["Pomp and Circumstance"]
to our Wednesday evening service.
Let's go ahead and open the service with a word of prayer.
Dear Lord, I thank you so much for this opportunity
that we have to be in the house of God this evening
in the middle of the week.
We pray that you would just bless this church service.
Lord, please be with the music and the fellowship
and most importantly, the preaching of the word of God.
We pray these things in the masterless name of Jesus Christ.
Amen.
All right, go ahead and turn a couple pages back with me
to song number 220,
Jesus is all the world to me.
Song number 220, just a couple pages back.
Sing it out with me this evening on this second song,
Jesus is all the world to me.
220 on that first.
Jesus is all the world to me,
my life, my joy, my all.
He is my strength from day to day
without him I would fall.
Sing it out.
When I am sad to him I know
no other one can cheer me sweet.
When I am sad he makes me glad.
He's my friend.
On that second.
Jesus is all the world to me,
my friend in trial score.
I go to him for blessings
and he gives them more and more.
He sends the sunshine and the rain.
He sends the harvest cold and grey.
Sunshine and rain,
harvest the pain.
He's my friend.
Amen. You guys are singing well this evening.
Join me this evening on this third verse of song number 220.
Give it all you've got, okay?
Let's sing it out on that third verse.
Jesus is all the world to me.
Good.
True to him I'll be.
No, how could I this friendly night
when he's so true to me?
Following him I know I'm right.
He watches normally day and night.
Following him by day and night.
He's my friend.
Finish strong on that fourth.
Jesus is all the world to me.
I want no better friend.
I trust him now.
I trust him when my sweet day shall end.
Beautiful life with such a friend.
Beautiful life that has no end.
Eternal life, eternal joy.
He's my friend.
Amen. And we want to welcome you to the midweek service here at Ready Baptist Church.
We're so glad that you are with us.
Let's go ahead and take our bulletins.
We'll look at some announcements real quickly.
If you do not have a bulletin, you can just raise your hand
and one of our ushers will get one for you.
If you need a bulletin, just put your hand up and we'll get one for you.
The verse this week, Psalm 23 6,
Holy goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life
and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.
And that's a good verse there.
We like that if you open up your bulletin, you'll see our service time Sunday morning,
service 1030 a.m.
We do, of course, invite you to be with us on Sunday morning on the Lord's Day for church.
We have our Sunday evening service at 6 p.m.
and we're glad you're here for the Wednesday evening Bible study.
If you look at our soul-winning times, our main soul-winning time is on Saturday mornings at 10 a.m.
and then we have additional soul-winning times on Thursdays and on Sundays at 2 p.m.
So if you'd like to go soul-winning, there'll be an opportunity for you to be able to do that tomorrow.
And, of course, we'd love for you to join us on Saturday for our main soul-winning time.
If you look at the announcements and upcoming events, of course, on Sunday we had our I Love My Church Sunday
and all of that went well.
We had great attendance and, of course, we had the popcorn and the choir did a great job
and praise the Lord for all of that.
And I just want to remind you that this Friday is Valentine's Day, of course,
and we're having a special Valentine's Day party for the homeschool group.
So just don't forget about that.
If you have not yet signed up and you'd like to sign up, you can do that on your communication card.
If you need a field trip flyer that explains how the party's going to go
and all the different things in regards to the kids giving out Valentine's Day cards,
my wife has those flyers so make sure you see her and she can, of course, answer any questions.
Also, PE class is scheduled there for you.
And then we've just got some things coming up that we want you to be aware of.
There's a teen activity coming up on Friday, February 21st at 6 p.m.
So all the teenagers, of course, their parents are invited.
This one's going to be here at the church building and you can sign up on your communication card.
If you would do that, we'd appreciate it and help us know who's coming.
Also, we have a Spanish service coming up on February 22nd at 5 p.m. That's Saturday.
And for this Spanish service, there's not going to be a potluck.
Afterwards, there'll be pizza so you can take a break from that, from preparing stuff for the potluck.
And then also Sunday, February 23rd at 6 p.m., there's our second family fun night for the year.
So that's kind of a busy weekend there, the 21st on Friday, the 22nd Saturday, and then the 23rd.
And of course, we'll have a puppet show and we'll have all the things that we did for last family fun night.
So make sure your kids are here for that.
There's a note there about the Biblical Leadership Institute and then there's other things there.
Make sure that you go back there.
If you finish your nine chapters a day, there is a clipboard in the back that has everybody's name on it.
And if you wouldn't mind, please go back there and check for your name.
And if it's correct, mark it just like a checkmark or something letting us know that you saw it and it's good.
If it's not, cross it off, write it the way it's supposed to be written.
If your name is supposed to be there and it's not, you can add it to the end and we'll put it where it goes.
But make sure you go back there because that's what we're going to send to get the plaque made.
And once the plaque is made, we're not editing it, all right?
So you've got to look at it now and let us know if there's any issues and we'd appreciate your help, of course, with that.
If you look at the back of the bulletin, birthdays and anniversaries for the month of February this week.
We had Laurel Rubin's birthday on February 10th.
Ms. Lisa Sweeten had a birthday yesterday, February 11th.
And Brother Warren Lauterman has a birthday tomorrow, February 13th.
Delia Vindicent has a birthday, February 14th.
And Victor and Julissa Zuniga have an anniversary, February 14th.
Praise Report, Money Matters, all of those things are there for you to look at.
And I think that's it for all of the announcements.
So we're going to go and take our song books and sing one more song as we prepare to receive the offering.
We're going to sing page number two, Glory to His Name.
Page number two, Glory to His Name.
We're going to sing it out on the first.
Page number two, sing it out on the first.
Down at the cross where my Savior died.
There to my heart was the blood of God.
Glory to His name.
There to my heart was the blood of God.
Glory to His name.
Remember to sing it out on the second.
I am so wondrously saved from sin.
Jesus so sweetly abides within.
There at the cross where He took me in.
Glory to His name.
There to my heart was the blood of God.
Glory to His name.
Oh, Christ is found in the saints from sin.
I am so glad I have entered the name.
There Jesus saves me and keeps me clean.
Glory to His name.
There to my heart was the blood of God.
Glory to His name.
Come to this mountain so rich may be seen.
Just one more soul at the Savior's feet.
