Hi, this is Pastor Tom and I want to welcome you to our look at Psalm 68 together today.
Verse 19, let me read you verse 19 of Psalm 68.
"Praise be to the Lord our God, our God and Savior, who daily bears our burdens."
Who daily bears our burdens.
We have daily burdens.
You have daily burdens, but you have a God who will bear those burdens daily.
He won't wait until the end of the week or next week or next month and then he'll get
to you.
He will daily bear your daily burdens.
Just think for a moment right now of the burdens that you're bearing today.
If they're heavy, they've already been on your mind.
And then what I'd like to do for these next few moments is take that burden that you're
thinking of and put it beside the truth in Psalm 68 because this is a psalm that assures
us again and again that God has the power to bear our burdens.
It doesn't pretend that we don't have any burdens because we have them.
It tells us that God can bear our burdens.
Now before we look at those assurances that we see again and again in this psalm, I want
to be clear about who we're talking about, about what kind of burdens we're talking about.
God cares about those who bear even the greatest burdens.
Listen to verses 5 and 6, "A father to the fatherless, a defender of the widows is God
in his holy dwelling.
God sets the lonely in families.
He leads forth the prisoners with singing, but the rebellious live in a sunscorched land."
So he talks in these verses about some of those who have the greatest burdens in life,
the fatherless, the orphan, the widow, the lonely.
It says he sets the lonely in families.
That family, by the way, is the church.
He wants to put you in the church, a place to deal with the loneliness you're facing.
He talks about the prisoner in these verses.
A few verses later he talks about the poor.
In verse 10, "Your people settled in it, the land, and from your bounty, O God, you provided
for the poor."
These are reminders that no matter how great your burden, no matter how difficult your
circumstance, God promises to bear your burdens today.
He doesn't bear them with you, alongside of you.
He bears them for you.
He has the power to bear burdens that you can't even bear.
With that in mind, I'm going to listen for these next few moments to the great assurances
that this psalm gives us.
The assurance of this psalm is this.
Our God has the power to bear our burdens.
You've got a burden, God has the power to bear it.
And listen to this list in this psalm of how God shows that power.
Number one, it's the power of the one who makes the earth shake.
Verse seven, "When you went out before your people, O God, when you marched before the
wasteland, the earth shook."
We are used to earthquakes in Southern California, and the ground shakes.
It shakes for miles and miles.
It's unstoppable, it's uncontrollable, it's powerful.
You sense something of how great God's power is in an earthquake.
But I want to say to you, when it comes to the burden in your life, when you feel shaken,
the God who can shake everything is on your side.
He is greater than what is shaking you.
So you ask God to bear your burden right now.
You ask Him to be your rock of security.
Maybe you're emotionally shaken, or spiritually shaken, or relationally shaken, or financially
shaken.
Something has shaken in your life.
You ask God to be your rock of security, to bear that burden with you.
Not watch you bear the burden, not encourage you as you bear the burden.
No, He wants to bear your burden.
It's the power of the one who makes the earth shake.
But it's also number two, the power of the one who makes the heavens pour down rain.
The heavens poured down rain before God, the one of Sinai, before God, the God of Israel.
You gave abundant showers, O God, you refreshed your weary inheritance.
Last part of verse eight and verse nine.
Abundant showers it talks about here.
If you've ever been in a downpour, where maybe you step out of your car, or you step out
into the street, and you're instantly drenched, a total downpour, then you know the power
of the rain.
The power of that rain, that same power, it waters the earth.
It eventually brings about growth.
And I just want to say to you, if your burden right now is that you feel dry, you feel empty,
God wants to send His abundant showers into your life.
There's a phrase here, you refreshed your weary inheritance.
What is this weary inheritance He's talking about?
Well, now it's you.
According to Ephesians, we, those who are following Jesus Christ, we are God's inheritance.
We are the inheritance of all that He has given through His love.
And He wants to refresh you in your weariness.
So you ask God right now to bear your burden and refresh you by His power today.
He keeps on listing more and more expressions of His power throughout this psalm.
Number three, it talks about the power of the one who scatters the armies.
Verse 12 and then verse 14, "Kings and armies flee in haste.
In the camps men divide the plunder.
When the Almighty scattered the kings in the land, it was like snow falling on Zalman."
Zalman's a mountain.
So just look at this power of God.
He scatters His enemies like fallen snow.
