Psalm 103. The title of which is A Psalm of David. This is God's word to us this evening. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me. Bless his holy name. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits, who forgiveth all thine iniquities, who healeth all thy diseases, who redeemeth thy life from destruction, who crowneth thee with lovingkindness and tender mercies, who satisfieth thy mouth with good things, so that thy youth is renewed like the eagle's. The Lord executeth righteousness and judgment for all that are oppressed. He made known his ways unto Moses, his acts unto the children of Israel. The Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and plenteous in mercy. He will not always chide, neither will he keep his anger forever. he hath not dealt with us after our sins, nor rewarded us according to our iniquities. For as the heaven is high above the earth, so great is his mercy toward them that fear him. As far as the east is from the west, so far hath he removed our transgressions from us. Like as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear him. For he knoweth our frame, he remembereth that we are dust. As for man, his days are as grass, as a flower of the field, so he flourisheth. For the wind passeth over it, and it is gone, and the place thereof shall know it no more. but the mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting upon them that fear him and his righteousness unto children's children, to such as keep his covenant and to those that remember his commandments to do them. The Lord hath prepared his throne in the heavens, and his kingdom ruleth over all. Bless the Lord, ye his angels that excel in strength, that do his commandments, hearkening unto the voice of his word. Bless ye the Lord, all ye his hosts, ye ministers of his, that do his pleasure. Bless the Lord, all his works in all places of his dominion. Bless the Lord, O my soul. May God bless the reading of his word to us this evening. I'll read the first two verses of the psalm, which is the text for the sermon tonight. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me, bless his holy name. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits. I call your attention, beloved in the Lord Jesus Christ, to this text under the theme, Bless the Lord, O My Soul. The three points of the sermon are the following, and you'll notice how they string together. Speaking to self, in the first place, to bless the Lord, in the second place, for all his benefits, in the third place. Bless the Lord, O my soul, speaking to self, to bless the Lord for all his benefits. What I want to do in the beginning of the sermon this evening is explain from a general point of view what it is that David is doing in these opening verses of Psalm 103. I struggled when writing this sermon to figure out when and how to explain this point. But it's a point that I believe is worthy to spend some time explaining. to look at what David is doing in these opening verses because of how important it was for David to do this, how important it is for these two who confess their faith to do this, and really how important it is for all of us as Christians throughout our lives to do what David does here in the opening verses of Psalm 103. And what he does is expressed in the title of the first point of the sermon. David, in these opening verses of this psalm, is speaking to himself. Bless the Lord, he says, to himself. O my soul, and all that is within me, bless his holy name. Bless the Lord, O my soul. and forget not all his benefits." David here is not talking to his wife. David is not talking to one of his children. David is not talking to some other Israelite and telling him or her, this is what you need to do. You need to bless the Lord with your soul. And you need to bless the Lord with all that is within you. And you need to not forget His benefits. David's not addressing someone else. David is addressing himself. He says to Himself, O soul, He says to Himself, all that is within you, bless the Lord and don't forget His benefits. I say again, what David is doing here in speaking to himself and telling himself to bless the Lord, is an important activity for the child of God in his or her life. What David is doing here is not unique to Psalm 103. There are other psalms in which a very similar thing is done. And remember now what the Psalms are. The Psalms are the very personal and intimate experiences of the child of God in his relationship with God before men, against opposition, and in the reality of being a sinner. Very personal, very intimate. And the thing about the Psalms is that we can identify with the psalmist in so many respects. And we must identify ourselves with the lives and experiences of the psalmist. And we must identify ourselves in this respect as well with what David is doing in these opening two verses in speaking to himself. Just to illustrate the fact that this isn't the only place in the Psalms in which we find this, I'll read just a couple of examples of very similar language to what we have in the beginning of Psalm 103. We have it right at the beginning of 104. Same thing, bless the Lord, O my soul. Psalm 116 is another example of this. In verse seven, speaking to himself, he says, return unto thy rest, O