This sermon was preached on Sunday July 29th, at the Cornerstone Baptist Church in Cherry Log, GA
by Rev. Paul Mims.

Psalm 37:1-7,25-27,34

Someone has said, “The person who has no problems is out of the game.”
This is the philosophy of the late Norman Vincent Peale. He said, “One day I was walking down the street when I saw my friend George approaching. It was evident from his downtrodden look that he wasn’t overflowing with the exuberance of human existence which is a high-class way of saying that George was dragging bottom.”

“Naturally, I asked him, ‘How are you, George?’ While that was meant to be a routine inquiry, George took me very seriously and for fifteen minutes he enlightened me on how bad he felt. And the more he talked, the worse I felt.”

“Finally, I said to him, ‘Well, George, I’m sorry to see you in such a depressed state. How did you get this way?’ That really set him off. ‘It’s my problems,’ he said. ‘Problems, nothing but problems. I’m fed up with problems, if you could get rid of all my problems, I would contribute $5,000 to your favorite charity.’”
“Well now, I am never one to turn a deaf ear to such an offer. So I meditated, ruminated, and cogitated on the proposition and came up with an answer that I thought was pretty good. I said, Yesterday, I went to a place where thousands of people reside. As far as I could determine, not one of them has any problems. Would you like to go there?”

“When can we leave? That sounds like my kind of place,” answered George.
“If that’s the case, George, I’ll be happy to take you tomorrow to Woodlawn Cemetery because the only people who don’t have any problems are dead.”

So what do you do when you feel overwhelmed with problems and you don’t know what to do?
David was a man of many problems. In his old age he looks back over his life and offers us advice on what to do. Psalm 37 is a treasure of spiritual wisdom. There are eight precepts for the person of faith to follow. If these steps are followed you will come out a winner every time.

I. DON’T LET YOUR EMOTIONS CONTROL YOU. (v.1) “Do not fret because of evil men or be envious of those who do wrong…”

The dictionary defines “fret” as: to be vexed or troubled; worry; to be worn or eaten away; become corroded; to move agitatedly; to gnaw with the teeth in the manner of a rodent.”
It is so easy to fall into fretting when someone does you wrong. Your spirit is vexed and troubled. The climate of your soul is stormy. Your mind is given over to worry. You feel like your life is being eaten away. You become agitated with those around you. You move your mouth like you are gnawing on something. To put it simply, your emotions are in an uproar. You look at people who do not even claim to serve the Lord and they seem to be doing fine and you are not. It is easy to be envious of them.
All of this can happen if you give your emotions free rein. When we do that, the storm gets out of control and will not abate for a long while.

David indicates that he had to learn the hard way. Those were terrible times when his emotions ran rampant. But he learned to face problems and to control his emotions. You see, he learned that God would deal with evil people: “…for like the grass they will soon wither, like green plants they will soon die away.”

II. REALIZE THAT THE OUTWARD ACTIONS OF YOUR LIFE DEPEND ON YOUR INNER STRENGTHS. (v.3) “Trust in the Lord and do good.”

Life for the believer is really a faith walk. The more we grow in faith, the more we have to walk by faith. What is happening on the inside of you controls what will happen outwardly in your life. What we think, we become. What we project usually happens.

The “faith center” is the control center of your life. So what is going on inside of us is shaping what happens in our lives.

David had times when he walked by faith in god and times when he walked by faith in himself alone. When he walked by faith in God, he was able to do good. When he walked alone, he did not want to do good. The same is true of us. When we walk alone, we have to draw on our full nature; and that includes our lower nature, which does not want to do good.

The promise is that if we trust the Lord and do good we will dwell in the land and enjoy safe pasture. This means that life will be meaningful and that God’s safety net of provision will be under us.
Pastor James Brown said, “There is no situation I can get into that God cannot get me out. Some years ago when I was learning to fly, my instructor told me to put the plane into a steep and extended dive. I was totally unprepared for what was about to happen. After a brief time the engine stalled, and the plane began to plunge out-of-control. It soon became evident that the instructor was not going to help me at all. After a few seconds, which seemed like eternity, my mind began to function again. I quickly corrected the situation.

Immediately I turned to the instructor and began to vent my fearful frustrations on him. He very calmly said to me, “There is no position you can get this airplane into that I cannot get you out of. If you want to learn to fly, go up there and do it again.” At that moment God seemed to be saying to me, “Remember this. As you serve me, there is no situation you can get yourself into that I cannot get you out of. If you trust me, you will be all right. That lesson has been proven true in my ministry many times over the years.” James Brown, Evangeline Baptist Church, Wildsville, LA, in Discoveries.

III. FOCUS YOUR MIND ON THE LORD (v.4) “Delight yourself in the Lord…”
David is telling us that he had to become a God-focused person. He was a king, but that which gave him joy was not his power in ruling the nation, but his submission to the power of God. He was wealthy, but his delight was not in his riches. His security was in God. David gave audience to the rulers of the world who came to visit him. But his real delight was when God gave him audience. He contemplated the great matters of state, but what delighted his heart was meditating on the Word of God.

