WEBVTT 00:00:00.650 --> 00:00:03.149 Hello, you are listening to Second City Sermons, 00:00:03.270 --> 00:00:06.209 a ministry of Second City Church in Midtown Harrisburg. 00:00:06.870 --> 00:00:08.750 It's our hope that these sermons will draw you 00:00:08.750 --> 00:00:11.169 more into the life of following God, Father, 00:00:11.330 --> 00:00:14.150 Son and Holy Spirit. Please consider coming and 00:00:14.150 --> 00:00:16.469 joining with us each Sunday morning at 10am in 00:00:16.469 --> 00:00:18.809 the heart of Midtown Harrisburg. You can find 00:00:18.809 --> 00:00:22.329 us online at SecondCityChurch .org and on Facebook, 00:00:22.629 --> 00:00:25.030 Instagram and YouTube. We hope you enjoy this 00:00:25.030 --> 00:00:30.390 sermon. God Bless. Oh Lord God, your name is 00:00:30.390 --> 00:00:35.490 great through all the earth. You are good to 00:00:35.490 --> 00:00:38.109 all those things that you have made. We praise 00:00:38.109 --> 00:00:41.729 you for your fatherly care. We praise you that 00:00:41.729 --> 00:00:47.109 you have embraced the church as your bride. We 00:00:47.109 --> 00:00:49.609 ask now that you would open our hearts and our 00:00:49.609 --> 00:00:53.850 minds to hear your word. May the words of my 00:00:53.850 --> 00:00:56.429 mouth and the meditations of our hearts be pleasing. 00:00:56.840 --> 00:00:59.359 In your sight, O Lord, a rock and a redeemer. 00:01:00.299 --> 00:01:09.019 Amen. Four score and seven months ago, and another 00:01:09.019 --> 00:01:11.379 four years because that's only about seven years, 00:01:12.079 --> 00:01:15.420 our passer brought forth in this church building 00:01:15.420 --> 00:01:19.689 a new sermon schedule. conceived in liberty, 00:01:19.769 --> 00:01:21.909 because nobody made him do it, and dedicated 00:01:21.909 --> 00:01:24.510 to the proposition that we would study the Bible 00:01:24.510 --> 00:01:28.370 in its various parts in more or less equal intervals. 00:01:29.349 --> 00:01:32.890 That is, when Peter took this job, initially, 00:01:33.269 --> 00:01:35.870 he started doing these quarterly teaching series 00:01:35.870 --> 00:01:40.849 and began doing Psalms in the summers. And today, 00:01:41.450 --> 00:01:43.930 in God's goodness, and with God's sense of humor, 00:01:43.969 --> 00:01:45.290 which we've already heard a little bit about 00:01:45.290 --> 00:01:50.200 today, we are going to study Psalm 76 eight days 00:01:50.200 --> 00:01:53.420 after we celebrated the 250th anniversary of 00:01:53.420 --> 00:01:55.200 the signing of the Declaration of Independence 00:01:55.200 --> 00:02:00.140 in 1776. When we're done here, if you're feeling 00:02:00.140 --> 00:02:02.900 especially patriotic, you can jump on Interstate 00:02:02.900 --> 00:02:05.299 76 and drive down to Philadelphia and take a 00:02:05.299 --> 00:02:14.680 picture in front of the Liberty Bell. And it's 00:02:14.680 --> 00:02:18.319 an interesting thing that we're studying 76 so 00:02:18.319 --> 00:02:21.900 close to the celebration of 76. I'll just tell 00:02:21.900 --> 00:02:24.060 you, this is not something that Peter had planned 00:02:24.060 --> 00:02:28.979 11 years ago. We didn't know as a church about 00:02:28.979 --> 00:02:32.639 a month ago that this coincidence was occurring 00:02:32.639 --> 00:02:35.560 and we all sort of giggled about it. It was just 00:02:35.560 --> 00:02:37.759 accidentally the next thing on the schedule once 00:02:37.759 --> 00:02:40.180 Peter had got done with his series on the Ten 00:02:40.180 --> 00:02:41.860 Commandments last week, which by the way, I thought 00:02:41.860 --> 00:02:45.530 was excellent. And I think we should think about 00:02:45.530 --> 00:02:50.310 this coincidence a little bit because if you 00:02:50.310 --> 00:02:55.990 believe in an omnipotent God, you believe that 00:02:55.990 --> 00:02:59.969 his plan and his providence extends to all things. 00:03:00.629 --> 00:03:04.409 And so when you get a coincidence or a small 00:03:04.409 --> 00:03:07.289 providence like this one, you have to think about 00:03:07.289 --> 00:03:11.460 how to think about it, right? The poet Robert 00:03:11.460 --> 00:03:13.979 Frost has this great line where he asks quote 00:03:13.979 --> 00:03:19.120 if design govern in a thing so small Does design 00:03:19.120 --> 00:03:22.379 govern in a little thing like this, right? What's 00:03:22.379 --> 00:03:26.199 the point of seeing? Claiming that you see providence 00:03:26.199 --> 00:03:28.240 at work if you can't see that there's any sort 00:03:28.240 --> 00:03:32.020 of providential point in the action What's my 00:03:32.020 --> 00:03:34.719 contention? Excuse me. It's the manner in which 00:03:34.719 --> 00:03:37.879 I conducted my study of this particular psalm 00:03:37.879 --> 00:03:41.360 that when we see one of these small providences, 00:03:42.659 --> 00:03:45.080 something that we know theologically to be part 00:03:45.080 --> 00:03:48.180 of God's plan, even if we can't understand the 00:03:48.180 --> 00:03:51.020 purpose of it, if it seems like a small thing, 00:03:51.599 --> 00:03:54.800 well that should drive us to prayer. That should 00:03:54.800 --> 00:03:59.240 drive us to receptivity toward God. Maybe he's 00:03:59.240 --> 00:04:02.120 teaching us something. Maybe he's strengthening 00:04:02.120 --> 00:04:05.419 our faith. Maybe he's showing he loves us. Maybe 00:04:05.419 --> 00:04:08.080 he just wants us to be on our toes spiritually 00:04:08.080 --> 00:04:12.659 speaking. So in the spirit of prayer and Receptivity 00:04:12.659 --> 00:04:15.479 and being on our toes. I want to talk about 76 00:04:15.479 --> 00:04:19.459 and 76 today I want to talk about America as 00:04:19.459 --> 00:04:21.720 a historical phenomenon, which I think we can 00:04:21.720 --> 00:04:25.259 all agree to be part of God's Providence one 00:04:25.259 --> 00:04:27.360 way or another then I want to talk about history 00:04:27.360 --> 00:04:31.600 as such in really big picture terms and Because 00:04:31.600 --> 00:04:35.420 I'm taking a wide angle on the text today. I'm 00:04:35.420 --> 00:04:37.339 not going to talk about a number of things that 00:04:37.339 --> 00:04:39.399 I would like to. I have a list of these things. 00:04:39.500 --> 00:04:42.519 It's written here. The things that I'm not going 00:04:42.519 --> 00:04:45.000 to be able to get to. Feel free to come and ask 00:04:45.000 --> 00:04:47.839 me after the service if your unanswered question 00:04:47.839 --> 00:04:52.259 is on my list. So after that big picture stuff, 00:04:52.360 --> 00:04:56.500 I want to zero in on a song and ask what it has 00:04:56.500 --> 00:04:59.819 to say about history and Providence and us as 00:04:59.819 --> 00:05:05.040 a congregation. If you want points. If you want 00:05:05.040 --> 00:05:07.579 to write down alliterative points, I have got 00:05:07.579 --> 00:05:10.000 them for you. My points today are going to be 00:05:10.000 --> 00:05:15.560 history, humility, and hierarchy. History, humility, 00:05:15.699 --> 00:05:18.240 hierarchy. So let's get into the first point, 00:05:18.300 --> 00:05:23.199 history 76 and 76. So I think it's a good and 00:05:23.199 --> 00:05:26.740 spiritually mature thing to be interested in 00:05:26.740 --> 00:05:29.800 the customs and the traditions of your country. 00:05:29.899 --> 00:05:33.050 And I think it's undeniably a mark of holiness, 00:05:33.170 --> 00:05:37.129 to be grateful to God for the good gifts that 00:05:37.129 --> 00:05:40.410 He gives through all the different facets of 00:05:40.410 --> 00:05:43.089 our lives. If you think about the blessings and 00:05:43.089 --> 00:05:46.750 curses in Deuteronomy 28, for example, which 00:05:46.750 --> 00:05:49.610 go on for a long time, one of the more chilling 00:05:49.610 --> 00:05:53.370 parts of this whole litany of curses, it says, 00:05:54.050 --> 00:05:56.790 all the cursings come, it says, because, quote, 00:05:56.930 --> 00:06:00.069 you did not serve the Lord your God with joyfulness, 00:06:00.360 --> 00:06:04.019 and gladness of heart because of his great gifts. 00:06:05.680 --> 00:06:09.339 Being ungrateful to God is a mark of great sin. 00:06:11.560 --> 00:06:15.079 It is spiritual foolishness not to give thanks 00:06:15.079 --> 00:06:18.800 to God for his blessings. And this poem is helpful 00:06:18.800 --> 00:06:21.600 for us in remembering that. So Matthew Henry, 00:06:21.939 --> 00:06:25.060 who was not an American, when he writes about 00:06:25.060 --> 00:06:27.540 this poem, he says, quote, It is a psalm proper 00:06:27.540 --> 00:06:30.639 to a Thanksgiving day. that is for all people, 00:06:31.100 --> 00:06:33.879 for whatever particular gifts they have received 00:06:33.879 --> 00:06:37.980 from God, and I think he's right. So in our context, 00:06:38.579 --> 00:06:41.800 I'm pleased that our denomination, the Presbyterian 00:06:41.800 --> 00:06:44.360 Church in America, at the last General Assembly, 00:06:44.399 --> 00:06:47.199 had no less than three overtures recommending 00:06:47.199 --> 00:06:50.480 that we, as a group, solemnly thank God for our 00:06:50.480 --> 00:06:54.220 country. The one that passed, one did pass, was 00:06:54.220 --> 00:06:56.779 from the Philadelphia Presbytery, and it introduced 00:06:56.779 --> 00:07:02.100 itself in these words. Whereas, hold on, whereas, 00:07:03.319 --> 00:07:06.160 God's word calls his church, oh, give thanks 00:07:06.160 --> 00:07:08.899 unto the Lord for his mercy and doors forever 00:07:08.899 --> 00:07:12.279 in whatsoever comes to pass according to Jesus 00:07:12.279 --> 00:07:15.899 Christ's sovereign rule and reign over all men 00:07:15.899 --> 00:07:20.180 and nations. In other words, it is right always 00:07:20.180 --> 00:07:22.879 and at all times to give thanks and praise to 00:07:22.879 --> 00:07:24.639 the Lord, right? But