Celebration Sunday

Yesterday, I visited some friends who have a little almost two year old son, little Noah. And Noah is just starting to talk at those very early stages of putting words together. But Noah is also very cheeky coming to age two. And Noah's mom and dad have been teaching Noah some very good manners to say thank you when mom or dad, you know, give him something or do something for him. But lately, he's been playing a little game with daddy.

Where instead of saying, thank you daddy, when dad has done something, he says, thank you mommy instead. And talking to his mom and dad yesterday, they're not sure if he's doing this as a mistake or on purpose. Purpose. But I think it's on purpose and cleverly so. Because now he's getting dad to do all sorts of tricks for him to try and get Noah to say the simple words, thank you daddy.

He can say daddy, he can say thank you, but he hasn't put the two together. And so he has dad running around like a monkey on a string. I wonder this morning if our heavenly Father sometimes feels gypped like this as well. Where He has done all the work, but He gets zero acknowledgement. In our lives, He might be pouring into it miracle after miracle, answered prayer after answered prayer.

And for some reason, whether we are too busy or whether we haven't made the time or had the time to reflect, we either don't say thanks or we put it down as to some stroke of luck or a twist of fate. Well, this morning we're going to turn to a passage in the Bible that deals with the idea and the command of giving thanks to God. And it's perhaps the most logical place for us to go to the book of Psalms, which is full of thanksgiving to God. And we're going to look specifically at Psalm 107. Let's have a read of that together.

Psalm 107, verse 1. Oh, give thanks to the Lord for He is good, for His steadfast love endures forever. Let the redeemed of the Lord say so, whom He has redeemed from trouble and gathered in from the lands, from the East and from the West, from the North and from the South. Some wandered in desert wastes finding no way to a city to dwell in. Hungry and thirsty, their soul fainted within them.

Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble and He delivered them from their distress. He led them by a straight way till they reached a city to dwell in. Let them thank the Lord for His steadfast love, for His wondrous works to the children of man. For He satisfies the longing soul and the hungry soul He fills with good things. Some sat in the darkness and in the shadow of death, prisoners in affliction and in irons.

For they had rebelled against the words of God and spurred the counsel of the most high. So He bowed their hearts down with hard labour. They fell down with none to help. Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble and He delivered them from their distress. He brought them out of the darkness and the shadow of death and burst their bonds apart.

Let them thank the Lord for His steadfast love, for His wondrous works to the children of man, for He shatters the doors of bronze and cuts in the bars of iron. Some were fools through their own sinful ways and because of their iniquities suffered affliction. They loathed any kind of food and they drew near to the gates of death. Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble and He delivered them from their distress. He sent out His word and healed them and delivered them from their destruction.

Let them thank the Lord for His steadfast love, for His wondrous works to the children of man, and let them offer sacrifices of thanksgiving and tell of His deeds in songs of joy. Some went down to the sea in ships doing business on the great waters. They saw the deeds of the Lord, His wondrous works in the deep for He commanded and raised the stormy wind which lifted up the waves of the sea. They mounted up to heaven. They went down to the depths.

Their courage melted away in their evil plight. They reeled and staggered like drunken men and were at their wits end. Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble and He delivered them from their distress. He made the storm be still and the waves of the sea were hushed. Then they were glad that the waters were quiet and He brought them to their desired haven.

Let them thank the Lord for His steadfast love, for His wondrous works to the children of man. Let them extol Him in the congregation of the people and praise Him in the assembly of the elders. He turns rivers into a desert, springs of water into thirsty ground, a fruitful land into a salty waste because of the evil of its inhabitants. Yet He turns a desert into pools of water, a parched land into springs of water, and there He lets the hungry dwell and they establish a city to live in. They sow fields and plant vineyards and get a fruitful yield.

By His blessing, they multiply greatly and He does not let their livestock diminish. When they are diminished and brought low through oppression, evil and sorrow, He pours contempt on princes and makes them wander in trackless wastes, but He raises up the needy out of affliction and makes their families like flocks. The upright see it and are glad, and all wickedness shuts its mouth. Whoever is wise, let him attend to these things. Let them consider the steadfast love of the Lord.

So far, our reading. We find a summary statement to this whole unfolding hymn right at the start in verses 1 and 2 that really explains the direction that this Psalm is going into. We read, firstly, that we are to give thanks to the Lord. Why? For He is good.

His love endures forever. Then it's sharpened in verse 2 a little bit by explaining how this should be done. Let the redeemed of the Lord tell their story. Now these two opening verses give the big picture of what the rest of the Psalm is going to express. Because in verse 4, we start reading about different stories, different testimonies of what people have experienced.

