“What is Man that You Are Mindful of Him?”
Sunday, August 1, 2010
Great Questions Series: Psalm 8:3-4
Introduction: Who are the ones you think about the most? I would guess it would be your family and good friends, and maybe God. Also, it might be someone who you are in conflict with, and this person has gotten under your skin, and this anger causes you to dwell upon them and the situation a little too much. We tend to think about that which has importance in our lives, and/or that consumes our emotions.
There are many people that believe that the God we believe in, is made up; that this God doesn’t really exist. We have just made this God up in our imagination. But if this were true, I believe that this God would look much different. More like the Greek gods: Aphrodite, the goddess of love; Apollo, god of music and healing; Ares, the god of war; Athena, the virgin goddess of wisdom; Hermes, the god of messengers; and on and on it goes. These made up gods have their own specific power and place in this world. And these gods don’t have much to do with the humans, and are definitely not personal with them in any way.
But there is something different about the God of the Bible. In our question for today we look at: What is Man that You are Mindful of Him?
I. Mindful of him- (Psalm 8:3)
a. God knows us- From the very beginning of time there has been a
personal nature between God and us, His creation. We are told in Genesis 1 that God wanted to make us in His image. This shows how much thought went into our making. In Psalm 139 we are told that God knows about what we do, and cares about what we do. In fact, the Bible is full of passages that talk about a God who cares for us and for how we live.
This is a profound thought, because it would be easy to think that God has so many more important things to care about. What about the whole of the universe? What about creating others worlds? What about holding this world together? Why would God even care about you or me?
Imagine with me for a moment: by some occurrence you come to know the president of the United States; you become friends with him. He knows your name, knows your family, knows some personal things about you. One day the president comes into town, and he is giving a speech; you are in the audience. At the end of the speech many are trying to get to him, trying to talk with him, trying to touch him, and you walk up, he sees you, and calls out your name. How would that make you feel? You have been set apart above all the other people, because someone that everyone else wants to know, is known by you!
This is how it is with God. God is far greater than the president could ever be. God is far more powerful, far more capable, far more important. And this God knows you. As we talked about a few weeks ago, when we looked at Psalm 139, we saw that God knows everything about us. If God were present here on this earth, and you walked by, God would call you out by name!
b. God is mindful of us- But even more than knowing us by name,
God is mindful of us. Meaning, that we are in God’s thoughts.
Whenever we go to my in-laws house, right there in the kitchen, on the
refrigerator, are many pictures of our family. Why are these pictures there?
Because it helps them to be more mindful of us; to keep us in their thoughts.
Someone once said, “If God had a refrigerator, your picture would be on it.”
We want to feel important in this world. We seek to feel important in our relationships with others. We seek to feel important by establishing ourselves in a good job. We seek to feel important by having nice clothes, and a fancy car. The problem with all of this, is what happens if we don’t get these things? Or what happens if we do get them, but then lose them? The “importance” we attained was not real importance. We were only important for how we appeared. That is why it is so hard for many athletes to retire, because once the retire, they are not seen as important anymore.
Our importance with God is not based on what we attain, or who we appear to be, but by the mere fact that we are God’s creation. I’ve said it before, and I will keep saying it, because to me it is a profound truth: as I understand the importance my children have in my mind, it helps me to understand the importance I have in God’s mind. Because I am a part of God as a part of His creation, God is mindful of me; AND YOU.
II. Care for him- (Psalm 8:3, 4; Mark 1:13; 1 Timothy 2:5)
a. Man- This psalm is really about the psalmist, David, as a king,
thinking that he was important. But then he says in verse 3: “When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars which you have set in place.” David begins to understand that even though he was a king, and a powerful king at that, even though he felt important, he realizes that there is so much more to the world. He realizes that the universe stretches out to infinity, and that he is just a small part of all that exists. He begins to wonder why God would pay any attention to him at all. “What is man that you are mindful of him?”
God has absolute authority over this universe, and that authority includes you and me, and all of God’s creation. While God gave authority to Adam to care for this earth (and by inheritance all human beings), God still oversees all. God has not relinquished control, or concern for this world; or for you and me. While this world is to be in subjection to us, we are to be subject to God.