of course, there's more 00:07:24.639 --> 00:07:26.959 to it just than that. So the overture writers, 00:07:27.389 --> 00:07:31.870 And I think that this country has been the instrument 00:07:31.870 --> 00:07:34.269 through which God has provided immense blessings 00:07:34.269 --> 00:07:38.410 to many people. Consider we have a very large 00:07:38.410 --> 00:07:41.769 degree of religious liberty here. I read a book 00:07:41.769 --> 00:07:45.149 once where the author who was a missionary was 00:07:45.149 --> 00:07:47.509 talking to a guy after a service and he was lamenting 00:07:47.509 --> 00:07:50.389 that American Christians were so lukewarm in 00:07:50.389 --> 00:07:52.730 their faith. And the guy that he was talking 00:07:52.730 --> 00:07:55.149 to who was a Christian from the Middle East. 00:07:55.980 --> 00:07:58.439 and was visiting here, he said, this morning 00:07:58.439 --> 00:08:01.620 I saw a public baptism conducted openly and without 00:08:01.620 --> 00:08:05.300 fear. I saw hundreds of people worshiping God 00:08:05.300 --> 00:08:08.980 openly without fear of governmental retribution. 00:08:09.019 --> 00:08:11.199 This is the type of miracle we've been praying 00:08:11.199 --> 00:08:16.500 about for years. How about that? Many people 00:08:16.500 --> 00:08:19.019 around the world right now cannot worship God 00:08:19.019 --> 00:08:23.180 the way they feel is right. There are many people 00:08:23.180 --> 00:08:25.600 connected with our own congregation. who have 00:08:25.600 --> 00:08:30.220 had to get away from religious persecution in 00:08:30.220 --> 00:08:33.580 their country of origin, right? We ought to give 00:08:33.580 --> 00:08:36.240 thanks to God that we can worship freely here. 00:08:37.340 --> 00:08:40.159 Additionally, peaceful living! has been historically 00:08:40.159 --> 00:08:43.080 possible here for a large percent of families, 00:08:43.360 --> 00:08:45.840 such that many of us have been able to live quietly 00:08:45.840 --> 00:08:48.820 and mind our own affairs, as Paul says in 1 Timothy. 00:08:49.200 --> 00:08:52.419 This country and its stability has been a huge 00:08:52.419 --> 00:08:55.000 common grace kindness from God to this people. 00:08:55.960 --> 00:08:58.019 And I think we should thank the Lord for his 00:08:58.019 --> 00:09:01.950 gifts. All of this is not to say that this country 00:09:01.950 --> 00:09:04.409 doesn't still have very large problems and doesn't 00:09:04.409 --> 00:09:07.870 have huge historical sins in its past that we're 00:09:07.870 --> 00:09:10.710 still working through as a country and as a church. 00:09:12.129 --> 00:09:14.950 But if we're thinking historically, I think we 00:09:14.950 --> 00:09:17.830 need to think as people with a historical sense, 00:09:18.750 --> 00:09:22.149 not just as impatient moral idealists. Here's 00:09:22.149 --> 00:09:26.049 an example of what I mean. I think it is scandalous. 00:09:26.350 --> 00:09:28.509 that women did not have the right to vote in 00:09:28.509 --> 00:09:32.210 this country until 1920. I think that was a flawed 00:09:32.210 --> 00:09:34.909 judgment on the part of our forefathers. I think 00:09:34.909 --> 00:09:39.809 that's all true. It is a bad lack of judgment. 00:09:40.909 --> 00:09:42.970 But we should consider what's happening in the 00:09:42.970 --> 00:09:45.889 rest of the world at that same time, right? None 00:09:45.889 --> 00:09:48.809 of the other large democracies allowed women 00:09:48.809 --> 00:09:53.659 the vote in 1920. America beat England. to granting 00:09:53.659 --> 00:09:56.059 women suffrage by eight years. It beat France 00:09:56.059 --> 00:10:04.500 by 25 years. Really surprisingly, in Bolshevik 00:10:04.500 --> 00:10:08.679 Russia, women did have the right to vote. But 00:10:08.679 --> 00:10:11.080 just like men, they did not have a legal right 00:10:11.080 --> 00:10:13.740 to free speech. They did not have the right to 00:10:13.740 --> 00:10:16.179 form an independent political party. So they 00:10:16.179 --> 00:10:20.480 were allowed to vote, but only for the person, 00:10:20.519 --> 00:10:25.129 the state. chose to be voted for, right? And 00:10:25.129 --> 00:10:27.269 soon that was going to be a guy named Joseph 00:10:27.269 --> 00:10:31.429 Stalin who famously said it's not who votes that 00:10:31.429 --> 00:10:33.850 counts, it's who counts the votes. So there's 00:10:33.850 --> 00:10:39.289 that. Then, of course, there's the issue of racial 00:10:39.289 --> 00:10:42.929 slavery and following the Civil War racial discrimination, 00:10:43.129 --> 00:10:46.889 which is an enduring and awful evil. But again, 00:10:47.129 --> 00:10:49.750 we should consider how the US was able, in some 00:10:49.750 --> 00:10:52.429 sense, to deal with some of its unjust laws. 00:10:53.529 --> 00:10:56.090 The historian John Meacham says, quote, in our 00:10:56.090 --> 00:10:58.490 living memory, Christianity