So we're looking today at Psalm
98. Oh, sing unto the Lord a new
song, for He hath done marvelous things. His right hand and His
holy arm hath gotten Him the victory. The Lord hath made known
His salvation, His righteousness hath He openly showed in the
sight of the heathen. He hath remembered his mercy
and his truth toward the house of Israel. All the ends of the
earth have seen the salvation of our God. Make a joyful noise
unto the Lord, all the earth. Make a loud noise and rejoice
and sing praise. Sing unto the Lord with the harp
and the voice of a psalm. With trumpets and sound of the
cornet, make a joyful noise before the Lord, the King. Let the sea
roar and the fullness thereof, the world and they that dwell
therein. Let the floods clap their hands.
Let the hills be joyful together before the Lord, for he cometh
to judge the earth with righteousness, shall he judge the world and
the people with equity or fairness. Oh, singing to the Lord a new
song. We've talked about that from time to time. Many of the
Psalms speak about singing a new song unto the Lord. And our praises
unto the Lord should be new every morning because the mercies of
God are new every morning. And He deserves a new song, does
He not? not just some rote thing that
we go through out of habit or whatever, but to pause and consider
the goodness of God. And in so doing, we will sing
unto the Lord a new song. Now, when you just go through
the motions of religion, that's an old song. But when you worship
the Lord in spirit and truth, that's a new song. And because
it is new, because it's the work of the Spirit of God in the sons
of God, which a thing is that which He brings about, which
is new. It's not something that's old
that comes from us, but it is that which is brought about by
Him. And why do we sing unto the Lord
a new song? Because He has done marvelous
things, wondrous things in the earth. I mean, every man can
see. the marvelous things that he's
done in the earth. Who can look around him and look
at the creation and not just be amazed? If you've never had
any spiritual understanding at all. You know, I mean even the The creation, as it says here,
the floods clap their hands, the hills are joyful. I mean,
even the very, what we would consider inanimate objects and
the dumb animals bring praise unto the Lord. All creatures
great and small are those that are to give praise unto the Lord.
Because why? Because he hath done marvelous
things in the earth. Now that's set apart, the natural
creation is something that every man can see, and because every
man can see it, every man, the scripture says, is without excuse,
because in those things, without any spiritual understanding whatsoever,
in those things there is a testimony to the glory of God. And men
ought, because of that, to fall on their faces and worship God. But the Scripture says, because
they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, they worshipped
and served the creature more than the Creator. And that is
the natural bent of man. And so while we say that men
ought to do those things, he ought to worship God, we know
that by nature he will not worship God. Men will not worship God. Now they'll worship, you know,
you hear a lot of people talk about nature, mother nature,
I hate that. I mean every time I hear that
term, Mother Nature, it just sends chills up and down my back.
Why not just say the sovereign God of the universe brought these
things to pass, not Mother Nature. Things don't just happen in the
earth. They happen because God causes
them to happen. And so he's the one that's due
the praise, not mother nature, as if mother nature is gonna
take care of us. Mother nature, who is mother
nature? I've never known anything about mother nature. His right hand and his holy arm
have gotten him the victory. Now we need to understand this
clearly. The salvation of God's people
is not directly for their benefit. Now they do benefit in it, but
the salvation of God's people is primarily for the purpose
of bringing glory to His name. That's why he has gotten him
the victory. That's what we read about in
Isaiah, where he says, who is this that cometh from Edom with
dyed garments from Basra? He said, it is I, mighty to save. Mine own arm hath gotten me the
victory. You see, Christ has triumphed
over all of His enemies. And the enemies of Christ are
the enemies of His people. And the Lord in His mercy and
kindness would deliver His people for what? His namesake. Why did He deliver Israel? For
His namesake. It's His victory. It's His glory. It rightly belongs to Him. And
we ought to give Him the praise and the glory. Man is just kind
of like a bystander. I started to say he was an innocent
bystander, but he's a guilty bystander. He's not an innocent
bystander. He's standing there guilty from
head to foot, and God, in His mercy, has determined to redeem
sinners. What a glorious thing. His arm
hath gotten him the victory, his holy arm. That is, there
is none like him. The Lord hath made known his
salvation. His righteousness hath he openly
showed in the sight of the heathen. The gospel is not hid. The Lord didn't do something
and cause it not to be known in the earth. He could have. He could have secretly saved
his people without any fanfare or whatever, and we could just
wake up one day in the presence of God if it had pleased him
to do it that way, but it didn't. He said he would demonstrate
his righteousness, his justice, and his glory, and his mercy
in the earth. And so He has made known His
salvation. All of creation, whether they
like it or not. Now we've talked about this before,
but you know they've changed now. They don't talk about, it
used to be B.C. and A.D. And they changed all that because
they didn't want to give glory to God. But it don't make any
difference because the change in the date is still the same
thing. And what is it? It's when Jesus Christ came into
the world. God, who at sundry times in divers
manners, hath in time past spoken unto us by the prophets, hath
in these last days, brethren, the world knows of but two times,
the former times and the latter days. And these are the last
days. Ever since Christ came into the
world, John said it. He said, this is the last time. This is the last age. This is
the last era. There is not coming another one.
