Sermon Central
-
Which Path Should I Take? Part 1 Series
Contributed by Bobby Oliver on Apr 16, 2018 (message contributor)
Summary: The paths of the righteous and the unrighteous both have company, direction, and a destination.
Which Path Should I Take? Part 1
- The Book of Psalms is one of my favorite books in the Bible because it’s full of treasure and a wealth of information.
- In it, we find every kind of emotion…
- Anger, sadness, happiness, fear, surprise, trust, and many more…
- It contains prayers and songs to the Lord, full of praise, and believers all throughout the centuries have memorized and used them in their spiritual walk with God.
- The book of Psalms is divided into five sections, labeled as books.
- Although the reason for this is not clear, many commentators believe that it’s similar to the way the Pentateuch is organized, into 5 books…
- So just like the Law was vitally important to Israel, contained in 5 volumes, so too were Israel’s praises to God, contained in the book of Psalms in 5 parts.
- Most of the Psalms have titles which identify the timeframe of when they were written.
- Many were composed by David while he was being persecuted by King Saul…
- Others were composed after David began to reign as King in Israel, after the death of Saul.
- Some were composed during the rebellion of Absalom.
- Others were written between the rebellion of Absalom and the Babylonian Captivity.
- Some were written during the Captivity.
- Some were written after the Jews were permitted by King Cyrus to return to their own land, Jerusalem.
- So as you can see, the book of Psalms has meant a great deal to generation after generation after generation.
- As we go through this great book, we’re going to take our time because it’s not something we should rush through.
- I don’t have a timeframe on how long it will take, but I think it goes well with prayer meeting because each of these Psalms can be read as a prayer.
- The goal as we move through these Psalms is to grow closer to our Great God and learn more about what it means to honor Him as a Church.
- Back when Sherri’s parents lived in Rockland, we used to go visit them for vacation.
- Usually, we’d try to make a trip in the Summer, so we could enjoy the nice weather, and one in the fall, so we could enjoy the foliage.
- One year, we ended up going later in the year than we wanted, sometime in November.
- I remember Sherri and I had tickets to go see the Christian band Third Day in Bangor, so we left the kiddos with her parents and off we went.
- Of course, since we were driving from Rockland to Bangor, it was a different route than what I’m used to on Route 9.
- We left during the day, and our GPS guided us to the correct location.
- We enjoyed the concert, and when it was over, it was dark.
- When we stepped outside, we realized it was snowing.
- But this wasn’t the white, fluffy snow…this was the snow mixed with freezing rain and ice.
- Of course, the road back to Rockland from Bangor was unfamiliar to me, but I thought, “I’ve got the GPS, and I can just go a bit slower, no big deal…”
- I was expecting it to lead me down the right path, so I relaxed and just focused on driving.
- I remember Sherri being on the phone with her parents, letting them know we were headed back, but they started chatting about something, and were on the phone for a while.
- Well, I’m on I95, and I know my exit is coming up, but I couldn’t remember which exit it was…
- I wasn’t worried though, because I had my handy dandy GPS!
- So I kept driving…but there was one problem…when Sherri called her parents, she muted the GPS…
- I knew she had done it, but I wasn’t paying attention, so the entire time, I’m expecting the GPS to say, “In 1 mile, take exit such and such…”
- It never did…
- About 10 or 15 minutes later, I said, “Sherri, I thought we’d be to our exit by now, I wonder how much longer…”
- That’s when we realized that we had passed our exit about 10 miles back and we were headed in the opposite direction of where we were supposed to go.
- Of course, the snow was still coming down, so I said, “Don’t worry Sherri. We’ll just take the next exit and turn around to head back the other way.”
- That’s what I planned to do…
- But when we took the exit, the GPS said, “Recalculating…” and instead of telling us to turn around and go back the other way on the interstate, it was telling us to stay on this road we were on.
