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So what we're going to be doing here is we're going to go back to the series I was teaching on in the psalms. So we're going to be looking at a couple of psalms this morning. What's coming out is a checklist, if you will, or a questionnaire to go through interpreting the psalms, a specific type of psalms that we're going to be looking at today.
It is the praise psalms. We're going to see a couple of praise psalms. How do we study this? How do we just revel in the greatness of our God as a psalmist extols his God and our God? And I think this detour from forgiveness to praise is appropriate in a lot of ways.
Many a time when we struggle with forgiveness, it's because we think we are so important. I think I'm so important that I have been offended so mightily by this other human being that I do not want to freely forgive the offense that has been made against me.
But when we take our eyes off of ourselves, when we start to look up at the greatness, the grandeur, the majesty, and the grace and mercy and tenderness of our God, it becomes a lot easier to forgive others as we ourselves have been forgiven.
So I have a few introductory comments on forgiveness. Does everyone have a copy? Okay. Yeah, if someone doesn't have one to look at, maybe we can make some more copies for it. If you can share, that's fine.
If you need more, because I think when we go through the psalm, it's helpful for you to have that handout. All right. So let me give a few introductory comments. So by that time, we'll have the copy as well to work through the psalm.
So let's begin with praise. What is praise? Can someone just give some definitions of praise as you understand it from the scriptures? What is praise? Acknowledging who God is, and that's going to be a key element in the praise psalms.
There is one type of praise psalms called the descriptive psalms that just describes who God is. So acknowledging who God is in his attributes, in his grandeur, in his works, that's part of what praise is, is to acknowledge who God is.
It is a form of worship. In fact, you have this term called the sacrifice of praise, and I'm going to use a few scriptures. I'm going to get some volunteers to read it so that we think rightly about praise.
Sometimes we just think, oh, some people just mindlessly say hallelujah, and that just doesn't make any sense. But praise is a very important element of our worship. We are commanded to praise our God.
So let me give a few verses just so we get our mind thinking right about praise, and then we will get into our psalm. So if I can just have some volunteers, just lift your hands, and I'll give you different scriptures to turn to who would like to read.
If you can read Leviticus 7, 12, another person, and you can read Psalm 66, verse 8, and you can read Psalm 95, verse 2, and I need a few more. And if you can read Psalm 100, verse 2, a couple more. If you can have 1 Corinthians 10, 31, and if you can have Philippians 4, 6, and just a couple more.
Hebrews 13, 15, and the last one, Psalm 30, verse 9. All right, so we have a few people turning to different scriptures. We'll just go quickly through them. This is not going to be an exposition of these verses, but I think it'll just give you a flavor of where praise fits in the life of a believer.
Some of these are Old Testament, and you're going to see how the second element of praise is going to be not just ascribing to God His greatness, but also thanking God for what He has done. God is so powerful in our lives that there's going to be thanks very closely intertwined with praise.
So I want you to look for these key words as these verses are read. Praise, thanksgiving, sacrifice, and glory, because it is the glory of God that we are going to be looking at, and I'll explain glory in a minute.
So let's read the verses as we have them. So the first verse is from Leviticus 7, 12. Here you're seeing the Levitical sacrificial system, and then one of the sacrifices that you have is called the thanksgiving sacrifice.
When we think of giving thanks, we sometimes just say, you know, I just thank God for what we did. And here the Old Testament saints would come before the temple and provide a sacrifice that acknowledges what God has done for them.
And in fact, when we think of praise, one of the things that we often forget is we've gone through a trial. God has helped us. We just say, oh, thank you, God, and then we move on to the next thing. Whereas the saints in the Bible are commanded to come back to God for what God has done, to recollect the power of God in their lives, and to give him thanks, and to praise him for what he has done.
And the sacrificial system here just gives us a very vivid picture of how this was done in the Old Testament. So the next one is Psalm 66, verse 8. Isn't that wonderful? Bless our God, O peoples, let the sound of his praise be heard.
