1 Chronicles 16:8-36

Discussion Questions

1. Which of the imperatives listed from 1 Chronicles 16 jumps out as something that you should focus on over the coming week?
2. Are there aspects of your own kingdom you need to let go before being able to honestly say “Lord, Thy kingdom come”?
3. As we head into the Advent season, what can you do to help “stir up” the wills of those around you, encouraging them to return to God as the source of their refreshment?

Transcript

I’m really glad you’re here with us today. Well, we study through books of the Bible here at The Village Chapel. Today is kind of different. It’s no different, because we’re studying from the Bible, but remember, we’re taking a pause from 1 and 2 Kings for Advent. If you’d like a paper copy to follow along with, just raise your hand and somebody will deliver it to you. And up on the screen, we’ve got our Wi-Fi info and the password, and then the QR code if you want to view the notes and quotes.

And as always, we like to welcome our online congregation with us. Welcome, y’all. Glad you’re joining us this morning. And this week, we always like to give a little shout-out to people we hear from around the country and around the world. We’ve heard from Toronto, Canada, from Jamaica, from the Hoosier state of Indiana. Thank you very much. And from the UK, specifically Wales. Yes, we’re watching you, Tommy and Emily. We see you over there on vacation in Wales. But thanks for shouting out to us. Hope you guys have fun.

Well, how was Thanksgiving? Was it good? It was good at our house. Jim, did you get enough pumpkin pie? I mean, how much pumpkin pie is enough, right? Just one more. Exactly. Just one more slice. We had plans of making our homemade whipped cream, which we usually do, and then we had a can of spray whipped cream, and it’s just so convenient. The goal is always to have more whipped cream than pie. Well, okay, so let’s conduct a short survey, kind of easing into our Stir Up sermon. Let’s do a little traditional turkey dinner survey here. How many turkey lovers are in the audience? You just cannot get enough turkey. Biggest part. Thank you very much. Yes, I’m in the club with you.

Okay. Let’s call it. How many turkey tolerators? Like, “Okay, it’s not my favorite, but I can eat it… A little less turkey, a little more stuffing.” Okay, and then lastly, how many turkey… hate’s a strong word, isn’t it? Let’s not use that word, but how many people take the littlest, littlest piece of turkey, and you’ve gotten to be an expert at hiding it under the mashed potatoes. And then you kind of figure if you move it around your plate long enough, eventually it’s time for pumpkin pie. And then so safe space, no condemnation. How many? Yeah. Yes, I know that. We have alternative proteins or extra proteins at our house.

Well, okay, so then we also have a tradition. Thank you very much, Jim Thomas, Pastor Jim, for instituting this tradition. We have a tradition of ugly sweater picks on Stir Up Sunday, and this is one that Jim found a few years ago, and it’s been in rotation for a couple of years, and I just hate to move on from it. Look at the expressions on their faces. First off, the kids, they’re barely tolerating the existence of their parents. Although if you think about it, they owe their existence to their parents, which there’s a gospel sermon illustration in there somewhere. But let’s look at the girl on the left. Boy, as only a teenage girl can express disdain for anything that is not cool, right? And then the dad has this look of “I am the coolest dad ever. And look what I’ve done.”

And then the wife is kind of, “The stuff I put up with, so he feels like he’s the coolest dad ever. Bless his heart.” And then the young boy, the lad on the right, man, I’ve been here. He’s desperately trying to not be awkward and hang on to some cool. I just love it. Thank you, Jim for finding that picture.

Oh, well, so this is what we call Stir Up Sunday or Christ the King Sunday. In some streams of the church, it’s the last Sunday before the Advent season begins. And there’s a tradition in England that on this Sunday, they make their Christmas pudding, and the family goes home, and they stir the pudding together. Each family member makes a little wish when it’s their turn to stir. That’s not really where Stir Up Sunday comes from. It comes from the Book Of Common Prayer that Kim read from for our classic prayer, “Stir us up, Lord, we beseech thee.” And it’s a great on-ramp, isn’t it, to the Advent season away. Like Kim said to kind of shake off our lethargy, to refocus our hearts and minds on Jesus as we get into the on-ramp and dive into the rush hour traffic, if you will, of the Advent season. It’s just a good way to come together and remind each other of that.

