If you wanna turn to our scripture reading today, it's gonna be found in the 40th division of the Psalms, Psalm 40. Couldn't help but notice how aligned the last verse of that song was with what I intend to speak on this morning. Last verse of that song says, now Lord, I would be yours alone. and live so all might see, the strength to follow your commands could never come from me. Oh, Father, use my ransomed life in any way you choose, and let my song forever be my only boast is you. Music is a funny thing. especially as we sing in worship, it can have many intents. I might say, I hope you sing intentionally when we sing. I hope, even if you don't utter the words, that your heart is expressing some of these things. And that's why we sing. We don't sing just because we don't know how else to start the service. Sometimes our music is declarative. We state something confidently. So when we exalt the Lord and we commend Him for all of His goodness, that's a declaration of our heart. Sometimes it's a plea. And I believe that's what the last verse of this song is meant to say. And we ought to be careful when we make pleas. Because listen to this, listen to the seriousness of this prayer to the Lord. It says, I want to be yours and yours alone and live in a way that people would see that the strength to follow your commands does not come from me. Listen to this last phrase of this third verse. Wow. You just said that to the Lord. I did too. Like, think about that. You just uttered that to the Lord. The Bible teaches us that there are not idle words that will refrain from the judgment. That's a solemn, thought-provoking plea that we just sang to the Lord, that we would allow him to use us in any way that he sees fit. And our psalm that we're gonna read from this morning, is rightly called a messianic psalm. It must be such a strange thing, David knowing what he knows now, having written these things, because in the moment, I don't think he really knew a lot. He knew some, but the extent to what he was writing and the double meaning that it had, but this is very clear that we can look at this from our own vantage point And we can also look at it from Christ's vantage point, as if Jesus was saying these things. And lest we wonder if this psalm in particular was a messianic psalm, the writer of Hebrews clarifies it by quoting from this and directly applying it to Jesus. So we know that this psalm is a messianic psalm. This morning what I would like to talk about for a few moments, if the Lord would help me to do so, is doing God's will. Doing God's will. Now I think very often we get sidetracked with a question that we think runs or is synonymous, and that is, what is God's will? Finding God's will. but aiming to find God's will is different than aiming to do God's will. And although the degrees just seem a few degrees off, where you will end up will be vastly different if your aim is just to discover God's will versus to do God's will. I think very often the pursuit of finding God's will is rooted in the desire for control. If I can find God's will, then I can determine whether to obey it or not. If I can find God's will, then I can upend the need to walk by faith, because I know what I'm doing, because God's told me. But why would we want to uproot a life of faith? That's where the richness of communion with God is found, is in faith. There seems to be in my own heart, and I think in yours, this frantic desire to just have the questions of the future answered. And yet, I don't think that that's what we ought to aim for. Perhaps a more righteous desire to find or discover God's will is if I find it, then I can deliberately do it. But as the third verse of that song indicated, you don't have the strength to do it. Even if you find God's will, you do not possess the power to do God's will. And so God intentionally places us in a state of fragile vulnerability. We don't know what today holds. We don't know what tomorrow holds. We know so little. And God does not call us to just pursue at all cost, Lord, just tell me what you want me to do. Just tell me, just tell me, give me that knowledge that I might find peace. What if God doesn't want you to find peace? What if God wants you to do his will, maybe even unbeknownst to you? Isn't that strange? Like don't we like to imagine God tells me, then I execute, then I know I'm pleasing to the Lord. But what if that is not the way God has designed our lives to go? What if, like this messianic psalm indicates, what if God has intended for all of us not to reveal His will so clearly that we're constantly in this state of seeking and in brokenness and independence that Lord, My heart's aim is to please you, and though I don't know exactly what I'm in to do in this day, I am going to move forward. I am going to take actions based upon what I know and trust that if these actions are right, you will certify them, you will allow me to carry them out. and if they're not, you will move my path to a different way because at my core you know I want to do your will. I'm not so set on finding your will before I do it. Do you see the subtle difference? One inherently requires perpetual faith. One requires a dependence upon God to redirect us even if we're not conscious of His redirection and that we know that that's the way that He works. God, I don't understand. God, I don't know what to do, but I'm going to march forward trusting that You are guiding my steps if my intent is to do Your will. Here the psalmist begins, I believe, with a expression equally applicable to Christ and equally applicable to us. He says, I wait patiently for the Lord, and he inclined unto me and heard my cry. You know, I think doing the Lord's will, one of the things