What is the most common answer to the question, “How are you?” Most people will say, “Good.” When they answer this way, I sometimes remind them of what Jesus said that “there is no one good but God.” Of course I know that this is not what they are saying, that they are saying “I am doing well,” but we do say “I am good.” If we think of this saying, “I am good,” we know that we are not good but we trust in the words of Jesus that God is good. Or do we? “Is God good?”
What if He is not? This week I have had more than one experience in which people would have every reason to question whether God is good. Does God want to help us or hurt us or is He indifferent? If we do not know that He is good, we never know for sure whether He is on our side or against us. If God is not good, then we are utterly vulnerable and God is not worthy of our praise or even our trust. If God is good, then we can put our trust in Him no matter what happens.
This morning, as we celebrate Thanksgiving, I want to remind you that God is good! In order to focus our thoughts, let us look at Psalm 65. In this Psalm, there are several things, which relate well to all that is happening here today, which show us the goodness of God. We have rejoiced in a baptism, we are going to remember our salvation as we partake of communion and we are acknowledging God’s provision as we celebrate thanksgiving. Psalm 65 helps us see the goodness of God in all of these things.
I will share a few thoughts which come out of this passage, but also leave some time in the middle of the message for you to share your thanksgiving because of God’s goodness.
Giving The Blessing Of Relationship
We have just heard the testimonies and observed the baptism of Sherisse and Kelli. As we have celebrated this event, we have seen the goodness of God. Psalm 65:1-4 helps us see three different ways in which God’s gift of salvation reveals the goodness of God. God wants to know us and invites us to conversation, God forgives our sins so that we can draw near to Him and God chooses us to be near to Him.
I remember a number of years ago that if communication was breaking down, people used to say, “talk to the hand.” It was a way of saying, “I am not listening to you.” Is that good?
Psalm 65:2 reminds us that one of the ways we see the goodness of God is that he hears prayer. We read, “O you who hear prayer, to you all men will come.”
The promise that God hears prayer is repeated often in the Bible. I particularly like the imagery in Revelation which speaks of prayer as incense rising before God and declares the promise that God hears all prayer. Revelation 5:8 says, “…the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb. Each one had a harp and they were holding golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints. In Revelation 8:4 we read, “The smoke of the incense, together with the prayers of the saints, went up before God from the angel’s hand.”
When it says that God is the one “to whom all men will come” it reminds us that the way to God is always open. God is always ready to hear the prayer of the person who is willing to repent. God is always open to hearing the prayer of those who come to Him. When we become His followers, one of the blessings of that relationship is the promise of communication. God is good because He is one who does not close off communication, but opens it up. Charles Spurgeon says, “God not only has heard, but is now hearing prayer.” Therefore we know that God Is Good!
As we have baptized these two young ladies, we have been reminded of another way in which God is good. Psalm 65:3 says, “When we were overwhelmed by sins, you atoned for our transgressions.”
There is a level at which sin seems to be a pleasure. The Bible even speaks of “the pleasure of sin.” ( Hebrews 11:25) But that is only for a season. There are so many ways in which sin is no pleasure at all. When the text says that “we were overwhelmed by sins” this is something that makes a lot of sense and something that we can identify with. For one thing, sins overwhelm us because they are so subtle and there are so many so that the Psalmist says in Psalm 19:12, “Who can discern his errors? Forgive my hidden faults.” Sin is also a burden because we find it so hard to overcome. Ultimately, we are overwhelmed by sin because it always leads to death. It may lead to death in the short term by destroying us and the relationships we have or in the long term by physical and spiritual death.
When we come to that realization and repent, the goodness of God is demonstrated in His forgiveness. The word used here is “atonement.” This reminds us of the tremendous gift of God given in Jesus by which He died in our place. As a result, we are set free from both the power and the consequences of sin.
Every time we hear a testimony of God changing lives or observe a baptism and every time we observe the Lord’s supper we are reminded that God is good!
The third blessing we find in this passage is that we are chosen by God. Psalm 65:4 says, “Blessed is the man you choose and bring near to live in your courts! We are filled with the good things of your house, of your holy temple.”
Not only do we have the privilege of coming to God in prayer, not only does God forgive our sins, but when we are Christians, we know that God has chosen us to come near to Him in relationship.
God’s goodness is seen in that before we even knew Him, He had already chosen us. Ephesians 1:4 says, “For he chose us in him before the creation of the world…” The choosing of God is also seen in that God draws to Himself all those who are being saved. John 6:44 says, “No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him, and I will raise him up at the last day.”
God chooses us so that He can call us His children. Ephesians 1:4-6 says, “…In love he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will— to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves.”
