Judg 8:34, Thus the sons of Israel did not remember the Lord their God, who had delivered them from the hands of all their enemies on every side…
We are currently in the midst of the view God gives of humanity in the light of that old human nature of obstinacy and self-willed disobedience, set against the plan and the purpose of wholly being the people of God. As we read about the history of the Children of Israel, it becomes so readily the account of our lives. That is until the advent of complete surrender to Christ Jesus and His new life which flows as the focal being of who we are now in Him. 
We must never place ourselves in judgment above the actions and the adulterous and idolatrous behavior of that Chosen Nation of God as detailed in scripture. To do so is to judge ourselves and our attitudes and our selfish decisions as so set against the Lord’s Holiness and Righteousness and Faithfulness. It is only because of who we are now in Christ that all the treasure-trove of God causes us to rejoice in that entirely new creation whom He has now put into place in us with our complete desire after His heart of love and grace and mercy.
We continue with the fact that the Psalmist understood, even in the Old Testament days, that something needed to take place within the hearts and minds of the people of God. They could not go forward in their relationship with God and still partake in their abject refusal to seek the goodness and the holiness of God. When they were in trouble, they would call out to God and ask for His forgiveness. Then, when the pressure was off, when all was right with the world, they would once again forsake God and His Holiness and would rather become entranced with all the filthy lucre of this age.
Please open to the 106th Psalm and stand as we read verses 12-48 together. Here, the Psalmist continues the recounting of the history of the unfaithfulness of the people, even after knowing and being saved by the Omnipotent Splendor of the Lord God Almighty. 
Ps 106:12-48, Then they believed His words; They sang His praise. They quickly forgot His works; They did not wait for His counsel, But craved intensely in the wilderness, And tempted God in the desert. So He gave them their request, But sent a wasting disease among them. When they became envious of Moses in the camp, And of Aaron, the holy one of the Lord, The earth opened and swallowed up Dathan, And engulfed the company of Abiram. And a fire blazed up in their company; The flame consumed the wicked. They made a calf in Horeb, And worshiped a molten image. Thus they exchanged their glory For the image of an ox that eats grass. They forgot God their Savior, Who had done great things in Egypt, Wonders in the land of Ham, And awesome things by the Red Sea. Therefore He said that He would destroy them, Had not Moses His chosen one stood in the breach before Him, To turn away His wrath from destroying them. Then they despised the pleasant land; They did not believe in His word, But grumbled in their tents; They did not listen to the voice of the Lord. Therefore He swore to them, That He would cast them down in the wilderness, And that He would cast their seed among the nations, And scatter them in the lands. They joined themselves also to Baal-peor, And ate sacrifices offered to the dead. Thus they provoked Him to anger with their deeds; And the plague broke out among them. Then Phinehas stood up and interposed; And so the plague was stayed. And it was reckoned to him for righteousness, To all generations forever. They also provoked Him to wrath at the waters of Meribah, So that it went hard with Moses on their account; Because they were rebellious against His Spirit, He spoke rashly with his lips. They did not destroy the peoples, As the Lord commanded them, But they mingled with the nations, And learned their practices, And served their idols, Which became a snare to them. They even sacrificed their sons and their daughters to the demons, And shed innocent blood, The blood of their sons and their daughters, Whom they sacrificed to the idols of Canaan; And the land was polluted with the blood. Thus they became unclean in their practices, And played the harlot in their deeds. Therefore the anger of the Lord was kindled against His people, And He abhorred His inheritance. Then He gave them into the hand of the nations; And those who hated them ruled over them. Their enemies also oppressed them, And they were subdued under their power. Many times He would deliver them; They, however, were rebellious in their counsel, And so sank down in their iniquity. Nevertheless He looked upon their distress, When He heard their cry; And He remembered His covenant for their sake, And relented according to the greatness of His lovingkindness. He also made them objects of compassion In the presence of all their captors. Save us, O Lord our God, And gather us from among the nations, To give thanks to Thy holy name, And glory in Thy praise. Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel, From everlasting even to everlasting. And let all the people say, "Amen." Praise the Lord!
Thus reads the Word of God. You may be seated.
As the Psalmist points out, the people were unwilling to whole-heartedly submit to the Hand of God. They continually turned away from the Lord as they sought to immerse themselves in the idolatry and the wickedness of the nations surrounding them. 
They did not want to be different. They did not want to be holy. They did not want to be seen as a distinct people after the testimony of God. They chose rather to submit to the domination and the confusion and the consequences of their own vile and depraved baser instincts in the utter rejection of all the goodness of God. 
They showed themselves in the true color of all humanity set in sin and trespass against the beauty and the honor and the majesty and the glory of God. Therefore they suffered the severe consequences of that malevolence against God. They found themselves the most piteous of all people. They had tasted of the Lord’s goodness but were not following the way of Jehovah. At the same time, they were unable to fully digest the vileness of the nations, because they had seen the truth of the Hand of God in operation. 
It is what we all have to face in the manner of our turning against the Holiness and the Righteousness of God, once we have seen and have acknowledged the miracle of the redemptive work of Jesus Christ. We cannot find a place for giving in to the lusts of our old nature any longer. We know the displeasure of the Lord and we see the tawdry delights of this age as they now are illuminated in the life and the light of Jesus Christ. We are the most piteous of all creation when we have turned our life over to the Lord, and yet then try to take it back into our own feeble and faltering control. 
