I. The Extraordinary Ordinary 00:00
Thank you, Lord. Thank you, Jesus. Lord, we do pray that you would help us this day to build our life again on your firm foundation. Lord, I pray that as we dive into your Scripture and we learn of your word, we would be not just impacted in our minds, but transformed in our lives. In Jesus’ name, amen.
Today we have our first Sunday in many weeks that we call ordinary. Technically, Ordinary Time started last week, but it was Trinity Sunday, Father’s Day; there was all sorts of stuff going on. And I want to just pause for a moment and dwell on the significance of “ordinary.” I call it the extraordinary ordinary. That’s what we’re in right now. Because when you’re telling the story of Jesus in our liturgy, we love, of course, Advent. That’s the beginning of the new year. We’ve got the candles, and we’re anticipating the coming Savior. We’re remembering all of history before Jesus, where they knew something was wrong and they were looking for the salvation of God. And then Christmas, probably most of our favorite season of the year. I mean, what a beautiful time, when God becomes flesh. And then we see, from that moment when Jesus is born, we follow in the liturgy the pattern, the story of Jesus’ life, every year, to remember what he has done for us. And then we get to the Ascension, and, like the disciples, we’re looking at the sky: “Where’d you go?” And the angel says, “No, there’s stuff for you to do. Go and wait for him there.” And then Pentecost, of course, that wonderful outpouring of the Spirit, the birth of the church.
And what I want you to know today, as we enter into Ordinary Time (it’s the longest season of our year): it’s extraordinary, because we are now living the life of Christ on earth. In the liturgy we kind of model the pattern, the narrative of Jesus’ story. But with the birth of the church, it’s now our job to be Jesus in the world. In fact, there are billions of Christians everywhere that are supposed to be the light to the world that sits in darkness. And so when we go into Ordinary Time, we have this extraordinary calling to make him known in the world and in our life.
So don’t sleep on Ordinary Time. You know, it’s getting slept on here. This is actually also known as Kingdomtide. It’s when the tide of God’s kingdom fills the earth. The story didn’t end with Jesus ascending. The story is being lived out in the history of the world, in the church. I could go all day talking about the ways that Christianity has already brought the kingdom of God in our world for 2,000 years. Most of what you think and believe today, and even our culture today, is because of Christianity, even if they don’t know it. Because God is saving the world through us. He chose to do it that way. He could have done it himself, but he chose to do it through us.
So it’s not so ordinary. But again, I want to focus: there’s something beautiful about that word ordinary. Every day, the actions of everyday Christians, the actions of loving your neighbor and loving God in your life, is what brings the kingdom of God to the world. That’s a profound and remarkable witness in the midst of a world… If you guys have been following the news, maybe you’re a little worried right now. Maybe you’re feeling a little fear. The US bombing Iran: that’s scary. Let’s not mince words. There’s a possibility that terrible things could happen in the world. But I’m here to tell you, like we sang today, we have one King, named Jesus. And we get to live his kingdom out in spite of everything that goes on in the world.
II. I Waited Patiently for the Lord 04:06
It’s ordinary Christian life that will save the world. I’m not making a political statement here. I’m making a reality statement. All of our world can be framed in the trust and the knowledge that Jesus is ruling over this earth, and you don’t have to be afraid. And so when you’re walking through this ordinary life, there maybe is no better psalm for talking about the ordinary life than Psalm 40. I love this psalm, and we’re going to talk through it today. And so we’re going to jump in here with verse 1. It says:
1 I waited patiently for the Lord; he inclined to me and heard my cry. Ps 40.1
We used to always joke, or people would say, you know, “This is the microwave generation. We’re in such a hurry. We want things right now, right away.” But I heard somebody recently say something that I thought was funnier: “We’re the Ozempic generation now.” We want the transformation immediately, without any of our effort. “Just give us the drug. Make us what we want to be right now.” That is not the Ordinary Time we’re talking about.
