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Great. Thank you, Ellie. Good evening, everybody. Please keep the Bible open there. Page 544, I think it was.

Psalm 4. We're ending our series, as Matt said, on a day with Jesus, how to get a good night's sleep. Some people, it seems, can sleep anywhere. Are you one of those people? Do you know someone like that?

They can sleep anywhere. When I was 18 and I left school, I went to Malaysia for a year and taught English in a little. In a primary school. And at the end of the year, those who I'd gone to Malaysia with came back to England and I had a few weeks on my own, so I thought I'd explore. So I went, flew across to East Malaysia, Borneo, and got a little boat up the river and went to all sorts of interesting places.

Then I thought, I'm running short of money. What I need to do is hitchhike. So, age 18, I thumbed the lift with a logger, a guy who was chopping down the rainforest, really and taking a great lorry load of logs. And I got into his cab. I didn't speak a word of his language, he didn't speak a word of mine.

And we somehow managed to communicate and I wanted to go that way. And that was the way he was going and fine. And I fell asleep. And I fell asleep sound asleep. And I woke up hours later and I just sort of opened my eyes and I saw a sign on the road and we'd driven halfway across Borneo.

I never told my parents that I'd done that. Mom, if you're watching, it was okay. I got back alive. It's fine. Some people can sleep anywhere.

I wish I had kept that habit up. Other people really struggle to sleep. Maybe it's anxiety about the next day or even about the night. I've got a friend. I remember for months he slept with a baseball bat by his bed because he was afraid of his neighbours in London.

That's a bit fearful, isn't it? Most of us, I guess, can cope with a night or two of disturbed sleep. But weeks or months without good sleep take their toll. Ask the parent of any baby or young child. The sense of distress and despair can be intense.

When we're consistently missing sleep, we'll do almost anything to get a good night's sleep. And don't you find that when you're lying awake, worries and anxieties seem ten times as big in the middle of the night? And then in the morning, everything feels different? When we've had a good night's sleep, getting a good night's Sleep is big business. Of course.

There's all kinds of devices and things you can do. Essential oils, tea, candles, all sorts of things that are supposed to help you get to sleep. I discovered this afternoon BBC Sounds has a podcast series of recordings that you can play to help you drift off. Does anybody use them? You don't have to put your hand up, but selection retreat between the reeds, drift off to the rustle of reeds in the fen with gentle bird song and classical music.

Five and a half hours of reeds just going shh.

Or about this one. Keep calm. Knitting by the fire. It's on the BBC website, I promise. It's basically five and a half hours.

The sound of a fire crackling in the grate and someone rather annoyingly knitting over the top of it. Just want to. Anyway, maybe somebody finds that helpful here. How is it possible to sleep when we have all kinds of worries? Health fears, money worries, relationships, problems, things that are going wrong at home.

How do we sleep then?

Some try to face it with alcohol, to switch off or to relax, or other addictions. Or some people can only sleep if they are utterly exhausted.

Does our approach to life, I wonder, let us sleep when the storms are raging around us? If we can't sleep, not just once or twice, but consistently, maybe it's a symptom of something deeper.

Jesus slept in a storm, didn't he? Do you remember that? When these hardened fishermen were in the boat and they were terrified and he was asleep in the back, that earlier that day he'd just been teaching about worry. We read it, I think, last week. Do not worry.

Each day is enough trouble of its own. Who, by worrying, can add a single hour to his life. And having taught that, he actually practised what he preached. He fell asleep in a storm. Whatever truth he teaches obviously works to be able to rest in peace each night.

And as we come to die, we've got to be in the safety of the Lord, then that actually is a mark of eternal life, being able to rest. It's not easy always.

Psalm 4. Let's look at it tonight. It says, for the director of music or to the chief musician. I think that's one of the titles of the Lord Jesus, the one who brings everything into harmony.

These psalms were written for Jesus. As we read Psalm 4, we're learning from Christ how to live as he lived and how to sleep as he slept. So, just as a quick outline, verses 1 to 2, if you have a look down, Psalm 4, verses 1 to 2 set out the problem. Verses 3 and 4. Set out the solution.

Know that the Lord has set apart the godly for himself. And verses five to eight, the result. Okay, so the problem, verses one to two. The solution, verses three to four. And the result, verses five to eight.