has been deployed 00:10:58.490 --> 00:11:01.610 as a means of liberation and progress in that 00:11:01.610 --> 00:11:04.350 issue. He's talking about the 1960s civil rights 00:11:04.350 --> 00:11:06.690 movement, of course, which was primarily the 00:11:06.690 --> 00:11:09.710 work of the black church asking the white church 00:11:09.710 --> 00:11:13.980 to get the memo. the White Church finally listening 00:11:13.980 --> 00:11:16.340 up and voting accordingly. And think about how 00:11:16.340 --> 00:11:18.899 the nonviolent protest movement was able to get 00:11:18.899 --> 00:11:23.440 things done here in this country. So Martin Luther 00:11:23.440 --> 00:11:27.519 King Jr. famously said, quote, we will wear you 00:11:27.519 --> 00:11:33.120 down by our capacity to suffer. Do to us what 00:11:33.120 --> 00:11:37.480 you will and we will continue to love you. He 00:11:37.480 --> 00:11:41.029 said that in 1957. which was the same year that 00:11:41.029 --> 00:11:43.250 Eisenhower needed to deploy the National Guard 00:11:43.250 --> 00:11:45.929 to protect black students as they walked to school. 00:11:47.049 --> 00:11:49.029 And, here's the remarkable thing about all of 00:11:49.029 --> 00:11:53.210 this, King's nonviolent Christian approach worked. 00:11:54.789 --> 00:11:56.830 Right? Appealing to the consciences of our people, 00:11:57.129 --> 00:11:59.710 eventually, gradually, grudgingly, worked. And 00:11:59.710 --> 00:12:01.190 I think we should thank God for this. Again, 00:12:01.190 --> 00:12:03.029 consider the alternative, right? If you tried 00:12:03.029 --> 00:12:05.090 that with Stalin, he would say, you're gonna 00:12:05.090 --> 00:12:07.570 wear me down by your capacity to suffer? See, 00:12:07.570 --> 00:12:11.100 you try. Here's a quote from Russell Moore, and 00:12:11.100 --> 00:12:13.139 I think this gets the balance that we should 00:12:13.139 --> 00:12:17.200 have just right. Quote, our patriotism is the 00:12:17.200 --> 00:12:20.240 kind that needs our country to be our country, 00:12:20.779 --> 00:12:24.179 not our messiah. We have another king for that. 00:12:25.559 --> 00:12:28.039 We love our country best when we don't expect 00:12:28.039 --> 00:12:32.379 it to be our final city on a hill. So that was 00:12:32.379 --> 00:12:34.879 the intro to my history points. Anyway, I want 00:12:34.879 --> 00:12:38.799 to go back to Psalm 76 I want to go back to 1776 00:12:38.799 --> 00:12:42.379 in 1776 the Continental Army was really destroyed 00:12:42.379 --> 00:12:45.620 on several different occasions They were outmanned 00:12:45.620 --> 00:12:47.899 by the British who had the largest most well 00:12:47.899 --> 00:12:50.419 -funded and most professional army in the world 00:12:50.419 --> 00:12:52.240 Supported by the strongest Navy in the world 00:12:52.940 --> 00:12:55.799 In fact, the American Revolution came so close 00:12:55.799 --> 00:12:57.980 to being snuffed out almost immediately that 00:12:57.980 --> 00:13:00.000 the people at the time and smart people since 00:13:00.000 --> 00:13:04.179 have talked about God's special providence favoring 00:13:04.179 --> 00:13:06.860 the Americans. Here's a quote from a Massachusetts 00:13:06.860 --> 00:13:10.460 newspaper in that year, quote, we have thought 00:13:10.460 --> 00:13:14.019 that God was for us and had given many and signal 00:13:14.019 --> 00:13:19.460 instances of his power. mercy in our favor and 00:13:19.460 --> 00:13:21.620 had greatly frowned upon and disappointed our 00:13:21.620 --> 00:13:24.840 enemies and verily it has been so." The author 00:13:24.840 --> 00:13:26.519 goes on to say that the people needed to give 00:13:26.519 --> 00:13:30.299 God the glory for his work and pray for his continuing 00:13:30.299 --> 00:13:33.879 favor. Even the cautious historian David McCulloch 00:13:33.879 --> 00:13:36.879 says that the outcome of the war quote seemed 00:13:36.879 --> 00:13:40.240 little short of a miracle especially for those 00:13:40.240 --> 00:13:42.850 who knew what a close call it was. in the beginning. 00:13:43.350 --> 00:13:45.570 So when we think about the revolution of 1776, 00:13:45.649 --> 00:13:47.990 we're thinking about a bunch of smart guys who 00:13:47.990 --> 00:13:50.309 started a war they did not have a great chance 00:13:50.309 --> 00:13:52.730 of winning, but which they did win partially 00:13:52.730 --> 00:13:57.429 by accident. That's the haughty defiance of 76 00:13:57.429 --> 00:14:00.529 that Walt Whitman, our great poet of democracy, 00:14:01.049 --> 00:14:02.929 talks about, which I quoted in your bulletin. 