Praise week - day 1

 

Our study for the last two weeks was on Psalm 33; it's a wonderful psalm full of praise to God. I thought it might be good for us to concentrate on praise this week . . . by that I mean, let's listen to a praise song each day, and try to remember it all day long.

Hard times?
Praise Him!

We have a flat tire?
Praise Him!

We are experiencing tight financial times?
Praise Him!

Are we worried about our health?
Praise Him!

Are we praying for someone's salvation?
Praise Him!

Let's give Him the glory for all of the good things and the hard things, too. Let's lean on Him and pray for His strength and His grace to help us get through!

(And I just bet that the close of the day will find us still humming our song of praise!)

Friday praise -- not a slowdown!

Let's praise our Redeemer today! 

Get excited! Be happy! Even in the midst of our circumstances and trials, let's praise Him!

Praise him, praise him! Jesus, our blessed redeemer!
Sing, O earth, his wonderful love proclaim!
Hail him, hail him! Highest archangels in glory!
Strength and honor give to his holy name!
Like a shepherd, Jesus will guard his children.
In his arms he carries them all day long.

Refrain:
Praise him! Praise him! tell of his excellent greatness.
Praise him! Praise him! ever in  joyful song.

Results: thankful, worshiping hearts

Let's slide back up to the start of our psalm . . . trust in the Lord results in thankful, worshiping hearts:

Sing joyfully to the Lord, you righteous;
    it is fitting for the upright to praise him.
 Praise the Lord with the harp;
    make music to him on the ten-stringed lyre.

Sing to him a new song;
    play skillfully, and shout for joy.

 For the word of the Lord is right and true;
    he is faithful in all he does.

The Lord loves righteousness and justice;
    the earth is full of his unfailing love

An interesting analogy: A golf ball can be unwound; underneath the outer coating with the iconic bumps and logo, the elastic string that surrounds the core can be said to represent gratitude and worship. We unwind it and unwind it and find a solid core made of rubber or some polymer that gives the ball bounce. 

In the same way, thankfulness and worship are bound up with trusting in the Lord. If we unwind that gratitude, there will be a core of trust in His faithfulness -- it's the center of our worship. When we have no human means of escape and we cry out to God as our only hope -- He delivers us! Our hearts overflow then in thankfulness and praise to Him. 

When a slick method works, men or women get the praise. When God works, He gets the praise.

And I don't know if you noticed, but it's pretty exuberant praise that is called for! 

Sing!

Give thanks!

Play on the lyre and the harp!

Play skillfully and shout!

Doesn't sound to me like the psalmist would be happy with a crowd that kept their heads bowed and examined their church bulletin, or looked around at the rest of the worshipers with a frowny face!

"But I don't feel comfortable getting excited." "I just don't feel like I can raise my hands." "I'm doing good to just sing, much less say "amen" or shout or something." 

Hold on just a minute. If you are watching your favorite team play soccer or football, or watching your grandkids or neighbor's kiddos play ball or piano . . . . If they play like mad and sound awesome, don't you jump up and clap, and give them an ovation? You know you do.  And if your favorite team is in a close game and a player hauls in a spectacular catch for the win, do you sit there expressionless? Do you keep pushing chips in your mouth? Or do you jump up and holler? Maybe fling that bowl of chips into the air? You know you would!  Just don't toss the salsa; that would make too much of a mess. But I have known folks who "lost it" when their team won...... (Grin)

Why would people react that way at a sporting or other event? Because they are delighted with what happened. They are happy. The secret to heartfelt praise and open, unembarrassed thanksgiving is to recognize that we were in a desperate situation. There was no way for us to save ourselves from God's righteous judgment. We cried out to the God Who spoke the universe into existence -- the One Who sent His Son to save us by His grace.  And now, since we have experienced His love and mercy, we delight in Him and in His great salvation, and we can't help but sing for joy!

Amen!

Our completely trusting in the Lord results in thankful, worshiping hearts. As God's "righteous ones," who have seen Him deliver our souls from death, let's sing and praise him. 

Exuberantly!

Unembarrassed!

Let's delight in Him!

