Psalm 34 (Songs of Deliverance, Jeff Kliewer)

The Birth of a Song of Praise in a Time of Suffering

The cancer had gotten to the point where a decision was made that they could no longer treat the cancer, and so there was a really sad spirit in the service that day. As they all prayed together, they had a corporate time of prayer at the end, and the pastor came over and was trying to speak words of comfort, but then felt prompted by the Holy Spirit to sing some words over her.

However, in his flesh he sort of felt like, if I start singing I might kind of freak everybody out, or he also had the thought that maybe the words wouldn't be appropriate, maybe it would be hard for this woman to hear rather than encouraging, but nevertheless he prayed and felt like God was calling him to sing that, and he began to sing a little chorus over her in that prayer meeting, and the words came out, you're a good, good father.

That's who you are. That's who you are. And he began to sing that, and everybody began to join in, and before long this woman who was suffering began to sing those words, you're a good, good father. That's who you are.

That's who you are. They sang that chorus for over an hour that day, and that was the birth of a song that's run around the world. Chris Tomlin would later record it. This guy who first sang that chorus was Anthony Rogers, and his friend Pat Barrett added some other words to it, but just in the spontaneity of that moment they began to sing.

It wasn't a pre-written verse, it was something that came just through singing in the spontaneousness of trying to encourage a sister. The song, Good, Good Father, was born. That would be an example of what we find in Psalm chapter 34.

Now notice I didn't say Psalms chapter 34. It's not Psalms 34, it's Psalm 34. So the book of Psalms means there's multiple songs herein, but each individual Psalm, it's like revelations. It's not revelations, it's revelation.

It's one revelation. So Psalms are that way, and Psalm 34 has the word right there in the first verse, tehillah, tehillah, kind of like tequila. Sounds like that, but it's tehillah. So we're not a church that likes to shout back and give verbal feedback, but this is one time that I'm gonna do it.

When I say tehillah, you guys say tehillah. Ready? Tehillah. Very good. That is a Hebrew word for praise among seven that are found in the book of Psalms. Seven words for praise. Tehillah refers to a song, so it's actually singing most often, and it's very often spontaneous.

So as we were singing Living Hope today, you notice the line hallelujah. In the Hebrew, the word hallel is another word for praise, and jah at the end is the first part of God's name. They would say Yahweh.

So praise God. Hallelujah. That's why we sing hallelujah. That's given to us in the scripture. Well, tehillah is a word for praise, and it often refers to the spontaneous singing, like when Good Good Father was born as a song.

Just singing from your heart. Why? Why do you sing from your heart? Because you have something to be happy about. You have something joyful that makes you want to sing, and so it's very often associated with some form of deliverance.

That you sought the Lord, and he answered you and delivered you from all your fears. Tehillah is a spontaneous praise. I liked when the men were away at the retreat not long ago, and our brother Ben began to sing loudly while he was holding the iPhone, and we piped it into the church, but Ben was so close to the phone, all you could hear was his voice.

You couldn't hear the rest of the men, but what I loved about it was as Ben was singing, you heard the joy in his voice. It was such a pure worship, and then that's true of so many of you. When you sing tehillah, it should have a quality of joy and exuberance, a freeness uninhibited, because you are singing to the God who has delivered you from all of your fears.

The God of deliverance, and so we give praise to Jesus because he is our Savior. He is the Deliverer, and the name of Jesus itself should awaken a heart of praise. When you hear the name that is above every name, something should stir inside of you to make you want to sing.

That is tehillah. So the main idea today is that God delivers the righteous from many afflictions. Contrary to the prosperity teachers that God will always make your life easy and good, and you'll be rich and blessed and happy all the time, that's not the teaching of the scripture.

The teaching of the scripture is that there will be many afflictions, but God delivers us from them all. He keeps delivering us, just like he delivered us from our sins. Now why does he do that? He wants to fashion our hearts into instruments of praise.

He wants our hearts to be filled with joy and thankfulness because of his deliverance. As we remember where we were and what he brought us out of, and as we contemplate and we're aware of where we would be without the grace of God, the afflictions of this life, and the ultimate punishment of the wicked, all of these things point us to praise for the one who's delivered us.

David’s Deliverance and the Setting of Psalm 34

So today we're in Psalm, singular, 34. Turn there with me, if you will. The heading atop this psalm says, of David when he changed his behavior before Abimelech, so that he drove him out and he went away.

