which is the progressive wisdom of your confused professor. He gives you the ability to be neither a conservative or a liberal. Verse 105, your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path. In other words, the word of God gives me the ability to find the way in a place of confusion and darkness.

C.S. Lewis said, he said, yes, the law can be narrow and constraining, but it's like somebody who is lost in the woods that suddenly in the dark finds the path again. You ever been lost in the woods? So when God built me, he chose not to give me one ounce of any sense of direction. But he also chose to give me this pioneering spirit that says, wherever I am, there's probably a shorter way to get to where I need to go than the path that has been laid out.

These are two very dangerous things for God to put into one human being, which means I spend a lot of time lost. And when I'm in the woods, I'm like, why are we going? We should go that way. I think we can get back to wherever we're going that way. And when I get lost, you're just feeling a panic. And then, you know, it starts getting dark and you're trying to, and you're just walking. And then all of a sudden you find that path again, right? And that light shines on that path and you're like, here it is, here it is. And it's narrow and it's constraining, but it's liberating at the same time because it is the path out of the darkness.

Listen, college students, high school students, you're about to walk into some wildernesses known as dating and college and career. And you got a bunch of things that there's nobody, not me, not your parents is going to be able to prepare you for. And the Psalmist says, it is the word of God that gives me light and insight into things I can't see because it helps me see the end before I even get to the beginning. The word is a light to your path and whatever the verse says. Verse 133, keep steady my steps according to your promise and let no iniquity get dominion over me.

Steady, the word right here, steady. Whatever part of your life is not anchored into God's word is going to be a shaky part. And what happens is the enemy finds whatever shaky in your life and that becomes the area he begins to tap. I will say that one more time.

I'll give you an illustration too. Whatever part of your life is not anchored into God's word is the part that the enemy is going to start tapping and he's going to try to bring the whole structure down. It's kind of like the game Jenga. What happens is the enemy looks at you and he figures out what parts are not anchored into God's word. Maybe it's your career. Maybe it's your money.

Maybe it's your purity. And he starts tapping it and tapping that. And eventually he finds the one that brings the whole structure of your life down. So he says, you got to stay steady by building every part, thinking through every part of your life on the word of God. Verse 23, even though princes sit plotting against me, your servant will meditate on your statutes. When the most powerful people in the world, whether they're financial, political, my friends, my spouse, when they turn against me, the first place I turn to say is, are my feet anchored in God's word? Because even the most powerful people around me can be against me.

But if my feet are on God's word, then my feet are on a solid foundation. Where do you turn in opposition? Where do you turn in tragedy? Where do you turn when the bad health report comes in?

Where do you turn when your marriage goes into hard times? Because the way that your life stays steady is when you are anchored in God's word. Number three, the Bible, he says, is primarily the story of God's deeds, not ours. It's the record of his promise, not our duties.

Let me explain this to you. Look at verse 27 there. Cause me to understand the way of your precepts that I may meditate on your wonderful deeds. Wait, I thought the Bible was about all the deeds that I was supposed to do. But here he's telling me, I got to meditate on what he's done. Let your steadfast love come to me, O Lord, your salvation according to your promise. The Bible is primarily the story of somebody who came to rescue you because you'd broken all the rules, rejected all the advice and messed yourself up so bad that you were unable to start keeping any of it again. And that story of love is going to be so big and so captivating that when you finally learn that story, the rest of your life is going to start to make sense. And you're going to be able to think about your marriage differently and your career differently. And you're going to have the motivation to start to obey God again. You got to stop reading the Bible as if it's all about you, because it's not. It's all about Jesus. If your life were conceived as a movie, who would you think the main character would be?

You're like, well, duh, it's me. It's a movie about me. Scripture says, what if we gave you the invitation to get out of a movie about you and get into one where you're not the main character, but you're a minor character?

Now it's going to change some things. Because what's going to change is the fact that not everything that happens to you is going to be for you. In fact, God may prosper you because he wants you to support with your prosperity the point of the main character. And if God puts you through pain, if you blow up in an X-wing fighter, maybe it's because you're supporting something that the main character is doing. And the point is not living and dying. The point is how you are contributing to a story that's going to last and go on forever. You say, well, why would I want to do that?

I want to be a main character on my movie. Here's why, because that movie goes on forever for all eternity. It is the kingdom that nothing can ever touch or change. And I find a strange amount of significance and purpose in being a minor character in a movie that's about Jesus. That's the invitation of scripture is that it is all about him. You have to stop reading the Bible as if it's all about you. The main message of the Bible is not here are some practical tools that can fix your life. The main message of the Bible is fix your eyes on Jesus. And then your problems are going to be seen in a different light.

And then when you fix your eyes on Jesus, he'll begin to fix your life for you. By the way, that's why all the genealogies and those things are in there. You read a genealogy and you're like, what does Abimashazzam and Moshe also got to do with my marriage?