We get a big picture of what is going on. Some people have been saved dramatically by God. But basically, when we come to the end and even repeat it in these stories is the same command, give thanks to the Lord. Let the redeemed tell their story. And so we're going to have a look at what is happening here.

The two commands that we are being given. Firstly, we are told, let the redeemed say this, the Lord is good. We are shown that God will allow His people to go through all sorts of hardships. He allows these things to happen in their lives. But instead of terrifying experiences of pointless chaos in the existence of humans on this little speck in the universe, we are told that there is a purpose behind it.

There's a reason that God allows these hard things to happen. They are guided by a loving hand. And one of these purposes of this hardship is to make us think more about God than about our comfort. Psalm 107 gives us plenty of examples of hardship, doesn't it? In verses 4 to 9, we find the description of people who wander through wastelands and deserts.

People who are utterly restless. They are people who have no home to call their own. Verses 4 to 9, we read about these very restless people. Then we move down to another category of people in verses 10 to 16 where we are shown prisoners. People who are locked in dark rooms.

People who are bound by iron chains. They have no friends to visit them. They have no family to look after them. Their hearts, the Bible says, are bowed down in hard labour. We are showing that they are here especially, specifically because of their rebellion.

Their rebellion against God's will. In verses 17 to 22, we are shown people who wrestle with some sort of mental illness. They are people that even though they could have eaten, they have rejected it verse 18 says. And in this case, they are brought to the point of death, the gates of death, the Bible says. And then still others in verses 23 to 32, they go out to make money on the ocean.

They are merchants doing trade. They are ambitious for wealth and power and they get caught in a terrible storm. A terrifying storm. But in each of these terrifying cases, God comes through for them. That refrain is repeated again and again, isn't it?

He brought them out of their distress. He has let them thank the Lord, for example, in verse 21. The same refrain. Let them thank the Lord for His steadfast love, for His wondrous works to the children of man. Why does God give them this deliverance?

In order to make them, us, enjoy the blessing of life and its inherent goodness. Why else does God restore things? It's not just to bring out a balance, some sort of Eastern mystical belief like the Buddhist religion that says there must be a balance of good and bad in our life. You know, embrace the bad because that is just equalising life. No.

God is about restoring things to what is good. Humanity feels pain because we inherently know what things should be like. God is in the business of redeeming and restoring. And so God doesn't leave people in those situations and simply says to them, well, life is just a balance of good and bad. Get over it.

God is concerned about restoring people's lives. And so if one of the purposes of God allowing us to go through hardship is to make us look up, to awaken our spiritual senses, then one of the results of God delivering us from these hard times is to make us say the Lord is good. First, we have to look up to say, God, please save me. And when He does, the natural response is, Lord, You are good. Author Philip Yancey says, it's a terrible thing to be grateful and have no one to thank.

It's a terrible thing to be awed and have no one to worship. So the first command from Psalm 107 is a call for the redeemed, for the restored, for the rescued, all those people who have witnessed God's power to say this, the Lord is good and His love endures forever. But then not only we are to simply say these things, say the Lord is good, we are commanded to do something as well. And this leads us to the second point. Let the redeemed do this.

Give thanks to the Lord. The end of the Psalm, that verse 33 at the end says this, we are to attend to these things if we are wise. Whoever is wise, let him let them attend to these things. Let them consider the steadfast love of the Lord. And the question is, how do we attend to these things?

Well, we bring our thanks to God. We bring our thanks to God intentionally. We do something. I know many Christians that are very thankful tell me, pastor, I am so thankful. But that's where it stops.

It's not directed to God. It's not a life in awe and worship in response to those things. It is to become intentionally quiet. It's all about intentionality. Let your heart make time to be quiet.

Pour yourself that glass of wine and go sit on the veranda in the evening. Go and take that long walk on the beach by yourself. Sit around a fire in the backyard being careful not to light any bushfires. And attend to reflecting on God's unwavering love. That is what it means to give thanks.

The word that is translated here as steadfast love and it's repeated again and again, that word, steadfast love, in verse 43 that we find is the word chesed in Hebrew, which is a very special term, a very special word for the Hebrew people. It means God's promise-keeping love. It's tied to grace. It's tied to mercy. It's the love that God had for a ragtag bunch of people that had no connection with Him that God chose out of His electing grace to love, to save, to make them His people.

That is the love that is steadfast. And friends, that is the same love that has drawn us into relationship with Him. It is His grace, His electing grace that has chosen us. And so over and over again in this Psalm, all these people are found in very hard situations. But they are told to express their thanks verbally and consciously to God.

