Hope for Saints on a Journey

Well, as we continue our journey through a sampling of the Psalms, we find our way today to Psalm one hundred and twenty one, another very familiar psalm. And as you've seen, as we've looked at the Psalms, we have tried to highlight different types of Psalms, one highlighting psalms from each of the five books of Psalms, and two highlighting different types of Psalms so that we can have a better understanding of the book as a whole. And also our goal, and this is very important for today, is to learn how to read and understand the Psalms, because we don't read the Psalms like we read other literature in the Bible, and great mistakes can be made in reading the Psalms incorrectly. We have to understand that this is a song book. We have to understand that this is poetry. And you don't read a book of songs or a book of poetry the same way, for example, that you read a book of law. So if we took Blackstone's commentary on the Law, and then we took you know, William Shakespeare and one of his poems, and we found the same word or the same phrase in Blackstone's Commentary on the Law that we found in one of Shakespeare's poems. We wouldn't immediately assume that the two of them are they're they're they're very similar in types, they're from the same place, and you know, and use some of the same kinds of language. We wouldn't assume that they were trying to say the same thing in their use of that phrase amen, because one of them is writing law and the other is writing poetry. So when we come to the Psalms, it is very important that we keep in mind that we are dealing with poetry. We are not reading the law. We are reading poetry. This is very important, for example, when we read things like we're going to read today in Psalm one hundred and twenty one, where if we're not careful, we will end up assuming that what we're reading are certain promises and guarantees, as opposed to reading a song that has to do with the way God deals with his people. If we make that kind of categorical error, what we end up doing is wrecking shipwrecking our faith. We end up in a place where things don't happen the way we think they ought to happen, and therefore we either doubt God or we doubt ourselves. And yet at the same time, these words are true, this is are real. So how do we understand these promises within their context, within their biblical, historical and literary context, so that we get the most out of them without taking them to a place that they never intended for us to go. It's something to keep in mind as we look today at Psalm number one hundred and twenty one. Let's read this familiar psalm. Shall we listen to the words of the psalmist in this Psalm of assent? Again? The psalms of assent were particular kinds of psalms, psalms that were often sung on the way up to Jerusalem. On the way up to the Temple three times a year, every able bodied Jewish male had to make his way up to Jerusalem, had to make his way up to offer sacrifices three times a year to come to this place, a unique opportunity and experience in worshiping God, a unique opportunity and experience in gathering together with all of Israel, so to speak, a unique opportunity where you begin at your home by yourself and as you get closer and closer to Jerusalem, you encounter more and more pilgrims until you get to the outskirts of the city, and there is a press of people like you've never experienced before, other than those three times a year when you make your way to Jerusalem. And this is one of those songs that sort of captured and encapsulated that experience of ascending. I lift up my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come. My help comes from the Lord who heaven and earth. He will not let your foot be moved. He will keep. He who keeps you will not slumber. Behold, he who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep. The Lord is your keeper. The Lord is your shade on your right hand. The sun shall not strike you by day, nor the moon by night. The Lord will keep you from all evil. He will keep your life. The Lord will keep your going out, And you're coming in from this time forth and forevermore. Amen. Beautiful words. Beautiful words in any context, but when you understand them properly in the historical context, and in the redemptive historical context, even more beautiful. First, we have to understand that this is a metaphor, and in understanding that this is a metaphor, we see it on multiple levels. Number one, we see it on the level of ascent up a hill, up a mountain, because coming to Jerusalem, you're actually going to a high place. You're going up a hill, you're going up a mountain. And even today, if you come to Jerusalem, you come to the city of Jerusalem and you come toward the Temple, there are three valleys around that temple area. So no matter what angle you come from, you have to go down into a valley and then make your ascent up to the temple and to the temple mount So in one sense, we have to think about this physical journey, this journey of going from wherever you are, wherever you live, days, weeks, journeying with enough provisions for however much time it takes you to get there and to get back, and then eventually making that last climb to the place. Secondly, metaphorically, we have to think about this in terms of worship and ascending to the presence of God. We have to think about this metaphor of not only you know, we're climbing up a hill, we're climbing up a mountain to get to a particular physical place. But also we're ascending when we come to God. This is true of us whenever we come to worship God, that we ascend to where God is. That we live in a valley of our own sin and our own frailness, we live in a valley of our own finitude. But when we come before God, this holy and righteous God, we are ascending in a sense to worship God. And then there is this