Latest / Fifteen Minutes With Fritz - Where Scripture Meets the Sidewalk / Solving our "Yeah - but" fears

Transcript

Solving our "Yeah - but" fears · Fifteen Minutes With Fritz - Where Scripture Meets the Sidewalk

• 0:10
  SPEAKER_01: Today marks the one year anniversary of the very first Fifteen Minutes with Fritz podcast.
• 0:19
  SPEAKER_01: It appeared as though some doors were being closed to be able to continue the Bible study we had started at Presco Technology in nineteen ninety seven.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_01: Perhaps it had run its course and it was time to draw things to a close.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_01: But after much prayer and some valuable advice from my wife, we decided to try something different.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_01: Rather than a traditional in person Bible study, we decided to try a podcast style approach.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_01: And so on october eighth, twenty twenty five, the first fifteen minutes with Fritz podcast was distributed as an email attachment to thirty five individuals.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_01: We also began publishing them on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and iHeartRadio, and the results have been remarkable.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_01: In the past year over four hundred podcasts have been downloaded by listeners literally around the world.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_01: People in Japan, India, Australia, Vietnam, and New Zealand have tuned in to hear these messages from God's Word out of Cleveland, Ohio.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_01: We even had one download in Iraq.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_01: In addition to cities in the US, people in Kyoto, Mumbai, Tokyo, Wellington, and Ho Chi Minh City have found our little podcast and downloaded our messages.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_01: And I am amazed, humbled, and thankful for what God has done.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_01: And so I would ask you to pause this week and thank God for his goodness and his blessings and ask him to continue to open this window of opportunity wider and wider for his glory.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_01: With that said, let's turn to living in the Psalms and find some encouragement for life's daily grind.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_01: Once again, Chuck Swindall provides an appropriate introduction to the psalm we're going to look at today.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_01: One of the most paralyzing problems in all of life is fear.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_01: Our fears are directed in so many areas fear of the unknown, fear of calamity, fear of sickness, disease and death, fear of people, fear of losing our jobs, fear of enemy attacks, fear of being misunderstood or rejected, or criticized, or forgotten, or being mistreated.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_01: Now, although that's not an exhaustive list, it pretty much summarizes many of the things that keep us awake at night.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_01: In today's Psalm, David once again bears his soul regarding the fears that he carried around.
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_01: And while some of them were unique to being the king of a nation and therefore out of our scope of reality, others are eerily similar to the things many of us are concerned about today.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_01: And so if you can, open your Bible to Psalm twenty seven and listen to King David as he pours out his heart to God.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_01: The Lord is my light and my salvation.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_01: Whom shall I fear?
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_01: The Lord is the stronghold of my life, of whom shall I be afraid?
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_01: When evil men advance against me to devour my flesh, when my enemies and my foes attack me, they will stumble and fall.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_01: Though an army besiege me my heart will not fear, though war break out against me, even then will I be confident.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_01: One thing I ask of the Lord, this is what I seek, that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to seek him in his temple.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_01: For in the day of trouble he will keep me safe in his dwelling, he will hide me in the shelter of his tabernacle, and set me high upon a rock.
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_01: Then my head will be exalted above all the enemies who surround me.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_01: At his tabernacle will I sacrifice with shouts of joy.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_01: I will sing and make music to the Lord.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_01: Hear my voice when I call, O Lord, be merciful to me and answer me.
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_01: My heart says of you, seek his face, your face, Lord I will seek.
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_01: Do not hide your face from me, do not turn your servant away in anger.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_01: You have been my helper.
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_01: Do not reject me or forsake me, O God my Savior.
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_01: Though my father and mother forsake me, the Lord will receive me.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_01: Teach me your way, O Lord.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_01: Lead me in a straight path because of my oppressors.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_01: Do not turn me over to the desire of my foes, for false witnesses rise up against me, breathing out violence.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_01: I am still confident of this I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_01: Wait for the Lord, be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_01: As I read this psalm I felt that David kind of jumped around quite a bit.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_01: In some verses he seems to be talking to himself, while in other verses he is speaking with God.
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_01: There are also some strong contrasts.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_01: Sometimes he is lamenting his situation and other times he's praising God.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_01: He mentions worship and he mentions war, and he jumps from persecution to praise.
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_01: That said, David starts really strong in this psalm.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_01: The Lord is my light and my salvation, whom shall I fear?
• 6:32
  SPEAKER_01: The Lord is the stronghold of my life, of whom shall I be afraid?
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_01: These are words of a man who is clearly confident in God and how he will keep him from harm.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_01: He even asks two rhetorical questions that we already know the answer to Whom shall I fear?
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_01: No one of whom shall I be afraid?
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_01: No one.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_01: He continues this strong conviction in verses two and three.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_01: When evil men advance against me to devour my flesh, when my enemies and my foes attack me they will stumble and fall.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_01: Though an army besiege me, my heart will not fear.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_01: Though war break out against me, even then will I be confident.
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_01: Now we could stop there and armed with these words of David face any situation of life feeling strong and confident in God's protective care.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_01: But David felt the need to press on.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_01: He next makes a rather sudden transition from his confident, passionate belief statements to something else that's been on his mind, something he wants with all his heart.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_01: One thing I ask of the Lord, this is what I seek, that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to seek him in his temple.
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_01: Well, that's a pretty high calling, isn't it?
• 8:11
