So if you’ve been with us, let’s pray and then you can be seated. Father, again, we ask that You would meet with us here and now. We ask that You would speak to us through Your Word, Lord, by Your Spirit. Give us ears to hear. Even now, be softening our hearts to receive Your Word, for Your Word is life. Your eternal life. And so I pray that You would help me now, Lord, to put forth Your Son, Jesus. And that we would all be in awe of Him this morning. And it’s in His name we pray. Amen. And be seated.

If you’ve been with us over the past couple of weeks, Pastor Chad has preached through the book of Jude. And just as an overarching rehash of it, just the necessity and the importance of pretending. Protecting the doctrine. Protecting what God has said in His Word. Not letting it become twisted or distorted by wicked men or even ignorance. And just the importance of being a word-saturated people. So as Christians, we are word-saturated people. It’s how we know God. It’s how we come to believe in Him. And so with that, it’s going to sort of launch me into this morning. And just as we are. We are word-saturated people. We are a people who are about evangelism. Our lives are about reaching the lost with that word that we so tightly keep to the best. And we protect and guard. And so we know, just like Jesus said, His words are eternal life. And so we want to reach out and present that word to as many people as we can. And to present to them the truth and the name, the only name under heaven by which they can be saved. And that’s Jesus. And so as we talk about evangelism, there are a number of texts that we could go to to illustrate how you could go about it or different scenarios and circumstances. But I feel like all too often, maybe we don’t prepare enough first. We don’t ready ourselves to engage a lost world, a hostile world, a dying world with what they need most. And so when we do it, we limp in or we do it. We do it with timidity or we’re not bold with it. Or maybe we just don’t know what exactly to say. Maybe all we have is what we learned in Sunday school when we were kids. And, hey, Jesus died for your sins. And that is true. And it is the very essence of the gospel, right? For sinners, God sent His only Son to come and to die and to pay the penalty for that sin that we might be reconciled to Him. That’s the gospel at its core. And that must be the foundation of evangelism. Our evangelism. But I feel like if we don’t build around that and have a full-orbed worldview of what God says in His Word and how we’re to go about that, we’re not going to be maybe as effective as we could be. We’re not going to be as passionate about it as we could be. And so the word saturation, I believe, will propel you to be an evangelistic person. Okay? And so I’m just going to try to flesh that out for you this morning. And I’m going to use Psalm 145 because I feel like David gives us a good starting point, a good recipe for how he would do that. So if you’ll turn to Psalm 145 with me, we’ll just read through it, and then I’ll walk through it with you.

He says, I will extol you. I will heap up praises to you, my God. O King, I will bless your name forever and ever. Every day, I’ll bless you. I’ll praise your name forever and ever. Great is the Lord, and highly to be praised. And His greatness is unsearchable. One generation shall praise your works to another, and shall declare your mighty acts. On the glorious splendor of your majesty, and on your wonderful works, I will meditate. Men shall speak of the power of your awesome acts. And I will tell of your greatness. They shall eagerly utter the memory of your abundant goodness, and will shout joyfully of your righteousness. The Lord is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and great in loving kindness. The Lord is good to all, and His mercies are over all His works. All your works shall give thanks to you, O Lord, and your godly ones shall bless you. They shall speak of the glory of your kingdom, and talk of your praise. They shall praise your power, to make known to the sons of men your mighty acts, and the glory of the majesty of your kingdom. Your kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and your dominion endures throughout all generations. The Lord sustains all who fall, and He raises up all who are bowed down. The eyes of all look to you, and you give them their food in due time. You open your hand, and satisfy the desire of every living thing. The Lord is righteous. The Lord is righteous in all His ways, and kind in all His deeds. The Lord is near to all who call upon Him, to all who call upon Him in truth. He will fulfill the desire of those who fear Him. He will also hear their cry, and will save them. The Lord keeps all who love Him, but all the wicked He will destroy. My mouth will speak the praise of the Lord. And all flesh will bless His holy name forever and ever.

