Monday Morning Coffee with Mark
Monday Morning Coffee with Mark. A spiritual boost to start the week.
Monday Morning Coffee with Mark
The 5 Toughest Questions - Baptism
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Welcome to the Westside church’s special Monday Morning Coffee podcast with Mark Roberts. Mark is a disciple, a husband, father and grand dad, as well as a certified coffee geek, fan of CS Lewis’ writings and he loves his big red Jeep. He’s also the preacher for Westside church.
Hello, and welcome to the West Side Church's special Monday Morning Company Podcast. On this podcast, our preacher, Mark Roberts, will help you get your week started right with a look back at yesterday's sermon so that we can think through each other and better work the applications into our daily life. Mark will then look forward into this week's final reading so that we can know what to expect and watch for. And he may have some extra bonus thoughts from time to time. So grab a cup of coffee as we start the week together on Monday morning coffee with Mark.
SPEAKER_01:Good morning, good morning. Welcome to the Monday Morning Coffee Podcast for Monday, November the 10th. I'm Mark, and I am ready to talk with you about the Psalms. I'm ready to look back at yesterday's sermon. I'm doing it all while I'm holding a great cup of coffee, and I don't just mean the contents this time. This is the coffee in the mugs, pretty good stuff, no doubt about that. But even more, it's in a mug that I really, really like. This mug has a bear on it, and it says Yellowstone National Park. Holding this mug just brings back all kinds of tremendous memories of the trip that Dean and I made to Yellowstone a couple years back. I saw somewhere a study that says your coffee's better if you drink it out of a mug that means something to you, and I subscribe to that 105%. And I should say, sometimes people give me a hard time, Mark. You always got coffee. You always talk about coffee, coffee, this, coffee and Bible reading, coffee, coffee, coffee. But having a great cup of coffee with my daily Bible reading makes me look forward to doing my daily Bible reading. It's it will be wonderful because I'm in the Word of God and I'm doing something that I really love, which is yeah, drinking coffee. So do things that make your habit of daily Bible reading more enjoyable, and you'll find it easier to stick with that habit. So whether that's coffee or tea or diet Mountain Dew, oh my, please don't drink antifreeze. If whatever that is that makes it enjoyable, makes you look forward to it, then do that because we want daily Bible reading to be something that we want to do. We do what we want to do, and I want to read the Bible, especially because I want to have a great cup of coffee. So grab your Bible, grab your coffee or tea or whatever it is that you're gonna sip on as we work in the Word of God together. Grab your Bible, grab your coffee, let's grow together. Okay, so I'm all fired up about daily Bible reading, but first I really need to look back on yesterday's sermon. Yesterday was the last in a three-lesson mini-series on the five toughest questions pertaining to the crucial matters of salvation. And so yesterday, of course, finished that up by talking about baptism. And there's a lot more that I can say about all of that. There's another question I want to deal with with baptism, probably deal with that in the Q ⁇ A at the end of this month. But maybe the thing to say here is to say something about the manner and mode of baptism. That's a key question. It didn't make the cut, but it's a big question. Does it matter how I am baptized? Many wonder if the method, the mode, whether I'm poured on or sprinkled or immersed, does that even really matter? And the answer to that is yes. It completely matters because in baptism, we are participating in, we are, we are part of a figure of the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus. And they didn't pour a little dirt on Jesus and they didn't sprinkle a little dirt on Jesus. He was completely buried. That's what it means to be buried, is complete. Uh, you know, Halloween's over, zombie time is done. Okay, we're putting them all the way in. And if you go read Romans 6, we are baptized into Christ's death to arise to walk in newness of life. And there's a complicated argument that could be made here from the New Testament Greek that the word baptism actually just means an immersion, a complete plunging under, and that is absolutely so. But I don't think you have to know Greek to know that the way people were baptized in the New Testament was through immersion. In Acts chapter 8, verse 37, the Ethiopian eunuch and Philip went down into the water. And if you're going to be baptized with New Testament baptism, you need to follow the New Testament pattern for baptism, and that is immersion. Hope that helps you as you think about your baptism and helps you as you think and help others think about obeying