I'll be on my phone with the rest of you.
I know he wants to go.
Good evening. Welcome to our services tonight here at Faith Ward Baptist Church.
It's a joy to see you all here on this Sunday night.
Let's all take our seats, please, as we begin with our congregational singing tonight.
Let's begin with hymn number 150 in your song books.
Number 150, My faith has found a resting place.
Number 150.
Let's sing it out on this first verse together.
Number 150.
I need no other argument. I need no other plea.
It is enough that Jesus died and that He died for me.
Enough for me that Jesus saves, visits my fear and doubt.
A sinful soul, I come to Him. He'll never cast me out.
I need no other argument. I need no other plea.
It is enough that Jesus died and that He died for me.
My heart is leaning on the Word, the risen Word of God.
Salvation by my Savior's name, salvation through His blood.
I need no other argument. I need no other plea.
It is enough that Jesus died and that He died for me.
My great physician heals the sins, the bluffs He paid to save.
For me His precious blood He shared, for me His life He gave.
I need no other argument. I need no other plea.
It is enough that Jesus died and that He died for me.
Amen, Pastor Brother Barron, so let's open this up in the Word of Prayer.
Well, thank you to the church here, the gathering of true believers.
I pray that you bless the singing that we're doing to give you praise, honor, and glory.
And I pray that you please bless Pastor as he preaches your Word.
In Jesus' name I pray, Amen.
Amen up to Him, number 441.
Great is Thy faithfulness, number 441.
Really think about these words as you're singing, number 441 on this first verse together.
Great is Thy faithfulness, O God my Father.
There is no shadow of turning with Thee.
Thou changest not thy compassions, they fail not.
As Thou hast been, Thou forever will be.
Great is Thy faithfulness, great is Thy faithfulness.
Morning by morning, new mercies I see.
All I have needed Thy hand hath provided.
Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord unto me.
Summer and winter and springtime and harvest.
The moon and stars in their forces above.
Join with all nature and manifold with this.
To Thy great faithfulness, mercy and love.
Great is Thy faithfulness, great is Thy faithfulness.
Morning by morning, new mercies I see.
All I have needed Thy hand hath provided.
Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord unto me.
Pardon for sin and of peace that endureth.
Thine own dear presence to cheer and to guide.
For today and bright hope for tomorrow.
Blessings of mine with ten thousand beside.
Great is Thy faithfulness, great is Thy faithfulness.
Morning by morning, new mercies I see.
All I have needed Thy hand hath provided.
Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord unto me.
This time we'll quickly go through our announcements.
If you don't have a bulletin, put up your hand nice and high.
On the inside we have our service time.
Sunday mornings at 1030 is our preaching service.
Sunday nights at 6.
Wednesday nights at 7 is our Bible study.
This week will be in Ezekiel chapter number 15.
We've got the soul winning times listed there below,
as well as salvations and baptisms.
Happy Thanksgiving to everyone.
Of course it's this Thursday.
Thank you to everybody who came to the picnic
and who helped out in any way as we all had a great time.
Singing classes every Sunday night at 5 o'clock.
Music emphasis night.
On the back we've got the Mexico Mondays
on the first Monday of every month.
See Brother Segura for more details on that.
But basically they leave at 7 a.m.
and get back around 9 o'clock at night.
And then the mission strip to St. Croix,
U.S. Virgin Islands.
This is going to be a good one.
It's not that far.
It's a cheap plane ticket.
It's like 400 bucks or something.
It's close.
We've got a plan for the lodging
where we're getting people economical lodging.
So if you can afford a plane ticket
and spend a little money on lodging,
we're providing food.
And so it's a very receptive place for soul winning.
It's already been scoped out
and it's a place where people are very receptive
and it looks like it's going to be a fun place to go.
And so that's January 16th through 22nd
and get in touch with Brother Raymond Cooper
to get more details about that.
Praying for the ladies in our church that are expecting
that they'll have a safe and healthy pregnancy and delivery.
Other upcoming events listed below.
Also, after the service,
just briefly after the service,
Brother Segura is going to have a meeting with parents.
So anybody here who is a parent
want to have at least one parent from each family
in this meeting.
And there's just been some problems with kids
just being a little bit out of control
at church services and church activities.
And so we need to make sure that we're all on the same page
about what is acceptable and what is not.
And the Bible says that we ought to know
how to behave ourselves in the house of God.
And I know that was a verse that was always emphasized
to me when I was a kid growing up
and I was expected to act a certain way at church.
And obviously we need to train our children
and teach them to behave in an acceptable manner.
And so Brother Segura is just going to have a meeting
with the parents after the service,
so stick around for that.
I was told to cut my sermon a little short for this meeting,
so maybe I'll do that, I don't know.
But anyway, all right, let's go ahead and count up
the soul winning from the past few days,
going back to Thursday the 18th.
So anything to report from Thursday the 18th?
Anything from Thursday?
How about Friday?
Okay.
Got it, got it, got it.
Anything else from Friday?
All right, how about Saturday?
Okay, got it, got it.
Anything else from Saturday?
What about today Sunday?
Brother Scott?
One.
Got another one, two, gotcha.
Okay, got it, got it.
There we go.
Anything else from today?
All right, very good.
Keep up the great work on soul winning.
And with that, let's go ahead and sing our next song.
Come lead us.
All right, you should find Psalm 11
in the front of your hymn notes.
If you don't have one, please raise your hand.
We'll sing Psalm 11.
The children of men,
the Lord trieth the righteous,
but the wicked,
and in them of His violence,
His soul made him,
upon the wicked.
He shall resist
fire and grace of heaven
and horrible tempest.
He shall be
a portion of their gods
for the righteous Lord.
Love and righteousness
is countenance.
