We Trust in the Name of the Lord our God

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Open your Bibles to Psalm 20.  If you need a Bible, raise your hand and we can give you one.  And if you don’t have a Bible, please take one from us.  It is our gift to you. 

For those who are not regular attenders of Cornerstone Church, we have been working out way through the book of Psalms this summer.  As I thought about our service this morning in the Park, I considered preaching from another text, but upon further reflection I believe that this Psalm 20 is exactly where God desires us to be this morning.  Therefore, I am choosing to stay the course and preach from Psalm 20 today, which is an absolutely wonderful text.  So let us get right to it this morning and read Psalm 20, I will then pray, and they we will walk through this wonderful Psalm this morning.

To the choirmaster. A Psalm of David.
20 May the Lord answer you in the day of trouble!
    May the name of the God of Jacob protect you!
2 May he send you help from the sanctuary
    and give you support from Zion!
3 May he remember all your offerings
    and regard with favor your burnt sacrifices! Selah
4 May he grant you your heart's desire
    and fulfill all your plans!
5 May we shout for joy over your salvation,
    and in the name of our God set up our banners!
May the Lord fulfill all your petitions!
6 Now I know that the Lord saves his anointed;
    he will answer him from his holy heaven
    with the saving might of his right hand.
7 Some trust in chariots and some in horses,
   but we trust in the name of the Lord our God.
8 They collapse and fall,
    but we rise and stand upright.
9 O Lord, save the king!
    May he answer us when we call.

The key to understanding the Bible is to begin with understanding the context of a passage.  As we see right out of the gate, this Psalm was written by David.  Who is David?  He is the chosen one of God to be King over God’s people Israel.  During the days of David, approximately 1000 B.C., there were many nations, but there was only one Holy Nation. 
Deuteronomy 14:2 states, “For you are a holy people to the LORD your God, and the LORD has chosen you to be a people for His own possession out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth.”  And David was selected by God to be the ruler over God’s people.  2 Chronicles 6:6 says, “I have chosen Jerusalem that my name may be there, and I have chosen David to be over my people Israel.”  David was pinnacle of Israel's King, that is, until Christ was born.

Israel's Pep Rally
Let us now ask the question, why did David write this Psalm?  What is its purpose?  Obviously it was for the purpose of being sung, but we can be more specific than this.  This particular psalm would have been sung by the people of Israel prior to David leading his armies out to war.  This was Israel’s  fight song, if you will.   A song that they would sing during their pep rally. 

My guess is that all of you have been to a high school pep rally.  It was usually right before a big game.  It would be held in the high school gym, the band would be playing, cheerleaders would be doing what cheerleaders do, and then the entire school would yell out the fight song before they headed off to battle their lifelong rival.  This, in a sense, is the purpose of this Psalm.  All of Israel would gather together and shout this song of victory. 

The location that they would sing this Israeli fight song would have occurred at the tabernacle in Jerusalem.  If you look at verse 2 it says, “May he send you help from the sanctuary and give you support from Zion!”  Zion is the name of a Mountain that is located in Jerusalem.  The sanctuary is the name of the inner part of the tabernacle.  The sanctuary symbolized the presence of God among his people.  So picture a couple million people gathered together around the tabernacle preparing to send the army out onto the field to do battle.

More than a Song
Now, as they gathered at the tabernacle in Jerusalem they did more than just sing a song?  Look at verse 3, “May he remember all your offerings and regard with favor your burnt sacrifices!”  What is this all about? Right before battle, with all of God's people gathered, an offering was made to the Lord.  And this offering was an offering from the King, and it would have consisted of the killing of animals that would have then been burnt.  Why would David need to offer sacrifices?  Because he, along with all of Israel were sinners.  Sacrifices were done for the purpose of payment for the sins of the people, including David.  And how did they know they were sinful?  The law of God.  It was the Word of God that showed God's people that they had broken God's rules.  And prior to going off to war, it was the desire of David, and Israel to fight with clean hands, if you will. 

We Trust in the Name of the Lord Our God 
The congregating at the sanctuary, the offering of sacrifices, and the singing of a Psalm was not the only thing that distinguished Israel from the nation that it was going to war with.  Look at verse 7, “Some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we trust in the name of the Lord our God.”  Who is this “some”?  It is the nations that Israel was fighting against.  These are the people of the world that stood in opposition to God’s people.  The chariots and the horses are a reference to the other nation’s military strength.  In today’s terms we could say tanks and fighter jets.

Israel, stood in stark contrast to the nations of the world.  Instead of putting their faith in the size of their army, they put their faith in the size of their God.  Israel was to look to their covenant keeping Creator and place their confidence in him and not in the dust of creation. 

And as we think about Israel we can see examples of this over and over again.  It was not Israel’s horse or chariots that destroyed the armies of Egypt, for Israel had none.  It was their God who parted the Red Sea and pummeled the army of Pharaoh under the water of God’s wrath.  Likewise, it was not horses that stormed the Mighty Fortress of Jericho that caused the walls to fall, it was trusting in God’s word and literally walking in His way.  We see it again in the story of Gideon found in Judges 6-8.  Prior to war with the Midianites God commanded the leader of Israel’s Army, Gideon, to take his troops from 32,000 people and wean it down to only 300 men.  The reason for this is found in Judges 7:2, “The Lord said to Gideon, “The people with you are too many for me to give the Midianites into their hand, lest Israel boast over me, saying, ‘My own hand has saved me.’” 