But so often we fail in this call. We have failed in that sin came into the world through Adam and Eve. We fail in that we often do not love others as God would have us to love them. We have failed in that we are not caring for this earth, but rather we are destroying it with our misuse.
b. The Son of Man- So God turned His attention to the Second Man;
Jesus Christ; God in the flesh. God gave the Son of Man authority over the universe. So the Second Man comes onto the scene. We are told a little about Him in Psalm 8:4- “You made Him a little lower than the heavenly beings…” When God the Son took on flesh, He was lower than the heavenly beings in that He was human. As a human He had flesh and blood; He had emotions; He had temptation. He needed care, as we see in Mark 1:13 at the end of Jesus’ being tempted in the wilderness and having gone 40 days without food, we are told: “…and the angels waited on him.” The Son of Man became for us a mediator to help us. God showed His care for us in that He didn’t want us to stay lost, so we were given a Savior who now mediates on our behalf. 1 Timothy 2:5 tells us, “There is…one Mediator between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus.” Though Satan has sought to thwart God’s plan, and to keep us from the care of God, through the Son of Man, Jesus Christ, we continue to be cared for and counted as precious in God’s sight. Therefore, knowing that God is going to carry out His purpose, we not only see that everything is put under His purpose, but it is done so because He cares for us through and by the care of Jesus.
III. Made him- (Psalm 8:4; Matthew 1:18-23)
a. Jesus was born into the world- One of the interesting notes of the
Scriptures is that for God to come into the world as the Son of Man, He had to be made, created, born into this world. That is why the psalm says “you made him a little lower than the heavenly beings.” Or another way to say it would be to say “you begat” him. Like begats like. Meaning that as a cow begats a cow, or a human begats another human, so God begats God.
Listen from the gospel of Matthew, 1:18-23: “This is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about: His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be with child through the Holy Spirit. 19Because Joseph her husband was a righteous man and did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly. 20But after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, "Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. 21She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins." 22All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: 23"The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel"—which means, "God with us.’”
And so we have the Son of Man come into the world with a purpose; to be God with us, but also to ‘save His people from their sins.’ The purpose of His being made God in the flesh was very specific; He was to come to redeem His people!
b. Used Him to redeem us- “A Stranger at the Door,” Hot
Illustrations… p. 25; There is a story of a man whose wife and children were getting ready to go off to their church’s Christmas Eve service. The wife was hoping the husband would go with them, but he wasn’t a believer and thought it was all nonsense. So his family went off without him while he sat by the fireplace reading his book. Not long after his family left it began to snow. He noticed it outside the window, but then something else caught his eye as well; 3 young cats walked past the window. The man put on his coat and decided to check it out. As he opened the door a shiver ran through him by a blast of the cold air. He saw the cats were very young and needed to be helped out of the cold, or they might die. So he called out to the cats, but the cats ran away, frightened by his voice and presence. He again called out to them saying, “Come back, don’t be afraid.” But this did not help at all. “Well,” he thought, “I’ve done everything I can for them,” realizing that any attempt to go toward them just drove them farther away. The only way that I could help them would be to become a cat and lead them to safety. Just then the church bells rang. The bells stopped him in his tracks as he remembered how his wife had told him that God had become man so that He could help us and lead us to safety. At this he went inside, dropped to his knees before the fire and wept, asking for God to forgive his doubting and to take away his sin!!!
Jesus came to this earth to save us because God cares deeply for us!
IV. Crowned him- (Psalm 8:4; Philippians 2:9-11)
Yet, even more than our mediator, Jesus, the Son of Man, is our LORD! The
psalmist says: “You crowned him with glory and honor.” We learn at Easter that the resurrection is important. It is important because of Jesus being resurrected from the dead. A dead Lord would not be of any use to us; not have any power on our behalf. But Jesus is not dead, He has been raised from the dead. And we are told that He sits at the right hand of God, on the throne of God, crowned with glory.
As God in the flesh, Jesus is more than God’s son; He is more than man. He is God in all fullness! As we are told in Philippians 2:9-11, “Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, 10that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” Poem: Face to Face, by Carrie Breck (The Tale of the Tardy Oxcart, p. 317)
“Face to face with Christ my Savior, Face to face—what will it be—
When with rapture I behold Him, Jesus Christ who died for me?
