Psalm 113 Praise ye the Lord. Praise, O ye servants of the
Lord. Praise the name of the Lord. Praise three times. How many
times have we seen this phrase? David exhorts us over and over
in the Psalms to praise The Lord, and we've heard that so many
times. Are you tired of hearing that? Praise the Lord. What could I even say about that
now that wouldn't be so repetitive, that we wouldn't have heard so
many times, that we wouldn't even hear it anymore? What could
I say about that? Well, I wondered this, this afternoon,
I wondered why David so often exhorts us to praise the Lord. And that's
what he's doing, he's exhorting us. Religion goes around saying
praise the Lord, thinking they're praising the Lord. What David's
doing here, as I've said so many times to you, he's telling you
to praise the Lord. He's fixing to praise him. But saying praise
the Lord ain't praising him. And to many that's just a religious
some religious rhetoric that they spout forth to sound religious. But what can we say about that?
Why so much? Why so many times does he say
it? Why so repetitive? Many of the Psalms begin this
way and have it in the Psalms somewhere, just about all of
them it seems like. Well, there's two reasons. It's because the
Lord is so worthy of our praise. Praise the Lord. It's always
an appropriate thing to say. It's an important exhortation.
It's not to be taken for granted. It's not to just become so mundane
to us that we don't hear it anymore because it's an important exhortation.
Do you know how many good things had to happen? How many gifts from the Lord
were necessary? How many wonderful things God
did for you Just for you to be sitting where you are right now
tonight. Do you have any idea? Let me show you something in Luke
chapter 12. Let's turn over there together. Luke 12, 22. This is something that I wondered
about recently and it goes right with our message. Praise the
Lord and us thinking about There's so many reasons to praise him
so many good things that he's done for us that we just We just
really take them for granted look at verse 22 of Luke 12 and
He said unto his disciples therefore I say unto you take no thought
for your life what you shall eat Neither for the body what you
shall put on The life is more than meat, and the body is more
than raiment. Consider the ravens, for they
neither sow nor reap, which neither have storehouse nor barn, and
God feedeth them. How much more are you better
than the fowls? And which of you with taking
thought can add to his stature one cubit? If ye then be not
able to do that thing which is least, why take ye thought for
the rest? Hold it a second. Verse 26 there. Isn't that interesting? Adding
to your stature is counted as the least, the small thing. And
you having something to eat is much greater than that. And we
think, wait a minute, that seems backwards to me. It seems like
a much bigger deal to me to add to my stature than just to get
something to eat. You know why? Because you're
taking for granted everything that's necessary for you to have
something to eat. And there's another reason too.
You're looking at it from your point of view and not God's. For God to add to your stature,
that's just one thing. He can just do that. It's just
one thing. For Him to feed you, He's got to do a lot of things.
A lot of things have to fall into place. We just take them
all for granted. And we look at it from our point
of view. I can't add to my stature. That's a big deal. That'd be
some great thing if I could add to my stature. But I can go get
something to eat. No, you can't. You can't do either
one. That's what he's saying. You
can't do either one. And the little one, the least,
is the adding to your stature. If you can't do that, then what
makes you think you can get you something to eat? Leave it to
him. Trust him with it. For you to eat in order for you
to eat god had to make a world He had to put the sun in the
sky to shine on that earth He had to create plants and animals
for you to eat he had to send rain upon his earth or there
ain't gonna be no eating Everything involved in providing and sustaining
that which you ate is You have to cross paths with that animal
or plant somewhere along the line and a lot of things have
to happen for that to happen. He gives you an appetite. He
gives you a desire to eat. I'll never forget somebody, a
good friend of mine that was dying and a long good while before
he died he completely lost his sense of taste. And it was impressed
upon me what a terrible thing that is to hear him talk about
it. He said I don't get it. Ain't no use me even eating.
I don't even want to eat. Can't taste it. And I thought, man, you talk
about taking something for granted. What I had for lunch today tasted
pretty good to me. It tasted real good, and I'm
thankful for that. But all of the things, He gives
you the means to obtain what you ate. The strength. The wisdom. The funds. 200 years ago would have taken
more strength and wisdom. Now it just takes funds, but
it takes strength and wisdom to get the funds to pay for the
food. I can't even think of it all,
can you? You see the perspective now? So what about you being
here tonight? What all had to happen for you
to be sitting right where you're sitting this evening? Why are you here? You had to want to, didn't you?