the gospel, being baptized into Christ. Well, now we can dive into the Psalms. Psalm 70 is our reading for today. As you're looking at the 70th Psalm, you may have a note that you wrote it sometime, or maybe your study Bible has a note that this is identical to the 40th Psalm, verses 13 to 17. And of course, the obvious question then is why? Why is Psalm 70 doubling Psalm 40? And there's a lot of discussion about that. There's not really consensus, but most scholars think that Psalm 40 is the older psalm and that it may have been used in worship. And then Psalm 70 could be the shorter version that people used in their own personal life or in other worship services. I like that idea a lot because it helps us see that the psalms are so flexible, they can fit a variety of circumstances and a variety of needs. And I really love this idea of praying the Psalms, making the Psalm your own. Now, I talked a little bit about that last Sunday in the 9 a.m. hour when I talked about savoring the psalms. You remember that? Let's go over those takeaways from that lesson and hold on to that as we work this week. First and foremost, we always ask what kind of psalm is this. Then we're going to read the psalm slowly and prayerfully. We want to read it out loud, and we want to feel the psalm. We want to get the emotions and the mood of the psalm. Then let the psalm take you to the Lord, and then finally, that business about praying. If you can, pray the psalm. Make this your prayer, and that way you're taking the psalm into your own heart and into your own life. This is very much a lament, and it won't take you a moment to see that. The first three verses are all about I have enemies who are coming after me. And then there's a wonderful little note of confidence in verse four, and then there is more lament in verse five. I need your help, God, and I need your help immediately. So let me add just one additional hint here. And if the audio changed dramatically, is because I realized I had the settings all wrong and was using the wrong microphone, just the built-in microphone on the computer instead of this good microphone. So if all of a sudden it got a whole lot louder in your ear, it that's completely my fault. That is completely my fault. Let me add this. If we're going to talk about the psalm taking us to God, asking questions like how does the psalm describe God, and what is the psalmist seeking from God, and how does the psalmist praise God? That's one of our questions on the back of our Bible reading schedule. I think verse 4 really helps us here. May all who seek you rejoice and be glad in you. May those who love your salvation say evermore, God is great. There is so much to be said about the goodness of God and that God wants us to what? Be glad. But that's only going to happen to a certain kind of person, the kind of person who rejoices and loves God's salvation. But it says so much about God that He wants you to be fulfilled, He wants you to be content. He wants, in the context of this Psalm, to deliver, to save, and to help. That's the God that we serve, and that is the God that is being appealed to in Psalm 70. Our reading for Monday is Psalm 70. It's Tuesday. It is Tuesday. And today we're reading the 86th Psalm. Psalm 86 is our reading for Tuesday. You will find immediately, as soon as you jump into this Psalm, that it is a lament. One scholar said this Psalm is a prayer in which the individual speaker expresses supplication and complaint to God. The speaker, the prayer, is in great distress and apparently even in danger. Note verse 2 and verse 14. The supplications for mercy and relief are pressed toward God with urgency. That is exactly right. And it is, according to the heading, a prayer of David, which we could identify specifically when David prayed this prayer. One scholar that I have a lot of respect for thinks it could have been during the Absalom Rebellion. It is a cut-and-paste psalm. A major characteristic of this psalm is that it uses a ton of language found in other psalms, and it's put together, and maybe that helps us think of David in a time of great suffering and tribulation. He's running from Absalom and afraid for his life. And so he's praying the phrases that are deeply embedded in his heart. I'll give you an outline here, although laments don't always necessarily outline perfectly the idea of hear me, O Lord, in verses 1 to 7, and then praise, there is none like God, verses 8 to 13, and then the request, save me, O Lord, verses 14 to 17. And it begins with I am poor and needy. That's really an expression of godliness. Often in the Psalms, I am poor and needy is a way of saying, I don't depend upon riches, I don't depend upon my possessions, I depend upon the Lord. You might note Psalm 37, 14, Psalm 70, verse 5, an expression he's used a lot in the Psalms. And then David's expression, I am godly, in verse 2, that's not egotistical, is not bragging on himself. He's just saying, Lord, I'm in