That of course comes from the story in Samuel where David is on the run, Saul has gone mad and is ready to kill him, David has fled and he finds refuge in the Philistine territory. However, the Philistines are enemies as well, so David is sort of caught between a rock and a hard place.

He's got this raging maniac named Saul trying to kill him and he's driven into enemy territory and comes to the presence of Abimelech. Now we see Abraham and Isaac both encountering in Abimelech in this area, and so Abimelech is probably a title and the name of this particular king is probably Hashish is his name.

But in any case, Abimelech is an enemy of Israel. Remember, David, this young man, is the one who killed their giant, Goliath. No friend of Israel. They've been destroyed by this David who's killed his tens of thousands of Philistines, and so David is in great danger.

So what does he do? He changes his behavior. Changes his behavior. How so? Well, for one, he lets drool drip down his beard. Pretty strange, huh? And he begins to scribble on walls and his eyes are bugging out and he's acting very strange, intentionally trying to deceive the king, and it works, as if he's a madman.

And the answer of Abimelech is, do I not have enough madmen in Philistia? Let him go, let him go, and they kick him out of the court, and so he left. David's ruse worked, but it was God that made it work, and David is recognizing this.

Time and time again, David has alluded death by the deliverance of God. A couple chapters later, Saul will be closing in on him and David will go around one side of a giant rock, and Saul's entire army is moving on the opposite side, but there's people trailing behind and people going ahead.

David is hiding behind the very rock that Saul is on, on the other side, and so it's only a matter of time before he'll be discovered. But just then, news comes from the capital that there is an attack.

The Philistines are attacking, and so Saul withdraws at the last second, and David delights in God. He was this close to death once again, but was delivered. Delivered again and again. That's what motivates this psalm.

So let's take the first two verses. By the way, there's 22 verses. Anybody have a guess as to why? The Hebrew alphabet. Very good. I knew you would know that, Rich. The Hebrew alphabet goes 22 letters from Aleph to Tev, or Tav, and each one of these verses begins with a letter from the Hebrew alphabet right on through.

So it's an acrostic and a poem in that way. So we'll take the first two. I will bless the Lord at all times. His praise. Tehillah! Say it. His tehillah shall continually be in my mouth. My soul makes its boast in the Lord.

Let the humble hear and be glad. The very point of our existence on this earth is the glory of God. Jonathan Edwards talks about how God is perfect and complete in and of himself, and he glorifies himself and creates a world for the very purpose of reflecting his own glory back to himself.

So the point of your existence is to glorify God. I will bless the Lord at all times. His praise shall continually be in my mouth. David recognized why he's here. The glory of God emanates from God, and Edwards will use the language of remanation.

It comes back to God through his creation. All things remanate his glory. So the birds that sing songs in the morning, and when I was in Florida there was a bunch of birds in the lake right by my parents house, and they just wake you up every morning with these loud songs.

But those songs are singing glory to God, their Creator. And the trees that are waving in the wind are made to glorify God, and these distant stars that you can only see with the Hubble telescope, every one of them exists for God, and they're sustained by him, created by Jesus our Lord.

And so were you. You were made in the image of God, but because of the fall of man, the image of God has been marred, it's been defaced, and we don't reflect God to his glory the way we should. Yet that's still our purpose for existing, and David here has rediscovered it through deliverance.

He's been forgiven of all of his sins, washed clean by God's forgiveness, and then delivered time and again through circumstances like the one with the Bimelech. And so he says, I will bless the Lord, when?

At all times. He's living for this. This is while he's walking around in his palace, while he's hiding in a cave, while he's moving from country to country, escaping Saul, his praise shall continually be in my mouth.

Wherever he went, he's praising God. He says, my soul makes its boast in the Lord. Let the humble hear and be glad. One of the things about Tehillah is that people can hear it. It's not just an unspoken praise that's somewhere deep inside of you, it's actually verbal praise.

You see that in verse 2? Let the humble hear and be glad. Let somebody else hear you singing and be glad because of it. My singing does not often make people glad. I think it maybe scares away rodents, and it maybe has charmed a snake, but it's never made someone glad just by the quality of my voice.

But I'll tell you this, in my family I'm blessed because the other three can all sing. They can all carry a tune. And whenever I hear the sound of one of my children singing, it's always a worship song because that's all we really listen to is Christian music, but whenever I hear that sound, it is beautiful because they know how to sing, but it makes me happy.

It makes me glad for a different reason. When I hear them sing, I know it is well with their soul. Something's coming out of their soul and they're singing praise to God. When I hear my wife sing, it's well with her soul, and it just makes me happy.