King David himself could testify of this pattern in his own life.  The beginning of his military career began with Goliath, a strapping 9’6”, and who carried a spear described as a weaver’s beam with a point of the spear weighting 15 lbs.  David, on the other hand was just a boy with a sling shot.  And this is what the Boy David says to Goliath and the Philistinian army in 1 Samuel 17:45, “Then David said to the Philistine, “You come to me with a sword and with a spear and with a javelin, but I come to you in the name of the LORD of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied. 46This day the LORD will deliver you into my hand, and I will strike you down and cut off your head. And I will give the dead bodies of the host of the Philistines this day to the birds of the air and to the wild beasts of the earth, that all the earth may know that there is a God in Israel, 47and that all this assembly may know that the LORD saves not with sword and spear. For the battle is the LORD’s, and he will give you into our hand.”

We see the same thing with David as we did with Gideon as we did with the Exodus and as we see in Psalm 20.  God intentionally stacks the deck against his own people, so that God gets all the glory.  And God is the same yesterday, today, and forever.   And the foundation of this Psalm was Israel's faith in their God. 

The Office of King
But this Psalm is not just about faith, it is also about a specific person.  Look at the entire Psalm and count all of the times that the word “you” or “yours” is used.  Perhaps I am wrong, but I counted 11 times you or yours is used in these nine verses. 
1 May the Lord answer you in the day of trouble!
    May the name of the God of Jacob protect you!
2 May he send you help from the sanctuary
    and give you support from Zion!
3 May he remember all your offerings
    and regard with favor your burnt sacrifices! Selah
4 May he grant you your heart's desire
    and fulfill all your plans!
5 May we shout for joy over your salvation,
    and in the name of our God set up our banners!
May the Lord fulfill all your petitions!

King David, inspired by the Holy Spirit, seems to make himself the center of this Psalm, but why?  David is not the only one that goes out in battle.  David will be marching along with thousands upon thousands of other men.  Why before going to war is so much attention placed on the King?  Because as the King went, so went the nation.

As we stated earlier, David was appointed by God to lead God's people.  The King was one of the three offices established by God.  The other two were prophet and priest.  The Office of King entailed authority, protection, and prosperity.  The King was the ultimate representative of God's people, Israel.  And as I said, as the King went, so went the nation.  David, was known as a man after God's own heart, he never lost a battle, and he ushered Israel into the greatest prosperity that this world has ever seen.  Other Kings that followed David were not as faithful to the Lord, and they lead the nation into sin, which lead into times of difficulty, and eventually lead into the exile of Israel.  As the King went, whether good or bad, so went the nation. David knew this, and on the brink of war, David is the one who needed the prayer of his people. 

So What?
Now, many of you may be sitting there and asking the ultimate question that arises in every sermon.  So what?  Who cares about how Israel prepared to go to war?  How is this relevant to me?  I bet you can guess, I will tell you.

Romans 15:4 states, “For whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, that through endurance and through the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope.”  Psalm 20 is written so that we may learn.  It is written to encourage us.  It is written so that you and I may have hope.  But how is this true?  It is true through Jesus Christ. 

In John 5:39 Jesus tells the religious leaders of his day, “You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me.”  What does Jesus mean that the Scriptures, which at the time of Jesus would have only been the Old Testament bear witness about Jesus?  How does Psalm 20 bear witness about Jesus?

We, like Israel, are in a constant state of war.  Our enemies are not the Philistines, or the Midianites, or the Syrians, our enemies are Satan, sin, and death.  Most people in the world are clueless that they are in the midst of this war.  Yet they are.  It is Satan's desire that all of humanity to be eternally separated from God and go to Hell.  And because we are all sinners, Hell is what we deserve.  The Bible says in Romans 3:23, “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.”  Everyone in this park, and in this town deserves Hell, for we all have sinned and fall short.  So what are we to do?

First, as Israel assembles themselves at the Sanctuary of the tabernacle to seek the presence of God, we are to do the same.  However, our sanctuary is not a tabernacle, our sanctuary is Jesus Christ.  Jesus says this himself in John 2:19, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” 20The Jews then said, “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple,c and will you raise it up in three days?” 21But he was speaking about the temple of his body.”  Jesus is the temple of God.  He is the presence of God on earth.  John 1:1, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God....14 And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.”  Christ is our help from the sanctuary and his is our support from Zion.  John 14:6 says, “I am the way, the truth, and the life, and no ones comes to the Father except through me.”

 Second, just as David offered sacrifices to God, so did Christ, however, the sacrifice of Christ was the sacrifice that ended all sacrifices.  Hebrew 10:11, “And every priest stands daily at his service, offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. 12But when Christ had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God, 13waiting from that time until his enemies should be made a footstool for his feet. 14For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified.”  The sacrifice that was offered by Israel was just a shadow of the greater sacrifice to come from Jesus.  The blood of animals had no power, it is only the blood of Jesus that can wash away a man's sin.  And as it said in Hebrews, the single offering of Jesus perfects those who have placed their faith in Jesus.  The sacrifice of Christ pays for all your sins.  Nothing can be added to the sacrifice of Christ.  And once again, the only way to defeat the enemies of Satan, sin and death, is only through Christ alone. 

Third, as David was King of Israel and let his people into battle, so does King Jesus for all who put their faith in Him.  When Christ came, he did not come to merely teach, he did not come to merely do good, he came to defeat our enemies, Satan, sin and death.  And the battleground for this war was the cross.  For it was on the cross that victory is won.  Colossians 2:13, “And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses, 14by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross. 15He disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame, by triumphing over them in him.”  Only in Christ the King is their victory.  1 Corinthians 15:55, “O death, where is your victory?  O death, where is your sting?”  56The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. 57But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.”

Psalm 20 is relevant to us because Christ is the ultimate fulfillment of it, and because of that we can sing this same words as Israel did 3000 years ago and say as it does in verse 5, “May we shout for joy over your salvation, and in the name of our God set up our banners!”