“I waited patiently for” what? “The Lord.” Man, I can’t wait patiently for anything. I want it all right now. But not only that: he’s also focused on the right thing. “I waited patiently for that new iPhone to come out. I waited patiently for my Amazon order that comes within three hours of me ordering it. I waited patiently for this thing, that thing.” No, we need to wait on the Lord. Every one of us has a problem in our life. Every one of us has a need. Are we looking to the right place to get it? And how soon do we give up on Jesus when he doesn’t answer in our timing? “Oh, I have this great big problem that I’m wrestling through. I’m praying. I’m doing all the good Christian things. And then the answer doesn’t come when I want it. Well, I’m going to fix this now. I’m going to find a way to make my situation work.” We’re really bad at waiting on the Lord. And, you know, some of you out there are like, “I’m a pro.” No, you’re not. The apostles said Jesus is coming soon, and it’s been 2,000 years. That’s waiting on the Lord. It’s pretty active waiting, let’s be real. There’s work to be done. There’s participation to be done. But we’ve got to wait on Jesus. It’s all about him in Ordinary Time.
III. Patience Is a Virtue 06:20
Now, we’re told often, “Patience is a virtue.” But if you look up a list of virtues, it’s not on it. As a kid, I loved that fact: “No, it’s not.” That’s not the point. What “patience is a virtue” means is that the only way to get patience is the way you get all the virtues: practice. Virtue is like weightlifting. That’s like the greatest analogy to virtue. When you first start, you practice the form of patience. You emulate what you’ve seen others do: “I’m going to be patient. I’m going to wait. I’m going to hold my tongue.” But then you start adding weight: “Oh, this is more important.” You’re getting your squat form down; you’re starting to add weight. “Oh, can you be patient in that time?” And what happens as you work your way up from being patient with your friend over a text message you’re waiting on, to toddlers who just learned how to ask the question “Why?” The patience level has to increase. You have to grow your virtue.
And what happens when you’re weightlifting? Your whole body is transformed. Your whole mind is transformed. Your neurons actually rewire when you weightlift, to be better able to handle what you’re doing. In the same way, when you practice patience, you gain patience. In fact, in Scripture we’re told patience comes through tribulation and trial. When those weights get added to the bar, your patience can crumble. I know; I’ve been there. Thank God we’re waiting for the Lord, who has mercy on us, because patience is not my strong suit.
So when we look at this, and we say, “I waited patiently for the Lord,” when we talk about patience as a virtue, you might have tools that will help you. One tool I was given by my mom growing up is a little song. It goes something like this:
Be patient, be patient, Don’t be in such a hurry. When you get impatient, You only start to worry. Remember, remember, That God is patient too, And think of all the other times People had to wait for you.
That goes through my head all the time. And it’s so useful, because, yes, people wait for me all the time. And, yes, our God is patient with us. Thank the Lord. It’s just like reading the Psalms. Today we’re reading Psalm 40. That is a tool for you to remind yourself about patience. You don’t need a little ditty like that song to remind you. You could have the Scripture at your fingertips, ready to go, to remind yourself in those challenges to turn to.
IV. Out of the Miry Bog 09:32
And the last thing I will say about this: it says, “He inclined to me and heard my cry.” Something in you might be saying, “But how long, O Lord?” And I’ll say to that: a God… our God is never late. He arrives precisely when he means to. Truly, though, it’s, you know, paraphrasing from a well-known piece of amazing literature. But there’s this idea in our minds that God doesn’t show up on time. If you ever think that, if you ever find yourself feeling like God is too late, or “Where is he?”, just know that he will arrive precisely when he means to. You can trust that. Hold on. Be patient.
Verse 2, it says:
2 He drew me up from the pit of destruction, out of the miry bog, and set my feet upon a rock, making my steps secure. Ps 40.2
Do you ever feel like your feet are just stuck in concrete, like you just can’t move? Like there’s too much going on, and you just get overwhelmed, and it’s like, “I can’t take another step. There’s no way out of this.” I was reflecting on this verse, and I was thinking: most of us are not necessarily facing a crisis, but we’re facing a thousand endless troubles that we just can’t find our way through. Kind of like a bog. That’s how bogs work. You have all this sand, and it gets a certain type of wet, and then it sucks you in. But it’s not like a big crisis. It’s a slow, steady sinking into this grasping fluid. And you think about our lives, and we are wrestling, and there’s this kind of poetic aspect of… imagine the difference between struggling against your problems and then being set on a rock where nothing that comes will shake you.
