Do you fear the dark? I’m not really talking about the “night” as much as I mean the “dark night of the soul.” The times when you simply don’t feel the presence of God; the times when we feel less Psalm 23 and more Psalm 88!

Consider something, God made the light of day, but He also made the dark of night. Listen to Psalm 104:19-20,

“He made the moon to mark the seasons; the sun knows its time for setting. You make darkness, and it is night, when all the beasts of the forest creep about.”

We love the hour of sunrise…the light comes in the eastern sky, the birds celebrate a new day, but I sat outside last night. The day choir of bird choruses was resting, but my ears were full…in fact it was louder than the daytime…it was time for the night choir sing.

We often focus on the Day Choir…the birds singing, the wind blowing in the trees, all praising our Maker, but the volume of the Night Choir is simply…loud. Katydids, crickets, cicadas, frogs, and the occasional owl…they too all sing for the glory of their Creator.

As I sat there last night, I thought about how we often view our lives…when darkness comes: depression, hardship, grief, we often forget the call to continually praise our King. But it would seem the insects teach us a lesson…when the darkness comes the time to praise is NOW!

Maybe the lightning bugs are a good reminder of what John said, “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.” Trust the Providence of God in the day and night and worship Him.

I have to show you one more thing from Psalm 95. The summons, the warning, but notice the Savior. Notice verse 1, “Oh come, let us sing to the LORD; let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation.” Who is the rock of our salvation? When Moses brought water from the rock after they grumbled at Massah and Meribah, he stood at the rock of Horeb, struck it with his staff and water flowed. What is amazing is what Paul said in 1 Corinthians 10:1ff, “For I want you to know, brothers, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and passed through the sea, and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, and all ate the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual Rock that followed them, and the Rock was Christ.”

That’s another blog all by itself, but their salvation was our salvation…it is Jesus. God swore in His wrath that they would not enter His rest…that rest was the Promise Land, but the book of Hebrews won’t allow us to keep Psalm 95 to the past…we must apply it to us today…what’s our rest. It is Heaven. How can we enter Heaven? In Matthew 11:28-30 Jesus said, “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”

He alone gives rest for our soul because He alone can take us to the Father’s rest through His death, burial, and resurrection. But before I close let me pick back up where Paul left off in 1 Corinthians 10.

“Nevertheless, with most of them (the one’s that grumbled) God was not pleased, for they were overthrown in the wilderness. Now these things took place as examples for us, that we might not do evil as they did.” He then went on to talk about idolatry, sexual immorality, and putting Christ to the test by grumbling. He said, “Therefore let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall. No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation He will also provide the way of escape.”

Church, we must hear the summons, heed the warning, and seek the Savior and as we remember His beauty and see it in the Word we worship Him and sin loses its temptation…if we don’t we are in danger of being hardened in our hearts and there will be no rest for our souls.

As we walk through Psalm 95 we come a transition. The transition of the second half of verse 7 and leading into verse 8 is jarring…there is a clash here because we move from the summons to the warning. In verses 7-9 David goes back to Exodus 17 and Numbers 20. The people of Israel saw God move in mighty ways, but they were always prone to grumble. They grumbled against God and against Moses. Meribah was the word for dispute, and Massah was the word for testing. That summed up the wilderness wanderings where the people hardened their hearts—they heard God’s Word, but refused to obey…ultimately it cost them the promised land and they all died in the wilderness and it was their children who crossed over and conquered. They saw the work of God, but tested Him and refused to obey.

In verse 11, God adamantly said, “Therefore I swore in my wrath, ‘They shall not enter my rest.’” We could easily think that was for them, but David takes his readers back to the wanderings and 1,000 years later the writer of Hebrews takes his readers back to the wanderings, and 2,000 years after that all three, Moses, David, and the writer of Hebrews take us back to the wanderings.

Let me sum it up—don’t just listen—obey. They heard God’s voice, but refused to obey. Last week I spoke of the availability of God’s Word to this generation…don’t just listen to it obey it!

Then, don’t test God—trust God. That’s the message of verse 9. Let me give you a quick run-down of what the people of Israel saw…

They plundered the Egyptians as they left,

God split the Red Sea and they passed on dry ground while God wiped out the army pursuing them,

they came to Marah and couldn’t drink the water—they grumbled against Moses and God cleaned the water and they drank,

they grumbled about bread and God gave them manna,

and then in chapter 17 they again grumbled about the lack of water…God had just provided and He did it again and again…this time by having Moses strike a rock and water flowed. Trust God—don’t test God.

Then, from that let me say, don’t grumble—embrace the grind. I first heard that phrase from Ray Lewis, a LB in the NFL…embrace the grind…it won’t always be easy, but God is using the hard times to shape you and mold you. The hard times make you more like Jesus! Embrace the grind!

Don’t whine—worship. The people of Israel were professional whiners…they cried and grumbled and whined against God and Moses over and over again. Every time I think, “Why does God put up with them?” I am reminded, He puts up with us! Don’t be like that…when difficult times come worship. Grow through it and remember what we said in verses 1-7—rejoice. You do that by getting to know God, by knowing His ways, and by avoiding His wrath through obedience.

Are you worshipping or whining right now? Turn the whine into worship…you won’t always feel like it, but our feeling has nothing to do with our call to worship. Worship through the hard times, worship through the valleys, and trust Him.

As we make our way through Psalm 95 we are letting David teach us to worship. We come rejoicing and we come remembering, but we also come reverently. He is God you know! Verse 6 says, “O come, let us worship and bow down; let us kneel before the LORD, our Maker!”

The psalmist does something amazing here—the three words he uses: worship, bow, and kneel, basically say the same thing. The word worship means to prostrate oneself…the idea is to kneel before God and to bow oneself and to touch the floor with your forehead. We are to worship before Him, we are to bow before Him, we are to kneel before Him…there is a real sense in which verse 7 says this, “Oh come, let us bow, and let us bow, and let us bow before the LORD, our Maker!” We are to bow before Him!

This speaks of humility before the greatness of Sovereignty. We enter into the presence of the One who made us and so often we are so casual…He is our Father, He is our Savior, He is our Shepherd, but He is our God...He is the God! Let us never forget that He is holy, holy, holy and let’s worship Him accordingly!

But there is something else…if we are to worship reverently, we must bow, but we must also come before Him and hear Him. The end of verse 7 says, “Today, if you hear His voice, do not harden your hearts.” To come before God and to worship Him is to listen to Him. To worship is to listen…the spoken Word, the taught Word, the prayed Word, the sung Word…that is worship. You can’t separate worship from the Word…fact is you don’t have worship without the Word.

The heart of worship is nothing less than the bending of our wills to God’s will and it is a renewal of our pilgrimage toward Him and His celestial city. That’s worship…nothing else will suffice!

Ponder this! Are you are person who worships? I’ve found that we all tend to worship differently…some have more passion than others, some have more freedom than others, but Psalm 95 leaves none of us out…these are the things we must do if we are to worship.

