May the Lord be pleased to bless
us together this morning as we consider his word. Let's turn
to the book of Psalms, Psalm 78 and we'll read verse 4. Psalm 78 and reading verse 4. We will not hide them from their
children, showing to the generation to come the praises of the Lord
and his strength and his wonderful works that he hath done. We have this long psalm of Asaph
which runs through in some detail God's goodness and God's mercy
and favour to Israel as they came out of Egypt and how the
Lord was with them and helped and blessed them through that
time in the wilderness and provided for them. And the thrust of Asa's
concern is that the people that lived when he wrote this psalm
and the generations that should follow should realise the great
goodness and the great favour and the mercy of the Lord. And
so we read these words and he commences by saying, give ear,
O my people. And how needful it is that we
do give ear to the word of the Lord. And as we give ear to the
word of the Lord, that that word is then as it were, distributed
and spread abroad, and particularly to our children, to our families,
and to those that we meet with. And he says, he says, we will
not hide them from their children. And how important this is, that
we do not hide these things. We are privileged indeed to have
the Word of God. We're privileged indeed to have
a wonderful account of God's dealings from Genesis to Revelation. And we need to remember such
a statement as this, that you and I today may not hide the
great truths of God from children, from our children and from other
children. And that they might be shown
to the generation to come how important it is and how perhaps
There has been and there is a neglect in the day and age in which we
live that these things are shown. And the psalmist tells us what
these things are. He says, the praises of the Lord,
His strength and the wonderful works that He has done. Well, perhaps we forget sometimes
that we have a great God. A God who is worthy of our praise. Now, sometimes we forget to praise
God. I'm sure it's a thing which is
common today. And on the other hand, there
may be an attempt to praise God, but sometimes praise is just
mere words. People who just sing praises
without the praise coming from their heart, it really is acting
in a hypocritical way. It is essential that we desire
that the Lord would give us true praise in our heart for the favour
and the mercies of the Lord. David in the 34th Psalm, he said,
I will bless the Lord at all times. His praise shall continually
be in my mouth." Well, that was a good desire, wasn't it? And
may that be our desire, to praise the Lord continually. And it's
quite clear that this is an audible praise. Sometimes we might be
thankful, I hope we are thankful, in our heart, in our mind, for
the things that the Lord does for us, And when he answers our
prayer that we would truly be thankful in our mind. This is
right and proper and good. But here we have a very clear
statement that it should be a spoken statement. His praise shall continually
be in my mouth. So that we might acknowledge
what the Lord does and what the Lord means to us and the greatness
of our God and his wonders that he makes known. It's good, surely,
therefore, to observe a statement like this, that his praise shall
continually be in our mouth. My soul shall make her boast
in the Lord. The humble shall hear thereof
and be glad. O magnify the Lord in me and let us exalt his name
together. I sought the Lord and he heard
me and delivered me from all my fears. And so if we have been
favoured in our lives, when we've sought the Lord, that means we've
prayed to God. We've prayed to God. We've sought
Him. And He's heard us. And He's delivered
us. Then has there been that praise
to our God from our mouths? There is a reluctance, isn't
there, to praise God. There is that in our nature,
which the devil brings about, that we are reluctant somehow
to acknowledge the Lord's goodness, the Lord's favour. And there
is therefore a reluctance to praise God for hearing and answering
prayer. Well, here we have then this
desire of Asaph, that he says he will not hide this truth,
the praises of the Lord, he will not hide them. May we not therefore
hide the praises of the Lord. Remembering what David said,
remember what Asaph said, and then we can go to the New Testament
and we can read what the Apostle Paul said when he wrote to the
Hebrews And in the last chapter, the 13th verse we, the 13th chapter,
the 15th verse we read, By him therefore let us offer the sacrifice
of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of our lips
giving thanks to his name. Well, it's very clear, isn't
it? And it means really that to praise God is a sacrifice. And what that means, a sacrifice
is something which we give and we don't receive payment for.