00:14:03.529 --> 00:14:06.289 But I want to turn back to our actual sermon 00:14:06.289 --> 00:14:11.879 text this morning. Psalm 76 is a war song But 00:14:11.879 --> 00:14:13.960 in a very strange sense, isn't it? Look with 00:14:13.960 --> 00:14:15.700 me at the text. What does it say? What does it 00:14:15.700 --> 00:14:17.840 say in essence? What's the main point of it? 00:14:19.440 --> 00:14:25.139 It says this, God is in control. The strong, 00:14:25.620 --> 00:14:28.679 the well -armed, the warlords, they can't stand 00:14:28.679 --> 00:14:35.179 before God. God breaks the flashing arrows. That's 00:14:35.179 --> 00:14:39.779 verse three. He sinks the stout -hearted into 00:14:39.779 --> 00:14:43.850 sleep. The men of war are paralyzed, that's verse 00:14:43.850 --> 00:14:47.289 five. At your rebuke, O God of Jacob, both rider 00:14:47.289 --> 00:14:50.950 and horse lay stunned, verse six. God smashes 00:14:50.950 --> 00:14:55.809 up the tanks, we might say. God confounds the 00:14:55.809 --> 00:14:59.450 helicopters, right? Here's an interesting thing. 00:15:00.210 --> 00:15:03.389 The word arrows in Hebrew is actually the word 00:15:03.389 --> 00:15:07.110 thunderbolts. That's why it says flashing arrows. 00:15:07.789 --> 00:15:10.149 So the bad guys are guys who think that they 00:15:10.149 --> 00:15:12.789 have God -like power, which seems a lot like 00:15:12.789 --> 00:15:15.929 most of the governments today, right? By the 00:15:15.929 --> 00:15:17.549 way, did you know that the initial tests for 00:15:17.549 --> 00:15:19.769 the atom bomb that were conducted in New Mexico 00:15:19.769 --> 00:15:22.450 were called the Trinity tests? That's kind of 00:15:22.450 --> 00:15:26.610 strange, isn't it? But God shrugs off all human 00:15:26.610 --> 00:15:28.769 weaponry. Think about what's being said in this 00:15:28.769 --> 00:15:31.889 poem. Here's our poet. He lives in a very tumultuous 00:15:31.889 --> 00:15:34.710 time. Think about the records in Kings and Chronicles. 00:15:34.730 --> 00:15:38.039 They make you exhausted. He says that it doesn't 00:15:38.039 --> 00:15:41.259 matter how big the enemy armies are. Why? Because 00:15:41.259 --> 00:15:44.159 God is bigger. We could call this the haughty 00:15:44.159 --> 00:15:50.000 defiance of Psalm 76. Against all the materialists, 00:15:50.480 --> 00:15:52.639 against all the people who think they can play 00:15:52.639 --> 00:15:55.360 God if they just get together a big enough army, 00:15:55.539 --> 00:15:59.700 this Psalm is shouting, nope. God is in control. 00:16:00.159 --> 00:16:02.860 He will decide the battles that decide the fates 00:16:02.860 --> 00:16:07.340 of nations. God will be glorified. His name is 00:16:07.340 --> 00:16:10.039 great in Israel. God's faithful people will continue 00:16:10.039 --> 00:16:12.740 to praise him, and they can know without hesitation 00:16:12.740 --> 00:16:15.620 that he is the boss, even in the face of political 00:16:15.620 --> 00:16:19.700 or military opposition. So that's my first point, 00:16:20.120 --> 00:16:22.860 or half of it. So God is in control of actual 00:16:22.860 --> 00:16:24.779 history, the stuff that actually happens in the 00:16:24.779 --> 00:16:28.720 world. God is intensely concerned with what happens 00:16:28.720 --> 00:16:32.620 here. And he is at work to bring salvation to 00:16:32.620 --> 00:16:34.840 his people and glory to himself. Think about 00:16:34.840 --> 00:16:36.519 what we say every week in the Apostles' Creed. 00:16:37.279 --> 00:16:40.139 Jesus suffered under Pontius Pilate. That's a 00:16:40.139 --> 00:16:43.299 particular person. God did not snap his fingers 00:16:43.299 --> 00:16:46.600 outside of time and physical reality. No, he 00:16:46.600 --> 00:16:49.679 entered into history and Psalms like this one 00:16:49.679 --> 00:16:52.919 say that he has been involved in history since 00:16:52.919 --> 00:16:56.299 the beginning. This is the doctrine of Providence. 00:16:56.779 --> 00:16:58.940 The Philadelphia Presbytery, when they made their 00:16:58.940 --> 00:17:01.399 overture to the General Assembly this year, referenced 00:17:01.399 --> 00:17:04.039 a guy named John Witherspoon, who was a minister 00:17:04.039 --> 00:17:06.420 as well as a signer of the Declaration of Independence, 00:17:07.200 --> 00:17:11.779 from a sermon which he preached on Psalm 76 in 00:17:11.779 --> 00:17:15.000 the year 1776. So I'm going to quote his main 00:17:15.000 --> 00:17:50.150 point from that sermon. He says, That is... God 00:17:50.150 --> 00:17:54.589 is in control even in the evil of history. He 00:17:54.589 --> 00:17:59.130 restrains that evil to show mercy, and He allows 00:17:59.130 --> 00:18:02.529 that evil in order to bring about His plans and 00:18:02.529 --> 00:18:05.769 to let the evildoers store up wrath for the day 00:18:05.769 --> 00:18:09.470 of judgment. And we see this supremely, of course, 00:18:09.630 --> 00:18:13.509 in the judicial murder of Christ. He was killed 00:18:13.509 --> 00:18:15.789 by the ambition of mistaken princes, the cunning 00:18:15.789 --> 00:18:17.750 and cruelty of oppressive and corrupt ministers, 00:18:17.829 --> 00:18:20.109 and even the inhumanity of brutal soldiers. All 00:18:20.109 --> 00:18:22.630 of these things were instruments that got used 00:18:22.630 --> 00:18:25.029 in the human life and death of Jesus to bring 00:18:25.029 --> 00:18:27.829 about his great redemption. God is at work in 00:18:27.829 --> 00:18:31.490 history, even though it's messy. So I want to 00:18:31.490 --> 00:18:33.410 come back to that. But first, here's the other 00:18:33.410 --> 00:18:35.930 half of this first point. God is not just the 00:18:35.930 --> 00:18:38.450 God of actual history. He's the God of all history. 