So this morning's message is entitled Courage in a Cave because it's one of the greatest Psalms in the history of the world. And yet it was written in one of the most unlikely places that all the songs that we sang today get their origin from this Psalm isn't that cool, but all the song, a lot of the modern worship songs that we sing, get their roots from scripture and the songs we sang today got get their roots directly from Psalm 34 today. But that song was not written from the top of the world, but rather in a cave of someone who's experiencing the low of lows literally on the run for his life. And yet it's in that moment, they choose, chose to sing a song about the goodness of God. Isn't that cool? Because what, what that tells us here and just backing up for just a moment. We're, we're spending the summer in the Psalms and, and the word psalm just simply means song or praise. And so it's a collection of 150 songs or poems. And we shared that really uh in week one that Psalms help us experience God in everyday life that we call them lyrics for life that no matter your season in life, there is a Psalm for that. And then we shared in week two of our series here that from Psalm one, the Psalm that unlocks every other psalm is that the blessed life is planted in God's word, that the blessed life is planted in God's word. And so today, as we turn to a Psalm of thanksgiving, a psalm of praise, some consider it a song of wisdom because there's some practical advice thrown in there as well. But what we see is this and if you're taking notes, I encourage you to write this down that God's goodness is greater than your crisis, that God's goodness is greater than your crisis. Because you see the fact that David wrote this psalm on the run for His life shows us that our worship is not dependent upon our circumstances. And that sometimes when you're walking through difficult situations and you feel like God is all you have. What you realize is that its core is God is all you need and his very presence and his existence of who he is and what he's done is reason enough to praise. Now, the Olympics are coming up here this summer and I love watching the Olympics. I love the competition. It's the best athletes in the world and it's still crazy to me that people will train their entire lives. And it's decided off like that. You know what I'm talking about? Like, it's like, 0.001 of one second. It's like, so your whole life is like, oh, it's done. Um, but I love, I love the competition. I love just like, like we can all rally together and be patriotic. Like, yeah, America. Right? Like, let's win. Like, we're better than the rest of the countries or so we think. And, um, but I love that, I love hearing our na national anthem play. But I tell you one thing I love regardless of countries is the, is the back stories, those inspirational stories, right? You watch, they're gonna show some this summer where people overcome insurmountable odds to representing their nation to be one of the top athletes in the world. And what makes their story great is the back story is the background to all the things they overcame to get there. Well, what makes Psalm 34 especially great is the backstory and the background behind it. And so I want to share that with you before we read it together. So you can see how, how good God really is because this Psalm of praise of tasting and seeing the goodness of God came from a guy named David. Now David had this incredible journey, he started out as a shepherd boy, Samuel, the prophet comes because he's told that the next king is gonna be from his family and his dad. Uh talking about Father's Day, didn't even think he was good enough so that he lined up all the sons and then sent him out into the field and said, well, surely it's not David like he's the runt of the family. It's not gonna be him. Somebody else is gonna be king. And so Samuel with this inkling from God goes through says, someone from your family is gonna be king and then has this weird question to the dad saying um it's not any of these guys by chance. This is weird, but by chance, do you have any other kids? He says, well, I got David but he's just watching his sheep. It's like come go get him. So and he says, yep, that's gonna be the king. I me, you know how good that would feel to be the youngest one in the family and then be told you're gonna be king, right? Come on, you got some, you got, you gotta feel all right. OK. With the siblings, right? Like who's gonna be king? Not you guys, right? Like go through and so he's feeling good but he has to go back and watch sheep. Then he gets pulled in to play music for the king and he has to go back and watch sheep and then he says, hey, I want you to go to battle. David's like sweet, let's go. He says no to bring cheese and bread to your brothers. And so he goes to the battlefield, he sees that the Israelites have been afraid of this