There’s a passage in 1 Peter, and it’s oftentimes used for evangelism, and it’s where we get our word apologetic from. In 1 Peter 3, 15 and 16, Peter says to always be ready to give, apologia, to give a defense or a reason for the hope that is within you. And I feel like we always start there. Be ready. Know the gospel. Know these things. Be ready for this. But we miss what Peter says right before that. This is what he says. Sanctify Jesus Christ as Lord in your hearts. And then, always be ready to give an account, to give a defense. And so I feel like that’s an important piece that we, we overlook, we pass over it. And so if you don’t get that first part right, you’re not going to be as effective when you give your defense, when you give your reason. Maybe you won’t even have a defense, because you don’t know fully that Christ is Lord in your heart. And you see in verse 1, David does just that. In his psalm of praise, he says, I will extol you, my God and my King. In 1 Peter, the word for Lord there is kudios, in the Greek, it just means supreme. It means authority. It’s the highest level that you can get. And so you place Christ, you place Him as God, Lord, kudios, in your heart. He is the highest, first, foremost. And so when you do that, that will govern everything else that you do in your life. Right? And so we must begin with the knowledge of God. David starts out praising God. I’ll bless your name forever and ever. I’ll bless you every day. He resolves to make God’s name known and to praise Him, and He is worthy of our praises. And to praise God is to know God. You can’t praise God whom you don’t know. And I don’t mean just a simple intellectual knowledge. Anyone, anyone can come to this book and know something about God. But what I mean is a knowledge that’s intimate, it’s a loving knowledge. If you look in the Greek Septuagint, which is the Greek version of the Old Testament, the word used in John 17 by Jesus, He says, To know you, Father, is eternal life. The same word for knowing there is the same word used when Genesis 4 gives us an account that Adam knew his wife Eve and they conceived a child. And so I’m not directing your mind to something, something unsavory, but it’s an intimate knowledge. It’s not just simply an intellectual knowledge. And so get to know God. Sanctify Him as Lord in your hearts. He is supreme. So David then goes on from a general exhorting himself and us to know God and to praise Him for what we know of Him. He gets more specific about what, what he does know about God. And he gets more specific about the praises that are due God. And so the first thing that I notice here in this passage is that God is known for His splendor. God is splendor in nature and character. So you think about God as eternal. He has no beginning and He has no end. He knows all. The Scripture says that God knows every hair on your head. He knows every single star by name. His knowledge is inexhaustible. His greatness is inexhaustible, it says. You can go on and on and on about God’s character. So praise Him. Know Him for who He is as a person, God. Know the splendor of His works, His creative works. You can open up to the very, very first verse in the Bible. In the beginning, God created. Out of nothing, He brought into being everything. And so God stretched out the heavens. He set the world and the heavens in an orderly fashion. He holds them together. That’s splendid. Let me give you some synonyms of splendor. It means brilliance, gloriousness,

grandness, magnificence, majesty, nobility. To contrast that, you would be modest, unimpressive, ordinary, undistinguished. God’s works are splendid. They stand apart. He is the only one who can bring something into being from nothing. Because He existed before there was anything. He doesn’t exist before there was anything. Right? Think about supernatural works. Just recently, reading in Judges, Gideon, God calls him to gather an army. And Gideon’s like, well, Lord, you’re going to have to show me a sign. I’m not really sure. And so he sets out the skin outside. And he says, okay, the skin will be dry and the earth will be full of dew. And God brings it to pass. That’s a supernatural. The God who brought the natural into order and governs it has the authority and the ability to go outside of that and do something supernatural. So he can do that. And then Gideon’s still unsure. He says, okay, okay, okay. Now make the skin wet and leave the ground dry. And so God does it. And think about Elijah in 1 Kings 16. 16. He tells Ahab that there’s going to be a drought. And it’s judgment. He’s prophesying. And so after this, he’s thirsty and he meets up with a widow. And he asks the widow for a drink of water. And so on her way out, she’s going. He says, oh, wait, by the way, bring me a piece of bread back too. And she says, well, as sure as God is, I can’t do that because all I have is a bowl full of flour. And a jar full of oil. And Elijah says, you know, you bring me the bread and God will continually supply your flour and your oil until he sends rain again. How does that happen? God’s splendor. He goes outside of the ordinary and accomplishes what he wants to accomplish when he wants to accomplish. He wants to accomplish. Think about personal experiences of splendor in your own life.

Has God ever gone outside of what makes sense to you? I’m not saying we go around looking for these spiritual experiences, but surely there’s been a time in your life when I don’t know how I’m going to pay these bills. I think about…

Baby Gallagher, Baby William, born super early. And God has given doctors wisdom. He has given mankind grace upon grace. And so he sustains Baby William’s life. To me, that’s God’s splendor, not chance, or not merely man’s knowledge. I will give glory and credit to a God who made the brain rather than the person who possesses the brain. Think about anything in your life that God has ever… Do you have a wayward son or daughter and they’ve come back home? They’ve repented. They’ve turned back to the Lord. That’s a splendid work of God that only he can accomplish.

