The sermon by Jamey Stout focuses on Psalm 81, urging believers to listen to God and embrace obedience to receive His blessings. It highlights the commands to worship God joyfully, using music and instruments as expressions of praise. The sermon underscores the importance of redemption, drawing parallels between Israel's liberation from Egypt and the individual believer's deliverance from sin. It warns of the consequences of ignoring God's commands, emphasizing that disobedience leads to missing out on divine blessings. The sermon invites believers to enlarge their expectations of God, encouraging them to seek His promises and live in accordance with His will.

Psalm 81, Psalm 81, sing aloud to God our strength, make a joyful shout to the God of Jacob, raise a song and strike the timbrel, the pleasant harp with the lute. Blow the trumpet at the new moon, or at the time of the new moon, at the full moon on our solemn feast day. This is a statute for Israel, a law of the God of Jacob. This he established in Joseph as a testimony when he went throughout the land of Egypt where I heard a language I did not understand. I removed his shoulder from the burden, His hands were freed from the baskets.

You called in trouble and I delivered you. I answered you in the secret place of thunder. I tested you at the waters of Meribah, Silam. Hear O my people and I will admonish you. O Israel if you will listen to me.

There shall be no foreign god among you, nor shall you worship any foreign god. I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt. Open your mouth wide and I will fill it. But my people would not heed my voice, and Israel would have none of me. So I gave them over to their own stubborn heart to walk in their own counsels.

Oh, that my people would listen to me, that Israel would walk in my ways, I would soon subdue their enemies and turn my hand against their adversaries. The haters of the Lord would pretend submission to Him, but their fate would endure forever. He would have fed them also with the finest of wheat, and with honey from the rock I would have satisfied you. Let's pray. Father we thank you so much for your word.

It is a light unto our path, a lamp unto our way. We bless you for the rescue mission that you have sent it forth to cause in our life and how it has done so over and over and over again. We pray Lord that you would do so again today, that you would use your word as you already have in our midst to conquer our hearts and cause us to be a people who don't miss out on anything that you have promised. In Jesus' name, amen. God through Asaph commands us to worship him alone, for he is our Redeemer who longs to bless his obedient people.

So the question is will we take God at his word and be blessed or miss out on what could have been? And that comes out in this holy text. Now one of the reasons I picked out this text is I'm seeking to bring to a close the series we've been doing on the providence of God and this is one of the texts that is quoted specifically 81 11 through 16 there by those who wrote the London Baptist Confession of Faith in paragraph 6 in the section on providence. So that's why we're here and when we get to there, Lord willing, even as we look at this text we'll see God's good hand of Providence in the in the text. So bottom line I think we could sum up the whole thing of this psalm is Listen to God and be blessed.

Don't listen to God, be cursed, right? That's really the summary of the psalm is do you want to be blessed? Listen. Listen. And biblically speaking when we listen it is obedience isn't it?

We listen by our feet, walking in those ways that our God has commanded. And so first of all, let us listen to the command to joyfully worship our Redeemer. Now who's this coming from? And I think that this pretty much captures all of the first part verses 1 through 10. Let us listen to the command to joyfully worship our Redeemer and then the disastrous results coming in verse 11 and following of when we refuse.

What happens if we refuse? So let us listen to this great command and bend the knee to it. This is Asaph. He is a prophetic song leader. So 1 Chronicles 16, 46 says this, Moreover David and the commanders of the army set apart for the service some of the sons of Asaph and Heman and Juduthon who were to prophesy with liars, harps, and cymbals, and the number of those who perform their service." And then it goes on in 1 Chronicles 25.1 actually.

So First of all, He commands us. These are all commands. Sing aloud, make a joyful shout, raise a song, strike the timbrel, blow the trumpet. It's all commands, and then He goes into verse four and says this is a statute and a law for Israel. Sing aloud to God our strength.

Aren't you glad that our worship of God doesn't depend on us and our ability, but it is fueled by the eternal God whom we worship. He's our strength. We are singing to God our strength, our shield, our protector, our refuge. He is the one who strengthens his people to do all that we do. We can do nothing, what did Christ say, without him.

We need Christ. He is the one who gives us the capacity, the ability by regenerating us, putting his spirit within us to worship him and worship him aright. So here's this command from this prophetic song leader, if you will, to sing aloud. And here are some definitions of this word. To sing for joy.

To produce a song with the voice as a response of joy. To rejoice. To cheer. To shout and triumph. And The next one is really much the same.

It means to rejoice, cheer, shout, and triumph, to shout joyfully to the God of Jacob, the next phrase there. So, When we sing, brothers and sisters, is this our heart? Is this what's coming out of us? And I believe it is. I mean, there are such times of great joy when we sing together, isn't it, brothers and sisters?

