Praise The Lord

Praise the Lord, Psalm 150

Eric A. Snyder, Minister, Farwell Church of Christ

September 1, 2002

An older woman was well-known for her faith and she talked about it a lot. She would go out on the front porch and yell,

"Praise the Lord!" Her next door neighbor would shout back,

"There ain’t no God!"

During those days, she was very poor, so the neighbor decided to prove his point by buying a large bag of groceries and placing it at her door.

The next morning, the woman went to the porch

and, seeing the groceries, said,

"Praise the Lord!"

The neighbor stepped out from behind a tree and said, "I brought those groceries, and there ain’t no God."

the woman replied,

"Lord, you not only sent me food

but you made the devil pay for it."

How many of you really believe that God is good?

But for some the concept of worship has gotten them into trouble

There was a preacher that was trying to sell his horse. A potential buyer came to the church for a test ride. "Before you start," the preacher said, "you should know that this horse only responds to church talk. Go is: Praise the Lord, and Stop is: Amen."

So the man on the horse says, "Praise the Lord," and the horse starts to trot. The man again says, "Praise the Lord," and the horse starts to gallop. Suddenly there is a cliff right in front of the horse and the man yells, "Amen!"

The horse stops just at the edge of the cliff.

The man wipes the sweat from his brow and says, "Praise the Lord!"...

Today we are talking about worship and pouring ourselves out before God. Our text today is one of the most popular worship texts in the bible

Today we are in Psalm 150

150:1 Praise the LORD. Praise God in his sanctuary; praise him in his mighty heavens. 2 Praise him for his acts of power; praise him for his surpassing greatness. 3 Praise him with the sounding of the trumpet, praise him with the harp and lyre, 4 praise him with tambourine and dancing, praise him with the strings and flute, 5 praise him with the clash of cymbals, praise him with resounding cymbals. 6 Let everything that has breath praise the LORD. Praise the LORD.

Prayer

The focus of this Psalm is that God summons us to worship. This is essential to the Christian life, because before God calls us to anything else, he calls us to worship him. Ephesians 1 suggests that the reason God has called us, redeemed us, and gave us his Spirit is to worship him.

Listen to what Ephesians 1 says 4-6 4 For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love 5 he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will-- 6 to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves.

Verse 6 is the reason God sent Jesus. So that we can praise Him.

Unfortunately we have defined worship by our consumer tastes.

When someone decides to go church many people treat it like test driving a car which is fine to find where you fit, but after a few years your maturity level should have grown to a point where you know where your home is. Walmart style works well for seekers who only want God at an arms length apart, but for the person who desires to grow and learn a more committed stance is required.

All of that means we are going to have to get incredibly honest as a church. We have to really open ourselves up and do what David did when he said search my heart God. The best worship you will ever experience has an honest relationship at its core. Some of us need to ask God to look into our heart and reveal our weaknesses. Some need to say “God I have a problem with selfishness” or God I don’t know what my problem is but I want you to find it reveal it to me and help me beat it.

One of my favorite church leaders was a man named Soren Kirkegaard. He was in that whole time period of reformation and would have been alive at the same time as Martin Luther. The reason that I like him so well is because he was a “no nonsense” kind of guy. He was always looking at what the church had to do to be more pleasing to God. He was a bit rude and incredibly outspoken and he was always in trouble. He was a prophet of the modern church.