Christ has come in. This is the day of salvation.
Christ has come into the world to redeem His people. And whether
the world wants to admit it or not, even the very hinge of time
centers on Him, before Christ and after. In the year of our
Lord is what the AD stands for. I used to, when I was a kid,
I thought it meant after death. But it means Anno Domini in the
year of our Lord. Now they've changed it to CE,
I think it is. The common era, or current era,
or something like that. Some ridiculous song. How foolish
is the way of man. Men will do whatever they can
to seek to rob God of glory. But they can't do it. because
God has ordained to have praise in the earth through the salvation
of His people. His righteousness hath He openly
showed in the sight of the heathen. He hath remembered His mercy
and His truth toward the house of Israel. That's pretty plain, is it not?
He has remembered His mercy and His truth to a particular people. He says the house of Israel.
Now we know that He is not a Jew which is one outwardly, but one
which is one inwardly. The Lord has raised up the Jews
in order that He might manifest His people in the earth. That's
the reason He chose the nation of Israel out of all the people
in the earth, was to demonstrate and illustrate. His eternal love
for those people that He chose in Christ before the foundation
of the world, before Abraham had any seed. Before Jacob was
ever born, the Lord had a people in Christ. And he has showed
his salvation and he will remember his truth toward the house of
Israel. All the ends of the earth have
seen the salvation of our God. That is, there's not a place
on earth, dear brethren, at the present time, there's not a place
on earth where the gospel has not been declared. Now, people
say, oh, well, what about all those people that haven't heard,
who are they? The Scripture says that His sound went into all
the earth. Men can't stand before God one
day in the judgment and say, well, we didn't know. No. Men
know. The problem that men have is
not that they don't know. It's that they won't worship
Him. They reject Him. They hate Him. They say, we will
not have this man to rule over us. Make a joyful noise unto the
Lord all the earth. That doesn't leave anybody out.
Everybody's included. Make a joyful noise unto the
Lord all the earth. Make a loud noise, a joyful noise
and a loud noise. Now, some people complain, well,
the reason I don't sing is because I can't carry a tune. Well, it
doesn't make any difference whether you can carry a tune or not.
Make a joyful noise and a loud noise. You can be joyful. You
can be loud. It doesn't say sing with a beautiful
voice. It just says praise God with
whatever you have. I remember when I was growing
up, there was an old gentleman that was a part of the church
that I grew up in and he couldn't sing a lick. But from time to time, he'd stand
up and he'd say, God gave me a song. People laughed at him. But he gave praise unto God. He sang the song that God gave
him. And the Lord was more pleased
with that worship. than is with all of the beautiful
voices of all the choirs that practice up and get everything
just right. And you know, it's just a wondrous
thing and people just swoon and whatnot. God's not interested
in none of that. That's all done for men. See,
that's the way of men. Men think the Lord's pleased
with these mighty cathedrals and all this swelling music and
everything goes and God's just sitting up there, oh, you know,
it's wonderful. God doesn't care anything about that because the
Lord looks on the heart. And He would have men to worship
Him in spirit and truth, singing to the Lord. all ye lands, make
a loud noise and rejoice and sing praise. We rejoice. I mean, it's a glorious thing,
is it not, to praise God? I mean, I look forward to coming
together with the brethren to sing. I mean, what a glorious
thing it is to praise God with our voices. to lift up his name
on high in song, sing unto the Lord with the harp and the voice
of a song. Now, you know in the Old Testament,
And in the Psalms, there are many of these instruments that
are often mentioned and to be used. Now, we've talked about
this to some extent in times past, but when we think of the
harp, I mean, what we think of a harp is a big thing, you know,
with people play strings on it. And there's evidence that David,
whenever he played a harp, and it was that sort of an instrument.
Men have taken that, however, as they look at the scriptures,
and when they read about a harp, that's all they can think about.
