Sunday, August 15, 2021 AM

Good morning, everyone. Welcome to Sunnyside this morning. It's exciting to be able to worship with you all together today.

Have a few announcements this morning. Come back tonight for our evening service at 530 here in the church.

Also looking ahead to Wednesday, we'll have dinner for the whole church in the fellowship hall at 545 and then

Bible study and prayer for the kids as well. And then coming up Sunday, August 22nd,

Truth Group for the young adults after the evening service. And then Wednesday, the 25th, that's just a week from this.

Wednesday tag will begin for the new year for the kids. So looking forward to that for them.

Our fighter verse for this week is from Matthew chapter 11, verses 28 through 30.

Jesus says, Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.

For my yoke is easy and my burden is light. We still have some needs for Operation Christmas Child, some new needs and suggestions that you can look for for the month of August.

Things like flip flops, sunglasses, tennis balls, some other small things that you can put in those shoe boxes.

Still have a few need for volunteers regarding some of the demo work that is needed over in the women's restroom in the gymnasium.

Scraping the floor over there. Any updates to the church directory? You can see Tristan call about also.

And then there's also still some needs regarding the sewing ministry, needing a few supplies. All right.

Any other announcements before we get started this morning? We're going to open in prayer before we start worship, and then after that,

Brian will come and open us in prayer. Father in heaven, we rejoice in our gathering with brothers and sisters here in this place this morning.

And we do have burdens that we need to leave at the foot of the cross. We do have those among us who are ill and suffering and hurting.

Would you be their healer, their physician, their comfort, their hope? And we rejoice in the joy that you bring into our lives through the ministry of the

Holy Spirit. Whom you left with us to abide with us and we with him.

We look forward to the word being opened and taught, preached. We look forward to rejoicing in song, lifting our voices to heaven.

We rejoice in life itself. Our most holy

God, who knows our every thought, our every inclination, our every desire.

Father, this day, we we desire to yield to you, to learn from you, to increasing wisdom and knowledge of the word.

May the Holy Spirit minister that to us. Thank you for your people.

Thank you for this place and this time. We ask these things in Christ's precious name.

Amen. Would you stand with me for a call to worship?

This morning, I heard some good news. I heard some answered prayer about Jan and Jerry feeling better.

So we praise God about that. Just think also the song I heard mom playing this morning.

Christ will hold me fast. We're in good hands with God. We're going to finish past our chapter 69 in Psalms this morning.

So if you would read with me Psalm 69, starting verse 34. Let heaven and earth praise him.

The seas and everything that moves in them. For God will save Zion and build up the cities of Judah and people shall dwell there and possess it.

The offspring of his servants shall inherit it. And those who love his name shall dwell in it.

Our first song this morning is our little black hymnals, hymns, modern ancient page 133. You are the

Lord. There's none like you, the

Son and Spirit. You redeem us from some who shed joy and sneer.

You show us and move the

Son and Spirit. Praise, praise, praise from all nations.

Praise to you all the days gathered around your throne.

We will exalt you, worthy and most unlike you.

You are, you are God, Father, Son and Spirit.

You are, you are God, Father, Son and Spirit. Our scripture reading this morning is from the book of Jonah.

We'll be looking at chapter two, Jonah, chapter two, beginning in verse one.

Then Jonah prayed to the Lord, his God from the fish's belly. And he said,

I cried out to the Lord because of my affliction. And he answered me out of the belly of Sheol.

I cried and you heard my voice for you cast me into the deep, into the heart of the seas and the flood surrounded me and all your billows and your waves passed over me.

Then I said, I have been cast out of your sight, yet I will look again toward your holy temple.

The waters surrounded me, even to my soul, the deep closed around me.

Weeds were wrapped around my head. I went down to the moorings of the mountains, the earth with its bars closed behind me forever.

Yet you have brought up my life from the pit. Oh, Lord, my God, when my soul fainted within me,

I remembered the Lord and my prayer went up to you into your holy temple.

Those who regard worthless idols forsake their own mercy. But I will sacrifice to you with the voice of thanksgiving.

I will pay what I have vowed. Salvation is of the Lord. So the

Lord spoke to the fish and it vomited Jonah onto the dry land.

Would you pray with me? Lord God Almighty, we thank you for your word.

