Tepid Worship (Part 2)

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Thanks for tuning in to No Compromise Radio with pastor and author Dr. Mike Abendroth.

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Today on No Compromise Radio we'll be hearing Pastor Mike open the Word of God in a recent message he preached at Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston, Massachusetts.

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Now let's join Pastor Mike in progress as he preaches through the scriptures verse by verse with No Compromise.

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Why do we think Psalm 95 was given so often to the churches in the

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East and the churches in the West? And how many times do Eric Johanson and Tom Bertrand give us for a call to worship

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Psalm 95? Because we need the reminders. Now before you think

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I've gone off the deep end, I'm going to be wildly Pentecostal or something, look at the other command to worship found in verse 6.

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If you overdo 1 and underdo 6, or overdo 6 and underdo 1, you're in trouble.

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But the word in verse 6, okum, it's a different word in Hebrew than okum in verse 1.

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You can't tell that with your English text, they both say okum. While the first one has some sweat to it, some enthusiasm, some joyful shouting, raising your voice, this word, kum, means you're going to a solemn house of worship and it's got the feeling of quiet, respectful, on your face, solemnity, reverence, spurgeon.

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This word is to be accompanied with lowliest reverence. We are to worship in such a style that the bowing down shall indicate we count ourselves to be as nothing in the presence of the all -glorious

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Lord. There's a tone that's changed here.

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We've gone from, yes Lord, you're the greatest to, yeah, you're so great I better be on my face, getting low.

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And look at how the psalmist writes with this parallelism, again, all driving the point, there's a reverence and a humility and an homage.

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Verse 6, let us worship. That means you meet a king and you lay down.

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You get on your face in front of the king. Now that's kind of hard to do during a worship service here, corporately,

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I know, but I wonder if you've ever done that at home where you just lay down on your face and say,

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God, you're just the greatest king. I'm thankful that you'd love a sinner like me. He says in verse 6, let us bow down.

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See how similar that is to the worship? Worship means to bow down and now he says it explicitly, bow down, every knee shall bow kind of language.

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Augustine said they were misled into seeking him by throwing out their chests rather than beating upon their breasts.

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Second Chronicles, and all the sons of Israel seeing the fire come down and the glory of the Lord upon the house, bowed down on the pavement with their faces to the ground and they worshiped and gave praise to the

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Lord truly as good, truly as loving kindness is everlasting. And the writer goes on, verse 6, let us worship, get on your face, let us bow down, let's get low, let us kneel before the

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Lord, our maker, kneel down. Luke and I stopped off in London for a few days on our way to South Africa.

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We didn't go to the British Parliament, but it reminded me of the story. Neil Martin, a member of Parliament, was giving a guided tour and he saw along with his group

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Lord Halsham, the Lord Chancellor, and he had all his stuff decked out, he was wearing it all, all the regalia.

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And Halsham recognizes Martin and said, Neil! And they all went down to their knees.

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Friends, you're a worshiper and you will worship something with your whole heart, mind, soul and strength.

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And if it's not going to be the Lord God, the Triune God, then vacuums must be filled and it'll turn into worshiping your spouse, your kids, your job, your career, the

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Boston Red Sox, or something else. As I also think of these verses here where God commands us to worship

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Him with an enthusiastic reverence, doesn't this destroy our idea of worship where we say, you know,

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I didn't really like that song we sang today. I think the pastor preached too long.

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I prefer, I wish they would have. See how man -centered that is?

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See how anti -Psalm 95 that is? That means worship is for you.

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That's consumerism. That's Mac worship. I guess people worship

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Apple too. I'm saying Mac like McDonald's worship. Have it your way. I just wish there would have been a little more entertainment.

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You know how I like drama. You know how I like the mime ministry up front and the puppet ministry. I sure wish they'd have something for children during that.

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Every one of those is I, I, I, I, I, instead of what would glorify

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God. What does the Bible require of me? Is it biblical?

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Is it worshipful? And now take a look at verse 3.

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There's a command to worship. There's how to worship. And now we get reasons to worship. Isn't this good?

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He could just say, you need to worship. But now he gives us some reasons. And so let me give you some reasons that even if you have the worst trials in the entire world, and you're the person that wants to make sure everybody knows how miserable you are.

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You're the person, you can't see anything good in life. You're the person who struggles with rising your eyes up high enough to see that your salvation comes from the hills.

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Let me give you five reasons to worship God. These are good for all of us.

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Number one, found in verse 3, for the Lord is a great God. For Yahweh, see all the capitals there?

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He's a great God. Why do you worship this God? Sing joyful noise with thanksgiving, songs of praise.

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Why? This God is great. This God is great.

