Why You Don't Need to Fear the Future - Part 1

0:27 Today we continue in our series of Psalm 23, the most important or most famous chapter in the entire Bible. It's only six verses, but it gives us a dozen pictures of the goodness of God. Now you know as I've been teaching this psalm to you, I've studied all the scholars. I've read all the commentaries. And a lot of commentaries, biblical commentaries, actually get this psalm wrong. wrong. They say, this is a psalm of David's confidence and David's faith. Absolutely not. They're all wrong about that. It's not even about David. It's not about a shepherd, David being a shepherd. It's not about sheep. It's about the goodness of God. It's all about God. You know, a lot of times we talk about you being committed to Jesus or you being committed to God. This psalm turns that upside down.

1:22 This psalm is not about your commitment to God. It's about God's commitment to you, to you. And in this psalm, God says, I'm gonna do 12 things for you. They're metaphors and you have to explain them. But he says, I'm gonna do these 12 things for you because I'm a good God and I love you. And these are the things I've committed to do for you. It's 100% about God. Now, we're drawn now toward the end of this series. I want us to read the whole psalm again together. It's only six verses. But I want you to read it aloud with me, and I want you to emphasize the 12 times it talks about God. Because this psalm is not about you. It's about what God does for you. So up here on the screen, let's read this together. The Lord is my shepherd. I have everything I need. He makes me lie down in green pastures.

2:16 He leads me beside still waters. He restores my soul. He leads me in the right paths for his name's sake. Even when I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil for you are with me. And then he says, maybe.

2:39 Thank you. Your rod and your staff comfort me. You prepare a banquet for me in front of my enemies. You anoint my head with oil and my cup overflows. Surely goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever. Now I want you to notice first that this psalm begins and ends with the Lord. The Lord is my shepherd. And it ends with, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever. This psalm is all about God. It's all about his goodness to you. If you missed any in this series, I would encourage you to go back and listen to the 12 things that God has said he wants to do for you because he is a good God. Now, today we look at this last verse.

3:34 Surely goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life. That's a promise. And I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever. That's heaven. That's future. Now, any time you start worrying, you need to remember the last verse of Psalm 23. If you have difficulty with the future, you tend to get anxious about the future. You get fearful about the future. You get worried about the future. You feel anxiety welling up within you over the future. You need to remember this last verse. Because this last verse tells us the three reasons you never need to fear the future if you're a believer. You never need to fear the future because of the three things that it tells us in this last verse.

4:33 Now, if you're taking notes, you might just write this down. Here's the first reason. I don't need to fear the future because God's goodness is watching over me. I don't need to fear the future because God's goodness is watching over me. The Bible says, surely goodness will follow me all the days of my life. Do you know that God in his goodness is always paying attention to you? Did you know that you've never had a second of your life God was not watching you? God is always paying attention to you. Why? Because he created you to love you and he's a good God. So how in the world can God be interested in me? There's seven and a half billion people in the world. The God who created trillions of stars can surely care about seven billion people all at the same time. you don't understand how big God is if you don't understand that God can pay 100% attention to you while paying 100% attention to everybody else too he's God there has never been a moment in your life God was not watching he knows every detail of your life he knows when you get acid indigestion and when you get a few other things in your stomach, he knows there has never been a moment, he knows the highs and lows, the goods and the bads, the ups and downs, he's paying attention to you right now.

6:00 In fact, God knows you better than you know yourself. God knows the details of your life, every one of them. He knows more details about you than you do. Why? He is a good God, and the goodness of God is following me all the days of my life. Psalm 145 verse 20 says this. The Lord watches over all who love him. God's goodness is watching over him. He doesn't miss any details. And not only does he watch over you, he actually protects you. You are protected from thousands of things you don't even know you missed. Accidents that you could have gotten into. problems that you could have created, decisions that you made, and God said, no, we're not gonna let the consequences of that one happen right now. How does God watch over you?