giant Philistine named Goliath and no one's willing to fight him. And so David goes, well, I'll fight him, I'll find him. He's nothing compared to God. Because when you got God on your side, you already got, you always got majority. Right? Like, and so I love that. And so he goes out there this little shepherd boy, no armor and right throws the stone, takes down Goliath um chops off his head a little gruesome. We don't add that into the kid's version of the story. But um and like they go and they like, you know, like pillar the city basically. And so they go through and they have this great victory, right? And, and so soon the legend of David grows to the point where there is this song being sung around the, around the people around the area that Saul has struck down his thousands and David his tens of thousands. And so he's known as this great warrior, but Saul is thinking, oh my goodness, what was an asset for me? This warrior is now a threat. And so now David has to go on the run for his life and he has nowhere left to go. And so he thinks the only place I can go is a city called Goth or Goth and Goth is like the headquarters of the Philistines and he doesn't have any weapons. And So the only weapon available to him at that point is Goliath's sword. So how crazy do you have to be, to be on the run for your life to try to hide in the city of Goth, the city of the Philistines of Goliath who you just killed and you have his sword, right? And so he's there. He's like, OK, maybe I'll hide here. Well, the song makes its rounds. He's like, hey, the song about David, it's about that guy. He's right there. And so they bring him to the king, uh um the king named Aks. Oh, another place is you see the name Abimelech, but Abimelech is really the Philistine title for king. So you see two different names, but they're actually the same person. It's similar like if you use the title Pharaoh in Egypt or Caesar, like those type of things. So two names, same person. So now David is standing before the king, the king of the country of the people, the Philistines who he killed their best warrior. It's like this isn't gonna go well for me. And so he runs out of place. He doesn't, he apparently doesn't have a sling because I don't know, it's like I can just picture him going through the city like, wow. Wow. Wow. Like, it's like working through like those movies, right? And going through. And so he must not have a sling or something because he has nowhere else to go. And he says, oh, I know how I'll get out of this. I'll act crazy. So he acts like Britney spears level crazy. OK? And if, and if you don't understand that reference, then you're probably holier than, but that's OK. So like he literally is afraid for his life. And he says, well, you know what, he won't attack is a crazy person. And so he starts shouting and going crazy. And it says in the scriptures actually says there in first Samuel 21 verses 10 to 15 read Samuel first Samuel chapter 21 and then also 22. And, and he says that he lets the spit dribble down his beard and he's like dancing and shouting. And so the king looks at him, he's like, whoa I don't want anything to do with this crazy person and just kind of pushes him out. And so in response, David now goes to this cave called the cave of Adam and he goes and hides there. And so the fa his family finds out and they go to comfort him. But guess who also goes to comfort him? It says in here, let me find it here in sec. Uh At first Samuel 22 verses 1 to 5 in there, it says, and everyone who was in distress in debt and bitter in their soul gathered with him, about 400 people talk about the island of Misfit Toys, right? So he's on the run from one king in a sense, he's on the run from another king. This is the guy who is the greatest warrior of all time. David, his army has killed thousands of people. He's now in a cave on the run for his life. And the people that came to form his new army are those who are in debt, those who are bitter in their soul. And then, and then those again who are in distress. This is not how you start a movement. You've now filled a cave with a bunch of complainers and mentally unstable people, right? But yet this is the time and the place in which David writes Psalm 34. Because what he recognizes is that in his lowest point in his life with no title with no prestige, with no things, what he realizes is that he has God and God has spared his life. And while life is not good, God is good, you see, worship is a response to God's goodness. It's important for us to distinguish the difference because I think it actually shows that worship is so powerful that sometimes when you find yourself the most angry at God or the most isolated or, or the most in pain, that's when you need praise and worship the most. Because no matter how far away you are from God, God is never far away from you that the power and the presence of God was available