Scripture Reading: Psalm 84
We have been talking about the various ways God is our refuge and our experience in this world. He is our shelter in the stormy blast. He is our dwelling place. Here in this psalm, he is talking about a dwelling place that we will be calling home eternally. So it is not only a shelter and a place in this world where we find safety and peace, but also, after our life in this world, we will be in a place that God is preparing for us.
That is the greatest hope of the Christian faith: we are going to a destination. Our journey has a destination, and we are looking forward to that place.
When we sang the song "Mansion Over the Hilltop," it was a beautiful song. We are just pilgrims searching for a city. "I've got a mansion just over the hilltop, in that bright land where we'll never grow old."
When we were taking care of our baby years ago, and he started growing up, he began talking. One day he told me, "I want to grow up faster." I said, "Why?" He said, "Well, I want to drive the car."
He was probably two and a half or three years old. Then he asked me, "Do you want to grow older, too?" I said, "Not really." He was very puzzled. He didn't ask me why, thankfully, because I probably wouldn't have had a good answer.
But you and I know that as we come to a place in our lives where getting older is not always fun, we don't necessarily want to grow older. Yet in the song we sang today, we are looking forward to a place where we will never grow old. Can you believe that? That is the kind of place where God is going to take us.
I think it was Mark Twain who said, in one of his famous quotes, that it would have been much better if we were born at 80 years old and grew toward 18. It never happened, right?
And if that happened, you know what would happen. We wouldn't want to leave this world because we would be young and healthy. But there is an end to our life, and there is a decline in our health. Everything has a purpose that God has designed for us.
So how do we look forward to a time when we are not very happy about getting older? What is the problem with getting older?
The biggest fear of most of us is not death. I don't think it is. We have faith, we trust in God, and we are not afraid of death. Most of us are not. But I once asked an older gentleman in his late 80s about his health. He said, "I'm very afraid." I said, "What are you afraid of?"
I thought he was going to tell me that he was afraid of dying or something like that. But he told me, "My biggest fear is not having the strength to do the things I need to do."
That is a great fear that we all have. That is why, after a while, we don't like getting older. There is a fear of dependence, that we will lose our freedom, and along with that, we lose a part of our personality and who we are.
I don't have to tell each of you that. I am getting there, and we are all getting to that place. There is also the fear of falling. Something that you take for granted suddenly becomes something you have to be very careful about. You have to watch where you walk so you don't fall down.
That is the fear that we all have. I still remember when an old relative was toward the end of his life. He had been very active when he was young and was doing ministry, but toward the end of his life, his children had to tell him that he could not drive anymore. They took his driver's license and car keys away. Right then and there, he started going down.
A very simple thing that we take for granted, something that we never think we are going to lose, suddenly becomes something we cannot do anymore. It can change the whole course of our life and even our personality.
When we were young, we used to do a lot of things. Our measurement of strength was about our muscle power and the strength of our bodies. Our physical and mental health will decline as we grow older, and after a while, we have to depend on others for many things. We may need hearing aids, glasses, walking canes, and many other things.
But the good news is that we are going to a place. We are on our journey toward the end of our journey in this world, but we are stepping into a world where we will never grow old. We won't need canes anymore. We won't need crutches or anything like that.
As we get older, we get weaker in our physical bodies. But there is another kind of strength that God gives us.
The sons of Korah had a love for God's house. Psalm 84 has a little history behind it. Their ancestors, when they were young, struggled and fought against Moses because they didn't like Moses' leadership. They rebelled against Moses, and Moses prayed to God. God gave them a severe punishment. The Bible says that the earth opened up and swallowed them and their families.
Apparently, their sons were away from home when this happened, and they were saved. They understood what had happened, and they became very faithful ministers of God. They also had a great talent for singing. They became the singers of the temple, the sons of Korah.
That is the great story behind them. They knew what the presence of God meant and how important it was. In this psalm, they were longing and crying out to be in the courts of the Lord. In verse 2, we read, "My soul yearns, even faints, for the courts of the Lord; my heart and my flesh cry out for the living God."
They used to go to the temple and spend much of the day singing, praising, practicing their music, and worshiping God. They enjoyed that life.
All of a sudden, something happened in their lives that prevented them from going to the temple for some time. We don't know exactly what the situation was. It could have been some kind of crisis or plague. We don't know.