Read the instructions - then trust in Him

 

My grandma used to say, "There's method to my madness!" In other words, if you looked carefully, there was a logical reasoning behind how she did things and why.  Some task or process may have seemed chaotic or illogical, but in time, the "method" behind the "madness" could be seen.

In much the same way, if we will look carefully, we will see a pattern in how God works: He doesn't work through man's strength or schemes (though, as we've seen, He can use ANYTHING to further His plans), but He does work through those who fear (reverence) and trust Him.

Have I made it as clear as mud? Let me try to explain . . . . 

In verses six through twelve, we studied the power of God's Word. Now we will look at how God accomplishes things.

From heaven the Lord looks down
    and sees all mankind;
 from his dwelling place he watches
    all who live on earth—

he who forms the hearts of all,
    who considers everything they do.

 No king is saved by the size of his army;
    no warrior escapes by his great strength.

A horse is a vain hope for deliverance;
    despite all its great strength it cannot save. (Psalm 33:13-17)

If you and I were to go up in the elevator of the Empire State building, we would walk out onto the observation deck and look around us. We could walk to the wall and peep over, and see the thousands of tiny people below. Hurrying and scurrying, they walk and drive cars and speak to others, and go about their lives. We would only be able to see a couple of blocks worth, looking almost straight down, but we'd know that beyond our gaze were many, many more streets and many thousands (millions) of people. We wouldn't know their names. We wouldn't know what was going on in their lives. We wouldn't know what was in their hearts.

But we know Someone Who does know all of that. 

The psalmist pictured God as looking down from heaven just like we were looking down from the observation deck. But there's two HUGE differences! God sees everyone on earth - not just those two blocks we can see, looking straight down from the building. He sees the bustling city of Hong Kong, and all of the freedom fighters there. He sees a pastor in Canada who is feeding the poor and preaching the gospel, in spite of persecution. He sees a missionary fending off demons in the wilderness of Africa. He sees the native hunting for food in the Amazon, and he sees the suited businessman in the skyscraper, too. More than just seeing everyone, God knows what they are thinking in their hearts. He made each of us -- and He understands not only what we do, but also why we do it!

In verse sixteen, the psalmist mentions a king going out to battle. He's proud of his mighty army. Is he trusting in that army for victory? God knows. The soldier nearby is strong, muscular, and well-trained, and he counts himself fortunate to have his impressive horse to add to his advantages. Is the soldier trusting in his own strength and the strength of his horse? God knows.

Even as believers, who say that we trust in God's faithfulness, our human tendency is to perfect our methods. By this I mean, we will trust in the methods. We live in a day that is overwhelmed with how-to books and manuals on how to live a victorious Christian life. We see techniques on how to have that idyllic, happy family. We see instruction books, seminars, and workbooks on how to build a successful network of disciples, or how to grow a church organically. Now, don't get me wrong -- many of these methods are helpful because they are based on Scripture. And I think that we all can agree that God's normal way of working (both to resolve situations and to "grow" Christians) is not faith alone, but instead: faith plus something. 

Faith plus hard work.

Faith plus a scripture-based method or means to accomplish His will.

For humans, the danger is that we read the instruction book, or plug in the method, and trust IN THEM to work.  It's far better if we use the instructions while we trust IN HIM to work. The psalmist is building on this concept and saying that God does not work through man's strength or schemes because then man gets the glory!

The psalmist makes another really important point, here, in verse eighteen.

But the eyes of the Lord are on those who fear him,
    on those whose hope is in his unfailing love,
 to deliver them from death
    and keep them alive in famine. (V. 18-19)

Verse thirteen said that God sees everyone and knows their hearts. Verse eighteen says that the eye of the Lord is on those who fear Him. God looks with favor on believers who fear Him and who trust in Him to deliver them from overwhelming situations. Put into today's vernacular, he's saying, God's means of working is not to find people with slick methods and great white board talks and bless them. It's not to find the person with the best gimmick nor the most beautifully designed workbook. God's means of working is to find people who trust in Him and bless them!

Why do we know that? Well, these people are not described as strong or self-sufficient. In fact, they are in a terrible predicament. They are in grave difficulty - facing death and famine. People who know how to be thankful and to worship must first learn to trust in God. And for people to learn to trust in God, they must first be stripped of every human prop. Take everything away . . . what's left? We look to God alone for our deliverance. 