God behold,
love behold,
the alibi,
in the Lord
the light of our trust.
Amen. Good singing in your psalm books now.
Please turn to hymn number 183.
Oh, how I love Jesus, number 183.
There is a name
I love to hear.
Number 183.
Oh, how I love Jesus.
On this first verse together now.
There is a name
I love to hear.
I love to sing its word.
It sounds like music in my ear.
The sweetest name on earth.
Oh, how I love Jesus.
Because he first loved me.
It tells me of a Savior's love
who died to set me free.
It tells me of his precious blood
the sinner's birth and queen.
Oh, how I love Jesus.
Because he first loved me.
It tells me what my Father had
in store for every day.
And though I dread a darkset pen
he'll sunshine all away.
Oh, how I love Jesus.
Because he first loved me.
It tells me what my Father had
in store for every day.
And though I dread a darkset pen
he'll sunshine all away.
Oh, how I love Jesus.
Because he first loved me.
Let's go back and do that chorus.
Sing it a cappella.
Oh, how I love Jesus.
Because he first loved me.
Amen. Good singing.
Alright, this time we'll quickly pass
our offering plates around.
As the plates go around,
let's turn our Bibles to Psalm 147.
Psalm 147, as we always do,
we'll read the entire chapter,
beginning in verse number one,
following silently with brother Dan
as he reads Psalm 147,
starting in verse number one.
In Psalm 147, the Bible reads,
Praise ye the Lord,
for it is good to sing praises
unto our God,
for it is pleasant,
and praise is comely.
The Lord doth build up Jerusalem.
He gathereth together
the outcasts of Israel.
He healeth the broken in heart
and bindeth up their wounds.
He telleth the number of the stars.
He calleth them all by their names.
Great is our Lord
and of great power.
His understanding is infinite.
The Lord lifteth up the meek.
He casteth the wicked
down to the ground.
Sing unto the Lord with thanksgiving.
Sing praise upon the harp
unto our God,
who covereth the heaven with clouds,
who prepareth rain for the earth,
who maketh grass
to grow upon the mountains.
He giveth to the beast his food,
and to the young ravens which cry.
He delighteth not
in the strength of the horse.
He taketh not pleasure
in the legs of a man.
The Lord taketh pleasure
in them that fear him,
and those that hope in his mercy.
Praise the Lord, O Jerusalem.
Praise thy God, O Zion,
for he hath strengthened
the bars of thy gates.
He hath blessed thy children
within thee.
He maketh peace in thy borders
and filleth thee
with the finest of the wheat.
He sendeth forth his commandment
upon earth.
His word runneth very swiftly.
He giveth snow like wool.
He scattereth the hoarfrost
like ashes.
He casteth forth his ice
like morsels.
Who can stand before his cold?
He sendeth out his word
and melteth them.
He causeth his wind to blow
and the waters flow.
He showeth his word unto Jacob,
his statutes and his judgments
unto Israel.
He hath not dealt so
with any nation,
and as for his judgments,
they have not known them.
Praise ye the Lord.
Dear Father in Heaven,
please fill the pastor's spirit
and please give us all ears
to hear and receive wisdom
and understand from this sermon
this night we pray in Jesus' name,
Amen.
Man, Psalm 147 is a beautiful
psalm giving a lot of reasons
why we should praise the Lord
and just really declaring
the Lord's greatness
in so many different ways.
It starts out in verse number 1
saying,
Praise ye the Lord,
for it is good to sing
praises unto our God,
for it is present
and praise is comely.
And then he says in verse 2,
The Lord doth build up Jerusalem,
he gathereth together
the outcasts of Israel.
Now, whenever we're reading
the Old Testament,
we always need to make
application with today
in the New Testament, right?
All of the Old Testament scriptures,
the Bible says,
are written for our admonition
upon whom the ends
of the world are come.
It's a big mistake
when you're reading the Bible
to look at the Old Testament scriptures
and say,
Oh, that's not really for us,
you know,
that was for them back then,
we're in the New Testament,
that's not written for us.
Well, you know,
1 Corinthians chapter 10
talks about scriptures
in the book of Numbers,
in the Mosaic law,
and it says that those things
were written for our admonition
upon whom the ends
of the world are come.
You know,
I don't believe that
there's ever been a time
when any Old Testament scripture
were more relevant
than it is right now.
It's not like,
well, it's more relevant
for them back then.
No, no, no,
it's written for our admonition
upon whom the ends
of the world are come.
It was relevant back then,
it's relevant now,
and if you want to make
an argument for when
it's more relevant,
it's more relevant right now
because it's written for us, okay?
So don't fall into this trap
of thinking,
well, this isn't really for us.
So when we read
the Old Testament scriptures,
we need to see our situation
in that scripture,
and especially,
this is easy to prove
about the book of Psalms
because the New Testament
specifically commands us
to speak to ourselves
in psalms and hymns
and spiritual songs,
singing and making melody
in our hearts to the Lord.
And so this is relevant.
Now,
the Lord does build up Jerusalem.
Okay, obviously today,
in 2021,
that's not where
the house of God is.
That's not where
the people of God
are congregated.
That's not where God
is doing his great work
right now.
You know, the Bible says,
because of the house
of the Lord our God,
I will seek Jerusalem's good.
Okay, but here's the thing
about that,
we need to apply this
to the New Testament believer
when it says the Lord
does build up Jerusalem.
Okay, that's talking about
the Old Testament nation
of Israel,
Jerusalem's the capital.
You know, in the New Testament,
we as Christians
are the people of God,
and it's not Jerusalem
that the Lord's going to build,
but rather the Bible says
upon this rock,
I will build my church,
and the gates of hell
shall not prevail against it.
So it's the church
that Christ is building
in the New Testament.