that is very hard for Americans to accept is that Every part of spiritual work requires patience. And it is exemplified in Jesus himself more than any other man. The patience of Jesus. Job has nothing on the patience of Jesus. You see, Jesus was different than us in so much that he knew what the plan of God was for his life when he came, and rather than us being sent here and born into the situation that God providentially placed us in, Jesus willingly volunteered to come. and knowing that part of the torture of coming to die for sin was waiting for the will of his father to be played out and the patience it would require every step of the way. If you're like me, when there is something daunting lying ahead of me, I just wanna get it over with. Let me just finish this thing that's in front of me. And so when in the halls of, or in the past eternity, when God had, the Father had determined that Jesus would come as a substitute for our sins, that he would suffer the wrath of God in place of us, Jesus had to wait. He didn't come right after Adam sinned. He didn't come in the second or third generation because God had a plan where He was carrying out that an optimum amount of people would come to know Him. And so God, over the course of hundreds, yay, thousands of years, allowed mankind to degenerate into sin, and God just permitted all of those things to happen while Christ patiently waited until the Father sent Him at the time that was according to the will of the Father. How many of us become eager to step into what God wants on our time as opposed to according to the will of the Father. I remember when I was in a younger phase of life and all the uncertainties that our teenagers experience now about who am I going to marry and what careers I'm gonna have and I just wanna know right now, I want to encourage you not to make that the aim of your life and your young life. Don't try to grasp for all the answers. Rather, seek to cultivate a deeper faith in God. You don't need the answers. You need the strength to do His will when God calls you forth to do His will. And the older I get, the more I pray, God, give me strength. And I'm not talking about physical strength alone. Many of you may struggle with physical strength because you've aged, but listen, the strength to do the will of God is more difficult than the strength to muster up physical strength to go about your day, no matter how old and decrepit and difficult your body fights against you. Doing the will of the Father is no easy task, and the psalmist acknowledges one of the hardest things about doing the will of God, and that is at times we must wait patiently as Jesus did. Now notice while he's waiting, he's not idle while he's waiting. He's crying, he's praying. Why? One of the things that is And I've expressed this before, but I'll express it again. One of the things that is difficult for me to accept is that at times there will be burdens that God gives to us, and God will give us the strength to come to Him in faith and wrestle with the Lord as Jacob did. when Jacob wrestled with the Lord. So many of you have burdens today, burdens for your family members. I think of my dear brother Roger that I've already referenced this morning who passed away. And I think about how much he wrestled for the spiritual welfare of his family. And he never saw the desires of his heart come to pass. That's something Jesus knows what that's like. Do you remember in the book of Matthew, as Jesus is ending his ministry and his life, in Matthew chapter 23, where he had given himself in his entirety that his kinsmen in the flesh, the Jewish people, would come to know him. And every moment of every day, he did the will of the Father for God's glory and for their good. Listen to me, he was never self-seeking, ever. One moment of one day. He always surrendered himself to do the will of the Father. And we like to think in the Disney enchanted mindset that when you do the will of God, the result is always going to be God gives you the good desires of your heart. That if you seek, you will always have your prayer answered. But we find about Jesus that one of the things that makes life so difficult, that makes the burden of this life so difficult, is that God has given people the freedom to reject the grace of God. I do not believe the Scriptures teach that you and I or anyone for that matter is predestined to an end eternal result. God gives people freedom. And with that freedom, God gives us the capacity to experience the deeper character of God in that we can experience love because we have freedom. But there's a dark side to human freedom. And that is that people can choose to reject what is eternally best for them. And that sets up in the hearts of people who understand the way God works a deep anguish. Because as you witness, as Jesus did, about to enter into Jerusalem, as he stood there and he watched all of the nation continue to reject the Messiah, the Lamb of God that had been sent for their salvation and for their spiritual freedom as God looked upon them as Jesus did and he had emptied himself of doing the complete will of God and yet they had still determined to reject him. There was a deep sorrow set in the heart of Jesus. And he looked upon the city and he said, Jerusalem, Jerusalem, How many times through the prophets and through God coming in the flesh did I desire to gather you as a hen gathereth her chicks, but listen, you would not. You wouldn't. You chose to reject the will of God for you and that is to come to know him. You see, the point I'm trying to make this morning is applicable to us, is that we can wait patiently upon the Lord. We can seek to do His will. And as we're doing that, we can call out in bitter