6:53 How does God protect you? Well, one of the ways this may shock you is angels. The Bible says God created angels to watch over you. You say, wait a minute, are angels real? Oh, yes, they're very real. The Bible tells us that. Now, let me say this. I don't have time to teach a whole message on it. I will sometime. We'll come back and cover angels. But there's a lot of phony baloney about angels out there. There's a lot of myths. There's a lot of lies. There's a lot of misconceptions. There's a lot of things that people think about angels that just aren't true. And so we'll have to come back and study that. But let me just say a couple things. When you die, you're not gonna become an angel.

7:36 When you die, when you go to heaven, you're gonna be a person. You're not gonna have any wings. Hate to tell you that. You're not gonna have any wings. In the first place, angels don't have bodies. They don't have human physical bodies. So they are the spiritual beings. You don't talk to them. I have walked with the Lord now for over 50 years. I've never had personal contact with an angel. Never, except Kay.

8:04 Thought I'd throw that in there. Okay. but they don't have physical bodies. You don't talk to them. You'll probably never have any interaction with them in your life, but they're out there watching over you. They are protecting you. They are actually created by God to encourage circumstances that encourage you. The Bible says in Psalm 91, verse 11, God orders his angels to protect you wherever you go. So they're like invisible helpers, and there are many ways they do this, But one of the ways is they create circumstances that you don't even know, how in the world did that happen? Well, an angel was in action. I could give you thousands of examples of this that I've seen over the years. Let me just give you one.

8:55 Several years ago, a young woman who was pregnant came to me for counsel, came to the church office, and she had discovered that she was carrying a Downs child, a Down syndrome child. And she was debating, am I going to terminate this pregnancy, get an abortion, or am I going to keep the baby? Am I going to give it up for adoption? Will I raise the child? She was very, very fearful, as is understandable. And I showed her some scripture, like Psalm 139, that says God planned you before you were born. God planned every day of your life when you were in your mother's womb. Abortion short circuits the will of God. God wanted you made. You were a person because he created you and thought you up. And she made the decision she was going to keep the baby. So she went home and I decided I would just write her a little note of encouragement. So I took out a postcard, wrote some Bible verses on it, wrote a little prayer and just a couple words of encouragement, some of the stuff I'd shared with her.

9:53 And I mailed that postcard to encourage that woman. The post office sent it to the wrong address. And so she didn't get it. but the woman who did get it read it and decided that she would hand deliver it to that other woman. So she goes, she looks up the address, it's obviously on the postcard, and she goes to the woman's house, knocks on the door and said, your pastor wrote you a word of encouragement, but it came to me, and I'm gonna give it to you right now. But I want you to know, I have a Down syndrome child, and I'm gonna help you. Yes, you go, you go. Now, I think an angel rerouted that postcard, okay? Because that kind of stuff just doesn't happen. What's the logic of how rare a Down syndrome child is? That card went to somebody else who could help her.

10:50 You don't even know how many times you've been helped by the goodness of God. But God says, my mercy and my goodness will be with you always. Now it says, surely goodness will follow me all the days of my life. What does that mean? Well, it doesn't mean that only good things will happen to you. Obviously, that's not true. A lot of bad things happen. A lot of disappointments happen. David had bad things happen. And the guy who wrote this doesn't mean only good things will happen to me. When the Bible says, surely goodness, God's goodness will follow me every day of my life, It means that God will ensure that good will come out of everything that happens to me, even the bad stuff. That's the promise. Not everything that happens to you is good. But surely goodness will follow me means God will bring good even out of the bad stuff, the evil stuff that happens to you.