In the Old Testament,
the Lord's building up
Jerusalem,
Israel are God's chosen people.
In the New Testament,
Christians are God's chosen people,
and the Lord will build
his church,
and the gates of hell
shall not prevail against it.
So we should praise the Lord
because the Lord builds his church
in the New Testament.
That's a reason to praise the Lord.
The Lord does build up Jerusalem.
He gathereth together
the outcasts of Israel.
He gathereth together
the outcasts of Israel.
One of the things
this reminds me of
is King David,
when he's assembling
his military force,
when he's on the run from Saul,
it talks about how a lot
of the people who come to him
are people that are in debt,
they're people who have serious problems
or they don't really have
anything going for them,
they're unemployed or whatever,
and David is sort of taking in
these kind of people
and actually making something
out of them, you know,
making them into
a good group of people.
And of course,
there were some bozos in the bunch
and there were even some people
that were following David
in that group that the Bible tells
were sons of Belial.
They were so bad.
But he's taking in a lot of people
that other people had rejected
and a lot of those people
ended up becoming great
and mighty warriors
for King David
and serving David greatly
for many years and even decades.
And so when the Bible says here
he gathers together
the outcasts of Israel,
God gathers the outcasts of Israel,
you know, there are people
that are an outcast
under this world
that we would actually
embrace as the people of God
in the local church.
And what we need to understand
is that in the local church,
we need to make sure that
we don't allow this mentality
to creep in,
this mentality out there
that's about rejecting people
because they're not cool enough
or rejecting people
because they're a certain color
or rejecting people
because they're poor
or they're a little bit strange
or whatever, okay?
We need to make sure
that the house of God,
the local church,
is a house of prayer
for all nations.
It's not for a certain nationality.
It's for all nations.
And also we need to make sure
that we do not
treat people badly
because they're poor
or because maybe they're not
what the world considers good-looking
or financially prosperous.
You know, the Bible's clear on this
that we should not respect
persons in that way
and treat someone better
because they're wealthy
than the guy who's very poor.
You know, church should not be a place
where those are the things
that are emphasized.
And so maybe some kid goes to school
and he's picked on
because he's a little bit of a goofball
or strange-looking
or poor
or doesn't have the right clothes
or doesn't act the right way.
But, you know, let church
never be that kind of a place, okay?
At church, we need to love people
that are unlovable.
We need to gather the outcasts
and not exclude people
based on those type of carnal things.
You know, if I'm going to exclude
someone from church,
let's exclude the one who's
called a brother and is a fornicator.
Let's exclude him.
Let's exclude the drunkard.
Let's exclude the idolater.
But you know what?
Anybody who comes here
and wants to serve God,
anybody who loves God,
anybody who has Christ in their heart
is our brother
and should be welcomed into the fold
and don't have this attitude
that you're cooler than everybody
and you've got more money
and so this guy,
he's working a low job.
You know what?
Hey, anyone who works an honest job
has my respect.
I don't care what your job is.
I respect you if you work an honest job.
I don't care if you're shoveling dung
or if you're a trash collector
or if you're doing blue-collar work,
white-collar work.
I don't care if you're working on a computer
or you're digging a ditch.
I don't care what you're doing.
You know, if you're doing honest work
for an honest paycheck,
then you have my respect
and you are on an equal playing field
with anybody in here
no matter how well-healed they are.
We want to make sure that we don't
let a worldly mentality come in
that judges people based on their physical looks
or judges people based upon
their financial status or their ethnicity
or judges them based on whatever worldly,
carnal criteria.
Let it be a spiritual criteria in this place.
God gathers the outcasts of Israel, okay?
And we ought to also accept those
that are not necessarily the coolest dudes out there.
But you know what?
Let's accept people that are different than us
and let's actually be loving and Christ-like
toward the outcasts of today.
He says next, he heals the broken in heart
and bindeth up their wounds.
And when you think of someone who's broken in heart
or broken hearted,
it's basically someone who's depressed or sad
or they've kind of just reached the end of their rope
and their heart is just broken.
And if you study the Bible
and look up all the different mentions of broken heart,
you'll find that to be true
that that's what the Bible is referring to here.
And the Bible says that God heals the broken in heart
and binds up their wounds.
He gives joy to those that can't find any joy in this life,
that are depressed and sad and miserable.
You know, the Lord causes us to rejoice with joy unspeakable
and full of glory.
One of the fruit of the Spirit is joy.
You know, being filled with the Spirit
brings joy and love and peace in our heart.
And so these are reasons to praise the Lord.
You know, praise the Lord for building his church.
Because the type of church that we have here
at Faithful Word Baptist Church
and other great churches across America
that are being built,
you know, on paper,
they don't seem like the type of church
that would succeed in our day.
But yet they are succeeding.
They are thriving.
Why?
Because it's God who builds the church.
It's not done by some kind of a cunning marketing
or great advertising.
Or, you know, we've got this formula
of just what people are looking for in 2021.
No, I mean, we just get up and just preach the Bible,
win souls, just keep doing it.
And it's amazing how God works.
So praise the Lord for building his church.
Praise the Lord that he gathers together the outcasts
and that he doesn't look at the people in this world
that are weak or shy or just in some way deficient.
He doesn't look at them and say,
oh, I can't use you.
He actually looks at them and says,
great, because my strength is made perfect in weakness.
Consider your calling, brethren.
There's not many mighty called.
I mean, there's not many great men that are called
into the ministry or mighty or super wise
according to this world's standards.
God has chosen the foolish things of this world
to confound the wise.
So before you just scoff at that church member
or just blow off somebody that you think is a loser
or whatever, you know, realize that that person
could be used greatly by God.
That person can win souls to Christ.
That person can be an important part of this church.
Maybe they're an outcast out there somewhere,
but you know what?