This is a command, and again, you'll see several times where you have this command to the people of God to extol and to exalt his name. And there is a reason for this. It is not just your heart that is praising God, but you are letting the sound of his praises get out to those who do not know it.
So someone else is here sitting, and you have seen the power of God. You have experienced the greatness of God. And as you shout out his praise, someone else is hearing about the glory of God. And when you talk about, well, I'll hold on glory for a minute.
So the next one is Psalm 95, verse 2. And that's how every time we gather together should be. We come here not just with dark faces and, you know, my bank account on my mind, what's going on there. We have to come here with thanksgiving and with shouts of praise.
We are here as a people called by God, and we are commanded to show forth his praise and his excellency. Thanksgiving and praise, once again, closely tied together. Psalm 100, verse 2. Amen. And let me move on.
So next one, 1 Corinthians 10, 31. And in one aspect, all of our life is to bring the glory of God to bear. So when we give thanks with God with our lips, which was what we normally think of with our praises, whether it is with our actions, whether with our food, whatever it is that we do, all of these things need to bring glory to God.
Now, let me just make a quick comment on glory, and then we'll move to the next verse. Glory, the word kavod is talking about weight. It is not something that is just light and fluffy. It is when we think of the character of God, the person of God, there is a weightiness about who God is.
And we give glory to God by making him famous. We are to boast about this great God to whom all this wondrous attributes belong. So our responsibility is to make his name heavy, if you will. It is not that, oh, this is just a God that the Christians worship.
This is the mighty God, the God that we believe in and that we proclaim to the nations. We give glory to God by making his name heavy, because it is a weighty God that we worship. So moving on to the next verse, Philippians 4 .6.
Amen. Once again, in the midst of your trial, Philippians, Paul is in the prison. Nothing to fear, because you have a great God with whom you worship. He is able to provide for all your needs. And with thanksgiving, that's the word that comes there, make your request known to God.
Hebrews 13 .15. And this is the verse that you're probably thinking most, and I think when I say sacrifice of praise, you're not thinking of the Leviticus passage, because we are not under the Mosaic law to bring those sacrifices.
But our sacrifice of praise is the fruit of our lips. Let our mouths not withhold praise from our great God whom we serve. And the last one, Psalm 30, verse 9. We don't have time to unpack Psalm 30, but this should give you a caution.
Why does God have you here on earth? He has you here to extol him. And while you have breath, make sure that your voices praise our God. So we have a few more material, but what I want to do is I want to just go through the Psalms first.
So all of you should have a handout. Thank you, Eric. And this handout just walks through one way of studying the Psalms. You know, the Psalms, as I've said before, they have two elements to them. One of them is the content.
What does it say? What does it explain about God, about the person receiving the favor from God? And how does God minister to us in our trials? And then we have the other element, which is so effective in the sense it is different from the other books of the Bible in that it is poetic.
It reaches at an emotional level to us as we meditate on the grandness of God. And it is meant to be that way because Psalms were written to be sung. They are like our hymn book, like our choruses that we sing.
These are meant to reflect upon the beauty and the grandeur and the goodness of our God. So this handout that you have will help you walk through studying a Psalm. And as you do, it's more than just getting the cognitive side of it, but to dwell upon the greatness of our God so you can meditate upon it, that you may hear from God through those scriptural texts and to be having your eyes opened about how good He is.
That while, like in Philippians, while you're going through those trials, you are not just overcome by those trials and the anxieties thereof, but rather your eyes get transfixed upon the goodness and the power and the majesty of our Lord.
So let me now begin with one Psalm. We have two Psalms we will look at today. And then if we have time, we'll come back and study a little more on the praise Psalms. So the first Psalm that I'd like to look at is Psalm 113.
And as we do that, we will use your handout to answer some questions. Psalm 113 first. Actually, while you're turning there, if I can have one person read Psalm 113 out loud. It's a short Psalm. Both the Psalms are short.
Thank you. Just real loud. Now, I didn't mention this earlier, but we'll come to this at the end of the Psalm. We were using Psalms during summer as a means of counseling. How do we counsel ourselves?