covenant relationship with you. I'm on your side, I'm trying to serve you. And I really love verse 4, gladden my heart. Don't we need to pray that sometimes? Lord, gladden my heart. Yesterday, the Psalms talked about being glad in the Lord because we love your salvation. Rejoicing in God, being happy to serve God is a major theme in the Psalms. Gladden my heart. And as you read along here, I think verse 8 probably will throw some people. What's the deal here about there's none like you among the gods? You have to remember that in David's day there's lots of gods, at least, belief in lots of gods. That doesn't mean that there are other gods. And this psalm is clear there is only one God. And the psalmist will go on. David will say this several times, you alone are God, verse 10, for example. So he's not getting into polytheism, but he is announcing his faith and trust in a world where there are many belief systems and many gods. You alone are God, you are the only one, and I want to know your way, verse 11. I'm going to talk about this more tonight in the Zoom call, but your way here, the way of the Lord, the way of God, teach me your way, O Lord, depending on your translation here. That's not really the Bible. I've seen it used that way. I've probably used it that way. But really, your way is how God does things, the way of God. How does God do things as opposed to how people do things, particularly wicked people do things. I want to do things in the way of the Lord. I want to be like God. And then verses 14 to 17, David finally gets to talking about his troubles. I am impressed that he has self-discipline even in prayer. He does not go straight to the, hey, I need some help here. Yeah, there's a little bit of that at the top of the psalm, but there's a lot more before David says, Lord, I need some help. This is a beautiful psalm. Can't wait to talk with you about it tonight in the Zoom call, Westsiders. If you're not a Westsider, I'll see you tomorrow on the podcast. Just a wonderful song. Take your time, pray the psalm, savor the psalm. Our reading for Tuesday, Psalm 86. It is Wednesday, it's hump day. Let's get on that camel. Today we are reading in the 109th Psalm, Psalm 109. And I wonder if you've ever thought about how to rate the Psalms with the movie rating system. Because if you think about that, if you classify Psalms like we classify movies, this would not be G-rated. It would not. This is a PG 13 Psalm without any question because it contains a very strong imprecation. David asked God repeatedly and very, very clearly to destroy his enemies in the most horrible of fashion. And that gives us a great chance to talk a little more about imprec im what's the answer? More coffee. Imprecatory psalms. There's really not anything here to help us date this psalm to know exactly when David wrote this. He has a number of times in his life when he has enemies who are really getting after him. So there's plenty of places we could fit this psalm. And I think a couple things will help us as we deal with the imprecation here. First and foremost, it begins, the psalm begins with praise in verse 1. And please notice verse 30, I will praise him in the midst of the throng. This is about God, and this is about praising God. This is about what God will do. I have some ideas, David says, about what I want God to do, but this is primarily about the action of God. So the imprecation begins in verse 6, and it's just a long series of curses. That's what an imprecation is. It's asking God to bring judgment upon someone. And I would say from reading verses 1 to 5, we learn a lot about imprecatory Psalms. They show us that we have to be right with God first. David is first and foremost a worshiper of God. His heart is right with God. He starts by saying, God, I'm serving you. And David has searched his own heart first, and then he can ask God to deal justly with those who are attacking others. Notably, they are attacking him. Imprecations come from those with clean hands and clean hearts. That's important here. Now, I've talked about imprecations both in QA and also in this podcast. I don't want to revisit all of that except to say that imprecations are asking God to deal with enemies. They use large poetic language. We see that in a lot of ways in the Psalms. The Lord is my shepherd, he makes me lie down. Nobody even thinks about that. It's just a lovely pastoral scene, but of course, that's a figure of speech. David is not literally, you know, a sheep. That's not how that is. A little coffee here to keep things going. And in the same way, I think David is really wrought up, and this teaches us some things about we can bring before God our problems and we can speak honestly to the Lord, and we can say honestly to God what we wish would happen. But I don't think that in any way somehow this contradicts what Jesus says about loving your enemies or that we should tear the imprecatory psalms out of the Bible. There are imprecations