Here, if they love the Lord,
they could be used greatly by God.
And praise the Lord for that.
You know, why do we praise the Lord for that?
Because then he gets all the glory
because he's using people that are not who the world
would have voted in the yearbook as the most likely
to succeed or whatever, most popular and what have you.
Praise the Lord.
You know, over and over again in Psalms,
it's a command, praise the Lord.
In this Psalm, we're commanded to praise the Lord.
Okay, this is part of our prayer life,
is to get on our knees and praise God.
And you say, well, I don't know what to praise him for.
Here's some stuff to praise him for right here.
Now, he kind of changes gears at the end of verse three,
and he says that God telleth the number of the stars.
Now, telling is a synonym for counting.
Sort of like at the bank, you have the bank teller.
And what do they do?
They count money all day.
Automated teller machine is counting out money.
So it says he telleth the number of the stars.
He counts the number of the stars,
and he calleth them all by their names.
Now, back when this is written, you didn't have telescopes, right?
So you can look up at the sky and see about 3,000 to 4,000 stars,
which is still a lot.
I mean, that's what you can see with your naked eye.
And those of you who have ever been out in the middle of nowhere
on a dark night in a dark place, and you look up, it's just wow, right?
Just an incredible number of stars.
What you're looking at is about 3,000 or 4,000 stars.
That's the number that you see.
That is about 3,000 or 4,000 stars.
That's the number that you're looking at.
Because people in the ancient world, they looked up,
whether it's the Babylonians, the Greeks, the Egyptians,
you know, they looked up, even in China,
they looked up just with their naked eye,
and they created vast star catalogs where they listed
and cataloged every star that could be seen with the naked eye,
even back then.
And of course, today we could do the same thing.
We could look up and see what we see.
But, you know, now with modern science and telescopes
and all the technology that even just goes beyond
looking into a basic telescope, you know, now we realize
truly how many stars there are.
There are actually just a number that can't even be fathomed.
You know, just even in our galaxy alone are billions,
billions of stars in our galaxy,
and there are billions of galaxies.
And it just goes on forever.
Nobody can even find the end of it.
It's just so mind-blowing how many stars there are,
and no one knows, but God knows.
And it's interesting how the Bible always compared
the number of the stars to the number of the sand
that's on the seashore, even though they're only looking up
and seeing in literal reality 3,000, 4,000 stars.
But now we know that the number of stars actually is comparable
to the number of the sand grains on the seashore,
or probably even beyond the number of grains of sand on the seashore.
So the Bible had that analogy right on
about the sand of the sea and the stars of the sky.
But God counts them all.
He knows everything. He's omniscient.
You'd have to be to count the number of the stars.
But not only that, he calls them all by their names.
He has named each and every star.
And then it says in the next verse,
great is our Lord and of great power,
his understanding is infinite.
Now what does it mean to be infinite?
Infinite means that you can't count it.
It just, it never ends. It goes on forever.
God's understanding is infinite.
There's no limit on his intelligence or understanding or wisdom.
That's pretty amazing when you think about
knowing all the stars, counting them all.
He created them all.
And he knows them. He calls them by their name.
His understanding is infinite.
It says in verse 6, the Lord lifteth up the meek.
He casteth the wicked down to the ground.
Sing unto the Lord with thanksgiving.
Sing praise upon the harp unto our God.
These are reasons to praise the Lord, right?
Praise him for his amazing power and his infinite understanding.
But the Bible also says praise him for the fact that he lifts up the meek.
Now what is a meek person?
A meek person is someone who is humble and lowly.
The opposite of being meek is someone who is proud and arrogant.
And the Bible is saying here that God lifts up the meek
and he casts the wicked down to the ground.
Of course, this is a parallelism.
He's lifting up one and putting down another.
Who's he lifting up?
Who's he putting down?
You know what this tells me is that pride is wicked.
Pride is wicked.
This is why, you know, it's not the meek and the proud.
In other scriptures, it's often the meek versus the proud.
Here it's the meek versus the wicked because pride is a wicked sin.
Sing unto the Lord with thanksgiving.
Hey, it's thanksgiving. I tied it in.
All right.
Let it not be said I didn't preach a thanksgiving sermon.
Sing praise upon the harp unto our God,
who covereth the heaven with clouds.
Now I love this part.
I don't know about you, but I always love the parts about the Bible
where he kind of talks about nature.
He talks about animals.
I love that part at the end of the book of Job
where he talks about all the animals and the things.
It's always fascinating to me.
But here he talked a little bit about nature with the stars.
Now he's going to talk about some things that are on this earth.
He's saying that God covers the heaven with clouds,
who prepare the rain for the earth,
who maketh grass to grow upon the mountains.
He giveth to the beast his food and to the young ravens.
And these last two words are interesting, which cry.
Which cry.
So, you know, I was really meditating upon these verses.
And here's the way I pictured this, okay, as I meditated upon these verses.
Because what we have here is sort of a food chain or a cycle.
Because in the first verse that we just read,
it starts out by saying that he covers the heaven with clouds, right?
So think about this as like a cause and effect.
So you've got the clouds and then he prepares rain for the earth.
So he puts the clouds in the sky and then the rain comes down on the earth.
And then what happens as a result of the rain?
He makes the grass to grow upon the mountains, right?
Because you know that mountains, when they're not getting a lot of rain,
I mean, I know it's hard for you to imagine a place
where long periods of no rain happen, but the mountains are brown.
But then when it gets rainy, even South Mountain,
you'll look at South Mountain and say, oh, look how green South Mountain is.
And it's not really as, okay, it never really gets that green here, okay?
I'll admit it.
But when you're in California, you can see this phenomenon.