We pray that your Holy Spirit, who dwells in us, would guard our hearts against dull reactions to your word today.

Increase our faith, Lord. Surely this sign of Jonah is a rebuke of unbelief.

For it so clearly points from the lesser to the greater, from the lesser servant to the greater servant, from the lesser prophet to the great prophet, from the lesser resurrection, which meant salvation for one

Gentile city to the glorious resurrection, which means salvation for the world, to every nation, tribe, people, and tongue.

Lord, we are thankful for the shadow, but our hope is in the substance, our

Lord Jesus Christ, who reigns forever and ever. Amen. You may be seated.

We're going to continue our song service in our blue hymnals. So if you would turn to page 58 and also to page 399, we're going to sing,

This is My Father's World and Higher Ground. This is my

Father's world and higher ground, This is my

Father's world and higher ground,

This is my Father's world and higher ground,

This is my Father's world and higher ground, The song of saints on high we sing.

Let's go to the Lord in prayer together. Father, I thank you for gathering us this morning, and Lord, we have confidence that you, as our heavenly

Father, know all of our needs before we even know to ask, able to provide for us, even when we don't know how to ask.

We thank you for this day, for this gathering. Thank you for providing for us such a sure and clear, powerful and beautiful word.

You reveal your Son through your Holy Spirit to us. For we who are made in your image, you have made to live according to your word.

It is the bread of life to us, your Son, Jesus Christ, his truth and this word to us.

And so we give you praise. We thank you. We ask that you would give us what we need today.

Lord, we need to worship you. We need to rejoice in your truth. We need your work to be done in us.

We are utterly dependent upon you. Lord, I pray that you would increase our confidence in you, that we would learn more of how to praise you, that we would think less of ourselves and far, far more of you.

I pray that you would deliver us from tyrannies of self -focus and deliver us into the freedom of worshiping and rejoicing in Jesus Christ.

Father, as we go through the word today, as we look at your text, I ask that you would, as your word promises, cut deep, right to the very heart of what we need.

That you would do your work and that you would also do not just a cutting work, but a healing work, and that you would restore us in the image of your

Son, Jesus Christ. And it's for his sake that we pray. Amen. We're in Daniel chapter four this morning.

I'll be reading verses 28 through 37 here in a little while. We've been talking a great deal about God confronting

Nebuchadnezzar in his pride. This of course has already been happening as Nebuchadnezzar is confronted with Daniel and his friends so easily outshining his best wise men, either in the re -education camp or later in the moment of crisis.

God has already been confronting Nebuchadnezzar in his pride as he boasts that no

God can deliver the condemned from his hand and God does so in a way that is undeniable, so God has already been confronting

Nebuchadnezzar in his pride and yet he does so again in Daniel chapter four, again with a dream, a disturbing dream, and once again, a word from the faithful prophet

Daniel, God resists the proud, God scorns the scornful,

God is right to do so and in fact, he is often more than we can count gracious to do so, confronting us in our pride and by his grace, humbling us and leading us to himself in a saving, reconciling manner.

We have a great need for deliverance from pride and we have a great savior for that need.

It is important that we know that our self -promoting, self -preferring, self -preserving ways are not

God's ways, that our self -exalting, self -enhancing, self -establishing thoughts are not

God's thoughts. As we read through this humbling of King Nebuchadnezzar and consider how it is that God may save a man from his assured, prideful destruction, we're looking at grace and so we should rejoice.

Seek the Lord while he may be found, call upon him while he is near, let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts, let him return to the

Lord and he will have mercy on him and to our

God, for he will abundantly pardon. If you'll stand with me,

I'm going to read Daniel chapter 4, verses 28 through 37. These are the words of our

Savior and Sovereign Jesus Christ by his spirit through his prophet

Daniel. All this came upon King Nebuchadnezzar.

At the end of the 12 months, he was walking about on the royal palace of Babylon. The king spoke saying, is not this great

Babylon that I have built for a royal dwelling by my mighty power and for the honor of my majesty?

While the word was still in the king's mouth, a voice fell from heaven,

King Nebuchadnezzar, to you it is spoken, the kingdom has departed from you and they shall drive you from men and your dwelling shall be with the beasts of the field.

They shall make you eat grass like oxen and seven times shall pass over you until you know the most high rules in the kingdom of men and gives it to whomever he chooses.