Because we're singing truth. We're singing about the God who is our strength, the God who fuels our hearts with love for him and love for each other. It just explodes in this time where we gather as this is exactly what is going on. This is God's people gathering to worship Him for what He has done and for who He is to them. And look at the explosion here in verse 2, raise a song and strike the timbrel, the pleasant harp with the lute.

So here's another commands by this prophetic song leader to take up the hand drum, the tambourine, to take up maybe the sither. Never heard of the sither before, but it's an uncertain kind of string instrument, possibly a sither is what it's called, consisting of a large frame that gave tension to strings which could then be plucked. So I would think of a harp, a lute. Look at the way it's described. It's pleasant, it's lovely, it's delightful, this music.

It's the way in the Song of Solomon that the beloved is characterized. It's the pleasantness of praise to God. It's the pleasantness of when brothers dwell together in unity. And this is the type of music that comes out of God's redeemed people is pleasant, the pleasant sounds of their voices blending together with a complement of music to worship our strength, our God. The lute as well is kind of an uncertain, we don't know exactly but it's like our harp that we would have today.

And so then he says, blow the trumpet at the new moon, at the full moon, on our solemn feast day. So as you study this, you could come to texts like when they were told to make these trumpets in Numbers 10. I don't know if these would be the specific trumpets because this is a ram's horn and then this one in Numbers 10 would be the silver trumpets that were made. But anyway also in the day of your gladness and your appointed feast and at the beginning of your month you shall blow the trumpets over your burnt offerings and over the sacrifices of your peace offerings and they shall be a memorial for you before your God. I am the Lord your God, Numbers 10.10.

You'll find it in Numbers 28, 11 through 15 as it talks about what they're to do in the new moons or the beginning of the month. And you'll see it characterized this way as you continue in Holy Scripture, such as 2 Chronicles 2-4. Behold, I am building a temple for the name of the Lord my God, to dedicate it to him, to burn before him sweet incense for the continual showbread. I must have missed something there. Let me see here.

No that's right. Continuous for the showbread, for the burnt offerings, morning and evening, on the Sabbath, on the new moons, and on the set feast of our God. This is an ordinance forever to Israel. 2 Chronicles 2.4. So here is our God calling for the public assembly, the public worship of God during the New Moons, during the first month here.

And it's hard to tell as he goes through this Psalm whether he's talking about a certain feast day or just that first of the month sacrifices that they were to do. It seems that he delves into the feast of the Passover and then of the unleavened bread because that's where he's going next. But I'm not really sure. So once again this is a command, this isn't an option. Aren't you glad your God commands you to be joyful in His presence?

It's amazing. For this is a statute for Israel, verse four, a law of the God of Jacob. He's commanding this because God commands this. This is an authoritative rule, an ordinance. It's a judgment.

That's what the word law is here, a law of the God of Jacob. It's a determination of right and wrong on legal matters. This is an official decision of God on this matter that He is to be worshiped for who he is and for what he's done. And so he the command to worship. Why should I do that?

Well I believe what we see in the next section of this psalm is that it is rooted in redemption. Look at the text. This is established in Joseph as a testimony when he went throughout the land of Egypt, where I heard a language I did not understand." Here this testimony has been fixed, authoritatively by our God, that his people should gather and worship him. And the setting is given, the when and where. When did he set this testimony?

When he went throughout the land of Egypt. And notice how he changes from the third person he in the next verse. Notice he goes to I. When I heard a language I did not understand. Now that's kind of hard to swallow because we know something about our God, don't we?

That he's omniscient. So in what way did God not understand the language of the Egyptians? And I think the commentaries are right that I was reading on this and it was the language of idolatry. It was not the language of the worship of the one true God and in that way in that sense he did not understand the language. It was the blasphemous language of idolatry that the human heart will run to left to itself.

So he heard a lip that's the word here meaning that the manner of speech the language that he did not understand. And look at redemption. Look at how worship, this command to gather together, the here and this setting being that of Israel's redemption from Egypt. I removed his shoulder from the burden. His hands were freed from the baskets.

Look at how Israel's burden and slavery is pictured as they made the bricks and carried them in the baskets and their task masters lorded it over them. That great burden that they bore of being under the thumbnail of Pharaoh. A serious attack of Israel and of Judah also characterized this way in Isaiah 14 25 that I will break the Assyrian in my land and on my mountains tread him underfoot Then his yoke shall be removed from them, and his burden removed from their shoulders." This tyrant king, but greater still, brothers and sisters, is the way in which our God has broken the burden off our back, that burden of sin, that weighed us down and would surely take us to hell and deservedly so. This word burden, the verb is used in Isaiah 53 of God's ultimate servant as he deals with the burden of sin of his people. This is how he says it, surely he has born.