When our heart is kind of weighted down, how do we let the Psalms counsel or give us wisdom in order to look rightly, to get help from God, or to help others who are going through these times? So as we go to the end of the Psalm, we look at the counseling element of it.
But as we begin, I just want us to just soak in on what the Psalm is so rich in. So let me, from your questionnaire, there are several questions. The first one I want us to look at is what is the reason for praise that the Psalmist finds here?
So you see praise the Lord pretty much all over the place. In fact, there are two types of Psalms. Again, if we have time, we'll come back to this. One of them will begin with, I will praise the Lord.
So that's a declarative Psalm, which says God has done something to me and I'm constrained. I have no choice but to praise God and you must praise God. That's a declarative praise Psalm. And this one is a descriptive praise Psalm.
It just starts out with hallelujah, praise be to God, and it'll end with the same way. And then it's going to describe something about God. So what is the reason for praising God that this Psalmist finds in Psalm 113?
So you can just raise your hand and give, there's many reasons given here. If you can just look at it and mention them, we will walk through the Psalm. What are some reasons mentioned here? God's greatness.
And how do you distill the greatness of God from the Psalm? Maybe a few verses or a few words from here. Verses four and five, high above all nations, glory above the heavens, incomparable. Who is like our God seated on high?
And I think when I think of those verses, you can even probably introduce verse six, although it brings in a new thought, but verses four and five especially give you the transcendence of our God. Our God is so great.
He's above everything else that we can think of or imagine. Excellent. What else do you see in the Psalm? That's true. That's a derived implication because the second sentence there says servants of the Lord, you know, he is this great one and we are, he has graciously allowed us to be his servant, especially as you read the rest of the Psalm, like that we would be permitted even to recognize him and to serve him.
Excellent. What else about the character or attribute of God do you see here? Excellent. The mercy of God in verse seven. He does not just, just because he is transcendent doesn't mean he is cut off from his creation.
He does look down and he does minister to the people here. Um, actually, uh, let me move on to verse question number three in your, um, handout and that will help us unpack a little bit more. Now, what does the Psalm is boasting over God and here, especially his acts like, uh, we just heard reveal about God's nature.
So what are some things about God's nature that we hear from, uh, the boasting of this, of the Psalmist? And I think verse seven kind of begins that. What else do you see, um, in, in the Psalm that reveals about the attribute of God, compassion and from, uh, excellent.
So again, from verse seven, the compassion. So along with mercy, you see compassion because he, he looks upon the poor and the needy and sovereignty from, Amen. There are some things only God can provide.
And, uh, so in verse nine, you see a barren woman who is made a joyous mother by God. He, he looks at the affliction and he provides relief sovereignty of God, the compassion of God, the mercy of God.
Anything else that comes to mind as you look at this Psalm is looking at God, his attributes and his actions. Excellent. Looks down, looks far down on the heavens and on the other. That's interesting.
He looks down on the heavens and upon earth. It's like even above the heavens. He, and the word you use was, I think, um, was it condescension? Our Christmas message. Excellent. Thinking about a God who would become a man on our behalf.
He condescends to look down and minister. And again, that versus six, four and five talk about the transcendence of God. And beginning with verse six, you start to see the imminence of God, this God who is worthy to be far above everything, who does not need to be bothered with the affect affairs of men has placed his affection, has condescended, has come down, shown mercy, compassion, and exerted a sovereignty upon our lives.
And I think this, this is the picture of who God is and what he has done that the Psalmist dwells upon. And as we spend our time in the word, as we reflect upon what, who this God is, our hearts overflow with praise because we can sense the boasting of this great God.
And we have reason again, uh, to praise God as well. Can you think of, especially verse nine, some examples in the Bible, uh, where you have, uh, where God actually did this, uh, in, in history, Samuel.
So you have, uh, Hannah who, uh, is barren and then God gives her anyone else Elizabeth that's right in her old age. She conceives, uh, John the Baptist, anyone else? Sarah, uh, Sarah and Rachel, Sarah, Abraham's wife in her old age and Rachel, um, God graciously opens her womb.