Brothers and sisters, we need to hear one another sing. You don't have to be the best singer. You just have to have delight in the one that you love, and it will stir one another on to more love and more good deeds.

It will delight the heart of the humble. Not everybody. Notice who notices this. Verse 2, let the humble hear and be glad. Those who have humbled themselves before God and have a fear of the Lord and a love for God, when they hear singing the name of Jesus, the name that is above every name, it will stir some delight in them.

That's the point of Tehillah. You're just singing spontaneously, walking around the house. I was singing that magnify the Lord with me all week long. The kids had learned it before they ever heard it because they learned it from hearing me say it.

How many of y 'all did the challenge? Should I ask for a show of hands? I sent out an email this week saying, I want you to listen to this song five times. We won't ask you to raise hands, but I wanted you to keep hearing the singing of God's Word so that it would get stuck in your mind, so that the Word of God would become a part of you and become part of your song.

Magnifying the Lord Together and Looking to Him by Faith

Let the humble hear and be glad. Moving on, verses 3 and 4. Oh, magnify doesn't make you want to sing right now. Magnify the Lord with me and let us exalt his name together. I sought the Lord and he answered me and delivered me from all my fears.

The redeemed impulsively invite other people to worship. Do you notice that? Oh, magnify the Lord with me. You've experienced something of the deliverance of God. There should be something in you that wants to invite others to experience what you have.

Magnify the Lord with me. Let us exalt his name. Alone? No, together. Drawing us together to worship God. Let us exalt his name together. What does this word magnify mean? What, in fact, what does it mean to glorify God?

You exist to glorify God. Does that mean that you make glorious? That without you God is not glorious, but you can make him glorious if you will recognize who he is? No, that's not what it means. To magnify something means to increase your vision of a thing.

If you look through a magnifying glass, do you actually make the thing bigger? No, you're just able to more clearly what is before your eyes. To magnify means to increase your vision of a thing, and this is the point with God.

He is who he is. He's all glorious. The whole world is full of his glory. The earth is full of his glory, but sadly you and I are distracted by football games and listening to songs on the radio that are contrary to his name.

We're distracted by the vile things, and our mind gets tunneled, and we begin to miss the image of the truly glorious and infinitely perfect God. Magnify the Lord with me. Begin to see him for who he is.

Turn your eyes to the eternal God. Look to him. Well, how do you look to a God who's invisible? Christians have a very interesting capacity. We are able to see with our ears. We're the only people in the world who can do this, because faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God.

We can see with our ears, because faith is a sight that's different from what the world has. Some people think that we have blind faith, like we're just just trustingly accepting whatever something is told to us.

Kind of like Indiana Jones, he has to trustingly step out on an invisible bridge. Trust that it will be there. Well, faith is actually not that way. Faith is not a blind leap. Faith is taking God at his Word.

When you look to God, you look to his Word, and as you hear the Word of God, as you see it with your eyes, faith is born in your heart, and it's a spiritual sight. You see things that others don't see.

You're able to recognize the God who created you, whereas most people without God are blind. It's you who have that sight, and you see through your ear. Oh, magnify the Lord with me. Let us exalt his name together.

I sought the Lord, and he answered me and delivered me from all my fears. Verse 5, those who look to him are radiant, and their faces shall never be ashamed. See, God is radiant. Glory exudes from him.

In Hebrews 1, we learn that Jesus is the radiance of God's being, of his essence. Glory radiates from God, but what we're being taught here is that those who do look with spiritual eyes, those who look to God, become like the one they're looking at.

Those who look to God are radiant. You begin to reflect his glory. Bart Millard is a famous musician with the group called Mercy Me. Maybe you've heard some of his songs. When he was a young man, he had an abusive father, and his mother at one point got fed up with it and left the home.

So Bart grew up with that abusive father alone in that home, and it was very difficult for him. But one day at youth group, he came to know the Savior, Jesus Christ, and began to sing songs of praise to Hila, singing Amy Grant songs and Michael W Smith songs, learning to praise God.

He trusted in God. As the band was getting going, it never quite happened for them. They never could quite take off, until finally he went back home to deal with unfinished business, some things that were left unsettled.

He went back to Texas to the home of his father, and there he discovered that his dad had been listening to Christian radio. His dad had been hearing the gospel, and through conversations with Bart, he became a believer.

And the transformation of his father was the difference between darkness and light, an abusive father to a loving dad. And Bart was wondering why God did it take so long. His dad was dying. He had pancreatic cancer and didn't live much longer, but he saw the difference in his father.

