My name is Kaylin.
Today's scripture reading is from Psalm 8, 1 through 9,
page 459 in the Bibles in the back of the pews.
Lord our Lord, how magnificent is your name
throughout the earth.
You have covered the heavens with your majesty.
From the mouths of infants and nursing babies,
you have established a stronghold
on account of your adversaries
in order to silence the enemy and the avenger.
When I observe your heavens, the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars, which you set in place,
what is a human being that you remember him,
a son of man that you look after him?
You made him a little less than God
and crowned him with glory and honor.
You made him ruler over the works of your hands.
You put everything under his feet,
all the sheep and oxen, as well as the animals in the wild.
The birds of the sky and the fish of the sea
that pass through the currents of the seas.
Lord our Lord, how magnificent is your name
throughout the earth.
This is God's word.
Thank you.
Out of all the things that God hath made,
there is but one who could gaze into the heavens
and ponder even his own existence.
And through some peculiar twist of irony,
it is the rest of creation staring back at the man
that testifies of the glory, the splendor,
the majesty and the beauty of the divine creator.
For thousands of years,
man has sort of clumsily bobbled about the earth,
searching for answers to questions which at first glance
might seem way above his pay grade.
But in reality, they're so simple,
even a small child could understand.
Books have been written,
poetry has been written, songs have been sung,
movies have been made, paintings have been painted,
sculptures have been sculpted, podcasts have been recorded,
celebrities interviewed, all of these things
at once happening trying to answer the question,
what is the meaning of life?
What is the meaning of life?
I would even argue that the proud atheist
in his darkest, loneliest moment,
perhaps after an event of heartbreak
or the sudden loss of a loved one,
that even he would lay in his bed
and look up to the ceiling
and in some dark place in his heart,
he would reluctantly whisper, why?
Why?
But alas, in a moment, his pride would sweep him away
for he is after all his own God made in his own image.
And he will one day die
and he will return to the dirt, oblivion.
Lord, our Lord, how magnificent is your name
throughout the earth.
You have covered the heavens with your majesty.
Who is David talking to?
Why the redundancy here?
Is he perhaps being poetic?
Is he just saying it that way to sound cool?
Lord, our Lord, maybe he's channeling
some inner future Walt Whitman.
Oh, Captain, my Captain.
Oh, Lord, our Lord.
Kind of has a nice ring to it.
Now, David is addressing God appropriately.
He is addressing God in a way
that is not just addressing God appropriately.
He is addressing God not just on a personal level,
but on a cosmic, royal scale.
Yahweh, our King, much in the same way Psalm 24 declares,
the earth and everything in it,
the world and its inhabitants, who do they belong to?
They belong to the Lord
because he laid its foundation on the seas
and established it on the rivers.
David here, he's not just talking about any old deity,
just a random, obscure God,
a man-made, feeble-minded, anxious pagan God
that was created for the sole purpose
of filling some temporal void
in man's sinful, treacherous heart.
David, he's talking to the Genesis 1-1 God,
in the beginning, that God.
He's talking to the Exodus chapter three God,
Moses, he was commissioned by God
to go stand before Pharaoh
and demand the release of the Israelites.
And he said, who do I say sent me?
What do I do?
And God said, you tell them, Yahweh, I am,
the great I am has sent you.
In one brief couple of words here,
David is rightfully addressing God
as the infinite, majestic, divine, faithful,
everlasting creator, the great I am.
The source and the reason for all that ever was
ever was, ever will be, Yahweh, our Adonai.
He is our King.
He is our master.
He is sovereign over all things,
and he is enthroned above all things.
He is the one that we bow to, the God of the universe.
He is the one that we surrender to.
He is the one that we pledge our allegiance to,
the one that we call our King, our earthly King.
When he speaks, we can offer nothing,
nothing in return, but a humble majesty,
thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.
O Captain, my Captain, Creator, our Master,
Yahweh, our Adonai, or simply Lord, our Lord.
Moving on to verse two, David says,
from the mouths of infants and nursing babes,
you have established a stronghold
on account of your adversaries
in order to silence the enemy and the enemy
and the avenger.
In other words, the Lord's prepared a safe place,
a strong place, a fortress that he would be praised,
where the weak, the marginalized, the afflicted ones,
where they can freely come and love the Lord
and worship him with all their heart,
their soul, their mind, and their strength.
We actually see this sort of play out in the New Testament.