my soul, for the Lord hath dealt bountifully with thee. One more well-known example is Psalm 42, in which Asaph, or rather the psalmist here, is speaking to himself. We read in verses 5 and 11, these words, addressing himself, Why art thou cast down, O my soul? And why art thou disquieted in me? And then speaking to himself, Hope thou in God, for I shall yet praise him for the help of his countenance, and the same thing in verse 11. It's the psalmist's activity to engage in this activity of speaking to himself to do something. Here in Psalm 103, it's to bless the Lord. This leads us to a discussion concerning why the psalmist would do this. One of the answers to that question, very simply, is the fact that he, along with every other child of God, on this side of the grave, still possesses a sinful nature. A sinful nature that, at times, believes a lie. At times, speaks the lie. At times, will live in harmony with the lie. Every child of God still has that sinful nature against which he or she must fight all the days of their life. And that requires at times, doing the exact thing that David does here at the beginning of Psalm 103. Because what does God use in the life of His children to counteract The lie, the lie generally in this world, the lie as we may believe it, speak it, or live it in our own lives, and the answer to that is the truth. All our life long, we confront the lie with the truth, and we need to be confronted with that truth time and time and time again. What David is doing here, very simply, is speaking the truth to himself and telling himself what the truth of what he must do is. Now in our lives, we often need others to speak the truth to us, to tell us what to do or what not to do. Every Sunday, twice on the Lord's Day, we come together to hear God speak to us truth. There are times in our lives when we need our husband to speak the truth to a wife, or a wife to say what a husband needs to hear, or parents to children, or friends to friends. But there's nobody who has your ear more readily than yourself. I, as your pastor, can't always be there to say what you need to hear. The elders can't always be there to say what you need to hear. Even a husband, or a wife, or a parent can't always be there to say what you need to hear. But on account of that new man that is in us, when we recognize that what we are thinking or believing or acting is wrong, at times we need to say it to ourselves. In a very literal way, like David says it to himself in this text. where we speak to ourselves what the truth is to counteract the lie that we may be believing or speaking or living. Think about Psalm 103. We don't know precisely why David was led to say this to himself. I think it's legitimate to surmise a couple of things. Maybe it's the fact that he recognized as a child of God who had the new man in him that what he tells himself to do in this text wasn't present like it should have been. That he wasn't in his life blessing the Lord in his soul. That he wasn't blessing the Lord with all that was in him as he said. That he wasn't remembering the goodness and love of God to him as one of God's children. And recognizing all of those things in his heart and mind and life, inspired by the Holy Spirit, he says to himself, O soul, bless the Lord. All that is within me, bless His holy name. Beloved, we can identify very much with the reality of needing to say that to ourselves throughout our lives. Yes, it's true that at times we don't need to say it, and it's right there. It may be right there for you right now on the mountaintops of faith. Here we are in God's house. Maybe a parent, a grandparent of these two. Overwhelmed with the goodness of God to us. A member of this church, tonight, confession of faith. This morning, two baptisms in God's Word all throughout the day. Spontaneously, inevitably, what bubbles forth from us is the blessing of the Lord God who is so good to us in His love, grace, and mercy. That's true for God's children in their lives. But what about this week? when you're lying in bed by yourself, overwhelmed by the reality of your own sin, and wondering, how does God see me right now? And then you realize the need to say to yourself, bless the Lord, bless the Lord, And don't forget his benefits because all of these things are true for me as one who believes in the Lord Jesus Christ. What about when you're utterly consumed with the struggles of this life? And take your pick. It doesn't matter what it is. where it's that thing in your life that literally you cannot get your mind off. You wake up in the morning thinking about it. At every turn, something reminds you of it. You go to bed at night, and it's the last thing on your mind. And all you can see in your life is that struggle. It's at that time that you need to say, O soul, to yourself, bless the Lord. Or the time when it seems like all that life gives you is hardship, sin, strife, division, struggle. You can't see past it to see the goodness and love of God to His people. You need to say to yourself, don't forget. the mercy and grace of God. Or this, young people, especially when life at times can seem so good, when things are good, when there seemingly isn't a care in the world, When you wake up in the morning and everything is right there for