That very hour, the word was fulfilled concerning Nebuchadnezzar. He was driven from men and ate grass like oxen.

His body was wet with the dew of heaven till his hair had grown like eagle's feathers and his nails like bird's claws.

And at the end of the time, I Nebuchadnezzar lifted my eyes to heaven and my understanding returned to me and I blessed the most high and praised and honored him who lives forever for his dominion is an everlasting dominion and his kingdom is from generation to generation.

All the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing. He does according to his will in the army of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth, no one can restrain his hand or say to him, what have you done?

At the same time, my reason returned to me and for the glory of my kingdom, my honor and splendor returned to me.

My counselors and nobles resorted to me. I was restored to my kingdom and excellent majesty was added to me.

Now, I Nebuchadnezzar praise and extol and honor the king of heaven, all of whose works are truth and his ways justice and those who walk in pride, he is able to put down.

This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God. Maybe seated. You might have noticed that God has a great many ways of humbling the proud.

You may have noticed that in the last few news cycles, public humiliation abounds among politicians and among the rich and the famous.

Do we really think that all of these spectacles are happening at random or is

God keeping his word and scorning the scornful? Is it really just the way the cookie crumbles or is it that God, who is completely in charge, resists the proud?

Time after time, the hypocrisy of public officials and the rich and famous, their vanity and their idiocy is exposed and we all have a hearty laugh at their self -righteous squawking.

But such modern day parables and proverbs should remind us and should serve as a continuing education that God delights in scorning the scornful and resisting the proud, but that God is no respecter of persons.

God is no respecter of persons. He is not a virtue signaler, only resisting the public proud and only scorning the publicly vain.

God also resists the privately proud. He not only scorns the famous scornful, but he also scorns the no -name scoffer.

It's not just the fools in the news who should take note, but each one of us should humble ourselves before the one with whom we have to do.

God resists the proud and praise his name, his grace makes them humble.

This chapter is, once again, Nebuchadnezzar's personal testimony of how God saved his soul, how

God turned everything around in his life. We hear about that in verses one through three, clearly, clearly

God conquers the proud by his grace. Verses four through 17, Nebuchadnezzar talks about the dream that came to him and how nobody could answer except for Daniel, the prophet who brought the word of God to him.

And we see that God confronts the proud by his word. In verses 18 through 27,

Daniel expounds upon the word of God and calls for a change to occur in Nebuchadnezzar's life.

We are reminded that God compels the proud to repent. Here in verses 28 through 37, we are reminded that God constrains the proud by his hand.

God constrains the proud by his hand.

The proud, even though they think they can do anything that comes into their mind, that they can do anything with enough resources and enough time, the fact of the matter is that the proud can only do what

God allows them to do, what God even enables them to do, giving them breath and strength and intellect and favorable conditions for them to run their petty, futile rebellion against him.

And this is the lesson that Nebuchadnezzar realized at the end. We are to humble ourselves before the almighty

God, but we will not do this by our fleshly efforts.

Humbling ourselves before God, you see, is not a matter that is successful by the means of the flesh. The flesh profits nothing, but it is the spirit who gives life.

And so it is not something where you must humble yourself before God. Great. Give me the list of the things that I must do to humble myself before God, and I'll do them better than anybody else has ever done them before.

Pretensions of piety, ideological asceticism, virtue signaling, self -flagellation.

I'm going to go public about how awful I am. This is all valued by the pagans.

But a time for humbling, by definition, by biblical definition, a time for humbling is not a time to put on a show.

A time for humbling is not a time to put on a show. God does not humble by the means of the flesh.

God humbles by the means of the spirit. And that is salvation for us. It is holiness and rejoicing.

The proud are emaciated and desiccated of soul, and they don't know it.

But the poor in spirit, Jesus says, rejoice in the kingdom. The real, true, humble by God's grace, always sit at meat, drink their fill, and rejoice in the bounty of a blessed feast.

You who have no money, come buy and eat. Yes, come buy wine and milk without money and without price.

Why do you spend money for what is not bread and your wages for what does not satisfy?

Listen carefully to me and eat what is good and let your soul delight itself in abundance.

You see, man's thinking and man's ways proceed from a heart most deceptively evil and prove most cruel.