Think of the disciples in the boat with Jesus, from our Gospel lesson. They’re going with the Son of God, who has done many miracles, and he goes to take a nap. The storm comes, and they’re like, “He doesn’t care that we’re going to die.” First of all, very impressive, sleeping in a storm of that magnitude. They’re very impressed with Jesus. This is another miracle. But secondly, they shake him awake: “Don’t you know we’re dying?” I mean, the language is so hard to get into, because it’s like, “Master, Master, we are perishing!” (Luke 8.24). And we’re like, “What does that even mean?” Nobody says “Master.” Nobody says “perishing.” It’s like, “Jesus, we’re going to die right now!” My wife has been through this many times when I’m driving. I see it: she goes… and I don’t see the danger, but she does. You know, and it’s very helpful for me. So you know how it feels when you’re in great fear. But what’s Jesus’ response? “Where is your faith?” (Luke 8.25). They were with the Rock, the one on which we stand, and they thought, “We’re doomed.”
I’ve got to use that line on my wife: “Where is your faith?” No, but… you know, understood. Looking at all this, we have to remember that the answer is to stand on a firm foundation. We were just singing about that: “I will build my life upon your love. It is a firm foundation.” The problem we run into with these thousand endless troubles is we’re always trying to solve it our way, on our strength. We’re not waiting patiently on the Lord. At least that’s what I do. I get so concerned with getting everything in order and making it happen the way I want it to happen, it’s like I forget to look to him. He will save you. He will set you upon the rock. Turn to him. Wait patiently on him.
V. A New Song 13:12
And then, when he does that, in verse 3, it says:
3 He put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God. Many will see and fear, and put their trust in the Lord. Ps 40.3
When was the last time, outside of a Sunday service, you were singing to God? You don’t have to answer that; it’s rhetorical. But there’s a real element of this where I don’t want to just tell you what to do. I want to remind you of how we do this. It actually is a part of your training regimen, to gain patience, to gain trust in the Lord: to sing to God. It’s one of the most powerful tools we’ve ever been given, this thing of music. And throughout all of church history, music has played an essential role. It strengthens us. It reminds us. You can feel it this morning, the anointing that was on those songs, and it moves your heart and your spirit. You can bring that with you throughout the week. You can find a way. And you don’t have to subject your kids to it. It is kind of fun; they don’t love it sometimes. But you can find a private spot. You can find a private place to sing to your God.
Underneath all of that (that’s a tool) is the element of gratitude: reminding yourself what God has done for you. If you can’t remember the last time God showed up for you in your life, it’s because you have not been focusing on him. It’s not because he’s not showing up. Open your eyes. Ask him to remind you. These psalms are great. Pray the psalms. Sing the songs. Do these things to keep you focused on him and what he’s doing. It will give you immeasurable strength. I mean, there are stories of saints who have memorized the psalms, and as they’re in prison, they’re saying the psalms. Or we have the great story when Paul and Silas are singing, and the prison cell shakes, and they get rescued (Acts 16.25–26). There’s this crazy history of how God shows up in our life. And yet we wake up on Monday morning, and we’re so locked into our own miasma, that miry bog creeps up. You don’t have to be there. You can stand firm on a rock. And, you know, you’ve seen what happens when you turn to God. You’ve seen the salvation of your God, the goodness of God.