There's that verb of the noun burden. He has born our griefs and carried our sorrows. Yet we esteemed Him stricken, smitten by God and afflicted. Verse 4 of Isaiah 53. Now verse 11.

He shall see the labor of His soul and be satisfied. By His knowledge My righteous servant shall justify many, for He shall bear their iniquities. And there's our word again. And so our God comes to us. The sin bearer bears the burden of sin so that we would bear it no more.

He takes that burden upon His own back and he bears it in full bearing the full brunt of God's almighty wrath it was the will of the Father to crush him so that we could be liberated to worship him as we were created to worship him as we talked about earlier in Revelation This is where all things are headed. This is what the church is a case in point as Ephesians chapter 3. God's creative purposes will be accomplished and thus he will not allow his fallen creation to not be what he created it to be and thus we have redemption and he redeemed us and that redemption will be finalized in that new heaven and new earth where we will enjoy our God and look upon Him in our resurrected bodies forever. All because the sin bearer came and did for us what Psalm 38 for caused our sins for my iniquities have gone over my head like a heavy burden. They are too heavy for me.

Have you come to that place? Is that, have you come to that realization that you have such a heavy burden upon your back of sin? Have you been awakened to that? You can't do a single thing about it? Have you come to the place of deliverance as Bunyan would put it so wonderfully in that allegory of the Christian life.

And has that burden rolled off your back and has it been placed in the tomb never to come back again? Oh hallelujah for such a Savior as this who bears the burden for the sins of his people in full. Oh yes, Satan will accuse, oh yes, the conscience will over will accuse, but I know one greater than our heart and he is the one who justifies. What a Savior, what a God. Do you know this sin bearer?

Has the baskets of sin that you can't release been taken out of your hands and been traded with the delights and privilege and glory and grace of being a child of God instead of a slave of sin and Satan and the world? Is that you? I pray that it is and if not, my friend, there's water freely offered to you. Come and drink and enjoy the treasures and pleasures of God through Christ Jesus. His promise is not in vain.

He will give to all who come. And I pray that the shadow here, as we all know that the Exodus was a shadow of the greater redemption to follow, that the shadow would give us insight into the substance of what our Lord has accomplished for us. You called, this is the testimony of all Christians, you called in trouble and I delivered you. I answered you in the secret place of thunder. I tested you at the waters of Meribah, the waters of contention, Silah.

In their slavery they called out to Yahweh, Have you called? Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord will be saved. What does God do to those who call upon him? And I delivered you. I rescued you." And I love this word.

I answered you out of the secret place of thunder. There was quite a various opinions on what that means. Was it the cloud as he takes care of Pharaoh's army in the Red Sea? Was it Mount Sinai as God's voice thundered there? Well, one thing is we've read Revelation, there's a lot of thunder, right, going on in the presence of God.

And He answers. There's no lack in our God to deliver any who call upon him. So he answers from the secret place of thunder. But what else does he do to his people? I would just encourage you, if you have time, to read Exodus 17, 1 through 7.

You'd also find it as well. Actually, I don't have the text written down, so you might not find it. It's in Numbers. It's the point where Moses also sins by striking the rock twice instead of speaking to it. In both these places you find Meribah.

Contention. So, I would just point out one verse from the Exodus text. So we call the name of the place Masa and Meribah because of the contention of the children of Israel, because they tempted the Lord saying, is the Lord among us or not? How many times do we do that? I mean here God has redeemed us by the blood of his own son.

And yet I have the audacity to doubt Him. He who didn't spare His own Son for me. You know, this side of the cross, as we pilgrimage together to the celestial city, It's shocking that the remnant of sin that's still in us, I guess it shouldn't be shocking right? God said it was that way in Romans 7, but that I would doubt him. It's ridiculous.

It's really ridiculous. There's another text I think that's very pertinent here. Psalm 95a, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion of Meribah, as in the day of trial in the wilderness. Listen, the story of Israel is really the story of us all. And my brothers and sisters, there's only one Israelite that got it right.

And he was crucified and now risen. And it's he that we trust. Out of Egypt I called my son says Matthew and his gospel because Jesus is the ultimate Israelite who will face the temptations in the wilderness and overcome for his people and then be crucified for them not. Isn't that awesome? It's just the best news I've ever heard.

And that, my brothers and sisters, is what fuels us to want to say, Oh God, enough with my way. Enough with me and my counsel and my stubborn heart. Oh, let me follow the good path. Let me walk in your way. Let me go the way of my Savior.