One James of day and He will come to me.
Glory to His name.
There to my heart was the blood of God.
Glory to His name.
Amen.
Good singing.
Just a quick reminder of course that we've got mother baby rooms and daddy rooms available for your convenience.
And also if you wouldn't mind making sure your cell phones are off or place them on silent during the service so that they don't go off in the middle of the preaching.
We'd appreciate your help with that.
We'll have the guys come up and help us with the offering at this time.
Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer.
Heavenly Father, Lord, we do love you. We thank you for allowing us to gather together today.
Lord, we pray that you'd bless the offering, the gift and the giver.
Lord, we pray that you'd bless the time society for prayer and then of course for the preaching of your word.
In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.
Amen.
All right.
Well, let's go and take our prayer sheets tonight and we'll go through our prayer list.
If you did not get a prayer sheet on your way in, just raise your hand and we can get one of those for you as well.
Of course I want to remind you that the way you add a request to the prayer sheet is through your communication card.
On the back of the card there's a place for you to write down a request.
Make sure you mark whether it's private or public.
If it's private, only I will see it.
If it's public, we'll put it on the prayer sheet.
If you don't mark it, we'll do our best to figure it out.
But we don't usually add those and of course we add them.
When we do add them, they're added in the order that they are received and they are removed after a couple of weeks.
And let's go and take these requests.
So, Lord, I'm going to pray out loud.
I'm going to ask that you would pray in your mind and your heart with me and let's bow our heads together.
Heavenly Father, Lord, we come to you tonight asking for these requests from our church family and we begin with these requests, Lord, with regards to health.
We pray for Ms. Tamara as she's praying for the health of Ruben Gonzalez and for the test results of his tumor that they would be favorable.
Also praying for Ms. Rebecca Garcia as she's praying for her daughter Maricela and her health.
Ms. Kate, we're praying for healing for her.
And Brother Warren, praying for his siblings' health.
Ms. Cricket, praying for healing for her client, Julie, who has breast cancer.
And Ms. Christine Ortiz, praying for her health.
Brother Salvador, for his health as well.
Ms. Maria Cudalima, praying for healing for her daughter's family.
And also Ms. Dogma, praying for relief for her pain.
Brother Edgar and Ms. Selena, praying for Urezi and Jonathan to continue to be healthy.
And, of course, we continue to pray for our missionary, Dave Cabantala's wife, Ms. Angel, as she's undergoing treatments for breast cancer.
Lord, we ask for all of these individuals. We pray that you would heal them.
Lord, if it's your will, we pray that you would take care of them.
We ask, Lord, that you would give wisdom to them as they make decisions to the doctors, nurses dealing with them.
We also pray, Lord, for the ladies in our church that are expecting Ms. Antonina, Ms. Katie, Ms. Ajana, Ms. Masha, Ms. Mars, and Ms. Melody,
praying that you'd give them all healthy pregnancies, Lord, with no issues, no complications.
And, Lord, we also pray for these that have physical needs and financial requests, praying for Brother Darrell,
as he prays for his sister Belinda to find housing before June.
Also, Ms. Irene, praying for her neighbor, who recently lost her home in a fire.
And Brother Warren, praying for his siblings, not only their health, but also their finances.
Ms. Christine, praying for her finances.
And, Lord, we pray that you would take care of these individuals, open doors for them, guide them, Lord.
And we also pray for these that have requests regarding salvation.
Ms. Irene, praying for her neighbor's salvation as well.
And Ms. Christine, praying for her family's salvation.
Ms. Natalie, praying for her husband's salvation.
Ms. Dogma, praying for her daughter and her family's salvation.
Lord, we ask for these individuals.
We pray that you would help them, Lord, to come to the place where they'd be willing to hear the Gospel.
Lord, we pray that you would move circumstances in their lives.
We pray that the Gospel would be communicated clearly to them.
And, Lord, we pray that everything that can be done would be done, that they might be saved.
We also have this praise report from Ms. Brittany, and we always want to acknowledge the praise report.
And her unspoken prayer request was answered.
And, Lord, we thank you for answered prayer.
We pray, Lord, also for Brother Warren, as he's praying for his siblings' church attendance as well.
Ms. Christine, Brother Salvador, praying for their faith and their walk with you.
Also, Brother Salvador, praying for his family.
And then, of course, Lord, we pray for all of these that have unspoken requests.
Ms. Ruby, Brother Montel, I might add, Brother Felix, Ms. Kate, Brother Salvador, Ms. Natalie, Ms. Dogma, all having unspoken requests.
Lord, you know what their petitions are.
You know what they're asking for.
We pray, Lord, that you would answer according to your will.
And we are thankful that we have confidence that you hear prayer.
Lord, we pray for our missions work.
We pray for our missionary, Dave Cabuntala in Cebu, and his family as well, and his ministry.
We pray for Pastor Stuckey and his family, and the churches in Manila, Pompanga, and Bicol.
We pray, Lord, that you would bless these locations and bless the work being done there.
We also pray for our church here.
We pray for the upcoming Spanish service, that you would bless it.
We pray for the vision offering that's upcoming.
Lord, that your will be done with regards to that.
And then, Lord, we just pray for our church, that you'd help us, strengthen us, help us to learn and grow.
We ask, Lord, that you meet with us tonight as we look at another portion of scripture together, help us to learn from it.
In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.
Please open up to the book of Psalms, Psalm 29, Psalm chapter 29.
If you do not have a Bible, please raise your hand and ask to bring your Bible.
Psalm 29, just keep your hand up as you will come by.
Psalm 29, Psalm 29, being verse number 1.
Give unto the Lord, O ye mighty. Give unto the Lord glory and strength.
Give unto the Lord the glory due unto his name.
Worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness.
The voice of the Lord is upon the waters. The God of glory thundereth. The Lord is upon many waters.
The voice of the Lord is powerful. The voice of the Lord is full of majesty.
The voice of the Lord breaketh the cedars. Yea, the Lord breaketh the cedars of Lebanon.
He maketh them also to skip like a calf. Lebanon and Syrian like a young unicorn.
The voice of the Lord divided the flames of fire.
The voice of the Lord shaketh the wilderness. The Lord shaketh the wilderness of Kadesh.