And after his dad died, in a matter of ten minutes, to Hila, he began to write in his notebook, I can only imagine what it would be like the words of I can only imagine, which has become one of the most famous Christian songs probably since Amazing Grace.

It was a spontaneous praise that he wrote into a notebook. And then one day, the record labels were ready to pick it up, and the release of the song was scheduled to be sung by Amy Grant on her comeback tour.

Some of you guys saw this movie, right? I can only imagine. If you haven't, you really need to. And Amy Grant is about to sing I can only imagine for the first time, but she stops. Rather than singing it herself, she says, Bart, come up here.

Sing this song. And he sings the song he wrote, because listen, those who look to him are radiant. There was something about his life story before Christ, and then coming to Christ, and then seeing his dad come to faith, and then writing that song.

He wrote that song, and he witnessed to the power of it in his own life. His story was wound together with the words that were to be sung. So it wasn't appropriate for Amy Grant to sing it, it was only appropriate for him.

And when he stood up to sing that song, the glory of the Lord filled that building, and people were touched by it. Many, many, many people have come to believe in Christ through that song as an instrument that God used.

Your life is just like Bart Millard's. There is a song in you, there is a tehillah in you. If you will begin to turn your eyes and look to him, your words as they come out in praise, the humble will hear it, and they will be glad.

You become radiant as you look to the one. In 2nd Corinthians 3, a very important verse, it says we with unveiled faces beholding the glory of the Lord are being transformed into his image from from one degree of glory to another.

In other words, as we look to Christ, we are being changed. When you look in the Scriptures, when you sing songs of praise, when you turn your heart to praise and begin to pray and seek his face to look for him, you're changed.

He changes you on the inside, and you begin to glow. There is a radiance that comes from your face that the world will see. You are becoming like him. Those who look to him are radiant. That's the meaning of verse 5.

Their faces shall never be ashamed. And guys, the opposite is true too. I just want to make a quick comment about this. When you look to the dark things, when you look at vile things, when you open your eyes, you become dark.

There is a deadening of your soul that happens, but when you look to the radiant one, you become radiant. Verse 6, this poor man cried and the Lord heard him and saved him out of all his troubles. The angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear him and delivers them.

Taste and See That the Lord Is Good

Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good. Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him. Martin Lloyd-Jones was a pastor from 1899 till 1981, Welsh guy. He says, trials and tribulations are the very things that make us think more of heaven and of the glory that awaits us.

This is because of our imperfection. When things are going well, with no trials and problems, we live for this world only. But notice the psalmist in verse 6. He says, this poor man cried. You will go through trials and tribulations in this world, but take heart, Jesus has overcome the world.

Your tribulations are achieving an eternal weight of glory that we don't understand, but they're fashioned for this purpose, to cause you to praise, to look to him rather than to the world, to be saved from all of our troubles.

Again and again he rescues us. Oh, taste and see. Many preachers will tell you that faith is only in the mind, that all you need to do is believe, and by believe they mean an intellectual ascent to the facts of the gospel, and you will be saved.

But the scripture teaches us that the nature of faith includes delight, it includes affection, a changing of the heart, not just the mind, right? Our mind needs to be made up, but it needs to go deeper than the mind to the level of the heart, to have an affection.

There's a guy I like who does some teaching, but he's not a Christian. His name is Ben Shapiro, and he says, facts don't care about your feelings, because so often the way the world reasons is just emotional.

It's just whatever makes me feel good is what I'll be believed to be true. I'll invent my own religion, just whatever suits me and makes me feel good, and they do this with all kinds of social issues and all kinds of political topics that we could get into at another time and another venue, but Shapiro will say, facts don't care about your feelings.

We need the life of the mind, we need rationality, we need truth, an absolute truth, not just whatever you feel about something, but I'm here to tell you that he's right about that. Facts don't care about your feelings, but God does care about your feelings.

He's not satisfied that you will sign on the dotted line. It's not enough that you'll tip the hat to Jesus Christ. He wants your affection. Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good. Feel, experience in your heart that Jesus is the Christ, that he died on the cross for your sin and rose from the dead, and he has taken your punishment.

You would be under God's wrath if it weren't for the blood of Jesus, and so your heart says, thank you, you've delivered me, and you begin to sing to Hila. You begin to praise him as you walk around your house.

It's just coming out of your heart. Untaught words, they don't have to rhyme. They don't have to sound good. Mine don't. Just sing from the heart. He wants you to taste and see, not just know intellectually.