A few years ago we were in the midst of worship and I felt the Lord prompt me to get on my face…I wrestled with that…Lord what will people think…and to be honest I justified it, that couldn’t be God…that would bring far too much attention on myself…and we sang on, but I knew I had disobeyed Him. I don’t remember much about the next song, but I spent it entirely in repenting before God. The next week I felt Him say, will you listen to me now? I dropped to my knees and then to my face and simply obeyed Him. We won’t always be on our faces…especially in public worship, but I wonder if it wouldn’t do us all some good!

I was at a gas station pumping gas and I looked over and a Muslim man was by the wall next to a propane gas storage container and he was on his face in prayer. I watched him until the gas tank was full, and then I parked my car close to where he was. I waited until he was finished and then as he got up I went by and his hand. I said, “Brother, you don’t know me. I’m a pastor of a Baptist church and there probably isn’t a lot we would agree on theologically, but I’d give anything for a church full of people with the tenacity to do that!

I’ve seen Muslim men pray in the Exit Rows of our airplane, I’ve seen African truck drivers on the side of the road, where no one else would know the difference, in prayer. Why is bowing so hard for us?

Check out yesterday's post and catch up if you missed it, but let’s jump in where we left off in Psalm 95. We are to come remembering…look at what he says about God. The little word ‘for’ in verse 3 shows us that he is going to explain verses 1-2…here is why we come rejoicing. He is great! For the LORD is a great God. Who else is like our God? Made us, came to save us, called us, redeemed us, fills us, provides for us, and will allow us to spend eternity with Him! He is a great God!

He is King. “For the LORD is a great God, and a great King above all gods. He is the great King…the King of kings and the Lord of lords and the God of gods.” All other gods are man-made, all other gods are created gods, but our God is the God…the One who sits on the Throne and is Sovereign!

He is Creator…”in His hands are the depts. Of the earth; the heights of the mountains are his also. The sea is his, for he made it, and his hands formed the dry land.” What a God! Chris Tomlin said it this way, “From the highest of highs to the depths of the seas…creation’s revealing your majesty.” He made it all and owns it all. You know what that means don’t you? It means He also owns you…you are not your own. Abraham Kuyper said, “There is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is Sovereign over all, does not cry, Mine!”

He is Shepherd. Look at verse 7, “For He is our God and we are the people of His pasture, and the sheep of His hand.” That means He assumes responsibility for our care…He will protect us, He will provide for us, and He will lead us. Jesus said, “I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.” God is no hireling…we are hand shaped by God and hand held by God! How can we not rejoice in God when we remember these things?

Yesterday we started looking at Psalm 95 and I took you to Hebrews to show you that this is both a Psalm of the Holy Spirit and a Psalm of David. I closed by saying, I think Stephen Cole was right when he said this is more than just an invitation…this is an ultimatum. That’s why the title today is worship God or die…that’s the idea we find in this Psalm.

The psalm can be divided into two parts…the first is found in verses one through seven and here we find the summons. It is a summons, “Oh come, let us sing to the LORD,” “Let us come into His presence with thanksgiving,” “Oh come, let us worship and bow down; let us kneel before the LORD, our Maker! For He is our God,” We make worship about so many things, but most of them center around our personal preferences…in the Word, Worship is centered around the Object of worship…the King of kings and the Lord of lords.

When I read this Psalm on Sunday morning I found myself reading, and just moving on…but the Holy Spirit often gives me a gentle “Stop” nudge and I realized I was just reading to read. I had just read six things that opened with “Let us,” and I didn't do any of them. I went back and read the Psalm and hit the pause button and acted on his summons. Let’s break it down.

Notice, we are to come rejoicing. “Oh come, let us sing to the LORD; let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation!” Christians are a singing people…the psalmist is calling upon us to give the King…the Savior…the acclamation He deserves. Singing is mandatory among the children of God and just in case you think, ‘well, I can’t sing,’ notice He doesn’t expect us to do what we can’t do, but we can all make a ‘joyful noise.’ We won’t all sing solos, and let me just say, we don’t all need to sing solos!, but we can all make a joyful noise and when we rejoice in the One who saved us that won’t be hard!

We come rejoicing by singing, by making a joyful noise and through thanksgiving…Let us come into His presence with thanksgiving…this is nothing more than humble gratitude for His abundant provisions. Think of what He has done…how can we not sing His praises with great thanksgiving?! We are to come rejoicing—singing, making joyful noises and thanking Him.

I often stop at places like this and sing something along the lines of Keith Green’s Oh Lord You’re Beautiful or maybe a hymn…let me repeat what I said earlier, for the Christian singing is mandatory…sing softly if you must, but you must sing!

Let me share something that happened a while back. I was sitting in my back yard, facing our bird feeders, and noticed all of the birds were gone…I looked for a hawk or my daughter’s cat, but neither were there. I could see them on the fence post, in some bushes, and in trees, but something amazing happened…I just started singing softly to the Lord and the moment I started singing everyone, I mean everyone of those birds flew to the feeder. I don't know what that means, I can’t explain it, but somehow at that moment, singing brought me into the Creator’s purpose for His creation and they knew I was ok.

You figure that out!, but let’s pick up here tomorrow.

I’m on sabbatical this month so my Sunday’s are much slower…I got to sleep in a little longer and then I got to sit outside and read the Psalms and take my time without thinking about the sermon I was about to preach. Yesterday, I read Psalm 95 and I want to spend the week in this psalm.

Psalm 95 doesn’t list the author, but it is one of those Psalms in which we have a Divine Commentary in the New Testament…the second half of the Psalm is quoted in Hebrews 3:7-4:10. I want to point out two things about what the writer of Hebrews said about the writer of our Psalm, first, he attributed it to the Holy Spirit, in 3:7 he said, “Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says,” and then he quotes from the Psalm. What we have here is Spirit inspired…don’t forget that, but He gave it to us through a human writer…in Hebrews 4:7 the writer said our text was written by David, “‘Today,’ saying through David so long afterward, in the words already quoted, “Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts.”

This is a great reminder of what Peter said in 2 Peter 1:21, “For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.” As we approach this Psalm, let’s remember that…these are words given to us by the Holy Spirit—they are worthy of our obedience! Let’s also remember what Paul said in 2 Timothy 3:16-17,

“All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work.”

Psalm 95 begins a series of Psalms, running through Psalm 100, where the psalmist calls upon us to worship God. John Stott said,

“True worship is the highest and noblest activity of which man, by the grace of God, is capable.”

Worship isn’t a problem for us…our problem is we tend to worship the creation instead of the Creator. David sets our God before us and calls upon us to worship Him and only Him. One commentator said this was an invitation to worship…I think Stephen Cole was right when he said this is more than just an invitation…this is an ultimatum.

I want to walk through the psalm this week, but I hope you understand how powerful it is for us to be able to say the words we read in our Bible are written by men, but they were carried on, they were inspired, they were given the words by the Holy Spirit. It isn’t like any other book…it is, as the writer of Hebrews says, “living and breathing.” Read Psalm 95 and get ready to worship with me this week.

This week’s blogs have been different…maybe because I’m in the first week of my month long sabbatical, but mainly it is because the cool summer mornings and evenings have allowed me to spend time sitting outside with God, my Bible and journal, and a cup of coffee (or two!).