When Jesus came, he went into the temple,
you guys remember he went into the temple
and he cleared it.
And he quoted an Old Testament scripture,
and it said that the house of prayer
has become a den of thieves, a den of robbers.
And he was very upset.
He turned over the tables, he chased everybody out.
And who was it that came in shouting at the top
of their lungs saying, Hosanna to the son of David?
Who was it that came in?
Probably realistically for the first time ever,
he probably had never been in the temple before.
Who was it?
It was the kids, the little ones, the defenseless ones.
And what did they do?
They came to Jesus and they said,
do you hear what these kids are saying?
Do you hear these obnoxious little kids?
You hear what they're saying to you?
Stop them.
Stop them, they're getting out of hand, Jesus.
And he said, have you never read
from the mouths of infants and nursing babes?
You have prepared praise.
He quotes that.
See, God uses the weak to humble the strong.
We know this.
He uses the insignificant to confound the proud.
The despised, what the world despises
and looks on as foolish.
He uses the fool to shame the wise.
Out of the mouths of infants and nursing babes.
He uses the praise of his people
like a weapon to strike fear in the heart of the enemy.
In the book of Luke, Jesus, he made his entry
into Jerusalem and he came riding in on his war horse
or his donkey, actually.
He comes in and there were people worshiping God
and they were crying out, they were crying out,
blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord.
They were shouting this just like the kids.
Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord.
And again, we see the Pharisees,
the religious leaders, the scribes,
they came to Jesus and they said,
dude, your people are getting out of hand.
Rebuke them.
Stop this, this is foolishness.
And Jesus said something really interesting here.
He says, I'm gonna tell you something.
He says, if they don't cry out, if they don't worship God,
if they remain silent, the rocks will cry out.
In other words, the Lord, the God of the universe
that David's talking to is so worthy of praise,
is so worthy of worship, is so worthy
and deserving of everything
that it can't be stopped.
Nothing can stop it.
If we don't, the rocks will cry out.
Nature, everything testifies to God's glory, right?
Moving on in verse three.
When I observe your heavens, the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars which you set in place,
what is a human being that you remember him?
A son of man that you look after him?
And here we come to it.
The ancient, timeless question.
What is man?
If you read Genesis, if you read the Bible,
if you read Genesis, if you read the creation story
in Genesis, you'll notice something really interesting.
You'll notice a lot of let there be's, right?
Let there be, we all know that.
Let there be light, let there be water,
let there be plants, let there be animals,
let there be fish, ew, fish, I don't like fish.
Let there be trees, let there be bugs,
let there be all of these things.
Let there be, let there be, let there be.
And then finally on day six, God says something different.
He says, let us make.
Let us make.
By the way, the us in that,
a lot of people get hung up on that.
It's not talking about some divine counsel
of the gods or anything.
It's just an early reference to the Trinity,
God being the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
Don't get caught up on that.
Let us make man in our own image.
Out of all the things God made, there's only one,
there's only one that holds the special privilege
of being intimately crafted and delicately created by God.
God said, let us make man in our own image, in a mago day.
Let us create something that will stand as a reflection
to my glory, my majesty, my beauty, and even my character.
Genesis chapter two says, the Lord God formed the man
out of the dust of the ground,
and then he breathed the breath of life.
He breathed into his nostrils,
and the man became a living being.
He breathed life into the nostrils of man.
Think about that for just a second.
He breathed life into the nostrils of man.
Think about that for just a second.
This act of creation was so intimate,
it was so close, face to face,
almost like a kiss from God, from the divine creator himself
on the lips of man.
Very intimate, very close.
Man was not just brought poof into existence.
Man was not one of the many things
that God said, let there be.
As the psalmist says, it was you, God.
You created my inward parts.
You knit me together in my mother's womb.
Man was held close in the arms of God.
He was touched on the lips by Yahweh.
God breathed his own breath into the lungs of man.
God gave a part of himself
to give life to the newly formed man.
He didn't want him to just be alive, let there be man.
He didn't want him to just be alive.
He wanted him to have life.
From the beginning, God,
giving of himself to those he loves
and those he cherishes in order that they may have life.
Doesn't that sound familiar?
It should.
We should all know this.
We all know that scripture.
For God so loved the world that he did what he gave.
He gave his only son and whoever believes in him
shall not perish, but they'll have eternal life.
See, man is, it's the crown of creation.
We are the reflection of the divine creator.
