Psalm 103

Well, good morning, Saylorville! My name is Trevor Meers as Pastor Pat said. I’m a pastor at Lakeside. If you don’t know the history, Lakeside Fellowship was planted by Saylorville Church 20 years ago this year as the first step in what would become the Engage Network. So it’s really exciting to be back here at a place that’s home in so many ways. I was last with you here on a Sunday morning almost two years ago, and a whole lot of life has happened during that time. You know, I was thinking about our journey at Saylorville. I started thinking about physically in terms of this auditorium. Our first Sunday, we started on the very back row, all the way back there, and we came looking for a fresh start in church. And man, did we find it! We plugged into Saylorville. We became members. We spent four years sitting right out there, kind of in the middle pews. And during that time, God lit a spark in me to say, ‘Maybe you should go into ministry,’ and Pastor Pat and other leaders who poured into me and they helped guide me toward where I am now as a pastor at Lakeside Fellowship.

And then, after going to Lakeside life brought us back to this auditorium. And it was 18 months ago we sat on that front row right there as Pastor Pat preached our daughter’s funeral. And that brings us today’s message in this summer series on Real Counsel. And today we’re talking about real counsel, trusting God in tragedy. And when you get invited to speak on a topic like that, that means you are in a club you probably don’t want to be in. I would much rather get invited to say, ‘Hey, could you come talk about how to trust God when things are going so well, you can’t keep your head straight?’ But that’s not the journey that God has had for us.

And as I share with you some things that we have learned on our journey through grief and tragedy, I just want to acknowledge upfront that these things come in so many different forms. My family’s story is that we lost a child with special needs. Most of you don’t know what that’s like, but many of you have lost children due to miscarriage. I personally don’t know what that’s like. Many of you have lost a spouse, which is a different kind of thing. Some of you have lost a loved one suddenly like we did. Some have lost a loved one after they lingered for a long time. Those are different experiences. Some of you have lost contact with a loved one while they’re still here physically due to something like dementia. That’s a different experience. So I almost never say to anyone anymore, ‘I know how you feel,’ because I probably don’t. But if you are feeling that soul deep hurt, I can probably say, ‘I know what you mean.’ I can at least say that much.

Pastor Pat’s invitation to speak on this specific topic indicates to me at least to some degree we have displayed some kind of trust in God through this tragedy. For that, I say “Praise God,” and I hope I can share something that can help some of you on whatever journey you’re on right now.

So I’m going to start with our story for those of you who don’t know it. This is not a place I love going back to. But if I don’t I feel like I’m disobeying 2 Corinthians 1:4, which says we need to comfort others with the comfort we have received.

[2 Corinthians 1:3-4

3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort,

4 who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God.”]

And I feel like God has given us an opportunity. More than that, He’s given us a ministry to help other people through what we’ve been through. And I also feel like I can honor my daughter by sharing some of these things we’ve learned.

Well, this next shot, this is my family. This is my oldest… this is my wife, Teri, my oldest daughter, Ali, and our youngest daughter, Katie. Some of you knew Katie. Katie was born with a genetic disorder that significantly limited her development, and it brought more medical challenges than we can even count. My wife had to give up most of her own goals in order to be a 24/7 care provider throughout Katie’s life. She never got the ability to really speak very well. She couldn’t read. She couldn’t take care of herself, but I have never known anyone who connected more easily with the people around her. And if you knew Katie, you know that was true. She participated in the Rise Up Ministry, and I don’t think there’s ever been a bigger advocate… maybe Anna.  She and Katie were the biggest fans of Rise Up Ministry. And this is the next picture during COVID when they couldn’t meet for Rise Up. They sent out a flyer to all the homes telling the people of Rise Up that you could watch it on YouTube. And if you look closely, that’s a picture of Pastor Paul on YouTube, and she could not be any happier that she got to go online and watch Rise Up with Pastor Paul. Teri, I think, really perfectly summed Katie up when she said, her smile was the loudest voice in the room.

Well, on December 23, 2023, about 4:30 in the morning, Teri woke me up and said, “You’ve got to get in here!” — because she’d gone in to check on Katie like she did every night multiple times, and Katie wasn’t breathing. And within about five minutes our house was full of police officers and EMTs, and they did everything that could. But about 30 minutes later, an assistant fire chief sat us down in the living room and said “There’s nothing we can do.” And by 9 a.m. it was over, and we were sitting in an empty house trying to figure out what just happened on a Saturday morning. Well, I gathered my strength, I started making phone calls to family members to say over and over again the worst thing that has ever happened to me. People filed through our house that day to pray with us. Pastor Pat and Marilyn came over. A lot of people… Pastor Paul came over that night and he played his guitar for us just like he always did for Katie on Sundays. And as the days went by, this kind of fog settled in on us. Many of you know what this is like. It was like nothing I’d ever felt before. We went to bed three days before Christmas, with a kid that required our attention 24 hours a day, and we woke up empty nesters like this.

