It’s a, you might call it a providence or coincidence that the text that I’m going to preach on this morning is the same text as the one that we just read. In fact, I only got to know about it last night when I saw the postings in the media team. And so please turn with me again in your Bibles to our text this morning in Psalm 103- Psalm 103. Let me just read the first few verses again.

“Bless the LORD, O my soul; And all that is within me, bless His holy name! Bless the LORD, O my soul, and forget not all His benefits: Who forgives all your iniquities, Who heals all your diseases, Who redeems your life from destruction, Who crowns you with lovingkindness and tender mercies, Who satisfies your mouth with good things, so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.” Let us go to the Lord and pray.

“Our dear Father in heaven, indeed we come and bow before You, for indeed You are our Master and our Lord and we come to You indeed mindful of our own sinfulness. Our chief complaint indeed is that our love is weak and faint, and we pray that this day that You might arouse us again and help us to know that You deserve all our love and all our devotion and that we are to love You with all our heart, with all our soul, with all our strength and our mind.

And so we commit ourselves again unto You this morning as we come to Your Word. We look to You for blessing, we look to You for enlightenment, and we pray that You will humble our heart as we hear Your truth, for we pray in Jesus’ name, Amen.”

Now I’ve entitled this psalm as “How To Stir Ourselves To Worship”. So the first thing I’d like to point out is that this psalm is about worship. Now I want to ask you this morning as we consider this whole subject of worship: Now how is your worship? What is it like? You see many Christians, their worship is cold and lifeless. They are really not excited about their worship. They are not stirred, they are not aroused as they come to worship their God.

Now sadly that is true of many Christians. Their worship is nothing like what we read of the psalmist in Psalm 42 where we read here about them, they cry out and said: “As the deer pants for the water brooks, so pants my soul for You, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I come and appear before God?”. Now here’s the cry of someone who is excited about worship. There is this longing to come and appear before God in worship.

For many, their worship cannot be said to be like the psalmist as we read in Psalm 84. You hear the psalmist wrote: “How lovely is Your tabernacle, O LORD of hosts! My soul longs, even faints for the courts of the LORD; My flesh and my heart cry out for the living God.”. Now, this is what worship ought to be like. This is biblical worship. This is worship where the worshipper comes and there is this cry. There is this longing after the true and the living God.

Now, this psalm is not just about the subject of worship but specifically, this psalm is about how to stir ourselves to worship, how to arouse ourselves to worship. And so the assumption is this that even the psalmist himself perhaps experienced that period in his life where he finds himself like many Christians, dragging perhaps his feet, unexcited, not stirred in his worship. And so he writes this psalm to stir himself. This psalm is about him trying to arouse himself to worship God as He deserves to be worshipped.

So how do we do that? Perhaps that is your complaint this morning. Your complaint to God is that I’m not excited as I ought to be. I’m not aroused. I’m not worshipping You as I ought to be. As I read the Scripture, I read of those in Psalm 42 and the psalmist in Psalm 84 and so on, I’m not like this. So how do we arouse ourselves to worship the true and the living God?

You see, there are many people who think that the way to arouse ourselves is through external stimulants, maybe loud music. Well, the worship this morning is lifeless and dead. We need to bring on more musical instruments, perhaps maybe the drums to beat it up so that our heart may vibrate and that we may get excited and that we may come up to our feet or rise up to our feet and we will be jumping there. And now we can see that we’re excited about worship.

Maybe something that to be aroused to worship is to have a charged-up atmosphere, to have special lightings, to have those shouting’s, and so on. Now it’s not just some Christians who think that that is the way to arouse ourselves to worship but many churches also think that that is the way to arouse people to worship.

If we want to get you excited about worship, then we must have special events, maybe some concerts. And maybe we should have some more exciting songs like the Hillsong. Or maybe we should bring on some more exciting people on stage like Phua Chu Kang.