We give it, we give it freely and it has therefore a cost to
us in one way or another. It may not have a physical cost. In Old Testament times, of course,
generally sacrifices had a physical cost. They had to bring animals
or flour or other meats to sacrifice and they had a cost. Well, the
sacrifice then of our lips, the praise to God continually, does
have a cost. A cost to us. It means that there
is an effort on our behalf. It's not something which we can
just think comes naturally to us. It's probably something which
does not come naturally to us. And therefore, there is involved
a cost in bringing praises of God from our lips, the fruit
of our lips. We think sometimes, don't we,
the need to be fruitful in the things of God and how necessary
it is. And here we have this statement here, the fruit of
our lips. And Paul goes on to say, but
to do good and to communicate Forget not. We are to communicate
in this way. For with such sacrifices God
is well pleased. Well, how good it is if we can
come and desire to do those things which the Word of God instructs
us in, and then to recognise that with these sacrifices God
is well pleased. Surely our concern should be
to please our God, our God who has done such great things, our
God who is so kind and gracious, so long-suffering to warn us. Our desire surely should be that
God will be well-pleased with our sacrifices. And therefore
our sacrifice is the praise to God continually. That is the fruit of our lips
giving thanks to his name. Well, do we have reason to thank
God? Do we have reason to thank God,
even this morning? Do we have reason to thank God
this morning for mercies? Indeed, mercies countless as
the sands which daily we receive. How often we are negligent of
praising and thanking our God for all His favours and for all
His mercies. And so we have this statement
here, the sacrifice of praise to God continually. So, the psalmist brings this
statement before us, that we will not hide from our children
the praises of the Lord. Well, that's a good consideration,
isn't it? On a Lord's Day, to bring praise
before our God, from our lips, to be able to thank Him for His
many mercies and for His many favours, so that the generation
to come might know that the Lord means something to us and the
Lord has done something for us. It's a privilege to acknowledge
the Lord's favour, to tell the generation to come If we're silent,
there will be no knowledge that the Lord is still working, the
Lord is still doing great things. There won't be any evidence of
the Lord's work. And so here we have this statement
that the generation to come might know of the Lord's mercy. Now, I believe this is therefore
in a double way. First of all, we have the word
of God. which gives us a glorious account
of His goodness and of His mercy, of His long-suffering, of His
wonderful provision for us, naturally, in the things that we need day
by day, and in a wonderful provision in the things of grace, through
His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. And my friends, these are wonderful
things, and these are great blessings And may you and I, therefore,
not hide these great truths from the generation to come, but that
we might be amongst those who follow the Word of God. Give ear, the Lord tells us,
O my people. We are to listen to what the
Lord says, and then we are to act on what the Lord says. because we are privileged, we
are favoured. Remember, it's addressed like
this, O my people, well, do we count ourselves amongst the people
of God? Indeed, have we the evidence
in our heart that we are the people of God? And if we do have
the evidence in our heart that we are the people of God, we
should not deny it, we should not pretend that we do not know
the truth of God. There is a very great evil in
acting a lie, in acting as though we are not aware of God's mercy,
that we are not aware of God's favour toward us, that we are
not aware of his great grace toward us. We're not aware of
his revelation that he's made known to us of the saving mercy
of the Saviour, of his great grace. Well, we should not ignore,
we should not deny God's favour toward us. What a blessing it
is if we can look into our hearts and analyse our lives and be
able to observe the goodness of the Lord toward us. How we want to be able to observe
that. Every one of us. The goodness
of the Lord toward us. We want to be able to observe
it. And if we see in our lives, if we see the goodness of the
Lord toward us, surely then our instruction is that we may therefore
show this blessing to the generation to come. Well, we have evidence
in the praises to the Lord and then of His strength. His strength. What do we know
of the strength of the Lord? What do we know of the strength?
Have we received strength from God? You know, we continue to
this day because of the favour of God. Do we understand that
the Lord has strengthened us? Maybe strengthen us in a physical
way. It's God that has given us strength. Maybe in a spiritual way, that
God's given us strength. Strength to hold on our way. Not to give up. Not to cast aside
that which God has given to us. And it is that strength, it's
his strength, which he imparts to us to enable us to continue
day by day in a natural way and also in a spiritual way. And so the Sama says, his strength,
his strength. Well, we know something of his
strength. how we can read in the word of
God of those who received his strength. Moses received the
strength of the Lord, didn't he? How he needed it as he led
the children of Israel. He needed God to give him that
strength. And how the Lord did supply that
strength. We know that David also needed
the help of God. He needed the strength of God,
and he acknowledged that it was God who gave him strength, it
was God who delivered him, and it was God who would deliver
him. He got the experience, he got the evidence of God's mercy
toward him, and therefore he was able to proclaim that. Remember when he came before
the king on that day when he heard Goliath speaking against
the Lord God, and he testified very clearly that it was God
that had delivered him, and it was God that would deliver him.
He had that faith given to him, and he was able to acknowledge
it. And there, amidst that great company, before the King, he
was not afraid to declare it. What a blessing for you and me,
my friends, if we are not afraid to declare the strength of God,
how He's helped us, how He's been with us, how He's been mindful
of us. His strength, He does give strength. He renews our strength. Isaiah
says, We renew our strength. A blessing
it is to know our strength is indeed renewed. Yes, we need
it, don't we? We need strength to be renewed. And Isaiah says, Even the youth
shall faint and be weary, and the young men shall utterly fall.