The voice of the Lord maketh the hinds to calve and discoverth the forests.
And in his temple doth everyone speak of his glory.
The Lord sitteth upon the flood. Yea, the Lord sitteth the king forever.
The Lord will give strength unto his people. The Lord will bless his people with peace.
Let's pray.
Heavenly Father, thank you for this evening. God, I thank you for your word and for our church.
As he please give us all tender hearts with a message tonight.
And please be with the pastor. Please strengthen him and fill him with your spirit.
We love you. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.
Amen.
Alright, we're there in the book of Psalms and of course tonight we're in Psalm 29.
We've been making our way through the book of Psalms on Wednesday night studying the book of Psalms together.
And tonight we find ourselves in this Psalm.
It's only 11 verses but it's a powerful Psalm.
And it's an interesting Psalm.
And I think I'm going to just go ahead and up front kind of give you the outline so you can jot it down if you're taking notes.
And I always encourage you to take notes and then we'll work our way through it together.
And I've divided this Psalm into four different sections.
And if you'd like to write these down then you're welcome to do that.
First we see the praise of God's worth in verses 1 and 2.
And then we see the purity of God's worship in verse 2.
The power of God's word in verses 3 to 9.
And then the providence of God's will in verses 10 to 11.
And I'll give that to you again as we go through it.
But we'll begin there in verse number 1.
The praise of God's worth.
If you look at verse number 1 I want you to notice what the Bible says here.
It says, of course you see the superscription of Psalm of David.
David is the human author who gave us this Psalm.
And then the Bible says this, give.
Give unto the Lord, O ye mighty.
Give unto the Lord glory and strength.
And I want you to notice the word give there.
The underlying Hebrew word that's translated there in our King James Bible as give.
Is also translated elsewhere in our King James Bible as the word ascribe.
And the Bible says here give or ascribe.
The meaning is that we are to attribute or when you ascribe something to someone.
You're assigning something to someone.
And here this is how the word is being used.
And we're being told to ascribe this or to attribute this to God.
We're told to give unto the Lord, O ye mighty, unto the Lord glory and strength.
The word glory is defined as honor or high esteem.
And we are commanded here to give unto the Lord glory and strength.
Now what's interesting here and this is why I've given this portion of the Psalm.
The heading of the praise of God's worth.
Because we're being told here to purposefully praise the Lord.
And to give Him praise with regards to His glory and His strength.
We are to give it unto Him.
What's interesting to me is that we're told who it is that should do this.
Here in verse 1 you see the words give unto the Lord.
I want you to just notice this little phrase here.
He says, O ye mighty, O ye mighty.
The word mighty means to possess great or impressive power.
So here the Psalmist is telling us, David is not only speaking to all of us,
although it applies to all of us, but he's specifically looking at individuals that are mighty.
People that are strong, they're powerful, maybe they're rich, they're resourceful, they've got influence.
And he's telling the mighty that they should give unto the Lord.
He says give unto the Lord, O ye mighty.
Give unto the Lord glory and strength.
He's telling the mighty of this world, the strong of this world.
The powerful of this world.
That they should ascribe and that they should attribute glory and strength unto God.
Now I'd like you to keep your place there in Psalm 29.
That's our text for tonight, but go with me just real quickly if you would to the book of Jeremiah.
Jeremiah chapter 9.
If you're there in Psalms you're going to go towards the end of the Old Testament.
You've got Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon, Isaiah, and then Jeremiah.
Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon, Isaiah, Jeremiah.
Do me a favor, keep your place there in Jeremiah.
We're going to leave it and we're going to come back to it.
I want you to be able to get to it quickly.
Jeremiah chapter number 9.
And the idea is this, that if the mighty are to acknowledge the worth of God, then all of us are to acknowledge the worth of God.
If the strongest of us, if the richest of us, if the most powerful of us are to acknowledge the fact that we are to give,
and to acknowledge, to praise the Lord, and give Him glory and strength.
Acknowledge, give that attribute.
The strongest are to look at God and say, no, I'm not strong, God is strong.
The most glorious, the most honorable, the most esteemed, the most respected are to look at God and say, no, I give God the glory.
It is the God who has strength.
We are to give Him, we'll see there in verse 2, the glory due unto His name.
If the mighty are to do it, then what that tells us is that we're all to do it.
We're all to acknowledge the glory and strength of God.
Now in Jeremiah chapter 9, I think in verses 23 and 24 are some interesting, I think, verses that parallel with this.
Jeremiah chapter 9, I want you to look at verse 23 and I want you to really look at this verse because I think it's an interesting verse.
Jeremiah chapter 9 and verse 23, the Bible says this,
Thus saith the Lord, let not, now he's about to tell us, give us a list of individuals and this coincides with Psalm 29.
Because in Psalm 29 verse 1, we're told that the mighty are to give unto the Lord glory and strength.
Here in Jeremiah 9, 23, we're told this, let not, here's the first group, the wise man, glory in his wisdom.
Now again, the word glory means to give honor or to high esteem.
If we are giving glory to someone else, we are honoring them.
We're giving glory to God, we're honoring Him.
If we are glorying in ourselves, then the idea is that we are showing off, we're boasting or bragging, we're honoring ourselves.
And here's what Jeremiah 9, 23 says, it says, let not the wise man glory, or another word that could be used, it's used synonymously, boast or brag.
Let them not honor themselves, notice, in his wisdom.
So he says, the wise man should not glory in his wisdom.
Then he says this, neither let the mighty man glory in his might.
The word might means strength.
And he says, the strong man should not glory in his strength.
The wise man should not glory in his wisdom.
Then he says this, let not the rich man glory in his riches.
Now what's interesting to me about Jeremiah 9, 23 is that this one verse pretty much covers all the pursuits of mankind.
Isn't that true?
Because when it comes to human beings and the things we glory in, the things that we find honor in, the things that we give high esteem to, aren't they these things, wisdom, might and riches?
I mean, aren't these the things that human beings pursue?
Don't they go to college and university and pursue degrees and pursue academics?
Why? That they might have wisdom, that they might have knowledge, that they might become smart.
And there's nothing wrong with that.
The Bible says the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge and the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.
But this is what the world pursues.
When we look at someone, we go out and buy a book and we look at an individual, maybe we listen to somebody speak and we glory in their wisdom or they glory in their wisdom.