Now you see that is how a lot of people and many churches perhaps think that is the solution to the problem that the psalmist is pointing out here when people are lifeless, when they are not excited about worship. So let us do something. But that is not what the psalmist tells us alright. So this psalm as I say is the psalmist telling us how he is stirring himself to worship the true and the living God as He deserves to be worshipped.

But the way to stir ourselves to true worship, to lively worship, the psalmist tells us the way to stir ourselves to true worship is to stir the heart by informing the mind. To stir the heart by informing the mind. You remember what Jesus said to the woman? He said that we should worship God in spirit and in truth. In spirit and in truth. In truth means as a response to truth. True worship in other words is a response to the truth about God. If there is no information here, there is no truth of God here in your mind, then there is no true worship because true worship is a response.

So the way the psalmist makes himself excited about worship is to remind himself or to inform himself of the wonderful truths about God. And that is the reason why there is this vital connection between the preaching of the revelation of God and worship. There cannot be exciting worship without preaching. To think that the way to get people to come and be excited is to minimize the preaching of the Word of God and to maximize all the other things or activities in the church. But that is not how the psalmist understands it.

And so he says the way to be excited about worship in other words is to be excited about God. If you are not excited about God, you are not excited about worship. So what are you excited about as you come to church this morning, as you come to worship God this morning? Excited about your friends, excited about some events, excited about some special speaker or entertainer might be coming to church this morning? What are you excited about this morning as you come to church? What are you looking forward to?

Well, let me tell you that we have not arranged any of these special things for you. No special celebrity, no special instruments, no special performance, no special singers for you because the way that you ought to be excited about worship is to be excited about God. And so what we find David doing here in this psalm is this that he’s preaching to his heart because he knows that there is no true worship without preaching of the revelation of God.

So he is preaching to his heart, reminding himself of truths that will stir him to praise and worship God. That is what he’s doing. He is preaching to his heart, and that’s why he says here in the very first verse: “Bless the LORD (means praise the LORD), O my soul”. He is saying to himself: O me, O my soul, praise God! Bless the LORD. Be excited about God. But how can you be excited about God? So he says: “Bless the LORD, O my soul”. He’s preaching to himself to stir himself.

Then he reminds himself of this wonderful truth. And so what we are going to look at this morning is three wonderful truths about God. Do you know any wonderful truths about God that will excite you to come this morning to worship Him? Is there something that you know of God that will arouse you to want to come and bow before Him? Is there anything that will make you bow before God this morning?

What is it that is even in your heart, in your mind? What is it that you are even thinking about as you come to worship God? Shouldn’t be those great thoughts of God? And that’s what hymns should be like. When we sing the hymns, hymns should reinforce those truths, should inform us to tell us what a great God He is, what a wonderful God He is, what a merciful God He is. Those are the great truths of God.

So follow me as I point you to this psalm and show you three wonderful truths about God that David is showing here so as to stir ourselves to worship God, and the three things are this: the blessings of God, the love of God, and the greatness of God. Look first of all at the blessing of God. So what the psalmist does and the first place is to remind himself of God’s blessing- of God’s blessing. 

Very often we only remind ourselves you know those complaints that we have against God. God, you have not done enough. God, you are not so good to me. God, why am I in this situation? God, why is this happening to me? God, why am I losing my job? God… We have a lot to complain about God.

If you have a lot to complain about your God, your God is not great. That’s the reason why you’re not worshiping Him. That’s the reason why you’re not excited about Him. And so what the psalmist here (that is David) is doing here now from verse 2 onwards is to remind himself of the blessing of God because it’s only as he reminds himself of the blessing of God that he would be stirred to gratitude. He will be able to stir his heart to gratitude that he will come and he wants to thank God. He wants to come and thank the Lord.

In other words, the first thing we should do as David tells us is to count our blessings. Count our blessings and name them one by one, and you will be surprised what the Lord had done. And what David does is that now that he might come up with a list as it were or catalogue of the blessings of God. Now let us perhaps do an exercise. Think of the many blessings of God in your life. What comes to your mind first and foremost?