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Remember the psalmist, he says, don't forget any of God's benefits. If you had to put a list together, tell me the reasons why you think

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God is great. What would you say? What would be at the top of the list? More and more these days,

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I'm impressed with God's greatness. Especially with the incarnation.

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Christ Jesus, who though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped.

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But made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. Being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death.

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Even death on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that the name of Jesus every knee should bow in heaven and on earth and under earth and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is

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Lord to the glory of God the Father. When you see

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God and who he is, think of the Old Testament. Think of the transcendence of God.

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Think of the holiness of God. Think of the otherness of God. You say, hey, you have to say to yourself that this

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God is a consuming fire. Who is like this God? He's too different. He's too above.

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He's too transcendent. And by nature, he's exactly that. But with the incarnation,

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God by essence is transcendent. But by will, he's close to us.

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He's eminent. And he decides, the second person of the Trinity, to cloak himself with humanity so he could be our representative.

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So he could be our substitute. So he could identify with us. So we could have a brother.

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So we could have a friend. Why is God so great? He's so great because his transcendence is not the end of it.

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He's transcendently eminent. That is to say, he's close. Turn to Judges for a moment.

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Judges 13. I was reading this yesterday and just thought, you know, I must tell this to the people.

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I almost said share, but pastors don't share, they proclaim. So, you ever want to really slam a pastor, you just say to him at the door, thanks for sharing.

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When 2 Timothy 4 says, we're to herald, we're to proclaim, preach the word, in season, out of season.

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But I want to show this to you. Judges 13. And I want to just give you a little hint of how great the

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Incarnation is. Why is God to be great? Was the last time you said, God, you're great because of the

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Incarnation. I thought that was only for Christmas time. Well, here's a nativity story.

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A very famous nativity story where we have angels visiting the mother. We have angels talking about bearing a son.

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It says in Judges 13, One of the people of Israel again did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, so the

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Lord gave them into the hand of the Philistines for 40 years. We're going to learn about Samson's parents.

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There's a certain man of Zorah of the tribe of the Danites whose name was Manoah. And his wife was barren and had no children.

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And the angel of the Lord, that's the second person of the Trinity before he is born, the eternal son, who one day will be named

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Jesus, appeared to the woman and said to her, Behold, you are barren and have not born children, but you shall conceive and bear a son.

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A Nazarite vow is going to be here. Therefore be careful. Drink no wine or strong drink or eat nothing unclean. For behold, she'll conceive and bear a son.

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No razor shall come upon his head. For the child shall be a Nazarite. You can read numbers about Nazarite vows.

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To God from the womb. And he shall begin to save Israel from the hand of the Philistines. You're going to have a baby.

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And this baby is going to have the hand of God on him. And he's going to be a savior for the nation. Verse 6.

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And the woman came and told her husband, A man of God came to me. His appearance was like the appearance of an angel of God. Awesome!

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I did not ask him where he was from. He did not tell me his name. And he said, Behold, you shall conceive and bear a son.

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So then drink no wine or strong drink and eat nothing unclean. For the child shall be a Nazarite. To God from the womb till the day of his death.

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Manoah then prayed to the Lord and said, O Lord, please let the man of God whom you sent come again to us and teach us what we are to do with the child who will be born.

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God listened to the voice of Manoah and the angel of God came again to the woman as she sat in the field.

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But Manoah her husband was not with her. So the woman ran quickly and told her husband, Behold, the man who came to me the other day has appeared to me.

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And Manoah arose and went after his wife and came to the man and said to him, Are you the man who spoke to this woman? I am.

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Now when your words come true, what is the child's manner of life? And what's his mission? You have a Nazarite vow for a mission.

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What's the mission? And the angel of the Lord said to Manoah, Of all that I said to the woman, let her be careful.

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She may not eat of anything that comes from the vine, neither let her drink wine or strong drink or eat any unclean thing.

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All that I commanded her, let her observe. Now here's where I want you to pay attention. I want you to think with incarnation at the center of your thinking.

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Manoah said to the angel of the Lord, Manoah says to the eternal Son of God, the second person of Trinity, Let us detain you and prepare a young goat for you.

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And the angel of the Lord said to Manoah, If you detain me, I will not eat of your food. I'm not going to eat with you.

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But if you prepare a burnt offering, then offer it to the Lord. Manoah did not know he was the angel of the

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Lord, and Manoah said to the angel of the Lord, What is your name, so that when your words come true, we may honor you?

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First of all, I'm not going to eat with you. Second of all, I'm not going to tell you my name. And the angel of the Lord said to him, Why do you ask my name, seeing it is wonderful, incomprehensible, same language from Psalm 139, such knowledge is too wonderful for me.

