Praise the Lord

Sermon - Richard Bristol (Psalm 150)

Worship Services - Church Life - Jake Boyd

Transcript

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SPEAKER_01 0:03

Okay, everybody for three? Any button? Everybody's doing good merely.

SPEAKER_02 0:16

That has improved, but she's having issues walking in there trying to get her in replay, but it's a deal with the insurance cut thing with the bubbles with mail, so just playing like that simple shouldn't get the replay.

SPEAKER_03 0:37

Yep, uh he's always had some cancer in the past, Lee's had some tests come back, some abnormal, but he doesn't want to do anything with it, so he's pretty crazy.

SPEAKER_01 0:55

Yeah, I had some blood work done last work last week. One of mine came back abnormal. I thought it was a doctor just poking fun at me, but I gotta call in next week. Anybody else? All right, everybody's doing good, very good. Um also uh, well, let's go ahead and while we're at it, do the Thanksgiving prayer. Anyone got anything they're thankful for that they want to share with us? Other than the fact that we're all pretty and happy and able to be here today. I'm thankful for each and every one of you. I'm thankful for this rain, and I'm thankful that hopefully it's gonna be dry all week, and I get to lay out of prison for a whole week. Just to put that out there. So okay. If there's nothing else, let's bow our heads. Father God, again, we come to you with our cares and with our praises. We come to you with uh sometimes heavy hearts, Father, because we do have people in our lives that we care so deeply about. And even in our own lives, Father, there's there's times whenever there's questions that we don't have answers to, and there's there's times that uh quite frankly, I mean, we can be scared at times, but uh when we don't know. Uh but we do know that you are God most high, and that you care for each and every one of us very deeply. And we just pray that you would be with uh Doris, um, who was mentioned this morning, Marilyn's friend, who certainly needs your presence in her life, um, just working out some situations there to ease in her recovery. Also, Susan's father, we just ask that you please be with him. And um as the days and weeks go on, just give him a clean report of health, we pray, and just uh continue to be with us as a church. We pray that uh you would just bless each and every one of us this week and give us strength and and just give us the things that we need to glorify and honor you. Again, we thank you so very much, Father, for this opportunity. And we pray that you be with us and that you would bless us. And it's in Jesus' name that we pray. Amen. Okay. Susan is hopefully gonna come read us a scripture.

SPEAKER_03 3:42

I'm gonna read Psalms sixty-two, verse one and two. Truly, my soul silently waits for God. From him comes my salvation. He only is my rock and my salvation. He is my defense. I shall not be greedly moved. I think Jake the Churchill.