Every heading on our compass is fouled. Every oasis on the horizon is a mirage.

But we are to hope in God, hope in God. Isaiah 55, 8 and 9.

For my thoughts, he says, are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways, says the

Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.

And our best ways and our best thoughts of of solving the problems and saving ourselves doesn't get anywhere close to God's ways and God's thoughts, which really are our salvation.

So why humbling, humbling is essential for our salvation, for our deliverance, for our restoration.

Let's talk about man's ways versus God's ways. Nebuchadnezzar had his ways and God had his ways.

Nebuchadnezzar had his approach to glory and God had his approach to glory. Nebuchadnezzar used his words in his way and God used his word in his way.

And we see that in the first six verses of our passage, verses 28 through 33.

See if you can distinguish the difference between the way that King Nebuchadnezzar approached glory and how he utilized his words versus the way that God approached glory and the way that God used his words.

All this came upon King Nebuchadnezzar at the end of the 12 months he was walking about the royal palace of Babylon.

The king spoke saying, is not this great Babylon that I have built for royal dwelling by my mighty power and for the honor of my majesty?

While the word was still in the king's mouth, a voice fell from heaven.

King Nebuchadnezzar, to you it is spoken. The kingdom has departed from you and they shall drive you from men and your dwelling shall be with the beasts of the field.

They shall make you eat grass like oxen and seven times shall pass over you.

Until you know that the most high rules in the kingdom of men and gives it to whomever he chooses.

At very hour, the word was fulfilled concerning Nebuchadnezzar. He was driven from men in a grass like oxen.

His body was wet with the dew of heaven till his hair had grown like eagle's feathers and his nails like birds claws.

What a time it must have been to live in that great city of Babylon during the reign of such a king as Nebuchadnezzar.

Which was the greater spectacle, Babylon's greatness or Nebuchadnezzar's madness?

You've probably seen a video or two of some $80 ,000 car being shown off for their sleek looks and incredible power, only to be stupidly, suddenly and thoroughly wrecked.

It's kind of what we're looking at right here. Nebuchadnezzar.

Babylon's greatness was no joke. Says he was standing at his palace, which was sharing a great deal of masonry with the greatest gate of Babylon, central north of the city, the

Ishtar gate. He's in the finest spot to survey his realm.

And as he looks from east to west, scanning his domain, he'll see somewhere between 45 and 60 miles of wall encompassing that great city.

He sees about a hundred brass gates at which markets and courts are being held.

He sees the golden temple of Esagila. He sees the hanging gardens of Babylon, one of the wonders of the ancient world.

He also sees a 300 foot high ziggurat called Etimanaki.

And that's just the first half of the survey. And then he keeps surveying some more. And he sees temples and armories and houses.

And there's a mighty bridge which spans the Euphrates, which cuts through about two thirds across the city.

And then, of course, there's the far west side of the city. Upon these walls, some of them are so wide and so strong that two chariots pulled by four horses broad, two chariots can be side by side and operate.

It's a two lane highway on top of the wall. Babylon was one of the greatest cities in the ancient world and hundreds of years, hundreds of years after the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, the

Greek historians still considered it the superlative city of the known world. That's what

Nebuchadnezzar sees. But he sees it all wrong.

He sees it all wrong. And this really is the kernel of his madness, that he sees it all as glorifying to himself.

Now, we consider the madness of Nebuchadnezzar, the judgment upon him.

We must do due diligence to put it into biblical context.

It is a special judgment of God to render one's rational soul into such a madness.

When the natural, listen, when the natural orientation of the soul is defied and God in his wrath releases the rebel into reprobation, we witness this ghastly and disgusting mental plague.

If you're reading the description of Nebuchadnezzar's judgment, how he went insane and was banished to the field.

If you read it and you're not disgusted by it, you're not reading it.

It is disgusting. It is ghastly. It's horrifying. Though made in the image of God, Nebuchadnezzar is here given over to a bestial mind.

His inner man is not removed, but degraded in judgment. What happens to Nebuchadnezzar here is a further and more wretched abomination beyond sodomite affections and those perverse desires of women who abandon the natural use of the men and burn in their lusts for one another.

The madness that Nebuchadnezzar has is actually a worse and more severe abomination than those who would be a man, but have a mind of a woman or a woman, but would have a mind of a man.