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Think about it. The pre -incarnate eternal Son of God shows up to Manoah and then says to he and his wife,

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I'm not going to eat with you, and if I told you my name, I'd have to kill you. That's how

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I described it to my kids when they were little. You can't Manoah my name. I can't eat with you.

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I'm different. I'm other. I'm transcendent. I'm above. I'm alien. And now think for a second.

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That's the eternal Son of God before He's cloaked Himself with humanity. I won't eat with you. I won't tell you my name.

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I'm too different. I'm too other. I'm too holy. And now think of Philippians 2, where God cloaks

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Himself with human nature. Jesus Christ is born of a virgin.

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He's manifest in the flesh. And after these things, it says in John 21, they got out on the land, they saw a charcoal fire in place with fish laid on it and bread.

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Jesus said to them, bring some of the fish that you've caught. So Simon Peter went aboard and hauled a net ashore full of large fish, 153 of them.

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And although there were so many, the net was not torn. Jesus said to them, don't ask

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Me my name, and I'm not going to eat with you. And Jesus said to them, come and have breakfast.

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What do you mean, come and have breakfast? You're the transcendent, eternal Son of God. Yes, who's now cloaked

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Himself with humanity and is a friend who sticks closer than a brother. I think to myself, how great is

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God? You want to know the greatness of God? Read John 13 where Jesus kneels down and washes the disciples' feet.

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Jesus didn't have to cloak Himself with human nature to save us, but He did.

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And more and more, I'm so impressed with the Incarnation.

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To what shall we compare this generation? What are they like? They're like children sitting in the marketplace calling one another, we played the flute for you and you didn't dance.

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We have a little game, it's called wedding. And we play songs, and you should be dancing at the wedding.

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We have another song, we sang a dirge and you didn't weep. We have another game the kids played back then. It's called funeral.

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Jesus says people have two games, the kids play wedding and the kids play funeral. Now kids play ring around the rosy.

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The wedding game, you false teachers, you don't sing. And the death game, you false teachers, you don't weep.

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What was He saying there? For John the Baptist has come eating no bread and drinking no wine. And you say

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He has a demon. When it comes to austere life and funeral dirge and repent for the kingdom of God is at hand, you won't identify with Him.

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And when it comes to the wedding game, where there's eating and joy and rejoicing, Jesus said the

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Son of Man has come eating and drinking. And you say, look at Him a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners.

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Friends, I wonder when was the last time you said, God, thank you. I praise you that you sent your

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Son and He cloaked Himself with humanity because I was in Adam and fallen and now

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I'm in Christ, raised from the dead spiritually and one day physically. I think

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God is a great God. Never forget about the incarnation. Let's go back to Psalm 95. As you're turning there, it says in Galatians 6,

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May it never be that I should boast except in the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ. We have lots of reasons to praise the

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Lord for the psalmist, God's great God. Number two, He's a great

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King above all gods. Do you see it in verse 3? Psalm 95 .3, A great King above all gods.

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You say, wait a second, I thought there's only one God. Deuteronomy 6, The Lord our God is one. What do you mean gods?

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Well, this is just a way to say it to prove that there are no gods. Remember Paul in 1

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Corinthians 8, Even if there are so -called gods, whether in heaven or earth, as indeed there are many gods and many lords, yet for us there's but one

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God. And so here's a way that the writer says, there's no other gods. There's only one

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God and He's a great God. If there were gods, He'd be the God of those gods.

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Philistines took the Ark of God and brought it from Ebenezer to Ashdod. Philistines took the

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Ark of God, they brought it into the house of Dagon and set it by Dagon. Remember Dagon? Who remembers what

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Dagon looks like? Some kind of perverse male mermaid kind of thing is basically what it was.

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The Ashdods arose early in the next morning and Dagon had fallen on his face to the ground before the

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Ark of the Lord. So they took Dagon, set him in his place again.

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Do you see the language? Here's the God. We've got to move the God back over with human hands. But when they arose early the next morning, behold,

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Dagon had fallen on his face to the ground before the Ark of the Lord. And the head of Dagon and both the palms of his hands were cut off on the threshold.

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Only the trunk of Dagon was left to him. There are no other gods.

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And by the way, look at verse 4. God isn't just great. He's not just preeminent.

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He's sovereign over everything. Look at verse 4. In whose hand are the depths of the earth?

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The peaks of the mountains are also His. Are His also. ESV says the heights of the mountains are

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His also. Luke and I fly from Joburg to London.

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Twelve hours. They had very interesting lunch. Same thing they serve for lunch and dinner on the airplane.

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It was patella. My own. Jammed up.