That's the roadmap for tonight. Let's just dive straight in at verse one. Answer me when I call to you, my righteous God, give me relief from my distress. Have mercy on me and hear my prayer. How long will you people turn my glory into shame?

How long will you love delusions and seek false gods? That's the problem. David's in distress and he can see the world's all gone wrong and there's no end of trouble. And the solution Then is verse 3. Know that the Lord has set apart his faithful servant for himself.

The Lord hears when I call to him. Tremble and do not sin when you're on your bed. Search your hearts and be silent. And the result? Offer the sacrifices of the righteous and trust in the Lord.

Many, Lord, are asking, who will bring us prosperity? Let the light of your face shine on us. Fill my heart with joy. When their grain and new wine abound in peace I will lie down and sleep for you alone. Lord, make me dwell in safety.

Okay, that's the psalm. Let's look at it. Give me relief from my distress. That's how it begins. David is praying.

I'm distressed. He's not just irritated by something. He is deeply, deeply distressed by something. And he doesn't go into detail what that thing is. Maybe that's helpful, actually, because maybe you have come here tonight and you feel deeply distressed about something.

You're not looking forward to going to bed. You don't look forward to going to bed each night. You're not looking forward to going to bed tonight. Maybe in the thought of it, you're saying, already, I know I'm not going to sleep. I know I can't.

I'm so anxious. And there are troubles that keep us awake at night. Aren't there things that make us wake up in the night? Nightmares. Stress.

Worries. Worries about the day ahead, a relationship gone wrong. Anxiety about exams or health or the future or whatever it is. What do you do if you wake up in the night? Do you have a habit that you do?

Do you get up and go downstairs? I've done that. Sometimes you go downstairs for an hour or two, and then you really can't sleep because you wake up properly, don't you?

Sometimes in my better moments, I'll pray. And if I don't know what to pray, I'll just say the Lord's Prayer. Might say it a couple of times. Just think about each line as I'm saying it. Sometimes actually, I keep a Bible under my pillow.

And I don't know, do you do this or right next to your bed and you can't sleep, or you're worried or you're afraid you're going to have nightmares or whatever? And sometimes I reach out and I just hold onto it. And it's almost like that's enough. That's just a reminder that the Lord is here. He's watching over me.

It's okay. Simple, silly, is it? That's a simple thing, but it can be a help.

Well, verse two takes us deeper. David says, how long will you people, or how long will you, O man, turn my glory into shame? Now, at this point, David's not talking about himself. How long will you people turn my glory into shame? As if he has any glory.

No, David is a prophet. He's speaking in the name of Christ. David is writing this psalm for Jesus the Messiah to sing one day. These are the words of Christ that we're reading. We're in his mind.

And it's as if Jesus is looking out at the state of the world and sees how everyone is behaving, how the human race has turned his glory into shame. The whole world's in rebellion against him. And why is he so distressed about that? Well, because he made us for so much more. He made us for such greatness.

He handmade the human race and gave us dreams and hopes and abilities, things to do of eternal value. He made us to be part of his storey. And that's within us. That's deep within us. That's our instinct.

But we've taken his life given for wonderful things, and we've used it for shameful things. So often we waste our life on shameful, selfish, worthless things. We turn his glory into shame. We take the life he's given us and use it for our own purposes. We ignore him and defy him.

And there might be all kinds of storms going around in our lives, around us, but the really worrying storm is the storm that, if we're honest, is often inside us. That's the big storm, isn't it? That's the big storm. Often we can't face the troubles of this life, all the storms around us, because there's a storm inside us, in our hearts.

Can anybody calm that storm?

Look at verse 2. Look how Christ describes that storm. How long will you love delusions and seek false gods? He Says delusions, false gods. Jesus is distressed because we turn his glory into shame and we fill our lives with these storms that result.

Ludicrous ideas, false hopes, dreams. We set our hearts and our lives on things which are going to disappoint us, which will never deliver what we were made for. Selfish things that actually enslave us and control us, things that actually count for nothing. And the things that are the most valuable, the things we were made for, we despise them. We pay so little attention to them, we don't value them at all.