11:45 You cannot control what happens to you in life. But you can be sure of this. if the Lord is your shepherd, God will always bring good, always, out of bad. Anybody can bring good out of good. God specializes in bringing good out of bad. And that's the great promise of Romans 8, 28, which says this. We know that all that happens to us is working for our good. It doesn't say it's all good. It says it's working for our good if, this is a promise, if we love God and are fitting into his plans. All things do not work together for good for everybody. If you're going in the opposite direction of God, if you're ignoring God's plan for your life, if you're not trying to live in God's love, all things are not working for good. They're all working for bad in your life. But this is a promise that those who love God, that those who really want to go God's way, who want to follow God's purpose, he says, okay, if you really want my will in your life, even the bad stuff that happens to you, I will bring good even out of that.

12:51 Now, of course, when you're going through a bad time, you never, never see the good in the moment. When my son, Matthew, my youngest one, took his life from mental illness, in the moment of that, I could not see any good out of it. It was a bad thing. It's still a bad thing. It's still a bad thing. But has God brought good out of it? I couldn't tell you all the good that God has brought out of it and how it's helped other people. And how God has used Kay, used me, and used our family to help other people through crises and problems. But in this situation, you don't see any good. But God is working. Why? Because his goodness follows me every day of my life. Now the second reason that you never need to fear the future, no matter what happens, first, because God's goodness is watching over me, the second reason is because God's grace is working in me. God's grace is working in me.

13:46 While goodness is working around me and it's watching out for me, God's grace is working in me at that moment. The Bible says, surely, not just goodness, but mercy will follow me all the days of my life. What is mercy? Mercy is grace in action. That's what it is. And so when I say God's grace is working in me, I'm talking about his mercy. It's grace in action. Isaiah 60 verse 10 says this. I will have mercy on you through my grace. Now let me explain this. When God says grace, goodness, and mercy are gonna follow you all the days of your life, what's the difference between God's goodness and God's mercy? Well, you might write this down here. It's up here on the screen. In the first place, God's goodness is when God gives me what I don't deserve.

14:41 That's goodness. God's goodness, that's his grace. God gives me what I don't deserve. I don't deserve all the blessings I have in life and you don't either. You don't, the air you just breathed, did you deserve that? The fact that your heart just took a beat, do you deserve that? The fact that you live in a free country, do you deserve that? Most of the things in your life are simply gracious gifts and everything you have in your life is a gift from God. Grace is when God gives me what I don't deserve. What's mercy? It's the exact opposite. Mercy is when God doesn't give me what I do deserve.

15:25 When God doesn't give me what I do deserve. All the stuff, all the ways I've been mean, I've been wrong, I've sinned, I've failed, I've flubbed up, I've made mistakes, I've been self-centered, I deserve punishment for that. I deserve discipline for that. I deserve retribution for that. If God gave me everything I deserved, I wouldn't be standing before you right now. If God gave you everything you deserved, you wouldn't take your next breath. So grace and mercy, or goodness and mercy, goodness, God gives me what I don't deserve, mercy, God doesn't give me what I do deserve. And he says both of these are gonna follow me. Because God is a good God, I can expect both his provision and his pardon. His provision, he gives me all kinds of good things in life. His pardon, he forgives all kinds of bad things in my life.

16:22 Forgiveness, that's the mercy, the mercy part. And because God is good, I can expect the most. Now why do you need mercy? Why do I need mercy? Because we're all imperfect. We all make mistakes. We all sin. We're all in a broken world. We don't always do the right thing. And we even know that when we don't always do the right thing. So I need forgiveness all the time. You need forgiveness all the time. You need God's mercy all the time. Aren't you glad that it says God's goodness and God's mercy will follow me all my life? It doesn't say God's justice will follow me all my life.

16:58 Because if you got what you deserved, you wouldn't be sitting where you are right now. You wouldn't take another breath. God doesn't follow you with his justice. He follows you with his mercy. He is a good God. Psalm 103 lists a number of ways that God shows his mercy. And as I read this, I want you to circle the verbs. And there's, I don't know, 10 or so things in this passage that are examples or definitions of God's mercy to you. Here's what it says, Psalm 103, verse 2 to 11. I will not forget the glorious things that God does for me. He forgives, you might circle that, he forgives all my sins. He heals me, that's mercy. He ransoms me from hell, that's mercy. He surrounds me with loving kindness, that's mercy.