VI. Making the Lord Your Trust 15:25
Verse 4:
4 Blessed is the man who makes the Lord his trust, who does not turn to the proud, to those who go astray after a lie! Ps 40.4
Anything you turn to to solve your problems besides Jesus is a lie. Now, don’t hear me wrong. If you need cash to give to somebody for a bill, and you turn to the ATM to get the cash out, I’m not playing games here. Yes, that’s a good way to get your cash to give to the person to pay the bill. That’s fine. I mean at the highest place in your life. If you think your job is solving your problems, it’s not. If you think your wife is solving your problems, she’s not. If you think your car is solving your problems, it won’t. Only God. What does it say in the Psalms elsewhere? It says, “A horse is a vain hope for safety” (Ps 33.17). Or if you put your hope in your political party (that’s pretty relevant, right?): if you think Donald Trump is solving your problems, he’s not. He might do something good for our country. He might do something that benefits you. That’s fine. But that’s not what’s solving your problems. God is your hope for salvation.
So those who turn, they turn to the proud. I mean, how relevant is that? Everyone online has an answer to your problem. They’re so proud: “Just do this and you’ll be fine. Just do that and you’ll be fine.” Well, what did we just sing today? “No, I don’t want anything. Just give me Jesus.” That is such a purifying and holy… “You are my one thing.” That is the focus from which everything else flows, everything else moves.
What did it say at the beginning here? It said, “Blessed is the man who makes the Lord his trust.” There’s an element here of work. Who’s making the Lord his trust? He had to do that day in and day out. In fact, one of the ways David, who wrote this psalm, did that is by writing psalms. He had to remind… What did he say? One of the greatest lines is, “Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me, bless his holy name” (Ps 103.1). He’s talking to himself, because he knows that he doesn’t want to. So he tells himself, “Bless the Lord, O my soul.” That’s making the Lord your trust.
VII. More Than Can Be Told 17:47
Okay. Verse 5:
5 You have multiplied, O Lord my God, your wondrous deeds and your thoughts toward us; none can compare with you! I will proclaim and tell of them, yet they are more than can be told. Ps 40.5
When we talk about Ordinary Time, and how I entered this whole idea that we are now living as Jesus in the world, we need to tell our stories. We need to share them with one another: at home group, with your friend, with your spouse. You need to talk about how God has delivered you. Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God (Rom 10.17). When you share with one another what God’s doing in your life, the faith goes up.
I’ll tell you one quick example. They’re going to love me highlighting them, but Jane and Michelle have a podcast. They have this podcast called In the Word. It’s a great time where they talk about what God is teaching them and what they’re learning as they read Scriptures together. But they’re constantly sharing anecdotes and stories about what God has done for them in their life. That raises the faith of those who listen to them. And I guarantee you, it raises their faith as they tell them to one another. Because then all of a sudden you look back and you go, “Wow, God showed up here. God showed up here. God showed up here.” And then the next time the big bad boogeyman shows up, the next time a problem comes in and you have that fear response, you go, “Wait, wait. Look at what God has done.” You remind yourself of the stories of God showing up again and again, and then you can have faith. Then you can trust.
“I will proclaim and tell of them, yet they are more than can be told.” We should have so many stories that we can’t even tell them all. When our problems come, we should remind each other, “Oh, remember when God did this, and this? And there are like seven other times, but I don’t have time to remind you of all these things.” All of these are tools: singing songs, reading the Psalms, remembering Scripture, talking about what God is doing in your life. These are the things that make it so that your patience becomes natural to you. Waiting on the Lord becomes ordinary to you.
VIII. I Delight to Do Your Will 19:39
In verse 6:
6 In sacrifice and offering you have not delighted, but you have given me an open ear. Burnt offering and sin offering you have not required. 7 Then I said, “Behold, I have come; in the scroll of the book it is written of me: 8 I delight to do your will, O my God; your law is within my heart.” Ps 40.6–8
How many of you are going out every day making great sacrifices for Jesus, but your heart is turned away from him? How many of you shoulder your burden every day? And praise God for you doing the work you need to do. Absolutely. That is 100 percent in Scripture. You need to work to do the things God has given you. But if it doesn’t have your heart, it’s meaningless. We just read all about that in Isaiah. They’re offering all these sacrifices, and God’s like, “It’s a stink in my nostril” (Isa 65.5). Like the smoke, it’s terrible. They’re blaspheming. You can do all the work and miss the heart.
