THE POINT: When God gives and when God takes away, our only right response is praise!
ME
Last week we took some time and we practiced praise. Let me hear you again today… Give me a sample of what praise sounds like!
Now, as we saw last week. Praise is more than just making noise, even if it is noise for Jesus. We also spent some time in the practice of praising him for some very specific things in our lives. He is worthy of praise, of worship, of thanks…
I hope that his week you’ve been practicing praise… I hope you’ve been looking for reasons to praise him (you shouldn’t have to look too hard) and that you’ve been finding or creating opportunities to praise him out loud to people.
WE
Last week we looked at praising him in the land that is plentiful. Too often, when the blessing fall on us we take the blessing and. We don’t stop to offer him the praise that he deserves! We fail to give him his due.
This week, we’re looking at our other tendency. The tendency we have to NOT PRAISE him in the desert place.
Open your Bibles to the book of Job, chapter 1.
If you don’t have a Bible, raise your hand and our ushers will make sure you have one so you can follow along.
[ushers hand out bibles to those who need them]
Here’s a fact that you probably are already aware of, but in case you aren’t let me enlighten you…
LIFE IS PAIN! ANYONE WHO SAYS OTHERWISE IS SELLING SOMETHING!
It’s a fact that you are going to face major pain and tragedy at some point in life. If you haven’t already you will.
I’m not being negative, I’m just being honest. Life is wrought with pain and we will all experience it at some point. The question isn’t “will I have pain?” The question is “when the pain comes, will I still praise Jesus?”
Will you be able to say…
Blessed be Your name when I’m found in the desert place
Though I walk through the wilderness, blessed be Your name
Every blessing You pour out I’ll turn back to praise
When the darkness closes in, Lord, still I will say
Here’s the point… the ONE THING… it’s the same as last week’s.
When God gives and when God takes away, our only right response is praise!
GOD
Look at the book of Job with me…
Job is a righteous guy. Of all the people on the earth, he seems to be one that God is especially pleased withy.
One day Satan approaches God and says…”Hey God, the people of earth are kind of worthless. None of them even love you.”
And God says…”Check out Job. He’s righteous and he loves and obeys me.”
To which Satan replies, “That’s only because you bless him. If his blessings were taken from him, he would curse you.”
So …poor Job… God says to Satan, “Give it your best shot. Take it all and watch what Job does.”
And so, in a quick succession of tragedies Job loses everything.
… his wealth
… his reputation
… his children
And this is Job’s response.
At this, Job got up and tore his robe and shaved his head. Then he fell to the ground in worship and said:
“Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked I will depart.
The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away;
May the name of the Lord be praised.”
Job 1:20-21(NIV)
Job got it. He realized that EVERY THING HE HAD EVER RECEIVED HAD COME FROM GOD…
His wealth
His reputation
His health
His family
His VERY LIFE
All he had was given to him by God. All were gifts. All belonged to God in the first place. God had given and God had taken away and the only right response was to praise God because it was all from him in the first place. Job understood that when God gives and when God takes away, our only right response is praise!
He is ALWAYS GOOD – even if it doesn’t feel like it – and so regardless of whether he is giving or is taking away our only right response is to praise him.
Why do we have trouble PRAISING JESUS when life is difficult?
We struggle with this because we tend to get caught up in believing that WE have earned what we have. We get caught up in believing that we DESERVE what we have and we forget that it has all come from God, it all belongs to God and it is His to do with as he pleases.
1. We think what we have is OURS.
We are possessive… Words like “Me” “My” and “Mine” give us away.
Let me illustrate by reading “The Toddler Rules of Ownership”
• If I like it, it’s mine.
• If it is in my hand, then it is mine.
• If I can take it from you, it’s mine.
• If I had it a little while ago, its mine.
• If it is mine, it must not appear to be yours in any way.
• If I am doing or building something, then all the pieces are mine.
• If it looks just like mine then it’s mine.
• If I think it’s mine then it is mine.
• If it’s yours and I steal it then it’s mine.
Sadly, most of us operate by those same rules now that we’re adults. We have trouble praising Jesus when life is difficult… especially when that difficulty causes us to lose what we have… because we tend to believe that what we have is OURS!
-Truth: What we have belongs to Jesus
In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth
Genesis 1:1 (NIV)
16For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him. 17He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.
Colossians 1:16-17 (NIV)
1 The earth is the LORD’s, and everything in it,
the world, and all who live in it;
Psalm 24:1 (NIV)
When life is difficult and we lose those things we think are ours, our possession, our wealth, our health, our money… whatever. We need to remember that it isn’t ours! It all belongs to God in the first place. It is his to do with as he pleases and so whether he gives or takes, our response must be praise! EVEN WHEN I’M FOUND IN THE DESERT PLACE!
When God gives and when God takes away, our only right response is praise!
2. We think we are GOOD.
When life gets hard, when we have serious, BIG TIME trouble, instead of praising Jesus we want to ask “Why?” “Why, God, do BAD things happen to GOOD people?’ And obviously, since we are good, bad things shouldn’t happen to us, right?
We have this tendency to believe we are good and that if God were fair, then he wouldn’t let bad things happen to us because a fair God wouldn’t let bad things happen to good people!
The problem is that we aren’t good.
-Truth: Only Jesus is good
All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags; we all shrivel up like a leaf, and like the wind our sins sweep us away.
Isaiah 64:6 (NIV)
"Why do you call me good?" Jesus answered. "No one is good—except God alone.
