It's easy to be thankful on a good day when the sun is shining and everyone is happy and healthy, and things are running smoothly.
What do we do on bad days? Well, as we'll hear today on Truth for Life, joyful thankfulness should be the daily expression of God's people, even when it seems like life has let us down. Alistair Begg is teaching today from the Psalms. I know when I say that, some of you think it's a line, it's rhetoric, but it's not. It's absolutely true. It is, in many ways, much easier to study stuff that is less familiar, less well-known, and harder to tackle than it is to come to that which we apparently know. Because the problem is, we think we know. And then we think that the people will think they know, and since we know that we don't know, we know that they don't know either. And yet, how are we going to convey this in a way that it is absolutely true? How are we going to convey this in a way that is absorbable and understandable?
And I gathered my thoughts around two main headings, which I'll mention to you. First of all, the invitation to thanksgiving, or, if you like, what we're called to do. And then the foundation for thanksgiving, or, if you like, what we need to know. First, then, the invitation to thanksgiving. You will realize—and the picture here is probably of the presiding priest welcoming people out and the courtyards as they make their way into the place of worship and celebration. And he greets them with a whole succession of verbs.
You will notice. Shout for joy, worship the Lord, come before him, know who he is, enter his gates, give thanks to him, praise his name. Nobody would be in any doubt, and any child reading the psalm even now, recognizes that this is a call to activity, that this is a call to action.
And so I determined that I would give you just two subheadings under our main heading. And the first of these is as follows, that what we have here in this invitation to thanksgiving is an invitation, first, to joyful worship. To joyful worship. Shout for joy to the Lord all the earth. No funereal faces here. No one looking as though they have swallowed something that has made them distinctly uncomfortable. No one looking like a large donkey leaning over a fence in the north of Scotland where it's freezing cold.
No, none of that at all. A cry to the nations to shout for joy. Now, you see, the psalmist recognizes, as we will go on to identify, that this is no mere rhetoric on his part. But the people of God, aware of God's activity in them and through them, have been surprised by joy, to quote the biography of C. S. Lewis.
Joy, if you like, has crept up on them and taken them by surprise. For example, in Isaiah 51.11, Isaiah says of these people, Everlasting joy will crown their heads, Gladness and joy will overtake them, And sorrow and sighing will flee away. The opportunity for joyful worship Is something which lifts the spirits of the genuine worshiper. And you will notice that no one is left out of the exhortation.
No one is sidelined by this invitation. Shout for joy to the Lord all the earth. The whole earth should praise God. That's what the psalmist says. This cry to shout for joy, this jubilate, should ring throughout the nations.
Why? Because God has made the nations, and he has made the nations for the praise of his glorious grace. Jehovah is not the tribal deity of Israel.
He is the sovereign ruler over the entire earth. And that is why joyful worship is the only right and proper response to God's revelation of himself. That is why, by the time you get all the way into the New Testament and to the applicatory portions of Paul's treatise on the Gospel in Romans, he says, by way of application to those whom he has instructed for eleven chapters, therefore, he says, brothers and sisters, I beseech you, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice to him which is your only reasonable service of worship. And what he is doing is he's fastening on the truth that the psalmist reveals here. There are all kinds of sacrifices in the Old Testament.
If we were to summarize them under two headings, they would be these. First of all, the sacrifices that are propitiatory to deal with sin, and then sacrifices that are celebratory or dedicatory in response to sin having been dealt with. And it is to this second dimension that we are called to recognize the wonder of what has been accomplished for us in the mercies of God—that that which was pictured in the Old Testament sacrificial system pointed forward to Jesus, a Lamb without spot and without blemish, who would bear our sins in his own body on the tree. And in light of that, then, surely, who, like the redeemed, should sing his praise? Well, the invitation is then, first of all, an invitation to joyful worship. And in verse 4, it is an invitation to thankful praise. Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise.
The simplicity of the very invitation daren't prevent us from being grasped by the wonder of it. Enter his gates. Gates are interesting things, aren't they?