You had to want to. There's a whole lot of people
that don't want to. Are you thirsty? Where would you be tonight if
you were sick? Where would you be? Where would you be tonight
if you hated God? Why are you here? You already
asked that Chris. No. What I was asking before
is why aren't you watching TV or at some party or something.
What I'm asking now is why are you here? Why aren't you at one
of the other hundreds of churches around here that don't preach
the gospel? What happened and when so that
you even know that there is a here? A place that's different. How
do you know that? You see what I'm saying? Praise
ye the Lord. And the second reason I believe
David says it so much is because, as we've already touched on,
The first is that He's so worthy. He's so worthy. But then also
we're so prone to just take for granted all of the things that
we ought to be praising Him for. When was the last time you praised
God because things didn't happen the way you wanted them to? Do you thank Him for your food? You know, we would say that's
the small thing. The adding to our stature, that's
a big deal, but just eating, that's a small thing. No, it's
not either. Are we thankful for it? And I don't mean, I'm not
talking about saying your blessing. Now, there may be a good time
and place to verbally thank God with a group of people that you're
eating with, you're eating with his family, to thank God. But just saying your blessing
is one thing, but just to sit there and eat Just another hamburger. You know, I was just eating just
another hamburger the other day. And I thought, how many thousands
of hamburgers have I eaten? But you know, this might be the
best one I ever ate. This is just so good. You know
what the best hamburger I ever ate is? The one I'm eating at
the time. It's just so good. Thank God. Praise you, the Lord. It's just
another hamburger. Well, yeah, but man, it's good. Man, it's good. And the Lord,
from His very hand, put that down in front of me so that I
could enjoy that. I eat good, don't you? I eat
so good. And I'm thankful for that. When you wake up, do you praise
Him for a good night's sleep? Maybe you've had better night's
sleep, but are you thankful that you slept at all? It wasn't because
you didn't have a comfortable bed to sleep in and a soft pillow
to lay your head on. Praise Him. And you notice I
didn't say thank Him for a good night's sleep because you can
thank God silently. But I don't think you can praise
Him silently. Based on what the word means, I don't think you can do it without
opening your mouth. And so it's good to thank Him.
And it's good to thank Him in prayer, in secret. We should
never pray without gratitude unto God. But also praise Him. You're going
to have to make some noise to praise Him, aren't you? And how
many times does He say, praise ye, praise ye, praise ye the
Lord? We just kind of get tired of hearing and reading it, don't
we? Oh, but we shouldn't. I don't think you can praise
him quietly. I really don't. Do you know the word praise means? This is so interesting. I looked
it up because I thought I knew what it meant to speak highly
of. You know, when you praise somebody,
you say, boy, he's just an outstanding this or that salesman or whatever
he is good at it. Blessed of the Lord. Or whatever. You know what it
means? It means to shine. To flash forth light. Does that remind you of anything?
Our Lord Jesus Christ said to his disciples. Are you one of
those? You know what he said to us? Let your light so shine
before men that they may see your good works and glorify your
Father which is in heaven. Shine. The way to shine is to tell people
how great and how wonderful the Savior is. Whether you're saying
it with your lips or you're saying it with your actions, you're
saying it tonight. Because of all the places you
could be tonight, of all the things you could be doing tonight,
You're here to worship the God of heaven and earth. And you're
saying by your very presence here, He's worthy. He's worthy. So whether it's a good work or
a good word, the Lord says shine. And the way to shine is to show
how wonderful He is. He's the light. And if we can
reflect, then we can shine. If we can reflect His glory,
if we can reflect His light, then we're shining. And that's
what praise is. I'm pretty sure that's what praise is. To flash
forth light, to shine. And the other definition of the
word is to be boastful. And that reminds me of another
scripture too, doesn't it, you? God forbid that we should boast.