SPEAKER_00 4:13

So I'm doing this one. I'm not gonna do any activities this time. Um, but uh I done this on uh the golden rule. Um golden rule is not how they treat us, but how we treat them. Uh it's something that we all learn at an early age. I remember Miss Bailey's class in second grade. She had it there, and we went over often um teaching little kids how to act. Um it's called the golden rule. Doing to others as you'd have them doing to you. It's a simple idea. Treat people the way you want to be treated. Be kind because you want to be people to be kind to you. Be honest because you want people to be honest with you. Help others because you'd want someone to help you. Show compassion because you'd want compassion shown to you. I learned learned that lesson when I was a little kid, but the older I get, the more I realize something. The golden rule is easy to learn, easy to remember, and easy to say, but it can be incredibly hard to live. Because our natural tendency often is to react instead of to do what we were told to by Christ and what he's called us to do. We think they hurt us, so we hurt them back. They disrespect us, so we disrespect them. They ignore us, so we ignore them. They talk about us, so we talk about them. They make our lives difficult, so we decide we're gonna make their lives difficult. As we say to ourselves, well, they started it. But Jesus didn't say do unto others as they do unto you. Jesus said, Whatever you want men to do unto you, do also unto them. That's Matthew 7, 12. And I think there's a huge difference between the two ideas. The world says give them what they give you. We live in a world that often teaches us to keep the score. If someone insults you, insult them back. If someone gets ahead of you, get ahead of them. If someone doesn't respect you, don't just don't respect them. If someone treats you badly, you have every right to treat them badly. We see this everywhere. We see it in arguments between neighbors, we see it in marriages, we see it between parents and children, we see it at work, we see it on social media everywhere. Someone makes a rude comment, someone else responds with an even ruder comment. Then another person jumps in, and then soon you don't know where the while the argument started, and everybody's just arguing, and it's nothing but hate. Everyone is just trying to win. But as Christians, we are called to live differently. The Christian life isn't about asking how do they treat me. The Christian life asks, how would Jesus want me to treat them? There are completely that's a completely different question. Jesus gave us the perfect example. One of the greatest examples of this is Jesus Himself. Think about how Jesus lived his life. Jesus didn't come to earth to be served, he came to serve. In Mark 10, 45, Jesus said, For even so even the Son of Man came not to be ministered unto you, but to minister and to give his life a ransom for me. Think about that. The Son of God, the King of Kings, chooses to serve others. He washed his disciples' feet, he fed the hungry people, he stopped for people who others ignored, he touched people who others wouldn't touch. He spent time with people, society pushed aside, and he did it without asking. What can they do for me? He simply saw and he met it. The part of the golden rule If we were hungry, I would want somebody to feed me. If I were struggling, I'd want someone to help me. If I were lonely, I'd want someone to sit with me. If I were hurting, I'd want someone to care. So if someone else is in that position, why shouldn't I do the same for them? Sometimes living the golden rule is as simple as asking, What would I want someone to do for me if I were in their shoes? And then doing it. The good Samaritan seeing someone in need. Jesus told the story of the good Samaritan in Luke 10. A man was traveling down the road when he's attacked, beaten, robbed, and left for dead. Several people passed him. They saw him, but they didn't stop. Then a Samaritan came along, and this is important because Samaritans and Jews had a history of hostility between them. This wasn't necessarily someone who had would have been expected to help, but the Samaritan saw I heard in person. He didn't ask, is this my friend? He didn't ask, would he help me if I was in trouble? He didn't ask, does he deserve my help? He simply saw someone who was hurting and had compassion. He stalked, he helped, he banaged his wounds, he took him somewhere safe, he paid for his care. The Samaritan put himself in that man's shoes, and that's empathy. Empathy is being able to look at another person's life and say, What if that were me? What if I were the one who needed help? What if I were the one who is showing? What if I were the one who needs someone to give me another chance? The golden rule asks us to put ourselves in someone else's shoes. Because sometimes the person who's who is hardest to love is the person who needs love the most. Gold rule means we don't rush to judge. Another area where the golden rule challenges us is how we judge other people. It's easy to look at someone else's life and make a quick judgment. We see someone who doesn't look at us, we see someone who makes different choices, we see someone who's struggling, we see someone who has made mistakes, and sometimes without knowing their story, we decide we know exactly who they are. But Jesus warned us about this in Matthew 7 when he said, Judge not that ye be not