to David on the run for his life from two different kings in a cave surrounded by a bunch of bitter misfit, distressed, bitter to the soul people. And it was there that he writes one of the greatest Psalms of all time. And it was there and he writes it with structure and meaning. In fact, there's 22 verses. It actually is on a cross stick for every letter of the Hebrew alphabet, which is pretty cool. And so what we see in the structure is this the first seven verses uh really tell us that worship is singing, worship is singing. And then the next several verses, verse 8 to 14, we see that worship is living. It's more than just singing songs. It it's, it's living. But then the last component which is really so incredibly powerful. Verses 15 to 22 tells us that worship is trusting. So let's break this down together. OK. Let's break this down. Let's jump into it. First of all, worship is singing verse one, he writes, I will bless the Lord at all times. Notice he says, notice the location of this. We saying, you know, I like bless God, right? He's in the middle of his challenge where he feels abandoned, he feels isolated, he feels alone and yet the old times like is right now like that's what he's talking about. Like he's in the lowest part. He says his praise shall continually be in my mouth. Now again, think of the context he just allowed spit to dribble out of his mouth to pretend to be crazy to spare his life. And now in the cave, he realized, wow, even in my craziness and stupidity and, and foolish actions, God still spared me. And so instead of just dribbling, spit out of my mouth, I'm gonna sing praises because he's worthy to be praised. Verse two, my soul takes its boast in the Lord. Let the humble hear and be glad. Do you think David was humble at that point? I mean, if you get named the next king, if you get called the greatest musician in the entire country, if you get named the greatest warrior of all time to where multiple nations are singing songs about how good of a war you are and yet you just acted a fool and basically peed yourself in front of a king to escape to now you're alone in a cave then to get surrounded by broken bitter people. Like that's gotta be a little humbling. You know what I mean? Like, I imagine taking your favorite sport. Like I'm OK. Imagine, imagine like Patrick Mahomes, right? He's won multiple Super Bowls. He's on the top of his game. He's seen as the best NFL player right now, right? Imagine if he goes from that to where next fall, somehow he's out of the NFL and like he's playing in like an adult rec league at the Y MC A and he looks around at his teammates and he's got like, Carl from accounting and he's got Joe the Landscaper and then, like, he, and then, and they go to their starting lineup and they don't even pick him to start. Like, he's in like the B league of the Y MC A in the rec league and he doesn't even get picked over Carl from accounting. Like, you know what I'm saying? Like, can you imagine, like, how humbling that'd be like you were the top of the world and now you're at the bottom. You know, what's the song like you start from the bottom? Now we're here. It's the opposite for David, right? Like he's, he's reached the top and now he's like, how did I get here? Like he is humbled. But yeah, he says, let the humble hear and be glad verse 30, magnify the Lord with me, let us exalt his name together that word, magnify. It really comes from a word uh gal which means to make great or to grow use 100 and 15 times in the Old Testament, roughly 15 times here in the Psalms. So just think of like a magnifying glass like to magnify is, is to increase sight. Another way to think about it. OK? Is seen leads to singing when you see God's goodness, you sing of God's goodness. And so you see this here to make great to make known. He says, magnify the Lord with me let us exalt his name together. And here's the verse we just sang this morning. I sought the Lord and he answered me and delivered me from all my fears. When I was literally at my wits end, as spit was dribbling down my beard pretending to be crazy for fear of my own life. Yet God was with me. He says, and answer me and delivered me from my fears. Those who look at him are radiant and their faces shall never be ashamed. This poor man cried, not the great warrior, not the great shepherd, not the great musician. He refers to himself, this poor man cried and the Lord heard him and answered him out of all of his troubles and the angel of the Lord in camps, all around those who fear him and he delivers them. Now some say this was like one of the uh archangels like Michael or Gabriel. Some say it might have been uh pre incarnate Jesus. Uh We don't know. But what we just know is that the angel of the Lord, on behalf of the Lord really means that the presence of the Lord encamps, those who believe in him. And we have that even more so in the New Testament because we don't just have the presence of God around us with the Holy Spirit. We actually have the presence of God in us and God sets us free. It's such a powerful picture here. So we see that worship is singing, but then he moves on to the second powerful component here and he says that worship is living, it's active, it's experiencing verse 80 taste. And see that the Lord is good. Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him. I love this experiential thing. Right? There's a big difference between talking about food and tasting food. You know what I'm saying? Right. Have you ever tasted something so incredible? You're like mm Right. You feel like what is it that the movie? What about Bob? Mm Yeah. Mm Right. And like going through like you taste to me like this is amazing. Right? I felt bad. Uh You know, one of the crazy side effects there for uh of the global pandemic and, and COVID was a lot of people lost their taste, right? And lost their experience of that and couldn't smell anything, couldn't taste anything. Uh Sometimes I think when it comes spiritually, I think people lose their ability to taste the goodness of God. Right? It just seems dull, it seems bland. But when you've experienced God, not just when you've heard God, but when you've experienced God, it changes things. It's on the other side of tragedy, right? If you think about someone who's come on the other side of addiction and recovery, some of the, some of the most incredible freeing praise and worship sessions I've ever experienced have actually been with inmates in prisons both here in the States and I've been down in, in Mexico and a few other places were people saying of being set free, like of being forgiven. You know, if somebody's been healed from cancer, right? It, it, there's this, this idea of just goodness like, wow, like we, we take for granted everyday things, don't we? Like if you've ever like, hurt your foot or your leg or broken your leg and you gotta walk with crutches and then you walk again. You find like, wow, I can walk again, right? And you become more grateful. But at its deepest, deepest core, Christians are different because they've tasted and they've seen the goodness of God because Christianity isn't simply behaving. It's not simply bad. People becoming good, it's dead, people becoming alive. It's darkness, experiencing light, it's chaos, experiencing peace. It's hopelessness, experiencing the living hope that comes and joy and love and purpose and peace that comes from trusting God as your savior. Amen. Because once you've tasted the goodness of God, nothing else will suffice, suffice. And he's saying this in the lowest of lows, in a cave said blessed is the man who takes refuge in him. Verse 90 fear the Lord. You his saints. For those who fear him have no lack. The young lions verse 10, suffer, want and hunger. But those who seek the Lord lack no good thing. Now, lions here is an interesting picture. Again, it's poetry. But again, this is the Shepherd, who when he went to face Goliath said to Saul at the time as it, when David was a teenage boy, he said, you know, the Lord delivered me from the lion and from the bear. And so this Philistine is gonna be just like one of them. So he had face to face combat experience with lions and he is in a cave where there might legitimately be lions nearby. Do you know how terrifying that would be to be in a cave at night? And you just hear this echoed like in the distance, you'd be like man, I'm on the run from two different kings and now lion's gonna get me like but he says in here he says, no, even lions hunger but those who seek the Lord lack no good thing says so come o Children listen to me and I will teach you the fear of the Lord. What man is there who desires life and loves many days that he may see good. Do you want the blessed life? Do you want a good life? What does that look like? He says here, keep your tongue from evil, your lips from speaking deceit, turn away from evil and do good, seek peace and pursue it. What he's saying here is that your life worships something. So whom or what are you worshiping? When you look at how you speak, when you look at how you act, are you worshiping self? Are you worshiping sexuality and pleasure. Are you worshiping money, greed, pride, power or do your actions reflect that of God? Right? How many of us in in here? Right? We can sing praises like I saw the Lord and he heard and he answered and we go out today and we'll stub our toe and we'll let a few other words come out. That is not praise, right? If anybody had reason to let some things fly, it would be David or the people that surrounded him, right? The people that he's talking to were distressed, bitter, broken, hurt at a loss. And he says, what you do is an act of worship. How you live is an act of worship. There is this theologian, his name was Benny. I'd like to think that he had a group of theologians