Nothing, in a direct way, but they're all about Jesus. And when you see the story about Jesus, suddenly everything in your life looks different. This is not a book of duties of things you need to do for God. It is the story of his love for you. What you hold in your hands is not a book of commands or heroes. It's the world's and universe's greatest love letter. Have you ever read it that way? Have you ever read it as God's statement of love, his love letters to you? Number four, the Bible has more value than life itself. The Bible has more value than life itself. The Psalmist says that the word has more value to him than thousands of pieces of silver or gold. See verse 72, thousands of pieces of silver or gold. Verse 109, what I showed you, he says, I hold my life very lightly in my hand, but I cling to your law. I hold it like a drowning man would cling to a life raft. Very simply, I want to ask you this question. What level of importance does the Bible have in your life? Men, let me talk to you for a minute.

If you found out that some kind of predator was in your neighborhood and you just let your kids go out and play with no supervision, what kind of dad would you be? Yet Jesus Christ, who you say understands reality more than anybody else, tells us that there is an enemy who prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. And Jesus said his intent for your kids is to kill, to steal and destroy them.

Their only hope, your only hope is scripture. Because the only way that you can confront a lie is to know the truth. When Satan attacked Jesus, Jesus didn't outwit him. He didn't outsmart him. He didn't say I'm better than you.

He didn't say I'm moral and you can't tempt me. He quoted scripture. What are your kids going to come up with when Satan attacks them?

Not if Satan attacks them, when Satan attacks them. Y'all, it is the word of God that God used to create everything that you see. He didn't mix up a potion and create out of that. He spoke a word. It was with a word that God raised Jesus from the dead. It was with a word that he gave sight to the blind. It's with a word that the book of Revelation tells us that one day he will destroy the works of the enemy and make all things new. It is by the word of God that God will release you from the chains of sin. He will heal the wounds of addiction. It is by his word that he will pick up the shards of a broken relationship and put back a family together again.

There is no power on earth. There is no power in the universe quite like the word of God. It is the word that creates. It is the word that redeems. It is the word that restores. It's the word that heals.

Everything in the Bible is about the word. You've got to know it. You've got to believe it.

It's got to saturate you. When life cuts you, you've got to bleed God's word. When life shakes you, you've got to regurgitate God's word. And the problem is not that you don't know that. The problem is that you've never brought your practices in line with what you believe.

So why not let this be the year that you change that? Which leads me to the last verse in Psalm 119. Look at it.

I love it. Psalm 19 176. I've gone astray like a lost sheep. Seek your servant for I do not forget your commandments.

Do you see kind of like a... Does it almost seem contradictory to you? It does to me. I've gone astray like a lost sheep, but I've not forgotten your commandments. Well, which is it? If you read the Psalm like I did this week several times, what you'll start to see is that there's all kinds of these little contradictions in there, seeming contradictions. In one breath, the Psalmist says, I hate double-mindedness. And two verses later, he's like, I am double-minded. I love the law.

Oh, I love a lot of other stuff besides the law. Which is it? Does he love it or does he not?

Here's the answer. He wants to love it. He wants to love it, but he knows his heart is divided. So he resolves that he's going to love it and ask God to bring his heart into line. You see, I love that because the writer of the Psalm is just like me. I want to love God's word. But I'll tell you, a lot of times I'm looking more forward to the next episode or whatever show is coming out that I'm watching than I am, what God has to say to me in his word. And so what I want to resolve is, God, would you bring my heart in line with what I know to be true. Christian growth begins by confessing to God what you are not and then asking God to make you into what you know you should be. And Jesus died so that you could be. For most of us, including me, the word doesn't have nearly the place of prominence in our lives that it should. Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it.

Prone to leave the God I love. Here's my heart, Lord, taken. Seal it, seal it for thy courts above. Why not let this be the year that we resolve together as a church, that this year is going to be the year of the Bible for us, that we will choose to hate double-mindedness, that we will ask God to change our hearts so the word of God becomes our prize, our passion, our treasured possession, that we would seek it more than we seek riches, more than we seek the applause of men.

We would pant for it more than a drowning man pants for another breath. I want you to resolve that and then ask God to bring your heart in line with what you know to be true. Kicking off a brand new teaching series called The Whole Story, you're listening to Summit Life with J.D.

Greer. We're so excited to have you along with us for this study as we walk through the Bible from Genesis to Revelation. You can always find all of our teaching free of charge at jdgreer.com. I think we'd all agree that the Bible is essential, but so is prayer. They go together hand in hand. The word of God is part of the two-way communication we have with our Father. But the truth is prayer can be a struggle. Giving specific practical tips for growing in prayer in everyday life, Pastor J.D. 's brand new book called Just Ask will leave you wanting to pray rather than just feeling like you should. Be one of the very first to have a copy of this new resource just released today. When you give $25 or more to support this ministry, we'll send you a copy of Just Ask as our way of saying thanks. You can also request the book when you make your first donation as a member of our monthly gospel partner family. If you've been growing through this program, why not join the team today? Give us a call at 866-335-5220.

Or you can give and request the book online at jdgreer.com. I'm Mollie Vidovitch. Tomorrow we're starting at the very beginning, looking at the creation account in the book of Genesis and discovering how even from the first days, the Bible is always about Jesus. Be sure to listen Tuesday to Summit Life with J.D. Greer. Today's program was produced and sponsored by J.D. Greer Ministries.