We are the glory of the hands of God.
Crowned with glory and honor and given dominion,
by the way, over every single one of us.
By the way, over everything that God
had previously called good.
Everything God made, he said, it is good, it is good,
it is good, and then he made man.
And he said, all of the things I call good,
you have dominion over.
How peculiar.
And it would be really cool if the creation story
ended right there, wouldn't it?
It would be awesome.
But unfortunately, that's not where it ends.
Unfortunately, there's more to the story.
Unfortunately, there was another prowling
and slithering around in the garden
who would seek to rob man of his reflective nature.
Who would seek to bring him back down to the dirt
alongside him and crawl in the dirt for eternity.
The same dirt that he was formed out of
that he was formed out of, the same dirt he will return to
and the same dirt he will spend the rest of his life
trying to wash off himself and make himself clean.
Adam, banished from paradise,
fated to walk the long, lonely plank of life
to an unfamiliar end called death.
There's a book by A.W. Tozer,
it's called Whatever Happened to Worship,
and he sums up the fall of man perfectly with this quote.
It says, man created to be more like God
than any other creature has become less like God
than any other creature.
Created to reflect the glory of God,
instead he is retreated sullenly into his cave
and now reflects only his own sinfulness.
You see, rarely do we pause to really consider
the gravity of the fallen condition of man.
Man created to be the reflection of God,
to be the image bearer of God, but what has he become?
He has become broken, distorted.
His Imago Dei has become twisted and perverted.
No longer are we driven to pursue what is right,
what is good, what is holy.
Instead, we are driven and compelled by greed,
by envy, by jealousy, by envy.
By greed, by envy, by jealousy, by lust, anger.
In the book of James, he says each person is tempted
when he is drawn away and enticed by his own evil desire.
By his own evil desire, and when desire is conceived,
it gives birth to sin, and when sin is fully grown,
it grows up, it gives birth to death.
So instead of cherishing and loving
what is made in the image of God,
instead of recognizing the majesty, the glory, our job,
instead, we arrive at the altar of self-preservation.
And we stand at the altar of self-preservation,
and just like Cain, we pick up the rock
and we bludgeon our brother to death.
Over and over again, we do this,
destroying, mutilating the Imago Dei, the image of God.
Paul, in the book of Romans says,
they exchange the truth of God for a lie.
And they worship and they serve the created thing
instead of the creator, who is to be praised forever.
We do this over and over again.
You see, this whole passage in Psalm eight
is really just David recognizing his place in the universe,
his place in the world.
It's very simple.
God, the creator, is the creator
of the world, you made me.
You made everything, in fact.
Your majesty and your glory, they're so big,
they're bigger than eternity.
And you created me and you care for me.
And you delicately knit me together in my mother's womb.
Blessed are the poor in spirit, right?
Jesus says that, blessed are the poor in spirit.
Blessed are those who understand
just how dependent they are on God.
That the very breath in their lungs is a gift from God.
I have been intimately crafted and delicately created
by the God of the universe.
What an honor that such a God would be mindful of me.
What an honor that he would even notice me,
he would take a second look at me.
My family and I, we recently went out to lunch together.
And we wanted a good burger, so we went to The Habit.
And we ordered our food, we sat down,
hanging out, telling jokes to each other,
just goofing off, playing rock, paper, scissors.
It was really fun.
Three way rock, paper, scissors, by the way,
which is really weird, but it was fun.
We were hanging out, waiting for our food.
And this family of five people comes in.
It was a dad, and it was just four kids.
He had two older children, a boy and a girl,
and then the two young children,
younger boy and then a young girl.
They came walking in, they ordered their food,
and then they sat down at their table
and waited for their food.
And they retreated into their cell phones.
And I don't mean they retreated into their cell phones
like they were having casual conversations,
and every now and then they would pick up their phone
and check a tweet or an Instagram or a text message.
I mean, they were sitting around a table about this big,
and they may well have been
a thousand miles away from each other, inside their phones,
ignoring each other.
It was the dad and his three kids just sitting there,
oblivious to each other.
And you're probably thinking, wait, you said four kids.
Where's the other kid?
Well, she, this little girl, she was probably 11.
She was not old enough to have a cell phone.
So what do you think she did?
She just sat there, bored, out of her mind.
I could see it, I could feel it.
She was sitting four feet from us.
It was hard to watch, because I have a daughter
who's getting close to that age.