Those delusions, we hang on to them and they keep us awake at night. And they could even lock us out of God's presence forever.

Well, what are the delusions we listen to each day? What are the delusions we go along with?

If we go along with the ideas of this age, the false gods and the ideas of this age, then we will be captured by them as well. We'll get entangled in them. Money, success, sex, image, identity. We'll never have peace from them.

Sometimes the TV adverts promise, buy this and get peace of mind. For 12.99amonth. You've seen that. Whether it's health insurance or cat insurance or whatever it is. Live in care at the end of your life, get peace of mind.

How deluded we can be. Can £12.99 really buy you peace of mind? I mean, at some level, but not really, not with the storms inside us. If we think that this life is all there is, then we will lie awake at night, worried, anxious, despairing. And we can keep ourselves busy during the day, travelling to work, going to school, stuck in a traffic jam, whatever it is.

But many people say it's when they go to bed and they can't sleep and they're lying awake, then they can't escape the fact that. That we're going to die. We think about it. We think about our lives when we're lying awake.

Well, the question is, what did Jesus know that enabled him to sleep? What truth did Jesus know that meant he could sleep in the midst of a literal storm all around him, knowing that the whole world was against him, turning his glory into shame? Deluded, serving, false God. What does he know which means even in the midst of all that, he can just lie down and go to sleep? The answer is in verses three and four.

David says, know that the Lord has set apart the godly for himself. The Lord hears when I call to him. Tremble and do not sin. When you are on your bed, search your hearts and be Silent Jesus knew that His Father had set him apart and his church, all those who love him. Jesus could sleep even in the fiercest storm because he trusted His Father and he knew that His Father was in control.

The world might look chaotic, but the key truth is that Christ and His church are at the very centre of God the Father's plans. That actually God rules over everything for the sake of Christ and His church. We might think the world is out of control and what's going on with the rise and fall of the nations. They're at war with each other. It's chaos.

But God the Father says no, don't worry, it hasn't got out of control at all. I'm directing it and it's all about Christ and the Church. You're at the centre. There's a purpose, there's a storyline. It's heading exactly where I want it to head.

Nothing has changed.

We talk about sleeping like a baby, although they don't always sleep, do they? But you know what I mean, sleeping like a baby. A baby was formed and is nurtured in a very protective little world, isn't it? Everything they need is supplied. All the big problems of the world are kept at bay.

There they are, just lying in a parent's arms. They don't know anything about danger or real need. When a baby's born, it can fall asleep in the arms of its parents, totally trusting. And if we could see how much our Heavenly Father cares for us. Much, much greater than a parent with their little baby, even than a mother's care that he formed us and cares for us and loves us, and he has done since the very beginning and he rules over all things for us.

We ought to be able to sleep in the love and trust of Christ. See, we can either look at all the problems of the world and get angry, look back at an day and feel bitter or disappointed or full of regrets or anxiety or worried about the future tomorrow and what might happen. Or we can bow down before our Father and know that he's put all of history in Christ's hands and nothing can happen except by his permission and he's looking after us and he'll never sleep. In other words, we can trust him to shield us and look after us. We can try and carry all our problems ourselves on our own shoulders and they will crush us.

But his shoulders are big enough and he actually tells us, cast your cares on the Lord and He will sustain you. He'll never let the righteous fall. Psalm 55:22. Cast all your cares on him because he cares for you. 1 Peter 5:7.

He says, I'll be with you through everything, everything you're ever going to face in life. You'll never be alone. Trust me.

Verse 4. That little verse is quoted in the New Testament in Paul's letter to the Ephesians. The Ephesians, if you know the book of Ephesians. They were a small church. They were living in a big city, cosmopolitan city, in the shadow of enormous temple to Diana or Artemis.

It was one of the wonders of the world. People travelled across the ancient world to worship Diana. And I guess when the Gospel came to Ephesus, the Christians there might have felt very small indeed, very intimidated, because the whole culture was against them. They could easily have been anxious, worried, tempted to despair, and so on. They were surrounded by a culture that worshipped false gods just as we are.

They were bombarded by delusions every day, just like we are. Money, sex, power. They could have easily been worried or angry about the state of the world. And there are plenty of podcasts and papers and websites that love to get us angry and riled up, aren't there? About the state of the world.

