Anxiety vs. Fear/Trust in the Lord: Psalm 127-128

Psalm 127-128

A song of ascents. Of Solomon.

Psalm 127
^1aUnless the LORD builds the house,

its builders labor in vain.

Picture yourself as King Solomon making an ascent up the steps to the Temple construction project that your father King David started and left for you to complete.  You have the location and the manpower and the materials, but you were born a child of the king.  You may be the wisest man that ever lived but you don’t have a clue about how to actually build a temple that would actually please the Lord for whom you are building it.  

Ask yourself this question, “Do I want to build this temple and fulfill my father’s dream?”  If you answer this question, “Yes,” then you will quickly realize, like Solomon did, that unless the Lord builds the temple through you, then it is a waste of time because it won’t be pleasing to the Lord or to your father.  It may never be completed, but even if it is, it won’t last.

Ask yourself another question.  “What role or responsibility do I want to play in this building project?”  Do I want to be the temple owner, the temple architect, the temple construction project foremen or do I want to be the temple construction servant who is actually doing the hands-on work of the temple construction project?

Jesus gave us instructions concerning this question in Luke 22:24-27:

Also a dispute arose among them as to which of them was considered to be greatest.  Jesus said to them, “The kings of the Gentiles lord it over them; and those who exercise authority over them call themselves Benefactors. But you are not to be like that. Instead, the greatest among you should be like the youngest, and the one who rules like the one who serves.   For who is greater, the one who is at the table or the one who serves? Is it not the one who is at the table? But I am among you as one who serves.

Jesus also gave us another instruction in Luke 6:40.  He said “A student is not above his teacher, but everyone who is fully trained will be like his teacher.”

Jesus was a church builder.  He told Peter in Matthew 16:18, “And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell will not overcome it.”

So as we become fully trained, we will be church builders too.

So before we move on from this verse ask yourself these questions “Do I want to build the Lord’s church and fulfill His father’s dream?  If so, “Am I willing to be a servant like my teacher (i.e., a servant who is willing to put my hands to the work and do what it takes to build this Church body up and not tear it down)? Psalm 127:

^1bUnless the LORD watches over the city,

the watchmen stand guard in vain.

Again picture yourself as King Solomon with the responsibility of protecting the city. You have many enemies just like the city of Jerusalem did then and still does today. The city is in a constant state of alarm due to your enemies wanting to over throw it and seize it and all of the treasure that is located in it.

Solomon knew that the city and the temple were vulnerable to an attack and to a siege.

The apostle Paul wrote 1 Corinthians 3:16-17, which reads as follows: 

Do you not know that you are a temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? If any man destroys the temple of God, God will destroy him, for the temple of God is holy, and that is what you are.

Your temple like Solomon’s is still vulnerable to an attack and to a siege by your enemies.

We can try and guard our temple and our treasure by posting security guards day and night but like Jerusalem today it can still be attacked by outside forces and unless the Lord watches over our temple and our treasure, our private security service efforts will be in vain.

Ask yourself, "Is the Lord watching over my temple?"  If so “Am I working against Him by eating and drinking things that are harmful to my body or am I working with Him by eating and drinking things that are healthy and nutritious for my body?  Am I working against Him by exposing my eyes and ears and mind to things that are harmful to my mind and that are stunting my spiritual growth or am I working with Him by reading and meditating on His word and proclaiming His Gospel to the unbelievers in my sphere of influence, so that my spirit can grow?   Am I working against Him by not getting the appropriate amount of sleep or am I working with Him by making sure that I get right amount of sleep that my body needs to function at peak performance? Psalm 127:

²In vain you rise early

and stay up late,

toiling for food to eat—

for He grants sleep to those He loves.

According to the National Sleep Foundation, teenagers need 9 hours and 15 minutes of sleep each night to function.

According to the Nationwide Children’s Center, a Pediatrics care facility in central Ohio, the average amount of sleep that teenagers actually get is between 7 hours and 7 hours and 15 minutes.

These teenagers typically go to school to get and education so that ultimately they can get a job to put food on the table for themselves and their families.  They have to get up early to go to school and they end up staying up late at night in order to complete their homework assignments.  So, according to Psalm 127:2, there is a degree of unnecessary anxiety involved in this. 