And he says that one generation shall praise your works to another. And so another thing about God’s splendor is that it is enduring. God doesn’t just sometimes do splendid things. He’s not sometimes… He’s not sometimes full of splendor. God is splendid, always. He is magnificent. He is never ordinary, modest, or unimpressive, ever. God is God. And so we must sanctify him in our hearts as that. David says he will think on these things and meditate on them. Constantly remind yourself of God’s works. Everything from natural trees growing to supernatural works in your life, when God shows up, in a way that no one else can. Think about these things often. Know him as splendid.

And teach them. Teach them to your kids. Learn them from your parents, from your grandparents. I’m thankful that my parents taught me of the Lord growing up. I’m thankful that I was brought to church to hear the gospel. I’m thankful that God has blessed me with children, children to advance his kingdom with. I’m thankful that I have a daughter. Just the other day, she’s learning how to write and how to read. She said, Dad, how do you spell Jesus died for our sins? And my heart is just overwhelmed. But that’s part of the next generation proclaiming God’s goodness and praising him. Jesus died for my sins, Dad. How do you write that? Hang it on your phone. Hang it on the fridge.

So teach. Even if it’s not your kids, surely you know people in your life that are of a different generation than you, that you can learn from, both learn from and teach. And so do that.

Know God for his supreme kingship.

I think in verse 7,

they shall eagerly utter the memory of your abundant goodness and will shout joyfully of your righteousness. Eagerly. Eagerly utter what sort of king you have over your life, the Lord of your life. His abundant goodness. Shout joyfully. Don’t come in all drab. Hey, have you ever heard of Jesus? Man. Act like you’ve been brought from death to life. Right? Shout joyfully about God. Sing his praises.

He’s good. He’s gracious. And he’s a kind king. In verse 8, David is not coming up with attributes of God for himself. He’s almost surely referring to Exodus 34, verse 6, where God actually, to Moses, declares this about himself. See, Moses had received the Ten Commandments on the tablets. He comes down. They had made the golden calf. Man, what’s wrong with these people? Right? Well, what is the deal here? Worshiping idols ain’t even going a month. So, he breaks the tablets. Well, God calls him back up on top of the mountain. And he says, you bring the tablets. I’m going to write them. I’m going to write my laws on the tablets. Again, just like the first ones. And he does that. And he says, the Lord announces himself, I am the Lord God. And he says, I am gracious. I am merciful. I am slow to anger. I am full of loving kindness and truth. I forgive iniquity. All of these things. So, David is not coming up with his own attributes for God. He’s simply quoting the law. He’s quoting what God has revealed about himself. So, David knows, he knows God. He knows what God has said about himself. And that’s important. So, think about what a good and gracious and a kind king God is.

These people were just delivered from the house of slavery. They were just brought out of Egypt. God had shown himself in a mighty way to these people. And their leader is going, pfft, pfft, pfft, pfft, pfft, pfft, pfft, pfft, pfft, pfft, pfft, pfft, pfft, pfft, pfft, pfft, pfft, pfft, pfft, pfft, pfft, pfft, pfft, pfft, pfft, pfft. And they’ve made a golden calf and they’re worshiping it. Yet, God still calls Moses back up on the mountain. Here’s who I am. Write it down. Tell the people. He’s good. He’s gracious. And he’s kind. He’s slow to anger. God is not in heaven waiting for us to mess up so he can wipe us out. He’s slow to anger. He’s merciful. His grace, he sort of extends all of these things to us. His mercy, he doesn’t right off the bat count our iniquities against us. He gives us time to turn. He gives us a chance to repent.

He’s slow to anger. I’m sure there have been times God is getting frustrated with me. Maybe not. I know as a dad, you can only tell, I’m sure my dad, can attest to this, you can only tell your kids so many times what you want them to do or what they need to do before you get frustrated. Before you want to whack them. You can only take so much. But God does not like us. He’s higher. He’s greater. And so he forbears thousands of years of people’s sins over and again and constant heaping up sins. And he’s just slow to anger.

God doesn’t reveal himself as this mighty, terrible, terrifying God. If he did, who would ever come to him? Yes, he is those things. God should be feared.