you, and it's all going as you hoped and planned, and so easily, God is distant from your thoughts, you need to remember at those times, I need to tell myself, don't Let all that I have, which is so good, lead me away from God, but I need to remember what the essence of it is all. Bless the Lord for his great spiritual benefits to me." My point is we can relate very much to needing to say to ourselves, bless the Lord. This isn't the only thing we do. We have God's Word. We need to go to God's Word as it's preached on Sunday, as we read it daily. To hear what God says to us, we need to pray. We need others in our lives to tell us what we need to hear. But let's not forget that this is what we do too. As believers, we say to ourselves, bless the Lord. And in a certain sense, of all of the things that you could tell yourself. This is the most important. It applies to every single one of us, no matter what the circumstances of life may be. It doesn't matter what it is. What is the response of the child of God? What is it that we are called to do? What is it that must consume the whole of our being and all of our life? It's exactly this. Bless the Lord for His great benefits to us. Repeated for emphasis sake. This is the essence of what we say to ourselves all our life long. So looking at it generally, David is speaking to himself. In the second place now, to bless the Lord. So, now we get into the content of what it is that he says to himself. And it's this main idea of blessing the Lord. Three main points to progress through this part of the text. The first is the object of that activity of blessing. The second is the activity itself of blessing. And then the third is that with which God is blessed, soul and all that is within me. The first is the object of the blessing, and the object is identified in two ways in these opening two verses. Three times we read bless, two of them have the object the Lord, and then one, At the end of verse one, his holy name. The object of our blessing is the Lord, or Jehovah, the Lord in all capitals. Same name and same truths that we identified briefly this morning in the sermon from Psalm 119. This is the covenant name of God that emphasizes his eternal, unchanging faithfulness to his people. But I want to call your attention to one more good reason that David, of all of the names he could have used to identify the object of his blessing, he uses the name Jehovah. And the reason for that is that this name is that which identifies very clearly the fact that David had a relationship with God. It's his covenant name and therefore the name in which it makes so very clear that God was his friend. David doesn't just say here, bless God, the almighty one. True enough, we say that to ourselves. But it's bless Jehovah, the one that I know as my God. My God, my Father, my friend. David's a child of God here. It's the child of God who tells himself to bless the Lord and he knows the relationship that he has with this God through, as we'll see, all of the benefits that he describes in this chapter. But then he adds as the object of the activity of blessing, name. So he is the God who is his friend. But yet David recognizes that the God who is the object of his blessing is the exalted one who is separated from any and everything else. Holy name, God's name is the revelation of his whole being as God. In Exodus chapter 34 we read that the Lord proclaimed his name and then that follows with all of the attributes of God listed. When we proclaim the name of God, what we are proclaiming is that this is who God is in all of his glorious and beautiful attributes. And it's a holy name. It's set above and separated from any and everything else. David is saying, bless the one who is very close as my friend. but not my friend like you are my friend, or you are my friend as a fellow human being, but my friend who is the exalted, glorious God of all things. Bless him, he says. The word bless has the root idea of to kneel down. From that idea of kneeling down comes this word, bless. Put very simply, the idea here is to worship this God, who is Jehovah, and to worship His holy name. We all know that the activity of kneeling down is an activity of worship. When someone gets on their knees on the ground in front of someone or something else, what you say automatically if you were to see that is that person is engaged in an activity of worship. The posture itself indicates devotion. It indicates that I am willingly putting myself underneath in humility, that which I kneel down before, which is exalted above me and worthy of my adoration and of my praise. To bless the Lord is to worship the Lord. He says, that that which is engaged in that activity of blessing the object which is the Lord and His holy name is my soul. And then he adds, all that is within me. David recognizes what we all need to walk out of here understanding tonight very clearly. And that is the true worship of God. arises out of our hearts, minds, and wills. To put it negatively, the true worship of God is not that which is fundamentally outward, though it expresses itself in outward activities. But the true worship of God is a matter chiefly of the heart. David is saying here, worship God. Worship God in a genuine, heartfelt, all-encompassing