But may that weight upon the Lord shall renew their strength. God renews their strength. He gives them His strength. It's
renewed. And they shall mount up with
wings as eagles, they shall run and not be weary, and they shall
walk and not faint. The strength of God. Oh, my friends,
what a great God we have. You see, a God who is so strong. We perhaps look at ourselves,
don't we? And we realise how we fail. We look to ourselves. We find our strength fails. Our
strength does fail in many ways. Our strength fails perhaps in
prayer. Our strength fails perhaps in our walk and conversation. And we need the Lord to hold
us up. And it's only His strength that
prevails. We come to prove our weakness. We're not strong ourselves. But
here we have God's strength. His strength. To remember His
strength. The Apostle Paul, as I often
refer to, tells us I can do all things through Christ that strengthens
me. There's our secret. My friends,
there's no strength really outside of Christ, but there's a fullness
in Christ, a wonderful strength in Christ. So to be able to testify
and to speak of the strength of our God. Well again, not only
have we got the record of it in the Word of God, also have
we got the evidence of it in our own lives. When God has strengthened
us, perhaps impossible situations
may have been in front of us. and yet we've gone in the strength
of the Lord God. What do we read? I will go in
the strength of the Lord, I will make mention of His righteousness,
even of Thine only. What a blessing that is, to go
in that strength, not in our strength, in His strength. And then you see two things. First of all, We will not fail. Secondly, his name will be honoured
and glorified because it will be his strength that we received
to go forth and to speak of his righteousness, of his only. I will say, we will not hide
them from their children, showing to the generation to come the
praises of the Lord and his strength." Well, it's a great blessing to
receive strength from the Lord God. And then he says, he's going
to speak and tell the generation of his wonderful works that he
has done. We should never tire of recording
and recording the works of the Lord that He has done. Again, we have a wonderful record
in the Word of God of His work. Right from the beginning of Genesis
with creation, the work of God, you think of that work, isn't
it a wonderful work that He has done? Men despise it, put it
aside, the truth remains, it is a wonderful work of God and
we should never be ashamed or backward in declaring such a
great and glorious truth that the Lord has created all things
from nothing. Man cannot understand it naturally. Man rejects it because he cannot
understand it in a physical way. But God gives faith to believe
it. And it is a wonderful work that
he hath done. And it is good if you and I are
able to therefore stand firm on these truths. The Word of
God tells us so clearly. He spake the Word into being. He spake and it was done. And my friends, we have the same
God today. We have a great God. We should
not therefore think of Our God is a little God. We have a great
God who does great things. He created the heavens and the
earth and all things therein. He created man. He created him
for his praise. And then as we look through the
Word of God, we see so many occasions, do we not, the wonderful miracles
that occurred in Old Testament times. The Lord appeared. The Lord did those things which
were impossible. You only have to think of the
lives of Gideon, Jonah, David, Solomon, Ezra, Nehemiah, Joseph. So many occasions that God did
great things, wonderful works. And they are recorded, my friends,
for your encouragement and for my encouragement today. And as
they are there, They are recorded so that we might today declare
it to the generation to come, the wonderful works that He has
done. And then as we go on, we look
into the New Testament and we see there the wonderful miracles
that the Lord Jesus Christ performed. His work evidenced how He came
into this world and did work such mighty acts, such wonderful
evidences of his power and of his strength and of his might.
He gave life, he gave sight, he gave hearing. Yes, he went
about doing good. What a wonderful record we have
of his wonderful works. And so often we forget to mention
it. We are almost afraid and ashamed
to mention it. And yet this is the God. The
God that we adore. I hope we adore this God. And
our hope is in what the Lord has done. That finished work
of the Saviour. What a wonderful work that is.
Do we declare it? Do we speak of it? Do we mention
it? The work of God. The work of
salvation. The work of redemption. What
a wonderful work it is, how gloriously it was performed, and it fulfilled
the promise which God had made right back in the early days
of the history of the world, that the seed of the woman should
crush the serpent's head. Oh, my friends, the testimony
of God, the fulfilling of His Word, and again, how instructive
it is to remember how the Word of God all fits together, and
how the many prophecies in the Word of God came to pass. They were fulfilled in the New
Testament, especially with reference to the life of the Lord Jesus
Christ. In detail, many, many years previously, there have
been those prophecies which had come to pass. the wonderful works
of God that he has done, they were fulfilled. Oh may we desire
to therefore bring these truths to the generation to come and
then to think of it in a more specific way, the work of God
in our own souls. Oh, glorious work, isn't it? It's a wonderful work. It's the
most important work. Without that work, we remain
dead, spiritually dead, in trespasses and in sins. But my friends,
if God has done that work in our soul, and that work is to
give us the gift of life, spiritual life, eternal life, it is a wonderful
work. A wonderful work. Do we ponder
it? Do we think about it? Who meditates
upon it? God's work in our hearts, in
our life, in our spirituals, in our innermost being. That
spiritual life is wonderful work. Can you lay claim today to His
work? His wonderful work in your soul. Can you lay claim to that? Oh, my friends, search it out.