Many teenagers make bad choices by not making the best use of their time during the rest of the hours in the day.  We as parents must train our teenagers to make good choices and we must model those choices in our own lives.  We can do this by setting prescribed limits for ourselves and our children as to what time is appropriate to go to bed and what time is appropriate to wake up.  We can do this without being dogmatic because each family and each child is unique.  However, if we note that our children are violating the prescribed limits that we have set for them, we as parents need to exercise parental intervention for both their wellbeing and for ours.

For example Christine and I try to get to bed by 9pm each night and get up by 5am.  When the children were younger we would make sure that they were in bed by 8:30 or 9pm but as they got older we allowed them to stay up a little longer to get their homework done.  However, we set limits as to what time they needed to stop doing their homework and go to bed.  This has worked out for their benefit.  However, it took both self-discipline on their part and parental discipline on our part.  

The author of the book of Hebrews tells us in chapter 12 verse11: “All discipline seems for the moment not to be joyful but sorrowful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterwards it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness.”  In this case the peaceful fruit of righteousness is rest both for us as parents and for them as children. 

Oh, by the way, I read recently that the average amount of sleep time needed for most adults is 8 hours although some adults may need a little more sleep and some adults can do just fine on a little less sleep.

Note that this verse in Psalm 127:2 says He grants sleep to those He loves.  He grants us sleep because He loves us and He knows that we need rest. 

He created rest.  In Genesis we read that on the seventh day He rested from all His work that He had done.  God loves all of His creation and He grants us sleep not to punish us.  On the contrary, He grants us sleep to bless us. 

If the Lord loves us by rewarding us with sleep then, we should love our children by rewarding them with sleep.

However, there are a few times that are recorded in His Word that He overrode this blessing with another blessing. Those are the times when He woke someone up in the middle of the night or early in the morning just to talk to them.  1 Samuel chapter 3 describes one of those times when He woke up Samuel when he was a young boy. 

  

Sometimes (not often), the Lord will wake us up in the middle of the night just to talk to us.  If this happens to you, don’t be alarmed or irritated by it.  Do what Samuel did,  say “Speak, Lord your servant is listening.” Then either pray (i.e., talk to Him) or meditate on His Word, or both, or get up and read some more from His Word.    Philippians 4:6 and 4:7 says the peace that surpasses all comprehension will guard your hearts and your mind in Christ Jesus.

Remember, we are in a battle.  If our enemy wakes us up in the middle of the night with anxious thoughts and worry and we start praying to the Lord or meditating on His Word or we get up and read more of His Word then the enemy will leave us alone and the peace that surpasses all comprehension will guard our hearts and our minds in Christ Jesus and we will be able to go back to sleep. Psalm 127:

³Sons are a heritage from the LORD,

children a reward from Him.

⁴Like arrows in the hands of a warrior

are sons born in one’s youth.

⁵Blessed is the man

whose quiver is full of them.

They will not be put to shame

when they contend with their enemies in the gate.

The secular message that permeates our culture and the other cultures of the world is that children are not a blessing from the Lord but are an inconvenience that can legally be put to death if the mother or the state so chooses by abortion.  In addition to this so called legalized abortion of unborn children in all 50 states, the states of Oregon, Vermont and Washington have also legalized physician-assisted suicide via legislation and the state Montana has legal physician-assisted suicide via a court order.

Is it any wonder why Americans are so anxious and fearful and worried about our enemies including our terrorist enemies at their gate?

In Solomon’s day his enemies could not put his warriors to shame at the gate nor did he have to worry about his enemies putting the next generation of warriors to shame at the gate because he put his trust in the Lord.

If we put our trust in the Lord then, we need not fear or worry.

With the United States Military’s present policy of including women in combat and with the legalization of homosexual men and women in the military and with the legalization of same sex marriage, Americans cannot honestly claim the same confidence that Solomon claimed and that we do about the enemies at the gate.

Now that we have looked at Solomon’s song of Ascent let’s look at another song of Ascent found in Psalm 128.

Psalm 128

A song of ascents.

¹Blessed are all who fear the LORD,

who walk in His ways.

King David wrote in Psalm 40:3-4

"He put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God;

Many will see and fear

And will trust in the LORD.

How blessed is the man who has made the LORD his trust,

And has not turned to the proud, nor to those who lapse into falsehood."

David knew that fearing the Lord and trusting the Lord went hand in hand.

Psalm 115:9-11 records this relationship of trusting in the Lord and fearing the Lord.