But it’s not just gospel cheerleading, it’s not just, “Give me a J,” right? We talked about that this week in our sermon prep time together, how being a cheerleader when your team is not doing well is really hard. And I’m just thinking those Titans cheerleaders right now are earning combat pay, because they just are still “Go, go, go.” And things are hard. And each one of us this morning, we walked in very different places in our lives, in our faith journey. Some of you might be here visiting family, kids or parents, and we’re so glad you’re here with us. You might’ve come in not having been in church for a long time or maybe never. Maybe this is your first time in church, and we welcome you. We want nothing from you and everything for you and hope that this service just gives you some joy and encouragement and something to look forward to in the Advent season. So, we’re glad you’re here with us.

Some just probably walked in with this contentment of things are going really well right now, and that’s an awesome time to feel like you’re headed into the Advent season with stuff going well, things are cooking, right? Some of us maybe walked in this morning just with this reminder of this week of a failed relationship, and how hard life is now because of that. Some of us walked in this morning with a new disease diagnosis to accompany them in the Advent season. And some of us, I know some of us have walked in this morning with the heartache of the newly empty chair at the table and facing the holiday season ahead with that. My mom died pretty young from cancer in her fifties and Christmas was her favorite holiday. She and my dad got married on Christmas day. And gosh, I remember that first Christmas morning without her was so hard. And just thinking back how doubly hard that had to have been for my dad.

Some of us, we are acutely experiencing just this desire for the return of Christ this season, right?

“A bruised reed, he will not break and a smoldering wick, he will not snuff out.”
Isaiah 42:3

And for any of us this morning that might be thinking, “Man, I’m just not looking forward to the holiday season this year,” and I get it, I get it. So instead of cheerleading, right, instead of “Give me a J,” let’s instead point to Jesus together. Let’s encourage each other in the truth of the Gospel, the good news that is sturdy enough to take all of the bad news the world wants to heap on it, and still come out of it proclaiming that it is good news indeed. Amen? That’s what let’s focus on.

So, I’m calling our study today, “Stir Us Up and Call Us Back,” which comes from this Augustine quote that’s so great.

“You never go away from us, yet we have difficulty in returning to you. Come Lord, stir us up and call us back. Kindle and seize us. Be our fire and our sweetness.”
Augustine

Man, there’s such grace in that quote, isn’t there? There’s that saying, when we feel like God is not as close to us as He once was: Guess who moved? Because God’s not ever going to move away from us. It’s us who drift and move away from God. And I want to encourage us that when we do drift, when we stray, God is not just waiting to scold us, to shame us, but rather the Holy Spirit is stirring us up, is calling us back to rekindle our love and faith in Him, and He’s both our fire and our sweetness. Praise God for that grace.

So, our passage today is a delightful passage. It’s from 1 Chronicles chapter 16, verses eight through 36, and that section in the ESV Bible is called “David’s Song of Thanks.” And on this next slide, there’s a little brief overview. It was written on the occasion of the Ark being brought to Jerusalem and put in the tent for worship by David. And the Ark had been on a journey, been making the rounds for about 100 years. The Philistines had captured it in battle, and they only held onto it for about seven months because they were heavily under the wrath of God while they held the Ark. So, it was sent back to the Israelites. It ended up in the town of Kiriath-Jearim in the House of Abinadab where it stayed for about 100 years until after David was anointed king.

He had the Ark brought back to Jerusalem and he placed it in this tent for worship where it was there for about 40 years until Solomon placed it in the temple, which we just read about a few weeks ago in 1 Kings chapter eight. Verse seven of this chapter reads, “Then on that day, David first appointed that Thanksgiving be sung to the Lord by Asaf and his brothers. I just love that. There’s your first Thanksgiving day right there. So, a very short, little nerdy moment, like just about a minute, if you’ll hang with me. If you look on the next slide, David used parts of this song in two Psalms. The first 15 verses, like eight through 22 are identical to verses one through 15 of Psalm 105. And then verses 23 through 33 can be found in Psalm 96.