It's even worse than that madness, even worse than that judgment. It is a further more hellish perversion to deny the categories of male and female as static and affirm a non -binary fluidity.

That's even a worse madness. But beyond all of those, beneath even those, these grotesque vitiations of humanity, we find this bestial mind, a man who thinks of himself as a beast and lives accordingly.

Do we see the horror of the judgment? Today in our country, many government schools in our nation feature protected and affirmed packs of youth under similar judgment who call themselves furries.

You probably haven't heard of that. Some of you have. They embrace bestial ways. They drastically change their appearances and their manners, causing chaos, fighting like animals would fight as part of their approach to life.

This is, of course, the necessary step for the normalization of outright bestiality.

You know, the plus on the end of the alphabet soup, there's a reason that plus stays there no matter how many letters get added.

I think probably by now, evangelical thought leaders are already working on how to make our churches, our youth and children ministries welcoming to furries.

How are we going to prepare furries to enter the music ministry and youth ministry? And can a furry preach from the pulpit?

Get ready for the incoming articles. For they're already writing them about the transgender.

They're already writing them. They've already written them about sodomite affections and so on.

But what are we looking at here? This is not something to be made sacred and holy and approved.

This is not something to be set aside as a special and sacrosanct.

This is the judgment of God. This is the judgment of God. And we see in this passage that the words and the will of this powerful man, the man who had it all, who is supreme power upon the planet earth, we see that his words and his will fails in the presence of the words and the will of God.

Despite all of his determination, despite all of his declarations, this powerful king

Nebuchadnezzar is thwarted completely. It is God's determination and it is

God's declarations that come to pass in his perfect time and in powerful triumph. Not Nebuchadnezzar's.

He had it wrong from the beginning. Is not this all mine for my glory? He had it wrong from the very beginning.

Consider the timeliness of God's word. In our text, there's a lot of time indicators and they all have to do with how powerful and perfect God's word is.

James, in his letter, reminds us that one of the symptoms of pride is our casual scheduling of our time as if God was not in control of every microsecond.

God's timing is perfect and it is preeminent. He brings to pass his word in his time.

And let's be honest, we are but corks upon the breakers of God's ocean.

Notice the timeliness of God's word in our text. Verse 28, all this came upon King Nebuchadnezzar at the end of the 12 months.

God gave him a year to consider the word from prophet Daniel. Verse 31, while the word was still in the king's mouth, a voice fell from heaven.

As he's still saying it, as he's loving himself and being very self -affirming and speaking his vision out there, judgment from heaven falls.

The voice of God falls from heaven. Verse 32, it is said seven times shall pass over you.

And then in verse 33, that very hour was fulfilled. The word was fulfilled concerning Nebuchadnezzar.

You see all this timing about God's word. 12 months is a fitting period of grace, merciful, long suffering of God.

But immediate is the heavenly rebuke for the prideful word of Nebuchadnezzar.

These seven years, I think they're years of degradation is fitting for the destruction of a temple that took seven years to build.

Driven to the field is Nebuchadnezzar, the very hour of God's declaration.

What are we looking at here? We're looking at that God brings to pass his word on his schedule and nobody gets to say otherwise.

How often are we thwarted in our words? We say, we're going to go do this or do that.

And it's going to take about this long. I'm on my way. I'll be there in 15 minutes. And how often are we made to look so very foolish as we so casually speak about time as if we are in control?

This is of course, no call to begin some new pharisaism. Every time we make a time notation in our words, we must say otherwise.

As the Lord wills, but it should sure be the foremost thought in our mind as we're scheduling, as we're talking about going from one place to the another, it's only as the

Lord wills. And that's a humble way to think. It's a humble way to approach.

The timeliness of God's word is made clear. The stupid arrogance of man is evident in our assertions.

In our commitments to making schedules and thinking, yes, this is exactly how it's going to happen.

Do you know what Nebuchadnezzar did not have on his schedule? A seven -year madness.

That wasn't on the agenda. It wasn't discussed with his nobles in the previous business meeting.

A seven -year madness was not on the schedule. How humbling it is for all our self -promoting plans.

How humbling it has been for all of our plans to be interrupted again and again by God's judgments as he inflicts madness upon our magistrates, scarcity upon our economy, and disease upon our bodies.