I know they swing both ways. And you may have gates that are your favorites. I suppose when I think of gates in any ultimate sense, I think of Buckingham Palace, and some of you have been there, and you understand why. Because like me and amongst the commoners, you have crowded around, and you have stood at those gates, and you've actually even poked your nose a little bit through the railings. But you've been struck by the fact that the gates are closed, and they're purposefully closed. They're closed in order to prevent our entrance. They're closed in order to protect the sovereign.
They're closed in order to make the point that we are not going in. It is Jesus who gives access to the Father. And the gates are opened wide, and they're opened wide in welcome. And the invitation that is given in this festal procession is to come right in—not to trample in his courts but to enter his courts with praise. In fact, the prophet speaks of those who simply trample around. God says, through the prophet in Isaiah 1 12, when you come to appear before me, who has asked this of you, this trampling of my courts?
You see the difference? Of course, you may trample because you're clueless. Oh, I didn't realize. You may trample because you're careless.
Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't notice. You may trample because you're callous. I don't care about your signs or about your flowers. Did you come to trample in the courts of God today? Just to trample in? Clueless? Or careless? I hope no one's callous.
Who cares? Let's get this over with. Let's get on with the real day. Now, you see, the invitation is very straightforward. Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise. Because, you see, the Christian of all people recognizes the wonder of this invitation—that the torn curtain at the time of the death of Jesus pictures what Christ had performed, opening up a new and living way into the presence of God by his own sacrifice once and for all and by his own blood. And when I understand this, then, irrespective of my circumstances or the state of my own health or my well-being or my interest in things, I realize why the hymn writers have helped us by saying, My heart is filled with thankfulness to him who bore my pain. Now, the invitation is a clear one, isn't it?
It's a timely one. An invitation to thanksgiving, an invitation to joyful worship, and to thankful praise. But if you're thinking—and I know you are—then you have to say to yourself, Well, on what basis, then, this joyful worship and this thankful praise? We've hinted at it, but now we need to get to the heart of it. Because here we have the foundation for thanksgiving.
The foundation for thanksgiving. Notice the verb that begins verse 3, Know that the LORD is God. Knowledge is power.
Knowledge is the basis for our praise. If you read your Bible at all, you will know that the Bible knows nothing of empty-headed Christians. There are empty-headed Christians, and there is some empty-headed Christian preaching, but it's not from the Bible. It's not from the Bible.
No, the Bible is very clear. You will notice that this doesn't stir up our emotions. Emotion is involved—not emotionalism, emotion. But it doesn't start from there. It doesn't start in the heart and try and stir the head.
It starts in the head and moves to the heart. You need to know something, he says. If you're going to accept my invitation to shout in this way to exuberant vocal praise, if you're going to become a people that are marked by this thing, there are certain things you need to know.
And if you don't know them, you will never be able to engage in this way. The expressions of gratitude that come are tied neither to the son of circumstances nor to his feelings. And were that not the case, then I don't know how it would be that the gentleman who wrote to me this week from the state prison in California could give such expressions of gratitude to God and thankfulness. He actually wrote to me from Pleasant Valley State Prison.
There's an oxymoron for you, I suppose. So where are you spending Thanksgiving? Well, I'm in Pleasant Valley. Oh, that sounds very nice. No, but wait a minute, it's not just—that's not the whole address.
But what about this fellow in Pleasant Valley State Prison? And how was your Thanksgiving? All your family there, were they? A superb meal, just the way your mother usually makes it? Well, I don't know how you could be thankful at all. You see, because we got it all wrong as the foundation for Thanksgiving.
The real foundation for Thanksgiving is in knowing that the Lord is God. You see, to know is to have firm ground underfoot. To know is to have firm ground underfoot. Several engineers recognize this. It is on the basis of knowledge and calculation that we can endeavor to take that strain and to bear that load.
We don't want somebody feeling that it would be a nice idea to have the bridge a little like this. No, we need to know. We need to know. You see, the Christian knows. Doesn't know everything, but knows this.
