MPC, 22nd April 2001.Psalm 62 "Rest, In Our Rock Solid God"
Maurie Cropper MPC, 22nd April 2001.
Tony Barber, who spent ten years hosting Sale of the Century, has just written his biography. I read an article about it recently. It talked about his very full life of hosting other shows like Family Feud, and The Great Temptation, and his time many years ago spent with the English Navy. And then there's his promotional work, TV and other media. A singing career, as well as his work on stage, and in advertising. The list is quite exhausting. He's packed a lot into his 61 years. But as with other busy people, his busy-ness took it's toll. Busy people have to slow down. Otherwise relationships, especially close ones just pass you by.
It's like that these days with our relationship with God. We have to stop! Take stock of ourselves, or we just pass God by. It's crazy when you think about it. God offers us the very rest that we spend our whole life searching for. If only we'd stop, and take note of what He offers.
But then maybe our expectations of God are more than what he offers us.
Because our experience is, that life keeps robbing us of our expectations. Everything important in life defies our attempt to control it - or define it - or pin it down and bring it under our control! We struggle for control over questions like: What is true love? How do we become wise? How do I live with integrity when I know that I've failed in certain areas of my life?
Just when our hopes are built up, and we assume we can rest in our success, everything seems to be ripped from our grasp.
None of this is new of course.
Psalm 62 tells us that this was also King David's experience. But this psalm gives us another perspective. It tells us that the key, the key to life, the key to finding rest, is TRUSTING GOD.
But we're impatient for maturity aren't we?
I remember what it was like, ...being just a kid, being impatient for things to happen. Like Christmas and my birthdays. They seemed to take all year to come round when I couldn't wait!
And as I was getting older, ...and being told: You're just a kid. You can't do that. You can't go there. You have to wait until you're older.
WAIT! Fair dinkum, I don't know how many times hearing that got me stirred up! Wait! No way! I thought growth was easy, and I wanted it then and there.
You know, we cause ourselves so much difficulty in life because we want easy growth. But growth, change, maturity, is never easy. And we make it more difficult for ourselves if we seek to achieve these things in any other place rather than in God. Because true growth and maturity are to be found only in God.
The New American Standard Bible translates the first verse of Psalm 62 as "My soul waits in silence for God only; from Him is my salvation".
'Waiting' and 'silence' seem to be two things we hate. We're always so busy. We've filled every area of our lives with business, amusements and noise. But some things can only be learned in WAITING and SILENCE.
And so it is with David. He has learnt much about God. David has learnt that his soul finds rest in God.
Picking it up again at verse 1:
"My soul finds rest in God alone; my salvation comes from him. He alone is my rock and my salvation; he is my fortress, I shall never be shaken."
Do you wonder how David came to find such stability, ...such deep rest of soul in God?
How is it that when our lives seems out of control, ...when people we love and care for are experiencing terrible emotional turmoil and pain, how is it that David can say 'his soul finds rest in God'?
Do you want to know the answer?
Be careful. Because you won't like the answer.
I sure as heck don't!
David has come to this conclusion through suffering. Not by seeking it. He was no masochist. David as King was under constant threat. David's downfall, even from within his own ranks, was the ambition of many. Jealous of his lofty position as king, they would at the same time as blessing him with their mouths, be cursing him with their hearts.
Reading from v.3:
"How long will you assault a man? Would all of you throw him down - this leaning wall, this tottering fence [this vulnerable man]? They fully intend to topple him from his lofty place; they take delight in lies. With their mouths they bless, but in their hearts they curse."
Yes, there were those who were only too eager for David's downfall.
So with his back against the wall so-to-speak, under assault, and with his life in danger - vulnerable and weak, and suffering the lies and hypocrisy that were fully intended to cause his ruin, David learns a fundamental but oh so difficult lesson. He learns that true rest can be found in only one source, ....well let's hear it from David, ...verse 5
"Find rest, O my soul, in God alone ..."
David found "rest" in God. When REST is found God, so too, is hope found. David found "hope" ...and he found security and safety, dependency, salvation, and refuge. THIS IS REST!!.
In God David found a person that he could trust, a person that he could pour out his heart to. And unlike his experiences with those who openly blessed him but secretly cursed, ...David found no hypocrisy in God.
God is fortress like, ....ROCK SOLID!
David's had to go through suffering to find out that real rest can only be found in God.
God has met David as he meets us in the heartaches and the pain of life. David is so certain of this he makes a plea to others. His plea is this:
Verse 8: "Trust in him at all times, O people; pour out your hearts to him, for God is our refuge."