They are found in these places. They have been redeemed and now they are called. That's not where it ends. You are to give thanks to God. Have a look quickly at all these places.

Verse 8. Let them thank the Lord for His steadfast love. These are the people in the desert wastes that have found a home. In verse 15, the prisoners, let them thank the Lord for His steadfast love. In verse 21, the people that are afflicted with some sort of mental illness, let them thank the Lord for His steadfast love.

Verse 20, it says, He sent out His word and it healed them. Verse 31, those who have realised the foolishness of their ambition, but God has saved them. Let them thank the Lord for His steadfast love, for His wondrous works to the children of man. And over and over again, they are also commanded to tell one another that. To bring this out into the assembly of the people, the congregation of God and tell them this is what God has done.

Celebrate with me. Please celebrate with me. This is what God has done. So the redeemed are to give thanks to the Lord. But this means that I think we, as Open House Church, should also have something to give thanks to.

This morning is celebration Sunday. Thanksgiving Sunday. Verse 2 in Psalm 107 has told us, let the redeemed tell their story. Let the redeemed tell their story and so it's good and right for us, I think, to this morning spend some time on the story that God has been doing amongst us. And so I wanna share with you some of the things that I've been very thankful for.

And these are some of the things that our elders as well, John, Brendan and Tony have also mentioned that they are thankful for. Firstly, we are thankful for people that have this year, perhaps for the first time, given their hearts to the Lord Jesus. That is the greatest thing that we can be thankful for. That is the purpose for which we exist as a church. To not simply glorify God, although that is the greatest point and purpose, to be satisfied in Him, but to bring more people into that mission, that purpose.

You might remember on Easter Sunday that we baptised Brian. That his whole family was here to witness that. That they could hear and see the Gospel presented in his life. In a couple of months, we hopefully will baptise Cassie. And there are others this morning that are exploring Christianity, exploring the faith, thinking about what it means to be a Christian.

These are things that we can be so thankful for and God has been doing that this year and amongst us. The second thing we are thankful for is that God has been working in our small group ministry. Quentin was thankful for that. At the start of the year, we had around 50% of our church, at least the members involved in some sort of small group ministry. Our goal has been, at the start of the year, we said we want to progress that to have 75%, three quarters of our church involved in a small group because we believe that is the heartbeat of our church.

That is where we mature as Christians. That is where we are challenged and comforted and encouraged to be Christians. It's really, really important. And so at the start of the year, we had five small groups actively meeting and over the course of the year, we've had three new groups start. Now that's 60% growth.

That's great. And obviously, we're still aiming of reaching that 75% in the coming years. Another thing I'm deeply thankful for is how God is bringing many of us from all sorts of different backgrounds to worship in this one church together. You may not know it because perhaps all of these people look like white guys to you. But we represent such a diverse group of people ethnically, culturally, but also church background and everything in between.

Social status, educational levels. And in this little church, God has brought us together as a family and somehow we're sticking together. It is a miracle to be sticking together. There would be no other situation, no other club, no other social group that would cause us to simply decide to be together in the representation that we are. The demographics that we are, God has brought us together.

God has a purpose for us. We are stronger because of it and I'm thankful for that. This year we've also promised each other that we would dig a bit deeper in terms of our donations and finances. We said that at the start of our financial year in June. We're still working on our goal as a church to get to a point where we can hire a full time pastor.

We have a part time pastor here at Open House. You know that I'm currently working as a part time Bible College project manager as well. And I feel that that is not just something I'm doing because I have to. It's something that I feel called to at this time. But our church wants a full time pastor and we're moving those goalposts every year.

We're increasing that size just a little bit more so that one day we will be able to have a full time pastor. And so I'm thankful for increasing donations and generosity and finances. Another thing I'm very excited for is that we are getting new chairs and hopefully they're here at the December. This is not just chairs for the sake of chairs. By having these chairs, we're going to increase the size of our capacity.

We'll be able to have more people in this auditorium. Why? Because we like spreading along our very long benches, take up as much space as we can, and having a chair means we're going to have to sit in our spot. So we are going to move from a capacity of say a 100 to maybe a 120 or something like that, which is gonna be excellent for us. It also is time that we retire these benches because they've been around for a long time.

We actually got them second hand and you can see all the patchwork that we've had to do over the years. So it's time and I'm thankful for that. It's a few thousand dollars and and again we've worked hard fundraising at garage sales, at trivia nights, all of that has gone into making this possible. Now these are just some things for which we can be thankful for and I could go on another half an hour about other stuff, personal stuff that I know as I look over people sitting here, I know what's going on this year in their life. And I am thankful for those things.