judged. Now that doesn't mean Christians should never recognize a rightful wrong. The Bible clearly teaches us to have wisdom and discernment. But there's a difference between discernment and condemnation. We can recognize that something is wrong without believing that someone is beyond God's grace. We can disagree with someone without treating them like they are worth us. We can correct someone without humiliating them. We can hold to our convictions while we still shape in passion. Because here's the thing, we all know our own intentions, we all know why we made the mistake, we all know what we were doing, going through. We know what was happening in our lives when we failed, but we when we look at someone else, we usually only see the outside. We don't know their whole story, we don't know what happened to them yesterday, we don't know what's carrying them today, we don't know what they're praying about tonight. So before we judge someone else completely, maybe we should ask, if I were in their situation, how would I want to be how do I want someone to treat me? That's the golden rule. Serving some others when there's nothing in it for us. The golden rule also changes the way we think about serves. Sometimes we serve because we were going to get something in return. When someone we help someone because they when they think they'll help us later. We invite someone because we expect on the invitation in return. We give because we expect recognition, but Jesus taught us to serve differently. Think about the story of Jesus washing his disciples' feet. Jesus was their teacher, he was their Lord, and yet he took the position of a servant. He got down on the floor and washed their feet. That was the job normally reserved for the lowest servant in the household. Jesus was showing us the top of something. True greatness isn't about being the first never without serves. True greatness is being willing to serve others. Imagine what would happen if we lived that way every day. Instead of asking, who's gonna help me? We we start asking who can I help? Instead of what am I gonna get out of this, we ask, what can I give? Maybe it's helping a neighbor, maybe it's checking on the elderly church member, maybe it's moaning someone's yard when they're having a hard time, maybe it's buying a meal for someone who's hungry, maybe it's simply sitting down with someone who feels alone. Service doesn't always have to be something big. Sometimes the smallest act of kindness can make the biggest difference in so I'm saying. Forgiveness is a part of the golden rule, but so is grace. Of course, the golden rule also applies when someone hurts us. Forgive forgiveness is important. Jesus taught us to forgive, but I think forgiveness is just a part of the bigger picture. The bigger picture is grace. Grace means we don't always give people exactly what their actions might deserve. Jesus showed us grace, and because we received grace, we're called to show grace. That might mean forgiving someone who hurt us, it might mean giving someone another chance, it might mean choosing not to bring up someone's past mistake every time we see them, it might mean deciding that we're going to let anger control us. But grace also means remember what grace what we need. But grace also means remembering that we need grace too. None of us have lived a perfect life. None of us have always said the right thing. None of us have always treated people exactly the way we should. So when we look at someone else's mistakes, we should remember our own that someone say the same God who's working on them is still working on us. We need to apply this in our homes. I think that's the hardest place to practice golden rule is in our homes, in our marriages, and our families. It's easy to be patient with people at church for an hour on Sunday. It's harder to be patient when we're tired at home. It's easy to smile at a stranger, it's harder to respond kindly when our spouses say something that irritates us. It's easy to tell people we love them, it's harder to show love when we're frustrated. But the golden rule belongs to belongs in our homes too. When we're tired, we can still be kind. When we're frustrated, we can still be respectful. When we disagree, we can still listen. When our children make mistakes over and over and over and over and over again, we can remember the mistakes we made at their age. Uh when our spouses had a bad day, we can remember that someday we're gonna have a bad day too. We should treat people the closest to us the way we hope they treat us in our worst days. Because eventually all of us are gonna have a worse day. And when that day comes, we're gonna need someone who chooses grace over judgment. So um, I learned the golden rule like I said whenever I was a kid, and just it's about empathy, it's about being the person who does the action instead of the reaction. It's about loving and not judging. Um think about stuff before you do it, not in the moment in the heat of it. Uh to me, that's a lot about what Christ did. Christ could see he knew what was gonna happen with everybody, but he treated them the way he wanted to be treated. Even with Judas, he still loved them, even though he knew what was gonna happen. Even when he's denied by Peter, he still loved Peter. So that's just what we're called to do. We're called to act with Golden Rule and not react to what the world tells us to do. Yeah, I see the same. Do you say that?