We can think of our family. Do you thank God for your family? You can think of the car that you have. Do you thank God for the car that you have? Maybe you’re not. You say only Myvi, I’m thinking of a BMW alright. Do you thank God for food that we receive each day we see on our table? Do you thank God for your parents? Do you thank God for your children? Do you thank God for your friends? Do you thank God for the church? These are the blessings of God.

But you see, it is significant that the first thing that David thought of is this in verse 3. He said: “Bless the LORD, O my soul”. He repeats that in verse 2: “And forget not all His benefits”. That is our tendency alright to forget His benefits. Then he says: “Who forgives all your iniquities”. In other words, David, he has experienced much blessings from God. Wealth he has from God, a kingdom he has from God, friends, family, wives, children, he has much blessings from God. But the first thing that came to this mind is this: the forgiveness of his sin.

Yes, we ought to praise God for the many, many blessings that God has blessed us with. But never forget in a sense the chief of all blessings. The chief of all blessings, it is to forgive us of our sin because our greatest problem is our sin. Our greatest problem is these things that is as it were drawing us into hell.

And so David reminds himself. He knows his sinfulness as we have considered that in Psalm 51. He understands he is a rotten, wretched, sinful being. He understands that without the grace of God he would be cast into eternal damnation in hell, and now he had experienced the grace of God, the forgiveness of his sin, sin that separates him from God. And now God has brought him to himself, and he thinks about that.

How often do you think of your salvation, the gift of life that God has given to you? How often do you thank God that in order to forgive us of our sin, He was prepared to send His one and only Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, to die on that cruel cross not for His own sin but for our sin? How often do we think about that and turn to God and praise God as David does here?

Next, he says: “And Who heals all your diseases”. Now we know that many may be quick to think that well David is now saying that God healed all his diseases, and therefore we should expect that from God. But if you read verse 2 to verse 5, you can see the whole context here is about his spiritual needs because he speaks of forgiveness of sin in the beginning of verse 3. He speaks of redemption from the pit of destruction in verse 4. He speaks of being crowned with lovingkindness and tender mercy, it’s like being raised. He talks of true satisfaction.

Now you see in this whole context, you see that David is thinking about the needs of his soul that he has been forgiven and that sin that has brought on so much destruction as it were diseases that destroy his soul. And he says that because of God’s grace in his life, because of forgiveness of his sin, his soul has been healed. And then he speaks of redemption, redemption from the pit of destruction. Now you see, he understands that because of his state in sin, his life is being destroyed. He’s like in the pit of destruction.

It is true of all of us in sin in this world that we are in the pit of destruction, that our cursed life is killing us. Now John Newton who wrote that famous hymn “Amazing Grace” tells of his story, the time when he was travelling home to England when he was caught in a storm. And there in the darkness below the ship that he was travelling on for several days, he remembered a Bible verse that his mother had taught him.

And then he cried out to God, and God showed grace to him. And God saved him, he said not only from the storm but also from his wild and sinful life because for once in his life he saw how wicked he was as a slave trader, and God delivered him from the pit of destruction. But David when he remembers the blessings of God, he remembers all these goodness and the grace of God. He does not only think of how God delivered him from his sin but how God raised him in the second part of verse 4: “Who crowns you with lovingkindness and tender mercies”.

In other words, he’s not just picking us up, but he actually raised us to a position of sonship. And now we are heirs and joint-heirs with the Lord Jesus Christ. And now we are nothing less than children of God. And that is a wonderful thing if you understand it. That’s why the Apostle John when he writes in his letter, he says: “Behold what manner of love this is, that we should be called children of God!”.

Don’t you understand what a blessing that is that God not only has saved you from the pit of destruction, forgiven you of all your sin, healed you of all your diseases as it were but also raised you to be His children? What manner of love that is that we should be called children of God! It is truth like this David said that is that is arousing in his heart, that gratitude towards God.