00:18:39.839 --> 00:18:41.720 Think about what it means that we're reading 00:18:41.720 --> 00:18:48.359 this text here in 2026, right? Many scholars 00:18:48.359 --> 00:18:50.200 think that this Psalm was written in celebration 00:18:50.200 --> 00:18:52.420 of the destruction of the armies of the Assyrian 00:18:52.420 --> 00:18:56.579 warlord Sennacherib. This is a pretty famous 00:18:56.579 --> 00:18:59.680 thing. You can find accounts of this in Isaiah, 00:18:59.759 --> 00:19:02.680 for instance. The English poet Lord Byron wrote 00:19:02.680 --> 00:19:05.759 a poem about this incident. The last two lines 00:19:05.759 --> 00:19:08.799 are, and the might of the Gentile, unsmoked by 00:19:08.799 --> 00:19:11.460 the sword, hath melted like snow in the glance 00:19:11.460 --> 00:19:14.400 of the Lord. It's a pretty good line. Poem is 00:19:14.400 --> 00:19:16.920 generally considered to be a part of a classic 00:19:16.920 --> 00:19:19.200 romantic literature, right? Well, here's the 00:19:19.200 --> 00:19:23.380 thing. Byron was born in 1788, which is the year 00:19:23.380 --> 00:19:26.329 before George Washington became president. Byron 00:19:26.329 --> 00:19:31.309 writes glowingly about Washington as news. We 00:19:31.309 --> 00:19:36.130 think of Byron as old. The English language as 00:19:36.130 --> 00:19:40.049 we speak it is maybe 500 years old, depending 00:19:40.049 --> 00:19:42.349 on how you want to measure early modern English. 00:19:42.769 --> 00:19:45.109 The Assyrian attack on Jerusalem, which is being 00:19:45.109 --> 00:19:51.450 celebrated in this poem, was in 701 BC. That 00:19:51.450 --> 00:19:54.670 is. At the time of the birth of Christ in Bethlehem, 00:19:55.049 --> 00:19:58.529 this poem was already older than our language 00:19:58.529 --> 00:20:03.710 is. Considered just in terms of antiquity, this 00:20:03.710 --> 00:20:06.930 poem is to Shakespeare as I am to my daughter, 00:20:07.009 --> 00:20:09.549 Bella, who turns three today. Wish her a happy 00:20:09.549 --> 00:20:13.410 birthday. She's in the nursery. This poem is 00:20:13.410 --> 00:20:15.950 at least 10 times older than the United States 00:20:15.950 --> 00:20:20.369 of America. Generations have trod, have trod, 00:20:20.430 --> 00:20:23.049 have trod, civilizations have risen and fallen, 00:20:23.470 --> 00:20:26.890 but this poem celebrating the acts of God in 00:20:26.890 --> 00:20:31.230 history is still here. It has weathered all of 00:20:31.230 --> 00:20:34.529 history from then till now. All flesh is as grass 00:20:34.529 --> 00:20:36.869 and the glory of man is the flower of grass, 00:20:36.970 --> 00:20:39.329 but the grass withers, the flower falls, but 00:20:39.329 --> 00:20:41.549 the word of the Lord endures forever. Friend, 00:20:42.609 --> 00:20:46.299 this word is a rock. It has been a light to all 00:20:46.299 --> 00:20:48.779 generations. If you want something that will 00:20:48.779 --> 00:20:51.099 last, if you want something bigger than yourself, 00:20:52.220 --> 00:20:55.660 you've got it in your hands. Treasure this word. 00:20:56.539 --> 00:20:59.460 Treasure the God who gave us this word so that 00:20:59.460 --> 00:21:01.779 we can know Him, us, and our children and our 00:21:01.779 --> 00:21:04.640 children's children. That was all point one. 00:21:04.759 --> 00:21:06.980 God is the God of history. He controls it. He 00:21:06.980 --> 00:21:09.079 always has. He's the ancient of days. He has 00:21:09.079 --> 00:21:11.420 determined the periods and the boundaries of 00:21:11.420 --> 00:21:13.359 the dwelling places of nations as we wrote about 00:21:13.359 --> 00:21:16.759 in Acts. Let's move to point two, which is much 00:21:16.759 --> 00:21:21.079 simpler. So what do we do as people living in 00:21:21.079 --> 00:21:23.299 history, knowing that God rules all of history? 00:21:23.380 --> 00:21:25.819 Make it practical. Fill in the blank for me here, 00:21:25.880 --> 00:21:27.720 right? Think about the song that we've read. 00:21:28.039 --> 00:21:32.059 God rules all history, therefore I should... 