Look for it. find it, desire it, pray for
it, acknowledge it, the wonderful work of God in your heart, the
greatest gift, the greatest favour, the greatest privilege that we
can ever think of or ever receive, God's grace, God's favour to
such unworthy sinners. We don't deserve it. We never
did deserve it. We never will deserve it. All
we can bring to God is our failure. We cannot come and say, I'm a
good man. We can come and say, I'm a bad
man. We can come and say, I'm ashamed in my life. We can't
come and say, I'm proud of my life. We have to come and say,
I'm ashamed in my life. My life has failure written over
it. But I desire to praise and glorify
and acknowledge the wonderful work of God in coming and claiming
a sinner, and coming and meeting with a sinner, a sinner on his
way to eternal hell. Oh, to think of the mercy
and the wonderful work of God, and that work of God made known
to us through the Holy Spirit's work, and to then direct us to
the redeeming work of the Saviour, what the Lord Jesus Christ has
done. The Word of God tells us here,
and His wonderful works that He hath done. What is the work of God? The
work of the Lord Jesus Christ mean to us today? What does it
mean to us today? Is it important? Is it necessary? Is it wonderful? Do you glory in what Christ has
done? And when you think of it, when
you recall the great cost that it was to deliver our soul, what
the Lord Jesus Christ did, He didn't halt, he didn't stop.
No, he went forward. He set his face like a flint
towards Jerusalem. He knew what was before him. That death, that agonising death. Yes, it was to save our souls. And what did he have to do? He
had to give his life. His life. Nothing less would
satisfy the demands of God's holy law. A righteous law. And we have sinned against that
law. And by nature we are unrighteous. We deserve the wrath of God. But oh then to realise that Lord
Jesus came to save our souls, to deliver us from the wrath
to come. Well, my friends, is this not
cause for thankfulness? Is this not cause to be able
to show to the generation to come the wonderful works that
He has done? Oh, His great love toward unworthy
sinners, Is our hearts touched by His love? Do we come and say,
on such love, my soul still ponder? Love so great, so rich, so free,
say whilst lost in holy wonder, why, O God, such love to me? Hallelujah! That means praise
the Lord, Hallelujah to our God. His praise, indeed, is worthy. It's worthy of our desire, isn't
it, to praise Him continually for His great love toward us,
for His wonderful works that He has done. Oh, what love there
was, wasn't there, toward us. It touched our hearts to think
that the Lord Jesus, He endured the wrath of His Father, He endured
that wrath against sin. He took it upon himself, this
great and glorious work that it was. He didn't turn back. He did all that his father gave
him to do. And he fulfilled it in every
detail. And he gave up the ghost. He
was able to declare, it is finished. He cried with a loud voice, it
is finished. The Lord Jesus spoke, didn't
he? He spoke very clearly. And we have a record of many
of the things that he spoke. The Lord Jesus spoke clearly.
My friends, we have his gracious example. And so we have this
statement here, showing the generation to come His wonderful works that
He has done. Well, how does that reflect in
our lives, your life and my life? It's not something that we just
mention once in our life. It's not just something which
is a one-off situation. You see, the praises of God are
continual. is it our concern to honour the
Lord, to honour our God, and also so that the generation to
come, the children, may know these things are real, that these
things are not just myths, they're not myths, they're not fairy
tales, they are true, it's God's work, We have the record of it
in His word, and we have the evidence of it in our hearts. Oh, what a testimony, is it not?
To be able to declare what the Lord has done, as recorded in
His word, and what He's done for us. Praise it out. In the things in providence,
in the things in grace, do we not have cause today to thank
God for His mercy, thank God for His favour, thank God for
His love. And therefore, let us not let
these blessings lie forgotten in unthankfulness and with our
praises die, but our heart be filled with God's favour and
filled with His love. It is our desire and our privilege
and our continual concern be able to come and hear the word
of God and to obey the word of God for His honour and for His
glory. What a debt we owe, don't we?
What a debt! Do you owe a debt? Do you owe
a debt to God? Why, you must answer before God.
But if you do, and if I do, then, my friends, are we hearing God's
word, speaking to our hearts. He says here, give ear. O my
people, incline your ears to the words of my mouth. We will
not hide them from their children, showing to the generation to
come the praise of the Lord and His strength and His wonderful
works that He has done. O the wonder then of redeeming
love, in redeeming our soul, the cost of our salvation, the
value of His blood, invaluable blood that has touched our hearts. O my concern be that what has
touched our hearts may touch our children's hearts, may touch
those we come in contact with, so that the name of our God may
be honoured and glorified and many souls blessed indeed. Amen.