This is something that people glory in.
Human beings are, they are impressed by someone's wisdom.
Why are we impressed by men like Elon Musk?
Because they build things and do things that other people haven't done.
But here God says, let not the wise man glory in his wisdom.
Then he says, let not the mighty man glory in his mind.
Isn't this something also that people pursue?
I mean, gyms are full tonight with people pursuing strength and pursuing might.
This is something that's impressive and something that we honor and it's a good thing.
There's nothing wrong with being in shape and being healthy and all those things.
But here God says, let the mighty man, neither let the mighty man glory in his might.
Then he says, let not the rich man glory in his riches.
And again, isn't this something that people admire?
Something that people are impressed with.
These are all the things that human beings pursue.
These are all the things that human beings are impressed with.
These are all the things that if you and I had them, we would want to glory in it.
We would want to show it off.
We want people to know.
But God says, let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, neither let the mighty man glory in his might.
Let not the rich man glory in his strength.
And then it was verse 24.
He says this, but, here's the contrast.
But let him that glorieth glory in this.
And if you don't have the rest of the verse, you might wonder, good night, well what's there, what is left to glory in?
Verse 24, but let him that glorieth glory in this, that he understandeth and knoweth me.
That I am the Lord, which exercised loving kindness, judgment, and righteousness in the earth.
For in these things I delight, sayeth the Lord.
And there's nothing wrong with wisdom.
Nothing wrong with might.
Nothing wrong with glory, with riches.
But when we glory in those things, we're glorying in things that God says, this should not impress us.
This should not be something that we put on a pedestal.
This should not be something that we pursue.
You say, what is the most important thing to pursue in this world?
It is God.
And the Bible says that if we're going to glory in anything, we ought to glory in this.
That we understand and know God.
That he understandeth and knoweth me.
That you are pursuing God with your life.
That you are pursuing the knowledge of God and the understanding of God.
And that ought to be more impressive than anything else in this world.
But let him that glorieth glory in this, that he understandeth and knoweth me.
And the interesting thing about that is that we all have access to the knowledge of God.
We all have access to learning the Bible, studying the Bible, reading the Bible.
We all have access to getting close to God.
We all draw nigh to God. And that is the only thing.
The Apostle Paul said that he would glory in the cross.
The only thing worth glorying in.
The only thing worth bragging about or boasting about is God and our relationship to him.
Keep your place there in Jeremiah. Go back to Psalm 29.
So notice we see, give unto the Lord, O ye mighty.
Give unto the Lord glory and strength.
Why does he say that? Because the mighty should not glory in his might.
The wise man should not glory in his wisdom.
The rich man should not glory in his riches.
The only thing worth glorying about is that he understandeth and knoweth me, is what the Lord said.
And then I want you to notice in verse 2, Psalm 29 verse 2.
He says, give unto the Lord the glory due.
The word due means owed unto his name.
So this is something that we owe God.
And look, ask Christians every once in a while.
And when I say every once in a while, I probably mean every day and multiple times a day.
It is good for us to just stop and think and praise and give glory to God.
To give glory for his strength. To give glory for his wisdom.
For his strength. For his riches. For the things that he's done for us.
We see the praise of God's worth.
And look, I know that we read the Bible sometimes and we think,
Oh this is just kind of a spiritual book and it's just kind of the things that the Bible says.
But I think it is good and Psalms teaches us.
It's good for us to stop every once in a while and just praise the Lord.
Just praise God for his word.
Praise God for his strength.
The Bible says that we are to give him.
Give unto the Lord the glory due unto his name.
And then I want you to notice the last part of verse 2.
In verses 1 and the first part of verse 2, we see the praise of God's worth.
In the last part of verse 2, I want you to notice that we see the purity of God's worship.
The purity of God's worship. Notice it.
He says worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness.
He says not only should you praise the Lord.
He says that you should worship the Lord and you should worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness.
What the Bible is telling us here, not only should we praise God's worth.
Not only should we acknowledge the worth of God.
Not our worth, not our impressiveness, not our skills, not the things we've accomplished,
but the things that God has done and we should praise God's worth.
But also we see here the purity of God's worship.
We're told that when we worship the Lord and that we should worship the Lord,
that we are to worship the Lord in the beauty of, notice this word, holiness.
What does that say? What does that mean?
Here's what that means.
You and I don't get to worship God however which way we want.
We don't get to worship God however we want.
Today there are many people who claim they worship God and they even glory in their worship of God,
yet they worship God in very carnal ways.
God says worship the Lord in holiness.
God says worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness.
And this is reiterated by the Lord Jesus Christ.
Go with me if you would to the book of John, John chapter 4.
In the New Testament you have Matthew, Mark, Luke, John.
Now I know you have your place in Jeremiah.
I appreciate you keeping your place there.
Also keep your place in John.
Those are the only two places I'm going to have you keep your place tonight.
Jeremiah and John.
But keep your place there in John chapter 4 and look at verse number 24.
Notice what Jesus said.
John chapter 4 and verse 24.
The Bible says God is a spirit and they that worship Him, notice these words,
must worship Him in spirit and in truth.
See, we must worship God in truth.
We must worship Him in the beauty of holiness.
We don't just get to decide.
We don't just get to decide, oh, because we're a church in the south,
we're going to have country western type music and when we're a church in the inner city,
then we're going to worship God with some sort of contemporary type music.
No, no, no.
We don't get to decide how we come to God.
We don't get to decide how we worship God.
We don't get to decide how we approach God.
We approach God as a holy God and we must worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness.
Holiness has to do with the way, the means, the method in which we worship the Lord.
It also has to do with our attitude.
Look, when we approach God, we need to be careful that we don't approach God in a casual way.
We're thankful that God is our Heavenly Father.
We're thankful that we can come to Him intimately and cry Abba, Father.
But let us never forget that though He is the intimate Father,
He's also the infinite Father, which is why Jesus said,
you don't just call out to Him and say, hey dad, how you doing?
No, no.
You say, our Father which art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.
Why?
Because we must approach Him in a holiness.
We must worship Him in truth, in our attitude, in our demeanor, our music, the way we act.
And again, today you go to most church services and they're worshipping God and it's carnal.