But I believe this is a true thing, and I believe that I can
prove it. I'm not gonna spend the time
to do it. But there's only three instruments that's ever mentioned
in the New Testament. And only two of them that's ever
mentioned in the context in which we would think of them. One is
a pipe, which it's not used in the term, it's just used as an
illustration in the New Testament. One, the other is a trumpet. But the amazing thing is in the
scripture, the only time that the trumpet's ever mentioned
is in the context of the angels. declaring the glory of God. The last trump shall sound. And the trumpet, if you read
in the book of the Revelation about the trumpets, the trumpets
that sound, they're sounded by the angels, by the messengers. if you so speak. They may have
reference to angelic beings as we think of them, but likely
just speaking about the messengers because the gospel is sent as
the sound of a trumpet. As Brother Al pointed out there
a few weeks ago about the Lord's use of the trumpet to declare
the truth of God in the giving of the law and whenever they
would have these feast days, the trumpet would sound. But
that's what the trumpet is speaking about. It's about declaring a
message. It's a loud thing. You cannot
escape it. And then the other is the harp.
The pipe, which is not really spoken of, except in a way of
illustration. And the trumpet is the sound
that's brought forth by the angels, but the harp Now you see a lot
of times in artist depictions angels with harps. There's no
angels in the scriptures that have harps. The harps in the
book of the Revelation, if you read it, it's always speaking
about the voice. It's not talking about a stringed
instrument. Now, some have taken the absence
of instruction about musical instruments in the New Testament
and they've made it into an idol of sorts in that they say, well,
you could not possibly have a musical instrument in the meeting of
the church because the scripture never indicates that we have
it. Well, it doesn't say anything about having a pulpit either.
It doesn't say a lot of things that we do, so it's not that
there's something evil or wrong with musical instruments, but
we do need to understand this, that they are not prescribed
in the New Testament because the worship of the New Testament
is vastly different than the worship of the Old Testament.
The worship of the Old Testament was something that was prescribed
and set out and this is what they were told to do and these
particular instruments were called upon to be used. We don't have
that given to us in the New Testament. We are, however, given indication
that the instrument of choice is the voice. Praise God with
the harp. See, He'd given each one of us
a harp. If you go and read in the book of Revelation, you'll
see what I'm saying. They're speaking about the voice.
It says right here, what's it say? Sing unto the Lord with
the harp. Now does that mean sing unto
the Lord accompanied with the harp? No, it means singing to
the Lord with the harp that He gave you. Why? Because, how did
I say that? It says, with the harp and the
voice of a psalm. So, when you look at the New
Testament, a case can be made for saying that there are no
musical instruments mentioned in the New Testament. But you cannot make that into
a prescribed thing wherein you prevent someone from using a
musical instrument. But what's happened today is
they've become the central point. And most churches wouldn't even
think about it. They'd probably not even have
church if they didn't have somebody to play the piano or the guitar
or something. Because it's just like, but you
gotta have that. Well, no, the Lord gave us the
most beautiful musical instrument that's ever been designed. And
he put it right, we don't even have to carry it with us. We
don't even have to pack it up and bring it with us because
we always got it. according to the mercy of God.
Now, having said that, praise God with all that's within us. And certainly, you know, as the
Lord enables us to praise Him with whatever we have at hand,
the voice of a psalm, the trumpets, the sound of the cornet, make
a joyful noise before the Lord, the King. Let the sea roar and
the fullness thereof, the world and they that dwell therein.
Let the floods clap their hands. Let the hills be joyful together.
The scripture says, the trees of the field shall clap their
hands. The floods clap their hands. Now, we know that the
floods don't have hands, do they? But it says, they clap their
hands. Well, what does it mean? It just
means that the roaring of the sea is unto the glory of God.
Every time a wave crashes to the shore, it's the praise of
God being brought forth by the creation that He made. And only He can still those waves. There's not a thing on earth
that a man can do to stop the waves of the ocean. Not one thing
in the world. They're going to keep coming
just as long as the Lord sends them. Because they belong to
Him. And He'll have praise from it.
Let the floods clap their hands. Let the hills be joyful together. It's kind of an interesting thing
if you pause and think about the world before man was created. Now, people, you know, we're
pretty self-centered, are we not? I mean, we think of ourselves
as really being something. It's like the Lord made this
world here just for us. No, He made the world for Himself.
He made us for Himself. To bring glory to His name. Oh,
let the creation, think about this, before man was ever created,
And of course you know all these guys go running around here.
They tell us how millions and billions of years ago and all
that stuff and all these dinosaurs was running around and whatnot.
Now I'm personally of the belief that there wasn't any dinosaurs.
Now you can call me crazy or whatever you want to be. But
my own personal feeling is that the Lord put the bones in the
ground to confound the wisdom of men. That's just foolish in
some ways for me to even say that. And you can believe in
dinosaurs if you want to and all of that stuff. I know one
thing, I don't believe that the oil was made by the dinosaurs
dying and all winding up two miles down in the ground. I mean,
how foolish is some of the things that men come up with. Why do
men come up with theories like that? Because they don't want
to give God the glory for making the thing by His own hands. He made the world and put the
oil in there. Why'd he put the oil in there?