last sense, which I believe is incredibly important for us to understand this Psalm rightly, and that is the sense in which our entire life is an assent. That we come to faith in Christ, and we find ourselves in this valley of sin, and we are redeemed, and we come to faith in Christ. And then there is this process whereby we are conformed to the very image of the Son of God, where our sanctification makes us more like Christ, and we are ascending, as it were, to this celestial city. This week and reading over and working through this Psalm, I could not help but think again and again and again of the pilgrim's progress, and think about Christian on his journey to the celestial city. So we have to keep those metaphors in mind. When you do that, we understand that this is if I had to title it, it would be a hope for saints on a hazardous journey, because in all three of those metaphors there is a sense of a hazardous journey. First of all, he says, I lift up my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come? Is this lets us know that we're talking about a hazardous journey. I lift up my eyes to the hills. That means I'm not up there, I'm down here, And so I've got to go from down here to up there. It's always hazardous when you climb from down here to up there. Amen, this is a hazardous journey. And then in that second metaphor, it's hazardous because here we come before God in worship, and even coming before God today as worshippers of God, gathering starting at our own homes and moving toward this place, and coming into that parking lot and walking into this place where we are going to say things that we know and believe to be true about God. Every one of us comes in here unclean and unworthy. Every one of us comes in here a liar. Every one of us comes in here a thief and a alter. Every one of us we walk in this place, and we are not inherently worthy in and of ourselves to worship a holy and righteous God. And it ought to dawn on every one of us every time we come before God for worship. It ought to dawn on us. I look and lift up my eyes to the hills. Where does my help come from? In other words, I can't conquer this hill by myself. I can't get to a place where I'm worthy to worship Almighty God by myself. My help must come from somewhere. And then there is that third sense of this metaphor. Again, we're lifting up our eyes to the hills, and the question is where does my help come from? Because I can't do this. So in that third sense, when we're talking about our lives in general overall, when we're talking about going from the valley of our shame and guilt and sin and coming to repentance and faith and Jesus Christ and being saved and then going through this process of being sanctified, and as we ascend that hill from the here and now to the there, and then the question is, as I look toward the celestial city. Where does my help come from? Because I am certainly not worthy in and of myself to ascend to the celestial city. I am certainly not worthy in and of myself to stand before Almighty God. And yet as I'm being conformed to the image of Christ, and as my outward man grows weaker and more frail every day, as I waste away and get closer and closer to my own physical demise, the reality comes clearer and clearer. I am on my way up the hill to face God, and I'm not worthy to do so. We must keep these things in mind if we are to comprehend this psalm. This is a hazardous journey. This is a hard road, This is a difficult climb. This picture of climbing up to Jerusalem offered a perfect opportunity to set these metaphors in place. But not only are we on a hazardous journey, but here's the truth. And everything else flows from this next point. God not only provides the help that we need on this journey. God is the help we need on this journey. Look at first two. My help comes from the Lord who made heaven and earth. That first phrase by itself would have been enough, I lift up my eyes to the hills. Where does my help come from? The answer, my help comes from the Lord. That would have been sufficient. However, there's a theological point that needs to be made, and we'll get to that momentarily. And that theological point about God, the maker of heaven and earth, being the one who is our help. But first and foremost our help comes from the Lord. Folks, God is not against us as we ascend to His presence. Amen. We need to keep this in mind. I say this, and we all say amen. You know God is not against us as we assind to his presence. Amen, I understand that on all three metaphors, God's not against us as we ascend to his presence, the physical journey to the place of worship, the spiritual journeys of the presence of God, and the overall spiritual journey of getting from here to the celestial city. God's not against me, Amen, Preacher, I know that. No, you don't. No you don't, because you get up in the morning and stuff doesn't go right on the day that you're getting ready to come here to worship, and is your immediate thought? God is for me. Oh, these little obstacles God, bless you little one, not wanting to get your clothes on today. God is just so good. Thank you wife, Thank you husband for taking so long to get prepared. God is for me today. Oh you wonderful Houston traffic. Praise the Lord for you today. Oh car out of gas. You should have screamed at me yesterday. Now you got your little blinky light on, and I'm trying to wonder if I got time or enough gas to get to the place of worship. Hi Lujah. That's not how we go through our life or even on the spiritual journey. As we prepare our hearts and our souls to come into the presence of God. We often see God as an adversary there and not as a friend. We see God as harsh and unreasonable. Or how about the overall journey as we go through our days being conformed to the image of Christ, which can often be unpleasant, and God chisels away