SPEAKER_01 14:34

Amen, Jake. Now that concludes services figured out. Amen. Um we've got some options here. I don't know what the uh offerings have been looking like lately, so I could sing to you until the basket's full, or y'all can just go over there when you want to and just drop it in there at some point today. I figured y'all'd like option too. Okay. So um, when asked um, what is the greatest commandment in all the scriptures? Jesus responded in Matthew twenty-two and verse thirty-seven, You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. He went on to say later in John chapter 14 and verse 15, If you love me, keep my commandments. So being that the greatest commandment for a believer is to love God, and Jesus tells us that we show our love through our obedience. Today, I want to take a look at a particular command we're given where we're told to praise God. If you want to take your Bible and turn over to Psalm 150, Psalm 150, very short Psalm, very powerful. Psalm 150, beginning in verse 1, we read, Praise the Lord, praise God in his sanctuary, praise him in his mighty firmament, praise him for his mighty acts, praise him according to his excellent greatness, praise him with the sound of the trumpet, and praise him with the lute and harp. Praise him with the timbrel and dance, praise him with stringed instruments and flutes, praise him with loud cymbals, praise him with clashing cymbals. Let everything that has breath praise the Lord. Let's pray. Father God, we do thank you for your word and the opportunity to explore it this morning. We pray that you would open it up to us, Father. Open our hearts and our ears, and let us receive the words that you have for us, and may you be glorified and honored. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. The word praise appears over 200 times in the Bible, with the book of Psalms using the word more than any other book. So with all of the thou shalt and the thou shalt not throughout Scripture, I think it's reasonable to conclude that a great majority of Scripture is directing us to praise our God. Now, I don't know about you, but there have been times in my life where it seemed like my prayer consisted of about one minute's worth of praise and about 15 minutes worth of reciting my wish list to God. Lord, thank you. Everything's good. Oh, you're great. Now, can I get this, this, that, this, this, that. And by the way, I need this done. Does that sound familiar, or is it just, oh, Richard? There's absolutely nothing wrong with you and I asking God for things. In fact, we're clearly told to what? Make our request known to God in Philippians 4 and verse 6. Jesus himself tells us in Matthew 7, verse 7, ask and it will be given to you. It's perfectly fine to ask for our needs and our desires, but I would challenge you to consider this morning. Do we prioritize praising God more than asking Him for blessings? That kind of stings a little bit when you get to thinking about it and really digging into it. Or does our praise depend on our perception of whether or not God has granted our request? We all praise what we enjoy. It comes natural with human nature. We all praise our favorite football team. Panthers, greatest of all time. We all praise our favorite food. Our favorite pastime. Maybe our favorite politician. Go Bernie Go. I'm just trying to keep some of you awake here. Hopefully, you praise your spouse if you're married. If not, that's something we can talk about later. But the fact is, we all praise what we enjoy, but praising God is the very reason that you and I draw breath. That's the very reason why He created us was to praise Him. Today, here in this short passage in Psalms, we find a four-part guide for praising God. Verse 1, he tells us where to praise God. Praise Him in His sanctuary. Now, most of you will know, especially coming up from many of our background, in the Old Testament, God's sanctuary was called the Tabernacle. And the place that he inhabited was called the Holy of Holies. In Jesus' time, God's sanctuary was the temple. But as we all know, Jesus radically changed that notion in such a way as he was accused with trying to do away with the scriptures. Which infuriated, easy for me to say, the Jewish elite at that time. Remember what Jesus told them in Matthew 5 and verse 17. He said, Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets. I have come not to abolish them, but to fulfill them. Today, we as Christians come together in churches, some big, some small. But we come together, gathered together to exalt Him, and He is in our presence. That's why church attendance is so very important. Now, I'm sure we've all known people in the past who've said, I don't want to go to old church, a bunch of hypocrites. I am praise God right here on the front porch. And that's true. That's true. But so many things are missed whenever we neglect coming together as a church body, as a church family. Think of the strength that we receive from each other, especially during the hard times. Verse 1 goes on to say, praise him in his mighty firmament or in the entirety of his creation. In other words, we don't necessarily have to be assembled all the time in a church to praise God. Praising God does not have to be a Sunday morning thing. Praising God should be an everyday thing. When we look at what He's created, we're blessed to live in one of the most beautiful places on this earth. Just to see the beauty that God's hand has created should give us all reason to praise. We don't have to be in a church. As a matter of fact, we as Christians are the church. We are the sanctuary. We are the temple. And being so our praise to God can take place at any place at any time. We can praise him in the car. Just be careful. We can praise him at our desk at work. We can praise him on the assembly line. We can praise him anywhere at any time. Verse 2 tells us why we are to praise God. Praise Him for His mighty acts. How many