That's so important! We might ought to read that couple of sentences every day!

Paul told us in II Corinthians:

We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired of life itself. 9 Indeed, we felt we had received the sentence of death. But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead. (II Corinthians 1:8b-9)

Oh my goodness! I love it when the Bible tells us right out loud! It's clear and I understand! God works through helpless people who trust in Him.

Verses 18-22 are filled with a variety of synonyms for trust in the Lord. We see "fear" (which means reverence), we see "hope," "waits," and these, too: "our help and shield, our heart rejoices in Him, and we trust in His holy name."

We wait in hope for the Lord;
    he is our help and our shield.
 In him our hearts rejoice,
    for we trust in his holy name.
 May your unfailing love be with us, Lord,
    even as we put our hope in you.

So, it's not that the methods are wrong -- that beautiful workbook, the talk with the whiteboard, etc -- all of those (if based on scripture) are profitable for our study and use. It's when we trust in the method that we do wrong. Our trust must be in God alone.

If we do? What then? We'll talk about the results tomorrow!

Our pride, His power, part II

 

Yesterday, we studied these verses:

The Lord foils the plans of the nations;
    he thwarts the purposes of the peoples.
 But the plans of the Lord stand firm forever,
    the purposes of his heart through all generations.

 Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord,
    the people he chose for his inheritance.

The picture that I chose at the top goes along with an illustration I heard one time: a newly-elected politician had just arrived in Washington, DC (cue the movie trailer for "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington"!) and was standing with an elder-politician on the bank of the Potomac River. The older man pointed to a log floating by and said, "This city is like that old log." The younger man was astonished, but the older politician continued, "There are probably hundreds of bugs, ants, and other critters on the log as it floats along, and each one probably thinks THEY are the one that is steering it."

In yesterday's study, we looked at a poem that while inspirational, points to the wrong kind of resolve. It glorified the prideful resolve of humans to "do it all ourselves." It ignored the fact that a compassionate and holy God is in control. I liked the second poem, didn't you? I could identify more with that one!

But the point is well taken, that humans do get puffed up with pride and they forget all about the plans and purposes of the Lord. In our verses, David points to the power of God to impede the plans of nations, to totally change outcomes, and to bless those who seek Him. He says that the power of God's Word is seen in His counsel.

Proud man thinks that he is steering the course of history. However, the Bible is clear on this: God sets up and takes down the most powerful leaders in history for His own sovereign purposes. We can go down the list; whether it was Pharaoh, Nebuchadnezzar, Cyrus, or another man, God used them to further His purposes for His people. 

It's true that none of those men listed knew God or were seeking to follow God (in fact, I only know of one who truly changed and wanted to seek God). They were making decisions that they thought would further their own agendas. But never fear! Behind the scenes, God providentially used their decisions to further His agenda. They were responsible for their decisions (and will answer to God for those decisions), yet God used them to implement His own counsel and plans. 

That's the power of God contrasted with the pride of man!

I guess one of the most graphic illustrations of this concept, the place where we truly can see God's power to use the plans of men illustrated, is the crucifixion of our Savior, Jesus Christ. This was the devil and proud humans' most serious attempt to cast off the rule of God. But check out this prayer in the early church:

Indeed Herod and Pontius Pilate met together with the Gentiles and the people of Israel in this city to conspire against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed. 28 They did what your power and will had decided beforehand should happen.  (Acts 4:27-28)

Peter and John had just been released from the religious authorities of the day, and they went back to the believers and lifted their voices in prayer. In that prayer, they referred to the fact that self-centered, proud rulers in all eras were responsible for trying to stop God's plans, and yet, even while they tried to stop God's purposes, they inadvertently carried out the plans and counsel of God. Herod, Pontius Pilate, and the others were carrying out God's eternal plan of salvation! God frustrated their plans -- and established His own plans.