groanings that God's will would be done through us and by us for His glory and for the welfare of those I love. But in no way does that ensure the end desire of our hearts. And that is a real anguish. It has come all over me the last two weeks about this family who, may never come to know the Lord, no matter what anyone does, they may reject Christ. I have a hard time accepting that. And yet, I am called to trust the Lord. In other words, the confidence that I have in God is not dependent upon him bending this world to my demands. There's a sinful part of me that wishes I had that kind of power. But there is a spiritual knowledge inside that says, you couldn't handle that power if you had it. Jesus, we find this sentiment expressed again in his life in the Garden of Gethsemane. And those piercing words, those powerful words, those words of conquering self, Lord, not my will but thine be done. What powerful words. What words that you and I cannot utter unless God gives us the strength to utter such words? Because I desperately want my will to be done. My flesh fights to have my will done. Jesus was not like that. Look at verse four of our scripture. I'm skipping around today and that's just the way I feel inclined this morning, look at verse four. It says, blessed is that man that maketh the Lord his trust. In studying the scriptures, since being called to preach 20 years ago, almost now, a conclusion that I think I have come to is that The power of the scriptures is not in understanding in the mind what they mean, but it's being granted the grace to apply those simple truths that our bodies fight against. You and I both know that trusting the Lord is a necessity. You know that and I know that, but doing it, That's an animal that I cannot tame. This scripture tells us that a man is blessed, not who discovers what the will of God is for his life, but that trusts God with God's will for his life. When I get to verses six through eight, I'd like to make a few comments about them if I can. Sacrifice and offering thou didst not desire. Mine ear, excuse me, mine ears hast thou opened. Burnt offerings and sin offerings hast thou not acquired. So I wanna pause for a moment on verse six. Now, under the old covenant, these words that David wrote must have been very strange to hear among the children of Israel. all of their religion was saturated with sacrifices, with offerings that were meant to appease, in their minds, the wrath of God, that were meant to, often in their minds, offer God something so that he would go easy on us. They had all manner of offerings, and all manner of ceremonies, and all manner of behaviors that were indeed prescribed by the old covenant that they were to carry out. And yet, here we find David boldly writing, God is not satisfied with sacrifices and offerings. The same I wish that the Lord would help us today to recognize in this text that there is an application today that God is not satisfied with the works of mankind both now, then, or forever. Your and my good works are not intended to satisfy God. Obedience and external religion has never been God's object for us to appease Him. There's a strange, if you look at verse six, there's a strange phrase in the middle that doesn't seem to go with the text. It says, mine ears hast thou opened. Now, I think, I don't know this for sure, but I think this is a reference to a practice of the Jews. Many of you know that in the book of Exodus, now, when I say the word slavery, I don't want you to think of slavery in the same way that we think of slavery in America that was carried off with the descendants of Africans, right? That's not the type of slavery that was found in the scriptures, and I'm not gonna take time to explain that, but what I will say is that There was a form of slavery that was found in the Old Testament amongst the Jewish people that after a six year period, on the seventh year, that all of those slaves were to be set free. But if there was a slave that wanted to stay as a part of his household, he wanted to stay in subject to his master for potentially a variety of reasons. Perhaps it's because his family was slaves to them and they were born into that house and so he wanted to stay with his family. Perhaps he enjoyed his life as somewhat of a tenant farmer subject to That master that he had been given, whatever the reason, there was a practice that they could carry out where they would go before the city and they would have their ear nailed to something before a group of elders. And what that was meant to do is show that they were lifelong bound to their master. This was not anything done under guilt. This was nothing done by force or coercion. This was a voluntary act that a person chose that this was the life they wanted to live and this was the master that they were pledging their allegiance and obedience to. I've often wondered why piercing of the ear. And the only thing that I can understand from that, and perhaps many of you have studied this more than I have, is that that was a way of saying that I am going to adhere to the things that the master commands me to do, and I'm doing it publicly professing my allegiance so that all can know, and there is going to be a trademark that is forever going to be here as a scar to indicate to all that my master is that one right there, and it has been certified by all the public of Israel. And so here in the middle of this text, we find Them saying, it's not in sacrifices, it's not in offerings that God is pleased, but what God desires is for one to willfully commit their life to the master, which is God the Father. If this is a Messianic psalm, and Jesus is doing this, this is what Jesus agreed to do, becoming a man. I will acknowledge