00:21:32.059 --> 00:21:36.119 What? Right? There's a lot of good answers to 00:21:36.119 --> 00:21:38.380 this question, of course. If this was a test, 00:21:38.859 --> 00:21:40.519 and my students were raising their hands and 00:21:40.519 --> 00:21:42.480 making that look on their face, I would say, 00:21:42.579 --> 00:21:44.920 I'll take a lot of... answers. There's a lot 00:21:44.920 --> 00:21:48.160 of ways to get full credit, but you need to explain 00:21:48.160 --> 00:21:52.099 yourself the reference to the text. Here's what 00:21:52.099 --> 00:21:54.240 I think we should take practically from this. 00:21:54.660 --> 00:21:59.180 God rules all history, therefore I should be 00:21:59.180 --> 00:22:03.680 thoughtfully nice. That's how I would fill in 00:22:03.680 --> 00:22:05.700 the blanks. Let me show you how I got this. Look 00:22:05.700 --> 00:22:08.700 again at the poem. Go to verse seven. It says, 00:22:08.880 --> 00:22:13.829 but you You are to be feared. Who can stand before 00:22:13.829 --> 00:22:16.329 you when once your anger is aroused? From the 00:22:16.329 --> 00:22:19.269 heavens you uttered judgment. The earth feared 00:22:19.269 --> 00:22:22.430 and was still. When God arose to establish judgment 00:22:22.430 --> 00:22:28.690 to save all the humble of the earth. Selah. You'll 00:22:28.690 --> 00:22:31.069 remember that Selah is kind of a mysterious term. 00:22:31.289 --> 00:22:33.990 That's why it's left untranslated. That's the 00:22:33.990 --> 00:22:35.930 English version of the Hebrew word. Our best 00:22:35.930 --> 00:22:38.029 guess is it's some kind of musical term meaning 00:22:38.029 --> 00:22:41.559 pause. Stop, breathe, think about that a second. 00:22:42.819 --> 00:22:44.880 That's what we should do here. God is in control 00:22:44.880 --> 00:22:46.740 of all things. No one can stand against him and 00:22:46.740 --> 00:22:49.359 he is a judging God and he is going to judge 00:22:49.359 --> 00:22:54.339 in anger in order to what? Save the humble of 00:22:54.339 --> 00:22:59.819 the earth. My point too today is humility. The 00:22:59.819 --> 00:23:03.079 God of history is on the side of the humble. 00:23:03.880 --> 00:23:07.279 What does this mean? Well, it means for our own 00:23:07.279 --> 00:23:09.680 good, we need to be on the side of the humble. 00:23:11.220 --> 00:23:14.140 We have this phrase in our society that's kind 00:23:14.140 --> 00:23:17.140 of this moral prod. We say we want to be on the 00:23:17.140 --> 00:23:19.660 right side of history, right? People say that 00:23:19.660 --> 00:23:22.019 when they want you to vote for them. And I think 00:23:22.019 --> 00:23:25.039 what they're saying is right, but they're not 00:23:25.039 --> 00:23:28.740 saying it with the meaning that this text has. 00:23:29.440 --> 00:23:31.460 People today seem to mean that in, you know, 00:23:31.579 --> 00:23:34.500 if you get things wrong today. In 50 years some 00:23:34.500 --> 00:23:36.640 teacher with a book in his hand is going to be 00:23:36.640 --> 00:23:38.279 shaking his head and saying, well those guys 00:23:38.279 --> 00:23:41.539 were wrong and we will feel shame in our grave 00:23:41.539 --> 00:23:43.940 or in our old folks home or something like that. 00:23:44.359 --> 00:23:48.779 It's a pretty windy judgment really. This text 00:23:48.779 --> 00:23:51.440 says something very different. It says that God 00:23:51.440 --> 00:23:53.960 intervenes in history and when he does he is 00:23:53.960 --> 00:23:55.900 on the side of the humble. The word translated 00:23:55.900 --> 00:23:59.240 humble here means what you think it means in 00:23:59.240 --> 00:24:01.460 the context of history. In different places it's 00:24:01.460 --> 00:24:05.799 translated meek. poor, lowly, oppressed. When 00:24:05.799 --> 00:24:07.940 Jesus says that the meek will inherit the earth, 00:24:07.960 --> 00:24:10.519 he's probably thinking of verses like this. Matthew 00:24:10.519 --> 00:24:12.960 Henry says, quote, though the meek of the earth 00:24:12.960 --> 00:24:16.000 are by their meekness exposed to injury, yet 00:24:16.000 --> 00:24:19.079 God will sooner or later appear for their salvation. 00:24:19.819 --> 00:24:24.559 And so when we read this text, knowing that we 00:24:24.559 --> 00:24:28.140 are those who are favored by history generally, 00:24:28.400 --> 00:24:30.339 we need to put ourselves on the side of the poor 00:24:30.339 --> 00:24:32.759 and the humble. Don't be an oppressor. Be kind 00:24:32.759 --> 00:24:35.599 in a thoughtful way. Be on the right side of 00:24:35.599 --> 00:24:38.519 the history and for the right reason. I think 00:24:38.519 --> 00:24:41.119 there is messiness, there is injustice, there 00:24:41.119 --> 00:24:44.720 is enormous pain in history, but God is not complacent. 