The power of God's Word as seen in His counsel is stated again in verse twelve of our psalm:

Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord,
    the people he chose for his inheritance. (Psalm 33:12)

This verse is talking about Israel, whom God chose as distinct from all other peoples to be His own. Even though they were often disobedient and rebellious, He used them to bring the Savior into the world. If I'm understanding the book of Romans correctly (chapter eleven), God has been waiting on the children of Israel for many years because they crucified the Savior. He will graciously bring a widespread revival among the Jews, and many will praise the glory of His grace. Meanwhile, we believers are "a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God's own possession" (in I Peter 2:9). 

Yes, it's true. We are His redeemed people. And it is a good reminder to read these verses (six through twelve) of Psalm 33 and think on this. We will learn to rely completely on the Lord when we see the power of His Word -- both in His creation and in His using everything to complete His sovereign plans.

Our pride, His power, part I

 

Grab a cuppa and settle in, dear readers.  We have a lengthy post today, but I hope that when we finish, you will feel it's time well-spent.

The Lord foils the plans of the nations;

    he thwarts the purposes of the peoples.

But the plans of the Lord stand firm forever,
    the purposes of his heart through all generations.

 Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord,
    the people he chose for his inheritance. (Psalm 33:10-12)

We are still in Psalm 33....today we are continuing our look at how powerful God is. Last time we studied, we focused on the power of His Word, both the written Word and His spoken word. When we closed last week, we mentioned that we humans are SO prone to pride . . . we think that everything goes according to our plans, and our desires. We plan and build super-cities; we tie the cities together with amazing infrastructure; we elect people to govern; we do all of these things and sometimes don't give a second thought to what God's plans are - or if He is working out His purposes in the world today. 

Doesn't matter if we don't think about it.  He IS working out His purposes in the world today.

We think we are masters of our own fate. We are not. We puny humans may shake our fists at the heavens, but God is in control. 

These verses made me think of a poem written by an atheist -- moral and immoral alike have drawn strength from its words. William Ernest Henley wrote "Invictus," and I've posted it here for you to read:

Invictus

Out of the night that covers me,

Black as the pit from pole to pole,

I thank whatever gods may be

For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance

I have not winced nor cried aloud.

Under the bludgeonings of chance

My head is bloody but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears

Looms but the horror of the shade,

And yet the menace of the years 

Finds, and shall find me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,

How charged with punishments the scroll,

I am the master of my fate,

I am the captain of my soul.

Invictus means unconquered. Henley wrote Invictus when he was twenty-seven, having lost a leg to tuberculosis of the bone. As an avowed atheist, the only place he could look for strength was in himself. He didn't believe there was any purpose to his pain; he felt it was "chance," as he said in the poem. He just hoped to stoically "take it like a man."

Henley wrote his poem as if he were shaking his fist at the universe, and when we read the last stanza, we realize he was shaking his fist at God, too. (Cue Frank Sinatra singing "My Way" . . . . )  Even if God didn't exist, how could Henley claim to be master of his fate, when he was subject to a thousand different forces beyond his control? If all it took to be master of one's fate was stubborn resolve, then all of the parents of toddlers had better look out! 

Perhaps his Invictus made sense to Henley because he was in the midst of the exciting days of Victorian era enlightenment: the teachings of Darwin and Nietzsche seemed to be a breath of fresh air for non-believers, and Christianity seemed to be limping off the stage. Kinda makes you wonder, though, if he would have had the same take on things if he'd lived one hundred years later? When he could see the results of Nietzschen and Marxist theories played out in the slaughter of millions -- by people who lived by those philosophies . . . 

One reason that Henley's poem is inspiring to so many is that it's appealing to their pride. Another is that it is close enough to the "real thing," to true courage and resolve, that it stirs our admiration. We all feel instinctively that there's virtue in courage. We admire the resolve that is shown by courageous people. The real heroes of history (and of the Bible) have been those who sacrificed (sometimes gave their all) for a cause greater than themselves. It's easy to list some: Moses before Pharaoh, Daniel facing the lions, the apostles before the Sanhedrin, our Savior before Pilate.

All of these stood up to evil - why? For the sake of righteousness . . . . and they stood up in spite of the fact that they KNEW the risk. We admire this kind of courage because we know instinctively that it's the "real thing." This is greatness: dying to self for the sake of others.