He took me out of a miry pit—this is the psalmist as well, you remember, in Psalm 40—he took me out of a miry pit and from the slimy clay, and he set my feet upon a rock, and he established my going, and he put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to my God. You see, it is the strength of the foundation that gives the basis for the exuberance of the praise. You see, the foundation for Thanksgiving is in what we know. What do we need to know? Two things.
Two things. He tells us, one, that the Lord is God. That the Lord is God. That Yahweh is Elohim.
That the Lord is God. He is the creator of the ends of the earth, and we were made by him. Notice, it is he who made us, and we are his.
The reference here is not to the work of creation in terms of our individual DNA and stuff. The reference here is to the work of God in creating a people that are his very own. You remember, he says to Abram, Through your seed all the nations of the earth will be blessed. And what the psalmist is saying here is this. Our very existence as a company of God's people, our very gathering in this way, is indication of who God is. God is the God who made us. Once we weren't a people, but now we are the people.
Once we didn't receive mercy, now we have received mercy. Well, you say, That sounds like the New Testament. Well, it is actually the New Testament.
But Peter is using Old Testament language to make the point. 1 Peter 2 verse 9, But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God. Once you were not a people, but now you're the people of God.
Once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy. You see, that's church. That's the people of God. Hey, are your feet on a solid rock? Yeah.
So are mine. Let's sing. Hey, were you in the miry clay?
Yeah, I was too. How did you get out? God brought me out. Hey, he brought me out as well. Let's sing.
What do you want to sing? Oh, I don't know. Just something. Well, you see, there's nothing in it. It doesn't come out. God puts it in before he brings it out.
What do we need to know? That the Lord is God, that we were made by him, and secondly, that we belong to him. That's the second half of verse 3. We are his people. We don't belong to ourselves. You're not your own.
You were bought with a price. When you were redeemed, you ceased to be your own man. You're God's man. You're God's woman. And God has given you a whole forever family.
And they're just as funny and weird as your own family, and in some cases funnier and weirder. But when we look upon one another, we realize that as the cry goes out, as the invitation goes out to sing God's praise, we look at one another and say, Don't you think we ought to be making a noise here or doing something about this? After all, I was in the miry clay. I'm on a solid rock, and so are you.
I couldn't hear you singing behind a bus ticket. What's up with you? Do you get the picture again in 1 Peter 2? He says, We were created for the praise of his glory. Peter simply knows his Bible. He knows that God views his people as those who were created for his splendor and for his glory.
And so Peter reinforces it. He is the potter who has fashioned us, and he is the shepherd who tends to us. He is the one who makes us lie down in green pastures. It is a lovely verse 3, isn't it? Know that the LORD is God. O God, help me to know that you are my Lord and God, that you made your people, that we belong to you, and that we are the sheep of your pasture. And the wonder of it is that he has redeemed us, that he has brought us into the fellowship of the Son that he loves, and all that is now ours in the Lord Jesus Christ is not an occasion for pride but is an occasion for praise. And I say to you again, we need to know this, so that the hymn writer capturing it says, It's what I know of thee, my Lord and God, that fills my heart with praise, my lips with song. If you think about it, the whole world's about praise. It's the spontaneous acknowledgement of what is valuable, and people praise what is valuable to them. They talk about what is valuable. That's why if you just let somebody talk for five minutes, you will find out what they're on about.
You'll find out what they like or what they read or if they read or they don't read. It will come out. And the point the psalmist is making is, if you assemble the people of God and leave them on their own, and they don't begin to sing exuberant, joyful worship, you know they have a problem.
Because people give vent to that which is most valuable to them. You get it? Isn't she lovely? Wasn't that a glorious sunset?
Did you see that game? Have you read that book? That's praise! The spontaneous, voluntary overflow of that which we value.
Incidentally, education is about teaching us what to value, so that we might value that which is most valuable, so that we might give vent to our feelings in relationship to those things. Finally, we need to know not only that the Lord is God, but we also need to know that the Lord is good. That the Lord is good. Moses meets God on Sinai, and God comes proclaiming his name.
Listen to it. The Lord, the Lord, compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. That's Exodus 34 6. And it is this that the psalmist affirms as the very foundation for thanksgiving.