that he called the Jets. So that'd be great, wouldn't it like Benny and the Jets? So, anyway, um, he's actually quoted by Charles Spurgeon. That's why I'm so I got the, the quote, I can just picture, I know it's well before. But can you imagine like Spurgeon going Manny, Benny? Ok. Anyway, sorry. Some of you started singing though with me in your head, you started bobbing and the ones whose head started bobbing were friends. All right. So this guy named Benny, quoted by Charles Spurgeon says this, he says there are some things especially in the depths of religious life which can only be understood by being experienced and which even then are in incapable of adequately being embodied in words, oh taste. And see that the Lord is good, the enjoyment must come before the illumination or rather the enjoyment is the illumination. Seeing the goodness of God leads to singing of the goodness of God and then also leads to living out the goodness of God. And then third, we see that worship is also trusting the goodness of God, trust in the goodness of God. Verse 15, it says the the eyes of the Lord are toward the righteous and his ears toward their cry. The face of the Lord is against those who do evil that cut them off the memory of them from the earth. So like don't, don't get the wrong impression. God is a just God. He's gonna deal with evil. Ok. Verse 17, he says, when the righteous cries for help, the Lord hears and he delivers them out of all their troubles, the Lord is near to the broken hearted and saves the crushed in spirit. Many are the afflictions of the righteous but of the Lord delivers them out of all of them says that he keeps all his bones, not one of them is broken, says, affliction will slay the wicked and those who hate, the righteous will be condemned for the Lord redeems the life of his servants. None of those who take refuge in him will be condemned. And so we see that even in your Brokenness, even in your affliction, trust God. And we know this to be powerful because he's writing, not knowing what the next chapter will be. We know that he becomes king and, and, and leads his incredible life. He's got some other moral failings that he has got to recover from. We're gonna jump into that one next week. So I'm 51. But, but he doesn't know what's coming when he writes this. And so instead he writes to the Brokenness of God. There's a guy named FB. Um there a writer named FB Meyer who writes that, a bird with a broken wing, an animal with a broken leg, a woman with a broken heart, a man with a broken purpose. These seem to drop out of the main current of life into shadow. They go apart to suffer and to droop. The busy rush of life goes on without them. But yet God draws near. I want you to not lose heart that no matter where you are or how you're feeling. God hears you. Your life might not be good right now, but God is still good. Rick Warren and his wife uh lost a son to, to mental health battles and suicide. I think someone who wrote purpose driven life uh impacted millions of people and yet their own child experienced heartbreaking loss and in his grief and talking about his son, uh he was able to share this that, that even broken trees can produce fruit. And I thought of that when thinking of this passage, because God speaks to us, even in our Brokenness that some of you might be here today. Feeling broken, maybe broken by your own actions. Feeling stuck in an addiction or a battle, maybe feeling shame or guilt. Maybe you're struggling with the sin or actions of somebody else, betrayal, hurting right? Loss attack. Maybe some of you are battling just things outside of your control, you know, job or, or finances or relational or right. A a health thing that you weren't expecting. I don't know, I don't know what you're walking through. But what I love seeing in this passage is that in our Brokenness, God is near and here's how I know this to be true. And this is so cool. Like when I saw this, when I read this, I was like, wow, because it brings a whole new level of depth in meaning to psalm 34. And that's why it's made it one of my favorites because you see, while some people are playing temporary circumstantial checkers, God is playing eternal spiritual and everlasting chess and let me prove it to you. You see at the end when talking about Brokenness, David says, hey, look, God comes near to the brokenhearted and I know this to be true because look at I'm on the run for my life from two different kings. I'm in a cave and yet I have no broken bones. I'm still standing. But you know what's amazing about this as this? Psalm wasn't just for him. The Psalm was for us. Let me show it to you in the gospel of John John 19 verse uh chapter 19 verse 32 to 36 Jesus is on the cross being crucified. So his lowest moment in his earthly life and in, in theory, the lowest moment in human history. So the soldiers came and broke the legs of the first