Verse 3 from "God Is Faithful (Psalm 114)"

We have known Your mercy and Your love as in the past
If days be few or many You will guide us to the last
You have said it, we believe it, every promise holding fast
For we know that You are good

Truths like these remind us of the faithfulness of God toward His people. From Old Testament saints to the New Testament church, including us today: GOD IS FAITHFUL TO HIS PROMISES!

Join us in a noisy celebration this Sunday as we sing together of the faithfulness of God!

Title: God Is Faithful (Psalm 114)
Album: Unchanging God - Songs from the Book of Psalms, Vol. 2
Link to listen HERE.

Today you may lack joy. You may not feel very joyful. We all find ourselves there at times. Psalm 16 is your psalm because it gives us a pathway to true and lasting joy. Below is an outline summary of the sermon for your further study and deeper reflection.

SERIES: Our 7 Shaping Virtues
TEXT: Psalm 16
TITLE: Joy
PREACHER: Derek Overstreet
BIG IDEA: Pursuing the God of all joy produces a joyful Church in all circumstances

POINTS:
1. Know Your Lord
2. Delight In Your Church
3. Guard Your Heart
4. Focus On Jesus

SERMON EXCERPTS:
”Do you believe it’s possible? And I’m not referring to heaven, I mean today. Do you believe its possible to possess joy that transcends even our most difficult circumstances? Psalm 16 compels us to answer with a resounding YES!”

“The truth is, Christians are joy seekers. Joy is a constant theme in the Bible.”
”God wants His church to be characterized by joy. Like a father or mother wants their child to be happy, God desires you to experience joy to the fullest.”

“By joy, we’re not talking about a strong personality trait or a superficial contingent happiness—’I’ll be happy if _______.’ Joy is an abiding and deep delight in God for the sheer beauty of who He is and the infinite worth of what he has done in Christ.”

“When troubles arise, our mind tends to immediately find human solutions. That always leads to anxiety and discouragement. But David fills his mind with the knowledge of his God. This is the beginning of true joy.”

“God is good! In feast or famine. In wealth or poverty. In peace or conflict. In health or sickness, in life or death. God holds my lot. He is in control. He is good. He is my portion, my cup, my inheritance. So whatever he providentially allows into my life, life is good because God is good.”

“Listen, this doesn’t mean we call what is bad, good. Bad is still bad. Cancer is bad. A miscarriage is bad. Losing a loved one is bad. Suffering is suffering, pain is pain, tears are tears. But, in the words of James 1:2, and this is one of the greatest fights in the Christian life—I can count it all as joy because I know who my God is!”

“You want more joy in your life, get to know your God better.”

“David turns his attention to God’s goodness expressed in His people. God, your people love you so I love them. Your people delight in you so I delight in them. This is not idolatry. The church can be an idol. Joy can be an idol, if it’s an end. We take joy in God’s people because God’s presence is with His people. So we love to be in the presence of your people because we long to be in presence of the Lord, where there is joy forevermore.”

“As often as we gather, gathering with your church should be an occasion of great delight and joy. Not because we’re so great but because our God is so great, and when we gather as a church, our great God is uniquely present and glorified. Is it a joy for you to gather with your church? If not, it’s a sign your heart has drifted. Go to God now!”

“The world can throw its best at you, it cannot touch the joy you have in Jesus.” 

“…we must, in the words of verse 8—set him before us. This is the ultimate key to our joy. We don’t set Jesus to the right, the left, or behind us. We set him before us. Right in front of us.”

ADDITIONAL SCRIPTURE:
Psalm 30:5
Galatians 5:22
James 1:2
Philippians 4:4
1 Thessalonians 3:9
Jeremiah 2:12-13
1 Chronicles 17:11

QUOTES:
John MacArthur - “The more you know Him, the better you know Him, the more confident you become, the more secure your joy is… Joy is related to your knowledge of God: little knowledge, little joy; much knowledge, much joy. The more you know of God’s glorious truth, of God’s great covenants and promises, of God’s plans, of God’s faithfulness, of God’s power, the more joy you experience in life… Our joy is connected to the goodness of the Lord. And the more you understand His grace and mercy and goodness, the more stable your joy becomes, no matter what circumstances may come.”

Bob Kauflin - “God is particularly interested in our joy. He tells us, “Be glad in the Lord, and rejoice, O righteous, and shout for joy, all you upright in heart!” (Psalm 32:11). When the church gathers, the sense of confident joy in God should be pronounced. When we fail to demonstrate delight and satisfaction in God, we’re not only dishonoring God, we’re disobeying Him. More than anyone else on earth, Christians have a reason to celebrate.”

Sam Storms - “Your choice isn’t whether to passionately seek pleasure. Trust me, you do. Your only option is where you’ll look or whom you’ll love or whose offer of pleasure you’ll accept.”

John Piper - “Is there anything fuller than full? No. Is anything longer than forever? No. This is no rocket science. This is just glory! Nobody anywhere in the world can offer you anything better than Psalm 16:11.  Because nothing is even conceivably better than verse 11. Nothing is fuller than full or longer than forever. “Fullness” means completely satisfying. And “forevermore” means those pleasures never stop.”

Sam Storms - “God created us so that the joy He has in Himself might be ours. God doesn’t simply think about Himself or talk to Himself. He enjoys Himself! He celebrates with infinite and eternal intensity the beauty of who He is as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And we’ve been created to join the party!”

APPLICATION:
By grace through faith in Christ, you have joined the greatest party ever thrown. You belong to the God in whose presence is fullness of joy and pleasures forevermore. Shouldn’t that make us the happiest people on the planet? It should. And we pray it will more and more. 

As we set Jesus before us every day, may the God of all joy pour out His joy on us as a church, for our good, for our testimony, and for God’s glory today, tomorrow, and forevermore!