When God chooses us, He brings us near so that we can have a relationship with Him and experience the blessings which come from that relationship. Living the Christian life means living in that relationship. It means that we are not just on God’s list, but friends with him. Some of you are on Facebook. You have a list of people who are identified as being your friends. But if they are just on your list and you never really have anything to do with them, never communicate with them, never send them a message or talk to them, can you really call that a relationship? Living the Christian life means that we continue to live near to God and grow in intimacy with Him. Sherisse and Kelli, as you have declared that God is your friend by baptism, our challenge to you is to continue to live in that relationship.
God’s salvation reminds us that God is good! Would anyone else like to share with us the blessing of living in a relationship with God?
Today is Thanksgiving Sunday. On this day we celebrate harvest and all the goodness of God which is expressed by the abundance of the good things which we receive from Him. Psalm 65:9-13 expresses thanksgiving for God’s goodness in this context. It is a Psalm of harvest thanksgiving in poetical language.
Sometimes when you go into a store to purchase something, the sales people will be very nice to you. Some are nice only because they want to sell you something. They don’t genuinely care about you, they only care about the sale they might make and you are right to question their intentions.
What are God’s intentions? In Psalm 65:9 it speaks about God providing “the people with grain, for so you have ordained it.” This speaks of God’s intentions. It is God's intention to bless. As we celebrate thanksgiving, recognizing the goodness of God, we celebrate first of all His good intentions towards us. So we see once again that God is good.
In this Psalm we see another aspect of God’s goodness. God does not give His blessing with half measure, but with abundance. The cornucopia is often used at thanksgiving to illustrate God’s abundant provisions. It is a fitting symbol of God’s goodness towards us. The decorations we have here are a symbol of the abundance of God’s provision. In Psalm 65:9-13 we notice many words which the Psalmist uses to express abundance.
9 – abundantly
9 – filled
10 – drench
11 – bounty
11 – overflow with abundance.
12 – overflow
13 – covered
The abundance of His provisions show us that God is good!
We also see, in this Psalm, a number of images which speak of His blessing.
It is a little hard for us to understand some of this Psalm in a year like we have had when there has been such a lot of rain, but if you have ever experienced drought or been in a place where there is little rain, you will understand the image in Psalm 65:10. Of course this was written to people in Israel who understood dryness. When we were there, even considering that it was spring, we saw the world to which this Psalm was written. From Jerusalem and into the south there is a significant amount of desert. We saw areas where crops were sown in dry river beds because these were the only places where there was a possibility that there would be moisture at some time of the year. In such a dry land, the soil gets hard and we all know what it is like to try to till or cultivate or hoe in soil that is hard because there has not been rain. If we can put that image in our minds, then we will understand the blessing spoken of in verse 10 which says, “You drench its furrows and level its ridges; you soften it with showers.” God is good because He provides the rain which is necessary to grow a crop.
Verse 11 may seem like a rather unusual image, but gives us another way of looking at God’s abundant provision. Whenever armies would come into the land, they would bring carts along which carried the engines of war and took away the spoil. Those carts were symbols of devastation. When there is war, as those in Sudan know, hardship and famine soon follow. Wherever armies and kings go they take away, and bring hardship. If that is the image in our mind, then the picture here is exactly the opposite. Unlike armies and the carts of kings that take away, God’s carts “overflow with abundance.” Wherever God goes, there abundance and blessing. abound. This idea comes from Spurgeon, who is quoted in the commentary by Tate saying, “when kings go through a land, they bring destruction, the most destructive thing for causing famine is war. Wherever it is, famine follows. But when God goes through the land, there is abundance.”
Another image which comes out of the land of Israel which helps us understand this Psalm is to recognize that desert areas are areas where things do not grow well. One of the things we discovered when we were in Israel, is that the cities are built on hills and crops are in the valleys. This is so for a number of reasons. On a hill, the people of a city would be able to see the coming of the enemies. The other reason is that the valley land is the arable land. In a dry land, moisture comes seldom and of course, water runs down so eventually it most often and most quickly ends up in the bottom of the valley. It is hard for us in this flat land to understand this, but you don’t have to go very far west in areas like Holland, Manitoba, to realize that on very wet years, the crop on the top of the hill is good, but most years, the top of the hill is dry and the valley has good crops. This is always so in Israel, where David was writing. So with that picture in mind, we read in Psalm 65:12, “The grasslands of the desert overflow; the hills are clothed with gladness.”
All of these images help us see the goodness of God in supplying abundantly. The imagery is agricultural, but we should take it to refer to all the ways in which our lives are enriched by the many blessings which come from God.
Celebrating God’s goodness is an appropriate response. We celebrate in praise, as we see in Psalm 65:1. “Praise awaits you…” We celebrate with obedience as we also see in Psalm 65:1, “to you our vows will be fulfilled.” Celebration of the goodness of God fills this whole Psalm. Psalm 65:8 says, “you call forth songs of joy.” The conclusion of the Psalm also celebrates the goodness of God when it says, “they shout for joy and sing.”
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