We will never find any satisfaction in the vile things of this age. We will know only despair and destruction and futility and trembling sadness in the realization that we are dejectedly displeasing to Our Most Holy and Righteous and Loving Lord God Almighty.  
This is declared as the most wretched of conditions by the Apostle Peter in 2 Peter 2:20-22. 2 Peter 2:20-22, For if after they have escaped the defilements of the world by the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and are overcome, the last state has become worse for them than the first. For it would be better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than having known it, to turn away from the holy commandment delivered to them. It has happened to them according to the true proverb, "A dog returns to its own vomit," and, "A sow, after washing, returns to wallowing in the mire." 
 That is what the Psalmist makes evident of the Nation of the Lord in the times of their wandering and even their entry into the Promised Land. It never took very long, not even an entire generation to pass, before they were once again mired in the filth and vomit of their own idolatry. 
Thankfully, the Psalmist continues with the following reality concerning the faithful and forgiving and sovereign hand of God upon His people. Yahweh’s continued and unending lovingkindness unto this people whom He had chosen for Himself out of all the nations of the world eventually resulted in a remnant of those who would choose to love Him above all else. They would declare that the Lord, Alone, was worthy of all praise and adoration and honor and glory.
Nevertheless He looked upon their distress, When He heard their cry; And He remembered His covenant for their sake, And relented according to the greatness of His lovingkindness. He also made them objects of compassion In the presence of all their captors. Save us, O Lord our God, And gather us from among the nations, To give thanks to Thy holy name, And glory in Thy praise. Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel, From everlasting even to everlasting. And let all the people say, "Amen." Praise the Lord!
	God always gave of Himself for the sake of the salvation of His people, especially from the results of their own disobedient and defiant seeking after self-interests instead of the interests of the Lord. He would allow those circumstances and trials and tribulations to come upon them which would test the intense and true fiber of their hearts. As they would remember the truth of Who God was and would turn to Him, they would discover anew, the wondrous and miraculous closeness and truthfulness and lovingkindness with which God would envelop them. It might be only a remnant who would come through the fire, but come through they would! They would seek Him with all earnestness and with all humility. They would declare His praise and His Honor and His glory and His adoration and His blessing with all their heart.
	We conclude this morning with the encouragement of the Lord as detailed by the Preacher in the 12th Chapter of Eccl. Herein is the picture of those who know to Whom they should turn with repentance and with humbleness of heart. It is clearly evident that there is no time to waste with all the fruitless frivolity of this age. We need to turn to the Lord with our whole heart and mind and being right now, today!
Eccl 12, Remember also your Creator in the days of your youth, before the evil days come and the years draw near when you will say, "I have no delight in them"; before the sun, the light, the moon, and the stars are darkened, and clouds return after the rain; in the day that the watchmen of the house tremble, and mighty men stoop, the grinding ones stand idle because they are few, and those who look through windows grow dim; and the doors on the street are shut as the sound of the grinding mill is low, and one will arise at the sound of the bird, and all the daughters of song will sing softly. Furthermore, men are afraid of a high place and of terrors on the road; the almond tree blossoms, the grasshopper drags himself along, and the caperberry is ineffective. For man goes to his eternal home while mourners go about in the street. Remember Him before the silver cord is broken and the golden bowl is crushed, the pitcher by the well is shattered and the wheel at the cistern is crushed; then the dust will return to the earth as it was, and the spirit will return to God who gave it. "Vanity of vanities," says the Preacher, "all is vanity!" In addition to being a wise man, the Preacher also taught the people knowledge; and he pondered, searched out and arranged many proverbs. The Preacher sought to find delightful words and to write words of truth correctly. The words of wise men are like goads, and masters of these collections are like well-driven nails; they are given by one Shepherd. But beyond this, my son, be warned: the writing of many books is endless, and excessive devotion to books is wearying to the body. The conclusion, when all has been heard, is: fear God and keep His commandments, because this applies to every person. For God will bring every act to judgment, everything which is hidden, whether it is good or evil.   
    	When all is said and done, we must face the choices that we make in this life all by ourselves before the throne of God. We will not be there with parents or spouses or anyone else to blame for our actions and our behavior. 
As well, it will never be a matter of doing enough good things to try to outweigh the bad things that we do. That is what many people try, in the folly of their minds, to put forward as justification for how they act on this earth. There are many well-meaning people who hold to that deceitful and false lie with some sense that it will bring them into good standing before God, if there is a God, when the time comes.
	However, the truth is that we come before Yahweh either in Christ, or outside of the saving grace of His death and resurrection. We are either covered by His righteousness, or we are seen for the defiled and sinful beings that we are in the vile course of our depraved and fallen human nature. Nothing will be hidden from the prescient eyes and the infinite understanding and omniscience of the Lord God Almighty. All our excuses and all our indiscretions and all our hidden agendas and plotting will be clearly seen for the wicked manipulations and vile motivations that we have put forth as our desire in this life. It is all but the futile means of advancing our selfishness at the cost of everything else. It will be shown as utterly worthless and vanity of vanities. 
The conclusion, when all has been heard, is: fear God and keep His commandments, because this applies to every person. For God will bring every act to judgment, everything which is hidden, whether it is good or evil. So be it!
Thus the sons of Israel did not remember the Lord their God, who had delivered them from the hands of all their enemies on every side… Amen.

This morning’s benediction is James 4:10. Humble yourselves in the presence of the Lord, and He will exalt you. Amen.