You've got people dressed immodestly, you've got people on the platform dressed immodestly,
you've got people singing with breathy voice.
I used to have a pastor, a pastor used to say, you know, they use the bedroom voice
while they're worshiping this breathy, like they're being romantic to Jesus.
That is inappropriate.
We are to worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness.
You know, holiness never has anything to be ashamed of.
Holiness never has anything to be embarrassed about.
Holiness is always beautiful.
We worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness.
They that worship Him, Jesus said, must worship Him in spirit and in truth.
Make your way back to Psalm 29 if you would.
Keep your place there in John.
Let me give you the third heading this evening.
We see number one, the praise of God's worth.
We must give God the glory due to His name.
We must attribute to Him strength and glory.
Not to ourselves, not glorying in our own might and our own riches and our own wisdom,
but giving God the glory.
And the only thing you and I have to glory about is the Lord Jesus Christ.
The only thing that we should glory is to glory in the cross.
The only thing to glory about, the only thing worth bragging about is that we know God
and that God knows us and that we can understand Him through His word.
That we can please Him through our lives.
So we see the praise of God's worth and we see the purity of God's worship.
That we must worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness.
And I want you to notice thirdly tonight, not only do we see the praise of God's worth
and the purity of God's worship,
but we see thirdly this evening the power of God's word.
In verses three to nine, the psalm changes a little bit.
And what we see is an emphasis on the voice of the Lord.
And what I want you to notice as we make our way through these verses is this,
that the psalmist David begins to give us a word picture.
He's going to create this imagery and he's going to illustrate the voice of the Lord
and he's going to illustrate it as a powerful storm, as a thunderstorm.
Now I'm not going to take the time to dissect every single line in verses three to nine.
I'm going to cover it here quickly simply because I just don't have the time to do it.
And I plan on coming back at a later time and preaching an entire sermon
just emphasizing verses three to nine and dissecting it.
But I just want you to see the emphasis.
The phrase the voice of the Lord is used in verses three to nine seven different times.
In fact the phrase is used seven times in seven verses.
And it's used repetitively.
The voice of the Lord. Notice verse three.
The voice of the Lord is upon the waters.
The God of glory thundereth. Notice the idea of this storm, this thunderstorm.
The God of glory thundereth. The Lord is upon many waters.
Notice verse four. The voice of the Lord is powerful.
The voice of the Lord is full of majesty.
The voice of the Lord, verse five, breaketh the cedars.
Yea, the Lord breaketh the cedars of Lebanon.
He maketh them also to skip like calves, Lebanon and Syria like a young unicorn.
The voice of the Lord divided the flames of fire.
The voice of the Lord shaketh the wilderness.
The Lord shaketh the wilderness of cedars.
The voice of the Lord maketh the hinds to cap and discovereth the forest.
And in his temple doth everyone speak of his glory.
So notice that this phrase is used.
The voice of the Lord. The voice of the Lord. The voice of the Lord.
Seven times in these seven verses.
And this phrase, the voice of the Lord, is used to represent the word of God.
The term voice is being used in this idea that it's audible.
And what David is using is this illustration, this image of a storm.
And of course we don't know this. The scripture is inspired by God.
It's the Holy Spirit of God.
But when I read this and when I study this, I imagine that as David is maybe writing these words under the inspiration of the Holy Ghost.
Maybe there's an actual storm happening at the time.
Maybe he's visually witnessing and experiencing a storm coming in.
And as he's doing that, the Holy Spirit is speaking to him and saying, you know, the voice of the Lord is like this powerful storm.
But the word voice there, it's not just simply talking about the audible voice of God.
Although it is talking about the audible voice of God.
But it's a representation of the word of God.
Let me just give you some cross references for that.
Did you keep your place in John? Go back to John chapter 10.
John chapter 10. Look at verse 27.
John chapter 10 and verse 27. Jesus famously said these words.
He said, my sheep hear my voice and I know them and they follow me.
Now here Jesus uses the phrase hear my voice.
But everyone that interprets this passage applies it to, and I think rightly so, to the word of God.
That we hear the voice of the Lord Jesus Christ, not audibly, but through the reading of God's word.
Through the King James Bible for us in the English language.
We hear his voice. My sheep hear my voice and I know them and they follow me.
Go to Matthew chapter 4. Matthew chapter 4. Look at verse 4.
If you go backwards from John, you've got Luke, Mark, and then Matthew.
Matthew chapter 4 and verse 4.
Matthew 4. Jesus said this. The Bible says, but he answered and said, it is written.
This is Jesus speaking.
And notice the connection between the word of God and the voice of God.
Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word, that's the word of God, that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.
That's the voice of God.
The reason that there's a connection between the voice of God and the word of God is because what makes the word of God special is that those words that we have in our Bible are inspired.
And the word inspired in a very basic term, in a basic way, simply means that they were breathed by God.
That God spoke them.
The words that you and I have in our King James Bible were spoken by God.
They were spoken out of his mouth.
Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.
So there's this connection between the voice of God and the word of God.
And here in Psalm 29, you can go back to Psalm 29, the phrase the voice of the Lord is being used, but is used to illustrate the power of the word of God.
And like I said, at another time, I'm going to preach a whole sermon about the voice of the Lord, and I'm going to dissect these verses for you.
Or dissect these verses, but tonight I'm not going to do that, but I want you to just notice several things here.
That the power of the voice of the Lord is used as an illustration.
It's used to illustrate the fact that there is power in the word of God, and the power is seen through this storm.
Notice it again, verse 3. The voice of the Lord, notice where the storm begins.
It begins offshore. It begins in the ocean.
The voice of the Lord is upon the waters, and it's almost like David is maybe sitting, looking out a window, and he sees out on the sea clouds forming, and waves beginning to be more furious, and wind beginning to blow, and he begins to see the storm to arise out of the waters.
And he writes these words, the voice of the Lord is upon the waters. The God of glory, he says, thundereth.
Now there's thunder that he hears, and lightning that is coming down. The Lord is upon many waters as this storm begins to form out in the sea, out in the ocean.
Verse 4, the voice of the Lord is powerful. I don't know that there's much, you know, when it comes to nature, and it comes to the power of nature, I mean storms, we tend to, you know, say this bomb is this powerful, and compare it to like a storm, a tornado, a whirlwind, something that God does in nature.
