We have a lot for which to be thankful, don’t we? Not the least of which is a beautiful building and sanctuary. We have the freedom to be here and we enjoy each other’s company as we worship. We have air conditioning and heat, a fridge full of stuff to eat and drink over in the Fellowship Hall. We are able to pay all of our bills. We even have doorstops on almost all of our doors!
Some of us used to joke about how when we become a rich church, we will know it when we use doorstops instead of bricks. The other day, Troy finished putting doorstops on the doors in the Fellowship Hall and I threw the door brick over under the steps and told Troy ,“So…this is what it feels like to pastor one of those rich, uppity churches.”
So, I’m thankful even for the little things that God has provided including doorstops. But I also realize that not everybody is as blessed as we are physically and financially. Not everybody is able to worship in a beautiful sanctuary. Some of you may have seen the same picture I saw this week of a church in the Philippines worshiping as they stood in water that was up to their knees due to the typhoon that recently hit there. Not only that but that typhoon killed about 5000 (last I heard) and displaced 4 million. And yet even with all that I will still say that God is awesome.
But the Philippines is not the only place hard hit. Much closer to home in Indiana and Illinois more than 25 tornadoes hit just last week. And what the day before had been neighborhoods are now just slabs of concrete with debris stacked on top. Those tornadoes and typhoons are often called acts of God and I understand that thinking but I will stay say that our God is awesome.
Planned Parenthood just opened a $6.5 million state of the art abortion clinic in south Ft. Worth , ironically right next to the Gladney Center for Adoption. According to the Centers for Disease Control, in 2009, 784,507legal induced abortions were reported to CDC. I’m sure many more were done but those are real, though conservative, numbers. What the day before had been a baby in a mother’s womb is now discarded debris stacked in a trash can. This country is spiritually and mentally sick to allow such a thing to continue and yet those centers have government funding. But even with all that going on I continue to say that we serve an awesome God!
Even closer to home I know that there are people right here in our community that lack the basic necessities of life. Food, shelter and clothing are scarce and not guaranteed for another day for many right around us even while there are million dollar mansions within walking distance of those people. There are people right here this morning that are hurting physically, mentally, spiritually and financially. It’s not fair. It’s not right. It’s painful. And someone might ask me this morning how I can dare stand up here, knowing all of the sin and heartache and poverty and problems of this world, and continue to say that God is good.
“Oh, it’s easy for you to say. You’re not knee-deep in water. You have clean clothes and a full belly. Your life is all rainbows and lollipops compared to those you just mentioned and you have the nerve to say that God is good?” Yes! I have the nerve. Yes, I have the gall and the audacity to say that the God I serve is good, not just sometime but all the time! I may not understand His ways. I may go through pain. I may lose my family, my job, my church and my friends but I say that God is awesome. He is good. He is merciful and generous.
And I can stand here and say all of that because I have seen it in my own life but I can also see it in scripture, the very Word of God that I stake my eternity upon. And if nothing else I say that God is awesome because the Bible tells me to! And that’s enough! It’s enough! It is enough that the psalmist tells me to and it is certainly enough that God tells me to and right here in Psalm 66 it tells me to “say to God, “How awesome are your deeds!” And so I stand here this morning and if I am not obedient in any other thing I will be obedient in proclaiming to you that I am in awe of God and His deeds are awesome!
And if that doesn’t make sense to you or if my audacity offends you, then please hear me out as we draw to a close our November Thanksgiving series entitled “Praise Songs”. We end our look at some of the books of Psalms or“praise songs” as they were known with Psalm 66. And I would give anything to be able to hear this song being sung with music in its original language. It must have been beautiful to hear. But its words are still beautiful to read and are powerful words of praise.
So, join with me as we read Psalm 66. For the director of music. A song. A psalm.
1 Shout for joy to God, all the earth!
2 Sing the glory of his name;
make his praise glorious.
3 Say to God, “How awesome are your deeds!
So great is your power
that your enemies cringe before you.
4 All the earth bows down to you;
they sing praise to you,
they sing the praises of your name.” Selah
2 Sing the glory of his name;
make his praise glorious.
3 Say to God, “How awesome are your deeds!
So great is your power
that your enemies cringe before you.
4 All the earth bows down to you;
they sing praise to you,
they sing the praises of your name.” Selah
5 Come and see what God has done,
his awesome deeds for mankind!
6 He turned the sea into dry land,
they passed through the waters on foot—
come, let us rejoice in him.
7 He rules forever by his power,
his eyes watch the nations—
let not the rebellious rise up against him. Selah
his awesome deeds for mankind!
6 He turned the sea into dry land,
they passed through the waters on foot—
come, let us rejoice in him.
7 He rules forever by his power,
his eyes watch the nations—
let not the rebellious rise up against him. Selah
8 Praise our God, all peoples,
let the sound of his praise be heard;
9 he has preserved our lives
and kept our feet from slipping.
10 For you, God, tested us;
you refined us like silver.
11 You brought us into prison
and laid burdens on our backs.