If you don’t understand yourself in your sinful state that you were dead in your trespasses and sin, that without God you are hopeless and helpless, that you are hell-bound. If you do not understand the true state that you were in, then you don’t understand the grace of God, this great blessing of God.

And not only that, David says in verse 5: “Who satisfies your mouth with good things”. You see, when we are in the world, we are never satisfied. We may have so-called good things, but we are never satisfied. But when Jesus came, he said this is the living bread. Eat, and you will never hunger again. He said I’m the living water. Drink, and it will truly satisfy you.

And so the psalmist understands that. He sees that. He sees the good things that God has given to him which truly satisfies his soul “so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s”. And so the first thing the psalmist says here as to how we should and we can arouse ourselves or stir ourselves to true worship of God is, first of all, to inform or to remind ourselves of the many blessings of God and not less this great and amazing blessing of salvation of deliverance, the amazing blessing of God’s love by sending His Son to die for us.

Second. The second thing he reminds himself so as to arouse or to stir himself to worship is by reminding himself of the love of God, in this, we see in verses 6 through 14. The love of God. And here in verses 6 through 14, David now shows to us the marvel of the love of God. The first thing we need to see is the amazing blessing of God that He has showered upon us. But the next thing is to see the marvel of God’s love.

We speak of God’s love very often. We even have that sticker perhaps on our car that says: “God is love”. We are just too familiar with the love of God, but not wonder at it. It doesn’t sound terribly nice to us alright if we say so; if we just assume it. But now David is saying think about the love of God not just to have heard it, not just putting on the sticker about the love of God, but think about the love of God. And if you truly know the love of God, it will stir you. It will arouse you to worship Him.

Try he says to comprehend something of the greatness of the love of God, and he does four things here, firstly by asking us to consider the proof of God’s love. The proof of God’s love in verses 6 and 7, which says: “The LORD executes righteousness and justice for all who are oppressed. He made known His ways to Moses, His acts to the children of God”.

Now, what is he saying here? You see in the days of the psalmist, that great act of deliverance of God was the Exodus experience. It was an event that the children of Israel will look back to again and again as it were to marvel at the mercy and the love of God for them that while they were in bondage in Egypt that God had delivered them. That was the great deliverance of the nation of Israel from their bondage. And therefore David here turns to this great event as the sure proof of God’s love.

He said look to that event, and it will remind you of the amazing love of God and that God had not only used Moses to lead them from bondage and to the Promised Land but God has also revealed to Moses the way of salvation. Verse 7: “He has made known His ways to Moses”. God has taught them through the sacrificial system that the way of salvation is through a sacrifice.

So that was revealed to them and to no other nations, and the law of God was also given to them. And so David is therefore saying here that is what we look to. Look to that event that shows to us this amazing love of God. And so also with us this morning, what do we look to so as to help us understand or comprehend something of the amazing love of God? What is it that we look to?

Romans 5:8, this is how Paul does it as it were, say this is what we should be thinking about. Romans 5:8, and Paul says: “But God demonstrates His own love toward us”. Remember this ought to be read with a tone of excitement and exclamation. And Paul is drawing attention to the love of God, and he’s saying spare some thought on this that God shows or demonstrates His love towards us “in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us”.

And then he said that again in Romans chapter 8. Romans 8:31 says: “What then shall we say to these things?”. What more can we say to these things? You see, that’s why he has been expounding in the earlier chapters on the gospel of the grace of God that we were sinners. “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God”. There is no difference whether Jews or Gentiles. All have sinned, all alike. “There is no one righteous, no, not one”, but the grace of God.

What more can we say to these things? “If God is for us, who can be against us?” But how do we know that God is for us? How do we know that God truly loves us or love me? How do you know that God truly loves you? Because He gave you a handphone last night? No, listen to Paul. He said verse 32: “He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?”.