On the flip side of the coin, most of us don't admire the Nebuchadnezzars, the Nietzsches, the Hitlers, the Stalins, or the 911 hijackers. What they accomplished did require a kind of resolve. But self-centered, self-exalting, nihilistic resolve is not true greatness. It's greatness perverted to evil. And that is what Henley's poem "Invictus" is, at its heart. A deluded claim to self-sovereignty. It has a ring of heroism, but it's delusion. It's counterfeit. When this deluded self-sovereignty based on Darwin, Nietzsche, Marx, and others is given power -- horribly destructive evil is unleashed on the world.

So. 

We can all agree that God is in control, no matter what prideful man thinks.

Are we ready for a breath of fresh air?

In the early 1900's, a believer named Dorothea Day adapted Henley's manifesto in a poem that she titled "Conquered" and I have posted it here:

Out of the light that dazzles me,

Bright as the sun from pole to pole,

I thank the God I know to be

For Christ - the Conqueror of my soul.

Since His the sway of circumstance,

I would not wince nor cry aloud.

Under the rule which men call chance

My head, with joy, is humbly bowed.

Beyond this place of sin and tears,

That life with Him and His the aid,

That, spite the menace of the years,

Keeps, and will keep me unafraid.

I have no fear though straight the gate:

He cleared from punishment the scroll.

Christ is the master of my fate!

Christ is the Captain of my soul!

The greatest need of our souls is to be conquered by Christ; to assume the self-sacrificing and servant traits of His character. The evil in this world will beat us bloody sometimes - both literally and figuratively, as seen in the plights of Christians around the globe.  Our task is to stand firm against evil in the strength of Christ Who loved us and gave Himself for us. Paul tells us that we will be more than conquerors in the end; with a courageous hope -- because come what may, the end will be glorious beyond our knowledge:

I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. (Romans 8:18, NIV)

If Christ is the master of our fates and the Captain of our souls, we have NOTHING to fear. We will be sustained to the end, and when that scroll is unrolled, it will read that we are guiltless. We know that all will work together for our good, and even though we die, we will live eternally!

The soul described by Henley's Invictus is not heroic - even though the poem has given resolve to many. That soul is foolish. But the soul conquered by the greatest Love that has ever existed, is not foolish -- by God's grace we can then withstand the worst that evil can throw our way. We can be more than conquerors and then live joyfully for eternity -- that is a life worth living!!

Amen!

(My thanks to Jon Bloom for the analysis of Invictus.)on FacebookHis only hope was to take his bludgeonings like a man, which to him meant a stoic resolve

Friday slowdown

"Finding myself at a loss for words, and the funny thing is that it's OK."

Let's be still.

Let's listen to Him.

To His powerful Word.

He can change us.

We can become more like Him.

Amen. Let it happen, Lord! Here am I.

God's Word is powerful

We have discussed how important it is to rely completely on God. We've said that if we truly trust Him, we will see "that the Lord is good" and we'll be filled with praise and thanksgiving.

Here's where we are camped out today:

By the word of the Lord the heavens were made,
    their starry host by the breath of his mouth.
 He gathers the waters of the sea into jars;
    he puts the deep into storehouses.

Let all the earth fear the Lord;
    let all the people of the world revere him.
 For he spoke, and it came to be;
    he commanded, and it stood firm.

 The Lord foils the plans of the nations;
    he thwarts the purposes of the peoples.
 But the plans of the Lord stand firm forever,
    the purposes of his heart through all generations.

Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord,

    the people he chose for his inheritance. (V 6-12)

The Word of the Lord. It's powerful. We read in Hebrews that:

For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. (Hebrews 4:12, NKJV)

How often do we think about the power of His Word? In Hebrews, the writer was focused on the written word. In our psalm, we are focused on His spoken word. Both passages are correct - they are simply pointing to different parts of our Father's Word to us! The power of His Word is easily seen in the world that He created. He created all that we see; He still is in control of it, too! In the words that the psalmist chose, we are told about the power of His Word in speaking the world into existence, and then the next verses lead us to recognize His power in ruling the world. After all, Paul told us in Romans that He controls even the circumstances of our lives:

And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. (Romans 8:28)

Believers, we should bow in awe before the Lord as we realize His immense power in simply speaking the galaxies into existence -- and His mercy in caring for the tiny, sinful humans who inhabit this planet! It seems that so often when we hear news of scientific discoveries, they pertain to the unimaginable size of the universe. Astronomers and physicists are discovering vast new regions of space, and finding previously unknown stars, quasars, asteroids, and moons. 