And as a Christian, my instinct in that time was to turn to Scripture, I know… ‘Read the Bible. This will help,’ but I would put my eyes on the page and nothing would process. I couldn’t even get through a sentence. So I put Shane and Shane on my headphones singing songs, trying to get some kind of Scripture into my mind. I would try to pray, but the only thing I could get out was “Jesus’ help!” That was it. Nothing more organized than that.

Well it’s two days later. It was Christmas, and we’re planning a funeral. And that morning I got up and I decided, I’m gonna go for a walk. I’m gonna go to Kum & Go to get a cup of coffee because I just needed something to do. And that Christmas morning it was warm and it was pouring rain, and I stopped. I took this picture of myself. I was a journalist before I was a pastor. I don’t know, maybe my journalist instinct said, ‘You gotta record this moment,’ and I took a picture of myself, and I thought “It is Christmas morning. It’s pouring rain. Everybody is with their families. I’m out walking in the rain this mourning my kid…” This is like grief to the max! Right? — pouring rain on a walk. And for months that fog just kept hanging around. I really didn’t wanna go to bed, because I knew the videos that would play in my mind of what had happened that day.

And we tried to figure out who we even were now. After 21 months, we didn’t have this child to take care of that dominated our life. Now, who are we? And those of you who have gone through a major loss, or like… you know, rhythms change slowly. Don’t they? Even a month ago, Teri and I, we went out horseback riding at a camp. It was a beautiful Spring morning, and we’re riding out of the corral, and the sky is blue, and the saddles are creaking, and this is what I love to do. And the thought that hit me… this was one month ago… we shouldn’t both be here at the same time, because somebody’s gotta get home and take care of Katie. So it’s just, it’s burned into you.

And as we tried to find a way forward after the funeral, I started doing what… I’m a word guy. A word guy did what word guys do. I wrote. I kept a journal. Pastor Curt suggested that last week. I started reading books. I got every book I could find by Christian men who had lost a child. I read a guy named Tim Challies. I read C.S. Lewis talking about losing his wife. I even read a book by a country music singer who lost a child. And as the months went by, I noticed that a specific passage of scripture started following me around. Have you ever had this happen with a Bible passage? It’s kind of like when you’re at church, you see somebody kind of orbiting. They want to talk to you, and you’re just not listening yet, but they’re there. Well, Psalm 103 started following me around. I went to a preaching workshop and a pastor there gave a talk encouraging pastors, and then he chose to teach out of Psalm 103. And then a few weeks later, a friend of mine who does a recovery ministry asked me to come and speak. He said, just pick a Psalm, any Psalm, and talk about it. I said, well, I guess I’ll do Psalm 103. I just heard about that. And in the middle of that, my brother-in-law sent me a book. It was this book right here. This was written by a pastor in Nebraska, my home state, about losing his daughter suddenly. And I picked it up, and it was so relatable! It was like every sentence sounded like my story. I was underlining things and it was so relatable, I had to put it down. It was just too close to home. So I put it away. I picked it up again a few months later, and I discovered something. This entire book is built around Psalm 103! It says on the cover, “A grieving father’s journey through Psalm 103.” And it says something about my mindset that I couldn’t even notice what he’d built the whole book around. But when God keeps putting a passage in front of you like that, you’d better start to listen. And I don’t know if he picked up on it, but Pastor Paul actually opened by quoting Psalm 103 this morning! I don’t think he has any idea what I was going to say. It’s still following me around.

So I want to drive into Psalm 103 today and take you there. In the very first verse, that got me into Psalm 103 was verse 10. In the first couple of weeks after we lost Katie, I was just battling enormous guilt, huge feelings of guilt. There were several people, medical professionals said you couldn’t have done anything. There was nothing you could have done to stop this. But Revelation 21 says Satan is the accuser, and he was on me like a prosecuting attorney. And I just kept asking myself, “Why hadn’t I loved her more?” “Why didn’t I quit that job that kept me on the road all those years?” “Why did I keep doing that? “What did I miss that week that could have stopped this if I had just noticed what was going to happen?” “How can I ever enjoy anything, ever again, after this?” And in the midst of all that, something… I think it’s the Holy Spirit… leads me to Psalm 103:10.