Because in California, you drive over that grapevine
when you're coming down the I-5,
and sometimes those hills are just like green,
like it looks like you're in Ireland or something, right?
They're just so green.
But then other times they're not.
And it has to do with whether you're in the season
that has received the rain versus a dry and hot season, right?
So the grass growing on the mountains is a result of rain falling on the mountains.
So you have the clouds across the sky,
and then you have the rain falls down as a result of the clouds.
You have the grass growing as a result of the rain.
And then he gives the beast his food because then the beast eats the grass, right?
So you've got the different goats and cattle or whatever
that are eating the grass.
And then, so he gives the beast his food and to the young ravens which cry.
Now what do ravens eat?
Ravens eat dead bodies of the guy that just got fed before them,
the beast, his food, you know?
So basically the clouds form, the rain falls, the grass grows,
animal eats the grass, animal dies, raven eats dead animal.
Raven parent delivers dead meat to baby raven.
So the way that I looked at this was that it all starts with the raven crying.
Because then it says the ravens would cry.
So it all starts with a raven crying.
Ah, feed me, feed me.
And then God goes through all this process, you know,
of he makes the clouds, the rain, the grass, the animals, they die.
Here you go. You're fed.
Truly amazing. I love nature.
All right, let's keep going.
It says in verse number 10, he delighteth not in the strength of the horse.
He taketh not pleasure in the legs of men.
But you know, back to the ravens for a second, okay.
You know, it truly is amazing how God keeps nature in such a balance
and an equilibrium.
You know, there was an experiment that happened many years ago
where down in, was it Tucson, Juja, where they did that biodome,
or didn't you go visit that or something?
They had like this biodome where they're going to try to simulate
an environment of just like a closed system,
sort of like make their own little self-conscious.
Stop me if I'm getting any of this wrong.
They're going to make like a little closed environment.
And I guess the idea is this is practice for, you know,
setting up some kind of a dome on Mars or something
and being able to live in the dome and everything self-contained
and the oxygen, the carbon dioxide and the water flow
and everything's in equilibrium and balance of an ecosystem.
But you know, these things typically,
they're extremely difficult to make happen
and then they typically don't work out.
And I think it was some kind of a scandal that in fact things had been breached
and that they were kind of letting in air from the outside.
What was it?
They were pumping in oxygen, turns out, okay.
They were doping with extra oxygen.
But anyway, you know, they were kind of cheating.
They had to cheat.
Why?
Because it's extremely difficult to create this system
that is at an equilibrium that's balanced.
But you know, God has done that with the whole Earth.
And the Earth is in this perfect equilibrium.
It's slanted at just the right angle as far as the tilt of the axis.
The distance from the sun is just right.
The moon plays an important role.
And you've got all these different carbon cycles and water cycle
and the rock cycle and all these different things.
And they all work together.
And you have all these negative feedback loops
where something gets a little out of whack
and then something else, you know, basically fixes it.
And you know, it's just constantly being kept in equilibrium.
That's God's design.
God has this amazing design.
And we see the cycle of the rains and the feeding of the animals
and the plants and the symbiotic relationship
where everybody has their role to play, scavenger birds,
beasts of the field, et cetera.
But it says in verse 11,
the Lord taketh, excuse me, verse 10,
he delighteth not in the strength of the horse,
he taketh not pleasure in the legs of a man.
Now what does this mean?
That God does not delight in the strength of the horse
or that he doesn't take pleasure in the legs of a man.
And then, you know, verse 11, of course, is the antithesis.
It says, the Lord takes pleasure in them that fear him
in those that hope in his mercy.
That's what God's impressed by, right?
God's impressed by people who fear him and hope in his mercy.
He doesn't delight in the strength of a horse
or in the legs of a man.
What's meant by the legs of a man?
Well, again, it's parallel, right?
The strength of a horse, the legs of a man.
The legs are picturing man's strength
because legs contain the largest muscles in our body, okay?
You know, we might sit there and flex a biceps or something,
you know, unless somebody's biceps got blown off or something,
you know, then they won't be able to be flexing that.
But anyway, you know, we might like flex the biceps,
like, hey, man, you know, big muscle.
But here's the thing about that.
That's not really the biggest muscle in your body.
That's one of the smallest, most insignificant muscles in your body, okay?
The real big muscles in your body are, first of all, number one,
the gluteus maximus in your backside and the quadriceps, right?
I mean, think about these big thigh muscles,
hamstrings, quadriceps, gluteus maximus.
I mean, these are some big, strong muscles.
That's why people who skip leg day don't make any real gains, all right?
Because, you know, you've got to work these big muscles.
You can't just only work your upper body.
You've got to build your legs as well.
So strength is equated with basically the legs of a man
because, let's face it, we could move a lot more weight with our legs
than we could with our arms.
Our legs are much stronger than our arms.
They're much bigger, stronger muscles.
But, you know, I don't care how much time you spend at the gym
and how big your legs are and how strong you are.
That doesn't impress God.
That does not impress God.
What does the Bible say?
You know, the Bible says bodily exercise profits little.
Now, I'm kind of an exercise junkie.
You know, I exercise a lot.
I don't really lift weights a whole lot anymore like I used to,
but I exercise for many, many hours a week.
I love exercise.
I'm for exercise.
It's one of my biggest hobbies is getting out and doing exercise.
And so I'm not down on exercise tonight.
I'm not down on going to the gym.
I go to the gym.
You know, we just went to the gym yesterday.
You know, I'm for it, okay.
But at the end of the day, I'm not going to get any rewards in heaven
for any achievements down at the gym.
I'm not going to get any rewards in heaven for any athletic achievement.
There's no rewards when you get to heaven for these type of carnal pursuits.
Now, look, obviously we need to have these things in our life,
just like we go to our jobs and make money.
