Joy in Forgiveness Part 1 — Chuck Smith

Welcome to the Word for Today, the broadcast ministry of Pastor Chuck Smith of Calvary Chapel, Costa Mesa, California. Pastor Chuck is currently leading us on a verse-by-verse venture through the entire Bible.

And on today's edition of the Word for Today, we'll be continuing with joy in forgiveness as we pick up in the 106th Psalm, beginning with verse 1. And now with today's message, here's Pastor Chuck Smith.

Praise for God's Goodness and Enduring Mercy

There are many psalms that begin with the word hallelujah and they end with the word hallelujah. This is the first of those many psalms. It begins with the Hebrew word hallelujah. It ends with the Hebrew word hallelujah.

Hallel, in Hebrew, is praise. Yah is the Hebrew contraction for Jehovah or Yahweh. So praise Yahweh or praise the Lord. And so it is translated, praise ye the Lord. Give thanks unto the Lord. Now, you are to give thanks to the Lord here for two reasons.

Number one, He is good. Number two, His mercy endureth forever. The psalmist will first of all speak to us in this psalm of the goodness of God. And then the psalmist will go on to show us how that the mercy of God endures forever.

So he sort of sets the tone in the first verse, give thanks to the Lord. Praise the Lord. Give thanks to the Lord. He is good. His mercy endureth forever. In speaking about the goodness of God, the psalmist questions, who can utter His mighty acts?

Who can show forth all of His praise? The works of God, so marvelous, so wonderful. We look around the universe. We look around the earth. We see the works of God. Who can declare them? They're just marvelous.

The psalmist said, blessed are they that keep judgment, that is, God's judgments, and he that doeth righteousness at all times. The psalmist prayed, remember me, O Lord, with the favor that you bear unto your people.

O visit me with your salvation, that I may see the good of thy chosen, that I may rejoice in the gladness of thy nation, that I may glory with thine inheritance. So he wants God to remember him and to visit him in order that I might, in turn, see the good of being chosen by thee.

God's Calling and the Believer's Spiritual Inheritance

Paul, when he was praying for the Ephesians, perhaps had this psalm in his mind. For as Paul prayed for the Ephesians, he prayed for them, there in chapter 1, that God might give to them the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of God, that they might know what is the hope of their calling.

Lord, help me to realize how wonderful it is that you chose me. As Paul lists the blessings of God, he begins the book of Ephesians by saying, thanks be unto God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in Christ in heavenly places.

And then he begins to list the spiritual blessings, and the first is chosen in him. And so the psalmist is praying, Lord, help me to just realize how glorious it is that you chose your people, the blessings of being chosen by God, that I might rejoice in the gladness of the nation, a nation chosen by God to fulfill his purposes, and that I may glory with thine inheritance.

Now we, the church of Jesus Christ, have been chosen. We are God's holy people, and we are the heirs of salvation through Jesus Christ. Again, as Paul is listing the blessings in chapter 1 of Ephesians, he speaks about that inheritance that is ours in and through Christ Jesus.

Israel's Sin and the Rejection of God's Prophets

So these are the things that the psalmist is desiring, expressing now his heart unto God as he speaks of the goodness of God to the nation of Israel. But they, on the other hand, and he confesses now the sins of these people who were chosen by God, who were God's holy nation, or intended to be God's holy nation, and who were his inheritance.

He said we have sinned with our fathers. We have committed iniquity. We have done wickedly. The Jews are a proud people and proud of their heritage, and rightfully so. But at the time of Jesus Christ, they were always into our fathers did this, and our fathers that, and this patriarchal society.

But Jesus spoke of his father and pointed out that their fathers weren't all that good. Now, this struck a mortal blow to the Jew, to be told that his fathers made some real blunders. You remember when Stephen was making his defense in the book of Acts before the elders?

And he starts out with a rehearsal of their history, how their fathers sold their brother Joseph as a slave. He was carried to Egypt because they were jealous at his dreams which spoke of his ruling over them.

They rejected that idea that Joseph should rule, and so they sold him as a slave. Later on, Stephen said, your fathers missed it again with Moses. And when Moses sought to interrupt the fight that was going on, they said, who made you to be ruler over us?

Moses thought they'd understand that God had chosen him to be the leader because he had been placed in that unique position in Pharaoh's court. Surely they know, they understand that God has placed me here for the deliverance.