I get up at different times each day. My responsibilities at the church require me to be up before the sun on at least three mornings a week and on those days I sit at the kitchen table which is on the backside of our house facing south. The bay window allows me to see the eastern sky and many mornings I know the sun is rising simply by the bird chorus. On some of the mornings when I can sleep a little later I am often awakened by the songs of the Redbird or the Wren…it is almost as if they are saying, “Get out of bed…you are missing it!”

One day last week, I was finished with my devotional reading and prayer time and I still had time before I needed to get ready so I went outside and just watched the sun rise. That evening I changed chairs and watched the sun set…it was a good day. There is something about being outside with God’s creation that simply renews me.

Isn’t it interesting that one of the most famous passages in the Bible is set in the environment of being outside. Think about Psalm 23…green pastures, still waters, paths of righteousness, walking through valleys, and even when the image moves from God as our Shepherd to God as our Host the table is in the presence of his enemies…which could well be outside on the battlefield.

Gary Thomas quoted Susan Power Bratton in his book Sacred Pathways,

“Experiencing the beauty and peace of God in nature is not a substitute for direct interaction with the regenerative powers of the Creator, but . . . the mending and binding so necessary to heal our stress-filled lives may flow through creation. For the spiritually oppressed or the socially injured, a pleasing or quiet natural environment can help provide spiritual release. Resting by a clear, free-running river or sitting on a sunny slope in a blooming desert grassland can bring peace and joy into very clouded souls.”

Think about Jesus…30 years of preparation for a three year ministry that would save the world and yet in the midst of all of the business of saving the world, Jesus often withdrew to the lonely and deserted places.

Some of my best memories involve time spent playing as a child in the woods. I went back to Ocean Springs, MS not long ago and those woods have been replaced by multi-million-dollar homes, but in a few weeks Kim and I will walk under the sequoias and sit in the meadows of Yosemite and I will simply be overwhelmed and overjoyed. Even this very day my family will enjoy the peaceful and yet over-crowded beaches of Destin, FL.

I think Luther summed it up for me,

“Now if I believe in God’s Son and bear in mind that he became man, all creatures will appear a hundred times more beautiful to me than before. Then I will properly appreciate the sun, the moon, the stars, trees, apples, pears, as I reflect that he is Lord over and the center of all things.”

Gary Thomas said regarding that quote, “If we don’t appreciate the outdoors, then maybe we don’t appreciate the Creator.”

I mentioned Mary Oliver yesterday. I don’t agree with her on everything, but when I read my old sermons, I realize I don’t even agree with myself on everything!, but I do love her writing…especially her poems. I think the thing I most disagree with her about it that she seems to substitute nature for the Bride…the Church. I admit that while I love being with the Church and the greatest lesson I learned in the Covid year was just how much I needed the church, I do find I feel closest to God outside.

Gary Thomas, in his book Sacred Pathways, gives nine ways we connect with God. I find myself in the category he calls the “Naturalists,” but there is no substitute for the Church and being with the Body of Christ.

As an introvert I find being in crowds drains my battery and I have re-charge in times of solitude. My wife is a natural extrovert. I remember she once told me, “I like being alone,” and I responded, “But I need to be alone.” She finds her battery recharged in a crowd…mine is recharging as I sit alone in the back yard or walking in the woods or sitting by a stream.

Thomas said,

“Many of the Old Testament theophanies, or appearances of God, happened in the wilderness. God met Hagar in the desert, Abraham on a mountain, Jacob at a river crossing, and Moses at a burning bush. It was far less common for God to visit someone in an urban center.

Jesus himself seems to have sought out the beauty of creation. Early in his ministry, he moved from Nazareth to live in Capernaum, which was by the lake (Matthew 4:13). When he called some of his disciples to follow him, he was walking by the Sea of Galilee (Matthew 4:18).”

Spurgeon once said,

“Oh, but surely, everything that comes from the hand of such a Master-artist as God has something in it of himself! . . . There are lovely spots on this fair globe which ought to make even a blasphemer devout. I have said, among the mountains, “He who sees no God here is mad.” There are things that God has made which overwhelm with a sense of his omnipotence: how can men see them, and doubt the existence of the Deity?”

I quote both of these men to show that while it is of value to study, to observe, and to learn from the created world, we must never stray from the Word of God or from His Church. In her poem, “The Beautiful, Striped Sparrow,” Mary Oliver spoke of walking through the fields humming hymns she used to sing in church. She closed it with these words,

“…am i lonely?

the beautiful, striped sparrow,

serenely, on the tallest weed in his kingdom,

also sings without words.”

Nature is a great place to get alone with God, to spend time in solitude, and to offer up prayers and praise, but it cannot take away our need for joining in with the Body of Christ. I need the hymns of the Church, I need to sing them with the people of God, but I find I also need to sing with the “striped sparrow” as we praise our Creator. So, I’ll walk through the fields humming a hymn, but that hymn I hum will most likely be from the service I attended and sang with my brothers and sisters. God seems to work best through me when I attend to both areas of my life.

In Luke 12:22ff Jesus spoke about being anxious and used examples from nature…ravens, lilies, grass in the field, and He said, “Consider the ravens,” and “consider the lilies.” The word “consider” comes from the Greek word κατανοέω and the meaning is interesting…it isn’t so much, hear what I am saying and move on. Isn’t that what we often do when we read the Bible…we read our passage for today and go about our business, but that isn’t what Jesus meant. My Greek dictionary says the word “consider” means “to pay attention, notice, observe; consider, contemplate;” and adds, “this word has a strong implication that the attention paid is intense, and the contemplation is broad and thorough, resulting in complete understanding.”

I’ve never read someone who takes that word to heart in contemplating creatures more than Annie Dillard. Have you ever considered why God made so many different types of birds? Why did He make so many colors, so many songs, so many sizes? Annie, in Pilgrim at Tinker Creek said,

“What is going on here? The point of the dragonfly’s terrible lip, the giant water bug, birdsong, or the beautiful dazzle and flash of sunlighted minnows, is not that it all fits together like clockwork – for it doesn’t, particularly, not even inside the goldfish bowl – but that it all flows so freely and wild, like the creek, that it all surges in such a free, fringed tangle. Freedom is the world’s water and weather, the world’s nourishment freely given, its soil and sap: and the creator loves pizzazz.”

I’ll be honest, I’ve never thought of that, but I think God does indeed love pizzazz! Pay attention to what He is doing, to what He has made, and listen…read His Word, listen to His words in creation, and learn as it declares the glory of God.

Kim and I planted several wildflower seeds this Spring and it seemed to take forever…the Cosmos came first and I kept watching the Zenas…one had a bud, the bud finally flowered, and now all of them are starting to follow its lead. What we are going to be takes time to develop. I am reading Sinclair Ferguson’s book Union With Christ with a group of men. In his chapter on Colossians 3:1-17 he said,

“When this Christ (the One described in Col 1:15-20)—as He clearly did for Paul—we realize that our primary focus is not in fact on our union with Him. It is on Jesus Christ Himself.”

It takes discipline to see creation like Annie Dillard or Mary Oliver, it takes discipline to see God in all things and to worship Him, it takes discipline to seek the things above, but I’ve found that the things below…the created things…can help me set my mind on Him.