Save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. Praise is all to
do with Him, isn't it? shine Shine forth his glory So
that when people see that whether in your good works or a good
word What are they gonna do? I'm gonna glorify your heavenly
father That's praise right there and look at verse 2 Blessed be
the name of the Lord from this time forth and forevermore This
reminds us that we're not to just praise Him for all the stuff. I'm thankful for the stuff, for
all the stuff that He gives me. All the things, all the blessings,
the earthly blessings, the temporal blessings. But blessed be the
name of the Lord. Praise Him for the things that
He does for us, of course. Be thankful for that. But even
when He takes, You remember what Job said? And it wasn't because
God gave him something, it was even though God took something,
a lot of something. He said, blessed be the name
of the Lord. So don't just praise him for
the stuff, praise him for who he is. His name is his character
and his attributes. And I had this part, the last
part of verse 2, I had this impressed upon me, I guess, I guess you
could say I learned this, whatever that means. We don't ever really,
we kind of learn in steps, don't we? Don't know anything yet as
we ought to know, but I believe I learned a little something
about this just a few years ago. The Lord revealed it to me from
Jude 1, 24, just one chapter in Jude, verse 24. But listen
to this verse that I'm going to read you and see how it compares
with the last part of verse 2 of Psalm 113. Jude 24, now unto
him that is able to keep you from falling. Think about this
is praising him now. He's able. This is saying something
good. This is boasting in him. He's
able to keep you. You remember that word kept from
our study last time? To keep you. We're kept by the
power of God unto salvation. He's able to keep you from falling.
so that you will ultimately be saved, experience His salvation,
the fulfillment of it. He is able to keep you from falling
and to present you faultless before the presence of His glory
and He does it with exceeding joy. You talk about praising.
To the only wise God our Savior. There is a lot of praise in this
little verse in there. To the only wise God our Savior
be glory and majesty, dominion and power Both now, here's the
last part of Psalm 113 to both right now and ever. And he said,
Amen. Right now he's to be praised
right now. Don't wait until you know the
outcome of any matter. In order to praise him. Because
whatever the outcome, He's worthy to be praised, isn't He? Whatever
the outcome, He's to be praised right now. You don't need to
see what the Lord's going to do in order to praise Him. You
can praise Him for what He's already done, and you can praise
Him for what He's going to do because it's going to be good.
I guarantee you that. He doeth all things well. And what Jude is saying, and
what David said in our text, but perhaps Perhaps we haven't
praised the Lord as we ought in the past. Guilty. That's just
the truth. We take it for granted. We hear
praise the Lord and it just goes one in. We've heard it so many
times. Perhaps we've taken for granted
all of his benefits and all that he is to us. But David's resolve
is this from this time forth. You see that I can't change what's
already happened, but starting right now. starting right now. I pray he'll reveal to us the
magnitude of all of what we consider the little bitty blessings. I
pray that he would make us good at discerning just how good he
is to us. Just how many of his mercies
we experience every moment. And that from this time forth,
we begin to praise the Lord. You know, just not going around just spouting
praise of the Lord, but say good things about Him. Boast in Him.
Shine. Let that light shine before men. By our actions and by our words. Because I'm pretty sure this
is not a silent thing. When people get tired of hearing
it, well they can just go hang out with people that aren't praising
the Lord. But I hope it doesn't happen that way. And he said, praise the Lord
ye servants of his. Not ye colleagues of his. The
Lord doesn't have any colleagues. And you know, I've had... I want
to go back to verse 1 here. This is in verse 1 again. You
servants of His. I've worked with quite a few
people that were pretty outstanding people and kind and decent people,
cooperative, good to work with. I've thought a lot of them. I've
worked with quite a few. I've worked with quite a few. But
how many of you worked for that were that way? There's a difference in there.
You know why? Well, the world, even the world, even the blind
ignorant world has a saying that goes like this, power corrupts
and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Have you ever heard that saying? Well, the world is wrong about
that. They're wrong about that, but
they're on to something. They've noticed something. They're
wrong. Power doesn't corrupt. You was
already corrupt before you had any power. But they're noticing
something that is true. Something that makes them say
that. They say power corrupts. There's a reason why they say
that. Because power brings out the corruption that's in you. So that's why there's not that
many bosses, if you've ever been able to say that. But I have
had one or two that I looked up to, was able to look up to,
but I've had a lot of bosses in my life. And one or two of
them were complete jerks. That's the nicest thing I can
think of to say about them. And that's because our natural
corruption is brought out. whenever we're given some authority.