“I delight to do your will, O my God; your law is within my heart.” This is what we’re working on with our kids. They really struggle with this: “You have to do this.” “But I don’t want to.” “I didn’t ask if you wanted to. I told you to do it.” “But I don’t want to do it now.” You know, it’s like you have this tug-of-war, where they think the most important thing in the world is what they want. And then you look in the mirror and you’re like, “Shoot, I do that too. ‘I don’t want to.’ The most important thing in the world is what I want.” Well, how do we solve this great conundrum? I want to do my own thing; God wants me to do his thing. Well, when you start doing God’s thing, you start wanting to do God’s thing. It’s this beautiful synergy, where you actually are blessed by following God’s ways, by being obedient to him, by submitting to him. And that blessing multiplies a transformation, so that you actually want to do it God’s way.
None of us finish that journey. As long as you live, you will still run into that stubborn self who wants to do it your own way. I heard this great story about Frank Sinatra. You know, he wrote that song, “I Did It My Way.” And it was so triumphant, and it was just this thing. It was a prideful statement: “I did it my way,” whatever. Well, he recorded it again later on in his life. I think he was in his 60s. And you listen to that recording: it is a different song. I heard about this… actually, Bono was telling this story to Joe Rogan. If you don’t know who any of those names are, it’s not important to the story. But he was saying that you can hear in the way he sings that song that it’s an apology. It’s a tragedy: “I did it my way. Look where it got me.” And it just flipped the switch in my life: how many of us are going to be 60, 70, 80, or standing before God, and look back on our life and think, “I did it my way”? C. S. Lewis says there are only two responses when you get to heaven. There’s the one who says, “Lord, not my will but yours be done,” and goes to heaven. And then there’s God, who says to the person, “Not my will, but your will be done.” That’s kind of harrowing, right? Eventually God lets you have your will. You get to choose him or not.
IX. Magnify God, Not the Problem 23:39
All of this in the context of this psalm: he’s writing all of these things to remind himself to trust in the Lord. And then in verse 12 he completely flips the script, and he starts saying, “By the way, I know I’ve talked about how amazing God is, how he shows up for me, how blessed it is to trust in God.” He flips the script on us in verse 12. He says:
12 For evils have encompassed me beyond number; my iniquities have overtaken me, and I cannot see; they are more than the hairs of my head; my heart fails me. Ps 40.12
So what is the psalmist doing? There’s literally this… almost like a light switch is turned, and you get a glimpse into what’s going on currently in this guy’s life. All the verses, 11 verses (there are only 17 verses in the psalm), 11 of them are praising God for his goodness, reminding himself and God of all the times he showed up for him. And then he gets to his problem. And yet we pray, and we go, “God, help me. Oh, I can’t do this. There’s too much going on.” And we get lost in the problem. Papu, my grandfather, used to always say, you know, “Magnify God, not the problem.” And that’s what the psalmist is doing. He spends 11 verses talking about how good God is before he gets to the point where he says, “I can’t even see. There are too many problems. My heart fails me.” Because he knows that he’s not there yet. He hasn’t figured it all out. He’s just reminding himself where his salvation is, where his rescue lies, and he’s teaching himself to wait patiently on the Lord.
X. Do Not Delay, O My God 25:05
So when you think about Ordinary Time: Ordinary Time in the Christian world leads to extraordinary lives. If you just do the ordinary things (pray, read your Bible, sing a song of gratitude, remind one another of the ways God is showing up in your life), if you get that language, you will become unbelievably good. You will become like him. He will transform you. You know, you’ve met people who are like that. I would say (and I’m sure he won’t like me pointing him out) Jim encourages me every time I talk to him. Even in the midst of whatever is going on, he just has this wisdom and this presence, because for how many years… like a hundred years he’s been doing this. No, maybe not that long. But he’s been doing it day in and day out, and his ordinary Christian life has led to extraordinary impact in the world.
So, as we wrap this up, the last thing the psalmist says really hit me, in verse 17:
17 As for me, I am poor and needy, but the Lord takes thought for me. You are my help and my deliverer; do not delay, O my God! Ps 40.17
Today, let that be your prayer: “The Lord takes thought for me. Do not delay, O my God.” Amen.