When Life Doesn't Make Sense

Trinity Church Tamworth

GOD IS ENOUGH … WHEN LIFE DOESN’T MAKE SENSE Trinity Psalm 73 07.04.24 50 years ago, 90% of weddings were in church. The rate is now about 20%. Funerals are not far behind. There may be something good about that, if it means that people are being more honest about where God fits in their lives. But what is the result of taking God out of life? It seems that most people think we end up with a better world, and better lives – where we can all do what we want and believe what we want and get what we want, and it is all okay. Tell that to the 10 to 20 million people murdered by Stalin who took God out of the picture. Or the 40 to 80 million killed by Mao in China. It doesn’t work that life gets better if you treat this world as a closed world where all that works is what we see and do: • Life gets reduced to what you own or do … the one who dies with the most toys wins; the one who is the most famous is the hero. • Since crooks and tyrants and abusers get off scot-free, why not do what they do? Certainly, don’t do anything that costs you. • You can’t challenge anything in the end - “It-s not fair”, “that’s not right” if we live in a closed world where “you do you” is the only rule to follow. Thankfully many people who want to live in a closed world are not consistent – they still admire generosity and heroism and want at least some laws, and fairness and justice. But there is going to be less and less reason for any of that the more that life is flattened to what you see, and what works, and what it means for you to do you. Asaph is the writer of Psalm 73. He is under pressure to take on a closed view of the world.  Over here are those who are healthy (“no pangs until death” v4), their dinner tables are loaded, and they have the best personal trainers (“their bodies are fat and sleek” v4b) … they don’t have any trouble paying their bills (“they are not in trouble as others are; they are not stricken like the rest of mankind” v5).  And because of that they are arrogant and proud: “they scoff and speak with malice; loftily they threaten oppression. They set their mouths against the heavens, and their tongue struts through the earth” (v9).  Do people see them for what they are? No. People are blind to their arrogance, besotted with their success. Others “turn back to them and find no fault in them” (v10).  Because secretly they love and serve the living God? No – they mock him – “What would he know?” they ask, verse 11. Then there is the other side of the picture in a closed world. There are people like Asaph. They do love the Living God and aim to live by his laws. They also full, and healthy, and popular. No. It’s the opposite ... verse 13 “All in vain have I kept my heart clean and washed my hands in innocence. For all day long I have been stricken, and rebuked every morning.” The pains in his body which he takes to bed are still there next morning. His reputation gets trashed. His children die. His money runs out. His friends walk out on him, and his family members treat him as a loser, and he is the man who fears the Lord! It’s not like that for every person. But it’s true enough to be able to generalise … more crooks and tax cheats and God mockers live in luxury than in prison cells. It’s generally true that God-fearers, the truly true believers are not as rich and famous as the others. Shouldn’t it be the other way round? Doesn’t God bless the godly, and withhold good things from the ungodly? Not in this world. That was becoming a problem for Asaph. He thought of giving God away. Verse 2: “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.” What he saw nearly undid him. He is good man. He knows God is real; he is the man who is responsible for the church services in the tabernacle and is on the preaching roster. But what he sees and experiences is a problem for him, and he is now troubled by doubts. Do his doubts make him an unbeliever? You have doubts only because you have belief. Unbelievers don’t doubt – there is nothing to doubt. So, don’t confuse doubting and unbelieving, will you? What happens if his doubts win? And he buys the line that what you see determines what is real and what is true? What happens if his doubts become convictions? There will be some big losses: 1. THERE WILL BE LOSS FOR OTHERS If he thinks “No it doesn’t pay to serve the Living God”, “Yes, it is better to get what you can while you can”, and he starts saying that to others … “If I had said ‘I will speak thus’, I would have betrayed the generation of your children. (verse 15) If you are a good friend to others, a father, an aunt, a leader in church or business or classroom or politics … be careful before you pass on your doubts to others as if they were certainties. What you say will either help or hinder others. That doesn’t mean we don’t try and sort out our doubts or get answers to hard questions. That is a good thing to do – with someone who might help, not someone who will be twisted or stumbled by our conclusions about life in this world. Take care about to whom you speak because words have impact on others. 