Episode 1444: Immutable in Love

[00:00:00] Scott Maderer: Thanks for joining me on episode 1, 444 of the Inspired Stewardship Podcast.

[00:00:07] Scott LaPierre: Hi, I'm Scott LaPierre, a pastor, author, and speaker, and I challenge you to invest in yourself, invest in others, develop your influence, and impact the world by using your time, your talent, and your treasures to live out your calling.

[00:00:21] Having the ability to run your life God's way. instead of ours is key and one way to be inspired to do that is to listen to this. The Inspired Stewardship Podcast with my friend Scott Maderer.

[00:00:39] Scott Maderer: That steadfast love comes before, comes during, and comes after. And it's our response to that overwhelming grace that lets us live forward in love and lets us continue to move forward. It lets us continue. [00:01:00] To be there and be the works of God's hands. Welcome and thank you for joining us on the Inspired Stewardship Podcast.

[00:01:09] If you truly desire to become the person who God wants you to be, then you must learn to use your time, your talent, and your treasures for your true calling. In the Inspired Stewardship Podcast, you will learn to invest in yourself, invest in others, and develop your influence so that you

[00:01:37] In today's Spiritual Foundation episode, I talk with you about Psalm 138. I also talk about how we often make gods out of things that are not God. And I talk about how we show the way, not by conquering, but by showing. Psalm 138 says, I give you thanks, O Lord, with my whole heart before the gods I sing you praise.

[00:01:59] I bow [00:02:00] down toward your holy temple and give thanks to your name for your steadfast love and your faithfulness. For you have exalted your name and your word above everything. On the day I called you, you answered me. You increased my strength of soul. All the kings of the earth shall praise you, O Lord, for they have heard the words of your mouth.

[00:02:19] They shall sing of the ways of the Lord, for great is the glory of the Lord. For though the Lord is high, he regards the lowly, but the haughty he perceives from far away. Though I walk in the midst of trouble, you preserve me against the wrath of my enemies. You stretch out your hand, and your right hand delivers me.

[00:02:36] The Lord will fulfill his purpose for me. Your steadfast love, O Lord, endures forever. Do not forsake the work of your hands. That psalm of Thanksgiving, I think a lot of times can be summed up with that phrase towards the end. Your steadfast love, oh Lord, endures forever. This is about the [00:03:00] gratitude that we have.

[00:03:02] before God in times of trouble, when things are going wrong, when our enemies seem to be winning, when things are not going the way that we want, we recognize that God's love endures forever. Now in this particular psalm, they don't give us any details about what particular crisis or disaster was averted here, and honestly in most of the psalms there's not really a lot of details about that.

[00:03:32] And that might be even done on purpose so that whatever crisis you're facing right now, whatever problem you're facing right now, you can interject that into the psalm. It makes it fit every situation if we don't spell out the situation. I think we all know those moments that we have, that joy that comes to us when we're released from something that's difficult, when we overcome [00:04:00] something that's painful.

[00:04:02] We have that feeling of the need to shout our gratitude, to rise and bring our joy forward. It has to come out from us somehow, sometimes verbally, sometimes physically, but we express it. And Psalm 138 is putting a structure for how we can declare gratitude. There's a feeling there sometimes about who are the gods to whom we sing praise.

[00:04:31] I think this isn't about is this God or that God in terms of which particular religion or belief about God somebody has, but rather it's about recognizing that we often put our faith into things that we think are going to deliver us are going to give us safety that aren't really God at all. As a nation, as a culture, as a people, as [00:05:00] individual people, sometimes we turn and elevate material goods, money, and status, power, as gods.

[00:05:09] Sometimes we bow down to privileges that come from race or gender or economic status or political party. We even national identity can be put forward and raised up as a false god. These are the gods of the world. These aren't the gods that Psalm 138 is talking about. Psalm 138 is saying acknowledge and reorient ourselves to God, capital G, as the ultimate source of salvation and hope.

[00:05:38] Not in your own abilities, not in your own skills, not in worldly things, not in money. None of those things truly provide long standing safety. Yes, they can provide comfort, they can provide momentary joy, but the joy, the love that endures forever only comes from God. [00:06:00] In verse four, it talks about the kings as well.

[00:06:05] But these kings aren't being lifted up as something that is worthy of praise. Instead, these kings actually turn and join in the act of praise with the psalmist, with whoever is speaking. This isn't about conquering or beating down the kings. This isn't about rebelling against them. This isn't about overcoming them with violence.

[00:06:27] Instead, it's about recruiting them with love. It's about telling the story or singing the song so that even the leaders of the nations join in. They can't help but share the story of love. And by the way, there are leaders that say that they are following Maderer. Christian teachings they are following and leading by example, but then you see their action and their actions don't show love.

[00:06:56] And in my opinion, that means that position of [00:07:00] power and ultimate authority is not actually looking to God. They're looking to the power for themselves. These leaders, the psalmist says, shall sing along because they've heard the words and they hear these from the mouth of the Lord, but they also hear them from us and they hear them sometimes in the actions that we take.

[00:07:26] We are the people that have to sing the song, that have to say the words with our hearts and our hands, not just our mouth. And that ultimate rhythm, that ultimate song, the theme of that story is that God's steadfast love endures forever. That may be something that seems simple at one level, that we should know to the core of our being, but the truth is that practice, that prayer, that creed, that belief, we say it, but we often don't practice it.

[00:07:59] [00:08:00] One of the prayers that I have said sometimes is, God, please save me from your people. Because I think sometimes the moments that we have when we say that we're acting as Christians ends up being the very moment where we don't show God's love. Instead, we show judgment, pain, anger, and hurt. And that can't be the way to show love.

[00:08:23] You can't show love through an unloving act. Do not forsake the work of your hands, Lord. It ends that at the end, because at a way, it's your love endures forever, but wait, maybe it doesn't. Won't you still take care of us? Maybe there is a hint of doubt that's being shown, but maybe it's also being shared as a word of encouragement.

[00:08:52] God, keep going, keep pushing through, and maybe it's even spoken as encouragement to us, for us to keep working, to [00:09:00] keep doing the hard work, and raising our hands, and showing through worship, through action, through prayer, through everything that we do, that we are showing an example of God's love. There, this emotion in the prayer makes this a human psalm.

[00:09:20] Our faith can sit alongside our doubt. Our faith can sit alongside of our fear. Our hope can sit alongside of our worry. Our joys can be lifted up, but so can our sadness, certainty, and confidence, fear, and inadequacy. All of these things can live within us because that's who we are. We're not expected to be perfect before grace comes.

[00:09:48] We don't have to be experts on loving before we experience love from God. That's what makes God worthy. That steadfast love comes [00:10:00] before, comes during, and comes after. And it's our response to that overwhelming grace that lets us live forward in love and lets us continue to move forward. It lets us continue.

[00:10:18] to be there and be the works of God's hands. Thanks for listening.

[00:10:29] Thanks so much for listening to the Inspired Stewardship podcast. As a subscriber and listener, we challenge you to not just sit back and passively listen, but act on what you've heard and find a way to live your calling. If you enjoyed this episode, do me a favor, go over to facebook. com slash inspired stewardship and like our Facebook page and market that you'd like to get [00:11:00] notifications from us so that we can connect with you on Facebook and make sure that we're serving you to the best of our abilities with time and tips there.

[00:11:12] Until next time, invest your time. Your talent and your treasures develop your influence and impact the world.