Louis de Boer commented, we must remember that against the judgments of God, there is no national defense.

Now let's consider the triumph of God's word. God's ways are not man's ways. Nebuchadnezzar's way, you see in the text, what did he do?

He stood there and surveyed all of his dominion and he quantified it all as descriptive of his personal worth and greatness.

He declares it to be, he speaks his own self -worth, he enunciates his self -love, and then notice

God's way. God's way was to specifically contradict man's word and declare and bring to pass a judgment which unfailingly resulted in man's humiliation and God's exaltation.

Notice as well that Nebuchadnezzar should have outright died from this mental collapse.

How did he not die? How did he not be, how was he not immediately executed by someone who was horrified by what happened?

How, how was it that he was able to survive for these seven years in the field with nothing but grass of the field and the dew from heaven to survive?

How did he keep on living? God preserved him.

God kept him alive. God made the grass of the field and the dew of heaven to be sustenance to him, to actually be nutrition to him.

God is the one who kept him alive that whole time. He preserved him for later restoration and then brought it to pass.

You see the depths of grace here. I think there are many such

Nebuchadnezzars wandering about like stray dogs in the streets of our city. I think there are many who willingly embrace a rebellious reprobation of the mind.

Will God restore their reason to them? Will God raise them up as vessels of mercy?

He can. He has. I feel confident he will.

We write people off way earlier than God does.

As we hope in God's restoration of those who are suffering in this way under just judgment, let us not dignify what

God has shamed. Let us not dignify what God has shamed, but rather pray for that salvation which

God promises through Christ. When we look upon a judgment of madness that has fallen over a person or a community, we should not think to ourselves, we must call it something other than what it is.

Let's come up with a better word, a nicer term. Let's give it some sort of dignity so they don't feel like everything is as horrible as it is.

We also should not dignify what God has shamed by proposing that if there was only a better system or a better structure or a better environment, that we would be able to improve those with such a madness.

Because I imagine if the solution for Nebuchadnezzar out in the field, having been exiled from society, who is eating the grass like an ox and trying to find water wherever it may be.

What if somebody had said, well, it's not really all that bad. I mean, this is obviously what he wants.

He wants the grass. He wants to suck the moisture out of the mud.

He wants to be outside of society. Look, this is what he wants. Clearly, this is in accordance with his now altered nature.

And so we shouldn't be against it, but we should help improve it and enhance his time out here.

Maybe we should make a little zoo for him. Maybe control the feed and water better and make sure that he can be as beastly as he wants to be, but just in a nicer environment.

And that would be love. Don't dignify what God has shamed.

If we do, we won't pray for the salvation which God has promised. Now, what will not fail us in this regard to properly understand what wickedness is and give us hope for salvation?

What will not fail to properly judge men and their wickedness and also recover them enslaved in darkness and deliver them to the kingdom of light?

The word of God will triumph. For as the rain comes down, Isaiah 55, 10, for as the rain comes down and the snow from heaven and do not return there but water the earth and make it bring forth and bud that it may give seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes forth from my mouth.

It shall not return to me void, but it shall accomplish what I please and it shall prosper in the thing for which

I sent it. We are reminded in this passage that no matter the greatness of rebellious men, the timely and triumphant arrival of the word of God exposes their madness.

We know things are wrong. We know things are off.

Even the most atheistic philosophers knew that there was something wrong with the world.

Everybody knows that knowing how to describe it, how to identify it, what should we call it?

The word of God gives us those words. The word of God brings clarity, light and definition to that.

And no matter how great a society or a person is, it's not enough to compensate for, atone for, cover over the madness of rebellion against God.

Rome was great. Jerusalem was great, one of the most mighty cities in the

Roman Empire. The temple that the Jews and Herod built and overlaid with gold upon gold was great and magnificent.

But at the perfect time, Christ, who is God, the word came and through his death and resurrection, he triumphed over all his foes.

And he rules in the kingdom of men as king of kings and lord of lords.

The government, indeed, rests upon his shoulders and all who rage against him are reduced to vain babblings.

Let us not allow greatness to obscure madness. I was down at the

Capitol on Monday morning and was very impressed with all of the improvements that they have made still under construction.

But you talk about the most wealthy, pristine, beautiful, luxurious building in the whole state of Oklahoma.