We sit down and eat food.
We brush our teeth.
We sleep at night.
I mean, these are just parts of life.
And I think exercise is an important part of life in the modern world
because we're so sedentary in order to stay healthy.
But at the end of the day, we never want to let that become an idolatry in our life
where that's the big thing.
That's the big thing.
You know, that's the important thing.
No, you know what?
Skip the gym if that's what it takes to get to church.
Right?
You know, get your priorities right.
You know, spiritual things are more important.
Bodily, exercise profit little.
Exercise thyself rather unto godliness.
You know, if I have to skip a workout or skip reading my Bible,
I'm going to skip the workout as much as I would hate to miss a workout.
You know, I'd rather miss a workout than to miss my Bible reading.
Because God isn't up in heaven delighting in or taking pleasure in
or being impressed by the legs of a man.
The strength of the horse.
Okay?
Now when you think about the strength of the horse, you know,
I always apply everything in scripture to humans because, you know,
the Bible's written to people, not horses.
Okay?
I don't think he's talking to the horses saying,
hey, God's not impressed by you.
What he's saying is to the humans, God's not impressed by your horse.
Okay?
So basically he says, you know,
God doesn't take pleasure or he doesn't delight in the strength of the horse.
What's the strength of the horse?
That's horsepower.
Okay?
You know, he doesn't take pleasure or delight in your car
and all of its horsepower, you know, or your vehicle or whatever.
Because the horse is the vehicle of the time that the Bible's written.
And it's not a vehicle that everybody has.
It's a little bit of a status symbol because poor people don't have a horse.
You know, poor people can't afford to feed the horse
and sit there and spend hours taking care of it.
I mean, people have horses.
They have to work hard to take care of that horse.
Or they have to hire someone to sit there and brush the thing
and do stuff to its hooves.
And I don't know what they do, but they do it and it takes hours.
Okay?
It's work and it's expensive.
You've got to store the thing.
And so it's always been something that rich people have
or at least people who are pretty well-to-do.
I'm not going to ask for a raise of hands of who has a horse in our church tonight.
But I guarantee you, whoever raises their hand is not living paycheck to paycheck
if they own a horse.
You know, they're a person who has a little bit of wealth.
They've been blessed with some means if they can afford to maintain
and have a horse.
Okay?
And so basically God's not impressed with riches.
He's not impressed with your fancy car, your fancy motorcycle.
He's not impressed by these sort of worldly status symbols such as a horse would be.
Or you could also use the horse to picture protection or a weapon in a sense
because throughout the Bible, obviously, horses and chariots have to do with the military
and having protection.
So he's not impressed with your weapons or the things that you own to protect yourself
and to keep you safe.
You know, at the end of the day, God takes pleasure in those that fear him, okay?
In those that hope in his mercy.
When God looks down from heaven, that's who he's impressed by.
It doesn't matter if they don't have a vehicle.
It doesn't matter if they're physically weak.
It doesn't matter if they are not well-healed.
God takes pleasure in them that fear him and in those that hope in his mercy.
Praise the Lord, O Jerusalem, praise thy God, O Zion.
You know, we need to make sure that we look at the world the way God looks at the world
and that we don't get this carnal worldly attitude that just exalts people's appearance
and their possessions and all these things.
Instead, we need to put a premium on what God puts a premium on, the fear of the Lord,
loving the Lord, being meek, hoping in his mercy, trusting in him.
You know, those are the real great people in this world.
Who does God consider great?
God considers the great people to be the great Christians, right?
The people who love Christ.
The people who are kind and good and meek and loving unto others.
That's what God considers great.
Those who fear the Lord and tremble at his commandments.
The Bible says, praise the Lord, O Jerusalem, verse 12, praise thy God, O Zion.
For he hath strengthened the bars of thy gates, he hath blessed thy children within thee,
he maketh peace in thy borders, and filleth thee with the finest of wheat.
Why else should we praise the Lord?
You know, just a quick review.
We said, hey, praise the Lord because he builds the church.
Praise the Lord because he gathers together the outcasts because we're all accepted by
him, even if we be a motley crew, you know, we be accepted by the Lord.
And he heals the broken in heart.
He binds up their wounds.
He gives joy to the joyless and the depressed and the sad.
He is so great in his knowledge and understanding that the whole universe is just an open book
unto him.
He can name every single star and he knows the number that no scientist can tell you.
His understanding is infinite.
He lifts up the meek.
He puts down the wicked.
He controls nature.
He controls the water cycle and the carbon cycle and all of these different natural processes.
Praise the Lord because he's not impressed by worldly carnal achievements, but rather
he lifts up the meek.
He takes pleasure in those that fear him and that hope in his mercy.
Praise the Lord because he has strengthened the bars, it says in verse 13, of the gates
of Jerusalem.
And again, you know, are we just supposed to look at this and just say, hey, isn't it
great that God strengthened the bars of the gates of Jerusalem 3,000 years ago?
No, what we need to thank God for and praise God for now is the fact that he has strengthened
the bars of our gates and that he has blessed our children within us and he's made peace
in our borders and he has filled us with the finest of wheat.
How about right now?
Because, you know, we could look at this and say that in America, we've got some serious
bars on our gates as far as we don't worry about being invaded by another country, do
we?
I mean, do we sit and worry and think about on Monday and on Tuesday, you know, what if
the Russians come and invade?
What if the Chinese come and invade?
You know, what if North Korea gets that missile program and gets their act together and gets
a warhead over here?
We don't even worry about that.
I mean, how often does that thought really come into your mind about being invaded by
another country?
I mean, look, I got a lot of things to worry about or problems, but that ain't one of them
is probably what you're thinking right now.
That's not on our minds.
Hey, that's a blessing.