And here he says the voice of the Lord is powerful, and what David is saying is this, that just like a powerful storm, he says the voice of God, the word of God is powerful, the voice of the Lord is full of majesty.
The voice of the Lord, he says, breaketh the cedars. The cedars, of course, is referring to a tree, and now the storm is coming up onto the shore.
And it's beginning to come through the trees, and the storm is passing through the trees. The Bible says that breaketh the cedars, yea, the Lord breaketh the cedars of Lebanon.
And I'm not going to take the time to take you through references, but if you do a study of the cedars of Lebanon, or the trees of Lebanon, you'll find that the cedars of Lebanon were known for their strength, they were known for their height, they were known for being strong, big, powerful trees.
But the Bible here tells us that the voice of the Lord breaketh the cedars, yea, the Lord breaketh the cedars of Lebanon, just like a strong storm would come through and begin to break the trees.
Notice verse 6, he says, he maketh them. Who's the them? The them there is referring to the cedars of Lebanon. He maketh them also to skip like a calf.
And the idea there is to skip like a calf. A calf is a baby. It's this sudden, uncontrollable movement.
If you've ever watched one of those, or if you ever grew up on a farm, I guess, I didn't grow up on a farm, I'm a city slicker, but if you grew up on a farm, or if you've done like I've done and just watched nature shows, you know, and you see these animals when their first birth and they begin to walk and their legs are just kind of flimsy and they're skipping.
That's the idea here, like a calf, this sudden, uncontrollable movement. And the psalmist is telling us that this is what the voice of God does to these huge, imagine a big oak tree and it's just being splintered and it's being moved around like a toothpick.
He maketh them also to skip like a calf, Lebanon and Syrian, like a young unicorn. And I don't want to spend too much time on this, but let me just say this, here the Bible makes a reference to an animal called a unicorn.
And, you know, I just believe the King James Bible, if it says it, then it is. And I'm not going to make excuses for it or try to explain it away.
The word unicorn here could be a name, it could be a different name for an animal that exists today, or it could be referencing an animal that is extinct. I tend to think it's referencing an animal that is extinct.
If you study unicorns in the Bible, you'll find that they're very strong animals and we've done that in the past, I'm not going to do that.
But let me just say this about unicorns, people will mock at the Bible. You know, it's interesting, this whole psalm is about the majesty and the power of the word of God.
And then in it, God puts a reference to a unicorn, which is something that people do to mock the word of God. They'll say, oh, well you believe in that Bible and it mentions unicorns.
And like it's so absurd. And I think to myself, what's so absurd about an animal with one horn?
I mean there's animals with one horn right now. So people are like, oh, well you can't believe the myth that the Bible is full of fairy tales that mentions a unicorn.
Like what's so weird about an animal that had one horn? This doesn't seem that absurd to me.
So he says that he makes them to skip like a calf, Lebanon and Syria, like a young unicorn.
Verse 7, the voice of the Lord divided the flames of fire. And I believe here the flames of fire is referring to lightning.
And that phrase flames of fire can be used in different ways in our Bible. But here we're describing a storm.
In verse 3, there's already been a reference to thunder. And the voice of the Lord, there's actually a connection, there's an association in our Bible with thunder and lightning and God speaking.
If you remember Mount Sinai, God spoke the Ten Commandments. Remember when the children of Israel, they heard his voice, they were afraid.
They said, Moses, you talk to God, we don't want to talk to God, that's scary. But when God spoke, there was thunder, there was smoke, there was lightning.
So here the voice of the Lord divided the flames of fire. Verse 8, the voice of the Lord shaketh the wilderness.
Just envision a storm, a big hurricane coming through, a big thunderstorm coming through.
And as it's making its way off the shore, from the ocean, onto the shore, into the forest, into the wilderness, it's breaking trees in its path.
It shaketh the wilderness. The Lord shaketh the wilderness of Kadesh. Verse 9, the voice of the Lord maketh the hinds to calf.
The word hind is a reference to a female deer. And when she calves, she's giving birth.
And the idea is this, that a pregnant deer would go into labor, that the voice of the Lord, like a powerful storm, would trigger and cause this hind to calf.
And notice these words, discovereth the forest. The word discover in our King James Bible is an older word that means to, the idea is that it's removing.
When it's talking about discovering the forest, it's talking about the wind coming through and ripping leaves off branches, ripping branches off trees.
It's uprooting the forest. It's discovereth the forest. And notice where the storm, I mean just imagine this idea.
If David was actually watching this happen, or just something in his mind as he's writing this word, but he sees off the shore, out in the ocean, the waves, and the wind, and the clouds, and the thunder.
This storm forming, it's making its way onto the shore, through the forest, as it's making its way through the forest. It discovereth the forest.
It uproots the trees. It's breaking these cedars of Lebanon in half. It's making them skip like calves. It's bringing this massive power and energy.
And then it ends. The storm just ends at the temple of the Lord. Look at verse 9.
The voice of the Lord maketh the hinds to calf, and discovereth the forest, and in his temple doth everyone speak of his glory.
See, the idea is this, that you want to show off about your money, you want to show off about your little muscles, God says, his voice is like this thunderstorm that comes through and uproots the forest.
And when it's over, when it's over, all you can speak, look, the truth is this, there's a connection between the voice of God, there's a connection between the word of God and the house of God.
Every house of God should proclaim the word of God.
Hear the voice of the Lord, it's making its way, it discovereth the forest, and it ends in the temple, in his temple doth everyone speak of his glory.
First of all, I'm telling you, if you and I ever got a real view of God, if we ever got a clear view of God, I'm not talking about a physical view, I'm not talking about seeing God physically, you and I aren't going to see the invisible God.
If we ever heard God, I'm not talking about audibly, you and I are never going to hear the audible voice of God.
But if we actually heard God through his word, if we actually saw God through his word, we would quit bragging about ourselves, and we would only speak of his glory.
Look at verse 9, in the temple doth everyone speak of his glory.
If you ever heard God, you'd stop being impressed with other people's riches.
If you ever heard God, you'd stop being impressed with other people's might.
If you ever heard God, you'd stop being impressed with other people's wisdom, and you'd only be able to speak of his glory.
