WEBVTT 00:00:00.200 --> 00:00:03.920 I'm going to invite you this morning to Psalm 147, where we're going to be together today. 00:00:03.960 --> 00:00:05.280 Psalm 147. 00:00:05.280 --> 00:00:09.680 For those that like to think ahead, we're going to conclude our Psalm series next week. 00:00:09.720 --> 00:00:15.360 We're going to end it with our state of the church message, which we usually do towards the end of summer. 00:00:15.360 --> 00:00:21.160 And we're going to look at Psalm 133, and then the week after that, we'll pick up in the book of Exodus. 00:00:21.160 --> 00:00:27.280 We're going to go through the book of Exodus together as we're making our exodus out of our building to our future promised place. 00:00:27.520 --> 00:00:31.240 We're going to go through the book of Exodus, which is a great book to study. 00:00:31.240 --> 00:00:32.440 So we look forward to that. 00:00:32.720 --> 00:00:39.760 But Psalm 147, if you take time to read through the Psalm, the theme of this psalm comes forth very clearly 00:00:39.760 --> 00:00:41.440 from the very beginning. 00:03:36.420 --> 00:04:00.060 If you 00:05:02.730 --> 00:07:26.360 just look 00:07:58.390 --> 00:08:09.590 at the 00:08:09.590 --> 00:08:18.070 beginning of the 00:11:30.930 --> 00:12:36.570 Psalm, the end of the Psalm, 00:13:50.680 --> 00:33:12.160 you find 00:33:13.040 --> 00:33:34.720 that the focus of 00:34:06.360 --> 00:35:25.390 this Psalm 00:35:53.110 --> 00:39:24.610 is very much 00:39:24.610 --> 00:39:43.920 centered on 00:40:04.160 --> 00:40:26.520 the idea of 00:41:10.520 --> 00:41:11.280 praise. 00:41:11.280 --> 00:41:17.800 And this is what we're going to talk about today is the thought of praise. 00:41:17.800 --> 00:41:17.800 But more than that, we're going to talk about the benefit of praise. 00:41:17.800 --> 00:41:17.920 I know it's a very pragmatic title in the way it practically works itself out in our lives, but I think it's critical for you to think through the benefit of praise in your life. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And maybe you're familiar with the idea that the Bible certainly talks about praise. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 It's not a miss to you, but wrestling with the concept and the importance of praise maybe is something you've not given a lot of time to. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And hopefully by the end of our time together, you start to see the significance of its practice in your life and why the Bible calls us to it. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 When you just study the word praise throughout Scripture, you find some form of the word praise used throughout the Bible well over 200 times, and more than half of those times, well over 100 times, you find the call to praise the Lord expressed through the book of Psalms. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 So the meaning or the thought of praise is used throughout the totality of Scripture. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 The practice encouraged among God's people to do it. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And it's amplified in the book of Psalms. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And when we think about what the book of Psalms represents, the Bible certainly teaches us who God is as we read through it, who we are in light of that. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 But the book of Psalms is unique from the rest of Scripture in that it's really walking us through how do we worship the Lord in light of what we come to understand who he is and who we are in light of him. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 So what does it look like to respond to the Lord? 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And the Psalms walk us through that. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And praise then becomes a central theme to the life of the believer in light of who God is. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And noting that, I want you to look at this particular Psalm. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 You'll see the theme of praise expressed throughout it right at the very beginning of the Psalm. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Verse one talks about the idea of praising the Lord. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 It's from the get go. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 The Psalm is telling you, this is what this psalm is about. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 It's about understanding what it means to praise the Lord. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Then again, in verse seven, it tells you to sing a song of thanksgiving, which is really an outworking of praise. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 This is what praise looks like in a tangible way, singing the song of thanksgiving. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Then again, in verse 12, it goes back to echoing the idea of praising the Lord. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And then when you get to verse 20, it ends that way again. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 So praise the Lord. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 So you're certainly seeing the theme of this psalm is built on the idea of praise. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And then when you look at verse one all the way down to verse six, it expresses to us why my heart should feel compelled to praise. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 The psalmist builds on this idea. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 He's not just saying, do this, but then he's sharing why the heart should be compelled to live this way. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And then in verse seven, he calls us to sing that song of thanksgiving as a practice of praise. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And then all the way down to verse 11, he's sharing with us the theme of that idea. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And in verse 12, he expresses it again all the way down to verse 19. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And as if we might forget the whole theme of the psalm, he then ends with, praise the Lord. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 So you're seeing the motivation of this psalm is to inspire the heart to praise. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And in so doing, we're learning the benefit of what praise is about in the lives of God's people. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 So here's what we're going to do as we look at this Psalm. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 We're going to talk about what praise is. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 We're going to define it. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 That's at the very top if you have notes this morning. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 If you don't have notes and you download the Bible app, you can click on notes and you'll get them digitally there. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 But we're going to define what praise is. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 We're going to talk about why we do it. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 We're going to talk about how we do it. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And then finally, we're going to spend the majority of our time on how do we inspire our heart to do that? 