at us through the difficulties of our lives. How often do we experience a difficulty and instead of saying, God in his sovereignty and God in his providence is chiseling away at me, taking away everything that I don't need in order to ascend that hell, and instead we say, God, why are you angry with me? Why didn't you give me that thing that I so desired? Why didn't you answer that prayer in the way I wanted you to answer that prayer. Why are you making this so hard? I love you, I want to serve you. I want to be yours. And it says, though you're putting obstacles in my way everywhere I turn. And we think, though we would never say it out loud, God, you're against me, Samma says, I look at the arduous journey that I have ahead. I lift up my eyes to the hills. And here's the question, where's my help come from? Where's my help come from? The answer is my help comes from the Lord Saints. God is for you, not against you. Amen. God is for you, not against you. If you were his He's for you, not against you. Now, if you are outside of the Covenant community and you have not come to faith in Christ, you have not come to repentance of your sin, then newsflash, God's against you mainly because you're against God. Amen, you're against God. But here's a news flash. You're listening to me today, so watch this. You're an enemy of God. You have not come to repentance and faith. You are serving yourself, your own interests. You are not worshiping God rightly. You deserve death, hell, and the grave. And if you die without coming to repentance and faith, that's exactly what you're going to get. And yet God, in his kindness has you sitting here listen to someone who is showing you exactly how to be right with him. God is good. Amen, God is good. Notice he says from the Lord. And then he says, who made heaven and earth? Where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord. And then there's this next phrase, who made heaven and Earth. Here's the important point. If on this journey we look to anything other than God for our help, then instead of going to the one who made heaven and earth and all the things in them, we are now going to something that was made by the one who made heaven and earth and everything in them. So we're opting for something inferior. So whenever we turn for our help to something or someone other than God, we are opting for something inferior. He is the source of your help. He is the source of your strength. It is God, the one who made heaven and earth. I have to make this climb. What or whom can I depend on? Whom have I in heaven? But you? God is our help, and He's the maker of heaven and earth. Here's what that means. Every obstacle and difficulty. God's the maker of heaven and earth. Everything that I have to overcome, God's the maker of heaven and earth, everything that gets me from point A to point B. God's the maker of heaven and earth. God is the one on whom I'm dependent. Listen to this from Charles Spurgeon. Our hope is in Jehovah, for our help comes from him. Help is on the road and will not fail to reach us in due time, for he who sends it to us was never known to be too late. Jehovah, who created all things, is e cool to every emergency. Heaven and Earth are at the disposal of Him who made them. Therefore, let us be very joyful in our infinite helper. We will sooner destroy heaven and Earth than permit. I'm sorry. He will sooner destroy heaven and earth than permit his people to be destroyed. And the perpetual hills themselves shall bow rather than he shall fail. Whose ways are everlasting. God is our help, and he's the one who made heaven and earth. So whatever it is that you are going to depend on other than God, God's the one who made it. As you read this, you can't help but think of Romans chapter one? Can you not? What is the great sin in Romans chapter one? That we worship and serve the creature rather than the creator. That we look to the gift rather than the giver. That we look to what God has made, as opposed to looking to God him self. God not only provides health, he is our help. But what is the cause for this help? Why is it that God helps us? Well? Look at verses three and four. He will not let your foot be moved. He who keeps you will not slumber. Behold, he who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep. This is a parallel, and we know that in the Psalms. Then this form of poetry, we see these parallels, and they're very important. So on the one the Psalma says, he's your keeper, and the one who's your keeper, he doesn't slumber, he doesn't sleep. Amen. But then here's the next statement. Behold he who keeps Israel will never slumber or sleep. So God is my keeper. God is my help. But why the why is found in the next phrase because of his disposition towards his covenant people. That's why now I know that. Here's our temptation. Our temptation is to think God loves me because I'm so unique. He loves me because I'm special and there's nobody like me, and I'm so special that God just can't imagine his world without me, and that's why he watches over me because of how special I am. Help you, that's just not the case. You got that backwards, by the way. You know, if you're one in a million, you heard that you're so special, you're one in a million. If you're want in a million, there's three hundred and ten people just like you, just in America, Amen, just in America. Over seven thousand people exactly like you in the world. You're not unique. Get over yourself, amen, Amen, And you're not special. Get over yourself. You're not special. Let me help you understand something, just really quickly. Okay. So God makes Adam this perfect man, right, and then he makes Eve and we have this perfect couple and they are untainted by sin. Right, they're perfect, flawless, beautiful, untainted by sin. Sin enters the world, and then everything progressively becomes more tainted by sin. Right you follow? Okay, do you know where your uniqueness comes from? Your sin? It comes from how flawed you are as a result of the fall. That's where your uniqueness comes from. And so here we are, all these years later, and we're going there's never been anyone that's white like me. Yeah, it's right. Stuff's getting worse, and here you came. So she's saying people are not special. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. People are not special. God is special. In fact, he's more than special. He's God. Amen. And it is because we're made in the image of God that we have inherent dignity and value. That's a completely different statement. One statement looks at me and says, because of me and my uniqueness and because of what I have that other people don't, that makes me special. The other statement says, because of God and his uniqueness and the fact that that unique God has made me in his image and in his likeness, that gives me inherent dignity and value. One points to me and puffs me up, the other one is a worshipful attitude toward God. Look at the progression again. He will not let your foot be moved. He who keeps you will not stumble. Amen. God is good and he keeps me. Well, why the whole, He who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep. God keeps his covenant people. God preserves his people. You're a member of the people of God. God is going to preserve you. But that's not because of you. It's because of God. It's because of God's glory. By the way, I'm not trying to beat you up to you here, I'm trying to help you because there's another step in this process. So if I look at myself and my own uniqueness and how special I am, and God's going to keep me because of how special I am and because of how unique I am, Now all of a sudden I begin to see my flaws and I begin to sin. Well, if my being kept was all about me, guess what I've got now? Nothing? But if this is about God, and if this is about God calling a people to himself, preserving a people for himself, and if this is about God, by his grace, making me a member of that covenant community. Then my eyes are no longer on me, so that when I see my own flaws and my own frailty, I don't look to myself as my own keeper because I can't keep me. I look to God, who keeps his people, and remind myself that I'm kept because I belong to them and therefore belong to him. This phrase is used in other places in the psalms Psal I'm sixty six eight. Bless our God, o peoples, let the sound of his praise be heard, who has kept our soul among the living, and has not let our feet slip. We see it in Proverbs Proverbs three twenty three. Then you will walk on your way securely, and your foot will not stumble. We see it earlier used a different way in Psalm seventy three. Listen to Psalm seventy three, verses one through three. Psalm seventy three is that great psalm where David talks very openly and honestly about the fact that he often envied the wicked because it seemed like they had it made. They lived however they wanted, and they had good stuff, and you know, God wasn't getting them. Listen to this verses one through three. Truly God is good to Israel. Truly God is good to Israel. Truly God is good to Israel. He doesn't start. Truly God is good to me. So truly God is good to Israel, to those who are pure in heart. But as for me, my feet had almost stumbled, my steps had nearly slipped. For I was envious of the arrogant when I saw the prosperity of the wicked. So here's the opposite. God keeps you feet from stumbling. There the Psalmist to say, David, say you know what. My feet is almost stumbled. It continues down in verse twenty three to twenty six. Nevertheless, I am continually with you. You hold my right hand, You guide me with your counsel, and afterward you will receive me to glory. Whom have I in heaven but you, And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. Amen, Ahelujah, Praise the Lord. That's how we're kept, and that's why we're kept because we're part of the covenant community. This covenant community. This phrase that we find. For example, in Exodus chapter three, we're in verse fifteen and sixteen. Moses repeats this idea, or God repeats this idea to Moses that he's to tell the people, I am the God of your father's Abraham and Isaac and Jacob. And then he repeats it again in sixteen. You tell them, you tell them this is who I am. I'm the God of your father's Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Notice that God, in presenting himself as the covenant keeping God, points them back to history, points them back to the covenant that he made and the covenant that he kept. He didn't keep that covenant because Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob were such wonderful men. He kept it in spite of the fact that they were awful. From the word go amen, God is the one who keeps us. And then in Acts chapter three and verse thirteen, here the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, the God of our fathers, glorified his servant Jesus, whom you delivered over and denied in the presence of Pilot when he had decided to release him. In other words, now we're connecting this the covenant community of Israel. Their God is who the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. They're in the New Testament. We see that this God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and the God of our fathers, is the one who's the God and father of our Lord, Jesus Christ. How are we united to him? Well, Christ died for sin, once for all, the just, for the unjust, in order that he might bring us back to God. So he connects us to this covenant community. That is why we're called in Galatian six, the Israel of God. We're grafted in. Paul says in Romans eleven, we're grafted in. We are part of this covenant community. So this keeping that we read about in