When I consider your heavens,
    the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars,
    which you have set in place,

what is mankind that you are mindful of them,
    human beings that you care for them? (Psalm 8:3-4, NIV)

God didn't have to work hard; it wasn't a strain for Him to create the universe. Instead, He simply said, "Let there be . . " and it happened! In Psalm 33, we read:

By the word of the Lord the heavens were made,
And by the breath of His mouth all their lights. (v. 6)

Again in verse 9 we read:

For He spoke, and it was done;
He commanded, and it stood firm. (v. 9)

Anyone else feel like having a praise and worship service right about now? (Grin)

Creation is a miracle. Our powerful Lord created everything out of nothing - by His spoken word alone. All miracles are the same in this respect: one must accept the miracle by faith in God (Hebrews 11:3) But which way takes more faith? To believe that a caring and compassionate God created a place for us to live, work, and explore? Or that by sheer random chance matter developed into the millions of intricately ordered forms that we now observe?

Then, in verse seven, the psalmist considers the oceans:

He gathers the waters of the sea together as a heap;
He puts the depths in storehouses. (V. 7)

When this psalm was written, the world that he knew was only a small portion of God's created world. He could only have known the Mediterranean sea, or maybe the Red Sea. He would have had no way of knowing that oceans cover two-thirds of the earth's surface. (The Pacific Ocean alone covers almost sixty-four million miles, and is miles deep in places! But the psalmist had seen farmers all his life, as they piled up heaps of grain within their barns. He pictured God, keeping the oceans within their boundaries, as piling up the waters in much the same way as the simple farmer who would easily scoop up grain and arrange it as he liked, within the walls of his barn.

When we think about the grandeur of the heavens and the oceans, our conclusion is the same as the psalmist's:  ".....fear the Lord.....stand in awe of Him...."  Surely reverence and awe are the natural responses to His power! And just a side-note: to those who feel that the universe came about by random chance? Nope! To those who feel that God guided evolution over millions of years? Nope, not that either! The Bible says God spoke and it was done instantly! Isn't it amazing that we humans get puffed up with pride and rebel against Him?

Paul spoke about the creation of the world when he was explaining how we come to know Jesus as our Savior. In II Corinthians, he says first that Satan has blinded the minds of the unbelieving. The devil doesn't want us to see the light of the gospel and glory of Christ. Then he states:

 For God, who said, “Light shall shine out of darkness,” is the One who has shone in our hearts to give the Light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ. (II Corinthians 4:6)

We humans love to take credit for things and get patted on the back for the wonderful things we do . . . .this verse reminds us that even our salvation was not our own doing. We were in spiritual darkness, and we were happy there. (John 3:19)  Then, in His mercy, just like when He spoke the sun and moon into existence, He spoke light into our dark hearts.

But wait! Didn't we have to be able to make a choice? Didn't I choose to believe in Christ? Didn't I choose to begin to grow my fledgling faith? Of course! But the Bible is clear, if we now believe in Jesus Christ as our Savior, it's because God opened our blind eyes to see!

I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened, so that you will know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, 19 and what is the boundless greatness of His power toward us who believe. (Ephesians 1:18-19a)

What a high note to end on!

I hate to have to say it, though, but we humans are going to mess this up. We are super prone to pride. We think we are awesome! We choose our leaders and we band ourselves into nations and we build up mega-cities. We invent and manufacture crazy numbers of "things" and we assemble huge armies. We argue and fuss with other nations and we scheme and fight to conquer kingdoms. We are so silly that we think we are in total control. "Nothing happens to us that we didn't plan because we are so smart -- and we control our destiny." 

Well, the psalmist is going to have something to say about that -- we will study it next time!