All right. So let's move on to the next section. And this one is where it kind of comes down, uh, to application. So we want to find a panel situation, uh, replace that word with your life in your life, where you would have the same reasons to praise God as that of the Psalmist.
So the Psalmist was looking back in, in Israelite history. He was looking back at the revelation of God at who God is, and he boasts about God in verses four through nine. And, uh, in your life, what would be some reasons to praise God for some of these attributes?
So for example, uh, well, this is not in our text here in Psalm 113, but if the Psalmist was calling his people to praise God, because his word is dependable, because God, your word is trustworthy in such a case, you, um, such a call would do good to a worshiper who might be given to doubt the reliability or sufficiency of God and his word.
So if the Psalmist says, God, your word is so good. And here I am going through my circumstances and I'm like, you know, I don't know if my God, uh, will actually rescue me. He will be with me. He will, um, aid me in my time of need.
And then you look back at the Psalmist and say, no, my God has helped. He is trustworthy. And I need to think differently about my God, because my problem seems to overwhelm me. And I need to remember this attribute of God and I need to give glory to God in this circumstances, just as the Psalmist did.
So that would be, if you take the word of God and his dependability, you could apply that in your circumstance. And therefore, for those times when you might doubt the will of God, uh, the reasons why you should not, uh, he should not, I don't know what that sentence is.
This is what happens when you practice, prepare the night before you teach. But, um, but the bottom line is, you know, when, when you doubt the will of God, you ought not to do so because the Psalmist extols that God is trustworthy.
You can depend on him and therefore, um, praise him as well. So now, so the question back to you is this, uh, it's both from B and C, uh, how do you apply these truths in our circumstance? So we looked at verses five through four through nine.
We saw the transcendence of God. We saw the eminence of God. We saw the greatness of God, and we saw the mercy and compassion of God. So what are some circumstances in your life? Maybe if you, if you want to just think of yourself as the Psalmist, Hey, the Lord has done these things and I want to give him praise.
What would be some of those events that you may want to praise God for today? So I want, I want you to think about those and give, give them, give those examples, if you can, or better still, if you are maybe going through a circumstance where you say, it is difficult for me to trust God.
It is difficult for me, uh, to acknowledge these attributes of God, but I ought to, because the word of God, um, reveals our God to be such and such. So if you have either of these circumstances, if you'd, if you wouldn't mind you, I would like to have you share them with us.
How would you praise God for attributes such as these that we have just heard? It take a few moments to think, and then if you can share them with, with us freedom. Yeah, that's, that's excellent. You know, um, when you, when you put yourself in the place of verse seven, right?
Uh, how many times have you been, um, on the ash heap of life? I'm sure every single one of you has experienced that. I have, there have been times when you're just thinking, you know, you're the rejected outcast, no hope in your life anymore.
You're constrained by the life and everything else that seems to just roll over you. And then you see this great God from heaven who comes down and gives you hope and takes you out of that ash heap and provides you a new life.
And you have a freedom to live life as you couldn't do before. Excellent. And don't we praise God for that? Can I hear some amen or some hallelujahs or something? That's a sacrifice of praise. Praise be to God.
He has done that in our life and we ought not to be quiet about it. We should be shouting here. We ought to be shouting out there in the streets. Yes, go ahead. Amen. You know, it's, it's often in the little things of life, you know, it's so easy to miss the hand of God.
It's like, oh, you know, these things, I just got the bonus. You know, the mechanic was a good guy. My car just got fixed up, right? But if you're like me and you're, you have nothing, you have no idea what mechanical work is.
Every time my car goes to the mechanic, it's like, palpitation. Exaggerating a little bit. You have no idea what's going to happen out there. But, but these are genuine trials that each of us go through.
You know, there are circumstances in life, but to say, you know, I'm going to trust in my God when these anxieties come over me or these maybe very real problems come there. And when, when the Lord just sovereignly brings the money, the people, the everything, and then you look back and say, well, thank you, God.
And that's, that's excellent from the small things to the big things, to the big things in your life, to others, which might seem small. In all of these things, we ought to give thanks to God. We ought to praise God because he has been faithful to us.