way. Because when the heart is right, and when all that is within me is that which is praising and worshiping God, it will affect and it will filter into every single part of one's life. As I was writing this sermon, and I was up to this point in explaining these ideas, there were two other passages or main ideas that I believe relate very well to this idea. The first is the summary of God's commandments. Every Sunday morning, we hear not just the Ten Commandments, but then we hear the summary of those Ten Commandments. And what is that summary? The summary is that we would love God with all our heart, mind, soul, and strength. The nature of God's law is that it requires not outward obedience first and foremost, but inward perfection. And David says here in Psalm 103, Bless the Lord with everything that is within me, or to use the language of the summary of the commandments, all my heart, all my soul, all my strength. And then the second thing that came to mind in this connection is that what David is saying here is the antidote to what was a very serious problem in the Old Testament life of Israel, and then in the New Testament, life of the Pharisees. And that's expressed in Matthew 15, verse 8. Quoting Isaiah from the Old Testament, we read these words, Well did Isaiah prophesy of you, saying, this people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth and honoreth me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. The answer to that hypocritical worship is to say to ourselves what David says in this text. Bless the Lord. and everything that is within me. Bless his holy name. Beloved, it is necessary for us to say that, recognizing our own sin and weakness, recognizing the fact that what David tells himself to do here is not that which we always do in our lives. That we're not always with our souls and with all of our hearts worshiping the name of God as we are called. And that we can, in our lives, be guilty of that hypocritical, half-hearted worship of God's name. I'll explain two ways in which that can be present in our lives. Let's start with what we're doing here. And every one of us, I believe, can relate to this to one degree or another. And as we hear often, at times our worship can very simply be the going through the motions. For whatever reason, you're here. You're here because mom and dad require of it to be here. You're here because you're concerned chiefly with public perception. You're here because you know that if you're not here, a phone call will be coming eventually from the elders, or whatever other reason it may be, or the very simple fact that we all struggle against at times, and that is we just come because that's what we do. We come. And we sing, and we put money in the collection plate. But all of it can be characterized very simply as going through the motions. We need to say to ourselves before we come to church, bless the Lord. And to elaborate a little bit, may it not be Just a half-hearted going through the motions, but bless the Lord with all that is within me. O God, fix my heart upon Thee in such a way that I know the greatness of Who Thou art. And I desire with the whole of my being to come to church to worship. I come to listen. I come to believe. I come to set my heart upon God's truth and word. I walk away saying nothing other than this. Amen to the word of God and God help me to live now this word in the week to come. God give me with all of my being the desire and ability to worship thy name in this day. Saturday night, let this be what you say to yourself. Sunday morning, let this be what you say to yourself. Sunday afternoon, let this be what you say to yourself. Bless the Lord, O my soul. Or you think about, in the second place, we can be hypocritical in areas of our lives. That one area of our life is characterized by the supposed worship of God's name with the corresponding outward actions, but another area of our life is devoid completely of the devotion to God's name as we are called to give it as believers. the young person who can come here tonight. Sing the words of Scripture. Put money in the collection plate. Understand in your mind what you're hearing in the sermon tonight. If we were in school right now, be part of the choir that sings the praises of God's name. But then on Friday, be at the party, over drinking, engaged in all sorts of ungodly behavior. Or the dating couple, who can be in the family room with mom and dad and speak all the right things and conduct themselves in all the right ways, but then in the privacy of the car things are very different. Or the father, who can sit around the dinner table and pray and read, but then he goes to the conference room at work, and the character is altogether different, or the privacy of his own car or hotel, and it's altogether different. Beloved, those are not behavior problems. Those are heart problems. And David knows That he doesn't have to speak to every area of his life to get it right. What he has to speak to is just one thing. He has to speak to his heart. and everything that's within him. Because if he knows that he has a heart that is right, if he knows that his desire is that everything that is within him, bless the Lord. He knows that at church on Sunday, it's going to be genuine. And around