This is how we know the love of God that He has given His Son, His one and only Son. He did not spare Him, illustrated by the example of Abraham sacrificing his son, Isaac. But that is only a picture of what we see here in Romans. And that’s what David is talking about here in the psalms that we should remind ourselves. And we see the proof- the proof of God’s love.

Then, the display alright- the display of God’s love in verses 8 through 10. Verses 8 through 10: “The LORD is merciful and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in mercy. He will not always strive with us, nor will He keep His anger forever. He has not dealt with us according to our sins, nor punished us according to our iniquities.”. Here is the display of God’s love.

Many Christians are perhaps often depressed by an awareness of their own sin. Oh, what a wretched man that I am, like Paul says. Maybe very often we come to that point in our life we see how wicked and how sinful we are that our chief complaint that we have not loved God as we ought, that we are not served Him as we ought, that we are not worshipping Him as we ought.

Maybe we have given up. We would have given up on ourselves a long time ago, but God, (David says) has not. Yes maybe you have failed God time and time again, you’ve sinned against Him, you’re not faithful, not devoted to Him as it were. But God has not dealt with us according to our sin. That is His amazing love. That is the display of His love.

And then thirdly, the psalmist speaks of the measure. Remember the psalmist at this point is trying to help us comprehend something of the greatness of the love of God, say look at the proof. Look at the display of His love. And thirdly, he says look at the measure or the extent of His love. Verses 11 and 12: “For as the heavens are high above the earth, so great is His mercy toward those who fear Him; As far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us.”.

That is the extend. That’s the measure, the greatness of the love of God that His love is in other words infinite. His love is eternal, that His love He tells us is beyond measure or calculation. As far as the heavens is from the earth, the east is from the west, how far is it? We do not know. It’s endless, and that’s what the psalmist is saying here- the measure of the love of God.

And then fourthly, the illustration of God’s love in verses 13 and 14: “As a father pities his children, so the LORD pities those who fear Him. For He knows our frame; He remembers that we are dust.”. You see, the Bible often helpfully tries to make things that might appear to be abstract concrete. And here by using an illustration, he is trying to make it concrete that he might help us understand this is the love of God. It’s like the father’s love for his son.

You know that Jesus used the same picture in one of His parables (that is the parable of the prodigal son). And when the prodigal son came back to his father, he understands the father’s love. Yes, he was a prodigal son. He wasted all his father’s money as it were. But when he came back, there is always a place in the father’s heart for the son. That is our God. He will never leave us nor forsake us. He’s always like the father with the arms wide open, ready to receive us back.

You may be running away this morning. You may be living in rebellions against God. You may be disobedient son. You may be unfaithful to God. You may not be loving God as you ought. But when you return to God, His hand is wide open. “As a father (he says) pities his children, so the LORD pities those who love Him.”.

Why? Because he tells us here in verse 14: “He knows our frame”. He understands. He has sympathy. You see, a parent have sympathy for their children, knowing that they are weak, they’re vulnerable. Their tendency is to rebel. He understands us, He knows our frame, and He is tender towards us.

Do you know the love of this God? Maybe perhaps that’s why you are not worshipping Him as you ought. So the psalmist says to stir ourselves to worship God is, first of all, to remind ourselves of the blessings of God, what amazing blessings those are. To remind ourselves of the love of God, what great and amazing love that is. And finally, he tells us that we must also remind ourselves of the greatness of God, that our God is a great God. And by reminding ourselves of the greatness of God, it will instil a sense of awe in us as we come before Him.

This we see in the following verses, beginning in verse 15. David says first of all that look, we tend to think too highly of people. Now Ed Welch has written a book called: “When People Are Big And God Is Small”, and that is to tell us that that is our tendency that we fear men more than we fear God. Why? Because we see them as huge or as big, because we think too highly of them. And therefore, our lives have been very much controlled by people and by the opinion, by their estimate of us and so on.