Praise the Lord for that because there are people right now tonight in some parts of
the world where that is on their mind.
People in all these sketchy war zones in the Middle East and North Africa and these different
places, you know, they are worried about getting invaded and everything.
Hey, praise the Lord because he strengthened the bars.
Our children are blessed within us.
I mean, they grow up in comfort and security and safety.
They don't know how good they have it.
Growing up in the United States of America, they don't realize that they are some of the
most fortunate people on the planet to have grown up here and that other children in other
places, they're barely even able to get educated, get fed, get a job, get livelihood, get out
of poverty.
It's a struggle for them every day.
I mean, kids, listen to me kids, you think you'd be living the life that you're living
right now if you've been born in India or born in Pakistan or Bangladesh?
You think you'd be living the same lifestyle that you're living right now in America?
You know, do a little traveling in this world and you realize how good we have it here.
Our children are blessed within us.
We ought to be thankful, okay?
People that are growing up today in Rio de Janeiro or something are not living the same
lifestyle that you're living growing up as an American in the USA up here, the land of
opportunity all around us.
And so praise the Lord that he has blessed our children within us.
Peace in our borders.
I mean, yeah, every once in a while, you know, BLM starts burning it all down, but
you know what?
In general, we got peace in our borders, right?
I mean, in general, things are pretty peaceful, you know, and that, you know, when that happens
when there's some kind of rioting or, or looting that's going on, you know, it's kind of,
it's a big deal.
And why is it a big deal?
It's a big deal because it doesn't happen that often because we can literally go years
without it happening.
I mean, it's not like, you know, we saw in 2020 just all of these raging fires and, you
know, seeing the different live streams of, of just people just trashing shopping malls
and, and burning down businesses and burning down police stations and just all of the
carnage.
But, you know, did we, did we really see that in 2019 or 2018 or 2017?
I mean, maybe I'm wrong, maybe I missed a riot in there somewhere, but it, you know,
it feels like a lot of years go by where we don't have that at all.
And we're living in a country with 340 million people that spans thousands of miles in
breadth, you know, over a thousand miles in height.
I mean, we have this huge country and rarely do these type of things happen because in
general, we really have a very high level of peace within our borders.
Have you thanked God for that?
Are you thankful for that?
Have you stopped to think about the fact that we live in a peaceful time, in a peaceful
place?
I mean, look at all the wars and the, the, the fighting throughout history, all the
insecurity.
You know, we are living secure today and even when, even when it was all burning down
and when there was rioting and looting going on at the Scottsdale Fashion Center last
year and, and some people were threatening and saying, we're coming into the neighborhoods.
We're coming into, you know, middle-class suburban neighborhoods.
You know what?
I, you know, we prepared ourselves.
We cleaned the guns and, and loaded them and, and we, we all, you know, reviewed our
battle stations.
But here's the thing about that.
When we reviewed the battle stations, I told my family, I said, look, the chances of anything
happening is like, is like one in a million.
I said, I'm not even worried about it.
Like, we might as well just, it's just fun to just load the guns and, and, and, and all
hands on deck to your battle stations.
But the thing is, I told my family, I'm like, it's one in a million.
Because they're not actually going to come into middle-class neighborhoods because they
know that all our neighbors are doing the same thing we're doing right now.
You know, they know that there's going to be a gun behind every blade of grass.
Okay.
And, and, and so we weren't even really worried.
And of course nothing happened.
Nobody came into any neighborhoods or anything like that.
Hey, you know what?
I'm constantly thanking God just for the peaceful setup that we have in the US here.
I mean, it's great, right?
I mean, isn't it great to just go to, I don't go to bed at night thinking somebody's
going to break in and, you know, uh, there's going to be blood in the streets.
I don't think about that because it's so remote because we live in such a peaceful
time, such a peaceful place, and we can really emphasize and make a big deal out of
the riots and everything, but they're so rare.
And then when they happen, they don't even get near our house.
They don't even touch us.
I mean, we are blessed and we need to praise the Lord for these blessings and be
thankful.
And does he fill us with the finest of the wheat or what?
I mean, we're eating einkorn and we're eating quality food.
We don't worry about dirty contaminated food because we eat some really good clean
food in America and it's, it's abundant, it's cheap, it's everywhere.
You know, we're all sitting here with full bellies right now and we've all eaten
well and we're doing great in America.
And you know, we need to thank God for that because other people today are hungry
and struggling just to get fed.
Do we realize how good we have it?
He sends forth his commandment.
These are reasons to praise the Lord, right?
Praise him for blessing us and giving us safety and good food and everything.
Here's another reason to praise the Lord.
He sends forth his commandment upon earth.
His word runneth very swiftly.
Now, what does that mean when it says God's word runs swiftly?
I believe that the reason why God's word makes such good time and goes so fast is
because it's so great, it's so powerful, it just spreads like wildfire.
This is why YouTube and Facebook and Twitter and all of these other wicked
companies have to try to slow it down all the time by shutting down their
YouTube channel, shutting down our Facebook pages, censoring us on social
media.
Why do they have to do that?
Because God's word will spread like wildfire.
If they just let some man of God get on there, filled with the Spirit, just rip
in face and preaching, it'll go way too far.
Because it spreads fast.
Not because of a personality, but because God's word being preached in the power
of the Holy Spirit, it doesn't matter who's doing it, it's going to go fast.
It's going to spread quickly.
It gets out.
God's word runs fast.
It runs very swiftly because it's so powerful and people share it and they
spread it and it just gets around.
And so that's a reason to praise the Lord just for the awesomeness of his word.
That he sends forth his commandment upon earth, his word runneth very
quickly, very swiftly.
He giveth snow like wool.
He scattereth the hoarfrost like ashes.
Okay, not here, but in other places.