They wallow in it. Now, we could do that if we wanted sleepless nights, but actually the only outcome is we get more depressed and angry and bitter and hopeless and despairing. So Paul doesn't recommend that. Instead, in Ephesians 4:26, he quotes from Psalm 4 and he basically says, stop thinking like pagans. Don't take on all that worry.

Don't think like those who don't know God. We can sleep. It's possible to close our eyes at night and find a deep peace in Christ. A peace that's beyond anything the world can offer. When we turn away from the world and turn to Christ, it's not just about positive thinking.

It's about a new life that we can have in Christ. A new birth, a new relationship with God as our Father. A new beginning. Some people say I need a new beginning. I can't go on like this anymore.

Well, you can have a new beginning. You can have a new start even tonight. The deepest new beginning that's possible, the deepest renewal that the Spirit of Christ himself will work in you when you turn to him and you start peace.

That's the kind of change that David describes in the final few verses of Psalm 4. Let's have a look down Psalm 4 from verse 5.

Offer the sacrifices of the righteous and trust in the Lord. Many Lord are asking, who will bring us prosperity. Let the light of your Face, shine on us. Fill my heart with joy when their grain and new wine abound. Or maybe a better translation is, you have put more joy in my heart than they have.

When their grain and new wine abound in peace I will lie down and sleep for you alone. Lord, make me dwell in safety.

We can't fix all the problems of the world. We're not meant to. We can't fix all the problems of our own lives. We're not able to. They're too big for us and if we try to carry them, they will only crush us.

But our Heavenly Father is in control, caring for us, directing everything that's happening for our good.

The world around us will tell us that the only way we'll be happy is if we have a successful career, a huge bank balance, sun drenched holidays, a perfect relationship, a beautiful home, good health, all the leisure time, whatever it is, make those obsessions yours and you'll be happy, we're told. Psalm 4 says, It's a delusion. It's a delusion. Make those your goal and you'll lie awake, anxious. They'll crush you.

You'll be depressed, despairing, bitter, lonely, full of regret, fearful about what tomorrow might bring. Instead, put on Christ.

Look out and see the world through his eyes.

See it as it really is, as the Father sees it. True fulfilment and peace and meaning are not found in things, but in the light of God's face shining on you, our Heavenly Father, delighting in us, the Lord God looks on you and loves you and will never let you go. And when it comes time for us to die, we'll never really die.

Death will be just the doorway through which we step into his presence. You fill my heart with greater joy than all these things. In peace I will lie down and sleep for you alone, Lord, make me dwell in safety.

Well, how do we sleep? How do we let go of everything every night? Actually, we have an opportunity to practise. Every night is a rehearsal. Every night we have an opportunity to let go of everything and trust the Lord.

Have you ever thought about that? For a few vulnerable hours we are unconscious. We are completely helpless. Anything could happen to us. But we trust ourselves to the Lord.

Every night we trust that he will look after us. Every night we lie down to sleep and the Lord is giving us a little rehearsal, a practise for the day when we will lie down for the last time, when we'll close our eyes and trust that God will bring us safely into a new day, a day that will last forever. We'll let go of everything and entrust ourselves to him and he'll bring us safely through. And every time we go to bed, and we're going to do it in a few hours time, I hope it's a chance to practise for that, for that future. And we'll close our eyes for the last time, entrust ourselves to him and be with him for the most wonderful day.

In peace I will lie down and sleep. For you alone make me dwell in safety.

If we try and cling on to all the pleasures and treasures of this passing age, we definitely won't find peace. We won't find that peace and safety and we probably won't sleep very well. But tonight, if we know Jesus, we can. We can rest in peace this evening as we go to bed. And one day, through Christ, rest in peace and enter into his rest and his peace forevermore.

Why don't we pray before we sing again? Lord Jesus, you tell us not to worry about tomorrow because each day is enough trouble of its own. And as we have gone through this little series over these last weeks together, we ask again for your help to live, trusting you one day at a time. And Lord, as we go to sleep tonight and each night, grant us, we pray, a deep, refreshing sleep.

We thank you that we know you as our Heavenly Father and are safe in your hands. And so we ask this in Jesus precious name, Amen.