Why give him thanks? For the Lord is good, and his love endures forever. This is his covenant love, his steadfast love that we sang about at the beginning. This is the faithfulness that continues through all generations—the covenant love of God by which he saves and preserves and keeps his people and causes generations yet unborn to arise and give him praise in their day. It is the sovereign grace of God that will not let us go, that affirms his faithfulness to us despite our wanderings.
And I think this was really my great discovery of thanksgiving in the study of this psalm, because I realized all of a sudden it hit me like standing on the end of a rake. I realized how narcissistic my interest in thanksgiving really was, how self-focused it really was, how it had to do ultimately with my stomach or with my feelings or with self-aggrandizement in some way. And I realized that if someone were to come in and take away that ability to eat, take away the company of those people, remove me from the benefits of this freedom, place me in a miserable desert, stick me in the wilds of Afghanistan, put me somewhere out in the middle of Iraq, remove me from everything that represents, you know, this great American experience, then I say to myself, I don't know what I would do. What would I sing about? What would I say?
With whom would I gather? What was our boy doing in the Pleasant Valley State Prison? None of this. That's not to make us feel bad. It is to make us understand this.
And I hope you get this, and with this I will close. You see, even when our voices are choked with tears, when our hearts fail us, when our circumstances frustrate us, when life seems to let us down or does let us down, when we are a disappointment to those who love us, yes, and a disappointment to ourselves, we may still find in God's covenant love the foundation for joyful worship and thankful praise. You know, one of the distinctive marks of Christian experience is a thankful heart, and one of the strongest indications of the fact that I am not yet a Christian is ingratitude. They neither knew God, although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him. And I just want to finish with this P.S., and that is for somebody who may be here this morning and say, Well, maybe I get a hint of this from what you're saying.
Maybe you're honest enough to say, You know, I've actually been trying to figure this equation out entirely on my own. I've been endeavoring to enjoy the kind of goodness and the gifts of this God while at the same time just ignoring the God himself. And I thought that if I got enough of the goodness and enough of the gifts, that would be enough for me. But I found that neither these expressions of goodness nor the gifts are able to fill the longings of my life.
No, they aren't, because Pascal was right. The void inside of us is a God-shaped void. It can't be filled by his gifts or his goodness.
It can only be filled by himself. The appeal is universal. It's an appeal to the nations to shout to God, to come and meet him in joyful worship and thankful praise, to know that he's God, that he made his people, that we belong to him, that he's good, and that he's good even when days are bad, even when doubts arise, even when fears consume us.
And that's the only foundation upon which we can say, Thank you. You're listening to Truth for Life. That is Alistair Begg reminding us that God is good, even on our bad days. Now, as most of you know, next week we celebrate Thanksgiving in the United States, and we're looking ahead to Christmas as well. So we are recommending a book today that we've selected called Promises Made, Promises Kept. This is a family devotional for Christmas, it's a colorfully illustrated, cleverly designed collection of Bible stories that your family can enjoy together, beginning the week before Christmas. The daily readings will take you and your school-aged children through seven Old Testament stories that predict the coming of the Savior, and then on Christmas Day you flip the book upside down, and over the next seven days you'll read seven more stories, this time from the New Testament.
These are stories that tell how God's promise of a Messiah was fulfilled in Jesus. Ask for your copy of the book Promises Made, Promises Kept, when you donate to Truth for Life today at truthforlife.org slash donate. And while you're on our website, if you're looking for other Christmas gift ideas, you'll want to browse several items that are available for purchase at our cost at truthforlife.org slash gifts.
You'll find a bundle of books for preschoolers, there's a book written for older children that explores the parables Jesus told, there's a pocket-sized booklet that teaches young children the story of God's plan of salvation, and there are gifts for adults. Again, visit truthforlife.org slash gifts. Thanks for joining us today. Tomorrow we'll explore the difference between natural gratitude and a believer's thankfulness. I hope you'll join us. The Bible teaching of Alistair Begg is furnished by Truth for Life where the Learning is for Living.