And I thank God personally for those things. People here have had massive breakthroughs in their life. People have found work after being unemployed for a long time. Others have had family members brought back to God after fifty or sixty years away from Him. Some people have had miraculous healings in their bodies, conditions that were just lifted all of a sudden.

So much has happened this year, so much. And therefore we have so much to be thankful for. But lastly, the final thing I'm very grateful for is the work of word ministry that is being done in this church. That we are able to take this incredible message that there is a God who is good. A God who is not just good, but also powerful.

Not a sentimental God who wishes us good things, a God who does good things, who redeems, who restores, who cultivates, a God who is at work in this world. And we as a church have this responsibility and it is something that is more rare than we would like to think on the Gold Coast. You are involved in this ministry. You take that word to your workplaces, but you also bring people into this congregation to hear this truth. And it's not just me.

Our elders here demand good preachers. They demand people who will bring the word of God, who will do ministry to our kids from the word of God. And that is something that I am very, very proud of and thankful for. And all of this then leads us back to Psalm 107. Have you noticed the common threads for all these situations that have been mentioned?

The common thread. These people in hardship, the ones that are restless and homeless, the people that are prisoners, the people caught up in storms. There's a common thread to them all and that thread is that they cry out to God. The one thing all of these situations have in common is that there are hearts and minds that have been lifted to acknowledge God in their life. Some of us need to hear this morning that our efforts of trying to appease and fix our situations by obeying our hearts and doing what we think is best is ultimately destructive, is ultimately futile.

If you aren't obeying God's will, God's goodwill for your life, you are smashing your head against a brick wall. You won't find joy in that. You won't find life in that. We are creating for ourselves that prison, that dark prison. We are clamping the irons on our own wrists by pursuing that.

And we are told to lift our heads to God, to turn to Him who saves. Some of us have ambitiously set out to make our money to win our comfort. Like the merchants on the sea, we've been caught up in the storms of that business. We've been caught up in the turmoil that comes with our line of work. Perhaps they were good motives for that work or perhaps there were motives that have become a little bit more blurred recently.

Look to the Lord and be saved. Don't let the wind and the waves destroy you. Lift up your eyes to Christ so that He may reprioritise that agenda. That He may realign your ambitions. The common thread for all these people giving thanks to God in Psalm 107 is they have found themselves in very hard situations, but they have done the wisest thing anyone can do and that's how the Psalm finishes, doesn't it?

Whoever is wise, let him attend to these things. Whoever is wise, let them consider the steadfast love of the Lord. And so my prayer is that you will hear that the Lord is very good. Whether that is through Psalm 107 this morning or whether that is in the story of the redeemed people saying it together this morning. In either case, may you consider the love of the Lord so that you may know that the Lord is good.

His steadfast love endures forever. And then in knowing His goodness, that you will not do what little Noah did and say, thank you mommy, when daddy's done all the work. Know God's goodness and thank Him for being your Lord and your saviour. Let's pray. Father, we magnify Your name.

We, as a redeemed people, being redeemed first and foremostly by the work of Jesus Christ on our behalf on the cross. We thank You, Lord Jesus, that we may stand here this morning. We may be in this place together this morning to say to one another, yes, the Lord has done this and it is marvellous in our eyes. He has redeemed us. He has brought us into eternal fellowship with Him and we are thankful for that.

Heavenly Father, as a giver of all things that are good, we also thank You for what You have done in each of our lives this year and it has been a big year. It has been a long year. But we pause this morning to thank You. Thank You for the work that You are doing in our kids' lives. As they are getting older, as some of them are graduating, Lord, we thank You that they are Your children.

We thank You that You love them, that You have called them. We thank You that they know You. Please protect them. Please guard their hearts. Lord Jesus, we thank You for our work.

We thank You that we can be tired at the end of the week. We thank You that we can invest our energies, our gifts, Lord, and we pray that we may see these things as being in service of You as You build Your kingdom here on earth even through our work. Lord, we thank You for our church, this family that we can call our own. We thank You that we can be with them this morning. We thank You for all these things that have been mentioned now that You have done, the lives that have been saved, people that have come to faith.

We pray, Lord, for next year that You may continue to do that even more. Lord, we are ready and we are willing to work and we are willing to celebrate even more this time next year. Father, You are good, and Your love endures forever. And so, Lord, this morning, we give You thanks. In Jesus' name, amen.