It's a sight to see. You go down there, you can walk on marble floors.

You can walk up plush carpeted staircases, wider, about as wide as half this building.

You can walk around and find your way through the building with interactive touchscreen maps.

And everywhere you see is luxury and beauty and glory.

But you know, all of that can obscure the madness within. As people in rebellion against God, time and again, arrogantly and boastfully and proudly decide that they know better than God's word.

Greatness cannot obscure the madness. It is no substitute. The absurdities of Nebuchadnezzar's ways were made manifest in God's judgment.

This is also true of professional greatness. Professional greatness is no covering for madness.

You might be involved with some very significant or satisfying projects in your professional life, but these are not an atonement for perversions.

At the ultimate consideration of things, when somebody dies, very often a look is made about all of their accomplishments as if somehow this is their atonement.

The reason why we believe they're in a better place is because of all the professional accomplishments that they had in their life.

But these are not salvation. They are not an atonement for sin. You can be involved in many good and righteous works.

You could minister and you can serve and you can do many compassionate things, but that is no platform for pride, arrogance, and the boastful word.

Very often we try to obscure the madness of rebellion against God with human greatness.

But as we see here in this text, it is no covering. It is no substitute. God will still judge.

We are to follow God's ways in Christ rather than our own ways. We are made in God's image and this image is restored in the reconciling work of Jesus Christ.

Everything has been given to him and he is making all things new and he is reconciling all things by the blood of his cross to obedience, submission, and righteous judgment before God.

As we serve Christ and follow Christ, anything that he calls us to do will not leave us in a state like Nebuchadnezzar was, standing above the works in our life and leaving us in awe of ourselves.

Anything that Christ calls us to do in serving him, whether we are loving one another in our families, or in our church, or laboring to provide for our families, or laboring to bring righteousness in the world today, whatever it is that God wants us to do for him in Christ is not going to leave us standing in awe of ourselves.

God is not going to lead us onto a palace to look over all of our accomplishments so that we can then say, wow, look what

I have done. But following God's ways in Christ brings us ever more into the fear of the

Lord. Look what God is doing. Look what God has done.

Be amazed at him. When you think of the stories in the scripture, who has in wisdom ever stood and gloried in all of their numbers and power?

Did Nimrod of the Tower of Babel, was he standing in wisdom, making a name for himself?

What about the King of Sodom? What about David when he tried to number the people to see how great and powerful a king he was?

Did he do that in wisdom? What about Hezekiah, who showed off all of the golden treasures of his kingdom to the

Babylonian emissary? Was that in wisdom? What about the way that the

Jews in Jesus' day felt about their temple? 46 years it has taken us to build this temple.

Did they stand in wisdom there? We see that this temptation is strong and it is foolish.

God's ways are not our ways. He does not lead us to quantify our worth by a reflection on all that we have accomplished.

But he leads us to consider his worth in all that he has accomplished.

And that is true wisdom. And that is the gracious antidote to pride.

Let's close the word of prayer. Father, I thank you for the time you've given us in your word. I pray that it has done your work.

Lord, you know how easy it is for us to resort to prideful ways in our conversations, in our scheduling, in our work.

We thank you that you are gracious and that you have ways of making us humble. And I pray that you would do so in this most joyous manner of putting our attention upon what you have accomplished in Christ, what you have and are and will do through your son.

And that this would humble us in joy as we consider your greatness. We pray these things, looking only to Christ, the one with whom you are well pleased.

Amen. If you would stand with me for our song of benediction, we're going to sing again.

Rejoice! The Lord is King. Sing with me. Rejoice, hear, face, and see, and triumph evermore.

Lift up your heart, lift up your voice, rejoice again

I say, rejoice. The Lord our

Savior reigns, the God of truth and love.

When he had purged our stains, he took his seat above.

Lift up your heart, lift up your voice, rejoice again

I say, rejoice. His kingdom cannot fail, he rules over earth and heaven.

The keys of death and hell are to our Jesus. Give, lift up your heart, lift up your voice, rejoice again

I say, rejoice. Rejoice in glorious hope, our

Lord and judge shall come. And take his servants up to their eternal home.

Lift up your heart, lift up your voice, rejoice again

I say, rejoice. May the love of the

Father, and the grace of the Son, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with us all.