The voice of the Lord is powerful, it's full of majesty, it breaketh, it divideth, it shaketh, it discoverth, and in his temple doth everyone speak of his glory.
So we see the power of the word of God, and there's much more that could be said about that, I'm not going to do that, I'll save that for another day.
I want you to notice, lastly tonight, not only do we see the praise of God's worth, verses 1 and 2, the purity of God's worship, verse 2, the power of God's word, verses 3 and 9,
I want you to notice lastly tonight that we see the providence of God's will, in verses 10 through 11, the providence of God's will.
And again, I want you to notice that there's this storm, there's this imagery of the storm, the voice of the Lord is upon the waters, the storm forms in the ocean,
the God of glory thundereth, it begins to thunder, enlightening, the Lord is upon many waters, and it comes onto the shore, it breaketh the cedar, it breaketh the cedars of Lebanon,
it's making its way through the forest, it's discovering the forest, it's breaking the branches and breaking the trees, it's uprooting the forest, it maketh them, the cedars of Lebanon, also to skip like a calf, like a young unicorn,
it divided the flames of fire, it's striking lightning, it shaketh the wilderness, it shaketh the wilderness of Kadesh, it discovered the forest.
See, the psalmist here is using the imagery of a storm, and the thing about a storm is this, is that it's chaotic, it's uncontrollable, it's not within our control.
When a storm comes, you can't stop it, you can't hinder it, you can only let it do what it's going to do.
And here's the thing, and I don't have the time to develop this tonight, but let me just say this, in the Bible, storms illustrate the trials and tribulations of life.
Isn't that true? Go to Matthew chapter 7, just real quickly, Matthew chapter 7.
And we could look at a lot of passages to prove this, I'm not going to do that, but I'll just show you maybe the most famous one, Matthew chapter number 7.
If you look at verse number 24, of course you've got Matthew chapter 7, the famous Sermon on the Mount,
and the famous Sermon on the Mount ends with this famous parable of building your house upon the rock.
We saw, if you remember last week, that the Lord is the Rock.
In Matthew 7 and verse 24, the Bible says, Therefore whosoever heareth these sayings of mine.
Now what are we talking about when Jesus says, whosoever heareth these sayings of mine?
We're talking about hearing the Word of God. Notice the consistency.
The Word of God, He says, whosoever heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them, I will liken him unto a wise man which built his house upon a rock.
The Rock, of course, is the Lord, the Lord Jesus Christ.
The house here is a representation of our lives, and the idea is this, that if you and I build our lives upon the Rock,
then when the storms come, look at verse 25, and the rain descended, and the floods came, and the wind blew.
What is that describing? A storm.
The rain descended, the floods came, the wind blew, and beat upon the house, and it fell not, for it was founded upon a rock.
What's interesting about this parable that Jesus is giving is this, that it doesn't say, and in fact in other gospels it tells us this,
it says when the storm comes, because we're all going to go through storms.
In fact, in the Christian life, I've said it many times, you're either in a storm, you're going into a storm, or you're coming out of a storm.
The Christian life is the life of storms. The storms of life represent the trials, represent the difficulty, the tribulations, the temptations, the difficulty we go through life.
And here he says that the rain descended, the floods came, the wind blew, and beat upon the house, and it fell not, for it was founded upon a rock.
Verse 26, and everyone that heareth these things of mine, and doeth them not, shall be likened unto a foolish man, which built his house, his life, upon the sand.
That's not the Rock. That's the opposite. The shaking sand.
See, the thing about the world and the world's philosophies is that they're always moving. They're always changing.
What's in style right now won't be in style ten years from now.
That's why some of you sitting here listening to me preach right now, when you were a young person, you were wearing bell bottoms and sporting an afro or whatever.
Because the world's always changing. The Bible says Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever.
But here, the Bible tells us that this man who built his house upon the sand, notice verse 27, the rain descended, the floods came, the winds blew, and beat upon that house, notice these words, and it fell,
and great was the fall of it.
I always think it's interesting that people will say things like, oh, well, this storm came and that's why that person quit.
Or this trial came, this tribulation came, this issue came, and that's why that person, you know, that's why they fell out.
That's why they got back to them. That's why they got a divorce. That's why they did this. They did that.
Listen to me. The storms only reveal what you already have as a foundation.
If you're founded upon the rock, no storm's going to cause you to fall.
But if you're founded upon the shifting sands of this world, then Jesus says it fell and great was the fall of it.
And the truth of the matter is this, that the storms in the Bible, they illustrate the trials and tribulations of life.
They illustrate the battles we go through, the difficulty we deal with.
Here's the beautiful thing about this Psalm. Can you make your way back to Psalm 29?
I won't have you go there, but if you remember, one of my favorite stories in the Bible is Paul.
If you remember when Paul was on his way to Rome, he got caught in a storm.
And as a result, you know, there's all sorts of things. But Paul told the men in that storm, he said,
The Lord spoke to me in the night and the Lord told me that we're all going to survive.
And he said these words. He said, I believe God.
And you know, they went through difficulty. If you read that story, I mean, they're throwing stuff out the ship and they're not eating for seven days.
They can't even see the stars or the moon or the sun. Nothing for days. They're struggling.
They're struggling to survive. And at the very end, the ship actually breaks in half.
They all get thrown into the sea and they all make it to shore. And the Bible tells us none of them died, all survived.
And you know, I just envision, again, the Bible doesn't say this, but I just envision Paul coming off that shore as he's looking around.
And he sees that everybody's safe, just saying to himself, I believe God.
Because God told him, you're going to make it through this storm.
In Psalm 29 and verse 10, I want you to notice what the Bible says.
I've emphasized for you how this psalm gives us this imagery of this powerful storm coming through, destroying the forest.
Starting in the ocean, coming onto shore. This powerful magnitude of a storm.
And then the psalmist says this in verse 10, Psalm 29 verse 10.
He says, The Lord sitteth upon the flood.
The word flood in our King James Bible can be used for multiple things.
When you and I think of a flood, we think of flooding and it can definitely be used that way.
The word flood is used about Noah's flood when the whole world was flooded.
But if you remember, Joshua also said, he referenced the flood.
He said, if you want to worship the gods that your fathers worship on the other side of the flood, and what he's referring to is a river.
So the word flood can be used for what we would call a flood.