So, hear all my people is the next. When we gather, We gather to worship and we gather for instruction, don't we? And so this prophetic song leader, Asaph, says, Hear, O my people, and I will admonish you, O Israel, if you will listen to me. Another command. Oh, do you see the pathos in God as he cries out to his people.

He knows. I mean it's like us as fathers and also mothers. We know if our child does that, this is going to happen. And we plead with them. Well, our Father in heaven is pleading with us.

Oh, here, just listen, just listen to me. That's all, it's all I'm asking. Listen. I will admonish you, I will warn you, I will counsel you in terms of how you ought to go, how you ought to live, how you ought to walk. It's used in Jeremiah 11, 7.

I earnestly exhorted you. This is one of those texts where the Hebrew author uses the verb twice. To admonish, I admonished. And so the translation, I earnestly exhorted you, your fathers, in the day I brought them up out of the land of Egypt until this day, rising early and exhorting you. Obey my voice.

If you listen to me, You know what he's saying right there? I wish you would listen to me. That's what he's saying. I wish you would listen to me. Because as the text unfolds we see what happened.

They didn't listen. Nobody, no parent in here has ever said that, right? I wish you'd listen to me. Here's the perfect parent with the perfect commands. How much more should we obey Him, right?

As the author of Hebrews 12 would put it. There shall be no foreign God among you, nor shall you worship any foreign God. Now we've come to the foot of Mount Sinai, haven't we? And yet we have the order reversed here. He'll finish, he'll make it so clear with verse 10, I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt.

Here's the first and the second command. You shall have no, and if you compare 81.9 with Exodus 23, you'll see the same type of verbiage. Same thing in Exodus 20 verse 5, you shall not bow down. In our text, nor shall you worship. It's the same word, you shall not bow down.

To a strange God. Deuteronomy 32, verse 16, using the word strange, they provoked him to jealousy with foreign gods, with abominations they provoked him to anger. It is the word used for the strange woman in Proverbs. Nor shall you bow down and worship to any foreign god. Why?

I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt. You know our God could say to us right now, I am the Lord your God who purchased you with the blood of my Son to liberate you. Because when he says, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, What is he talking about? He's talking about redemption and that's why I said let us obey the command. Let us heed the command to worship our Redeemer.

Because here he is coming to us again, reminding us of redemption. And then he gives us beautiful promise. And this beautiful command of our God. Open your mouth wide. In other words, enlarge your expectations of me.

Can you ever exceed the expectations of your heart? Can they ever exceed who your God is? Is that possible? Can you somehow pray a prayer that's bigger than God. Of course, I mean, every Bible student here is probably thinking, well, you've got to pray according to the will of God.

Amen. You're right. Is there anything in this book that tells us the will of God and what He wants for His people that God's not able to accomplish in you and me? You know the answer, don't you? Open your mouth wide.

There's the command. Enlarge your expectations. You know, it's used to shield, how shield opens its mouth large. It's appetite. Listen, what's your appetite for the things of God?

And what God has promised His people. And how does that come out of you when you're going to Him in prayer at the Throne of Grace, right? Bless Him Lord. Or is it Lord, strengthen him according to the power of your Holy Spirit and his inner man? You know, these type of prayers that we see in the Bible so that when he is hurt, when whatever happens, What comes out of that dear brother is Jesus Christ to the amazement of all around him.

Right? I mean these type of prayers that we see right there in the Bible. Here's the promise. What does God say? I'll give you half a cup of coffee.

No sir. I will fill it. He only bids them, this is Calvin, he only bids them open their mouth but he magnifies the abundance of his grace still more highly by intimating that however enlarged there our desires may be there will be nothing wanting which is necessary to afford us full satisfaction. How about the Apostle Paul? Now to him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think according to the power that works in us to him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever amen.

There's Asaph's Ephesians 3 20 through 21 right there. Open your mouth wide and I will fill it. Oh brothers and sisters you know what my problem is and I probably could say maybe some of your problem is too because you like me are a sinner. Our expectations of God are too small. Our exaggeration of our own sin and its indwelling nature still being in us are too big.

My God can conquer all that is contrary to me or in me that's contrary to Christ. And that's what I want. And that's what we're praying when His kingdom... Lord let Your kingdom come. I want to see your rule be as much as it can be and a man who's still not glorified.

And how does Paul define the kingdom? It's righteousness. It's joy. It's peace in the Holy Spirit. So you know I really thought I was going to be able to preach this whole Psalm, but I'm almost out of time.

I think. When did I start, brother? I started, he sang, so I still have more time, Scott. I still have more time. We're going to try to land a plane.