Because he would have us to drive cars one day. I mean, you know,
and isn't that foolish? I mean, people go around and
they try to make out all this, oh, we gotta take care of the
planet and whatnot. Well, I mean, we need to be wise
stewards with all that God gave us, dear brethren. Surely we
are to be wise. But the Lord put the coal in
the ground for a reason. He put the oil in the ground
for a reason. And so these things are so foolish
when men try to come up with all these different ways. What
we're going to do is make everything electric. So what are we going to do then?
I mean, how are we going to make the electricity? You know, oh,
well, we're going to do it with the solar panels. Well, how are
we going to make the solar panels? You know what I mean? It's just
foolish. But see, the people that propose
all this stuff, they're the smart ones, aren't they? I mean, they're
telling us how all this stuff, we're going to just have a clean
world, and people ain't even going to have to work. We'll
all be getting a check from the government, and everything will
just be great. But all of these things really
are the rebellion of men against God who said, in the sweat of
thy face, you shall labor. Because isn't that really the
goal, to get everybody where nobody has to do nothing? And
everything just goes along great, and everybody's happy. That's
what everybody's looking for, is happiness. Everybody wants
to be happy. and they're gonna make us happy
whether you like it or not. Let the floods clap before the
Lord for he cometh to judge the earth. He coming to judge the earth. We're part of the earth, don't
you understand that? Where'd we come from? The dirt,
the dust of the earth, that's what the Lord made us out of.
We're part of the earth there, people. I mean, we don't like
to think, well, God's coming to judge the earth and everything
that's in it. And the Scripture says that the
elements will melt with the fervent heat. He comes to judge the earth with
righteousness. Shall he judge the earth? He's
gonna judge the earth with righteousness. Now, what is the righteousness
of God? How do we know what the righteousness
of God is? Oh, it's the Ten Commandments.
Dear brethren, the Ten Commandments is not the righteousness of God.
The righteousness of God is Jesus Christ the righteous. He is the
righteousness of God. And that's the standard by which
the world is going to be judged. And those that are in Christ
are going to be judged righteous. Not because they're any different
or better than anybody else, but because they're in Christ,
who is the righteousness of God. That's the message we declare,
is that Christ is the righteousness of God. And he's that one into
whose hands is committed all power in heaven, earth, and hell. And he's that one who is the
judge of all the earth. And it is appointed unto men
once to die. But after this, the judgment.
With righteousness shall he judge the world. That is exactly the
standard that he is going to use. Is Jesus Christ the righteous? That's the righteousness of God.
And the people with equity, fairness, nobody's gonna be able to stand
before the Lord one day and say, well, Lord, it wasn't fair. Because there's not a man that
can stand before God in his own self, in his own flesh and blood,
and not be brought before the Lord as guilty. There's none
righteous, no, not one. for all have sinned and come
short of the glory of God. And apart from the grace of God
to give a man life, he doesn't have anything to look forward
to but death and destruction. I mean, that's just the simple
sad fact. If you want to look at it as
sad, but to the people of God, it's a glorious thing that he
has seen fit to show mercy. And we've been sent into the
world to declare the mercy of God revealed in Jesus Christ.
And He says to His people, to sinners, to those that know themselves
to need a Savior, He said, come unto Me, all you that labor and
are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. What a glorious Savior
we have. He's not one that's tried to
do something and failed, but He has accomplished his work
in the earth. and the world, the earth, the
worlds, the creation outside of what we see. You know, we
can only see so far. I think they had a telescope.
They was looking out far as they could see, and I think it crashed
into the, broke off or something. I didn't really read the whole
thing, but it sounded like the thing crashed and destroyed all
this work they had done, and now they can't even see what
they were seeing. Well, they couldn't see but just a little
bit anyway. But they thought they could see
a lot. But you know, the funny thing is they keep looking out
there and they say, well, you know, we need to look further.
I mean, surely we can, if we look a little further, we can
find out some stuff. But every time they go a little
bit further, they just find out they don't know any more than
they did when they started. Because God is greater than all
the things that men can comprehend. Can somebody search and find
out God? Can you know the mind of God
except that He should show it? And He has revealed what He would
have us to know. See, there's a lot of things
He hadn't determined that we should know. The things that
are secret belong to Him. The things that are revealed
belong to us. Now, He has revealed to us that Jesus Christ is the
Savior of sinners. We can know that. We can declare
that without any equivocation because He is that One who came
to seek and to save that which is lost, that which belonged
to Him from the beginning. And of those that the Father
has given Him, He shall lose nothing. What a glorious Savior
we have.