Psalm one hundred and twenty one is a keeping that we can rely on here as new covenant believers. Why because He's the God who keeps his people, and because in repenting of our sin and trusting in Christ, we have been united to him. We have been united to the God of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob. We have been united to the Israel of God. And therein lies our hope. Well, what about the the nature of this help Verses five and six. The Lord is your keeper. The Lord is your shade on your right hand. The sun shall not strike you by day, nor the moon by night. Again, think about this trifled metaphor here. Also, this is where we have to learn how to read the psalms. Right, God's our keeper. He's not gonna let our foot slip. Now it says the Sun's not gonna mess with us or the moon mess with us, because God's going to protect us from those things. Obviously he's being metaphorical here, but beyond being metaphorical here in the sense that the sun, you know, you're not going to be scorched by day, the elements in the day, in the night, you're not going to freeze. God's gonna protect you from the elements. We get that on the first part of the metaphor. I'm going up this hill and the day it's hot and the night it's cold. So there sun and moon. God is going to protect me and get me up this hill regardless of those elements. But does that mean that no Israelite will get sunburned on the way up to Jerusalem? Does it mean that nobody is gonna have complications because of exposure on the way up to Jerusalem. Remember this is a song. Okay, this is a song. So if we try to take this literally, we're in huge trouble here. You have to understand the other metaphors. Remember that first metaphor is just this trip up the hill or that's the source of the metaphor. Now related to this, we're talking about us coming into the presence of God to worship him. God is not going to allow his people to be forwarded from coming into his presence and worshiping him. But this makes the most sense when you get to the broadest metaphor, and that broadest metaphor is the people of God on that march through their lifetime from here to the celestial city. There are no elements that will stop you from getting to that place. This is not unique. Turn with me to the right and look in the book of Romans. Look at Romans chapter eight. Romans chapter eight, and beginning verse thirty one, What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? Jesus? This language already sounds for me, doesn't it. Who's our help? God is our help? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own son, but gave him up for us all. How will he not also with him graciously give us all things. Who shall bring any charge against God's elect It is God who justifies. Who is it to condemn? Who is to condemn Christ? Jesus is the one who died more than that who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us. He's our help. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation or distress, or persecution, or famine or nakedness or danger or the sword as it is written. For your sake, we are being killed all day long. We are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered. Knowing all all these things, we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor heights nor depth, nor anything else in our creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus, our Lord, same sentiment. But I want you to notice something right here in the middle of it, he says. Paul says, for your sake, we are being killed all the day long, we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered. How can both of those things be true? How can it be true that the people of God are slaughtered and that the people of God are protected? How can it be true that He protects us even from the elements. Sun won't strike us by day or the moon by night, and at the same time we die and we're struck down. Here's where you have to learn how to read the Psalm. The answer to that question is found in the next statement. The Lord will keep you from all evil. He will keep your life. The Lord will keep your going out, and you're coming in. Listen to this from this time forth forevermore. This is not about sunburn. Therefore, when we see this language about the shade on your right hand, and sun I strike you by day and the moon by night, listen to John Calvin here. I believe his point is well worked this quote. The language is metaphorical, the cold of night and the heat of day, denoting all kinds of inconveniences. The sense, then is that although God's people may be subject in common with others, to the miseries of human life, yet His shadow is always their side to shield them. From thereby receiving any harm. The prophet does not, however, promise the faithful a condition of such felicity and comfort as implies and exemption from all trouble. He only for the purpose of assuaging their sorrows, sets before them this consolation that, being interested in the divine layout, they shall be secure from all deadly harm being interested in the divine layout. This is where that last metaphor is crucial. I'm going to get to the celestial city. Amen, I'm going to get to the celestial city. That's why that last line. This time and forevermore, this is about my eternity. This is not just about tonight and tomorrow or next week. This is about my eternity. This is a statement about God seeing to it that his people come to the end that he intends. Here, the Psalmist continues the journey metaphor. The traveler would have to worry about exposure to extreme heat and cold as his journey in his journey toward Jerusalem. Therefore, in the immediate context, the pilgrim ascends to the place of worship, and he trusted that the Lord would preserve him from the elements. Likewise, the pilgrim journeying towards the celestial city, can know that God will see his journey through