Unless the Lord is gracious now and restrains it. How many in
authority are worthy of praise? But our God is on the throne
of the universe. And the government of all things,
the government of all governments is on his shoulders. And he is
absolutely worthy of that throne. He is worthy of nothing but praise. He's never given an order. He's never ordained anything. He's never executed anything
from his throne. He's never brought anything to
pass that wasn't praiseworthy. That wasn't admirable and worthy
of our gratitude and praise. He's holy. He doeth all things
well. He's good and right. He's compassionate
and kind and tenderhearted and patient and forgiving and plenteous
in mercy. Praise ye the Lord, ye servants
of his. His yoke is indeed easy, is it
not? Have you not found it to be so?
His burden is light. To work for him is rest. And
to be his bond slave is the very definition of freedom. Praise
ye the Lord. Verse three, from the rising
of the sun unto the going down of the same, the Lord's name
is to be praised. Isn't that beautiful? Maybe you
started the day praising Him. Because nothing bad had happened
yet, you know. But it won't be long now, will
it? You begin the day, you know, maybe praising the Lord. You're
just determined to. If your days are like my days,
it won't be long before disappointment comes, doesn't it? But you know
what? Are you disappointed in Him?
Is that where the disappointment's coming from? You're disappointed
in the Lord? Is it the Lord that's let us
down? You know that point of the day I'm talking about. It
doesn't take long, does it? You think, boy, I hope this is
a good day. We're going to do everything today that we planned
to do. Everything's going to go the way I want it to. It's
not going to be like every other day I've lived my whole life.
This one's going to be a good one, you know. And then, boy,
something. It's not the Lord that let us
down. It's not even some godless infidel that's let us down. Who
is it? Is it you? Did you let yourself
down? Well, let me just say this. If
we, you and I, cannot see, if we cannot see, if we cannot acknowledge,
if we cannot confess that even in our lowest, darkest hour in
this world that we are infinitely blessed of the Lord, then we
have let ourselves down, my friends. When disappointment comes, you
just disappointed yourself. That's what happens. I can't even think of what my
darkest moment in my life would have been. I think about when
my dad died. It was very sudden and unexpected
and just crushing. I don't know if that was it or
not. But you know, whenever it was,
whatever it was, I was in the hand of God Almighty and enjoying
blessings countless, innumerable, immutable, eternal, Glorious
blessings and mercies and benefits from my God in that very hour
And if I was too blind to see it, then I disappointed myself. That's what happened Now verse 4 let's take verses
4 and 5 together The Lord is high above all nations in his
glory above the heavens Who is like unto our God? Who dwelleth
on high When you think about this, he dwells on high, but
he humbles himself to behold the things that are in heaven
and in the earth. Even the things in heaven, for
him to have any consideration for the angels is a condescension. And the glorified saints, did
you notice that? Even the things in heaven, he
humbles himself even to behold the things that are in heaven.
The stars are not pure in his sight. He charges even his angels
with folly. Imagine that he would care anything
about or even notice us down here on earth. Our Lord humbles
himself even to notice us. And then think how he humbled
himself to actually come down here where we were. Where we are. and then to become
one of us being found in fashion as a man he was made under the
law made under the curse that he might redeem us who are under
the curse to become one of us being found in fashion as a man
and then even as a man he unbelieved himself and became obedient unto death
You think of the death he died, even the death of the cross.
This is the Son of God, this is the Lord of Glory. This is
God the Son, hanging naked on a cross, having been spit on
and beaten, punched in the face with fists, his beard ripped
out, whipped with a cat and nine tails, a crown of thorns rammed
up on his head, bloody from the crown of his head to his very
feet, nailed to a cross in open shame. If we had any idea who it is
now, that came so low, we would never cease to marvel and never
cease to praise him. Without controversy, Paul said,
great is the mystery of godliness. Nobody would argue with this.