the Father as my supreme master, and I will carry out all that He commands me to do. We keep reading in verse seven and verse eight, and we only wanna get to verse eight, and I'm gonna close, it says this, verse seven, then said I, Lo, I come. Now, I wanna make a comment here for a moment. If this is a Messianic psalm, and this is expressing the heart of Jesus, then verse seven is this attempt for Jesus to pause all of heaven and earth. And the word lo is saying behold. Look, pay attention. I come. Now, that alone is quite a profound thing to say from Jesus. I have come to do the will of my Father and I want all the world to behold that. Now, one of the things that we can say about God himself is that God never imposes something upon us that he himself has not first had to endure and in a much heightened way than what we have had to endure. And so, Jesus commands all of earth and all of heaven to behold His obedience to the Father. Listen, if you want to do the will of God this morning, it is easy to begin to feel like that God is requiring things of you that come at a high cost, and perhaps that is the case. But listen, God requires nothing of you in comparison to what He required of His only begotten Son. And Jesus is saying in this Messianic Psalm, everyone behold me. You know, oftentimes what is a good exercise when we begin to think about our situation and when the world amens our attempt to make victims out of the sacrifices that we have to give in the cause of God, very often a healthy way to combat that is to go to the person of Jesus and what the Father required of him. I always say, if you don't know where to read, start with the red letters. Because what God required, what the Father required of his only Son is not greater than what he is gonna require you to do his will. He pauses in verse seven and he wants the attention of all of heaven and earth to observe. And look at verse eight, how he says that we are to do the will of the Father. I delight to do thy will, O my God, yea, the law is within my heart. Oh, a tendency of human nature is to think that doing the will of God is always something you do. I think there is a very pernicious and clever deception of Satan that falls within the Christian worldview at times that he camouflages that makes you doing the will of God about you. It goes something like this. God has a purpose for your life. The only way you're gonna be happy, what you need to seek is finding God's will for your life. And then you will be happy. Then you will reach the apex of your existence. I'm not going to say there's not some truth that's sprinkled in there, but if the motivation of the heart is self, not only is truth mixed in there, but there's a whole lot of error mixed in there as well. You see, the heart of Christ was not, Lord, I want to do some of your will. I want to do all of your will, but I want to be able to also experience all the good things that I want to experience in life. That was not what Jesus came and did. Rather, He wanted a heart, and He wants us to have a heart that says, Lord, I want You to conform the desires of my heart to such an extent to please You that I delight to do Your will, whatever Your will might be. if it is foregoing and sacrificing things. Now, interestingly enough, in this whole thing about David and all the sacrifices, all the people around him would have continuously brought sacrifice after sacrifice, and in their worldview, living in that way was the way by which you pleased God. And yet David steps out of that old covenant and he says, you know what? The way that I am going to please God is not through the traditional avenues of religion, but it is through a heart that delights to do whatever would please God in this covenant of commitment that I am making to him in so much that I am permanently vowing to please him. This morning, Jesus, Jesus is committing to serve the Father at any cost. I wanna ask you this question this morning. Do you want to do the will of God? Pause for a minute. This is not a sermon trick. Do you want to do the will of God in your life? Is the answer yes? Or are there a lot of contingencies? What God wants... Now, in this, Jesus says, I come. The book of Hebrews chapter 10 says this. It's a repeat of this scripture. It's a recitation of this scripture, I come to do thy will, O God. Now, there's a subtle difference between us and him. He came to do our will. We've been created to do God's will. But both Jesus and us, it's still voluntary. That hasn't changed. I want to offer, now, This may seem especially applicable to young people who have the rest of their life ahead of them, but it's not. It's equally applicable to all of us. This morning, I think I think doing God's will, truly doing God's will, will probably look different in your life than your life looks right now. Like what if all of the ways that you've constructed that God's will must fall within this. I've got to live in this standard of living. I've got to live in this place. I've got to be associated with these people. I've got to do these activities. All these things are built into my expectations of what God's will looks like. And then if God wants me to do one or two little things within that construct, then that's okay. But what if that's not what we do? What if we just say, Lord, I'm here to do your will. whatever that might entail. Call me to do your will. And we let off the control. This morning, I pray God deserves us doing his will, doesn't he? Doesn't he deserve it? Doesn't God deserve the honor of obedience from the heart? I love the words that God said to Jesus, this is my beloved son, in whom I am well pleased. This morning, I pray God would help us to do his will from the heart.