Sunday 4th November 2012 11:00 – The Living Room @ St Thomas, Fair Oak
Psalm 23:5
Now, O Lord, take my lips and speak through them;
Take our minds and think through them;
Take our hearts and set them on fire with love for Yourself, Lord Jesus.
Amen
Good Morning!! I am about to speak to you about the best and most important verse in psalm 23. Which is obvious, it must be, it’s the one that I was asked to do and I am AWESOME!! Remember this; it will be important at the end.
The light turned yellow, just in front of him. He did the right thing, stopping at the traffic lights, even though he could have beaten the red light by accelerating through the junction. The tailgating woman was furious and honked her horn, made several crude hand gestures, screaming obscenities in frustration, as she had missed her chance to get through the intersection, dropping her cell phone and her makeup in the process. As she was still in mid-rant, she heard a tap on her window and looked up into the face of a very serious police officer. The officer ordered her to exit her car with her hands help up. He took her to the police station where she was searched, fingerprinted, photographed, and placed in a holding cell. After a couple of hours, a policeman approached the cell and opened the door. She was escorted back to the booking desk where the arresting officer was waiting with her personal effects. He said, ‘‘I’m very sorry for this mistake. You see, I pulled up behind your car while you were blowing your horn, giving the guy in front of you the finger, and cursing at him. I noticed the 'What Would Jesus Do' bumper sticker, the ‘Choose Life’ license plate holder, the 'Follow Me to Sunday-School' bumper sticker, and the chrome-plated Christian fish emblem on the trunk, so naturally... I assumed you had stolen the car.''
This story is not initially all that relevant to psalm 23, I think we’d all struggle to find it in any academic bible commentary or scholarly journal, but the message is important. We will get back to it later.
Psalm 23
1The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want. 2He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters. 3He restores my soul. He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name's sake.
4Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for You are with me; Your rod and your staff, they comfort me. 5You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; You anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows. 6Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the LORD forever.
Let's have a little overview of Psalm 23. This psalm, or hymn, is usually classified as a psalm of confidence in the Lord’s care. It uses two images: the Lord as Shepherd who cares for the sheep (vv. 1–4), and the Lord as Host who cares for his guest (vv. 5–6). These images would be familiar from everyday experience (for David’s own, cf. 1 Sam. 17:34); but they also evoke other ideas common in the ancient Near East (including the OT), with the deity as shepherd of his people and the deity as host of the meal. In worship, the faithful celebrate God’s greatness and majesty; and when they sing this psalm, they see his majesty in the way he personally attends to each of his covenant lambs. He is the shepherd for Israel as a whole; and in being such, he is the shepherd for each faithful Israelite as well.
Today we are looking at verse 5. So here we go, until today, the verses looked at from psalm 23 have been about the Lord as shepherd, now we begin to see The Lord as Host 23:5–6. Some have argued that the image of shepherd and sheep is still present here; but the mention of a table, of putting oil on the head, the cup, and the Lord’s “house,” all show that the psalm now describes the faithful person as God’s guest at a meal hence “prepare a table”. The enemies are powerless to prevent the enjoyment of God’s generous hospitality perhaps they are there as captives at a victory celebration, or maybe there is a more interesting meaning. Goodness and mercy, or “steadfast love” is the assurance for the faithful that God has showered his grace upon them. For a non-Levite to dwell in the house of the Lord is to have ready access to the sanctuary for worship (PS 27:4). As the ESV footnote explains, forever is literally, “for length of days”; this may simply be another way of saying all the days of my life, but is more likely to be meant as “for days without end” (PS 21:4; 93:5, “forevermore”).
And other than linking into this short but satisfactory analysis the story of the angry woman in the car from the beginning, just looking at a few faces to see who has drifted off already??, that could be that, but it’s not. Because God still speaks to us today through the Word, through His Holy Spirit and through prayer and prophecy. So we need to think about what this could mean in our context.
