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At Sandals Church, our vision is to be real with ourselves, God and others. This channel features sermons and teaching from Pastor Matt Brown and other members of the Sandals Church preaching team. You can find sermon notes, videos and more content at http://sandalschurch.com/watch
For whatever reason, I have always struggled to pray. And so, as this new year begins and as many of you think about new routines that you wanna give yourself to, especially for those of you who follow Jesus, I wanna invite you to learn to pray the Psalms with us. It's a practice I picked up years ago that really saved, my ability to learn to pray, to speak to God honestly about how I was feeling and what I was thinking. And so every single day on sandalschurch.tv on YouTube, we're gonna be releasing, praying the Psalms, a psalm a day. We started in January 1st and every day you're gonna get a new psalm, but the opportunity to read the psalm with us, to reflect on a phrase, and then to respond to God in prayer, how to pray through the psalms.
Pastor Fredo Ramos:This has been a gift to me in my own journey with Jesus. I pray that it's a gift to you and so would you join us. Grace and peace. As we continue praying the Psalms, we come now to Psalm 26 and David writes, starting in verse 1, declare me innocent, oh lord, for I have acted with integrity. I have trusted in the lord without wavering.
Pastor Fredo Ramos:Put me on trial, oh lord, and cross examine me. Test my motives and my heart, for I am always aware of your unfailing love, and I have lived according to your truth. I do not spend time with liars or go along with hypocrites. I hate the gatherings of those who do evil, and I refuse to join in with the wicked. I wash my hands to declare my innocence.
Pastor Fredo Ramos:I come to your altar, oh, Lord, singing a song of thanksgiving and telling of all your wonders. I love your sanctuary, Lord, the place where your glorious presence dwells. Don't let me suffer the fate of sinners. Don't condemn me along with murderers. Their hands are dirty with evil schemes and they constantly take bribes, but I am not like that.
Pastor Fredo Ramos:I live with integrity, so redeem me and show me mercy Now I stand on solid ground and I will publicly praise the Lord By way of reflection, I want to just draw our attention to kind of the past, present, and future movement of the Psalm there in verse 3, we hear David say, I'm always aware of your of your unfailing love and I have lived I have lived according to your truth. He then goes on to say, I don't stand with sinners, I don't walk according to their ways, I refuse to join in. It's kind of a callback to Psalm 1 where it talks about walking, standing, and sitting with those who do evil. He says that he loves the presence of God in verse 8, and then he goes to the future and says, I will live with integrity and I will praise you. There's a movement of past, present, and future, all with us all with this invitation that David is inviting God to search his heart.
Pastor Fredo Ramos:He wants him to be, he wants himself to be examined by God and I think it's because he's confident that there's an alignment with his inner life and his outer life. You see, today, we will feel the pressure to, maybe, cave to how circumstances are going in our life. We will we will feel the pressure to, maybe, kind of, cave on a conviction based on how we're feeling or whether or not we think God has been present to us, and yet David is confessing this confident, inner and outer life alignment. He's got integrity. Who he says he is, publicly, outwardly, is who he's desiring to be inwardly as well.
Pastor Fredo Ramos:And so Jesus, by way of invitation we hear this, that you are inviting us here today to live with integrity. And though, God, we might feel the pressures to cave, we want there to be alignment with our inner life and our outer life today. And so would you search our hearts and would you help us, as David says, to trust in your unfailing love, ultimately knowing that we love your presence, as verse 8 says, we love where the glory of your presence dwells. God, would you help us to live with that same kind of love for your presence? Even when we don't feel like you are near us, you are close to us.
Pastor Fredo Ramos:We commit ourselves to you today now in Jesus name. Amen.