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My knee in my... Thank you. May I have another? No, truth be told,

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I got... On British Airways, I got curry chicken for lunch. I got curry chicken for dinner.

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And for the snack before you disembark, I got a curry chicken sandwich. So... I looked out the window and for 12 hours, flying at 600 miles per hour, we're going the length of Africa.

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It took 12 hours to get from Joburg to London. And you look down there and I could have just easily started singing.

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He's got the whole of Africa in His hands. This is language, so we're trying to say to ourselves, who is like that?

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Who is so great? From the lowest place where the miners bore a hole down in the ground, that's the language there of mining, to the tops of the mountains and everything in between.

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God is a great God. Just listen to Isaiah 40 for a second.

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Same language. Behold, the Lord God comes with might. His arm rules for Him. Behold, His reward is with Him and His recompense before Him.

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God is powerful, omnipotent, and He's going to come back. And He will tend

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His flock like a shepherd. He'll gather His lambs in His arms. Oh, what about the one that can't keep up?

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He'll carry them in His bosom and gently lead those that are with the young. And then it says, of God, with language from Psalm 95, or at least reminds me of Psalm 95, who has measured the waters in the hollow of His hand?

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So that's the hollow of your hand right there. How much water can you scoop up? How much water can you scoop up and keep in your hand without any spilling?

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That's the hollow of your hand. It's pretty fascinating to be at Cape Town, South Africa, and you stand there at the very tip.

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And over here is the Atlantic, and over here is the Indian Ocean, and here it's like total chaos.

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And you go, God is so great and greatly to be praised. You take all the oceans. How many different oceans in the world are there?

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You say, God is so great, everything He has is just in the palm of His hand right there. It also says in Isaiah 40, who marked off the heavens with a span?

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So let's see, all those galaxies, all those stars, all those suns, all those moons,

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I just marked that. Let's see. Compared to me, the entire system out there is that long.

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Enclose the dust of the earth in a measure. You know how much dust is in the earth? You just have, well, here's like a little one -eighth of a teaspoon, or a tablespoon.

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How much dust is there? By the way, if dust is basically dead skin, 80%, how much dust is there?

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And weighed the mountains and the scales, let's say put Everest there, K2, Rocky Mountains.

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Let's put them on there and let's see what will be on the other side. Well, are Adirondacks mountains? Yeah, okay,

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I guess they go there too. Actually, Wachusa is a mountain. 2 ,000 feet or above is a mountain. I think

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Wachusa comes in at a stellar 2 ,004 feet, so we're set. And the hills in a balance.

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What's the point? There are some great things about God to praise Him for. There are no other gods.

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He's great. And when it comes to His size, as it were, He doesn't have a physical body, but He's immense.

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He's big. He's different. That's why you need to get a book called The Sovereignty of God, or The Attributes of God, or The Knowledge of the

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Holy, and immerse your mind in the sovereign attributes of God, because you'll think, you know what? He's a powerful

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God and I can praise Him. And all of a sudden, when you start thinking about God, then you don't think about, I'm sick,

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I'm broke, I'm tired. Repeat. Start thinking, you know what?

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No matter what, I'm going to praise God. So here's the good news, congregation. God loves repentance.

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Aren't you glad? So, if you're a tepid singer, and your praise is bad, and you're an awful giver, and you only pay attention during sermons, think for a moment about the

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Lord Jesus Christ, and I think He loved His Father with all His heart, soul, mind, and strength.

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I think if you went to the synagogue, and they had Scripture reading, He would be paying attention. I think He would be paying attention to the message.

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I think when they were singing on the way to Jerusalem, Psalm 118, I think He sang with joy and with thankfulness.

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And so, when we are bad praisers and worshipers, aren't we glad for the atoning death of Jesus Christ?

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So, those sins are forgiven. And we get credited for His great worship, because He always worshiped the

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Father. And since those two things are true, that should make us now want to praise

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Him all the more. And so, we're going to sing our final song. And I hope you sweat.

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I hope your armpits are pitted out by the end of the song. Now, I don't want you doing some funny dancing here, coming up, and doing some things you ought not to do.

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Tozer said this, I wonder if it's even close to our radar. I want it to be in my life. I mean it when

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I say that I would rather worship God than do anything else. No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston, Massachusetts.

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Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life -transforming power of God's Word through verse -by -verse exposition of the sacred text.

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Please, come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 8 .30 and 11 a .m. and Sunday evenings at 6 p .m.

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We're located on Route 110 in West Boylston, Massachusetts. You can check us out online at bbchurch .org

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or by phone at 508 -835 -3400. The thoughts and opinions expressed on No Compromise Radio do not necessarily reflect those of WVNE, its staff or management.