So let us heed the command to joyfully worship our Redeemer, for if we do not, there will be disastrous results refusing the command to worship the one true God. Let's delve into 11 through 16 a little bit here But my people would not heed my voice and Israel would have none of me They refused to listen the word Shema. Remember here all Israel the Lord your God is one Here's the Shema They would not Shema. They would not listen They weren't willing. Do you know every person who will be in the lake of fire, will have only one person to blame.

Themself. Because God's promise is offered freely. And they will have only themselves to blame that they were not willing to take God at His word and be saved by His Son. And that's exactly what the text is laying out here. In fact, it's used in Deuteronomy 13, 8, You shall not consent to Him or listen to Him.

This is a man that's trying to lead you into idolatry. In Deuteronomy 13, 8, it says, you shall not consent to him or listen to him, nor shall your eye pity him, nor shall you spare him or conceal him. That word consent. You will not consent. Israel would not consent to God who wooed them so sweetly, who redeemed them with such power out of Egypt.

And so what's God's response? And this comes to our...as we think about providence, God's working out of His decree from eternity and in history. I mean, God's providence, if you are on the wrong side of the immutable God, that sore cuts both ways. If you're on the right side of the immutable God, you're in Christ, then those promises in Christ cannot change because the promiser can't change. If you're on the wrong side, oh my friend, all God has to do is take his restraining grace away from you and you're hellbound.

So I gave them over, God says, to their own stubborn heart, to walk in their own counsels. That's worse than being delivered over to the lions. That's worse than the most wretched torture you can ever think of. To be delivered to your own heart says God to his this people who refuse him to their own hard heartedness their own stubbornness and what's the result to walk in their own councils and then listen to God's heart Does He take any pleasure in the death of the wicked? No.

God by nature is bent on blessing His creation. We ruined ourselves by the fall. Oh, that my people would listen to me. That Israel would walk in my ways. Here's God's desire expressed to us.

Now listen. Listen to what could have been. To a people who refused to listen. I would soon subdue their enemies and turn my hand against their adversaries. The haters of the Lord would pretend submission to him, but their fate would endure forever.

In other words, the haters of the Lord, it goes back to what we're talking about on the wrong side of providence. Their fate would endure forever. Their time. Their lot is fixed, the lot for the wicked. And then look at, he talks again to his people who would not listen.

He would have fed them also with the finest of wheat and with honey from the rock. I would have satisfied you." This finest of wheat is the fat of the wheat. It's like Genesis 45 18 where Pharaoh tells Joseph to go get his family and let them know that they'll eat of the fat of the land. It's the best. It's the finest.

So brothers and sisters, God Through Asaph commands us to worship Him alone for He is our Redeemer who longs to bless His obedient people. And I would just say to us this is as you come to the end of this song Who's the loser for not taking the path of obedience to our Redeemer. Well, brothers and sisters, it will be us. So bend your heart. You know, isn't it something God tells us to circumcise our hearts?

He commands us to do that, and then he tells us that he's the only one who can do that. But I will tell you this my friend is God's promise in vain if you look to Jesus Christ Will you be disappointed? What does the Bible teach us? It tells us very clearly that all who believe in Him will not be disappointed. But Notice the one who would have done this, and God's like, I would have done this for you.

And I wanted to. And as Jesus would say over Jerusalem, but you were not willing. I pray that's none of you here today. My friend, what in the world Could you possibly hold onto that's of more value than God's own dear Son that He freely gives to all who will turn to Him? For with Him, He will freely give us all things.

So brothers and sisters, may that not be spoken of us. May it not be God saying to us, I would have, but you were not willing. Instead, let us together worship our God till He comes. Amen. Occupy till He comes and take dominion as we were challenged this morning.

Let's pray. Father, all of us Lord, as we contemplate this together, know that there are times in our life we look back and it might even be this week. For me there's a sense in which I feel that I would have. Lord, we want those things to become less and less. Lord, we don't want to miss out on a single thing that you've promised us in your Word.

And we want our appetite to be enlarged. We want to open our mouths wide. Lord, would You enlarge the desires of our heart according to Scripture, as You put it, to delight ourselves in You and You will give us the desires of our heart. So Lord, we pray, give us the desires of our heart. Give us desires that are worthy of your name, worthy of your kingdom, worthy of your will, because you are worthy.

And oh Lord we'll give you praise and thanks and we ask you oh God that you would have your way with each of us And I pray that if there's any in here that no they're not willing that they would be willing Right now in the day of your powers you are seated at the right hand of God this day of salvation That will come to a close When you come again In Jesus' name, amen.