And David’s a songwriter. He knows a good song when he sees it. And so, he used this in a couple of different places. And this song is amazing. It is full, chockfull of indicatives and imperatives reminding us of who God is, of what He’s done, and then calling us to respond to those indicatives. So, let’s pray, church, and then I’ll read through the passage with no breaks, I promise. And then I’ve just got a couple of thoughts. So, let’s pray: Show us Your ways, oh Lord, teach us Your paths. Guide us in Your truth and teach us, for You are God, our Savior, and our hope is in You all the day long. Amen.

So, here’s 1 Chronicles chapter 16, verses eight through 36. And I’m reading out of the ESV. “Oh, give thanks to the Lord; call upon his name; make known his deeds among the peoples! Sing to him, sing praises to him; tell of all his wondrous works! Glory in his holy name; let the hearts of those who seek the Lord rejoice! Seek the Lord and his strength; seek his presence continually! Remember the wondrous works that he has done, his miracles and the judgments he uttered, O offspring of Israel, his servant, children of Jacob, his chosen ones! He is the Lord our God; his judgments are in all the earth. Remember his covenant forever, the word that he commanded, for a thousand generations, the covenant that he made with Abraham, his sworn promise to Isaac, which he confirmed to Jacob as a statute, to Israel as an everlasting covenant saying, ‘To you I will give the land of Canaan, as your portion for an inheritance.’

“When you were few in number, of little account, and sojourners in it, wandering from nation to nation, from one kingdom to another people, he allowed no one to oppress them; he rebuked kings on their account saying, ‘Touch not my anointed ones. Do my prophets no harm.’ Sing to the Lord all the earth. Tell of his salvation from day to day. Declare his glory among the nations, his marvelous works among all the peoples! For great is the Lord and greatly to be praised, and he is to be feared above all gods. For all the gods of the peoples are worthless idols, but the Lord made the heavens.”

I’m just going to read that verse again. “For all the gods,” little-G, “of the peoples are worthless idols. But the Lord made the heavens. Splendor and majesty are before him; Strength and joy are in his place. Ascribe to the Lord, oh families of the peoples, ascribe to the Lord glory and strength! Ascribe to the Lord the glory due his name; bring an offering and come before him! Worship the Lord in the splendor of holiness; tremble before him, all the earth; yes, the world is established; it shall never be moved. Let the heavens be glad, and the earth rejoice, and let them say among the nations ‘The Lord reigns!’ Let the sea roar, and all that fills it; let the field exult, and everything in it. Then shall the trees of the forest sing for joy before the Lord, for he comes to judge the earth. Oh, give thanks to the Lord for he is good; for his steadfast love endures forever! Say also: ‘Save us, oh God of our salvation, and gather and deliver us from among the nations, that we may give thanks to your holy name and glory in your praise. Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel, from everlasting to everlasting.’ Then all the people said, ‘Amen!’ and praised the Lord.”

Wow. Okay, so tell me, do you feel stirred up after reading that? Man, I sure do. I don’t feel ginned up. I feel stirred up. I feel pointing up to the God who is good, so good, so faithful, so steadfast, a God who is so good, it makes me us want to sing and shout, to shout aloud of His salvation day after day, after day. Look at what He has done. This right here is why it’s so important to have both indicatives and imperatives, because the Gospel is both “Come and see,” and “Go and tell.” If all we had were imperatives, “Do this, do that,” it wouldn’t be based on a living relationship with a personal God. It would just be by rote. It would be mechanical. It would be robotic. There would be no why behind what we were doing without the indicatives, unless as Jim talked about last week, it was to escape punishment and appease an angry little-G god.

That is not the everlasting God of 1 Chronicles 16. Look at some of the indicatives in this chapter. He’s a covenant-making and a covenant-keeping God. He is the God of promises made and promises kept. Let me reread at verse 15, “Remember His covenant forever, the word that He commanded for 1000 generations, the covenant that He made with Abraham, His sworn promise to Isaac, which He confirmed to Jacob as a statute to Israel as an everlasting covenant.”