to its end. God will see to it that you come to the place that He intends. Now you can look at this psalm in a wooden fashion and not understand that it's a psalm and hold on to this and say, here's a promise that you won't ever have any difficulty in life. Or you can look at this psalm as a psalm and in the context of broader redemptive history, especially in light of Romans chapter eight, and say God will save his people, and that there's nothing in this world that can stop that God will save his people. Now, one of these, if we sort of press the metaphor too far, one of these gets us to the kind of word of faith. Okay, And this is what happens in the Word of faith theology. Word of faith theology presses a metaphor too far, and whenever it sees something like this, it says, here it is, this is the promise. This is what God's guaranteeing for you. You need to believe this, and if you believe it, you'll get it. And if you're not getting it, it's because you're not believing it. That's not the point. It's not what's intended. Romans eight makes that very clear by quoting another song or quoting another Old Testament passage making reference to us being killed all the day long. That's not the point. The point here is that as you go up to Jerusalem, and as you go up to worship, you need to be reminded of something. You leave your house and you come there to the amount of olives, and you look up there at the Temple mount and you're reminded that this is the last stretch in my journey, and I'm going to that place where I'm going to worship God. I'm going to that place where sacrifices are going to be made. As you get there, you know that when I go down into the Kiddron Valley and I come back up to Jerusalem, it is God who will give me strength, God who will watch over me, and God who will get me to that place of worship. God's the one who does that. And then metaphorically, we come back away from that and we say that is not the greatest reality. There is the greatest reality there is is not getting over from the amount of olives down through that Kiddron Valley up to the Temple Mount, going there to the temple and having a sacrifice made on behalf of your sin. That that's not the greatest reality. Here's a greater reality. The greater reality is I don't have to go to that hill anymore. I don't have to go to that place anymore. Nobody needs to make sacrifices for me anymore. Why because the Lamb of God laid down his life for God's select that I am saved because Christ shed his blood on my behalf. I don't have to journey to Jerusalem. I don't have to journey to the Temple Mount Temple there anymore for a sacrifice is to be made. Guess what, There doesn't have to be one because there was a once for all sacrifice made in the person of Jesus Christ. God did that. It's done. So now here's the metaphor I look at when I look across to the celestial city. I have no idea how far I have to go. My life could end before I get to my seat, or I could live another hundred years. But regardless of how long it takes for me to get from here to there, God keeps my foot from slipping, because he who keeps Israel doesn't slumber asleep. God is the shade at my right hand, and exposure to the sun and the day, or to the elements at night will not stop me from getting to the celestial city. Why because He will keep me from all evil. He will guard my coming and my going, not just now but forevermore. God is the one who will see me through to that high place. That's the truth of Psalm twenty one. Because here's the deal you could there are there are plenty of people who sang song one twenty one, And they sang song one twenty one, and they came from their home wherever they were, and they eventually made their way down into that valley. They made their way up to that temple mount. They came up those stairs, they came in through the gate. They got their offering, and they made their offering. When they were finished with their business, they turned around, loaded up everything, and they went back to their homes, and they died and went to hell. Why because they trusted in the blood of bulls, lambs, goats or doves, and not in God, who was the maker of heaven and earth. If this song is only about getting to a physical place to experience temporal worship. First of all, the last few verses don't make any sense because the last few verses make it clear that this is not just about a temporal place, but this is about our eternity. But secondly, it's actually quite sad because if all we have is a temporal place and the temporal experience, and we don't have a relationship with the God who created all things, and we have not come to him in repentance and faith, then these last few verses are moot. The only thing we have to look forward to forevermore is judgment. But God, being rich and mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, made us alive together with Christ by grace. You've been saying, let's pray, Father, you are a good God, and we are grateful to you for every opportunity that you give us to come into your presence and to worship you. Grateful to you for every opportunity that we have to ascend the hill, so to speak. Grant by your grace that we would never grow weary of that journey. But Lord, would you also grant by your grace that we would never allow that journey to take the place of or overshadow the bigger picture that it's a small part of, and that is the fact that we are ascending a hill to the celestial city is not our home, that we are awaiting a city without foundations, whose builder and maker is God, and that because of the once for all sacrifice of your only begotten son, Jesus Christ, we have been made ready and completely secure for that journey. For this we are people. Thank you. For this, we hear people praise you. And for this we hear people worship you in Christ's name and for his sake. Amen.