2. THERE WILL BE LOSS FOR HIM In a closed world, what you see, and touch and think is all there is. Things like beauty, honour, heroism, truth, justice and a hundred other wonderful things matter less and less. When your dog hears the rattle of the dogfood what does he think about things like that? He doesn’t even think – he just reacts out of instinct and habit. Asaph says in verse 21 “When my soul was embittered, when I was pricked in heart, I was brutish and ignorant; I was like a beast toward you.” Of course, he is more than an animal, but, he says, he was acting like his dog. God made him to reason, not just react. God made him with desires that can never be satisfied by what you eat and feel and see in this world. We are told that when people get to do what they want to do, believe what they want to believe and express themselves in any way that is right for them, that they flourish. The opposite could not be more true. That way, we become more like animals at the trough than people made in the Image of God with all kinds of rich dimensions to us. Christians want far more for our friends, and our fellow citizens than they want for themselves. Not less. We want people to flourish, not be reduced to life in an ever-closing world. HOWEVER, it’s not enough to say, “don’t betray others by what you say”, or “don’t settle for life like an animal”. Why shouldn’t you? Why not do whatever you want? The answer is because there is a third loss this way: 1. THERE WILL BE ULTIMATE LOSS I have tried to be clear this morning that the problem Asaph faces and the questions he asks, are real. There are no good answers to it in a closed world. “When I thought how to understand this, it seemed to me a wearisome task” (verse 16). When you write an essay at school or college, it is normal to put your conclusion at the end “having seen this and this and this, therefore …”. But you could also put it at the start. “This and this are true … I will prove that by looking at 5 arguments for this.” Asaph has done both in his Psalm. His conclusion is at the start … “Truly God is good to Israel, to those who are pure in heart” (v1) as well as at the end … “it is good to be near God; I have made the Lord God my refuge” (v28). He saw that there is more than this world. He says in verse 17 that he “discerned their end”. He saw that the end of things is not in this world. The winners may be healthy and prosperous and popular now, but one day they will be the ones who are on a slippery path. And then it will be clear that they are the losers. “They are destroyed in a moment, swept away utterly by terrors” … like people in a dream that cease to be once you wake up (19,20) … “those who are far from you shall perish; you put an end to everyone who is unfaithful to you.” (27) Will people pay for their evil deeds and their pride and their hostility toward the Living God? Maybe not in this uneven world. But we get to see about 1% of what is real, here, and now. Asaph says that he saw the other 99% when he “went into the sanctuary of God” (v17), the tabernacle in Jerusalem. What was there? The law of God which showed what the good life really is, with its promises of blessings for some and curses on others … promises of God to be close to his children no matter what. And promises that those who reject his law will be judged and condemned for their unbelief. God describes a scene in 2 Thessalonians chapter 1 which we read earlier. A day of justice … a day when evildoers and abusers will be exposed. A day when those who were on the side of Jesus in the 1% of life that is this world, will be seen for what they are. A day when Jesus himself will shine in a way that exposes all unbelief as fraud. That day is going to answer some big questions: >> Do you have to have it all in this life? No. >> Are the certainties of despair in this life to be trusted? No. >> At the end, will you regret having followed Jesus for a second? No. >> Is there any reason to be jealous of anything an unbeliever has in this life? Not one. >> Will it then be clear why it was possible to live contentedly in this life? It sure will. But I need to finish like this. As I read the Psalm, I see that I am Asaph. I do lose perspective. I do envy those who have more than I do. I do wonder whether it is good to follow Jesus. My feet do slip, and I do become like an animal, forgetting to think the facts. Can I then be safe when that day of eternal destruction and judgment comes? For my doubts have sometimes falsely become certainties, and I have betrayed others, and I have acted like a beast. How unlike Asaph, and unlike me, Jesus is. He had more of a claim on what others had than I will ever have. He had more right to choose a path of ease rather than one of pain than I will ever have. He had given up more than I will ever have to give up. No one has been tempted as much as he has been – BUT he never acted like a dog. He never betrayed others. His feet never slipped. Not once. Shall I be safe on that day? Yes, because of him. Because his perfect, beautiful, and consistent righteousness is mine. Because though my feet slip, his have never slipped. And safe not only on that day. But also, until that day. We who follow in the same family as Asaph say of Jesus “Nevertheless (regardless of what I see with my eyes in this 1% world), I am continually with you; you hold my right hand. You guide me with your counsel … and afterward (after getting me though this world to the 99% of my life on the other side) you will receive me in glory.” (23,24) If concern for others does not matter … if it is okay to live like an animal … if there is not a day of reckoning and the life of the world to come … then God will not be enough here and now. But if Jesus’ life is for me … and if his presence is with me … then a closed world can never be enough. And never be right. Our sermon title today is “God is enough … when life doesn’t make sense”. Will you pray that that is where we as a church rest … and where we all, as members of it, also rest weary heads and tired souls?