God was manifest in the flesh. What a great mystery. Justified in the Spirit, seen
of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the
world, and received up into glory. He's not humiliated right now. He's given a name which is above
every name. And every knee is going to bow
to Him, and every tongue confess that He's Lord, and a whole bunch
of them already have. How about yours? Have your knees bowed to Him
as your tongue confessed? that Jesus Christ is Lord to
the glory of God the Father. Some, even as he hung there,
you think about the picture of him and knowing why he was there
because everybody hated him. Jews, Gentiles, the rulers of
the earth at that time, they all gathered together against
thy holy child Jesus. Everybody despised him. And we
stripped him, beat him, spit on him, humiliated him, and nailed
him to a cross so that everybody could see what a wretch we thought
he was. And some looked at him there
and said, there's my Lord right there. There's my King. From the very throne of glory
to the depths of this depraved world, from the throne and being
praised by all the angels of glory. You think about what happened
when he was up there when he was on his throne to the cross
for being praised by all the angels to being spit on by devils. He humbled himself for being
highly honored by the heavenly host to being betrayed and forsaken,
even by his best friends in this earth. From the darling son of
God in the bosom of his father, to my God and my God. Why? That's not forsaken me. He humbled himself to behold
the things that are in heaven and that are in the earth and
we're fixing to find out why in the next verse. He came down
to raise somebody up. He beheld us Why didn't he just
leave us where we were? That's what the law did. When the Levite passed by that
man bleeding and dying in the ditch, he looked at him and passed
by on the other side. Nothing the law can do for him.
And the Pharisee, religion, looked at him and passed by on the other
side. But our Lord beheld, He condescended
to behold us. And you know what it says about
Him in that same context? He had compassion on Him. And
He went where He was. Those are some of the most beautiful
words you will ever hear. He came where He was. That's
what our Lord did for us. And He had to come way down to
come where I was. And he came down, that he might
raise me up. He raiseth up the poor out of
the dust, verse 7 of our text, and lifteth the needy out of
the dunghill, that he may set him with princes, even with the
princes of his people. He came down to the dunghill
high in the world, having beheld us, beheld even while we were
yet sinners now. He didn't have any illusions
about what we were and why. He beheld us. He condescended
to behold us and still came down. Even while we were yet sinners,
he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even the
death of that cross. He came down to the dunghill
because there were some beggars down there that he had to raise
up. Why? Why did he have to raise
them up? Well, because he loves them.
Always has, always will. Would it shock you to hear me
say that the Lord of Glory gave himself because he could not
live without you. He could not live without me
if we are his children. And I don't mean by that that
he needed me or you for any other reason than this. Love. The need is love. He is the self-sufficient,
solitary God who said, if I needed anything, would I ask you? You're the creature. He's the
potter and we're the clay. He doesn't need us for anything.
But, if he's the self-sufficient, solitary God, then what's he
doing bothering with beggars on dunghills? That's a pretty
good question. There's just one answer to it.
He loves them. He can't let them go. He can't
live without them. And I'll tell you this, in Ephesians
1.23 it says, We are His body. Do you know the rest of it? The
fullness of Him that filleth all in all. You think about that
for a second. We are the fullness of the one
who is the fullness of everything. He doesn't consider himself complete without his sheep. That's why he did what he did. because he loved us and he must
have us. He came where we were and we know what it took for
that to happen. We weren't redeemed with corruptible
things but with the precious blood of God's Son. The last verse expresses a couple
of things that I'll just close with. He maketh the barren woman
to keep house and to be a joyful mother of children. These beautiful
pictures in the scripture Is there any more? You know, you
can't define something by just saying, here's what it means
and writing it down in a book. I mean, that can be helpful.
Webster's Dictionary, we've all used it. It can be helpful to
get us on the right track with regard to the word that maybe
we haven't heard before or haven't used much. That's fine. But the Lord doesn't define things
that way. You know how he defines joy in
this verse right here? A mother holding her newborn
baby. A barren woman holding her newborn
child that she never in a million years thought could ever be possible. And yet she's looking into the
face of the child of her womb. That's the definition of joy
in this verse right here. and a joyful mother of children.
So we see that when the Lord comes, there's joy. What you never thought could
be possible, all of a sudden is the reality. It's too good
to be true, my sins could never be gone, and yet they are. I could never have communion
with a God, a holy God of this universe, and yet I do. The impossible has happened.
The dead is alive. The leper is cleansed. The beggar is a prince. Now I'll tell you what else this
teaches. The sovereignty of our God. This is a barren woman that just
had a baby. There's no way Sarah's ever having
a baby. And when the Lord told her she
was, she laughed. And the Lord said, Abraham, what's
she doing laughing? Is anything too hard for the
Lord? We ought to ask ourselves that question fairly often. Is there anything too hard for
my God? Look at what He's done for us.
What shall He not do for us. Let's pray.