Luke 18:19 (NIV)
23for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.
Romans 3:23 (NIV)
We think we are good and so GOD should keep bad things from happening to us. But the fact is that NONE OF US ARE GOOD… NONE!!!! ANY good we experience in life is the result of God’s amazing grace and mercy poured out on us.
Thus, when tragedy lands in our laps… rather than blame God and rather than complain that bad things shouldn’t happen to someone as nice as we are we can praise him because… in spite of our sin and wickedness and evil hearts he has not abandoned us… he is still gracious and we are still blessed, even in the midst of tragedy!
We are not good. Thus, when God gives and when God takes away, our only right response is praise!
3. We think we DESERVE to be blessed.
Because we have bought into the myth that we are good, we tend to believe that we DESERVE to be blessed. We’ve been good right? So we deserve good things in this life.
When tragedy hits us we want to ask, “What did we do to deserve this?”
The fact is that we ALL DESERVE DEATH AND PUNISHMENT!
But let me ask this… what did we do to deserve being born in the greatest nation in history, having the greatest freedoms ever known to man, receiving the greatest wealth ever known to man? What did we do to deserve such blessing?
What did the poor children of aids infected prostitutes in sub-Saharan Africa do to deserve being born into poverty, war, pestilence and disease? I mean, if we’re going to ask God what did I do to deserve such trouble I have to be consistent and ask that same question for everyone!
-Truth: We deserve death and hell.
The fact is that we ALL DESERVE DEATH AND HELL!
“For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
Romans 6:23 (ESV)
A wage is what we earn… it’s what we deserve! What we deserve is DEATH! But praise Jesus that he isn’t fair! He hasn’t given us what we deserve but rather he has offered himself as the sacrifice for our sins… he died so we wouldn’t have to. He was punished so we wouldn’t have to be.
And through his death and resurrection he offers FORGIVENESS, REDEMPTION, and ETERNAL LIFE to those who will repent of their sin and accept him as Lord and Savior.
When I’m smacked down by trouble in this life I may be tempted to ask, “what did I do to deserve this?” But the fact is I need to praise him. when God gives and when God takes away, our only right response is praise!
SO WHAT?
YOU
At the end of the day… what it boils down to is this, when God gives and when God takes away, our only right response is praise!
If you are a Christ follower…
Today, if you are a believer (I think Christ follower is a better term. There are lots of people who believe but very few who actually FOLLOW JESUS)– a follower of Jesus Christ then you can praise him in EVERY CIRCUMSTANCE because he has offered GRACE… MERCY… FORGIVENESS… REDEMPTION… HOPE… ETERNAL LIFE…
Regardless of what painful, difficult or trying situations we find ourselves in we still have cause to praise him. Because he is good and holy and has blessed us – even when we don’t feel blessed.
He HASN’T given us what we deserve…
“For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
Romans 6:23 (ESV)
What we deserve… what we have earned… the WAGES of our sin is DEATH…
But God’s FREE GIFT to us is eternal life through the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ!
Whatever pain we are experiencing, the fact is that we have not received what we deserve and for that we have reason to praise him!
When God gives and when God takes away, our only right response is praise!
If you are not a Christ Follower…
-You’re someone who believes. You know the stories. You even believe that Jesus is the Son of God and that he died and rose again, but you don’t follow him. You haven’t surrendered your life to him and made him Lord…
You too can praise him in every situation. You can praise him when you’re found “in the desert place.”
Does it sound strange to say that someone who isn’t a Christ follower can praise him? Check this out…
God exalted him to the highest place
and gave him the name that is above every name,
10that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,
in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
11and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord,
to the glory of God the Father.
Philippians 2:9-11 (NIV)
A day is coming when EVERYONE will bow in praise… whether you have chosen to follow him and love him and serve him or not. You can choose to do so now or you can do so in eternity at the judgment, but we WILL ALL PRAISE HIM!
So even if, at this point in your life, you have chosen not to follow him…
You can praise him in the midst of difficulty and suffering because – he hasn’t treated you as you deserve. That you are alive, healthy in a free country, that you have people praying for you and loving you… you have experienced the GRACE of Jesus in your life.
You can praise him because often he will use the pain in your life to draw you closer to him… That pain may be an act of love from a God who desperately wants to adopt you as his child.
C.S. Lewis wrote, in his classic The Problem of Pain.
God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our consciences, but shouts in our pain: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world
When you – the one who believes but does not follow Jesus or the one who simply does not believe– experience pain and suffering and those “desert places” in life you can praise God because he is drawing you to him… he is using pain as a megaphone to wake you up to his love and mercy and forgiveness!
And it is my prayer that TODAY you will quit playing games and you will choose to surrender to Jesus. That you will choose to put your faith in him as the GOD of the Bible who died in your place and rose again three days later offering forgiveness and new life – eternal life to those who would repent and trust him.
But whether that is what you decide today or not – there is still only one right response to him in your time of suffering and that is to praise him!
When God gives and when God takes away, our only right response is praise!
WE
As we move through this traditional thanksgiving season, let it serve as a reminder that When God gives and when God takes away, our only right response is praise!
Even when we walk through the desert place… when life is painful and disappointing and when the load seems to be heavier than we can carry… our only right response is STILL to PRAISE HIM…
It’s a CHOICE we have to make… but it’s the only choice that is right!
[Close with communion]
Let’s Pray.