of you can testify to a mighty act that God has done? It doesn't take much. We just walk out the front door. It doesn't take much. I can tell you, if it weren't for God's mighty acts, I wouldn't be standing up here in front of you today. Look back at what He has done for us in the past. Consider His answered prayers. Consider those times when we were at our lowest and desperate for answers. And we'd looked everywhere. And finally we came before God. And he delivered us. Think back at his provisions throughout our lives, his love for us, his grace. He sent his only begotten Son. Psalm 103, verses 8 and 11, we read, The Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in mercy. He will not always strive with us, nor will he keep his anger forever. He has not dealt with us according to our sins, nor punished us according to our iniquities. For as the heavens are high above the earth, so great is his mercy toward those who fear him. When we consider those answered prayers. But we're also to praise God for what he didn't do for us or what he hasn't done yet. That thing that we've been praying for for years. That deliverance that we've been seeking for months. Still yet, we're to praise him. I can think back in my own life, as I'm sure you can as well, about all the unanswered prayers that I'd prayed desperately, thinking that I needed. And I can stand before you today and say, I am so thankful that God didn't answer those prayers. Because my life would look totally different. As I'm sure yours would as well, if he would have answered those prayers that I thought I needed at that time in life. Our Heavenly Father loves us so very much that He will never enable us to hurt ourselves. Ever. Don't turn there, but write it down. Habakkuk 3, verses 17 and 18. I tell you not to look because you'd be looking all day because it's one of them that stays hid way back there. Habakkuk 3, 17 and 18, though the fig tree may not blossom, nor fruit be on the vines, though the labor of the olive may fail, and the fields yield no food, though the flock may be cut off from the fold, and there be no herd in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the Lord. I will joy in the God of my salvation. We all know what it's like to have barren fields and gardens, times of life when it seems like things just everything we touch turns into something that most people would throw away. But even in those times, our Heavenly Father is still in control. He still knows every hair that's on our head. He still knows the plans he has for us. Can we truly say that even during the hard times of our lives, that we will joy in the God of our salvation? I hope we can. Verses three through five tells us how we are to praise God. Now, reading that, you know, sound of the trumpet, the dog, you know, for most of us today, these verses may seem a little odd, right? Might seem a little odd. I mean, you got trumpets, lutes, harps, tambrels, flutes, stringed instruments, cymbals, dancing. It almost sounds like a Sonny and Share concert from the late 70s, doesn't it? Just a lot of racket. But the writer of this psalm would have been well acquainted with Hebrew customs of worship. As we all know, reading the Old Testament, if anybody had a list of rules, it's the Jews, was it not? I mean, they had a right ritual for how to go to the bathroom, probably. There are seven Hebrew words in the Bible used to express the specific physical and spiritual actions that express praise to God. They include things such as kneeling, shouting loudly, singing songs spontaneously, the lifting up of hands, and making music. Now, you may ask, why do I need to know this? What difference does it make to me today? But by understanding the Old Testament customs of praise, it helps us, in 20 whatever century we're in now, it helps us develop our attitude of praise. The first word that we'll see is Barak. B-A-R-A-K. Not like Barack Osama Bama, former president. Barak is a Hebrew word which means kneeling or bowing in reverence. Okay? It's the idea of giving reverence to God, acknowledging his holiness and sovereignty over all of life. Psalm 95 and verse 6 we read, Come let us bow down and worship. Let us kneel before the Lord our Maker. That was one of the main things the Jewish people would do in praising God. Now I can tell you from experience that kneeling down for me would require both praise and prayer. Because once I got down on my knees, it would be a lot of prayer to get me back up. Lord God, please don't let this table slide out while I'm trying to pull myself back up. And once I did get back up, there would be shouts of praise coming from me. Thank you, Lord Jesus, for getting me back up. This was something that the Jewish people considered a necessity. I'm so thankful, so thankful that we, that's not one of our customs necessarily today. Now, if you have opportunity, you kneel down in your private time praying. I'm going to say, praise God, you still got good knees. And you have something to be thankful for every day of your life. The second word we see is halal. H-A-L A-L. And I'm pronouncing these as best as I can from my Western North Carolina Hillbilly translation. So I'm sure I'm butchering them. That's why I'm spelling them, just in case you want to take a look at them yourself. The word halal means boasting or celebrating. It's the root word for the word hallelujah. It means to shine, to boast, to celebrate, and joyfully rave about God. Can you think in days past, how often have we taken an opportunity to rave about our God? Imagine if we were to rave about God the same way as we do about our grandchildren. If we have them. Imagine having a picture of God. We would all do the same thing, would we not? We would open our wallet, they'd all fall down. Oh, this is him creating a universe. This is him. Imagine raving about God in such a way. The fourth word is Shabbat. S-H-A-B-A-C-H. It means shouting loudly. It means to shout