Oh, fear the Lord, you his saints, for those who fear him have no lack. The young lion, the young lions suffer want and hunger, but those who seek the Lord lack no good thing. He gives you everything you need, not necessarily everything you want, everything you need for life and godliness.

The Fear of the Lord, Obedience, and the Many Afflictions of the Righteous

Come, oh children, listen to me. I will teach you the fear of the Lord. We need to be taught to fear the Lord. This culture certainly doesn't, but we need to be taught to fear God, and we need to teach that to other people, not just with our words, but with our lives, to see us fearing the Lord.

We're almost finished here. Verse 12, and following, what man is there who desires life and loves many days that he may see good? Keep your tongue from evil and your lips from speaking deceit. Turn away from evil and do good.

Seek peace and pursue it. Now we're given the instructions. If we want to experience this joy, obey God. Love him. Seek peace. Do good. The eyes of the Lord are toward the righteous and his ears toward their cry.

The face of the Lord is against those who do evil to cut off the memory of them from the earth. When the righteous cry for help, the Lord hears and delivers them out of all their troubles. The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit.

Now make note of verse 19, because I think this is the main theme of the chapter. Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivers them out of them all. Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivers him out of them all.

We will go through many trials and tribulations, but the Lord again and again delivers us. This becomes our life story, rescued again and again. He keeps all his bones. Not one of them is broken. Affliction will slay the wicked, and those who hate the righteous will be condemned.

The Lord redeems the life of his servants. None of those who take refuge in him will be condemned. Romans 8 .1, in him there is now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. I have a little note card on my pulpit.

I learned this from some Scottish preachers. They have a tradition that on the back of the pulpit, where only the preacher can see, they write the words, Sir, we want to see Jesus. Comes from John chapter 12, when some Greeks came and they said to Philip, Sir, we want to see Jesus.

And Philip took them to Jesus, and he taught, and then ended up saying that when he's lifted up, he'll draw all people to himself, Jew and Gentile alike. Sir, we want to see Jesus. In closing, I want to show you Jesus in this psalm.

If you look at verse 20, when it says he keeps all his bones, not one of them is broken, the writer of the Gospels, John in chapter 19, tells us when they came to Jesus, with the criminal on his right and a criminal on his left, they had broken the legs of the two, because the Passover was near.

They came to Jesus and found that he had already expired. He had already breathed his last breath, and into his father's hand he had already committed his spirit. And so when they came to break Jesus's legs, they didn't do it, because he was already dead.

And John tells us this was to fulfill the words of the prophets. And then he quotes from Psalm 34 verse 20, he keeps all his bones, not one of them is broken. Again, when the Passover lamb was killed in Exodus chapter 12, they were told do not break any of the bones of the lamb, because that lamb, like the psalmist here, David, was foreshadowing, was foretelling the death of Jesus, that on the Christ, on the cross, not one of Christ's bones will be broken.

He delivers from affliction. And so you say, well wait a minute, Jesus wasn't delivered, he's dead. But his bones were kept, like Ezekiel 37, for a picture of the resurrection of the dead. The dry bones will live.

His bones were kept, and on the third day Jesus rose from the dead. The one killed for our sins, the one afflicted, was raised up on the third day. And so the final application I want to make to you guys today is to look at him.

Consider Jesus, the author and perfecter of your faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross. Look to Jesus and let your heart well up with praise. Begin to sing these songs, these tehillah, these songs of praise.

Christians, we are a singing people, whether or not you can carry a tune. There's some application questions at the bottom of your notes. I want to encourage you to look at those before you sleep tonight and just think about the answer to those from the text.

Go back into Psalm 34, or maybe in your small group, or with a prayer partner, go through those four questions and talk about it to apply the Scripture to us, to each of our individual lives. I'm gonna close in a word of prayer and worship team if you'll come up.

Closing Prayer and Call to Worship

Father, we thank you so much for Psalm 34. Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but Lord you deliver us out of them all. All of us are going through some kind of trial, or we've just come out of one, or we're just going into one, but you deliver us from them all.

And I pray that as you continue to save us from every trial, every temptation, Lord, I pray that our hearts would grow like David's heart to a heart of worship. Help us to sing songs of praise. I pray, Lord, that each one of us here today would make up a song.

When we're driving alone in the car, or alone in our rooms, or working in the basement, I pray that Tehillah would be formed in our hearts, that we would begin to sing songs like good, good Father. It's who you are.

It's who you are. I can only imagine. Lord, help us to praise the name that is above every name, Jesus. Amen. Let's stand and worship.