Today is the 4th November; let’s look at some things happening for St Tom’s in recent memory and in the next few days. Just now, we were led into a place where we confessed our sin; we were forgiven and have now through the sacraments at the Lord’s Table, been restored to God. Tonight at Costa Coffee in Eastleigh there is an event called Sunday Night Live where Ian Hayes-Anderson, with the help of Tom Hayes, will be hosting a free and public gathering expressing the gospel and the heart of God through worship and hospitality. Next Sunday, the 11th, as church, we facilitate and welcome the wider community to join us to remember and give thanks for those that gave their lives so that we might live in freedom. Last Wednesday, 31st October we hosted several hundred people at the Light Party where the gospel was unashamedly proclaimed and the secular darkness of the season was forced aside as the glory of God’s light was the focus. In the summer we had several events where we, as a church family, engaged with our neighbours and celebrated a Jubilee and the Olympics. We look forward to an even more exciting summer coming next year as we celebrate 150 acts of mercy to commemorate 150 years of grace on the 150th anniversary of St Tom’s church.
In case you don’t know, my wife, Nicki and I often sit at the back in the corner over there. There have been a number of times when what God has said through the words, actions and even the laughter of the kids that come here, have been far more profound than anything anyone up here has said. I’m not claiming that the preaching team are not capable of effective preaching, far from it in fact. But my point is that God will often meet us where we are. Bringing what we need into that situation. Which is why when someone stands here to say what they believe God has given them for a particular passage, or in today’s case just one verse, it can mean something slightly different to each individual person that hears it. That is important to remember. We will come back to that.
The reason I mention where we sit is our normal Sunday church experience involves this toy box; it usually sits under the back pew, normally full of toys and books. It has this written on the side… if you can’t read it, it says “toys and books for church building”.
Let us think for just a moment about what this might mean…
We’ll come back to this later.
So let’s delve back into the passage. And just to be different let’s start with the last part first. “My cup overflows” what could that mean? If we are to take the literal meaning of this verse that God is our host, why would He want our cups to overflow? Surely the carpets in heaven are white and clean, right? And why would God want to waste anything?
We have read many times over the years that God will provide us with what we need. We read that Jesus said “Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?” (Matthew 6:25-26 ESV) so if Jesus tells us God gives us what we need, what is the relevance of them overflowing. It comes down to the context within which the Psalm was written. Some translations of psalm 23 say “overflow” others say “completely full”, either way they speak of generosity and kindness of provision. Also we should consider that the same God that provides for our needs is the God that commanded the universe into being. I think it is safe to assume that He does things with a little extravagance and artistic flair? Maybe there is meant to be something of this provision left over? What might we need to do with it? Could this be talking about Basics bank? If we look at some other Old Testament verses we can see that overflowing is often linked with blessing.
Zechariah 1:17
Cry out again, thus says the Lord of hosts: My cities shall again overflow with prosperity, and the Lord will again comfort Zion and again choose Jerusalem.’”
Joel 2:24
“The threshing floors shall be full of grain; the vats shall overflow with wine and oil.
So then to have our cups overflow means that we have received our fill, but not emptied God’s reserve. This is important; we will come back to this.
So moving backwards through our verse, we now see that our heads are to be anointed with oil. Not by the Vicar or even by the Bishop, but by God himself. The anointing with oil was a traditional act of hospitality; we see it throughout the bible. A very well-known example is from Luke’s gospel.
“Then turning toward the woman he said to Simon, “Do you see this woman? I entered your house; you gave me no water for my feet, but she has wet my feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair. You gave me no kiss, but from the time I came in she has not ceased to kiss my feet. You did not anoint my head with oil, but she has anointed my feet with ointment.”
(Luke 7:44-46 ESV)
Not only did Jesus rebuke his host for lack of hospitality, but forgave the woman’s sin and used her expression of love to illustrate what he was teaching at the time. Most important for us to take from this, in relation to Psalm 23, is that Jesus would have expected to have had his feet washed and his head anointed, as it was the custom. And so it was further back into Hebrew history…
2 Kings 9:6
So he arose and went into the house. And the young man poured the oil on his head, saying to him, “Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, I anoint you king over the people of the Lord, over Israel
Ecclesiastes 9:8
Let your garments be always white. Let not oil be lacking on your head.