00:24:45.380 --> 00:24:48.400 God sees the ugliness of history and it makes 00:24:48.400 --> 00:24:51.599 him angry. The oppressors of history aren't just 00:24:51.599 --> 00:24:54.660 going to get away with it. God is on the side 00:24:54.660 --> 00:24:56.460 of the poor and the meek and the humble and we 00:24:56.460 --> 00:24:58.640 want to think about who those people are and 00:24:58.640 --> 00:25:02.339 make sure we are nice to them. So that was point 00:25:02.339 --> 00:25:07.079 two. My last point is hierarchy, and it's related 00:25:07.079 --> 00:25:09.960 to both previous points. Let's look at the last 00:25:09.960 --> 00:25:12.279 few verses of this poem quickly for my last point 00:25:12.279 --> 00:25:32.119 here. Verse 11. Who should we serve? Well, it's 00:25:32.119 --> 00:25:36.240 God, obviously, right? But then look at verse 00:25:36.240 --> 00:25:41.059 12. Who else should fear God? Princes and kings, 00:25:42.359 --> 00:25:45.119 right? The people who in a traditional society, 00:25:45.440 --> 00:25:47.880 everybody else is supposed to fear and serve, 00:25:48.180 --> 00:25:51.660 right? So there's a sense of course in which 00:25:51.660 --> 00:25:54.940 we're all equal before God. God's chose no favoritism 00:25:54.940 --> 00:25:57.900 or partiality as Peter says in Acts. A beggar 00:25:57.900 --> 00:26:00.299 woman can be the spiritual peer of the disciples 00:26:00.299 --> 00:26:03.720 as Jesus shows, but there's this still a sense 00:26:03.720 --> 00:26:06.160 and a very obvious sense in which a beggar woman 00:26:06.160 --> 00:26:08.740 and a king are different, right? One has money 00:26:08.740 --> 00:26:11.579 and power, one doesn't. This poem is saying that 00:26:11.579 --> 00:26:14.740 everybody on the earthly totem pole, everybody 00:26:14.740 --> 00:26:17.339 in every part of the social ladder will answer 00:26:17.339 --> 00:26:20.700 to God and the ones at the top are going to answer 00:26:20.700 --> 00:26:27.700 the most. They need to fear him. Let's put all 00:26:27.700 --> 00:26:29.619 of this together, and here's what I'm suggesting. 00:26:31.119 --> 00:26:34.259 I think we need to train ourselves to have concentric 00:26:34.259 --> 00:26:40.900 loyalties, or layered loyalties, right? Broadly, 00:26:41.000 --> 00:26:43.579 right? We should be loyal to ourselves. That's 00:26:43.579 --> 00:26:46.589 part of being a creature. But our loyalty to 00:26:46.589 --> 00:26:48.849 ourselves need to be bounded very tightly to 00:26:48.849 --> 00:26:51.890 our loyalty to those around us. And there's family 00:26:51.890 --> 00:26:54.309 loyalty, there's social loyalty, there's loyalty 00:26:54.309 --> 00:26:56.529 to one's country. And I think that's a good and 00:26:56.529 --> 00:26:59.809 healthy thing. Loyalty to this state is good, 00:27:00.029 --> 00:27:01.630 right? When it's correctly possible. And then 00:27:01.630 --> 00:27:04.390 of course there's loyalty to God who expresses 00:27:04.390 --> 00:27:07.829 himself most fully in Christ. And that's the 00:27:07.829 --> 00:27:10.829 hierarchy that should most concern us. God is 00:27:10.829 --> 00:27:13.529 at the top. and everything else, every other 00:27:13.529 --> 00:27:16.309 loyalty, no matter how real, needs to be subordinate 00:27:16.309 --> 00:27:20.170 to that. I think we need to be a thoughtful people. 00:27:21.710 --> 00:27:24.710 We should thank God for his grace, I think, in 00:27:24.710 --> 00:27:26.609 giving us this country. We should thank God for 00:27:26.609 --> 00:27:29.109 his grace in giving us this word. I think we 00:27:29.109 --> 00:27:31.630 can praise God freely in this country, and we 00:27:31.630 --> 00:27:34.069 should praise God for that. And further, we can 00:27:34.069 --> 00:27:37.890 praise this country under God because God is 00:27:37.890 --> 00:27:40.660 over. this country just as he's over everything 00:27:40.660 --> 00:27:49.839 else in all of history. Let's pray. Oh Lord God, 00:27:52.500 --> 00:27:56.700 your might is evident throughout all the world. 00:27:57.700 --> 00:28:00.720 You come in weakness when you come in the person 00:28:00.720 --> 00:28:05.099 of Jesus. We praise you that you are on the side, 00:28:05.140 --> 00:28:09.200 not of the warlords, of the poor. not humble. 00:28:10.619 --> 00:28:15.339 And each of us, Lord, in our sin is poor and 00:28:15.339 --> 00:28:18.859 humble. Come to each of us, Lord, bind our wounds. 00:28:19.519 --> 00:28:24.099 Help us to look to you in gladness, knowing that 00:28:24.099 --> 00:28:27.480 you are good, that your mercy endures, that you 00:28:27.480 --> 00:28:32.000 will be God to us. Help us, Lord, to love you 00:28:32.000 --> 00:28:33.859 and do your work. We pray these things in Jesus' 00:28:34.039 --> 00:28:42.230 name. Amen. Thank you for listening to Second 00:28:42.230 --> 00:28:45.049 City Sermons podcast. We hope this sermon has 00:28:45.049 --> 00:28:47.049 encouraged you to worship God and to celebrate 00:28:47.049 --> 00:28:49.910 the gospel of Jesus. Please consider subscribing 00:28:49.910 --> 00:28:52.769 to this podcast and joining us in person each 00:28:52.769 --> 00:28:55.650 Sunday at 10 a .m. You can find us online at 00:28:55.650 --> 00:28:58.789 SecondCityChurch .org and on Instagram, Facebook, 00:28:59.049 --> 00:29:01.549 and YouTube. Thanks again for listening. God 00:29:01.549 --> 00:29:01.890 bless.