His enemies are like flakes of snow before God.
Right now you might be feeling the burden of some attack against you.
God is greater than all your attackers.
God can just swipe away all your attackers and He will in the end.
So you ask God right now to bear your burden and to fight your battles for you today.
Stop trying to bear the burden alone.
That's the message of this psalm.
Ask God to bear your burden.
Number four, it's the power of the one who reigns as Lord.
That's who we look to.
That's the power we look to when we ask God to bear our burdens.
Verse 15 to 16, "The mountains of Bashan are majestic mountains.
Rugged are the mountains of Bashan.
Why gaze in envy, O rugged mountains, at the mountain where God chooses to reign, where
the Lord Himself will dwell forever."
And then verses 17 to 18, "The chariots of God are tens of thousands and thousands of
thousands.
The Lord has come from Sinai into a sanctuary.
And when you ascended on high, you led captives in your train.
You received gifts from men, even from the rebellious, that you, O Lord God, might dwell
there."
So these verses, this idea of ascending on high, leading captives in your train, receiving
gifts, these are all pictures of a king who's coming home victorious.
At the beginning we hear about the other mountains, looking at the mountain of God and recognizing
the greatness of those mountains.
And now we have this victorious picture of a king.
By the way, these verses, "You ascended on high, you led captives in your train."
In Ephesians 4-8, these are verses that are used to refer to Jesus.
This is what He did on the cross.
This is what He did in His resurrection.
This is what He did spiritually for all of us.
He is the greatest victor of all.
He's the greatest king of all.
So I want to remind you that God has the power to bear your burden.
And when your life is in chaos, you ask Him to lift your burden as the one who reigns
as Lord over all.
What I'm saying to you is, don't try to figure out the chaos on your own.
Start by asking God to bear your burden.
There's one final way that God shows His power.
Maybe the greatest of all.
I believe the greatest of all.
Verse 20, "Our God is a God who saves.
From the sovereign Lord comes escape from death."
So this is the power of the one who defeated death.
And although the psalmist might be talking about escape from death in a battle, we see
there's a deeper meaning here.
He gives us an ultimate escape from death in the fact that death has no power over us.
Because of the cross, you and I are going to spend eternity celebrating God's goodness.
You may be facing the burden right now of a health crisis.
You may be facing the burden of having to come face to face with the fact that you might
die someday soon.
God can bear that burden also.
Because He is the one who gives life for death.
And you look to Him right now and say, "God, I need you.
Bear this burden."
Now, our burdens, in a practical way, they are lifted as we worship God in His power.
Because we're reminded of all of these things.
The circumstances might not change immediately, but your heart can change immediately.
Because you know that the circumstances eventually will change because God's power is greater
and God's promise never fails.
So what should our response be to the great power of God?
It should be worship.
And I love the picture of God's people coming to worship in verses 24 to 27.
Listen to these.
"Your procession has come into view, O God.
The procession of my God and King into the sanctuary.
In front are the singers, and after them the musicians.
And with them the maidens playing tambourines.
Praise God in the great congregation.
Praise the Lord in the assembly."
Praise the Lord in the assembly of Israel.
There is the little tribe of Benjamin leading them.
There is the great throng of Judas' princes.
And there are the princes of Zebulun and Naphtali.
These are all the tribes of Israel He's talking about.
This picture of singers in front and musicians behind and the little tribe of Benjamin leading
the way.
The least of them all leading the way.
This great throng of leaders coming behind.
They're all coming to the temple of God.
This is a picture of pouring out our hearts and praise to God.
So let's join our hearts with them.
Let's join our hearts in a prayer to recognize God's power to bear our burdens today.
I don't want to start that prayer with verses 28 and then verses 32 to 35 of this psalm.
Pray this with me, "Summon your power, O God.
Show us your strength, O God, as you have done before.
Sing to God, O kingdoms of the earth.
Sing praises to the Lord, to him who rides the ancient skies above, who thunders with
mighty voice.
Proclaim the power of God, whose majesty is over Israel overall, whose power is in the
skies.
You are awesome, O God, in your sanctuary.
The God of Israel gives power and strength to his people.
Praise be to God."
And then verse 28 again, "Summon your power, O God.
Show us your strength, O God, as you have done before."
We ask this in Jesus' name, amen.
Tomorrow we're going to look together at Psalm 69.
It talks about what to do when you're in over your head.