Oil on the head, as well as being part of the customs of hospitality also is a mark of anointing, commissioning and being set aside. We see even now that at confirmations and commissioning services the presiding Bishop or priest will anoint the forehead of an individual, often using the cross symbol. The oil we read about in Luke 7 is likely to be myrrh oil, the very same type that was given as a gift at Jesus’ birth and in innumerable nativity plays ever since. Which goes to show the level of significance this custom took throughout the culture – it was a kingly substance. This matters to our story, we will come back to it.
So the last part of the verse, or is it the first, I’m getting a bit dizzy now myself, is “You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies”. So a few things to look at here; which table? When do we get to sit at it? Who are these enemies? And just what exactly are they doing at the party anyway?
So, here we go, who are our enemies? Can we call any nation we are at war with an enemy? Or anyone with which we have a dispute or grievance? Possibly, but bearing in mind it is God’s will that all man should be saved, as we see in Luke 3 “and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.” There are obvious problems to setting out any man made ideas as to what makes someone our enemy. Let’s have a look at a few verses and see if we can get an overall picture of who, or what the Bible says we might be able to call enemy?
Matthew 5:44
But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,
James 4:4
You adulterous people! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God
Ephesians 6:12
For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.
Funnily enough, despite the imagery that follows this Ephesians 6 verse about wearing armour and tooling up with the weapons of God, we can see from these verses that these enemies are not someone we need to fight, or to fear, but someone to love and reach out toward. Our enemies are those that are friends of the world, those that turn away from God, those that seek to undo his works upon the earth, and those that are ignorantly or deliberately seeking to undermine His Kingdom. What are we meant to do about these people? Or even as Ephesians 6 suggests powers and sprits? We are meant to pray. Hold that thought, we will come back to this in a few moments.
What or who is this table? There are two aspects I want us to consider when we think of this table. And they are both interdependent on each other. I believe that Christ, with arms stretched out on the cross, is the pinnacle of God’s provision in the presence of God’s enemies; and that Christ IS the table God provides for us in the presence of our enemies. This rings true with the rest of verse 5, as the provision is overflowing with generosity and kindness and it certainly allows us to be set aside as if our heads be marked with oil. The second aspect of this then is that the Lord’s Table is not just a picture of this sacrificial provision, but also, each time we come to take communion, God has afresh provided us with a table in the presence of our enemies. These two different events in space and time are one in the same. We do one to remember the other, but communion without Jesus’ death and resurrection is an empty ritual. Jesus instituted the significance of the Lord’s supper we read in Matthew “Now as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and after blessing it broke it and gave it to the disciples, and said, “Take, eat; this is my body.” And he took a cup, and when he had given thanks he gave it to them, saying, “Drink of it, all of you, for this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins. I tell you I will not drink again of this fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father's kingdom.” (Matthew 26:26-29). If communion has no meaning without Christ, does that mean Christ has no significance without communion? In a word, NO! But it’s not as simple as that. The apostles were commanded to break bread and take wine in remembrance of Jesus, and that has followed down through the years to us today. This sacrament has become the vehicle we use to restore ourselves to god’s grace and mercy. We were not able to witness the death or resurrection of Christ, but through the sharing of the bread and wine we take our place at His table, even at His side. For many of us, the act of communion is what gives us a tangible and real link into Jesus’s sacrifice for us. It can be a very personal experience, often when we feel most at peace and closest to God. So why might this gracious and merciful provision be in the presence of our enemies?
All the thoughts I have left dangling are connected to how I believe God would have us understand this last question… For those paying attention so far, we have looked at a lot of little ideas that come out of Psalm 23 verse 5 in no real order, of recent and upcoming events at St tom’s, of a toy box, an angry woman in a car and of course the FACT that I am awesome.