With enthusiasm and passion, David now encourages everyone to trust God and to seek refuge in him.
God is a huge solid rock, a mighty fortress, ...a safe place. God is so reliable all the time that we can pour out our hearts to him. He's like an impregnable castle.
But David knows his people all too well. He knows that they will place their trust in other options, and he mentions two of them: OTHER PEOPLE AND MONEY.
Because the are equally unreliable.
There are many who want to come to our aid with what they believe to be answers, or formulas. Magazines and newspapers are full of them. Just look at last Sunday's paper. Under the lift-out section called 'Body & Soul' it offered "the new you". And this one: "The spiritual path to wealth". We're offered 10 steps to this, and 10 steps to that. But there's a lot of discouraged people out there who know from experience that these offers don't work.
Verse 9:
"Lowborn men are but a breath [or more accurately, only vanity], the highborn but a lie [best understood as being delusional]; if weighed on a balance, they are nothing; together they are only a breath".
Lowborn or highborn, even if put together, they're just vanity. Full of themselves.
The point that David is making, is not so much that we have anything to fear from trusting others, ...as that we have nothing to hope from them.
Why is it that we have the mistaken belief that we can fully trust and depend on others, ...especially when we know ourselves better than anyone else knows us, ...and we don't like what we see. IMPERFECTION. An imperfect person.
Imperfect friends; imperfect men and women; imperfect husbands and wives; imperfect fathers and mothers; imperfect children. And we've all been there!
What's the matter with us that we all fall into the trap of demanding that others meet our needs, and meet them fully. And by falling into that trap, we then spend so much energy in the attempt to have our needs met by someone who simply isn't able to do it.
Only God can give us true rest.
We husbands demand that our wives meet our need of feeling significant and loved, and wives demand that their husbands meet their need of security and love. And yes it's important that we take our roles and responsibilities towards one another very seriously, whether it is spouses in a marriage, or parenting-child relationships, or any relationship. But we'll never meet each others needs fully.
Don't misunderstand David. This is not some cynical attack on the worth of others. But a strong and clear lesson for our lives. And this is it!
Don't seek rest for your heart in anyone else but God. No man or woman alive can bear the weight of another's soul - only God can do that.
And he does it perfectly.
So it shouldn't come as any surprise when the Son of God says, and I'm reading from Matthew 11:28,29.
"Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light."
With Jesus we find a gentleness and humbleness that will give us rest. The yoke of humility and suffering that took him to the Cross. It is in the crucified and resurrected Son of Man that we find true rest. A rest that no-one else or nothing else can provide, ...ESPECIALLY WEALTH.
This is what David goes on to tell us in verse 10 of his Psalm, when he says that money is the other unreliable source of rest.
Oh, it might be nice if riches would increase. But David warns against seeking rest in riches. Especially if they have come at the expense of others. Scrambling over the top of others for personal gain. Cheating or stealing in our search for rest.
Verse 10:
"Do not trust in extortion or take pride in stolen goods; though your riches increase, do not set your heart on them".
Money or people, neither of them give the rest our souls long for.
One of the consequences of this fallen world is that even in our most intimate relationships, we are guaranteed to let each other down.
We know that.
Experience has confirmed it. Yet we do all we can to deny it, usually by simply ignoring the hurt - or stoically accepting it. But that just keeps us tentative and scared in our relationships. Scared to be hurt further. Scared to be honest because of the possible consequences. Scared of being thought of as a failure.
If you think 'foot and mouth disease' in Britain is out of control, ...it has nothing on superficial relating which is at epidemic levels, even amongst christian people, ...including christian couples. People can live in the same family, or be in the same church or job, and keep incredible distances. In your relationships, and especially in your marriage, ....and as you rest in God, risk being real.
And because God alone is a haven for our lives doesn't mean that we don't move towards one another. Quite the opposite. Because, as David says in verse 11 and 12 that God is strong and loving, and is our safe fortress, our rock and our salvation, ...because God alone is these things, because he meets our deepest needs, because God is our true rest...that frees me up from looking to you to meet them.
And my reward of REST will follow on from what I am to do, ...and that is to TRUST GOD to meet both your need and my need of rest.
When I trust God he will reward me with His True Rest.
I NO LONGER HAVE TO TRUST YOU TO MEET MY NEEDS, ...THAT, ...I CAN LEAVE TO GOD ALONE.
NOW I CAN SIMPLY GET TO KNOW YOU.
NOW I CAN SAFELY SERVE YOU, ...AS I REST IN KNOWING THAT MY DEEPEST NEEDS ARE MET BY GOD.