But he reveals himself as good. He condescends. The God of everything condescends himself. And comes down and reveals himself to Moses in some manifestation and speaks with him. And ultimately he has done so in his son Jesus. He has humbled himself to the point that he became a man and died on a nasty, wooden, rugged cross so that we could know him if we would turn and repent and believe.

One commentator says it like this on that topic. He says, We’re God to bring his power prominently into view before us. We would be cast down by the terror of it rather than be encouraged.

As the papists represent him a dreadful God from whose presence all must fly, whereas the proper view of him is that which invites us to seek after him. Accordingly, the more nearly that a person feels himself drawn to God, the more has he advanced in the knowledge of him. So, if you really get to know God, you will see him as good and kind and gentle and patient and forgiving and loving and tender and merciful. You will see him as that because that’s how he has shown himself.

And not only is he good to those who love him, he’s good to all.

Think about how many wicked people, how many wicked nations are here today and they’re still eating. They’re still breathing. God says he makes the sun to rise on the righteous and the wicked. God is good to all. He gives all time to come. Time to turn from their wickedness and see him for who he is.

So, in his supreme kingship, he is the king of kings. All are subject to him. There is no king rivaling him. There is no king equal to him. There is no king who will ever conquer him. He’s the king of kings. The lord of lords. Nothing is outside of his rule. It may seem that way. You look around the world, you get on Facebook, you read the news. It may seem that God is distant or unaware, unaware of what’s going on here or maybe he doesn’t care, but that’s not true. The New Testament tells us that all things will be brought subject to Christ as king. There is nothing outside of his authority. Everything, again, from nature. Nature is subject to his authority. It is part of his kingdom. Individuals, you are not outside, you are not exempt from the lordship, of Christ, whether you believe it or not. The scripture says that every tongue will confess, every knee will bow one day that Christ is lord. So please do it now, willingly. Set apart God as lord in your heart, willingly.

There is no government outside of his control. Kingdoms rise and fall by the hand of God. He accomplishes his purposes with nations, with governments. It might not make sense to us now, but that’s the point. You trust. You trust in who God is. You believe in your heart of hearts that he is the king of kings. And all that stuff going on out there, it won’t cause you to be an anxious person. It won’t cause you to fret and to worry. It won’t cause you to make rash decisions. And be overly consumed in politics and all this and that because you know the king of kings is there and he’s governing it all.

And David also lets us know that his kingdom endures forever. He is an everlasting king. That’s good news to me because there’s never a chance that evil, there’s never a chance that someone who is not my God, my king, will ever overstate or overthrow his lordship. No, on the contrary, one day, God will have enough. God will say, this is it. And he will throw down all who are not with him. But on that day, all who are with him will live with him forever in peace and communion and enjoy his fellowship forever. And that will never be overthrown. That will never change. That’s good news. That’s something that you can be sure in. You can hope in it. Why do you hope in Jesus? Because he’s an everlasting king and no one will ever conquer him.

Know him.

David also points to God and he exhorts us to know him for his shepherding hand.

In verse 14, he says, the Lord sustains all who fall and he raises up all who are bowed down.

The eyes of all look to you and you give them their food in due time. You open your hand and satisfy the desire of every living thing.

Have you ever been broken hearted or despaired of whatever is going on in your life? Cancer?

Financial issues? Whatever it may be. You can know that God is there with those who fall down. God cares for you in your distresses. God knows them. He’s well acquainted with them. We read the passage last week that Christ can relate to all of our struggles with all of our temptations with all of our our our our I everything that goes on here but yet he’s without sin. So he knows he’s well acquainted with our grief and our sorrow. And so if you’re low this morning if you’re if you’re despairing if you’re if you’re broken if you need restoration know God for his shepherding hand. God doesn’t just leave the sick sheep over there to die and move on with the rest of them. He’s the flock. God will leave the rest and come and grab the one who’s run away the one who’s broken the one who needs help. God is tender and he cares for you.

He’s also a provider. He says that all look to him for their needs and he opens up his hand to satisfy the desire of all the living. So we don’t have to worry. Jesus said that the birds they don’t have homes and they don’t have store barns but yet God feeds them. How much more will he take care of you?

I’m not in the position now that I’m wondering where my next meal will come from but if that were ever to be my lot in life I pray that I know God and that I trust him. That he’s not going to leave me to starve. And if that were to come about in my life it’s because he has deemed it to be good and right and I need to be okay with that because I know God and I know he is my shepherd.