  SPEAKER_01: Instead of asking for wealth or power or even protection from his enemies, David tells God that the only thing he really wants is to enter the temple and worship him.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_01: God must have been pleased to hear those words from David's lips.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_01: We come to the next verse and David returns to another confident announcement.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_01: For in the day of trouble he will keep me safe in his dwelling, he will hide me in the shelter of his tabernacle, and set me high upon a rock.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_01: But the next seven verses are a kind of mixture of confidence and concern.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_01: Hear my voice when I call is followed by please be merciful and answer me.
• 8:59
  SPEAKER_01: His words of confidence you have been my helper, and the Lord will receive me are preceded by words of almost worry and concern.
• 9:09
  SPEAKER_01: Please don't hide your face or be angry with me, don't reject me or forsake me.
• 9:16
  SPEAKER_01: He is troubled that God might even turn him over to his foes, but then he stresses that he has confidence in the goodness of the Lord.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_01: So what are we to make of these middle verses?
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_01: I think these are yeah but verses.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_01: What do I mean by that?
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_01: Well, David was flip flopping back and forth between confidence and concern.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_01: We do this all the time, don't we?
• 9:48
  SPEAKER_01: You are sovereign, God, but do you really love love me and have time to listen to me?
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_01: You promise to protect me, Lord.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_01: But what if it's your will that I go through a rough patch?
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_01: I want to worship you.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_01: But what if you're angry with me for that sin I committed?
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_01: We often claim the promises of God, but we still harbor the yeah but fears, don't we?
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_01: You see, this is what I love about David.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_01: He is so real.
• 10:23
  SPEAKER_01: We can definitely relate to a man like him.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_01: When it's three o'clock in the morning and our head is on the pillow but our eyes are wide open and our brain won't shut down, and our mind begins to wander towards solving world problems, well, maybe not world problems, but certainly our problems.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_01: And as we tick down the list of everything that concerns us, the fears that Chuck Swindal mentioned earlier, we can easily get overwhelmed by the sheer volume of what we're facing.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_01: And then, because we know it's the right thing to do, we begin searching our minds for verses of comfort.
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_01: Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil for you are with me.
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_01: I trust in you, O Lord, I say you are my God, my times are in your hands.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_01: Be still and know that I am God.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_01: And then we can't seem to help it, and we begin to yeah but each one of these verses of encouragement.
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_01: And in the end we remain discouraged and fearful.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_01: So what are we supposed to do?
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_01: Well David, after disclosing in these middle verses that he goes through that exact scenario, closes this psalm with two powerful, brilliant verses.
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_01: I am confident of this, I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_01: The Hebrew word translated confident does not mean self reliant or brave from a personal perspective.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_01: It means to trust in another source in someone else who can provide the help needed, which of course is God.
• 12:16
  SPEAKER_01: To help me stay strong and confident in him, I circle words like will in my Bible.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_01: I am confident of I am confident of this, I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living, because it helps me to remember where my help comes from.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_01: My help comes from the Lord.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_01: In this Psalm alone I circled will six times.
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_01: My enemies will stumble and fall.
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_01: In the day of trouble he will keep me safe.
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_01: He will hide me in the shelter of his tabernacle and set me high upon a rock.
• 12:58
  SPEAKER_01: Doing this reminds me where my confidence lies in the strength and sovereign power of the living God.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_01: Now I would have expected David to close this psalm with some amazing examples of how God answered all these declarations and desires that David expressed in this psalm.
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_01: Remember when the Philistines attacked and God helped our armies to defeat them?
• 13:25
  SPEAKER_01: Remember when God put down Absalom's rebellion?
• 13:28
  SPEAKER_01: And let's not forget the time when a single stone from my slingshot defeated the Goliath defeated the giant Goliath.
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_01: Instead, he tells us we have to do something that is completely opposite of what we want to do when we're fearful.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_01: Listen to verse fourteen.
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_01: Wait for the Lord.
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_01: Be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord.
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_01: David committed to do nothing except to wait on God.
• 14:03
  SPEAKER_01: It's a fitting conclusion, Swindal writes, but completely unexpected.
• 14:09
  SPEAKER_01: He realized that the pressure would not suddenly leave.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_01: He knew his enemies would not do an about face and depart immediately after he rose from his knees.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_01: He was realistic enough to know that anything worth having is worth waiting for.
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_01: So in the final lines of this song, he tells himself to relax, to enter into God's rest, to cease from his own works.
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_01: Strength and courage are developed during a trial, not after it's over.
• 14:41
  SPEAKER_01: Waiting on God is essential.
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_01: So how do we solve our yeah but fears?
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_01: Wait for the Lord to fulfill his promises.
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_01: One final quote This one from James Hudson Taylor who founded China Inland Mission.
• 15:01
  SPEAKER_01: It does not matter how great the pressure is, what really matters is where the pressure lies, whether it comes between you and God, or whether it presses you nearer his heart.
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_01: Let's pray.
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_01: Father, we confess our weaknesses before you, our lack of trust in the never-changing promises of your word.
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you for sharing with us a man like David, faithful yet flawed.
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_01: May these words from Psalm twenty-seven reside deep in our hearts today and forevermore.
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_01: In Jesus' name we pray.
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_01: Amen.
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_00: To him who is able to keep you from falling and to present you before his glorious presence without fall and with great joy.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_00: To the only God our Savior be glory, majesty, power, and authority through Jesus Christ our Lord.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_01: This is the end of our podcast, but it's not the end of our story.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you for listening.