Psalm 103:10, “He does not deal with us according to our sins, nor repay us according to our iniquities.”

I cannot say that I did anything sinful in this whole thing with Katie, but here was assurance. Even if I had, it’s forgiven! — if our faith is in Jesus Christ. Whatever you did, He is not gonna deal with you according to that iniquity. And I felt some relief start to seep in for really the first time. And I wanted to keep going. I’ve got to go deeper into Psalm 103. So let’s do that together. Here’s how the Psalm opens, verses one and two. You’ve probably sung these words in church.

Psalm 103:1-2

1 Bless the LORD, O my soul, and all that is within me, bless His holy name!

2 Bless the LORD, O my soul, and forget not all His benefits…”

I’d sung those words a lot too, but this time they landed on me in a new way, because, think about it, when you’re in your darkest hours there are plenty of days when you do not feel like praising God. Can we admit that? You don’t feel like it. There are probably days when you do not think God deserves to be praised because of what He did to you. But don’t misunderstand what David’s asking here of himself and of us. This is not a Christian radio DJ. He’s not saying, ‘I’m positive. I’m encouraging. If I play the right song everything goes away.’ That’s not what David’s doing here. David is not spontaneously blessing God because he feels like it. Pay attention to what he’s saying. David is talking to himself, and he is actually calling on himself to bless God, every part of him right down to his soul, and he’s calling on himself to do work. The author of this book, his name’s Luke Veldt. He describes the opening of Psalm 103 like this:

“This is a deliberate response of blessing God in the face of suffering and disappointment. David’s blessing is not an outburst of emotion, but an act of faithfulness.“ Luke Veldt

Our natural response in our darkest hours will be, ‘My world has been destroyed. I am in no mood to bless God,’ and David says, ‘Do it anyway!’ David says, ‘Bless the Lord, no matter what you feel and wait and see what happens.’ David seems to know. He’s not going to get there emotionally. So look at the command he gives to us and himself in verse two.

Psalm 103:2, “Forget not all his benefits…”

David is not telling us what we should do. He’s saying here’s how to do it. And he’s saying here’s what will happen if you follow this prescription I am giving you. When we are in the lowest valley we need to praise God. And to find the heart to do that, we have to put God’s track record right in front of our eyes. Not just what just happened in your life, but God’s track record throughout scripture, throughout history, everything He’s done, everything he’s done in the lives of faithful people who you have watched your entire life. Work through the facts about what God has done and then see what condition your heart is in after that. The author Eugene Peterson seems to be speaking about Psalm 103 when he said this:

“Faith develops out of the most difficult aspects of our existence, not the easiest. We don’t wait for things to go well before we praise God. We speak words of praise in a world that is hellish; we sing our songs of victory in a world where things get messy; we live our joy among people who neither understand nor encourage us.” Eugene Peterson

When David decides to review all the benefits that God gives us, do not miss where He starts. It’s the very first thing on the list in verse three:

Psalm 103:3, “… who forgives all your iniquity…”

He forgives all your iniquity. When we start calling on ourselves to remember, ‘I need reasons to praise God right now in the midst of this,’ — we start with the fact that He provides a way for our sins to be forgiven. And David just keeps building on this theme in verses 10 through 12. There’s this beautiful string of assertions.

Psalm 103:10-12

10 He does not deal with us according to our sins, nor repay us according to our iniquities.

11 For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his steadfast love toward those who fear him;

12 as far as the east is from the west, so far does he remove our transgressions from us.“

This is the thing that unlocked it for me, in the midst of grief. This is what turned out to be the cornerstone of consolation in our grief. Now, at first that may sound surprising. Most of the time when you’re trying to help someone who’s going through grief and pain, you don’t talk to them about their forgiven sins I would imagine, because you might say, ‘Well, how does knowing that my sins are forgiven make cancer go away?’ ‘How does knowing that my sins are forgiven bring my loved one back?’ ‘How does knowing that someday I’ll stand in front of God and I won’t be held guilty, how does that help with the echoes in my head of all the trauma that I’ve been through?’ — And it may seem odd to prescribe a good shot of theology to someone who is in emotional pain, but that’s exactly what we need to prescribe. That is exactly what we have to grab onto if we’re going to keep from drowning in grief, because here’s what I think about. Still, in these dark hours when I cannot quit replaying that awful morning December 23rd.