How are you currently magnifying God with your life? How many of us would say—I live life with a thankful heart. Below is an outline summary of the sermon for your further study and deeper reflection.

TEXT: Psalm 69:30-32
TITLE: Magnifying God With Gratitude
PREACHER: Derek Overstreet

POINTS:
I. A Call to Magnify God
II. A Heart That Magnifies God

SERMON EXCERPTS:
”My hope for today is that the Spirit would speak to us and work in us in such a way that we could all say, and others would say about us—My life increasingly magnifies my Savior because my life is increasingly characterized by thankfulness to God in everything for everything.”

“David wants to be a telescope that brings God right into the midst of his affliction and pain. David does not magnify his affliction. He does not magnify his pain…that would be to magnify himself. His heart is to magnify His Redeemer.”

“If you have been saved by grace; if you are in union with Jesus by faith; if the Spirit of God lives in you; if by divine mercy you belong to the eternal family of God, then your heart should say with David and Paul—Magnify the Lord oh, my soul!”

“Of course, we are forgetful. We forget WHY we exist, and more importantly, we forget WHO God is. Our feelings, experiences, ambitions, sinful cravings, and deceptions of our own hearts move us to magnify self. We can marvel in the goodness and sufficiency of God one day and be oblivious to it the very next.”

“Paul prays they would have the eyes of their hearts enlightened. These are believers who have already had the eyes of their hearts enlightened. But Paul doesn’t want them to forget. He wants them to be more and more anchored in the hope they have in Christ, the riches of his inheritance, and the immeasurable power of the Spirit at work in them.”

“The desire to magnify self is at the heart of an ungrateful heart. In our pursuit of greatness, we make God small. When we apply this to a God who is infinitely great, we see our utter foolishness and sinfulness.”

“Put on a heart of thankfulness by looking upward as David did in verse 29—to the God of your salvation. This is where true thankfulness begins.”

ADDITIONAL SCRIPTURE:
Philippians 1:20
Corinthians 10:31
Ephesians 1:15-20

QUOTES:
John Calvin - “There cannot be a more powerful incitement to thanksgiving than the certain conviction that this religious service is highly pleasing to God.”

APPLICATION:
If you want to grow in gratitude or help someone who lacks gratitude, don’t begin with nice platitudes or common courtesies—begin with a BIG God who redeems and rejoices in His people!

What areas of your life do you wish God would hit the fast-forward button? In what areas do you feel stuck? On Sunday we learned that when it comes to revival God can do in a moment what we could never do in a lifetime! Below is an outline summary of the sermon for your further study and deeper reflection.

TEXT: Psalm 85
PREACHER: Guest Pastor, Dustin Smetona
BIG IDEA: Pray and prepare for revival!

POINTS: 
1.  Revival is our family history. (vs. 1-3)   
2. Revival is our present need. (vs. 4-7)
3. Revival is our future state. (vs. 8-13)

OPENING ILLUSTRATION & QUESTIONS:
”As I was talking to [my six-year-old son] about his anger I told him, ‘Buddy, you’ve got to remember to talk back to your anger and say no to it.’ Without missing a beat he responded, ‘Dad I’m trying! But my anger just won’t listen to me and it’s so loud that I can’t talk over it.’

My son felt stuck.
What are those areas for you?

• Does anger have a grip on you?

• Are you spiritually dry or joyless? Depressed?

• Do you lack direction and vision for what God wants you to do?

• Are you stuck in a pattern of sin and feel like you can’t get out?

Wouldn’t you be so relieved if God hit the fast-forward button on that?”

ADDITIONAL SCRIPTURE:
Romans 8 - For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. 19 For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God. 20 For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of him who subjected it, in hope 21 that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to corruption and obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. 22 For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. 23 And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. 24 For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees? 25 But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.

QUOTES:
Ray Ortlund - “Revival is a season in the life of the church when God causes the normal ministry of the gospel to surge forward with extraordinary spiritual power. Revival is seasonal, not perennial. God causes it; we do not. It is the normal ministry of the gospel, not something eccentric or even different from what the church is always charged to do. What sets revival apart is simply that our usual efforts greatly accelerate in their spiritual effects. God hits the fast-forward button.”

Martyn Lloyd-Jones - “The history of the church is a history of revivals.”

Jonathan Edwards - “This work of God, as it was carried on, and the number of true saints multiplied, soon made a glorious alteration in the town: so that in the spring and summer following, the town seemed to be full of the presence of God: it never was so full of love, nor of joy, and yet so full of distress, as it was then. There were remarkable tokens of God’s presence in almost every house. It was a time of joy in families on account of salvation being brought to them; parents rejoicing over their children as newborn, and husbands over their wives, and wives over their husbands. Our public assemblies were then beautiful: the congregation was alive in God’s service, every one earnestly intent on the public worship, every hearer eager to drink in the words of the minister as they came from his mouth; the assembly in general were, from time to time, in tears while the word was preached; some weeping with sorrow and distress, others with joy and love, others with pity and concern for the souls of their neighbors.”

Richard Lovelace - “[Revival] is an outpouring of the Holy Spirit which restores the people of God to normal spiritual life after a period of corporate decline. Periods of spiritual decline occur in history because the gravity of indwelling sin keeps pulling believers first into formal religion and then into open apostasy. Periods of awakening alternate with these as God graciously breathes new life into his people.”

John Piper - “The only life I have left to live is future life. The past is not in my hands to offer or alter. It is gone. Not even God will change the past. All the expectations of God are future expectations. All the possibilities of faith and love are future possibilities. And all the power that touches me with help to live in love is future power. As precious as the bygone blessings of God may be, if He leaves me only with the memory of those, and not with the promise of more, I will be undone. My hope for future goodness and future glory is future grace.”