I often sit and thank Him for the blue and green of the sky and grass, for the red and blue of the cardinal and the bluejay, for the belting song of the little wren, and for His beauty that I see in my wife, my girls, and my grandsons. When I look around I see His pizzazz and it makes me worship Him all the more!

If you have been following me, you know that I love the Psalms and try to read at least five psalms a day. For example, today is the 30th day of the month so I read Psalms 30, 60, 90, 120, and 150. Some of psalms stick out more than the others and typically I follow up my reading with writing out a prayer in my journal, letting the psalms of the day direct that prayer.

Last week, on the morning of the 24th, I read Psalm 84. It is a beautiful passage, but as Scripture often does a verse jumped out at me…I hadn’t noticed it before even as I have read it hundreds of times!

Psalm 84:3 says, “Even the sparrow finds a home, and the swallow a nest for herself…”. I was outside in my back yard and swallows were darting back and forth across the pasture and sparrows were feeding at the bird feeder. I smiled, looked up and watched them for a while and then kept reading, “where she may lay her young, at your altars, O LORD of hosts. Blessed are those who dwell in your house, ever singing your praise!” Selah.

Birds fascinate me…I watch them, feed them, listen to them, and try to learn from them. I’ve even tried to draw and paint them…I’ll keep those results to myself, but that line, “where she may lay her young at your altars O LORD of hosts.” That was the subject of my journal.

What did the Sons of Korah mean?

It could be simply a matter of proximity…the sparrow makes her next and lays her eggs near the altar of God. We know that sparrows are everywhere and that could be what he was saying.

It could be a matter of purpose…the sparrow lays her eggs and raises her young and they are used in the worship at the altar in terms of sacrifice.

But maybe, just maybe, it could be a matter of worship…the sparrow itself joins in the worship of her Creator. We know that God cares for the smallest of creatures…He even knows when the sparrow falls to the ground. (Matt 10:29).

So, my mind ran with this…does the Bible teach us anything about creation worshipping? There is such beauty in what God made, but Paul reminds us that even in that beauty the creation is under the curse of sin and groans for redemption. If it groans for redemption, could it not also sing in praise?

Psalm 19 says, “The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims His handiwork.” So, the heavens, the stars, the planets, all above us declare God’s glory!

Psalm 96:11-12 calls upon the heavens to be glad, the earth to rejoice, the sea and all that is in it to roar, the fields and everything in them to exult, the trees to sing for joy…maybe there is a song of creation that we can’t hear, but God hears!

Isaiah 55:12 speaks of the mountains and the hills breaking forth in singing…something tells me that would be the bass section of the Heavenly Choir…that the trees of the field shall clap their hands to the beat!

What about Psalm 148:7-10? He calls upon the earth, the sea creatures, the deeps, fire and hail, snow and mist, even the stormy winds to join in! the mountains and the hills, the fruit trees and cedars, and then the beasts and the livestock, creeping things and flying birds…in verses 11ff he calls people to join them!

So, maybe the moo of the cow I hear early each morning is a song of praise to the Creator…not to mention the birds and cicadas or the leaves rustling in the wind…could the wind just be joining the trees in their song of praise?

Let me close with Revelation 5:13-14,

“And I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and in the sea, and all that is in them, saying, “To him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb be blessing and honor and glory and might forever and ever!” And the four living creatures said, “Amen!” and the elders fell down and worshiped.”

I know that many will simply say this is all a matter of the writer using personification…giving human characteristics to something non-human, but how boring is that!! Is it unreasonable to think that God has created all of this for His glory and that the trees above are singing a song to Him that we simply don’t have ears to hear?

I sat there and pondered what I had just wrote and thought of some implications.

First, the creation is a part of the Creator’s work; therefore, it isn’t to be worshipped…we just need to join it as we worship our Creator and that little Wren sitting on the limb above me shouldn’t out worship me!

Second, we have a responsibility to see creation as God’s creation and as a gift to us. We must take care of it. We don’t worship it, but neither do we seek to take dominion of it thoughtlessly…we must be caretakers of this great gift.

Finally, let’s learn from it. 1 Kings 4 says Solomon spoke 3,000 proverbs, wrote 1,005 songs, and spoke of trees, beasts, birds, reptiles and fish. He studied God’s creation…can we?

Kidner spoke of Psalm 84 and said, “Longing is written all over this psalm.” Sitting there reading it last week caused a longing to stir within me for the New Creation. I sat there as I do most mornings watching the sun rise, hearing the birds sing, and I softly joined in with the song that was on my heart…He is coming again and all things will be new!

What does the Bible teach about love? There are many things I could say in answer to that question but let me suggest a few things.

First, God is love. That isn’t all that He is, but He is always that.

Second, love is the essence of what God requires. Jesus said the greatest commandment is that we love God and the second is that we love our neighbor. He also said,

“A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you always are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.’” (John 13:34-35)

Third, the order of the first two isn’t arbitrary. God is love and we are to love, but remember this, “We love because He first loved us.”

God is love, we are to love God and love our neighbor and even our enemy, and we can only love God, our neighbor and our enemy because God first loved us. And to top it all off, Jesus said, “By this,” by love, “all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”

John has much to say about love in his letter we know of as 1 John. We are not to love the world, but we are to love God, our brothers and sisters for “love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love.”

Tina Turner sang, “What’s love got to do with it?” The answer is everything! I sometimes wonder if the Church understands this. Do we see the importance of not only loving God, but loving our brothers and sisters? Do we see the importance of showing love even to those with whom we disagree.

It breaks my heart that some who claim Jesus as Lord make excuses about loving someone who votes differently, looks different, or believes differently. Love does not demand that we forget theology, forget truth, and just sing “Kumbaya”, but it does demand that we treat each other with decency, that we can agree to disagree on some things, and that we can look out for the good of one another’s soul.

I found what I would have thought to be an unlikely understanding of love from a Muslim Poet named Rumi, but the more I read him the more I realize he has a better understanding of love than many who claim to be followers of Jesus. That isn’t an endorsement of Sufi Mysticism…it is an inditement on the Church! He said,

“Unless Love dyes you in its colors,

you’re driftwood in God’s eye.

You’re stone.”

This week we looked at the prayer of Paul and compared it to a ladder—we started praying for the power in our inner being, we moved to asking for Christ to be at home in our lives, and then that we would be able to comprehend the love the Father has for us, and finally we reached the height of the prayer—that we would be filled with the fullness of God.

Robinson said, “No prayer that has ever been framed has uttered a bolder request,” but did Paul go over the top? Did he ask for more than we can think possible? Can we actually have the power in our inner being? Can we actually hope for God to dwell in our hearts through faith? Can we really comprehend the love of the Father? Can we actually be filled with the fullness of God? Our text this morning shouts a big YES to all of those questions!

The truth is we have another ladder of sorts—it is a doxology—a glory statement that progresses. Look at it—

Now unto Him,

now unto Him who is able,

now unto Him who is able to do,

now unto Him who is able to do far more abundantly,

now unto Him who is able to do far more abundantly than all we ask,

now unto Him who is able to do far more abundantly than all we ask or think,

now unto Him who is able to do far more abundantly than all we ask or think according to the power at work within us!

To Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations forever and ever. Amen!

There are so many ways we could go, but I want to walk though this and encourage you within the context of Paul’s prayer to understand that there is no limit to what God can do and our prayers are probably never big enough…when you consider what Paul is asking for in verses 14-19 and when you consider what Paul says in 20-21—we should be encouraged to come to God with things that are impossible for us but possible for Him. I want to share several things about prayer this morning.

First, don’t be guilty of not having because you are not asking God!

Second, don’t be guilty of not having because you doubt the ability of God!

Third, don’t be guilty of not having because you doubt God’s ability to work in you!

Finally, don’t be guilty of not having because you focus all your prayers upon yourself!

John Newton, the author of the great hymn Amazing Grace, believed in large asking. He would often site a legendary story of a man who asked Alexander the Great to give him a huge sum of money in exchange for his daughter’s hand in marriage. He told the man to make his request to the treasurer and when he did the amount was so large that the treasure went to Alexander the Great to make sure.

Legend says Alexander said, “Let him have it all. I like that fellow. He does me honor. He treats me like a king and proves by what he asks that he believes me to be both rich and generous.”

One of Newton’s hymns has these words, “Thou art coming to a King, large petitions with thee bring; for his grace and power are such, none can ever ask too much.” Never forget that God is sovereign and knows what to give and what to withhold, but never forget that He is your Abba Father and you can come to Him with anything—He is able you know!

As we’ve studied Paul’s prayer in Ephesians 3 this week we’ve borrowed an analogy from John Stott…he saw prayer as climbing a ladder to God. The first rung was power, the second was residence, and the third was knowledge. Finally, we come to the fourth rung of the ladder and on it we find fullness. This is the highest and most audacious rung,

“that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.”

Wow! Not just filled, but filled with the fullness of God. The word speaks of something that is full to the point of overflowing—it speaks of dominance. When you are full of something you’ll be dominated by it. To be full of God is to be emptied of self and to be dominated with love for Him and that is shown in our obedience. Pray for God to fill you, but not just fill you—to fill you with very fullness of what fills Him! Here we find Paul with an eye toward the end of days when we will be with Him forever.

MacArthur tells the story of J Wilbur Chapman who said he got off the Pennsylvania depot as a beggar. He said for a year I begged on the streets for a living. One day he touched a man and said, “Hey mister, can you give me a dime?” When the man turned around it was his father. He said, “Father, Father, do you know me?” Throwing his arms around his son he said, “Son, at last I’ve found you! I’ve found you. You want a dime? Everything I have is yours.” He was a beggar looking for a dime from his own father when for 18 years his father had been looking to give him all he had!

Don’t settle for anything short of the fullness of God! Start by praying that you’ll have the power in your inner man, then ask him to take up residence in you—invite him to remove what isn’t pleasing to Him so He will be at home, and then ask Him to help you comprehend just how much He loves you and then you’ll be ready to ask Him to fill you with His fullness. Pray this for yourself, for your children, for your parents, and for anyone else…

John Stott compared the prayer of Paul in Ephesians 3 to climbing a ladder…we’ve looked at the rungs of power and intimacy or residence, but today we come to the third rung. On the third rung of the ladder we find comprehension. Look at the end of verse 17 and go to 18,

“That you being rooted and grounded in love may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge…”

Paul is praying that they will comprehend God’s great love for them. Not just that they will love God, but that they will know just how much God loves them.

He wants them rooted and grounded—here we find agricultural and architectural terms—rooted—the roots of our life deep in the soil of God’s love and grounded—the building of our life firm on the foundation of God’s love. How do we get there? Focus on the extent of God’s love—how wide is it? It is wide enough to encompass all mankind. Anyone who will call upon Him will be saved. Ephesians 1 says it is so wide that it goes back to Eternity Past…before the world began. How long is it? It is long enough to last for an eternity…picture it going from eternity past to eternity future…no beginning point and no ending point. How deep is the love of God? It is deep enough to reach down to the most depraved of sinners (Eph 2:1ff)—to reach down to those of us who were or are dead in our sin. How high is it? It is high enough to exalt itself all the way into Heaven…Paul says we are blessed with every heavenly blessing and that our security is stored there with Him!

The love of Christ is best seen on the Cross. Go to the cross and meditate upon it, reflect upon it, and know just how much God loves you. The early church fathers said the description of Paul points us to the cross—the height and depth represented by the vertical bar of the cross and the width and length represented by the horizontal beam. Pray that others will comprehend just how much God loves them.

Verse 19, “And to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge.” How can we know something that surpasses knowledge? Just because you can’t surpass something doesn’t mean you can’t know something about it. We will never get to the bottom of the knowledge of God’s love, but we can know as much as we want to know! We are to know it, but the word speaks of experiential knowledge. It’s like the man asking Armstrong to explain Jazz, He said, “Man if you have to ask what Jazz is you’ll never know.” It’s like love—you can’t explain how you know you are in love, but when you experience God’s love you know what it is. That’s Paul’s prayer—that they would know the love of Christ—that they would comprehend it.

In Paul’s prayer we find what Stott referred to as climbing a ladder of prayer. The first rung was power, but let’s go to the second rung today…residence. In Ephesians 3:17 Paul says, “so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith…”

There is no doubt that the Bible teaches that the Holy Spirit indwells us the moment we are saved, but the word Paul uses for dwell gives us a clue as to what he is talking about. One Greek word for dwell speaks of dwelling somewhere as a stranger—we find it in 2:19, “so then you are no longer strangers or aliens…” The other Greek word, the one Paul uses in our text speaks of taking up residence, of being at home, of something permanent and not temporary.

Through faith Paul wants to see Jesus at home in our lives. Is He at home in your life? Do you remember the pamphlet that was out where Jesus moved into someone’s house and He began to clean out the house room by room? Look at the places in your life—what you watch, what your read, what you listen to, who you hang out with, where you go, etc.…is Jesus at home there or is He a stranger in your life? That seems to be a strange question, but if you are calling Jesus your Lord and yet living like the world He isn’t at home in your life and you are not at home in Him. Power and residence—pray for yourself and for others along these two lines, but don’t stop there.

There is nothing quite like being home! I often judge a good weekend by how close I stayed to my back yard! I love to travel, but I love being home even more and there is nothing like the feeling, the hope, the knowledge of God being at home in me as I grow accustomed to being at home in Him!

Yesterday we started looking at Eph 3:14-21. Now, let’s get down to the subject of his prayer…Stott compared Paul’s prayer to climbing a staircase with each step taking us higher and closer to God. I like that idea, but let’s look at it in terms of climbing a ladder in the school of prayer. You can take these subjects and pray for yourself or for anyone—those who are lost, those who are prodigals, and those who are walking in the Spirit. Notice the word, “that,” and you’ll find the topics of prayer.

On the first rung we find power.

“That according to the riches of His glory He may grant you to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in your inner being.”

Power is a common theme in Ephesians—we find the Greek words for power, strength, and ability in this letter and in these verses, we find all three. Paul is praying that God, through His Spirit, will strengthen you mightily with His power.