But they didn't know. Your fathers were blind to that. And Stephen goes on to show how that their fathers had rejected God's plan all the way along. He finally just really put the knife in. He said, which of the prophets have your fathers not killed?

Name one of them. And he said, but you are worse than your fathers because you killed the one the prophets were prophesying about. That really made them mad. That's when they took up the stones and they killed him and drug him out of the city.

But the psalmist here is recognizing that their history is not that glorious. He's recognizing that their fathers did sin. They did do wickedly. They did commit iniquity. And we are guilty too. We have sinned with our fathers.

God's Mercy in the Exodus

Now he's going to be talking to us about the mercy of God. Remember, we are to praise the Lord because his mercy endures forever. And he's going to show us how that God was merciful to the fathers. Their fathers.

Who had sinned. And had done wickedly. And yet God was merciful to them. For our fathers did not understand your wonders in Egypt. Here God had sent Moses to bring them deliverance from the bondage that they had experienced in Egypt.

The Jews were made slaves to the Egyptians. The Egyptians were hard taskmasters. It was a slave labor camp. The Egyptians were fearful because the Jews were multiplying so rapidly. They felt that the Jews would soon become more numerous than they, more powerful than they.

And so the Pharaoh ordered that whenever a boy was born he was to be slain. Let the little girls live. They make good housemaids. But kill the boys. And the people of Israel cried unto the Lord by reason of their taskmasters.

They were calling out to God for help. And God finally brought Moses who went to the Pharaoh and demanded the release. And God began to plague the Egyptians with supernatural plagues. But the fathers, the Jews that were there did not understand what God was doing.

The wonders of God in Egypt. And they remembered not the multitude of the mercies of God. Those that were in Egypt, they just did not remember how God had been merciful unto Abraham, unto Isaac, unto Jacob.

And they provoked him at the sea, even the Red Sea. Now, finally the Egyptians let them go. When God passed through and killed all the firstborn of the land of Egypt, except those whose houses were covered by the blood on the lintels in the doorpost.

The Pharaoh said, get out of here, let me never see your face again. And he ordered them to go. And Moses led the children of Israel out of Egypt. And they began to journey towards the land that God had promised to their father Abraham.

Israel's Murmuring at the Red Sea

They were just barely out. They had come to the Red Sea, still really within the land. And as they faced the Red Sea, they began provoking the Lord. Because the Pharaoh relented. And he ordered his army to pursue them.

Now we read that the Lord had led them into this valley between two mountains. They were in this valley, the Egyptian army pulled up behind them and they were trapped. The Red Sea in front of them, Egyptian army behind them, the mountains on either side.

And the people began to murmur against Moses and against the Lord. Just so soon, delivered from Egypt. Were there not enough graves in Egypt, God brought us out here to bury us? And they began to murmur and complain almost immediately.

They provoked God with that murmuring and with that complaining. You see, as a child of God, God is in control of my life. And of those circumstances that surround my life. And for me to complain about my circumstances is really to complain about what God has allowed.

Now many times the circumstances of my life are not pleasant. Life isn't easy in this corrupt world. And many times as a child of God, wanting to live a righteous life, I find myself at odds with the world in which I live.

And it's difficult. And there are times that I have a tendency to complain about what's going on in my life. I don't like these things. But yet God has allowed these things for my development. God seeks by these experiences to mold and shape me into the image of Jesus Christ.

And for me to complain against my circumstances is tantamount to complaining against the Lord. Or murmuring against the Lord. Because all things that happen in my life happen as the result of God's working in me to conform me into the image of Christ.

God's Pottering Work in the Believer's Life

The Bible, in three different places, uses the picture of the potter working with a bit of clay. The power over that clay to make of it whatever kind of vessel he desires. God's power over my life to make of me whatever he wants me to be.

The touch of the potter causing the clay sort of to spring into shape. God's touch upon my life forming, shaping me into that vessel that he desires that I should be. Now a lot of times I don't understand what the potter is doing.

And Paul said, the clay really has no right to say to the potter, why have you made me thus? Why have you allowed this to happen to me? For the potter has absolute power over the clay to make of that clay whatever he wishes.

And though I may not understand my circumstances, God has allowed them to happen as a part of the process of shaping me into the image that he wants me to be. And he's allowed them to happen because of his love for me.