In 1 Corinthians 15, Paul unpacks all the implications that happened when Jesus rose from the grave. When He walked out of the tomb because Jesus rose from the dead, our sins can be forgiven. That’s what David’s pointing to. Before there’s a name for Easter, that’s what he’s talking about in Psalm 103. And here are the verses that keep growing bigger and bigger for me from 1 Corinthians 15, verses twenty through twenty-six.

1 Corinthians 15:20-26

20 “But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep.

21 For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead.

22 For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive.

23 But each in his own order: Christ the firstfruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ.

24 Then comes the end, (listen to these promises) when he delivers the kingdom to God the Father after destroying every rule and every authority and power.

25 For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet.

26 The last enemy to be destroyed is death.”

First Corinthians 15 tells me Jesus was just the first fruits of the resurrection. That means there are more to come! There are millions and millions more to come who get to rise from the dead because they have put their faith in Jesus Christ and how He conquered death forever! Cynics will point out given a long enough timeline the survival rate of humans is 0%. I would point out the resurrection rate of Christians is 100%. 100%! The hope we seek when we are in the midst of tragedy is more than anything that can happen in this life. Our hope is that there is more than this life. Revelation 21, it tells us that in the presence of God, there will be no tears. There will be no pain. We will all live in perfect, resurrected bodies in perfect fellowship with God for eternity. Katie is already in the presence of God. And now it’s just a matter of time before I get to catch up. And one day, one day, we’ll both have resurrected bodies! She will have none of the limitations she lived with on this earth. Death will no longer haunt our memories or haunt our fears of the future.

In the last few months, in just the last few months, I feel like I’ve turned the corner. I don’t count back the days anymore to what happened. I’m looking ahead to when I get to see her again and when I get to be with God forever. This idea of the resurrection is gone from being just a theological point that I hold in my head to something that I actually feel. It is something that I long for now. With every passing month I ask with more and more confidence, the triumphant question, 1 Corinthians 15:55:

1 Corinthians 15:55

55 “O death, where is your victory? O death, where is your sting?”

Death, where is your victory? Where is your sting? It’s gone! I knew that verse 18 months ago, but now I feel it! Now I feel that it is true! It is speaking into my future, and I know right now my daughter is dancing on the grave of death. It’s conquered! Jesus already did it! And it turns out, what did I just do? I just walked the path of Psalm 103. Didn’t I? I just reviewed God’s works. I reviewed His benefits, and it works! I feel better! I have hope! When I look at what God has done and what He’s going to do, how can I not have hope?

There’s a song lyric that just stuck in my heart during all of this shortly after we lost Katie. As I look back now, I realize it’s basically following Psalm 103. I discovered the songwriter’s name is Andy Squyres and, I promise, he does not get played on positive, encouraging Christian radio. Someone said “This guy sits in the darkness of the why,” and that’s exactly what I needed. He wrote a song called Cherry Blossoms, and there’s a line in there that I quote all the time:

“In the winter I believe you/ in the spring time I see you.” Andy Squyres

Isn’t that Psalm 103? I think the beginning of Psalm 103 is Winter time. That’s when we believe God even when we don’t feel like it, and by the end of Psalm 103, it’s Spring time. Now we see it. Now we can feel it. Now, the journey there can be rough, and it’s always helpful to learn that we’re not the first ones to wonder where God is. In Mark [4], during the storm on the Sea of Galilee, the disciples went to Jesus and said, ‘Don’t you care that we’re going to die?’ They said that directly to Jesus! And I think we’re afraid to say it out loud or even to think it that God can feel distant to us. But Psalm 103 has something to say there too in verses 13 and 14.

Psalm 103:13-14

13 “As a father shows compassion to his children, so the LORD shows compassion to those who fear him.

14 For He knows our frame; He remembers that we are dust.”

He made us. God knows what we’re made of, and it’s weak stuff, but He doesn’t hold that against us. He treats us with compassion, like children. David is saying, that’s how God sees us. Even when all we see is our own weaknesses and our own failures. God has compassion on us. For that we should bless God. To deal with tragedy and grief, you have to tell God what hurts. God gives us permission to do that. He even provides the language to express it in the Bible. It’s called lament, and fully one third of the Psalms are Psalms of lament. So if I’m giving you a list of things you can do in tragedy number one is review God’s benefit. Number two is lament. And if you don’t know how to do that, go on Saylorville’s YouTube channel, Mark Vroegop did a whole session here this spring on lament that’s outstanding! Highly recommend you go watch that, because God gives us the language for expressing our pain back to Him and finding our way forward. So praise God in your grief. Pour out your pain through lament.