They were shut down from going to the temple, and we all experienced something similar during the pandemic. So we can relate to that. That is when they wrote, "How lovely is your dwelling place, Lord Almighty. My soul yearns, even faints, for the courts of the Lord; my heart and my flesh cry out for the living God."
While they could not go to the temple, they were singing about how their hearts were yearning and fainting for the courts of the Lord.
"My heart and my flesh cry out for the living God."
"Even the sparrow has found a home, and the swallow a nest for herself, where she may have her young—a place near your altar." What a great psalm that is. Why did they have that kind of love for the place of God's presence?
The temple represented God's presence. To go and worship God together is a special blessing. When they missed it, they were missing a part of their life. They were yearning and praying to God because the presence of God mattered so much to them.
"Even the sparrow has found a home and the swallow a nest for herself, where she may have her young—a place near your altar."
A swallow, a little bird, when it finds a place to lay its eggs, looks for the safest place possible because it doesn't want to leave its young in a risky situation. It finds a safe place, and they were comparing that to God's altar, the temple, where God's presence is like a place where we can feel safe in this dangerous world.
Safe from the harms and evils of this world. Safe from sickness. Safe from pain. Safe from suffering. Because God is with us. When we experience His presence, there is something special about being in the presence of God and worshiping God together.
Many of us know that when we miss one Sunday in church, we miss something. It is a blessing to be together and worship God together. We can express our love for the living God and our longing to know him.
The Lord is pleased when our heart's desire is to be with him and with his people.
In verse 10, we read, "Better is one day in your courts than a thousand elsewhere. I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than dwell in the tents of the wicked."
One day in God's presence, in God's temple, together, is better than a thousand days elsewhere in this world. One day spent with the Lord in worship and praise is better than a thousand spent elsewhere in less important ways.
This is also a pilgrim song. The Israelites took this song and made it a pilgrim song. Pilgrims would go on pilgrimage every year to the temple from various parts of the country. They had to walk miles and miles to get there. It could take several days before they reached the temple for the festival.
That was an annual pilgrimage that they used to make. While they were traveling, pitching their tents, and going together, they would sing this song. There are many other pilgrimage songs in the Psalms like this, and this is one of them.
"Blessed are those whose strength is in you."
The pilgrimage in those days was not very easy. They had to travel through trails, hills, and valleys. They had to walk up and down to get to the temple in Jerusalem. Sometimes they had to deal with animals, insects, and other dangers along the way. At certain times, there were robbers on the road.
They had to go through many struggles and problems to get there.
They needed the strength to continue that journey until they reached their destination.
Many of them were young people, and many of them were older people. But one thing gave them the power to move forward in the midst of those safety risks and problems: the destination.
The destination gave them the motivation to continue because the destination was where God's presence was.
You probably know what it is like when you are going to meet somebody you love. You don't care about the rest of the world. You just care about that person.
I've seen many times on television military families gathering in airports, waiting for their loved ones to come back from service. Little children are waiting for their fathers. Wives are waiting for their husbands. Parents are waiting for their sons.
It is very touching to see those families waiting anxiously for their loved ones to return from a dangerous zone of war.
They have only one thing in their minds: to see that person. "My dad." "My husband." "My son." Whoever is coming. Nothing else matters.
There may be thousands of people going by them, but they don't care about them. They don't even see them. They are not attracted by any of the gift shops or restaurants nearby. Nothing else captures their attention. They have one thing in their minds: to see the face of the person they are waiting for.
That is the kind of longing the pilgrims had when they went to Jerusalem to see and experience the presence of God and to be with God.
And that is our power when we go through our struggles in this world.
Even when our bodies grow weak, when we go through pain and suffering, when we may not like the things happening in our lives, and when we are afraid of many things that scare us every day, there is one thing that keeps us going: the place we are heading to.
We have a destination.
We are like a traveler climbing a mountain, and there is the power of God to strengthen us as we go through the valleys.
Just like David sang in Psalm 23, "Even though I walk through the darkest valley, I will fear no evil, for you are with me."
We have a God who is with us during our journey, regardless of the condition of our bodies or the situations in our lives. He will give us the strength to carry forward.
This is a beautiful picture of growing older with God.
Growing older is one thing, but growing older with God is a completely different thing.
Growing older with God is an enjoyable journey. Even though sometimes there is pain and suffering and grief that we have to go through, and troubles and things that we may not like, God is there with us.
God tells us to cast all our cares on him. Give them to him. He will carry our burdens so that we can rest easily.
There is a God who is more powerful than any problem that is outside of us.