in the New Testament, by the way. And so we need to be pretty careful about getting the scissors out when it comes to God's word. We can love our enemies while praying for God to judge them if they will not make changes. Now, there's more that could be said about that. That's a big subject. This is just a devotional that we can take advantage of first thing in the morning or maybe on your lunch hour. Let's move on in the Psalm. Verse 21 to 31 is his prayer, and he asks God to deal with these enemies because he is weak. And once again, verse 22, we get poor and needy, which, as I said yesterday, is a way to think about being godly. I'm just a godly person, but but I'm not strong enough. I can't do anything. So verse 26, God, I need you to do something. And I love verse 27. I think that's the key to impregatory psalms. You need to do this, God. Let them know that this is your hand. You, O Lord, have done it. What David is really praying for here is that God will act in a decisive way so that people will know the wicked aren't getting away with it. Let them see justice. Let them know that you can't flaunt God's ways and God's law. God, you need to act here so that your name is being upheld. I think that's a key idea in this Psalm. Our reading for Wednesday then is Psalm 109. Welcome to Thursday. Welcome to Thursday. And today we're reading the 140th Psalm. The 140th Psalm's got snakes in it. Hope that's not a trigger for you. I'm not a big fan of snakes. Mentioned this in Bible class recently. Snakes in the Bible almost uniformly bad. And then, of course, the Lord uses a bronze serpent to heal the people. So sometimes snakes show up as being kind of a good thing. Jesus actually compliments snakes. Go look for that in the Gospels. That's probably something most people don't know Jesus ever said. Back to the Psalm, Psalm 140. This is an individual lament, it is a cry for help to God. And I say often that the headings are not inspired, but I would say this: this psalm sounds like David. It is in the style of David. It looks like David. It walks like David. It talks like David. David wrote the 140th Psalm. And probably wrote this about one of those catastrophic occurrences, maybe Doag the Edomite killing all the priests, maybe Absalom's rebellion. But he is in real trouble here because evil people are doing evil things. In verses 1 to 5, you have the conspirators. Then in verses 6 to 11, the help that David is seeking from God. And then there's an affirmation of faith in verses 12 to 13. And it begins verse 1, deliver me. But the New American Standard has rescue. And I think that's better. Nobody calls the Coast Guard and asks to be delivered. You deliver pizza. You need to be rescued. And this is a psalm about being rescued. Verse 3, by the way, is used explicitly in the third chapter of Romans, Romans 3 and verse 13. And you may have out to the margin there the word sale. And I get asked about that from time to time. And the answer is we do not know. We do not know what salaw means or what that is. It seems to be a term meaning pause. It may be a musical term. We're just not sure. It is used for the first time since Psalm 89. And why it doesn't occur for these 50 or so Psalms, we don't even know that either. So then David seeks help from God in verses 6 to 11. There's a very personal appeal, verses 6, 7, and 8. Notice how he looks to the past, verse 7. You have covered my head in the day of battle. And then he looks to the future, verse 8. Based on what you have done, God, I have confidence in what will be done in the future. And then there is this imprecation section here. These people need to be punished. So verse 10, they tried to get him to fall into their traps. So you know what? They need to fall into their own traps. They need to be plunged into the pits of destruction. They have hunted him. They need to be hunted in turn. And all the stuff that I said about imprecation yesterday, all of that applies again. Just use all of that right here. And then I love this affirmation: the Lord will maintain the cause of the afflicted. He will execute justice for the needy. That is what imprecation is about. God, let your hand be seen. Let all people see that crime, wickedness, evil, sin does not pay. Our reading for Thursday, Psalm 140. It's Friday. It is Friday, and we're reading Psalm 141 to finish the week out. Now we always begin by asking what kind of psalm it is. Don't ask that this time. I'm just kidding. We have to ask that, but it is a mixed psalm. There is some lament here, some crying for God's help, but there's also some wisdom here, how to deal with temptation, how to deal with evildoers. So I'm going to move this over in the wisdom category. This is a teaching psalm. And there's a lot of repetition in this psalm. We always watch for repetition that says this is important and gets emphasis. So the first stanza here, verses one to five, says some things about evil and where evil is coming from. The