I don't wanna project or assume anything,
but I'm just gonna assume she probably doesn't have
the greatest relationship with her dad.
The only time she came alive was when the food came
and they had to all, they were forced
to put their phones away.
And they all had to eat and look at each other.
But she just sat there, bored, lonely, inside.
Nobody's even looking at me, nobody's talking to me.
I'm useless.
That is an amago de issue.
That is an issue of the love between a parent
and their child is just, it's nonexistent.
She's not there.
I don't know them personally, I don't wanna assume anything,
but society would tell us differently.
Statistically, we spend, what is it, close to three hours,
every day, doom scrolling on our phones.
Just oblivious to the world around us.
We live in our devices, we live in self-absorption.
That is an issue of amago de.
That is an issue of we are exchanging the truth of God
and we are instead worshiping what has been created
instead of creator God.
Because if we really worshiped and we really faithfully
served the creator God, we would be overflowing
with pure love, pure joy, peace, kindness, gentleness,
and we would see just how precious life is
and how beautifully and wonderfully made
even the barista that got your order wrong,
how wonderful it is that they have breath in their lungs.
We would see how precious life is
of the man or woman who unfortunately has to spend
their nights outside cold in the rain, hungry.
We would see how precious the life is of the small child
about the age of my daughter who is up here.
How precious that child who has to spend their days
slaving away in a mine in the Congo, mining the land,
which by the way is used to create our cell phones,
the batteries, how precious is that life?
But instead we arrive at our sinful idolatrous altar
with our rocks in our hand and we try to disfigure
and mutilate the amago de, the image of God
over and over again, exchanging the truth of God
and we are just worshiping what has been created.
We are just worshiping the image of God over and over again,
exchanging the truth of God for a lie.
So what do we do?
That's great, the world is broken,
humanity is spiraling out of control.
What do we do?
Do we just cue the sad music, the curtains close,
we walk away, there's no hope,
we can't come back from this, what do we do?
Well, the hope is actually found in verses five and six.
He says, you made him little less than God
and crowned him with glory and honor.
You made him ruler over the works of your hands
and you put everything under his feet.
I mean, sure, David was reflecting on creation,
he was reflecting on the garden and paradise
and how God had designed the order of everything, sure.
But whether he knew it or not, he was also looking ahead.
He was looking ahead to what Paul would call
the second Adam or the last Adam.
In First Corinthians, Paul says, it is written,
the first man, Adam, became a living being.
The last Adam became a life-giving spirit.
The last Adam, the second Adam,
just as sin and death have entered the world
through one man, Adam, in his choice,
eternal life, salvation and restoration back to the Father
have entered the world through one man, Jesus Christ.
The Son was given to set the captive free.
The Messiah King promised to David,
the one who would come to reign and rule
and finally bring peace to the world,
the Son of God, the Son of God,
and finally bring peace to a fallen and broken world,
the one who would finally do what Adam could never do,
perfectly bear the image of God
and reflect his glory forever.
On the cross, the love of God,
the mercy of God, the justice of God,
the goodness of the character of God,
all intersected and the image of God,
the Imago Dei, was finally restored.
Hebrews chapter two says, he was not subjected to angels,
he is not subjected to angels of the world to come
that we are talking about,
but someone somewhere has testified,
what is man that you remember him
or the Son of Man that you care for him?
You made him lower than the angels for a short time.
You crowned him with glory and honor
and subjected everything under his feet.
For in subjecting everything to him,
he left nothing that is not subject to him.
As it is, we do not see everything subjected to him,
but we do see Jesus.
Made lower than the angels for a short time
so that by God's grace, he might taste death for everyone.
Crowned with glory and honor because he suffered death.
Jesus Christ, the perfect image of God,
the Imago Dei finally restored in Christ.
Jesus Christ lived a life that we could never live
in order to die the death that we should have died.
Matthew chapter 22, Jesus commands us
to love the Lord with all your heart, soul, mind and strength.
That is the first and greatest commandment.
The second is just like it, he says,
love your neighbor as you love yourself.
So what do we do to love the Lord?
We love him.
He says, love your neighbor as you love yourself.
So what do we do?
You're probably thinking, where's your point?
Every sermon needs a point, right?
Number one, we need to remember.
Remember that like David remembered,
that you were intimately created and crafted
by the hand of God, that you were delicately knit together.
Have you ever tried to knit?
It's frustrating.