He is a saving God. He is mighty to save. Verse 23 and verse 35, “Sing to the Lord, all the earth. Tell of His salvation from day to day.” And also, “Save us, oh God, of our salvation. Gather and deliver us from among the nations that we may give thanks to Your holy name and glory in Your praise.” That’s what He does. That’s who He is, a mighty God, mighty to save. And he is an everlasting God. Only a God who is everlasting can make a covenant that’s everlasting. Only an everlasting God that is well-acquainted with infinity can remove from us our sins, as far as the east is from the west. He’s sovereign over finite things because He is infinite and everlasting. Verse 36, “Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel from everlasting to everlasting.”

Wow. Because of these great indicatives, we have a foundation for our response. Our response is not mechanical, it’s not by rote, it’s not robotic. It’s responding to who God is. And man, there is a long list of imperatives in this passage, and here’s just a few of them, because I could pretty much read the whole passage because it’s almost all imperatives. In verse eight, we’re encouraged to give thanks to the Lord to call on His name. We’re encouraged to seek the Lord, His strength, His presence. We are reminded to remember His wondrous works and His everlasting covenant. And then we’re exhorted to go and tell of His salvation from day-to-day and to declare His glory among the nations. Lastly, we’re encouraged to worship the Lord in the splendor of holiness.

So, I’d like to offer a little challenge, little gospel Advent challenge for us this week. What would it look like? There are six imperatives there. What would it look like if we focused on one of those imperatives every day, just in our devotional time and the way we interact with people here at church, our families, our friends, our coworkers? What would it look like if every day, between now and next Sunday, we focused and prayed over and meditated on one of those imperatives? I challenge you to do that.

Well, how might this passage be directly applied to the Advent season, stirring us up? How might it point us to Jesus, to Christ the King? I think David’s Song of Thanks reminds us first off, Christ the King offers grace for our past. Here’s another section of this passage that really stuck out to me, verses 19 through 22, “When you were few in number, of little account and sojourners in it, wandering from nation to nation, from one kingdom to another people, He allowed no one to oppress them. He rebuked kings on their accounts saying, ‘Touch not my anointed ones. Do My prophets no harm.”

God, again, He is a covenant-making and covenant-keeping, promise-keeping God. And He remembered Israel. He had already made this covenant with Him. He remembered Israel when they were of little account. They belonged to Him, and He remembered them. And just that same way, He remembers us in our lowest, darkest moments. That is when He runs after us with the most intention, when we are at our lowest, at our darkest. And that’s what the incarnation was all about, Jesus coming to us in our darkness. God remembers us. But you know what He forgets? Psalm 103, He forgets our sins and He removes our sin from us as far as the east is from the west.

We love all things just about the cultural holiday that is Christmas, not Advent, but cultural Christmas. And I’m not going to bash Santa, but here’s where Jesus trumps Santa every single time. We sing that little Christmas song about he’s making a list, he’s checking it twice. He’s going to see who’s naughty and nice. Santa Claus is coming to town. There’s some performance anxiety right there. Jesus has a list too. And on that list, it’s good news. But on that list, everybody’s on the naughty list, right? And yet, those are the very people that He’s running after. It’s not performance-based, it’s all based on the love of Christ.

Friends, we’re offered grace for our past. We are remembered. We belong to Him. John Stott says this, “Because in no other person but the historic Jesus of Nazareth has God become man and lived a human life on earth, died to bear the penalty of our sins and been raised from death and exalted to glory, there is no other Savior, for there is no other person who is qualified to save.” Man, amen to that. There is no other who is qualified to save.

David’s Song of Thanks also reminds us that Christ the King offers us courage for our present. And when I say that, you might think I mean courage to face present circumstances or trying times. And yes, we’re offered that, and I’m going to talk about that in a minute. But I’m talking about courage for our present, the courage to understand where we are, and what needs to be done about it. Another section of our passage that stuck out to me here was verses 25 and 26. “For great is the Lord and greatly to be praised and He is to be heard above all gods, for all the gods of the peoples are worthless idols, but the Lord made the heavens.” All the little-G gods are worthless idols, but the Lord made the heavens.