"O Israel, trust in the LORD;

He is their help and their shield.

O house of Aaron, trust in the LORD;

He is their help and their shield.

You who fear the LORD, trust in the LORD;

He is their help and their shield."

Proverbs 3:5-8 also records this hand in hand relationship of Fearing the Lord and Trusting the Lord.  It says: 

“Trust in the LORD with all your heart

And do not lean on your own understanding.

In all your ways acknowledge Him,

And He will make your paths straight.

Do not be wise in your own eyes;

Fear the LORD and turn away from evil.

It will be healing to your body

And refreshment to your bones.”

Let's go back to Psalm 128.

²You will eat the fruit of your labor;

blessings and prosperity will be yours.

Interesting this second verse in Psalm 128 reveals that the blessing and prosperity will not be an end to labor.

Part of the marketing ploy of all of the mega million dollar lotteries and power ball jackpots is this illusion in the minds of the players that when they win these lotteries then they can quit working and life is going to be easy and life is going to be great.  That is just not so.  As many of the older people in this room can attest to the fact that as you get older it gets hard to just get out of bed.

³Your wife will be like a fruitful vine

within your house;

your sons will be like olive shoots

around your table.

⁴Thus is the man blessed

who fears the LORD.

God promised Abraham and later Isaac that his descendants would outnumber the stars. 

In Genesis 32:12 God also promised Jacob that his descendants would be as the sands of the sea.  This passage reads as follows:

“For You said, ‘I will surely prosper you and make your descendants as the sand of the sea, which is too great to be numbered.’”

Brian Bridgeman also pointed out last week in:

Psalm 139:17-18 “How precious to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them! Were I to count them, they would outnumber the grains of sand.”

In this verse of the song of Ascents the Psalmist took the blessing of God made to Abraham , Isaac and Jacob a step further and said the individual husband would be blessed with sons (i.e., that is male descendants) that would be around his family table. 

I think we need to be very careful here that we don’t take this statement and apply reverse logic to it.  That is, we can’t say that a man who does not have a number of sons is not blessed by the Lord.  If this were true and absolute then we would have to say that Zacharias and Elizabeth were not blessed by the Lord because they only had one son (John the Baptist).  Jesus said of John the Baptist in Matthew 11:11 ““Truly I say to you, among those born of women there has not arisen anyone greater than John the Baptist!” I would say that his parents were very blessed even though they had no other children besides John.

The last two verses of Psalm 128 seems to make this clear that this is more of a wish and a prayer that people of those days would consider and ideal blessing.  This is not to say that this is the Lord’s ideal blessing or the Lord’s mandate that everyone man that fears and trust and obeys Him will be blessed in this way.  If it were then the apostle Paul would not be considered a blessed man.

⁵May the LORD bless you from Zion

all the days of your life;

⁶may you see the prosperity of Jerusalem,

and may you live to see your children’s children.

Peace be upon Israel.

These last two verses remind me of the Sabbath prayer that was sung by the characters, the papa “Tevye” and the mama “Golde” in the movie The Fiddler on the Roof.  What a beautiful prayer it is.  If you get a chance you should watch and listen to it on YouTube.  You can find it by searching for Fiddler on the Roof "Sabbath prayer."  I am not one for praying canned prayers but I prayed that particular prayer for all of you this morning before I began this message because it reflects my heart’s desire that you all be strengthened by the Lord and be blessed with long lives and that you be protected and shielded from all shame and all pain and granted happiness and peace until He returns for us.  I also included in my prayer all of those who are reading or listening to the archive version of this message via our church website.  God Bless you all. 

In Summary:

Each of us is a temple construction project of God and the Spirit of God dwells in us.  Collectively we make up a bigger temple construction project i.e., Christ Local Church.  We are part of an even bigger temple the Great Commission Association of Churches.  The Great Commission Association of Churches is part of an even bigger construction project i.e., the body Christ Church Universal which includes all of the believers in the world that have put their trust in Him for their salvation.   Christ is building His house locally and universally.  This church is part of that building project and you are part of this church.  You and the church will grow and be blessed based on the faith and trust you put in Him and the sacrificial labor that you offer Him as your spiritual form of worship.  Since the enemy has step change their offensive against His church, ask yourself this question “Does the Lord want me to make a step change in my sacrificial service for Him and His Church?”