Then David says verse 15, now look: “As for man, his days are like grass; As a flower of the field, so he flourishes. For the wind passes over it, and it is gone, and its place remembers it no more.”. That’s it. That is people alright. That is men, however great they might be, they may be the greatest person on earth, the most talented, the most brilliant person. They are just like the grass. They are here today and gone tomorrow. And tomorrow, its place will remember it no more. It’s gone. It’s finished, that however great they might be, that is what they are finally speaking.

By contrast, he says we have lost the sense of the grandeur and the greatness of our God. We bow before men, we fear men, we respect men, but we don’t respect God. We don’t come to God the way we perhaps appear before some people. And so the psalmist says by contrast we lost the sense of the glory and the majesty and the greatness of God. And that’s why we tribalize religion. That’s why we are not taking God seriously. That’s why we become superficial when in our worship because we do not know who we are coming before.

So what does the psalmist thinks of God? Verse 17: “But the mercy of the LORD is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear Him, and His righteousness to children’s children, to such as keep His covenant, and to those who remember His commandments to do them. The LORD has established His throne in heaven”.

That is our God. His throne is in heaven. He is the King of kings and the Lord of lords. He is the Master of the universe. We can sing that, we can say that, but we don’t really mean that. Do you? Do you understand that when you come before God, you’re coming before the Master of the universe, the One who made everything- everything in this universe and whose throne is not on earth but in the heavens, and His kingdom rules over all?

That is His kingdom. His kingdom rules over all. Now that is our God. We worship a big God. There is a need for us perhaps this morning to see the greatness and the glory of God, to see God as the prophet Isaiah depicts Him in his book in Isaiah chapter 40.

Now listen to what the prophet writes in Isaiah chapter 40 and beginning in verse 18, where Isaiah says: “To whom then will you liken God?”. Who is your God? “Or what likeness will you compare to Him?” Some idols somewhere? “The workman moulds an image, The goldsmith overspreads it with gold, the silversmith casts silver chains. Whoever is too impoverished for such a contribution chooses a tree that will not rot; He seeks for himself a skilful workman to prepare a carved image that will not totter.”.

That’s of course comparing with the many little gods that people make. Who is our God? What is He like? To what will you compare God with? “Have you not known? Have you not heard? Has it not been told you from the beginning? Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth that it is He who sits above the circle of the earth?”.

That is our God. He sits above the earth, “and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers (to Him), Who stretches out the heavens like a curtain, and spreads them out like a tent to dwell in. He brings the princes to nothing; He makes the judges of the earth useless. Scarcely shall they be planted, scarcely shall they be sown, scarcely shall their stock take root in the earth, when He will also blow on them, and they will wither, and the whirlwind will take them away like stubble.”.

And again to whom, the prophet asked. “To whom then will you liken Me, to whom shall I be equal?” says the LORD. Now lift up your eyes on high, and see who has created these things, Who brings out their host by number; Who calls them all by name, by the greatness of His might and the strength of His power; Not one is missing.””. Now that is our God.

Let me close by asking: Do you find your heart cold this morning as you come before God in worship? Then you need to be stirred. You need to be aroused in your heart once again to worship the true and the living God. But how do you do it? How do you do it? Not by more music, not by more drama or dancing or clowns or entertainment. The way to be aroused, to be stirred to worship God is to remind ourselves of the blessing of God, the amazing love of God, and the greatness of God. Let us pray.

“Our Father in heaven, we indeed bow before You once again and acknowledge that indeed You deserve true worship. You deserve us to come and pour forth our whole being unto You, to love You, to draw near to You with our whole being, with all our heart and all our soul and all our might and all our mind.

Lord, help us to be able to give You that. We pray that You may indeed help us to understand that the way to do it is to remind ourselves of Your many blessings and achieve salvation through Your son, remind ourselves of Your great amazing love for us, and to know who You truly are that You are the majestic, great, and wonderful God, for we pray in Jesus’ name, Amen.”

This transcript has been lightly edited for readability.