aloud, addressing the Lord in a booming, triumphant tone to overcome all other noise. Psalm 98 and verse 4 says, Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth. Burst into jubilant song with music. Now, I like a good Christian music concert as good as the next person. And I love me some good old bluegrass gospel music. We don't necessarily in our culture today get to hooping and the hollering quite like the Jewish customs were back then. We still equally praise our God just as they did during their customs. The fourth word here is tela. It means singing a spontaneous song. It's the idea of singing out to God with a song that is unplanned and unrehearsed, allowing our souls to rejoice directly to Him. In other words, it's not a scripted performance that we offer up to our God. I can think back in my younger days, I used to listen to a lot of rock music. And I can remember, thanks to my brother Jeffrey, we would be singing, and most of them rock songs, you know, you got the good beat, the sound, the wreck it going, and you were singing at the top of your lungs, what you thought they were singing. And then somebody has to butt in and say, Well, that's not the word you say. Well, that's not what he said. Well, it is too. I've heard a song. No, and then they bring out the words. Has anybody else ever done that? You've sung a song so long you think you're singing it right until somebody points out and you're not. Well, I've in life I've just got to the point where I accept that. There's a lot of times I'll be singing songs, you know, if I don't have a book in front of me, I'll just make something up that sounds similar and goes with the music. That's kind of the same idea. Taking a time, a thought, whenever we're, you know, out in God's creation, and turning a thought into a little melody. That's the idea. Five, we have the word todah, T-O-W-D-A-H, which means extending hands in thanksgiving. Extending hands in thanksgiving. It's raising up holy hands as a sacrifice of praise for who God is, for what he has done, and for what he will do. Hebrews 13 and verse 15, we read, Through Jesus therefore let us continually offer to God a sacrifice of praise. We see this sometimes today. The next word we have is Yada, Y-A-D-A-H. And it's similar to the word we just spoke. The meaning of this word is extending hands in complete surrender. It's the idea of forcefully extending your hands and surrender almost like you're throwing something away. You're casting something away from it in order to express an absolute and total commitment to God. Psalm 63 and verse 4, we read, I will praise you as long as I'm alive. And in your name I will lift up my hands. Now, I don't know about you. I've been to some churches, and that's a common thing. Raise your hands, flail, whatever. I've been in many churches, some churches too, where you just don't do that. Do you have to? No. I mean, if you wanted to do it here, I can assure you, I'm not going to make fun of you. Genie most certainly will, but I won't make fun of you. The idea praising God is something that comes from within each and every one of us. We don't lift our hands to be seen. We lift our hands as reaction for what's deep in our heart that we want to pour out to our God. We're not performing for a congregation. We're praising our Father. Lastly, we have the word Zamar, Z-A-M-A-R. And that means making music with instruments. It's the act of playing an instrument to touch God's heart and express our gratitude toward Him. I can't help but think about the story that we've all heard, the little drummer boy, that we sing or that we hear at Christmas time. Now, they probably don't do that in a lot of hardcore Baptist churches because they don't want them old drums and herd worship, you know. Me personally, I can't play a note. I don't know about y'all, but the only instrument that I've mastered in my life is the radio. As long as it's got a knob, I can get you anything you want. Which I don't know where it comes from, but I have a middle son who can pick up anything that's laying around and start playing it. It's just it's cruel. Finally, verse 6, we're told when, when to praise God. We read, let everything that has breath praise the Lord. All the days of our lives, which for you and I as Christians will be from now throughout all of eternity, forever. We'll be singing praiseless to our Father. Now, God doesn't need our praise to exist, he doesn't need our praise to feel good about himself at the end of the day, but he deeply desires and deserves our adoration. At all times, in all circumstances, with everything that's in us, regardless of what's going on in the world around us, let us forever praise our God. And I'll leave you with Colossians 3, chapter 3, verses 16 and 17. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs. Singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord, and whatever you do in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus. Give thanks to God the Father through Him. As time goes on, we'll always be a people in need. We'll always be in need of daily blessings from our Father. And he's quick to give them to us. But just as we'll always be a people of need, we must also always be a people of praise. Let's pray. Father God, we do thank you once again. We thank you for this opportunity. We thank you for bringing us together. We thank you for breathing life into our lungs. We thank you for all the many blessings you pour out on us each and every day, many of which we don't even realize. But we thank you. We thank you and we praise you. We love you, Father. We love you. We thank you for loving us and for saving us for eternity and making a home for us. We just pray that you'd go with us this week and keep us safe, keep us strong, and help us to just glorify and honor you in all that we do. We thank you and praise you in Jesus' name. Amen. Okay. You will be happy to know that I'm turning this off when we sing again.