Okay, this happens.
He casteth forth his ice like morsels.
Who can stand before his cold?
Now this has always struck me as such a beautiful passage because we usually
think of God as a consuming fire, don't we?
But here we see that God is also the God of ice and snow and who can stand
before his cold.
I mean, not only does he dominate fire, he also is the king of coldness.
He dominates even the forces of cold and ice, you know.
And this, you know, scripture is particularly scary for us, you know,
because who can stand before his cold?
Not me.
I'll just tell you right now, I can't do it, okay.
You know, we had this idea one year, or I had this idea one year, crazy idea.
I said, hey, we're going to do a soul winning marathon in Minnesota in the
height of winter.
Coldest possible time of year, the sub-zero soul winning marathon, Minneapolis.
And it was just because I've been so irritated over the years of just
churches just canceling soul winning for six months because it's too cold.
I was like, we can go soul winning year round.
The problem with canceling soul winning for any season is that it's hard to get
back into it.
You've got to stay in that habit, you know what I mean, and if you just
cancel it for a really long time, every year, six months, and then plus you're
only doing soul winning half the year.
You know, what about the other half the year, right?
You know, we could do the same thing.
We could say like, oh, it's 115 outside.
We can't go, you know.
No, we just put on the sun hat, we drink the Gatorade, we go for it.
And we take breaks as needed, we use the shade, we, you know, obviously we're
sensible about it.
But we had this idea, the sub-zero soul winning marathon, and we planned it for
just the height of winter.
And I'm telling you, God performed a miracle because it just happened to work
out that it was like the warmest day of the entire winter, the day that we were
not there.
Because God will not tempt us above what we're able, you know.
And I'm standing here like, all right, let's do it.
You know, sub-zero.
And God's looking down at Pastor Anderson like, you know, you know not what
you ask.
Like, are you willing to drink of the cup, you know, and be baptized with the
baptism wherewith these Minnesotans are baptized?
And I'm like, I'm able, Lord.
And he's like, no, you're not.
And so God was merciful and it was 39 degrees, which that's really cold.
But that's not really cold for Minneapolis in the deepest, coldest part of
winter.
That's a really warm day.
And I was freezing all day and I barely survived.
But, you know, who can stand before his cold?
You know, cold is a powerful force of nature is the moral behind that story.
He sends out his word, verse 18, and melteth them.
He causeth his wind to blow and the waters flow, right?
So he melts the ice.
He brings in a warm breeze, melts the ice.
The waters flow.
Again, more on the cycles of nature there.
He showeth his word unto Jacob, his statutes and his judgments unto Israel.
He had not dealt so with any nation.
I mean, he's saying, look, do you realize how good you have at Israel that God has
showed you his statutes and judgments?
He didn't do that for any other nation.
Unto you has been committed the oracles of God, Israel.
He had not dealt so with any nation.
As for his judgments, they've not known them.
So as a result, he's saying, praise ye the Lord.
Why aren't you praising God that you've been shown his word and his judgment?
And look, we could say the same thing as Christians today.
We've been shown God's word.
We are the recipients of all his righteous judgments.
You know, especially specifically those of us who speak English or Spanish or other major
languages where we've got the word of God translated into our language.
And we have this magnificent King James Bible.
I mean, we are blessed to have God's word readily available.
And, you know, most places in the world have access to the full Bible in their language.
And it's such a blessing to have these statutes and judgments as Christians.
And we need to realize how good we have it that we have this at our fingertips.
And so there are a lot of reasons to praise the Lord.
So don't you dare find yourself at a loss trying to figure out what am I going to praise
the Lord for?
Because prayer is asking for things.
That's what prayer means.
Pray literally means to ask for something.
And, you know, when we pray, we ought to be asking for stuff.
If you didn't ask for anything, you didn't even pray.
That's what prayer is.
Prayer is asking.
But, you know, another part of our prayer time or our prayer life or just our walk with
God should be praising the Lord and praising him to him, you know, speaking to him and
praising the Lord and also praising the Lord to others and telling other people about how
great the Lord is and singing his praises in the midst of the congregation, telling
other people, telling him, we need to be praising the Lord.
We got just in this one Psalm alone, we got plenty of reasons to praise the Lord.
Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer.
Father, we thank you so much for your word, Lord, and we just praise you tonight for
your awesome power, your magnificence, your all-knowing understanding.
Lord, thank you for accepting us into the Beloved.
Thank you for giving us salvation even though we don't deserve it and lifting up the meek,
casting down the wicked, all of your amazing care of nature and all of the forces of nature
that are in balance tonight so that we can enjoy beautiful weather and also what you've
worked out for us in the United States where we have safety within our borders and we have
peace and security and good food, Lord.
Help us never to take these things for granted but to realize that they all come from you
and you can take them away at any time and so we praise and thank you for your greatness
and in Jesus' name we pray, amen.
Amen, let's take our song books, please, and we'll turn to hymn number 110.
All the way, my Savior leads me, number 110.
We'll start on that first verse and be dismissed.
Number 110, let's sing it on that first verse all together now.
All the way, my Savior leads me, what am I to ask beside?
Can I doubt ascend to mercy?
Good the life has been my guide.
Heavenly peace divine is comfort.
Here by faith it aims to dwell.
For I know what e'er you call me, Jesus, doeth all things well.
All the way, my Savior leads me, cheers entwining that thy tread gives me grace.
For every trial feeds me with the living bread.
Though my weary steps they falter and my soul a curse may be.
Gushing from the rock before me, though a spring of joy I see.
All the way, my Savior leads me, all the fullness of His love.
Perfect recipe is promised in my Father's house of love.
When my spirit flown and born told, weeks entwined throughout the day.
Missed my song through endless ages, Jesus led me all the way.