Only faintly now I see Him, with the darkling veil between;
But a blessed day is coming when His glory shall be seen.
Face to face! O blissful moment! Face to face—to see and know;
Face to face with my Redeemer, Jesus Christ who loves me so.”
God cares enough about us to not only come to this earth to live among us, but also to die for us so that our sins would be removed, and even more, to bring us to heaven so that we will behold His glory face to face.
Conclusion: We see that in this psalm King David moves from a position of pride, thinking that he is great, to realizing that he is just a small part of creation. And yet, in his asking this question, (What is man that you are mindful of him?) David begins to realize that because of the Second Son, the Son of Man, Jesus Christ, God has shown the depth of His love; that He is indeed mindful of us through the love shown to us in Christ. This shows us all the more how wonderful it is that God is mindful of us. He is mindful of us as Creator, as Savior, as Redeemer, as Lord.
So what is man that God is mindful of us? We are God’s creation. We are God’s people. We are sinners who are saved through Christ. We are God’s beloved. We are people who have been given gifts by God.
EXAMPLE: Imagine that you had won the following prize in a contest:
Each morning your bank would deposit $86,400 in your private bank account for your own use. However, this prize has rules, just as any game has certain rules.
The set of rules?
1) Everything that you didn't spend during each day would be taken away from you.
2) You may not simply transfer money into some other account. You may only spend it.
3) Each morning upon awakening, the bank opens your account with another $86,400.00.
What would you personally do? You would buy anything and everything you wanted, right? Not only for yourself, but for all the people in your life, right? Maybe even for people you don't know, because you couldn't possibly spend it all on yourself and the people in your life, right? You would try to spend every single cent, and use it all up every day, right? Actually, this game is a reality, but not with money! Each of us is in possession of such a magical bank. We just don't seem to see it. The MAGICAL BANK is TIME! Each morning we awaken and receive 86,400 seconds as a gift of life, and when the day is done, any remaining time is gone and NOT credited to us. What we haven't lived up to that day is lost forever. Yesterday is forever gone. SO, what will YOU do with your 86,400 seconds
God is indeed mindful of us; He has given us life itself! Let us be thankful for this truth! Amen.
Sunday, August 1, 2010
Great Questions Series: Psalm 8:3-4
Introduction: Who are the ones you think about the most? I would guess it would be your family and good friends, and maybe God. Also, it might be someone who you are in conflict with, and this person has gotten under your skin, and this anger causes you to dwell upon them and the situation a little too much. We tend to think about that which has importance in our lives, and/or that consumes our emotions.
There are many people that believe that the God we believe in, is made up; that this God doesn’t really exist. We have just made this God up in our imagination. But if this were true, I believe that this God would look much different. More like the Greek gods: Aphrodite, the goddess of love; Apollo, god of music and healing; Ares, the god of war; Athena, the virgin goddess of wisdom; Hermes, the god of messengers; and on and on it goes. These made up gods have their own specific power and place in this world. And these gods don’t have much to do with the humans, and are definitely not personal with them in any way.
But there is something different about the God of the Bible. In our question for today we look at: What is Man that You are Mindful of Him?
I. Mindful of him- (Psalm 8:3)
a. God knows us- From the very beginning of time there has been a
personal nature between God and us, His creation. We are told in Genesis 1 that God wanted to make us in His image. This shows how much thought went into our making. In Psalm 139 we are told that God knows about what we do, and cares about what we do. In fact, the Bible is full of passages that talk about a God who cares for us and for how we live.
This is a profound thought, because it would be easy to think that God has so many more important things to care about. What about the whole of the universe? What about creating others worlds? What about holding this world together? Why would God even care about you or me?
Imagine with me for a moment: by some occurrence you come to know the president of the United States; you become friends with him. He knows your name, knows your family, knows some personal things about you. One day the president comes into town, and he is giving a speech; you are in the audience. At the end of the speech many are trying to get to him, trying to talk with him, trying to touch him, and you walk up, he sees you, and calls out your name. How would that make you feel? You have been set apart above all the other people, because someone that everyone else wants to know, is known by you!
This is how it is with God. God is far greater than the president could ever be. God is far more powerful, far more capable, far more important. And this God knows you. As we talked about a few weeks ago, when we looked at Psalm 139, we saw that God knows everything about us. If God were present here on this earth, and you walked by, God would call you out by name!
b. God is mindful of us- But even more than knowing us by name,
God is mindful of us. Meaning, that we are in God’s thoughts.