12 You let people ride over our heads;
we went through fire and water,
but you brought us to a place of abundance.
let the sound of his praise be heard;
9 he has preserved our lives
and kept our feet from slipping.
10 For you, God, tested us;
you refined us like silver.
11 You brought us into prison
and laid burdens on our backs.
12 You let people ride over our heads;
we went through fire and water,
but you brought us to a place of abundance.
13 I will come to your temple with burnt offerings
and fulfill my vows to you—
14 vows my lips promised and my mouth spoke
when I was in trouble.
15 I will sacrifice fat animals to you
and an offering of rams;
I will offer bulls and goats. Selah
and fulfill my vows to you—
14 vows my lips promised and my mouth spoke
when I was in trouble.
15 I will sacrifice fat animals to you
and an offering of rams;
I will offer bulls and goats. Selah
16 Come and hear, all you who fear God;
let me tell you what he has done for me.
17 I cried out to him with my mouth;
his praise was on my tongue.
18 If I had cherished sin in my heart,
the Lord would not have listened;
19 but God has surely listened
and has heard my prayer.
20 Praise be to God,
who has not rejected my prayer
or withheld his love from me!
let me tell you what he has done for me.
17 I cried out to him with my mouth;
his praise was on my tongue.
18 If I had cherished sin in my heart,
the Lord would not have listened;
19 but God has surely listened
and has heard my prayer.
20 Praise be to God,
who has not rejected my prayer
or withheld his love from me!
Now, you may have heard me say a word that we don’t normally say when we read through here. The word “Selah” is normally just skipped over and ignored even though it is part of the original manuscript. But I learned something this week that I want to share with you.“Selah” is found 74 times in scripture and 71 of those are in the Psalms.And the reason is it found so often in the Psalms and nowhere else is because it is an instruction to pause in the middle of a song.And as we have learned, the psalms were praise songs used in worship by the ancient Hebrews, hence the title of the sermon series.
“Selah” doesn’t just mean to take a break from singing. It is not the time that the guitar player does his jamming solo.And it’s not so the leader can improvise and tell everybody to “put your hands in the air like you just don’t care” or anything like that.“Selah” means to pause the singing so you can reflect on the words you just sang because they are important and you should soak them in.
I love how one commentary colorfully interpreted it as, “There.What do you think of that?” So, looking at the first paragraph or so, they would sing what we have as verses 1-4, ending with, “All the earth bows down to you; they sing praise to you, they sing the praises of your name.” And then the leader would stop and look at the people and say, “There.What do you think of that?Meditate on that for a few seconds.Think about what you are singing.”I love that and just had to share because I had never known that before about such a common word.
So, this psalmist, who was a king and may have been King David or maybe Hezekiah, obviously wants the people to mean what they are singing as they worship using the words he has written under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.And I believe he wanted them to see 3 things.He wanted them to see that this king was a happy man, a humble man and a holy man.And looking at verses 1-4, it’s pretty easy to see that he is a happy man. And who wouldn’t be a happy man when you see God for Who He really is as this psalmist obviously has.
We have talked at different times lately about the importance of praising God just for Who He is, and not just for what He has done for us.It’s easy to praise God for the new house, new car, new wife, etc.But as the Creator and Sustainer of the universe, God likes to be recognized as such and that should be at the top of our prayer list.It should be one of the first things we think about as we worship and talk or sing about how great God is.
And that is where the psalmist starts and it obviously makes him happy.He starts by looking forward to a time when all the earth will rejoice and praise God. This is probably a reference to the millennial reign of Christ after the rapture of the church.This time will last 1000 years according to Revelation 20 and it is during this time that the lion is said to lay with the lamb and Micah 4 tells us that there will be no more war and “they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks.”
If you don’t hear all the earth praising God now, just wait.His enemies will cringe before Him and all the earth will rejoice at the sound of His name.But the psalmist not only looks forward to what is coming with praise, he also looks backward with praise as he recounts what God has done in the lives of His children.
He looks back to the times when God protected and provided for His people and there are 2 times that he may be talking about in verse 6 where he says that God turned the sea into dry land.He may be talking about the Jordan or the Red Sea .Either time is worthy of looking back and saying, “Come and see what God has done, his awesome deeds for mankind!” as he did in verse 5.
But remember how the psalmist even knows about those times.He knows because they collected 12 stones out of the Jordan River and stacked them up as a remembrance of what God had done and they were told to tell their children and their grandchildren what happened there when they saw those stones.That’s exactly what we are doing with this goofy little glass here on the pulpit.We have seen how God protects and provides and we want to be reminded of it especially when we worship.And as we worship, we, like the psalmist are happy because of it.
Then he ends that section with that word “Selah”. He says, “There.What do you think of that?”But then he goes on to say that not only is he a happy man but he is a humble man in verses 8-12.
John Flavel has said, "They that know God will be humble and they that know themselves cannot be proud."We learned last month about what God requires of us as Micah 6:8 says, “and what does the Lordrequire of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?”The question of why do bad things happen to good people will never be fully answered this side of Heaven but sometimes one of the answers to that question is that it happens to humble us.God allows us to go through difficult times in part so that we will see Him and ourselves in a new and correct light.