And then finally, the last thing I would say is quit feeling the pressure to get back to normal. Don’t let this be discouraging to all of you who are in the midst of pain right now. You’re not going to go back to normal. But that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Not necessarily. Since Katie died, do I cry more easily? Yes. Have I lost some of the joy in certain hobbies I used to…? Well, yes. But am I a better person? I think it’s inarguable that I am. For one thing, I have empathy for suffering people like I never did before.

At Lakeside, we do a chaplaincy ministry every Wednesday. We go to a residence for people with severe brain, traumatic brain injuries, and every time I go, I cry every time, because now I feel what they’re feeling. Again, I haven’t walked their particular road, but I see myself in those rooms now. I see myself in those families. I connect to them. And for another thing, I feel the closeness of eternal life like I never did before! This life now seems so short to me, so unpredictable. Death is so imminent, and because of that it has motivated me to tell people the only way they can have hope and that is to have your sins forgiven through Jesus Christ. I have to tell people now, because I know how short this life is!

So that’s what I have to ask everybody here today. Can you start your review of God’s blessings by saying ‘my sins are forgiven’? Do you know that? And the only way to know that is to say ‘I’ve put my faith in Jesus Christ.’ Can you dance on death’s grave? Can you say, ‘Death, you have no sting for me anymore?’ — because I know the resurrection is coming for me because of what Jesus Christ did, and I put my faith in that. Have you turned to Him in repentance and said, ‘Give me that kind of hope, Christ.’ When you do, if you do that, you will approach tragedy with an entirely different perspective, because you become a new creature in Christ. And if you become a new creature in Christ, God does amazing things with the hurt that has happened in your life.

In the last couple of years, I learned about a Japanese art form. It’s known as kintsugi. And in this work, artists take a broken vessel like a bowl that has been shattered. And they put it back together filling the seams with gold and silver and platinum. And when they finish, the bowl is not only stronger than it was before, it is more exquisite than it was before. Kintsugi artists, their philosophy is that breakage and repair are part of the history of an object. They are not something to be concealed. In Kintsugi, the broken parts aren’t hidden. They are literally illuminated with gold. I may never put all the broken pieces of my heart back together exactly like they were before this happened, but God can assemble them into something more than they were before.

At the end of Luke Veldt’s book about losing his daughter, this grieving Father reflects on how much more valuable our praise for God is when it comes from our pain. He said this:

“If it’s true that praise that cost more is worth more, then I have an opportunity now to offer praise that is more valuable than any I have ever offered before.” Luke Veldt

David, in Psalm 103, if you look at the last verses, it is like a grand finale of exploding praise! It comes from every corner of Creation. He started with his soul and then he ends the song like this:

Psalm 103:20

20 Bless the LORD, O you His angels, you mighty ones who do His word, obeying the voice of His word!

21 Bless the LORD, all His hosts, His ministers, who do His will!

22 Bless the LORD, all His works, in all places of His dominion.” (The Psalm, it crescendos with all of creation exploding with praise to God when you look at everything He did, and then it’s almost like the whole thing goes down soft again to verse 22, and he says) “Bless the LORD, O my soul!”

Right back where he started, mission accomplished. The cosmos recognizes God’s work, and goodness, and praises Him, and our souls will too if we put His work in front of us. Praise God even when you don’t feel like it. This is where the hope lies. Would you pray with me that God will help us to do this?

Lord, You know our frame. You say it. Our lives are fragile. They are short. They’re a vapor. They’re like grass. You give us so many analogies. And all of us in this room at some point have to deal with the reality of how short our lives are. And I thank you that because of Jesus Christ, this life is just a tiny sliver of what we get to look forward to. I thank You that our sins can be forgiven. I thank You that we get to look forward to eternal fellowship with God, that we get to look forward to resurrected bodies and perfection, and it’s all because of what Jesus did for us! We can’t earn it. And I pray that this morning, Lord, just even if you can comfort a few, by what You’ve taught us, I pray that You will do that. I pray that someone here, they’re not alone today. They’re not the only one who hurts. They’re not the only one who has questions, the only one that carries doubt. I pray that we would just do the work that David says, ‘Let us praise you when our hearts are breaking.’ Our only hope of comfort is You, and I pray that just as You promised to do in Philippians 4:7, you will give people in this room a peace that surpasses all human understanding. I pray that someone this week will say, ‘I feel better and I don’t know why.’ That’s only God doing that… and let them turn to you. And Jesus, You know how we feel. You suffered loss, and abandonment and physical pain. Now you pressed on to the cross in order to set us free of all those things. Let this be our hope in the worst of times. In Your name. Amen. [Music]