raising of hands, notice verse 2 says that I'm dependent upon God. And then evil comes in many forms. Look at verse 3 and 4 in the speech, in your heart, which then leads to action. The prayer is widening beyond just what I say, to what I think, to what I do. All of that matters. Because if we're going to talk about temptation, we need to talk about the heart. That's where everything starts. If you're really dealing with temptation, you have to deal with your heart. Then the second stanza begins in verse 6. Verse 6 to 10 is the second stanza, and this is this contains some of the most difficult passages in the entire book of Psalms. When we get down to verse 7, everybody will be scratching their head, including me. So let's start with verse 6. The ESV says, When their judges are thrown over the cliff, then they shall hear my words, for they are pleasant. Well, there you go. That seems pretty obvious, isn't it? No, there's nothing obvious about it, but the Hebrew here is very difficult to translate. And literally it's something like, when the judges are thrown down by the side of the rock, then they hear words, my words are sweet. That's a rough translation given by those that know Hebrew a lot better than I do, and that's certainly way above my skill set. But apparently this means that when David's enemies are destroyed by being cast against the rocks, they will see that the psalmist was right, the righteousness of David. Then there is this proverb, verse 7: As when one plows and breaks up the earth, so shall our bones be scattered at the mouth of Sheol. That is very, very hard. Oftentimes, proverbs are understandable in that culture and in that society, but beyond that, they may be completely, completely lost, untranslatable. You think about the proverbs that we have. I've done some work in the book of Proverbs, and so for example, our proverb, a rolling stone gathers no moss, means if you if you're busy and you keep going, then moss doesn't grow on you. But the same proverb is used in England to mean that the busy person doesn't put down roots and have any real relationships, doesn't have any friends because he's always doing everything and going everywhere and doing stuff. So it means something entirely different there. Well, this is a proverb from Bible times, and it's just really hard. One scholar said, even as the farmer breaks up the soil and brings up the rocks, so the bones of the wicked will be scattered without a decent burial. And not being buried is a huge issue in the Old Testament. Another scholar says, as if one who plows and makes furrows in the earth, our bones are plowed and strewn at the mouth of the home of the dead Sheol. Probably it seems to be saying that the wicked does attack the righteous. Maybe, like our phrases, you know, oh, he got his plow cleaned. What does that even mean? Most people don't even know what a plow is anymore. But we know, oh, we got his plow cleaned means, you know, he got beat up. He got, you know, that team got absolutely shellacked. Well, there's a metaphor right there. They got thoroughly beaten. Maybe this is saying the wicked are attacking us and we're thoroughly beaten. But it ends then with some discussion of the Lord, my eyes are towards you, O God, you're my refuge. Keep me, let the wicked fall. I need your help, God, or I'm going to end up in all kinds of trouble, maybe sinful trouble, verses three and four, or even my life being taken by the wicked. This is not the easiest psalm. It takes some thought, it takes some time. Work with it. Remember to savor the psalm. This is this is tough savoring, I guess, but work on it and see if it doesn't bolster your confidence, your faith in God. And especially, I really like three and four. If you're struggling with sin, sit down there in verses three and four. Pray that. Ask God to help you so that you'll not fall into temptation. Our reading for Friday, Psalm 141. That concludes the podcast for the week. Thank you so much for listening. If this podcast has been a blessing to you, I certainly wish that you'd tell a friend and encourage someone else to listen to it so that it will help them in their walk with God. I love reading the Bible with you, talking about last week's sermon, getting in the Word of God, encouraging you. It encourages me drinking that coffee and doing that daily Bible reading. What a wonderful, wonderful habit to build. I'm Mark Roberts. I want to go to heaven, and I want you to come too. I'll see you on Monday with a cup of coffee.
SPEAKER_00:Thanks for listening to the Westside Church of Christ podcast, Monday Morning Coffee with Mark. For more information about Westside, you can connect with us through our website, just Christians.com, and our Facebook page. Our music is from Upbeat.io. That's Upbeat with two P's, U-P-P-P-E-A-T, where creators can get free music. Please share our podcast with others, and we'll look forward to seeing you again with a cup of coffee, of course, on next Monday.