Anyone else want to? Amen. And I think, you know, this, this is, I don't know if all of you heard what Peggy said in verse six, this God from heaven who did not, was not required to, but would look far down, would condescend, would come down, be incarnate, would die on our behalf.
He not only showcases himself as a God of mercy and as a God who come, who is humble, but who also gives us an example of how we ought to live our lives. We are image bearers of, of God. And for us in the new Testament, we have the direct revelation of God in the person of, in the person of Christ, his son.
And we are called to have, to imitate Christ, to, to do the same that we naturally wouldn't want to do. I mean, I know when I got, when, before I was saved, even after I was saved, maybe even today I'm tempted, you know, to just want to live for myself.
You know, I'm like, Oh, I deserve this. I deserve that. But when we look at this God who would give up Philippians 2, his glory and come down and live upon us, who would be spit upon the creator of the universe, but wouldn't retaliate.
What a great picture of the love of God that now rules in our hearts, that motivates us to say, you know, I can be offended. I can be trampled upon, but I have the power of God within me. I am not ashamed to be humiliated because my status as a child of God, as the, as a son and daughter of the king, I serve him much more than all these circumstances and excellent.
So when we look at who God is, and, and I thank you for bringing the new Testament in because that just explodes who the nature and the love of God in ways that we cannot, we could not have come up with because God does that and shows himself to us.
Anything else? If not, we'll move on to the next. Oh, I have missed one other thing. So in verse, in section E in your questionnaire, we want to also confirm in the mind, in our minds, the principles from these Psalms from new Testament.
So there are other passages, and I actually, Peggy just did that for us in bringing the example of Christ. I mean, what better picture to talk about both the transcendence and the eminence of God in our lives.
So let's, let's keep that. And then we'll move on to the next Psalm. Unless there are any questions, any questions or comments, thoughts on Psalm 113. All right. If not, let's move on to Psalm 146. Actually before, I don't know if you noticed the, those of you were here in the first service, the last hymn is a praise hymn.
And it was just so wonderful as I was just thinking about how we ought to sing our songs to God. So if you're here for the second service, make sure you sing the last hymn real loud. So out to Psalm, oh, you should sing every hymn real loud.
But Psalm 146, if someone can get there first, you can read it out loud. It's another short Psalm. Thank you. So a couple of quick questions as we walk through this. So the first question in verse three, in whom does the Psalmist tell you not to put your hope?
And as you think about what the Psalmist himself says, also think about those things in your life that fall into this category. So things that you would be tempted to put your hope in, but which the Psalmist says, don't do that.
So if someone can just answer, what does the Psalmist say? And what are some parallels in our lives? I'm sorry, who said that? Princess. You bring it even closer. The Lord of my life. Yeah, that's true.
When we put our hope in man, no matter how high or exalted he might be. So in those days, if you have a prince, he had sovereign rule over the land. He has the ability to make you rich, take care of you or destroy you.
Or in our days, whether it's politicians as we just heard or even pastors. And in fact, there was recently, there was a circumstance where there's a trial going through in the life of a believer. And it's easy for the pastor to intervene and then say, here, let me come and rescue you.
But it is so much more powerful when the believer looks to God and seeks the Lord in his moment of trial rather than say, I know my pastor can help me. Let me just make that call and get out of this situation.
So when you come, look back at that circumstance and then say, you know, how sweet was the Lord that he would restrain your foolishness, that he would come to your aid when you were so desperately out of health.
And so do not look to princess, do not look to any human agency as your ultimate source, because that is our temptation, whether it's my job, whatever it is that I tend to rely on, because I come from the world.
I think like the world, but we ought not to be off the world. We ought to be looking up to someone who is, who created the world. Yes, Karen. Excellent. And I think that's even more important in, in, in the, in the sense that I was talking about the pastor, it is good to call your pastor.
Don't get me wrong. If you, if you need to try, if you are in need, always the pastors are always well open. And not just that, as I've been telling you through this class, you know, there are people, godly men in the body that come alongside, have been ministering to, and you're always welcome.