Whenever we go to my in-laws house, right there in the kitchen, on the
refrigerator, are many pictures of our family. Why are these pictures there?
Because it helps them to be more mindful of us; to keep us in their thoughts.
Someone once said, “If God had a refrigerator, your picture would be on it.”
We want to feel important in this world. We seek to feel important in our relationships with others. We seek to feel important by establishing ourselves in a good job. We seek to feel important by having nice clothes, and a fancy car. The problem with all of this, is what happens if we don’t get these things? Or what happens if we do get them, but then lose them? The “importance” we attained was not real importance. We were only important for how we appeared. That is why it is so hard for many athletes to retire, because once the retire, they are not seen as important anymore.
Our importance with God is not based on what we attain, or who we appear to be, but by the mere fact that we are God’s creation. I’ve said it before, and I will keep saying it, because to me it is a profound truth: as I understand the importance my children have in my mind, it helps me to understand the importance I have in God’s mind. Because I am a part of God as a part of His creation, God is mindful of me; AND YOU.
II. Care for him- (Psalm 8:3, 4; Mark 1:13; 1 Timothy 2:5)
a. Man- This psalm is really about the psalmist, David, as a king,
thinking that he was important. But then he says in verse 3: “When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars which you have set in place.” David begins to understand that even though he was a king, and a powerful king at that, even though he felt important, he realizes that there is so much more to the world. He realizes that the universe stretches out to infinity, and that he is just a small part of all that exists. He begins to wonder why God would pay any attention to him at all. “What is man that you are mindful of him?”
God has absolute authority over this universe, and that authority includes you and me, and all of God’s creation. While God gave authority to Adam to care for this earth (and by inheritance all human beings), God still oversees all. God has not relinquished control, or concern for this world; or for you and me. While this world is to be in subjection to us, we are to be subject to God.
But so often we fail in this call. We have failed in that sin came into the world through Adam and Eve. We fail in that we often do not love others as God would have us to love them. We have failed in that we are not caring for this earth, but rather we are destroying it with our misuse.
b. The Son of Man- So God turned His attention to the Second Man;
Jesus Christ; God in the flesh. God gave the Son of Man authority over the universe. So the Second Man comes onto the scene. We are told a little about Him in Psalm 8:4- “You made Him a little lower than the heavenly beings…” When God the Son took on flesh, He was lower than the heavenly beings in that He was human. As a human He had flesh and blood; He had emotions; He had temptation. He needed care, as we see in Mark 1:13 at the end of Jesus’ being tempted in the wilderness and having gone 40 days without food, we are told: “…and the angels waited on him.” The Son of Man became for us a mediator to help us. God showed His care for us in that He didn’t want us to stay lost, so we were given a Savior who now mediates on our behalf. 1 Timothy 2:5 tells us, “There is…one Mediator between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus.” Though Satan has sought to thwart God’s plan, and to keep us from the care of God, through the Son of Man, Jesus Christ, we continue to be cared for and counted as precious in God’s sight. Therefore, knowing that God is going to carry out His purpose, we not only see that everything is put under His purpose, but it is done so because He cares for us through and by the care of Jesus.
III. Made him- (Psalm 8:4; Matthew 1:18-23)
a. Jesus was born into the world- One of the interesting notes of the
Scriptures is that for God to come into the world as the Son of Man, He had to be made, created, born into this world. That is why the psalm says “you made him a little lower than the heavenly beings.” Or another way to say it would be to say “you begat” him. Like begats like. Meaning that as a cow begats a cow, or a human begats another human, so God begats God.
Listen from the gospel of Matthew, 1:18-23: “This is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about: His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be with child through the Holy Spirit. 19Because Joseph her husband was a righteous man and did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly. 20But after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, "Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. 21She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins." 22All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: 23"The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel"—which means, "God with us.’”