Notice two things about this power—first the measure of it—“according to the riches of His glory.” It isn’t that Paul is asking God to strengthen them out of God’s riches of glory—it is that he is asking Him to do it according to the riches of His glory. That’s two totally different things—in the past I’ve used the analogy of Elon Musk giving according to his riches or out of his riches. Would you want a gift out of the riches of a trillionaire or according to his riches? God gives according to the riches of His grace.

But notice not only the measure of it, but the location of the strengthening—“in your inner being.” We spend so much time on the outer being which passes away, but the inner being is who we are in Christ, and we strengthen that as we feed it. We find the inner man mentioned again in verse 17 when Paul says, “in your hearts.” How much time do you spend feeding your inner being? At the end of 2 Corinthians 4 Paul says, “So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.”

Feed your inner man—the soul—with time in the Word, time in prayer, time in worship, and through obedience. The divine nature is imparted to us when we are saved—we are brought to life from the death of sin and we must now realize the need to be strengthen with God’s power in the inner man. That’s the secret to our growth as children of God. Feed it and you’ll find yourself seeking God’s will and God will in turn give you the strength to follow Him. Pray that God will give you the power to do it and pray that He will give the power to others.

I was reading an article not long ago by a former Buddhist monk. I’ll have to admit that isn’t normally within my reading habit, but what he said captivated me. I often speak out about the danger of the smart phone, what it is doing to our minds, but the writer spoke of the number of times we choose notifications over presence.

How many times have I sat with my beautiful wife across the table and found it hard to focus because I’m more worried about the score of a game or some strangers response to my social media post? I chose notification over presence and that choice doesn’t come without consequence.

Let’s be honest, this isn’t just a problem for adolescents or teens. I often sit in doctor’s waiting rooms with my dad and watch senior adults doing the doomscroll. I’ve spent time with grown men who just can’t seem to go a minute without picking up their phone. When I make the conscious choice to leave my phone in the car, I often feel like an alien on another planet!

I remember taking my youngest daughter out to dinner and watching a couple come in with what I would guess to be their granddaughter. She was young, but content with the colors and paper the restaurant brought to the table. I just glanced over and smiled remembering the time that the young lady across the table from me was doing that very thing, but then the grandmother did the most remarkable and disturbing thing…she took the paper and crayons away and gave the child her i-phone with videos cued up. She sat glued to the phone the rest of the time. The child didn’t ask for the phone, she wasn’t restless, she was enjoying a moment of creativity and that was stolen by a mindless video.

The grandmother chose entertainment over creativity. She lost the moment to engage and create and chose the easy means of wasted time. The moment was right there in front of her…as it is right in front of us.

A few weeks ago, I woke up, checked my phone to see what time it was and instead of putting it down, I scrolled. Not for long, but long enough. I got and went outside to read my Bible and spend time with the Lord and I just couldn’t focus. My brain was in a fog. I started a mental checklist…did I go to bed early, did I sleep well, did I…and I realized the only difference was I started with a scroll instead of time in the Word. It made a difference in my ability to focus and absorb.

I chose notifications and lost a sense of presence. How many times do we let screens rob us or what is right in front of us? This morning I was reading one of the Psalms and I heard a Carolina Wren singing and it seemed like she was right there…I looked up to the power line where she often sits and she wasn’t there, I looked over to the tree where she often hides and she wasn’t in an obvious place, and then I saw her fly by…she was sitting on a chair right across from me…she does that sometimes, but I missed it. How many times have I missed the manifest presence of God simply because I’m choosing the world’s notifications?

Here is the problem, we don’t live in the present. We are always looking for something that is coming, something that will be better. The monk said, we wait for the promotion to feel successful, the vacation to feel relaxed, the weekend to feel alive, but “life isn’t happening in those future moments, it is happening right now!”

I don’t know about you, but that stings me. I have a tendency to “keep treating right now as a waiting room for something better.” I’m “anxious about tomorrow” when “tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.” (Jesus!)

Jesus said that in the context of worry, but could I put it into the context of presence? Don’t waste this moment, live in the moment you are given. Don’t ignore eternity, live in the now with eternity in mind, but realize this moment is a part of eternity…make the most of it!

Every moment doesn’t have to be extraordinary…throwing the ball with my grandson, watching a hummingbird feed, enjoying a sunset or a flower in bloom…ordinary moments that are simply extraordinary. If every moment is lived in my waiting room looking for something better, I will miss the best moment and one day look back and have a past full of regrets.

So, put down the phone, turn off the notifications, cancel some social media accounts, and learn to live in the glorious moment of right now!

Let’s change it up this week and move from the Psalms and turn to Ephesians 3:14-21 and study one of my favorite prayers of Paul. Let me start with an observation, I’ve never met a child of God that seems truly satisfied with their prayer life. Even those who spend great amounts of time in prayer never seem to feel as if they have their prayer life together.

Over the years I’ve bought and read more books on prayer than probably any other topic, but I’ve found that I learn more from Paul in the school of prayer than from anyone else. This morning we come to the second prayer of Paul in this great letter and in this prayer we much to help us in our own prayer life.

Notice, for the second time in this chapter we find the words, “For this reason.” Paul spoke of the people of God—Jews and Gentiles—as the Kingdom, the Family, and the Temple of God at the end of chapter 2. He was about to go straight into this prayer, look at 3:1, “For this reason,” but the Spirit led him to speak more about the mystery of the gospel as it was revealed to Paul, but now he comes back to his prayer.

In verses 14 and 15 we find these words,

“For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named.”

Notice the posture of prayer mentioned here—“I bow my knees.” The most common way for a Jewish man of Paul’s day to pray was to pray standing, but here Paul says he bows his knees. This isn’t a prescription for all prayer, but it is a hint to the attitude of prayer—we don’t always have to kneel to pray, but we must always come in humility and in submission to the King of kings.

Notice also the One to whom he prays—“before the Father from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named—a family is any group with a common ancestor—I really think Paul is simply saying God is the creator of all…every one in Heaven and on earth comes from Him. He bows his knees, and he prays to his Father who is in Heaven—the Creator and Lord of all. We come humbly, but as we saw last week we come boldly because He has granted us access and we come with confidence because He is our Father.

I’ll pick up here tomorrow, but if you are enjoying these please consider subscribing so that the email comes directly to you and maybe hit the share button!

I have been reading the Five Psalms a Day for so long that I often wake up thinking about which Psalm I’ll get to read on that day…for example, on the 8th day I open my Bible knowing that I get to pray with David, “O, LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth.”

Today is one of those days…I look forward to opening with Psalm 19 and ending with Psalm 139…what incredible words, what incredible poetry. This morning I was thinking about David’s words in the opening verse of Psalm 19 and was just amazed at his poetic abilities.

Then I got to thinking that if David was indeed inspired by Holy Spirit then the greatest Poet in existence is certainly the Holy Spirit! I love passages like psalm 19 and Psalm 139, but what about Psalms like 109?

Christopher Ash said, “Psalm 109 feels like praying… ‘Dear God, my loving heavenly Father, I want to pray about so-and-so, who is causing me problems at work. Please may he/she die soon. May his/her children become wandering beggars. May no one take pity on them. Please do that for me. Thank you, loving heavenly Father. In Jesus’ name, Amen.’”

