Come and hear all ye that fear God and I will declare what he hath done for my soul

 LIMAVADY INDEPENDENT METHODIST CHURCH

SERMON NOTES FROM SUNDAY 21 MAY 2023 pm

PSALM 66

 

“Come and hear all ye that fear God and I will declare what he hath done for my soul.” verse 16

The Psalmist had something to rejoice about.  Have we got that which is worth shouting about?  George Whitfield was preaching in the open air one day when a man was seen running down the street to where he was preaching.  This man made an open profession that he didn’t believe in God nor in the existence of God.  Here he was running down the street.  Someone asked him where he was going.  “I am going down to hear Whitfield”.  “But surely you don’t believe what he preaches.”  “I don’t but he does.”  The author here of the psalm is unknown and there is much speculation about who it is as well as its timing and background.  Some say David others say Asaph.  Some say it was written after the Babylonian captivity.  Others say it was written during the days of Hezekiah when the opposing armies came to the gates of the city.  Hezekiah received the letter and spread it before the Lord.  Others say it was written at the time when David was on the run from Saul or Absalom.  It is a psalm that shows there is something worth shouting about.  “Come and hear” stopping everyone in their tracks.  I have something to relate to you.  Here’s what the Lord has done for my soul.  The psalmist is giving his testimony.

 

A personal experience.  An experience he had with the Lord.  It was personal.  “I will declare what he hath done for my soul.”  Not saying what he has done for us or my father, mother, brother or sister.  It is for me that the Lord did this.  Remember the words of the hymn “This is my story, this is my song.”  We need to challenge ourselves – have we got a story to tell?  This was a personal experience.  Salvation is personal – when we come and realise we have sinned and come short of the glory of God.  When you realise Christ has died for your sin, died to take away the guilt of sin and will take you one day to heaven to be with him for ever.  “I will go into thy house with burnt offerings: I will pay thee my vows which my lips have uttered, and my mouth hath spoken when I was in trouble.”  The Psalmist was taking us back to that day when he called out to the Lord.  God heard and answered his prayer.  He was now telling everyone what God did for his soul.  Many people at a time of sickness and tragedy say ‘Lord if you help me through this, I will do this and that’ but when they are raised up again they forget all about it.  The Psalmist had something to shout about.  It was so important as a Christian.  Are you telling men and women you are saved by the grace of God?  Think of Saul of Tarsus.  It was personal for him.  He was heading off for Damascus.  He has a task in his mind.  God brought him to his knees and he was saved.  A personal experience.  The Ethiopian eunuch in his chariot had a personal experience.  The woman at the well had a personal experience.  Peter preaching the word of God on the day of Pentecost saw the Holy Spirit come down and everyone cried out ‘what must we do to be saved?’  3000 people came to Christ that day.  Individual and personal.  You cannot be saved because any of your family is saved.   It is a personal experience.  Has Christ saved you tonight?

 

It is a powerful experience – ”what he hath done for my soul”.  The gospel is the power of God unto salvation.  Those people on the Day of Pentecost came under the power of God.  Peter simply preached the gospel that day.  It affected the men that night.  3000 were saved but everyone was individual.  The psalmist is speaking here of something done.  W P Nicholson said “you cannot be saved and not know it, you cannot be saved and not show it.”  The Psalmist knew there was something definite that had taken place in his life.  “But as to many as received him he gave the power to receive him.”  Not feelings, something you realise and acknowledge.  If you depend on feelings you might not feel like going to work on your sin.  “Whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved.”  In Psalm 40 the psalmist was waiting patiently for the Lord.  He was in a situation that was like a mud pile.  He kept sinking, there was no-one to help him out.  The Lord lifted him himself and put his feet on the rock never more to sink.  The woman with the issue of blood for 12 years tried every doctor, every remedy yet was none the better.  Someone told her of the Lord and how he was doing all manner of good.  He will not turn you away.  She believed with all her heart.  If I could touch the hem of Jesus’ garment.  She realised something powerful had happened when she did so.  We are not talking about an airy fairy thing, or joining a church but something that is mighty and it happens within the soul.

 

It was positive.  The Psalmist was ready to say “I will declare what he hath done for my soul.”  Salvation is a positive work of grace.  A positive change of nature.  We are made new creatures in Christ Jesus.  Nicodemus in John’s gospel came one night to Jesus.  “Rabbi we know thou art a teacher come from God for no man can do these miracles except God be with him.  He had only head knowledge.  “Except a man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.”  Christ died to take my sins.  He died in my place.  He died there for you as well as me.  “If any man be in Christ he is a new creature.”  Namaan the leper in the Old Testament went down to see the King of Israel about his leprosy.  The king told him to go to the prophet because he couldn’t help him.  The prophet told him to go into the River Jordan 7 times and afterwards we read “his flesh became white as a changed man.

 

 

 

It was a precious experience - “he hath done for my soul.”  Only God could do it.  The Philippian jailer asked “what must I do to be saved?  Peter and John replied “believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved.”