And I know that he will never leave me or forsake me or lose me. Jesus in John 10 says that he is the great shepherd. He lays down his life for the sheep. He’s there with us. He’s there caring for us. Tending to us. Providing for us. Feeding us. All the time. All the time. Jesus also says in John 10 that no one can snatch us out of his hand. No one can snatch us out of the Father’s hand. He and the Father are one. They are together in saving his people. Nothing can break us away. Not hunger or famine or persecution or trial or tribulation or death. Anything. Nothing can separate me from the love of Christ Jesus. Nothing.

So know God.

Know God for his saving love.

Verse 17 it says the Lord is righteous in all his ways and kind in all his deeds.

That’s comforting to those who are with him to know that he’s righteous. He cannot do but right. By his very nature he can only do right. And he’s always good in all his ways.

It’s amazing to know that if you want to see the greatest example of God’s righteousness look to the cross. There’s never been a more grand display of it.

Because sin unrighteousness must be dealt with. It cannot go unpunished. God must deal with it. And so your sins were not swept to the side passed over anything like that. No, they were put on Christ Jesus said he who knew no sin became sin on our behalf. He bore our sins in his body on the cross. Those sins were dealt with. Righteousness was served. That’s good news for you and me. Thank the Lord. Praise him for his saving love. For his righteousness.

Kindness.

The Lord is near to all who call on him. Call upon him. The psalmist also says somewhere that the Lord is near to the broken hearted. Just know that if you call on him he’s listening. The psalmist says he hears our prayers. He knows. He cares. Again. So in your distress if you’re one of his children and you call to him you can trust because his word says so. He’s there. He’s near to you. He’s not distant. Condition your mind to believe that. Make your heart to know that. He cares. He’s near. And so when you when you tell others about the saving love of God tell them that they can be sure if you will call out to God in truth if you will truly in your heart reach out to the saving love of God he will hear you. And he will answer without a doubt. You can know that. And so when you engage people with the gospel you can be sure that if you call out and you’re truthful in your heart he will hear you and he’ll answer.

He’ll fulfill the desire of those who fear him. And he’ll also hear their cry and save them. Again if you’ll reach out to him if you’ll call out save me God he’ll save you without a doubt.

And the Lord keeps all who love him.

And I think back again to Jesus and John 10 just the surety of my salvation in him. It’s not on me. It’s not of my own power. It’s not of my own doing. My own strength. None of it. God called me and saved me he’s saving me today and he has promised to keep me forever. And that’s all I have. That’s my hope.

And I love him. The Lord keeps all those who love him. He won’t lose any of them but he’ll raise them up on the last day.

But all the wicked he will destroy. And so that’s a warning.

Those who fail to repent those who go on gladly rebelling against God’s law those who go on sinning though they’ve been warned will be dealt with as wicked and will be punished.

My mouth my mouth will speak the praise of the Lord and all flesh will bless his holy name forever and ever. And so see from beginning to end what David does here. He starts out and he lets you know that the Lord of his heart is God. He sanctified him. He adores God. He praises God as such. And he lists all these different reasons that he has to praise God.

So think on him often. Know God. Read his word. Be word saturated so that you know him. And then you have a reason for the hope that is within you. Think about all the times that God has shown up and done splendid works in your life. Think about what a good and a kind king he is. Think about what a good shepherd he is. He provides for us. He keeps us and he tends to us. And think about his saving love in the face of Christ.

If you know him then you can make him known.

So when you think about evangelism saturate yourself with God. Make your life about praising him. Make your heart to overflow with the knowledge of him. And then I’m almost sure of it that when you go about in your daily life and maybe the atheist asks you a question or someone who is broken comes to you for counsel or advice or maybe you have a drug addicted family member or maybe you just know someone who is going through it or whatever the case may be you have an answer because you know God. You know who to point them to and you can be sure of it. You can rest in it.

So know God and make him known. It’s as simple as that.

Pray with me.

Father I thank you for revealing yourself to us and your word and the world around us

for condescending to us sending your son Jesus said that if we know him we know you if we’ve seen him we’ve seen you.

So I just thank you Lord for your infinite goodness for your infinite goodness towards us your infinite mercy I thank you for ruling over us

I thank you for providing for us and keeping us Lord and I thank you for saving us

Lord we just praise your name this morning in Jesus name Amen