talking about the criminal on one side and of the other who had been crucified with them. See that soldiers and crucifixion. So you got nails in your hands and in your feet and blood would start to fill the lungs. And so what, what criminals would do is they, they would lift up, using their legs enough to try to breathe in their lungs and then they would sink back down. And so if they weren't dying fast enough by the professional executioners of Roman Empire, they would go and break the legs so that you couldn't hold up. And so they go and the criminals on one side and the next say, oh, well, they, they need to break their legs. But check this out verse 33. But when they came to Jesus and saw that he was already dead, they did not break his legs. But one of the soldiers pierced his side with a spear and at once came out blood and water. And so that actually fulfills one prophecy. But verse 35 he who saw this as a born witness, that his testimony is true and he knows that he is telling the truth that you may also believe. Now check this out, verse 36 for these things took place that the scripture might be fulfilled. Not one of his bones will be broken. Quoting Psalm 34. So Psalm 34 wasn't just for David. It was actually a prophecy of Jesus pointing that at the lowest point of David's life. God is there at the lowest point of jesus' life. God is there. And the reason He did that was to show you that at the lowest point of your life, God is here that Psalm 34 was written around 1000 BC and 1000 years later, God comes back and says, actually, it's about this moment. It's about Jesus, it's about you and about me that God and Jesus himself will not be broken, that you might be feeling broken, but God is not broken. And what was written 1000 like, can anyone name anything that happened in 1000 24? Right? Can you imagine 1000 years from now? 3024 right? And yet God is speaking over millenniums to point out the fact that it fulfills the coming of Jesus, that He is, in fact the ultimate redeemer and savior. So that when you are in a cave when you are broken, when you are struggling, when you're filled with guilt and shame, when you are down to absolutely nothing. We can sing of the goodness of God because He is here, amen. And because Jesus died on the cross for your sins and for mine and rose again, conquering death, conquering sin. That last verse there in Psalm 34 about no condemnation. It's also about us, see Peter quotes Psalm 34 in his letter and first Peter, it talks about um the goodness of God there in, in first Peter chapter two verse three, chapter three verses 10 and 12. But then also Paul talks about this passage in Romans eight verses one and two. It says, therefore, it says there is therefore no condemnation for those who are in Christ, Jesus. For the law of the spirit of life has set you free in Christ and Jesus from the law of sin and death. We can sing of the goodness of God because you are free in Him because God's goodness is greater than your crisis. And as the band comes up here, I just want to ask you three different questions here. Number one. Have you tasted God's goodness? Have you experienced his freedom from sin? Have you experienced his grace that even though you messed up God is there that even though somebody hurt you got us there that even though you feel betrayed or alone or low or even in a cave God is there and God is with you. Secondly, have you thanked God for His grace? Yeah, because that's what worship is, is responding to His goodness. You might not have the material possessions that you think you might not have. The title or the position that you think. But you have been made alive in Jesus Christ. And you've been given eternal freedom and love and purpose and oh my goodness, is that worth singing about? And then the last thing, then if you've tasted God's goodness, if you thanked him for his grace, are you trusting God with their crisis? David wrote this psalm before he knew what would happen. And so whatever you're going through right now in the middle of grief in the middle of a battle, I want to encourage you to sing about God's goodness and ultimately to trust God's goodness because through the power of Jesus Christ, there is no condemnation to the God who loves you and sets you free will you pray with me dear heavenly father. We thank you for who you are. We thank you that you come to the brokenhearted. We thank you that you draw near to those who humble themselves as David humbled himself in a cave, as the band of misfits humble themselves and sing your praises God as we stand before you. Now trusting that you met David in his lowest point, you met Jesus at his lowest point and he did so all so that you can set us free that in our lowest moments when we put our trust in your goodness, that ultimately you can set us free. Lord, you are good and we sing of your goodness today and your son's gonna be praying. Amen.