Pastor Jim and Pastor Tommy taught over the last couple of weeks about how Solomon was turned away later in his life to the gods of… little-G gods of his wives and concubines and how this angered the Lord. God wants our worship, because He is the One, the only capital-G, sovereign creator God. And He wants our worship because it leads to our life and our flourishing. And all the little-G gods in our lives that we might be paying attention to – money, sex, power, reputation, politics – they’re all good things, but they are worthless idols. If we make them ultimate things, right? They might be good things, but boy, they are terrible and empty little-G gods.

Eugene Peterson puts it this way, “Christ’s way of life is a holy attack on everything that leaks the brightness out of our lives or detracts from the promised joy of our faith. It demolishes anything that promises liberation, but in fact, imprisons us in boredom. Following Him evokes a life pursued heartily and meaningfully.” Oh friends, what might be leaking the brightness out of our lives, out of my life? What am I following after that promises liberation, but is really a prison, ending up a prison of boredom?

Alan Redpath has an antidote to that situation. He says, “Before we pray, ‘Lord, Thy kingdom come,’ we must be willing to pray, ‘My kingdom go.'” Christ the King offers us the courage and the ability and the desire to do just that, to lay down our kingdom of worthless idols and to embrace the kingdom of the true king. As Pastor Jim said last week in his sermon, “Folks, we need a better king, and we have one in King Jesus.”

Well, lastly, Christ the King offers us hope for our future. And friends, we need hope. We need hope. We need hope that can’t be pulled out from under us by any of those phrases that rock our reality and change our circumstance. The test came back positive or, “Sorry, we’re letting you go,” or, “I want out.” Man, we need a hope that is stronger than the worst news we could ever receive, right? And only in the person of Jesus Christ do we find that hope. Only in Jesus do we find the one who runs towards us at our darkest and lowest moments and promises to rescue and redeem us. Only in Jesus do we find the one who said He was living water, the bread of life, the light of the world, the resurrection in the life. Only in Jesus do we find the one who said He could lay His life down and pick it back up again and did just that.

Just in the next slide, the reality of Christ the King coming to us in the incarnation, it doesn’t mean the darkness doesn’t exist, but man, it does mean that there is one greater than the darkness who has come, who has defeated death, our greatest enemy, and has promised to return to make all things right. Amen? That’s our hope for the future. That’s what we look forward towards in this Advent season. I’d love for us to read the first few verses of our passage together as a call and response. And I thought about doing this at the beginning of the message, but without the indicatives of this passage, it could have seemed, again, hollow – like gospel cheerleading.

But now, we have this perspective of reading about this covenant-making, covenant-keeping, everlasting God, who’s mighty to save. That’s the object of our faith. So, let’s read these verses together again as a way to corporately dive into the Advent season together, to shake off the lethargy, to exhort and encourage each other in the truth of the good news of the Gospel. So those of you on my left, y’all will be A. Those on my right, y’all will be B. Let’s read this together, friends.

A: Oh give thanks to the Lord; call upon His name; make known His deeds among the peoples!

B: Sing to Him, sing praises to Him; Tell of all His wondrous works!

A: Glory in His holy name; Let the hearts of those who seek the Lord rejoice!

B: Seek the Lord and His strength; Seek His presence continually!

A:  Remember the wondrous works that He has done, His miracles and the judgments He has uttered.

B: O offspring of Israel, His servant, Children of Jacob, His chosen ones!

And altogether:  Oh, give thanks to the Lord, for He is good; For His steadfast love endures forever!

Friends, He is good. His steadfast love does endure forever. I’ll close out with this last slide from Acts chapter three, which fits nicely with an Augustine quote from earlier. He stirs us up and He calls us back, and His nearness is our good. Think of this as a tether, a way to anchor us and counterbalance the drift of this busy Advent season. “Therefore, repent and return, so that your sins may be wiped away, in order that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord.” Amen? Isn’t that good?

Let’s pray, church: Good, God, You stir us up over and over again. You remind us of Your goodness and Your promises over and over again. You call us back to You over and over again. Your love knows no end. Your grace is unbounded and unfettered. And we thank You for coming for us over and over and over again. And we pray this in Jesus’ name. Amen.