The psalmist recounts some times in Israel ’s history where this may be the case.He uses 3 metaphors to describe these times in verses 10-12.He talks of captives being thrown into prison; prisoners turned into slaves and defeated troops overrun by chariots.And as difficult as these times were for Israel , and nobody is saying that they weren’t incredibly difficult, (maybe you can relate) the psalmist still starts this section praising God for these times.
Read verses 8-9 again in context of all these bad things happening.“Praise our God, all peoples,
let the sound of his praise be heard; 9 he has preserved our lives and kept our feet from slipping.”Do you know what kind of person says those things? I hate to say it because I wish there was an easier way to get this kind of wisdom but the kind of person that talks like that is an experienced person.Only through experience can you look back at all the hard times and still be able to see that God is good.Only through experience can you give God humble praise even in the midst of those hard times because it is only through experience that you are able to see how God continues to protect and provide even while allowing you to be humbled so that in the end you will be more like Jesus and for the good of His Kingdom.
let the sound of his praise be heard; 9 he has preserved our lives and kept our feet from slipping.”Do you know what kind of person says those things? I hate to say it because I wish there was an easier way to get this kind of wisdom but the kind of person that talks like that is an experienced person.Only through experience can you look back at all the hard times and still be able to see that God is good.Only through experience can you give God humble praise even in the midst of those hard times because it is only through experience that you are able to see how God continues to protect and provide even while allowing you to be humbled so that in the end you will be more like Jesus and for the good of His Kingdom.
And just like James chapter 1 tells us to count it all pure joy when we face trials of every kind for in the end it brings us everything we need, this passage also says something similar that proves what James said.The psalmist doesn’t try to say it didn’t hurt or that it was even fair.He simply says at the end of verse 12 that, God, you have brought us through all of that into a place of abundance.
I think about the story of Job that proves that.I think about the life of Joseph, the life of Daniel, David, Ruth and Esther.I also see that it is going to happen in the lives of Cody and Monica and for Carol and for the Amermans and my parents and for everybody here; maybe not today and maybe not tomorrow.But this life is a wisp of smoke and if I have to wait until Heaven to see that place of abundance then I believe Romans 8:18 and I know that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us.Oh, there needs to be a “Selah” right there because when I stop and reflect on that I can’t help but be humble and give God praise just like the psalmist.
But the psalmist wasn’t only happy and humble, he was also holy.Look at the last section, verses 13-20.There is a distinct change in the psalm at this point.When you praise God it brings you happiness but it also allows you to see Him better.Then when you see Him better, you start to see yourself better.And when you see yourself in contrast to God you will want to be holy.You will want to be like Him and He is holy but you will also want to please Him more and He is pleased with our holiness.But you will also see that holiness is just the best way to live.
C.S. Lewis said, “How little people know who think that holiness is dull. When one meets real thing, it is irresistible.”It is irresistible when you see it in God and it is irresistible when people see it in you.And to be holy simply means that you are different or set apart for divine use.
When the psalmist says he is going to fulfill his vows and bring animals for sacrifice, that is his way of being obedient.
We are no longer under the Old Testament Law but we still are to be obedient.Everybody knows we are to be obedient to the 10 Commandments but there is more to it than that for us.We don’t have to bring animals to sacrifice for our sins anymore.Jesus is our sacrifice.But we are told to do many other things besides just the 10 Commandments. Do you know that just the idea of being holy is a command?
We are to be holy as He is holy.We are to forgive.We are not to gossip.We are to love.We are to show respect where it is due.We are to have faith, not worry, pray at all times, encourage each other daily, consider each other more important, not love money, work at anything you do with all of your heart…and we are commanded to praise.And he ends 15 with “Selah”. Meditate on that.Meditate on how we are to be holy.Reflect on what that means to you right now.What is God telling you to do to be obedient and holy?
Do you need motivation to do that?Reread verses 17-19.“I cried out to him with my mouth;
his praise was on my tongue. 18 If I had cherished sin in my heart, the Lord would not have listened; 19 but God has surely listened and has heard my prayer.”
his praise was on my tongue. 18 If I had cherished sin in my heart, the Lord would not have listened; 19 but God has surely listened and has heard my prayer.”
The idea of holiness is a command but it also comes with benefits.He’s not saying he is perfect.That’s not necessarily holiness.He said he did not cherish that sin.He didn’t keep doing it or make excuses for it.He didn’t cry out, “Why me, God?”He cried out “God forgive me!”He didn’t waste time feeling sorry for himself or dragging guilt around like a wet blanket.He had a relationship with God and through that relationship he found joy and peace and the ability to end by saying, “Praise be to God.”
Praise was on his lips and he wanted everyone to know.That’s what happens when we see God and ourselves correctly. It makes us happy, humble and holy. Isn’t God awesome?
Invitation
Grab your bulletin and let’s sing that last song, “Give Thanks”.
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