And so we have the Son of Man come into the world with a purpose; to be God with us, but also to ‘save His people from their sins.’ The purpose of His being made God in the flesh was very specific; He was to come to redeem His people!
b. Used Him to redeem us- “A Stranger at the Door,” Hot
Illustrations… p. 25; There is a story of a man whose wife and children were getting ready to go off to their church’s Christmas Eve service. The wife was hoping the husband would go with them, but he wasn’t a believer and thought it was all nonsense. So his family went off without him while he sat by the fireplace reading his book. Not long after his family left it began to snow. He noticed it outside the window, but then something else caught his eye as well; 3 young cats walked past the window. The man put on his coat and decided to check it out. As he opened the door a shiver ran through him by a blast of the cold air. He saw the cats were very young and needed to be helped out of the cold, or they might die. So he called out to the cats, but the cats ran away, frightened by his voice and presence. He again called out to them saying, “Come back, don’t be afraid.” But this did not help at all. “Well,” he thought, “I’ve done everything I can for them,” realizing that any attempt to go toward them just drove them farther away. The only way that I could help them would be to become a cat and lead them to safety. Just then the church bells rang. The bells stopped him in his tracks as he remembered how his wife had told him that God had become man so that He could help us and lead us to safety. At this he went inside, dropped to his knees before the fire and wept, asking for God to forgive his doubting and to take away his sin!!!
Jesus came to this earth to save us because God cares deeply for us!
IV. Crowned him- (Psalm 8:4; Philippians 2:9-11)
Yet, even more than our mediator, Jesus, the Son of Man, is our LORD! The
psalmist says: “You crowned him with glory and honor.” We learn at Easter that the resurrection is important. It is important because of Jesus being resurrected from the dead. A dead Lord would not be of any use to us; not have any power on our behalf. But Jesus is not dead, He has been raised from the dead. And we are told that He sits at the right hand of God, on the throne of God, crowned with glory.
As God in the flesh, Jesus is more than God’s son; He is more than man. He is God in all fullness! As we are told in Philippians 2:9-11, “Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, 10that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” Poem: Face to Face, by Carrie Breck (The Tale of the Tardy Oxcart, p. 317)
“Face to face with Christ my Savior, Face to face—what will it be—
When with rapture I behold Him, Jesus Christ who died for me?
Only faintly now I see Him, with the darkling veil between;
But a blessed day is coming when His glory shall be seen.
Face to face! O blissful moment! Face to face—to see and know;
Face to face with my Redeemer, Jesus Christ who loves me so.”
God cares enough about us to not only come to this earth to live among us, but also to die for us so that our sins would be removed, and even more, to bring us to heaven so that we will behold His glory face to face.
Conclusion: We see that in this psalm King David moves from a position of pride, thinking that he is great, to realizing that he is just a small part of creation. And yet, in his asking this question, (What is man that you are mindful of him?) David begins to realize that because of the Second Son, the Son of Man, Jesus Christ, God has shown the depth of His love; that He is indeed mindful of us through the love shown to us in Christ. This shows us all the more how wonderful it is that God is mindful of us. He is mindful of us as Creator, as Savior, as Redeemer, as Lord.
So what is man that God is mindful of us? We are God’s creation. We are God’s people. We are sinners who are saved through Christ. We are God’s beloved. We are people who have been given gifts by God.
EXAMPLE: Imagine that you had won the following prize in a contest:
Each morning your bank would deposit $86,400 in your private bank account for your own use. However, this prize has rules, just as any game has certain rules.
The set of rules?
1) Everything that you didn't spend during each day would be taken away from you.
2) You may not simply transfer money into some other account. You may only spend it.
3) Each morning upon awakening, the bank opens your account with another $86,400.00.
What would you personally do? You would buy anything and everything you wanted, right? Not only for yourself, but for all the people in your life, right? Maybe even for people you don't know, because you couldn't possibly spend it all on yourself and the people in your life, right? You would try to spend every single cent, and use it all up every day, right? Actually, this game is a reality, but not with money! Each of us is in possession of such a magical bank. We just don't seem to see it. The MAGICAL BANK is TIME! Each morning we awaken and receive 86,400 seconds as a gift of life, and when the day is done, any remaining time is gone and NOT credited to us. What we haven't lived up to that day is lost forever. Yesterday is forever gone. SO, what will YOU do with your 86,400 seconds
God is indeed mindful of us; He has given us life itself! Let us be thankful for this truth! Amen.
posted by Logan's Blog at 9:51 PM
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