So you don't have to be as strong as you used to be. You only have to trust God with the strength that you need for every day.
Your strength may change, but your purpose does not change.
Our purpose is to complete the journey, to meet our Savior face to face, and to be with him.
Sometimes we think, "I can't do what I used to do anymore," or perhaps we think that people no longer see us as useful in this world.
But that's not the case.
If God has given us one more day to live in this world, there is a purpose behind it. The world may not see it that way, but God has a purpose for us.
Moses was 80 when God called him to a new assignment to lead the people. Caleb was 85 when he went on his mission and later claimed the mountain God had promised him. And there are many others in more recent history. John Wesley was preaching and traveling well into his 80s and 90s. He rode horseback from church to church as a circuit rider. Billy Graham was 87 when he preached his last major crusade.
Getting older may not always be fun, but it can be meaningful when we think about the purpose God has given us to accomplish in this world.
God is not asking you to do everything you once did.
You may want to do the things you did in the past, but God is not necessarily asking you to do those things anymore. God is giving you new phases in your life, and he will give you the strength to do the things you can do in new and different ways.
Our ministry may change. Our pace of life will change. Our responsibilities will change. Our bodies will definitely change.
But God's faithfulness and his purpose for us do not change.
"Blessed is he whose strength is in God." That is the greatest strength we can have. It is the greatest strength that nobody else can give us.
Nobody applauds the person who gets up every morning and keeps going. Nobody sees the older man or woman who wakes up with aches and pains but still says, "Thank you, Lord, for another day."
Nobody sees the person who has lost friends and family members but still comes to church and worships every Sunday.
That is a different power. That is a different strength. It is a strength that only God can give us.
God sees us, and that is the strength the psalmist is talking about. The sons of Korah are talking about going from strength to strength.
Verse 4 says, "Blessed are those who dwell in your house; they are ever praising you."
Verse 5 says, "Blessed are those whose strength is in you, whose hearts are set on pilgrimage."
And verse 7 says, "They go from strength to strength, till each appears before God in Zion."
It is not from weakness to strength. It is not from failure to success.
It is from strength to strength. Strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow.
If God gives you one more day to live in this world, he has a purpose for you, and he will give you the strength to carry on for that day.
So let us pray for today's strength because tomorrow is not ours. If God gives us another day tomorrow, he will give us the strength to carry on tomorrow.
That is what "strength to strength" means: one day at a time.
God has given us one more day to be here, and there are many things we can do.
We can become stronger in serving God through our prayers. We can become stronger in forgiving others. We can become stronger in loving others. We can become stronger in helping others in whatever way we can.
There are so many different ways God has given us to be here and to become stronger. Even trials and sufferings can be a way of making us stronger.
Those who have passed through trials and suffering know that they can become stronger after those experiences. They can also become a source of strength to other people who have to go through similar situations in their lives.
And we know that our journey has an end. Where does it end? It ends in Zion.
Zion is the city of God that they were going toward. We are also going to an eternal Zion, the spiritual city of God, the city toward which we are marching.
And on that day, when we reach there, there will be somebody receiving us with a warm smile, saying, "Well done, my good and faithful servant."
You won the race. You fought the good fight. You finished the race. It is not about winning the game. It is about finishing the race.
And on that day, we don't need a cane. We don't need a walker. We don't need medication. We don't need glasses. We don't need hearing aids. We don't need someone to help us get up.
We will be with God, and he will give us the strength to do everything as we praise him forever. So don't ask yourself, "How much strength do I have?" Ask yourself, "Do I have the strength God has given me for today?"
Because God is there with me. You will go from strength to strength. One strength for one season and another strength for another season. Strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow. And strength sufficient to make the last journey home.
The phrase "from strength to strength" can be understood as successive stages of renewed strength as the pilgrims continue toward God's presence.
In 2 Corinthians, Paul said that even though our outer body is being destroyed, our inner self is being renewed day by day.
When our hands become weaker, may our grip on God become stronger.
When we finally come to the end of our earthly journey, may we discover that we were never going from strength to weakness.
We were going from strength to strength until one day we appear before God in Zion together.
Our pilgrimage will end, and we will reach the goal that God has placed before us.
The sparrow has found a home, and the swallow a nest.
And we are going to be like that in God's presence, peacefully resting with our loved ones eternally.
May the good Lord bless us with these hopeful words as we go from this place to be powerful witnesses for him in the days to come.
Amen.
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