The church is a body. We are meant to serve a lot together. And he has equipped us each one with different gifts to serve one another. But the previous example was given in order to make sure that your ultimate trust is in God.
It is not even in God ordained health that we have on earth, but it would be even more foolish for us to go to the world and say, you know, I'm a psychologist, some counselor in the world. And you know, that's what I'm relying on to take care of a problem that is deep in its inner core spiritual.
We need to be looking to God for our health. Yes, that's right. God, Jesus is both God and fully man. Yeah. And yeah, yeah, no. And I think I, do you want to elaborate on it a little bit about the nature of God?
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Can somebody here fully explain, you know, the complete humanity and the complete deity of God and how they both cohere in the person of Christ? You know, there are some mysteries in who our God is, you know, from the Trinity to the person of Jesus Christ.
Those are just, I think they keep us humble in some ways, because, you know, sometimes I try to think, I know who God is. You know, he's my co-pilot. We'll have all those bumper stickers. My God is a God who made heaven and earth.
You know, if I think I understand how heaven and earth are made, I need a little class. Yes. And that's true. I mean, we just, you know what, this is what we praise God for. Think about Jesus Christ. You know, he was not just God, he became man.
Not just man, but he was the perfect man. Not just the perfect man, but he suffered in every way that we suffered. You know, every single sin that we were tempted with, every single trial, you know, if we think we are going through the worst situation, no, you know, Christ has gone before.
He is, Hebrew says, you know, he has gone through them all and he empathizes. Yes. And he never sinned. Yes. Excellent. And how do we know about this God? If we, like in this psalm, we just read something about God.
So when you talk to an unbeliever, you know, someone who doesn't believe in God, you're like, hey, you know, you can say your God is merciful. Your God is the one who created the heavens. I don't believe it because they, they don't have a means to know this God.
And they don't have a heart to be able to comprehend this greatness of this God. But God has been so gracious. Not only does he save us, he gives us his word and he reveals, I mean, the word we think of word as something we speak.
And this is God's speech to us given to us in a way that we cannot have any doubt about who God is. Yeah, that's right. It is a covenant. God says that I have placed my affection upon you and I have revealed myself to you.
Excellent example. Charlie, did you want to say something? Excellent. And I think you just kind of unpacked that, you know, that aspect of Prince and, you know, all the hopes and aspirations that, you know, the people could have placed upon him, but end of the day, you know, he is just a human, his breath departs and he may not be good.
You know, we think that's right. Yeah. Solomon dies and his son comes in. Oh yeah. You know, you thought my dad was tough. Hear what I have for you, you know? But the, and actually that was their hope.
When Solomon died, the people thought, you know, Solomon was taxing us and doing all these things to us. But, you know, we'll appeal to the new King, you know, that he would be kinder, but no. But the contrast being man is finite.
He doesn't live forever. God is the one who lives forever. Man's power is finite. He cannot do all the things that you think he can, but our God, we see in verse six, made heaven and earth. He is omnipotent and man is sinful and would not necessarily do you good, but our God is a God of benevolence and goodness.
I think we are out of time, but so we'll stop here. So when you go home, you can continue to meditate on Psalm 146, use those questions. It'll probably help you unpack this more, more that you catch a glimpse of a great God from the Psalms and that you would just revel and praise him with your life.
Any final comments or questions before we close? All right, let's pray. Our loving and gracious Father, we thank you that in the depths of our sin, in the depths of our wretchedness, in the depths of our depravity, you sent your son, you opened our eyes, you rescued us.
Lord, I pray that for every single one here who names the name of Christ, that you, O Lord, would continue to showcase yourself, open our eyes even further. May the light from your word illumine our minds and our hearts.
May our lives, O Lord, be lives that proclaim your goodness day and today. And I pray, Lord, for those here who may not know you, that you would be gracious to open their eyes, that they too may see your glory and they too may worship you in spirit and in truth.
We commit the rest of this day, especially the next service, into your care. May you, O Lord, be exalted in all that we do and all that we hear. In Christ's name we pray. Amen.