What can all these disjointed, out of sequence and seemingly unrelated things mean? We’ll put them together and find out. Let’s just take a moment to see if God wants to move amongst us, to speak to us or to give us revelation…
So we need to love and pray for our enemies. Some of us struggle with this. God in His mercy has ways of equipping us, sometimes without us even noticing. God made us in His image, but he made us diverse. This is for a reason. God knows us as the unique individuals we are; our gifts and passions, as well as our faults and flaws. This is why we are so blessed to be ministered to by the Holy Spirit. I mentioned earlier that we can all listen to the same sermon, but all hear a slightly different message. This is just one example of how God is fully able to provide us with just what we need, just when we need it. God provides abundantly for our needs. He prepares a table for us in the presence of our enemies exactly so that we might be an example of faith and family for the world to see. We know that God will provide us with protection when required. We know that God sets us aside for this purpose. We can fulfil this purpose. We are after all made in His image, it’s not just me that’s awesome, it’s all of us. Believe me; if God was willing to pay Jesus as a ransom for us, He thinks we are awesome!!! However, if we call ourselves Christian and our actions do not testify to this then we are not building the Kingdom, but undermining it, in essence for a season, becoming an enemy. We are restored through the blood of Christ. This is why the Lord allows His table to be prepared in the presence of enemies. We all slip, stumble and generally mess things up. We can all in the blink of an eye become an enemy that needs God’s provision and hospitality afresh. We are called to be in the world not of it. So, the light party, costa coffee tonight, remembrance Sunday next week and everything else, all opportunities to actually BE the church, to be the Christians, we claim to be. Out there. Doing what we say we believe. Living God’s purpose out in the world.
Psalm 23 is a statement of faith. It could easily be a creed of sorts or a list of fundamental key beliefs that identify us as Christians. We acknowledge God as Lord, He gives us peace and restores us, and we have faith in Him and therefore fear nothing. And from what we have just learned He provides for us and that provision is more than enough. Psalm 23 tells us that The Lord is the ultimate shepherd. This by default makes Him the ultimate Servant and the ultimate Master. He will do all we need, we should do all we can. This I believe is the key to being content and finding ourselves blessed and walking with God. God calls us to serve him in the world, literally in the presence of our enemies; it is in this battlefield that we can fully and completely experience his love and provision in all the intended glory and abundance. It is not the presence of enemies that hinders our ability to receive God’s provision, be it practical needs, grace, peace, mercy or whatever else God may have for us. It is however our own inability to reach out and accept it with thanksgiving. A gift is worthless if the intended recipient never opens the box… ah, speaking of boxes! I never tied in the relevance of the toy box. Toys and books for church building… Are these toys and books for the church building? Or are they toys and books for building the church? I believe a simple change in how we look at what is provided can be the key to advancing the Kingdom in this place…
Let us pray.
Lord help us to walk the walk rather than simply talking the talk. Help us to remember that it is only by Your grace and mercy that we are able to call ourselves Your church. Lord when we begin to stumble and wander off course, away from Your purpose in our lives, we pray that You would call us back. Lord thank You for never giving up on us. Thank You Lord that You will always watch over us, even when You have to move to bring back the one sheep that strays. We thank You lord that you give us the shepherd image to remember this promise. Thank You Lord that You make provision for us, that it is indeed abundantly sufficient. That our cups overflow with Your generosity and love. Lord we thank You that You are at work already among those You call us to serve. The poor, the broken, the weak and our enemies. Lord thank You that You provide all we need, making it within our reach to follow You. Lord we pray that we may have open hearts to hear and see what You will have us do, as church and as Your individual children. Lord we pray that we will be good stewards of the gifts You bless us with, and that by doing so, we may be able to advance Your Kingdom, bringing forward glimpses of Your Glory, by doing so Lord, we pray that those that think of you as enemy, or do not think of You at all will be blinded by Your light and transformed into something beautiful and awesome. Amen.