What do we do with psalms like this? I mean, aren’t we supposed to love our neighbor, love our enemy, and turn the other cheek?

Psalm 109 opens with a description of David’s crisis (1-5), turns to praying against David’s enemies (6-20), David praying for himself (21-29), and ends with David’s praise (30-31).

So, the Psalm opens and close with praise…somehow we are supposed to find a truth here…something in verses 2-29 that will drive us to praise God.

I never really understood what we call the “imprecatory psalms” which are prayers in the Bible’s Book of Psalms that call down God’s judgment, calamity, or wrath upon enemies until I watched a video of militant Muslims taking a group of Christians and beheading them. I didn’t/couldn’t watch the entire video, but I saw enough to understand how the psalmist could call down wrath. But even now, I struggle with such prayers in light of the actions of Jesus.

David opens with,

“Be not silent, O God of my praise! For wicked and deceitful mouths are opened against me, speaking against me with lying tongues. They encircle me with words of hate, and attack me without cause. In return for my love they accuse me, but I give myself to prayer. So they reward me evil for good, and hatred for my love.”

Notice he says they are wicked, deceitful, liars, hateful, they accuse him falsely, and reward evil for good and hatred for love. I love what David says in verse 4, “But I give myself to prayer.” There is a lesson here for us…when we find ourselves in a crisis, when others are spreading lies and rumors, the first place we should run is God’s Throne.

Ash said, “Note that Psalm 109:6-20 is not a curse but a prayer.” David is presenting his case before God and asking God to move on his behalf. Verse six says, “Appoint a wicked man against him; let an accuser stand at his right hand.” If I had to go to court I’d want a lawyer on my side who wouldn’t mind gong after the accuser…that seems to be what David is asking for.

David isn’t calling down a curse, but he is praying to God about his enemies and asking God to move. He is leaving the outcome to God.

We must trust God, but we must also pray for repentance.Jesus paid for sin on the cross, he took the judgment, and even while hanging on the cross He prayed for forgiveness of those who were crucifying Him.Bring your “issues” to God, let God determine the outcome, and trust Him.Trust Him to do what is right even when you can’t see the “right” in His decision, and give yourself to prayer and seek to forgive as He has forgiven you

Psalm 135 gives us a call to praise and then six reasons to praise and the Psalm closes with a Repeated Reminder to Praise,

“O house of Israel, bless the LORD! O house of Aaron, bless the LORD! O house of Levi, bless the LORD! You who fear the LORD, bless the LORD! Bless the LORD from Zion, he who dwells in Jerusalem! Praise the LORD!”

It ends as it begins—Praise the LORD.

He calls upon Israel, He calls upon the priests and the Levites, he calls upon the nations…all should praise the LORD!

Praise Him for He can see,

He can speak, He can hear,

He can save,

He is living, He is loving,

and He is good.

Praise Him and don’t rest until everyone joins you!

William Temple said, “To worship is to quicken the conscience by the holiness of God, to feed the mind with the truth of God, to purge the imagination by the beauty of God, to open the heart to the love of God, to devote the will to the purpose of God.”

I love that quote…focus on the holiness of God as He has revealed Himself in the pages of Scripture, feed the mind with that truth, let the picture of God in the Word purge your mind so that you think thoughts that please Him, and open up to the goodness and love of God and praise Him.

Let me close with these suggestions:

Praise Him more fervently than you praise anything or anyone else,

Praise Him continually—make it as natural as breathing,

Praise him publicly—don’t be ashamed,

Praise Him privately—it really does start there,

And praise Him now because if you are His child you’ll do it eternally…shouldn’t we get a head start?

Praise Him

Yesterday we starting looking at Psalm 135:3-18 and the reasons to praise God. The Psalmist gives us six reasons…we saw three of them yesterday—He is good, He loves, and He is sovereign. Let’s look at the next three today.

Praise Him because He is our Savior. In verses 8-12, the psalmist takes us from Egypt to the Promised Land. Verse 4 took us back to God’s choosing of Jacob—Jacob’s 12 sons made up the Tribes of Israel. They would eventually go to Egypt where God had already sent Joseph to rescue them. 400 years later God used Moses to lead them out of Egypt, that’s verses 8-9, then in verses 10-11 we have God moving in them to strike down and judge the pagan nations, and in verse 12 we find God bringing them to the land He promised Abraham. God saved them and provided for them and that is worthy of praise.

God took Abram by the hand and called him, Abram obeyed, and God gave him a son by the name of Isaac. Isaac had twins sons—Esau and Jacob—God chose Jacob and through him God provided the 12 Tribes…the land God promised was delivered…God saved His people.

God saves us…He is good, He is loving, He is sovereign in our lives, and He redeems us…that is worthy of our praise! Many of these same examples are repeated in Psalm 136 and every single verse repeats this line, “for His steadfast love endures forever.”

Verses 13-14 tell us to praise Him because He endures forever, “Your name, O LORD, endures forever, your renown, O LORD, throughout all the ages. For the LORD will vindicate His people and have compassion on His servants.” The God of the OT is the God of the NT. The promise keeping God is still keeping promises. The God who watches over His people watches over us. The story of Israel is our story…it is the churches story…that’s our eternal and enduring God. Praise Him for He endures forever, and He vindicates and has compassion!

Finally, praise Him because of the impact it has on you. That might surprise you, but look at verses 15-18, “The idols of the nations are silver and gold, the work of human hands. They have mouths but do not speak; they have eyes but do not see; they have ears, but do not hear, nor is there any breath in them.” Spurgeon told the story of John Thomas, a missionary to India. He noticed a large group of people gathered at the door of a temple, and as soon as the doors opened they piled in and he joined them. An idol was set before the people and Thomas went to the front and raised his hands for silence.

He touched the eyes and said, ‘It has eyes, but cannot see!”

then the ears, ‘It has ears, but cannot hear,’

‘It has a nose, but it cannot smell,’

‘it has hands, but it cannot handle,’

‘it has a mouth but cannot speak, neither is there any breath in it.’

At the moment he fully expected to be rushed upon and killed an old Brahmin was convicted and said, “It has feet, but cannot run away.” The entire crowd felt shame and left the temple.

Our idols seem a little more sophisticated don’t they…they come in the form of bank accounts, homes, cars, teams, sports, hobbies, and people…but none of it will lead us to praise the God of this psalm. The impact of our worship is found in verse 18, “Those who make them become like them, so do all who trust in them.” You and I will become like that which we worship. If too much time around a person changes you for the worse, too much time around an event…you have an idol on your hands. Worship God! Be like Him!

I love the scene in Lord of the Rings when King Aragorn honors Frodo and Samwise after the defeat of the dark lord with the rallying cry: "Praise them with great praise!" Surely they deserved great praise, but have you considered just how great our praise should be toward our Father.

I often rise before the sun comes up, but I love the moment when the light begins to appear and the feathered chorus strikes up the note and they sing…they sing praises to their Creator…how much more should we!