It can be used for any sort of stream of water or coming of water for a river.
Here I believe it's being in reference to the storm.
And the storm is probably bringing flash floods with it, bringing storms floods and storm waters with it.
But as David is maybe watching the storm or as he's envisioning it, he envisions this power and this chaos.
Then he says this, The Lord sitteth upon the flood.
Yea, the Lord sitteth King forever.
The Lord will give strength unto his people.
The Lord will bless his people with peace.
And here's what I believe David wants to teach us.
Not only the praise of God's worth and not only the purity of God's worship, not only is the power of God's word,
but the providence of God's will.
That when you are founded upon the rock, no matter how chaotic the storm, Paul,
when you believe God, then you can trust that the Lord sitteth upon the floods.
That the Lord sitteth, you say, My whole world's falling apart. You don't understand, pastor.
There's all sorts of issues and problems. It seems like I'm in the midst of a storm.
Everything's chaotic. Everything's breaking apart.
Hey, always have confidence in this, that the Lord sitteth upon the floods.
The Lord sitteth King forever. No storm ever bothered the Lord.
And the Lord will give us strength. The Lord will give strength unto his people.
The Lord will bless his people with peace.
And we see the providence of God's will. And the providence of God's will is this.
That you and I may need to go through some storms.
Paul went through a storm. He didn't want to.
In fact, if you remember the story, he told them, We should not do this. We should not set sail.
In life, you and I are going to go through storms.
But we should believe this, that God can get us through those storms.
And that if we're trusting in the Lord, if we're founded upon the rock,
then the Lord that sitteth upon the floods, the Lord that sitteth King forever, the God of the storm.
I like how it says there in verse number 3, Psalm 29 in verse number 3, let me find it real quickly.
It says, Notice verse 3, The voice of the Lord is upon the waters. Notice this phrase.
The God of glory thundereth. He's the God of the storm.
He's the Lord that sitteth upon the floods. He's the Lord that sitteth King forever.
The Lord will give strength unto his people. The Lord will bless his people.
So if you and I are founded upon the Lord, then he will get us through the storm.
And I just want you to notice how this psalm ends because I just don't think this is a coincidence.
I don't think there's any coincidence in the Bible.
And this psalm is a powerful, as we've been talking about, powerful image of a storm.
And the chaos of a storm. And the God of the storm.
But notice how the psalm ends. Psalm 29 verse 11.
The Lord will give strength unto his people. The Lord will bless his people with, notice this is the last word of this psalm.
With, notice this word, peace. Peace.
Let me read to you just a passage. We'll finish up. Just three verses from Mark chapter 4.
You don't have to turn there. I'll just read this for you but I'd like you to hear these words.
Mark chapter 4 verse 37. The Bible says this,
And there arose a great storm of wind, and the waves beat into the ship, so that it was now full.
And he was in the hindering part of the ship, asleep on a pillow.
And they awake him and say unto him, Master, carest thou not that we perish?
And he arose and rebuked the wind, and said unto the sea, Peace, be still.
And the wind ceased, and there was a great calm.
See sometimes we're going to go through storms. But as long as you're with the Lord of the storm, you have nothing to worry about.
Because he is the Lord of the storm. He is the God of glory. And he can speak peace into the storm.
Father we do love you. And we thank you for this great song.
And the imagery that is given to us.
Lord I pray that the idea wouldn't be lost to us.
That sometimes storms, physical storms can be scary.
And the storms of life can be difficult.
They're chaotic and they are out of control.
The trials and tribulations, the battles we go through in life can be hard.
But Lord when we're in the midst of a storm, let us always remember that you are the Lord that sitteth upon the floods.
You are the Lord of the storm. And as long as we're founded upon the rock, then we can make it through.
And Lord we thank you for that. We thank you for this great song. The encouragement from this song.
We love you. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.
Alright well God bless you. Thank you for being here tonight.
We're going to have brother Andrew come up and lead us in a final song.
Just want to remind you for those of you that are part of the homeschool group that we have a Valentine's Day party this Friday at 11 am.
So don't forget about that.
And if you would like to sign up to help bring certain things or help, there's a sign up sheet in the back.
If you need a flyer you can see my wife for that.
There will be pizza for lunch so you don't have to worry about that.
But don't forget about that.
And then of course I want to invite you to be with us on Saturday morning for our big soul winning rally.
If there's anything we can do for you please let us know.
We'll have brother Andrew come up and lead us in a final song.
Alright well go ahead and grab your song books and turn with me this evening to 361 as we'll finish the service.
Kind of a newer song or a song we don't sing very often so learn it with me this evening okay?
Do your best and we'll learn it together here.
Did you think to pray song number 361?
Join me as we finish the service on this song on the first.
There you left your room this morning, did you think to pray?
In the name of Christ our Savior, did you soothe a behavior as a shield today?
Oh how painless the feeling, the air will change the night's play.
So in sorrow and in gladness you go and forget to pray.
Alright now that you've heard it one time join me on that second verse okay?
Join me on that second verse, song number 361 as we end the service this evening.
On that second sing it out.
When you lived with great temptation, did you think to pray?
By his dying love and merit, did you claim the Holy Spirit as your God and Savior?
Oh how painless the feeling, the air will change the night's play.
So in sorrow and in gladness you go and forget to pray.
Okay good, let's sing it on that third one.
Slow it down just a little bit.
I'll ask you to slow it down for me just a little bit.
Join me on this third verse of this song 361, did you think to pray?
A little bit slower.
When your heart was filled with anger, did you think to pray?
Did you think, where is my brother?
That you might forgive another who had crossed your way?
Oh how painless the feeling, the air will change the night's play.
So in sorrow and in gladness you go and forget to pray.
Good, nice and slow on that fourth.
Let's finish strong this evening.
Oh how painless the feeling, the air will change the night's play.
So in sorrow and in gladness you go and forget to pray.
Sing it out.
Oh how painless the feeling, the air will change the night's play.
So in sorrow and in gladness you go and forget to pray.
Amen.
Great singing this evening.
Thank you so much for joining us for our Wednesday evening service.
We'll go ahead and close the service with a word of prayer.
I'll ask Brother Matt if he doesn't mind closing us with a word of prayer.
Amen, we'll see you on Saturday.