17:54 He fills my life with good things. He is merciful and tender. Toward those who don't deserve it, that's mercy. He's slow to get angry. I'm glad for that, that's mercy. He never bears a grudge. Aren't you glad for that one? Some of you don't believe that. You think that something you did a long time ago, God's still trying to get even with you for it. Anything bad happens in your life, go, God's getting even with me. God, it says, does not carry a grudge. He's not getting even. How many times have you heard me say, God is not mad at you, he's mad about you.

18:36 No man will ever love you like Jesus Christ. No woman will ever love you like Jesus Christ. Any human love is minuscule in comparison to the creator who created you and he made you simply to love you. And so he follows your life with goodness, giving you the things you don't deserve, and mercy, not giving you the things that you do deserve. And he's following you these two things. He never bears a grudge. He has not punished us as we deserve for our sins. For his mercy, there's the word, is as great as the height of the heavens. He's like a father to us, tender and sympathetic to those who reverence him. now because God's mercy is following you every day of your life it means you can come to God with any problem any screw up, any mess up any fault, any failure, any sin and God has a 24 hour drop in service because his mercy is constantly following you there's never a moment he's not showing mercy to you and so you can always come to him no matter what you're going through that takes away your fear the Bible says this Hebrews 11, excuse me, 416.

19:55 We can come before God's throne, this is talking about prayer, where we can receive mercy and grace, mercy and goodness, to help us when we need it. When we need it. You know, sometimes you have sins in your life that are habitual. And we've all got these. I've got them, you've got them. It's areas that you continually stumble over and over. If you have a problem with anger, you tend to lose your temper over and over. Or you tend to clam up and swallow it over and over and over. Or you may have a problem with lust or you may have a problem with jealousy or you may have a problem with your mouth. You can't keep your mouth shut.

20:35 And you gossip all the time and you criticize all the time and you say mean things and you go, why did I say that? If you have an area of habitual sin, sometimes you start feeling a little guilty that you keep coming back to God for the same sins like, oh, I'm gonna bring this one to him. And you think, you're gonna come to God and say, God, I did this again, and God's gonna go, oh, come on, can't you come up with a new sin?

20:59 You're gonna give me the same old one, I've already forgiven that one 5,000 times. Come on, I'm so bored with that sin, give me something really to work on, to chew on here. And sometimes you're embarrassed, you go, you know, God, five minutes ago I just confessed this, and guess what, I just did it again. And you think God is getting tired. God never gets tired. Of forgiving you. Never, never, never. so don't hold back because his mercy follows you every day of your life it is God's nature to be merciful he loves to show his mercy he doesn't get tired of it he doesn't get bored with it he doesn't get frustrated that you keep coming back God loves showing mercy so you don't have to come embarrassed let me read that verse again look there on your outline we can come before God's throne where we can receive mercy and grace to help us when we need it now this phrase mercy will follow me all the days of my life it says goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life I think of two pictures that kind of are metaphors first, this is the Lord is my shepherd I told you in a previous message that you drive cattle but you lead sheep when cattle are driven on a cattle drive the cowboys drive the cattle from behind they push them forward and the horses are behind and they're pushing them forward.

22:25 But with sheep, you lead sheep. The shepherd is out in front of the sheep and he's walking with his rod and staff and they're following the shepherd. But at the back of the flock are a couple little sheepdogs. And those little sheepdogs are nipping at the heels of the sheep, making sure they don't run off into the ravine. And these two sheepdogs keep you on track following the shepherd. The sheepdogs in your life are God's goodness and God's mercy. Let me introduce you to your sheepdogs.

22:59 One's called mercy, one doggie's called mercy, and one doggie's called goodness. And God's goodness and God's mercy are following you as you follow Jesus the shepherd. Does that make sense? So these are the sheepdogs. God's goodness and God's mercy are the sheepdogs that keep you moving in the right direction.