Yesterday we turned to Psalm 135 and saw the call to praise the Lord, but in verses 3-18 we are given the reason to praise the LORD. He gives us six reasons. Verse 3, “Praise the LORD, for the LORD is good; sing to His name, for it is pleasant!” Notice the little word “for.” It gives us the first reason and in it helps us throughout this section. We praise God because He is good.

In the Garden, Satan came to Adam and Eve and tempted them along these very lines…you won’t surely die, God knows that if you eat of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, you’ll be just like Him. He is holding out on you, He is trying to keep you down, He isn’t being good to you…we’ve swallowed that line ever since.

The beginning of praise is to know the goodness of God. God is good…all the time; all the time…God is good. We don’t always see the goodness of every action…we are not omniscient, we don’t see the eternal ramifications of what He is doing, but we must start here…praise God from whom all blessings flow. Every good and perfect gift you have is from above…praise God because He is good.

Notice, it is pleasant when you do this. It is pleasant to praise God…if you are walking without joy or happiness…start by praising Him and reminding yourself of His goodness and the good things He has done.

Second, we praise God because He first loved you. That’s what John says in 1 John 4:19, “We love God because He first loved us.” In verse 4, “For the LORD has chosen Jacob for himself, Israel as His own possession.” Paul uses this same logic in Romans…why Jacob? God chose Jacob over his brother Esau while they were still in the womb…before they had done anything good or bad. They had the same parents—it wasn’t like Ishmael and Isaac. Jacob was the younger of the two—the older was supposed to be the chosen son. Why Jacob? It is the mystery of God…but Deuteronomy 7:6-8 takes up the idea of God choosing the entire nation…,

“For you are a people holy to the Lord your God. The Lord your God has chosen you to be a people for his treasured possession, out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth. It was not because you were more in number than any other people that the Lord set his love on you and chose you, for you were the fewest of all peoples, but it is because the Lord loves you and is keeping the oath that he swore to your fathers, that the Lord has brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.”

God’s choice was a choice of love and grace and it is left within the mystery of His own decisions but make no mistake just as God chose them—the NT says He chose you and that is a humbling thing of which should constantly be a matter of praise from your lips. Praise Him for He is good. Praise Him for He first loved you. That leads to the third reason to praise Him.

Third, praise Him for He is sovereign. Look at verses 5-7, “For I know that the LORD is great, and that our LORD is above all gods. Whatever the LORD pleases, He does, in heaven and on earth, in the seas and all deeps. He it is who makes the clouds rise at the end of the earth, who makes lightnings for the rain and brings forth the wind from His storehouses.” Simply put…the fact that God is sovereign means He is on the Thone and He is in charge. That is a matter worthy of our praise…especially when we consider that this comes after the first two.

Imagine a God fully sovereign who isn’t good. Imagine a God fully sovereign who doesn’t love. But imagine a good and loving God on the Throne moving this world toward His own purposes. Look no further than the exercise of His providence as he moved from man’s first sin to the cross and ultimately to the New Heaven and the New Earth. His sovereignty is a reason for great praise…He is the King, we are in His kingdom, and His kingdom is advancing.

We will pick up with the next three reasons tomorrow, but spend some time praising Him for His goodness, His love, and His sovereignty!

The last of the five Psalms I read this morning was 135…let’s spend the week seeing what we can learn. Calvin said, “The World is a theatre for the display of the divine…and the Church is the orchestra!” I love that thought…God created this world to display His glory and the center point of His creation was man and woman…we were created to bear His image, to worship Him, to show His glory in our actions, to praise His glory in our words, and to sing of His glory and to love Him with all that we have, but we fell and we constantly need to be reminded to praise the LORD!

That’s what we find here in verses 1-2, The Reminder to Praise. What a shame that we have to be reminded. Plummer said, “It is a sad fact and affords proof of a very fearful alienation from God that inspired men call upon us so often to do this work, to which we are criminally indisposed. Surely the holy creatures in heaven require no such perpetual call this this work.” And yet we must be constantly reminded to “praise the LORD.”

Three times in these verses the psalmist says, “Praise the LORD! Praise the name of the LORD, give praise,” the three-time repeated word is the root of the word hallelujah, but it what does that mean. Ultimately, the idea of praising God is to boast in God, to brag on God, to make much of Him. What is the central focus of your boasting?

I often beat this drum, but what do your social media pages reveal with regard to your boasting? What does your money trail reveal? What does your thought life reveal? What makes you jealous? What makes you envious? What really gets under your skin?

Is God the center of your praise? Is He the center of your decisions, your thoughts, your love, your life? That’s the call we find here in our psalm and it will be repeated over and over again throughout the rest of the book…praise the LORD…give praise to Him. We praise Him…we boast of who He is, and we boast of what He has done. We boast of what He is doing, and we boast of what He has promised to do. That’s the reminder…praise the LORD.

Let’s pick up with the next verse tomorrow. If you’d like a direct email with the blog…hit the subscribe button and if you like it…hit share!

Let’s go back to Psalm 8:5-8 where we find God’s Image.

“Yet you have made him a little lower than the heavenly beings and crowned him with glory and honor.”

Here we find God given dignity…not man earned, or man supplied dignity, but God given dignity. It is beyond what we might expect…the word for “heavenly beings” is actually Elohim…David says, “Yet you have made him a little lower than God.” He looks up to God’s glory in verses 1-2, then he looks to God’s creation and back to the Fall in verses 3-4, but here he will take us beyond the Fall and back to Genesis 1 where God created us in His image.

Our dignity is wrapped up in this—we were created as image bearers of God…we were created in His image. God has given man a dignity that is second only to His own glory.

Angels are ministering spirits with no earthly bodies,

animals have bodies but no spirit,

but man has both spirit and body. We are the crown jewel of God’s creation—the apex of all that He made—look at what David said, “and crowned him with glory and honor.” These are words used of God and yet God shares that with us.

Now you must see Jesus here…in Hebrews 2:6-8 the writer quotes Psalm 8:4-6 and applies it to Jesus and then says at the end of verse 8 and verse 9, “At present, we do not see everything in subjection to Him. But we see Him who for a little while was made lower than the angels, namely Jesus, crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death, so that by the grace of God He might taste death for everyone.” These verses in our Psalm apply to us before the Fall, but they are fulfilled in Jesus in the Incarnation.

Plummer said, “There is no greater gulf than that which separates the created and the uncreated, the finite and the infinite, man and God,” but this verse shows us how fallen man is restored—Jesus suffered in our place so we could be declared righteous. That’s the dignity we were given but notice verses 6-8 and you’ll also see God given dominion. We should never worship the creation—the Creator gave us dominion over it.

We looked at the God given dominion yesterday, but I wanted to come back to this because I am convinced we will never be caretakers of this earth if we do not see the dignity in which we were made.

There are those who seem to worship the earth. I’m not sure the Church has adequately been as active in caring for the environment as we should be…in fact I am quite sure we have not and when I saw we I include me! The difference I think in caring for the world God has given us and in many environmentalists today is that they are striving for what is going to come only after Jesus returns…a New Heaven and a New Earth is coming, but until that day we should care for those made in God’s image, but also for the Creation which yearns with us for the Creator’s redemption.