- Introduction
A. This is a new year’s sermon, designed to send us into the year with a precious reminder of the greatest reality of the next 361 days, and the rest of our lives.
B. Psalm 32:10–11 Many are the sorrows of the wicked, but steadfast love surrounds the one who trusts in the LORD. 11 Be glad in the LORD, and rejoice, O righteous, and shout for joy, all you upright in heart!
C. David seems to have been written Psalm 32 after his repentance from the Bathsheba/Uriah the Hittite affair. Psalm 51 was written during his repentance, and Psalm 32 soon after his repentance.
1. And these two verses are David’s concluding statement at the end of the psalm.
II. Verse 10
A. 10 “Many are the sorrows of the wicked,”
1. The wicked
a. Some people are troubled when Christians refer to non-Christians as “the wicked.”
b. But this is God’s word. Instead of being offended, we would do better to think about WHY God would refer to them as wicked.
c. He doesn’t mean that they are mass murderers or human traffickers or exploiters of the weak.
d. He is referring to something much worse than that.
e. You see, a lot of people don’t understand what is the most despicable thing a person can do. They think it’s hurting another person, or abusing others, or not being true to yourself. But according to the Bible, the worst sin is not sexual immorality or cruelty or greed.
f. The worst sin is to violate the greatest commandment. And what is the greatest commandment? To love the Lord with all our heart, soul, mind and strength. (Matt.22:36-37)
g. This is what wickedness is, first and foremost. It is refusing to love God, refusing to acknowledge Him, refusing to give Him thanks, refusing to worship Him as your God. This is the heart of wickedness.
h. So, on the one hand, people who consider themselves good people should not take this to mean that God is labeling them as wicked unfairly.
i. And, on the other hand, they should realize how seriously God takes it that so many won’t listen to Him, and live as though He doesn’t exist and as though they can be happy without Him!
2. “Many are the sorrows of the wicked,” The wicked experience the pains and miseries of earthly life: sickness, failure, rejection, frustration, heartbreak, unfulfilled desires, toilsome work. But that’s just the beginning of it. Even believers experience these things.
3. What a miserable life belongs to those who are Christless!
4. Not because when you have Jesus, He gives you everything you need to be happy, but because when you have Jesus, you have what you need to be happy, because He is what we need to be happy.
5. Because they don’t have Him, they have no anchor, no future, no purpose, no answer for death, no sense that the world makes sense, no sense of permanent, unconditional love, no sense that behind everything else there is ultimate Goodness and ultimate Love.
6. Sadly, they are “harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.” – Matthew 9:36
7. This is the greatest sorrow of the wicked.
B. “Many are the sorrows of the wicked, but steadfast love surrounds the one who trusts in the Lord.”
1. You’ve probably heard of Hebrew parallelism before. There are several kinds. The most famous being synonymous parallelism and antithetical parallelism.
2. Synonymous parallelism in Psalm 51
a. 2 Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin!
b. 3 For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me.
c. 5 I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me.
d. 6 You delight in truth in the inward being, and you teach me wisdom in the secret heart.
e. 7 Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean; wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.
f. 8 Let me hear joy and gladness; let the bones that you have broken rejoice.
g. 9 Hide your face from my sins, and blot out all my iniquities. Cf. v.1, 10-13, 16, 17
3. Antithetical parallelism
a. Psalm 27:10 For my father and my mother have forsaken me, but the LORD will take me in.
b. Psalm 31:23 The LORD preserves the faithful but abundantly repays the one who acts in pride.
c. Ps.34:10 The young lions suffer want&hunger; but those who seek the LORD lack no good thing.
4. “Many are the sorrows of the wicked, but...” The antithetic parallelism here leads you to expect (and maybe even hope!) that the who one trusts in the Lord will be sheltered from sorrows. But no, that’s not what it goes on to say! It says rather that the one who trusts in the Lord is surrounded by His steadfast love! That’s different!
a. But the one who has eyes to see knows that having the steadfast love of the Lord is actually much better than having a life devoid of suffering.
b. In Psalm 32, being surrounded with the steadfast love of the Lord is such happy news that, in the next verse, it demands gladness and joy.
5. This is a man who has recently experienced intense suffering!
a. Look at v.3-4 “My bones wasted away through my groaning all day long. For day and night your hand was heavy upon me; my strength was dried up as by the heat of summer.”
b. He knows well that even those who are not wicked experience plenty of suffering.
6. A suffering-free life is exactly what some preachers today promise: If you trust in the Lord, you will not only be happy and hopeful, you’ll be healthy and wealthy and have earthly success.
7. But the passage DOESN’T say, “Many are the sorrows of the wicked, but the Lord will spare the righteous from them all.”
8. It DOES say, “Many are the sorrows of the wicked, but steadfast love surrounds the one who trusts in the LORD.”
9. We are foolish when we wish God would give us lives with no suffering. He loves us too much for that. Instead, He gave us the treasure we really need: lives surrounded with His steadfast love.
10. The ones who trust the Lord are not spared from afflictions, but – unlike the wicked – they are spared from “the EVIL of afflictions” (Westminster Confession XX:1). In other words, God will absolutely prevent His people from experiencing any affliction which is not for their good.
11. For many people, though, things going the way they want in their lives is the whole basis for their happiness. “What else is there?” they ask?