If your busy life is so focused on God that he is your delight, then all of your daily concerns will have the undergirding of your spiritual strength.

The promise is that if you delight in God, He will give you the desires of your heart. In that context there is no conflict between His will and your will.

IV. PLACE YOUR FUTURE IN GOD’S HANDS (v.5) “Commit your way to the Lord; trust in him and he will do this…”

One of the hardest things to let go of is the future. We can disengage the past, for it is behind us. We can give God the present, for we can see it. But when it comes to the future, which we cannot see, or control, it is very hard to say to God, “I commit my way to you.” It is hard because we are very reluctant to give up control of our lives and we do not know what God may do with us.
The promise is that “He will make your righteousness shine like the dawn, the justice of your cause like the noonday sun.”

The Summer Olympics are in progress in London. There are always exciting stories about how the participants paid a great price to get there. But one from 1988 illustrates this truth.
Robert Sutton says, “A television program preceding the 1988 Winter Olympics told of blind skiers being trained for slalom skiing, impossible as that sounds. Paired with sighted skiers, the blind skiers were taught on the flats how to make right and left turns. When that was mastered, they were taken to the slalom slope, where their sighted partners skied beside them shouting, “Left!” and “Right!” As they obeyed the commands, they were able to negotiate the course and cross the finish line, depending solely on the sighted skiers’ word. It was either complete trust or catastrophe.

What a vivid picture of the Christian life! In this world, we are in reality blind about what course to take. We must rely solely on the Word of the only One who is truly sighted–God Himself. His Word gives us the direction we need to finish the course.”

V. BE PATIENT WITH GOD (vv.7, 11) “Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him“…

The problem with waiting is that we tend to feel that nothing is happening. But in a way that we cannot see, God is at work bringing all things together for our good. We interpret action with work. With God, stillness and visible inaction is great work. God is on his own timetable and when he acts, it will be right.
The promise is that he will give you peace. “But the meek will inherit the land and enjoy great peace.” The conflicts of today will be over and you will enjoy peace.

VI. BE REMINDED THAT GOD NEVER FORSAKES HIS FAITHFUL PEOPLE (vv.25-26) “I was young and now am old, yet I have never seen the righteous forsaken or their children begging bread…their children will be blessed.”

David’s testimony in his old age is that he has never seen the righteous forsaken. What about you? Have you ever seen God forsake one of his own faithful? Then why do you fear that he will forsake you?
One of my greatest joys is how I see God blessing my children. But my greatest joy is to see their deep walk with the Lord and their faithful service to him in their service to him in their churches and careers. You see, God blesses me by blessing them. Also the blessings that we have known here at Cornerstone, which we will celebrate on PRAISE SUNDAY, are from his gracious hand. God blesses me by blessing you.

VII. FORSAKE EVIL AND DO WHAT IS RIGHT (v.27) “Turn from evil and do what is good…”

Our evil nature would like to retaliate toward those who seek to harm us. David learned that God would handle those situations and that the wisest thing was to do the right thing for all concerned.
It may not be apparent at the moment, but God honors those who treat others fairly.
On a weathered monument in England is the saying, “In the worst of times, he did the best of things.”

VIII. FACE THE FUTURE WITH OBEDIENT EXPECTATION (v.34) “Wait for the Lord and keep his way…”

In a time of uncertainty many Christians tend to become lax about their spiritual lives and fall prey to the wiles of the devil. The reasoning is, “If God is not going to work this out for me, then I am not going to keep my spiritual disciplines.” This is the point where some have shipwreck of faith. The waiting time is a time of testing and a time of getting ready for what God is going to do. If we pass the test and have acted properly, then the blessings will be sweet indeed. We can look forward with expectation to what God will do in our lives. The promise is that God will bless us. If we follow these eight precepts we will do the right thing in a time when we do not know what to do. And in the course of time we will be into a new era in our lives. It is like the story told by Randy Licklinter about a man crossing the Nevada desert.
“There was a man who got lost in the desert. After wandering around for a long time his throat became very dry, about that time he saw a little shack in the distance. He made his way over to the shack and found a water pump with a small jug of water and a note.

The note read: “pour all the water into the top of the pump to prime it, if you do this you will get all the water you need”. Now the man had a choice to make, if he trusted the note and poured the water in and it worked he would have all the water he needed. If it didn’t work he would still be thirsty and he might die. Or he could choose to drink the water in the jug and get immediate satisfaction, but it might not be enough and he still might die. After thinking about it the man decided to risk it. He poured the entire jug into the pump and began to work the handle, at first nothing happened and he got a little scared but he kept going and water started coming out. So much water came out he drank all he wanted, took a shower, and filled all the containers he could find. Because he was willing to give up momentary satisfaction, he got all the water he needed. Now the note also said: after you have finished, please refill the jug for the next traveler.” The man refilled the jug and added to the note: “Please prime the pump, believe me it works”!

If we will prime the faith pump we will know what to do when we do not know what to do.

PRAISE BE TO HIS NAME!