Behind the whole work of the potter is love. God loves me. And those things that God is doing and those things that God allows in my life, they come to me through the filter of God's love. Nothing can happen to me except it come through that filter of God's love.

And so I have that kind of confidence. Now, the fathers in Egypt did not understand the wonders of God. And they began to provoke him almost immediately, and they continued in that provocation for 40 years.

But praise the Lord, give thanks unto God, because his mercy endureth longer than 40 years. His mercy endureth forever. All through my life I shall experience the mercy of God. As David said, surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life.

And when that's over, I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever. So, they provoked God at the Red Sea. Nevertheless, because God is merciful, he saved them. But notice, not because they deserved it, but for his namesake.

Deliverance for God's Name's Sake

For the honor of his name. You see, had he allowed the Egyptians to wipe him out right then, then people would say, well, look how God treats his people. You know, he delivers them out of Egypt, and then he destroys them right there at the Red Sea.

What kind of a God is that? And so for his namesake he was merciful, not because they deserved it, but for his namesake he saved them, that he might make his mighty power to be known. God is now going to demonstrate to them the exceeding greatness of the power of the God who delivered them out of Egypt, out of the bondage of Egypt.

And thus God rebuked the Red Sea also, and it dried up. The tremendous power of God. Here they are trapped. There seems to be no way out. And Moses fell on his face and began to cry unto the Lord. And the Lord said, Moses, why are you crying unto me?

Get up. There is a time to pray and there is a time to move. And now is the time to move, Moses. And he said, stretch forth your rod over the Red Sea. And Moses stretched forth the rod, and God caused that wind to blow.

The sea parted, and the children of Israel passed through the Red Sea as through the wilderness. That is, as walking through the dry, parched desert. The floor of the sea was dry.

We'll return with more of our verse-by-verse study through the book of Psalms in our next lesson, as Pastor Chuck Smith continues with more on the joy in forgiveness. And we do hope you'll make plans to join us.

But right now, I'd like to remind you that if you missed any part of today's message, or perhaps you'd like to order a copy for that special friend or loved one, you can do so by simply contacting one of our customer service representatives, and they'd be more than happy to assist you with the ordering details.

Simply call 1 -800 -272-WORD. And phone orders can be taken Monday through Friday, 8 a .m. to 5 p .m. Pacific Time. Once again, our toll-free number is 1 -800 -272 -9673. And for your added convenience, you can order online, anytime, when you go to TheWordForToday .org.

And while you're there, be sure to browse through the additional resources that include Bible studies, commentaries, CDs, DVDs, and so much more. Once again, that's The Word for Today online at TheWordForToday .org.

And for those of you who still prefer to write, you can use our mailing address, which is The Word for Today, PO Box 8000, Costa Mesa, California, 92628. And be sure to include the call letters of this station with your correspondence.

And now, on behalf of The Word for Today, we'd like to thank all of you who share in supporting this ministry with your prayers and financial support. And be sure to join us again next time as Pastor Chuck Smith continues his verse-by-verse venture through the Psalms.

That's right here on the next edition of The Word for Today. Now once again, here's Pastor Chuck Smith with today's closing comments.

Resting in God's Strength and Growing in His Knowledge

May the Lord bless you and keep His hand upon you, guide you with His counsels, and keep you in His strength. May you rest upon Him and may you experience His strength and His love. And may God help you to really come into a full understanding and knowledge where it isn't just hearing Him with the hearing of the ear, but it's really coming to apprehend, to see God, to see the truth of God.

You might be strengthened knowing that God is with you and shall sustain you as His child.

The Holy Spirit's Continuing Work in Acts

It is my great pleasure to present Pastor Chuck's commentary on the Book of Acts.

The Acts of the Apostles is an open-ended book. Jesus continues even to the present day to work in the lives of people throughout the world through those who have been empowered by the Holy Spirit.

This book also includes a special forward written by Pastor John Corson.

We studied the Book of Acts, but we never saw the Book of Acts. But we were seeing the moving of the Holy Spirit. Calvary Chapel family, may you always be known as a people who pray in Jesus' name, that it would be Jesus Christ, nothing more, nothing less, nothing else.

May the Jesus movement continue on.

To order a copy of Pastor Chuck's book, The Acts Commentary, please call The Word for Today at 1 -800 -272 -9673 or visit us online to read a sneak preview of the book by visiting thewordfortoday .org.

This program has been sponsored by The Word for Today in Costa Mesa, California.