12. When Michelle our daughter turned 12, we had eight kids aged 14 to 6mo. We did our best to make it a special day for Michelle. But with eight little kids, things rarely go the way you planned them and there were difficulties and problems and lost opportunities. At bedtime, Michelle didn’t seem very happy. So I sat down on the side of her bed and asked her about it. “It wasn’t a very fun day,” she said. Her expectations for her birthday were not matched by what actually happened. This is how I replied, “Well, having fun isn’t everything, you know.” Then she asked, “What else is there?” As a 12 year old, she thought that life was all about having fun.
a. Now most adults have a slightly larger view of life than that, but for most, having an enjoyable life is just about the only thing that matters. But not those who trust in the Lord.
C. “Many are the sorrows of the wicked, steadfast love surrounds the one who trusts in the LORD.”
1. CHESED = steadfast love, covenantal faithfulness
a. This is more than kindness or being nice or generous.
b. This is analogous to the love you have for your own children.
c. Covenant: marriage, adoption (but also siblings, parents)
d. It’s love for one who is a part of you. It’s love with commitment.
2. Some of the most precious verses of the OT use this word CHESED.
a. Psalm 23:6 Surely goodness and mercy (CHESED) shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the LORD forever.
b. Psalm 36:5 Your steadfast love (CHESED), O LORD, extends to the heavens.
c. Psalm 51:1 Have mercy (CHESED) on me, O God, according to your steadfast love.
d. Psalm 63:3 Your steadfast love (CHESED) is better than life.
e. Psalm 103:2 Bless the LORD, O my soul, 3 who forgives all your iniquity, who heals all your diseases...4 who redeems your life from the pit, who crowns you with steadfast love (CHESED) and mercy.
3. Now this Hebrew word doesn’t have a perfectly corresponding word in NT Greek either.
4. But God’s steadfast love here is for “the one who trust in the LORD.” This is God’s love for His precious children. This is the love which was proved by sending His Son to die on the cross.
5. This is the love that is so great that Paul prays that the eyes of our hearts would be open to see how high and how wide and how deep and how long it is. (Eph.3:18)
6. The CHESED of the Lord is the treasure of the believer. It is the sweetness of our lives. It is indeed better than life.
7. And notice that the steadfast love of the Lord is not just upon believers, but it SURROUNDS believers. It is all around them, it is on every side of them, it hems them in behind and before (Ps.139:5). It is not just there, it permeates their lives, it sticks with them. Wherever they turn, it is there. They live and move and have their being in it (Acts 17:28).
8. The world wants everything in life to go smoothly. But believers have something so much better than that. Believers are surrounded by the steadfast love of the Lord.
9. So it makes sense that after saying the steadfast love of the Lord surrounds those who trust in Him, it goes on to say...
III. Verse 11
A. 11 “Be glad in the LORD, and rejoice, O righteous, and shout for joy, all you upright in heart!”
1. Because they’re surrounded by the steadfast love of the Lord, the righteous have reason to rejoice.
2. The One who has His hands firmly on the steering wheel of the universe, who orders every atom to do what He wants it to do, this great supreme ruler of all things loves His people with an infinite and everlasting love.
3. That doesn’t mean they always feel joyful. But it does mean that they always have good reasons to be joyful. They have something no one else has.
4. This is also a call to rejoice. In other words, as believers we don’t just have good reason to rejoice, but we are instructed to take those reasons and use them to call our own hearts to joy: “Why are you cast down, O my soul? Hope in God; for I shall again praise him, my salvation.” (Ps.42:5, 11)
a. It is a battle to believe what God tells us in His word, and not what we experience in this world.
b. My brother wrote a tract about this. In it he tells the story of his daughter when she was a baby crawling around on the floor. She found a pin in the carpet and was trying to put it in her mouth. And when he forced it out of her hand, she had the mother of all temper tantrums, furious that he had taken away her treasure. From her infantile perspective he was depriving her of the very thing she needed to be happy. But really he was acting in her best interests, removing a danger which could well have caused her significant pain and harm.
c. She should have been thanking him and celebrating his watchful love for her. But instead she was throwing a hissy fit.
d. So often I’m the same way. I experience things as if I’m being deprived, but God assures me in His word that He only acts for the benefit and welfare of His beloved ones.
5. David forced himself upon a woman, apparently, and he had her husband murdered. But after being confronted by the prophet Nathan, David repented, a repentance which ended with, “Be glad in the LORD, and rejoice, O righteous, and shout for joy, all you upright in heart!” He was forgiven and his joy was restored.
a. Some people have a problem with that. They feel that if you do something like that, you should never have another happy moment in life. And they feel like you should never again be able to associate yourself with the righteous and upright in heart.
b. People who feel that way do not understand the grace of God. True repentance ends with a party — as well as with a renewed commitment to righteousness. The command here is to be glad, to rejoice, and to shout for joy! This isn’t just being relieved that God didn’t strike you down with lightning. It is the cry of a conscience which has been made clear by the cross.
c. If the grace of God in Christ was not enough to cleanse the worst of us, none of us could ever be saved!
6. And even in all our struggles with sin – and struggle we do! – we know that God is not only bigger than our fears, our problems, our enemies, our temptations, He is also bigger than our sin.
a. We know that we are not alone, but have a Helper who loves us, “a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness.” (Exodus 34:6)
7. Ps.32:10-11 Many are the sorrows of the wicked, but steadfast love surrounds the one who trusts in the LORD. 11 Be glad in the LORD, and rejoice, O righteous, and shout for joy, all you upright in heart!