the table on Monday, it's going to be genuine. And when he's by that conference room with his co-workers, it's going to be genuine. And when he's in the privacy of his own car, it's genuine. Because he has one singular desire in his life. I want to praise, worship, and serve my God. And if my heart ascribes to God the worship that he is due, then as Romans 12 says, his life in all of its aspects will be a living sacrifice of praise. Examine your hearts tonight. Examine your motives tonight. Examine your wills tonight. And say with the psalmist, Bless the Lord, O my soul, in everything that is within me. Bless his holy name. He speaks to himself to bless the Lord for all his benefits. David in Psalm 103 knows that this blessing of the Lord arises out of being the recipient of God's great gifts. And what he follows Psalm 103 verses one and two with is an enumeration of all of the things that God was pleased to give to him. And now notice what the heart of it all is. It's not. Thanks God for the house that I live in, for the car that I drive, and for the money that's in my bank account. It's nothing earthly. He knows what God has given him, and do you know it? Do you understand what it is, chiefly, that we receive from God? Psalm 103 in this respect is one of the most beautiful passages in all of God's Word to describe for us the blessings of our salvation in Jesus Christ. He forgives our iniquities. He heals our diseases. He redeems our life from destruction. He crowns us with loving kindness and tender mercy. He's merciful, gracious, slow to anger. Doesn't chide. Doesn't keep His anger forever. Won't deal with us according to our sins. Has not rewarded us according to our iniquities. High as the heavens. Another figure. I think this morning's sermon. So great is His mercy. East to west. So far removed. Pities us. His mercy is everlasting to everlasting. It's amazing. What God has done for us. And these two young adults confess that tonight. Because at the heart of their confession was a confession of Jesus Christ. And everyone who knows Jesus Christ knows that this is the heart and essence of their life. that in Christ we have the forgiveness of sins, our diseases healed, our life redeemed from destruction, and everything that follows. If one believes in Jesus, he or she knows that the only thing that matters in this life, very simply is this, that I am a sinner, an unworthy, guilty, worthy of hell sinner, but in the person and only begotten Son of God. These benefits, by God's grace, are mine. If you believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, if you know yourself as that sinner, you have a new man, and God forbid that your conscience is seared at this time, Such that you don't want what the psalmist so very much wants in verses 1 and 2. That not just part of your life, and not just part of who you are, participates in the worship and service of God. But you say, what an amazing God who has saved me, oh wretched sinner that I am, in the blood of Jesus Christ. Bless, you say to yourself, with everything I am, the Lord who saves me. And don't forget it. The end of the verse, and forget not all his benefits. It's so easy to forget. And when we forget, we don't bless the Lord, and it doesn't filter into all of our life. Don't forget it. And so what do you do? What do you do the two of you who confess your faith who know to be a recipient of these benefits? Every Sunday you come right here. And you come here twice, if you're able. So that not a week goes by in which the glorious benefits that God has given us do not come ringing through your ears and hopefully penetrate into your heart. Every day, and if you're not doing this right now, start today. Every day. You read the Word of God, and you don't read it like I described earlier, just going through the motions, but you read it and say, I need to know God. And you pray, and you live close to God. When you live that way, By God's grace, your conscience will be sensitive. You'll recognize where you're drifting. You'll see in your life where it's half-hearted or going through the motions, and you'll have the desire in every area of your life to worship the God who saved you in Jesus Christ. Don't forget. and say to yourself, tonight, tomorrow, all your life long, knowing through faith in Jesus, to be a recipient of these great benefits. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me, bless his holy name. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits. Amen. Father in heaven, we pray that thy word may have penetrated our hearts deeply this evening so that we are desirous to bless thy name. Help us to do that, and help us to know the greatness of our sin, our misery, and how we are unworthy but thou art a God of grace and mercy in Jesus. so that knowing ourselves to be the objects of Thy love and grace, we desire not just to go through the motions, not just in part of our life, but from our heart, filtered into the whole of our existence, to serve Thee. And when we fail, as we all do as sinners, convict us of that, lead us to the cross, and day by day renew us in the desire to live not for self, not even first and foremost for others, but we live for thee and therefore in love for our neighbor. Hear our prayer, Father, for Jesus' sake, amen.