You were delicately knit together by the hand of God.
God held you in his arms and he breathed
the breath of life into your lungs.
He gave a part of himself so that you could have life.
And he did the same for your neighbor,
your frustrating neighbor.
He did the same thing for the barista
that is half paying attention to your order
and doesn't get it right and you've gotta go
because you've got an appointment
and they're just holding up your day.
He did the same thing for the guy standing outside
the Safeway, barking at you as you walk in,
who wants you to sign some ridiculous peace treaty
or something.
What is this man saying?
I don't know, I'm with my family, just leave me alone.
He did the same thing for that guy.
He did the same thing for the aborted baby.
He did the same thing for the mother
who has to, in her heart and in her world,
make that hard decision.
Do I go in?
Where do I go?
What do I do?
I'm losing my mind.
I don't know if I can do this.
And she stands at the altar of self-preservation
and she doesn't know what to do.
God did the same thing for her.
He did the same thing for the atheist
who says in his heart, there is no God.
1 John chapter four.
If anyone says, I love God and yet hates his brother,
he's a liar, he's a liar.
For the person who does not love his brother or sister
whom he has seen cannot say they love God
whom he has not seen.
And we have this command from him.
The one who loves God must also love his brother
and sister.
See, you can't hate those created in the image of God.
And claim to love God whose image they were created in.
It doesn't work.
Number two, reflect.
Reflect his glory in all that we do,
even down to our speech.
Yeah, even the things we say should be reflected
in the glory of God.
James says, with the tongue, we bless our father
and with it we also curse those
who are made in God's likeness.
You can't reflect the image and the glory of God
if you're going around spewing hate, spewing poison,
just overflowing with horrible speech
towards your brothers and sisters.
Colossians says, whatever you do in word or deed,
do it as unto the Lord.
To fill yourself with the word of God
because out of the overflow of the heart,
the Bible says, the mouth speaks.
Lastly, reach.
Reach is the word of God.
Reach, reach.
We are the body of Christ.
You knew that, right?
We're the body of Christ.
We are made in the image of God.
We were designed to reflect his glory
in all that we do in word or deed.
We were designed to reflect the goodness
of the character of God in all that we do.
So reach, reach out.
Do something.
This actually goes straight to our mission here at Village.
Our mission, if you know it, say it with me.
Our mission is building a kingdom fellowship
of Christ-honoring disciples
equipped to bring the gospel to life.
I did it.
So we reach out, we reach.
What does that mean?
In the lobby out there, there's love in the bags.
There's Alternatives Pregnancy Center information.
Grab the love in the bag.
Get involved with Alternatives Pregnancy Center.
Join a small group.
Talk to the barista.
They're stressed for a reason.
Talk to the guy that says,
I just need 74 more cents and I can catch the bus
and I can get across town, please.
There's a guy by the Starbucks that we go to.
He sits outside on the sidewalk
and every time we drive by, my wife goes,
he's reading his Bible.
He's not saying anything to anybody.
He's just sitting on the sidewalk.
Homeless, he's clearly homeless.
He has a little dog with him
and he's just sitting there reading his Bible
and he's highlighting it.
I don't know how he got there.
I don't know what in his life happened to get him there,
but he's there.
As I get to the end here,
whether we like to admit it or not,
there's somebody in our life that we go,
they need Jesus, but I really hope
it's not me that has to bring him to them.
Like Jonah, go preach.
And he was like, nope, not me.
A complicated family member, a boss
that frustrates you to no end,
that doesn't understand,
I have to make it to my kid's birthday party.
I have to.
I can't work that day.
Maybe it's a
a couple of days later,
I'm gonna be able to make it to my kid's birthday party.
A coworker, a neighbor.
You drive up and down 58th Street,
you'll see, you'll start to see the ideology in the flags
and in the things that people post.
Maybe it's the political, the politician
who is ideologically opposed to you in every way.
There's no way I would ever vote for him.
There's no way.
He was made in the image of God.
Whether you like that or not,
he was created and crafted and knit together
in his mother's womb.
Matthew chapter 25 says,
Jesus talking, says, I was hungry
and you gave me something to eat.
I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink.
I was a stranger and you took me in.
I was naked and you clothed me.
I was sick and you took care of me.
I was in prison and you visited me.
Truly, I tell you,
whatever you did for the least of these,
the marginalized,
the insignificant, the defenseless,
whatever you did for them,
you've done for me.