“Your people will offer themselves freely on the day of your power…” Psalm 110:3

Psalm 110 shows us a victorious King, and a people who willingly offer themselves to Him. The language of v.3 carries the idea of a freewill offering… not guilt, pressure, or obligation, but people gladly placing themselves at the King’s disposal.

Jesus isn’t looking for volunteers because He needs workers. He creates willing people because He has captured their hearts. When we truly see the King, availability becomes our response.

This week take the sermon to the table: Where is Jesus asking for your “yes”? In your home? Your marriage? Your work? Serving? Generosity? Sharing your faith? A conversation you’ve avoided?

Psalm 110 doesn’t describe perfect people. It describes willing ones who have encountered an extraordinary King.

In Psalm 4 we see how David’s example shows us how to navigate stressful situations prayerfully, trusting God through whom he experienced joy and peace.

1. What have been some unhealthy ways you have dealt with stress?

Do you blow up with anger?

Do you freeze up with fear and anxiety?

Do you give up in despair and discouragement?

Do you shut down or try to escape?

Do you busy yourself with work, activities, or entertainment to avoid stress?

The pressures that we experience in our life can often come in between us in our relationships, including in our relationship with God. We would do well if we would allow those pressures to move towards God in prayer rather than allow to move us away from Him who is source of life, help and hope that we need.

In Psalm 22, a passion psalm, the suffering of our Lord is described prophetically. Though David wrote the psalm and experienced a great deal of suffering in his own life, it ultimately points us to Christ and was prophetically fulfilled in him as he carried out God's great redemptive plan by dying for the sin of the world. Here are some ways we can apply this to our lives.

• Consider Jesus and his great suffering for us (Hebrews 12:3) 

• Celebrate the victory that is brought to us through the suffering, death, burial, and resurrection of Christ.  

• Cry out to God in prayer using some of the language of the Psalms of lament when you are walking through suffering and stressful times. 

• Be comforted by the knowing that you are not alone in your suffering and that the Lord has not been aloof to it. Christ allowed himself to feel the pain that we experience in this life and one day will remove suffering from our lives altogether in the age to come.  

• Comfort others who are walking through affliction and suffering (2 Cor. 1:4). 

• Be confident knowing that your suffering will be turned for your good and bring God glory (Romans 8:28-29, 2 Corinthians 4:17).

God blesses His people to be a blessing to the nations for their salvation and joy and God’s praise and honor.

Repentance and reliance on the mercy of God were David’s responses to his sin and are our proper responses to our sin as well.

This psalm teaches us that the worst of sinners who repent and rely on God’s mercy can experience sweet forgiveness, restored joy, renewed spirit, cleansed heart and nearness to God. This is only because God is merciful and gracious, loving and forgiving.

“The function of this psalm, as a song sung by the entire congregation, is to shape their hearts so that they feel this at the deepest level, lest they ever presume upon the grace of God.” - C. John Collins, ESV Study Bible Notes, p.1000

In this sermon we see that God renews His people when they remember Him, return to Him in prayer, and heed His word.

This is a podcast from primarily sermons preached at City Church Garland.

In Psalm 78 we see that God raises shepherds who know Him deeply, and faithfully lead others so that the next generation sets its hope in God. He challenged us parents to transfer God’s redemption story to our children that they might set their hope in God and not be unfaithful to the Lord.

In this teaching, Dr. Justin Bass shares the historical background as to how we got the powerful epistle of 1 John.

God calls his people to give him their highest loyalty and to guard against competing desires, affections, and ideologies.