Psalm 103 | Talking Back

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Slides:

There are times in life when we need to stop listening to ourselves, and start talking to ourselves.

Sometimes we need to command our souls to bless the Lord.

Memory is very treacherous about the best things; by a strange perversity, engineered by the fall, it treasures up the refuse of the past and permits priceless treasures to lie neglected, it is tenacious of grievances and holds benefits all too loosely. It needs spurring to its duty, though that duty ought to be its delight. - Spurgeon

Don’t be an ingrate.

Sin always separates us from God, but sometimes sickness or suffering brings us closer to God. God always delights to forgive us of sin; but sometimes He waits to heal us from disease.

Our God wants to be known!

We become like what we behold.

The blood of Jesus is totally sufficient.

Ephesians 3:17-19

And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, 18 may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, 19 and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

The reason why these truths are powerful is not because we are deserving. These truths are powerful, and effective, because Jesus died for us. He is deserving, and we trust in Him.

"I desire fullness, and fleshly thoughts seduce me by attaching themselves to this basic desire. They exploit the empty spaces in me, and they promise that fulness will be mine if I give in to their demands. When my soul sits empty and is aching for something to fill it, such deceptive promises are extremely difficult to resist.

Consequently, the key to mortifying fleshly thoughts is to eliminate the emptiness within me and replace it with fullness; and I accomplish this by feasting on the Gospel. Indeed, it is in the Gospel that I experience a God who glorifies Himself by filling me with His fullness. . . . This is the God of the gospel, a God who is satisfied with nothing less than my experience of fullness in Him! . . .

Indeed, as I perpetually feast on Christ and all His blessings found in the gospel, I find that my hunger for sin diminishes and the lies of flesh simply lose their appeal. Hence, to the degree that I am full, I am free. Eyes do not rove, nor do fleshly thoughts rule, when the heart is fat with the love of Jesus!” ― Milton Vincent