FHBC Sermon Notes

Psalm 67:1-7 - How do we know where we are going? How do we know when our mission is complete? What will it look like when God's purposes for creation and for man is done?Today we will see this answer from an unlikely text. Not from Acts, or the Book of Revelation. Missions has been God work from the beginning. It is at the heart of everything.

1. The underlying cause of the missionary endeavor is the display of God's grace to sinful men.
Psalm 67 is a celebration of the grace of God. v.1 is almost the exact wording for of the priestly blessing. A call that grace may continually show his grace.

What is grace? Simply put, it God's unmerited favor upon us. As a father, we also want to lavish on our children, to give to them abundantly. God is like this as well. We don't want our children to pay for our gifts to them. It is not for the merit of the child that we act so. Our Heavenly Father, is so much more than this. Why did Noah get spared in the flood. Was it because he earned it? In the Exodus, God crushed the enemies of Israel, rescuing them from slavery. Was it because they earned it? In the Old Testament God often showed grace to Israel, but he also showed grace to gentiles. Even there is that time we begin to see God's plan to rescue for himself a people from all nations. Consider the story of Ruth, the story of Jonah and the people of Nineveh.

And so this song, this psalm is a celebration and declaration of all the wonderful grace and blessings we have received. As Paul says, "the immeasurable grace" lavished on us, because of who God is, instead of who we are.

Now what is the incentive for us to go, if we are not first overwhelmed by God's grace.
We can not go on mission if we do not first gather to be consumed by God's grace.

2. The singular purpose of the missionary endeavor is to make God and his salvation known among all nations.

Verse 1 says, "May God be gracious to us and bless us and make his face to shine upon us..."

This is followed by the reason,

Verse 2, "...that your way may be known on earth, your saving power among all nations."   

If we hear the name of someone famous we think about who they are, their character, and what we think on them. With, God it is so. God desires that his character may be known to all peoples.  Strangely enough, he has decided to use us as the implement of proclamation.

Consider the story of Jonah again. He knew that God would save the Ninevites. That is why he ran away, because Jonah did not like the Ninevites. But God desired to save them, to show his grace, in the most spectacular of ways, by displaying his "saving power".  God is more than a Santa Claus. He saw that we were needed, and he raised us a savior to save us. To display his grace, yes, but also his saving power.

All nations.... All peoples.  Some version of this phrase of is used 11 times in this Psalm. This is a song written before Jesus. Let's admit it, Israel, just like most any nations, was a nation concerned with their own interests. But God in his "saving power" had a plan, a mission, that is much bigger.

Indeed this has been the plan from the start. From every time and every place, God makes his people.

This is our mission to make Christ known to all people. Of the 6600 people groups on earth, less than half have heard this news.

3. The hopeful response of the missionary endeavor is the joy of all nations that culminates in praise to God.

Note that our part is limited. We do not do the saving, but we are called to go, as we go to proclaim, so that some will turn to God.

3Let the peoples praise you, O God; 

let all the peoples praise you!

What we are doing in the missionary endeavor is to call others to join us in our praise for Christ. Our hopeful response is that all in the world would know the incredible and eternal joy of Jesus.

Amen, Amen!