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Or how is our heart inspired to praise? 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Because in those first three questions, the why and how, we're going to more examine it from a theological perspective. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 But then we got to get to the place of putting rubber to the road. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 What does it look like for me to live this out in my life, if it's so important for the life of the believer? 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Knowing the Bible talks about it so frequently, what is it that we need to know about this thought of praise? 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 So when we talk about praise and defining what it is, let me give you the definition. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 The most simple way of saying it is this: praise the Lord in Hebrew is the word hallelujah. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 That's the blank in your notes. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And in fact, some English translations won't even put the word praise the Lord in writing. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 They'll just copy the word hallelujah and assume you know that that's what hallelujah means. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 But the idea of praise the Lord simply is the expressing of hallelujah. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 No doubt you've probably heard that term at some point in your life. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 It's two Hebrew words smashed together to create that idea, praise the Lord. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 The idea of praise and the Lord put together. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Hallelujah. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And it's the two Hebrew words of the Hallel and the Hebrew word of Yahweh, or at least a shortened abbreviation of the word Yahweh with Yah. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 So it's Hallel and Yah. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 The Hallel — for the Jewish people there are specific times when they use the word Hallel, where they're specifically talking about certain practices in their faith. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 So like on Passover, for example, if you read the New Testament, you find in the final moments of Jesus going into Jerusalem before he's crucified, the people of God are going into Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover, and they're singing what they refer to as the Hallel, which starts in Psalm 113 to 118. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 When they would ascend up into Jerusalem — Jerusalem was on a hill — they would sing the Hallel. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 That's the Psalms from Psalm 113 to 118. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And when Jesus appears in Jerusalem for the final time, they express praise over Jesus from that section of Scripture. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And so the Hallel was not only a reminder of the ascending to Jerusalem to worship, but the word Hallel literally means praise, or to ascend or to shine brightly, to put the spotlight here, to acknowledge the worth of something. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And then they're attaching it to Yah or Yahweh. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 So the idea of Hallelu is saying, not just you praise, but the idea of you is saying, all of us. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 So praise the Lord as this call for all of God's people to honor him. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Hallelujah. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Praise to God. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And so when we think about what praise is, it's also important to consider why do we do it? 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Like, why does the Bible command us to do this thing? 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And it's interesting when you start to dialog over that concept, you can quickly find out whose concept of praise is healthy and who isn't. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And so when we talk about why we praise, let me give you a little bit of an explanation here. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And you're going to see this unfold as we look within Psalm 147. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 But why do we praise? 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 This first line is important. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 I want to stop here as we consider all of this. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Praise does not change who God is. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Meaning, this is where I say, if we talk about praise for a minute, sometimes we can immediately discover if someone has an unhealthy view of who God is. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Because in some of our minds we might consider the importance of praise working this way. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Well, I've got to praise, because if I don't praise, God's going to get angry at me. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And if I don't praise, then God's going to be in heaven wondering where I am. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Like God needs me to do this. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Is this the reason? 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Of course God has commanded me, because, well, he needs me. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And I want you to know if your concept of the reason that we praise is because you think, well, God's going to get mad at you, and you've done enough bad things, and you kind of got to balance the yin and the yang — you got to do enough good things, so you got to get here on a Sunday and you gotta praise with all your heart, you better do that, otherwise God's going to get mad at you because that's what the Bible tells you to do. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And if you don't do what you're told, then you're simply going to live under the anger of God. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Or, well, who's going to remind God how important he is? 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Like he's in heaven right now and he really needs you. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 He really needs you to show up and praise him. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Because if you don't, he doesn't even know how he's going to move forward. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 He's like, he's just sitting there thinking, man, I made that person. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And I've been working on their heart, trying to get them to go here, but they won't. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And now they're not here and I don't know what I'm going to do. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Like God's up in heaven having that kind of conversation right now. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And if your concept of God even remotely fits in one of those ideas, I don't want to shatter someone's wimpy ego. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 But if that's you this morning, it needs shattered for a minute, because that is absolutely unhealthy and wrong. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 The motivation of praise is not because, well, God needs me and I better get there to remind God of how important he is. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 That's a role reversal that's really putting you in the position of God. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 It's as if you're creating a God that's dependent upon who you are, and in his weakness and his own desperation he needs you to show up to remind him, because he is weak in his own being. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 The idea of praise is not built on God is weak and you're strong and thank God you're here. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 The idea of praise is built on the exact opposite. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 You're the dependent one, and God is the independent one in his own nature. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 So the motivation of praise isn't because of the desperation of God. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 The motivation of praise is certainly for the glory of God. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 But the benefactor of praise is you. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 So if you're showing up to praise the Lord and you're feeling like, man, I feel guilty, I better do this, I want you to know there might be a warped concept of your understanding of who God is. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Because the purpose of our praise, certainly for the glory of God, is designed for your benefit. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And when we understand this, as we get ready to look at the scriptures, you'll say to yourself, oh, now I see it. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 I see the significance of the benefit of what praise is about. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Because as we go on from here, we would define the rest of it this way. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Rather, praise changes our awareness of who God is and reorients our hearts towards him. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 What it's really saying is that we have the tendency of taking our eyes off the significance of who God is and getting distracted through the temptations of this world. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And it can come not only in luring us with bad things that we shouldn't be doing, but also overwhelming us in the problems that life might throw at us. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And we start to look at our problems rather than our God. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And so in so doing, praise becomes a practice for your benefit because it's reorienting your life to the significance of who God is and what it truly means to live life in light of him as you walk with him. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Praise is a gift that God has given us. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 In fact, in verse 11 of this Psalm, one of the things that the psalmist does is at the very end of that verse, he reminds you of the steadfast love of the Lord. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And what he's saying is, don't forget the unchanging, faithful, covenantal love of God. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 God does not change. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 We do. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And because God doesn't change, he is the consistent one. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And when he promises to us, he will be faithful to deliver. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And so as we face the inconsistency of the world and we wrestle with the inconsistency of our hearts, this idea of praise is helping us to reorient ourselves to the richness of who we are in light of who he is. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Praise honestly is really not for the Lord. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 It's for you and the toxicity that can creep into our own soul when we're not mindful of the richness of what we have in Christ. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 So we see what praise is. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 We see why we praise. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And let me just say this. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 As I was reading through this Psalm this week, I often read through these passages many, many times as I reflect on them to teach them. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 But I kind of jotted down my own little journal entry of what I think the expression of praise is stating through this Psalm, and this is the way I answered it. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Praise is important because, number one, God is worthy of it. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And number two, Scripture also shows that praise does something profound in us. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 It takes my eyes off my problems and reminds me of his goodness and his care for us through his truth that endures. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 It builds my faith. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 It changes my perspective. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 It fights discouragement, strengthens my soul, and produces humble gratitude. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Praise is important for the life of the believer, and we praise God because of who he is and what he has done. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And in praising him, our hearts are reshaped by the truth about him. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Praise is important and so it becomes significant then for us to consider how do I do it? 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And I want you to know the practice of praise is directional. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And when we think about how we express it, if I gave you really all the answers under that next question in your notes, it is to remind us that praise is directional. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 As you look at these answers, I want you to know that the first two answers really categorize themselves together, and the bottom two answers, they categorize themselves in a cluster. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Meaning, we talk about how do we practice praise? 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Well, we look up and we look back. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And when we start by looking up and looking back, both of those things can happen simultaneously. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Meaning we look up at the goodness of who God is and his character. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And we also look back at the way that character is made known through the way that God has expressed himself, the things that God has done. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Or sometimes we might look back at what God has done, and it reminds us of who God is. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 The actions of the Lord are the outworking of his character, and his character is expressed in the outworking of what he does. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Both of these things can happen simultaneously. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 I get to know who you are, and knowing who you are, I come to anticipate the way that you would work. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And in seeing the way that you work, I start to understand the nature of who you are. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 So how do I express it? 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Well, it starts here because when I see the consistency of who God is playing itself out through a historical perspective, I then begin to see in the faithfulness of God how I can express my faith to God. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 His faithfulness is what leads to my faith. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And in so doing, I begin to see what God does inwardly. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And as God transforms me inwardly, he expresses that outwardly. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 The change that happens in my heart is made known in my life. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And so this becomes the expression of praise made known. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And this really helps us correlate between: is God just simply a concept, or have I truly known him? 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Because we can express the words of praise in our life but never truly demonstrate it. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And praise works in many facets. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 It's not just saying a word. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 It's not just singing a song. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 It's every ounce of my being expressing the richness of who he is upward, backward, inward and outward. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 It's kind of like the GPS of our life. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 I don't know if I'm the only one that this happens to, but every once in a while I'll get driving down the road with my GPS on, and then I'll kind of forget that GPS is guiding me, and then I'll just turn. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Sometimes I'll turn before I should turn. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 Sometimes I'll turn having missed the turn. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 But then the GPS has to recalibrate and it reorients me so that it can lead me. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 And that's what praise is about. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 It becomes this place of recalibrating, reconnecting, reorienting where you are in light of who God is. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 You see, in this way of thinking about praise, you realize that it's not a command that God's saying to you simply because, well, you better or he's going to be angry, or you better because he's really needy and he needs to know how important he is. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:17.920 The glory of praise is given to God, certainly, but the benefit of praise is for you. 00:41:17.920 --> 00:41:18.280 This is a gift that God has given us in our own relationship with him to delight in him all of our days. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And therefore learning how to praise becomes important. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 So then we could ask the question, well, what stirs my heart to praise? 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 So it's good to know this information, but rubber meets the road — what can help my heart to be faithful to this if it's so beneficial for my relationship with the Lord? 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 What helps me walk this kind of path? 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And even asking that question, like, what stirs your heart to praise? 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Let me just ask you: when you think about this last week, was praise a part of your walk with God at all? 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Now, I'm not saying, did God hear from you? 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Because I don't have a doubt for most of us that claim to have faith in the Lord that at some point during the week, God likely hears from us. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 But the way that God hears from us — it might often not be because we're truly seeking God because he may not be our real God. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 But the motivation behind the reason why sometimes we might seek God — and by the way, I'm not hurling insults or trying to accuse any of you, I'm obviously talking about other people because you have a healthy walk with the Lord, right? 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 But maybe our motivation in pursuing God really isn't about the Lord at all. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Maybe if we're being honest and we reflect back on our week, the only time I can remember when I talked to the Lord was when I faced a problem. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And the reason I talked to the Lord was because I wanted God to change my problem. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And so I came to God asking him to change my problem. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And let me just say it like this. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 It's not wrong to do that, but I would just say it's worth stopping and reflecting on that for a moment. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Because perhaps your real God isn't God. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Your real God is comfort. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And the reason you pursued God wasn't because you wanted the Lord. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 It was because you wanted to use the Lord to serve what you truly desire, which is simply comfort in life. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And if you reflect back on your last week and the only time you sought after the Lord was so that the Lord would change something in your life, I want you to know there might be a praise problem. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Because praise believes this: God, no matter what I go through, whether it be the mountain or the valley, you are so good that I am trusting that whether you change that season of my life or not, you're going to meet me there and sustain me with everything that I need. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 So that when I'm going through the trials of my life, I can always praise, because you're always good and you will always be faithful to be there with me. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 See, there's a walk in the life of the Christian — and I would say amplified in societies that are more affluent — where there is this creep to worship comfort rather than the one true God. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And it's not wrong to ask, God, help me in this. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Lord, if it be, can you change it? 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 But I want you to know when you read Scripture, God doesn't always remove the storm, but he is faithful to walk with the believer through it. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 So how does God stir my heart in the praise that he is deserving of, for my benefit? 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Let me give you number one. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Number one is this: recognize his faithfulness. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Recognize his faithfulness. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And I want you to know as we look at this particular song, we're going to have to look at it in chunks because the psalmist expresses from verse 1 to 6 — we'll look at it together — verse 7 to 11 together, and 12 to 20 together. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 But I want you to see how he shapes this idea of recognizing his faithfulness. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 We already read verse one, but verse two: the Lord builds up Jerusalem. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 He gathers the outcasts of Israel. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 He determines the number of the stars. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 He gives to all of them their names. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Great is our Lord and abundant in power. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 His understanding is beyond measure. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 What stirs my heart? 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 The psalmist is really expressing this — I'll say in two words. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 He's expressing it in the power of God and also in the person of God or the personality of God. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Meaning he's showing God's authority, his sovereignty over all things. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And he's saying things like, look, you go outside at night, you see the stars. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 God not only put those there, but he's mindful of the details of every one of them. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 So you have this God that is sovereign in his authority over all things, but also intimate in his care. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And this becomes critical for you and for me — both of those concepts. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 How God is personal and powerful. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Both of those concepts are critical because if you're seeing the power of God but you don't see how God is personal, you're going to think, that's great, he's got the authority, but that God doesn't care about me. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 But then if you see how God is personal without his power, you're going to say, I'm glad God cares about me, but he doesn't have the authority to do anything about it. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 But in this Psalm, he's saying, here's the motivation of your praise: the authority and the grandeur of this God and all that he's created that displays his hand to you. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And at the same time, how God is personal in the lives of his people. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And the way that we know this is, if God even knows every star he's created and it's simply a star, you're the crown of his creation. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Why would God give such concern for the stars but not that detail of concern for his people? 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And so he's saying to Israel in this passage, in verse two, the Lord builds up Jerusalem. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 He gathers the outcasts of Israel. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 When you put this in its context, it becomes significant for us because Psalm 147 is from that time period where Israel is coming out of Babylonian captivity. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 They've been conquered and taken away as slaves. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 God's now liberated them, and he's bringing them back to the Promised Land. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 They were asking questions like, God, we must be forgotten by you because we disobeyed you. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 We've been chastised by you. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 We've been removed from you. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And now we're outcasts here. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 We're on the fringe. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Do you even care about us, God? 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Are you going to be faithful to what you promised when we weren't? 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And this psalm is the answer to that. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 He's bringing back the outcasts. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 He's faithful. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 He's consistent when we're unfaithful, when we're inconsistent. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And he brings them back to their land to fulfill the promises that he gave them, which leads to the redemption of all humanity. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And then when you look in verse three, he says, he heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 This is important for all of us to think about, because when Israel is taken into captivity, not only were their homes destroyed, their temple destroyed, the city walls destroyed, but their hearts were shattered with it. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 They saw their people attacked. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 They saw their friends and family killed. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 They lived as slaves in a foreign land. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And when they're coming back to Jerusalem, they're not only coming back looking to repair their walls, but at the same time, they need to discover their hearts repaired too. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 The psalmist is saying, not only is God sovereign in his power, but he's personal in his nature. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And he's reminding Israel as they're coming back with this broken city, Jerusalem — he knows they're also coming back with broken hearts. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And he's saying to them, not only trust me with your walls, but trust me with your soul. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 I bind those broken hearts in me. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Because it's the same for you. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And the significance of praise is reminding us of this God, that no matter what season I'm going through, I can always praise him. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Because he may not change the season that I'm enduring, but he promises to sustain me by his presence as we walk through it. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And therefore, as God cares for the stars, he has the same personal care for me, and even more so, because we are the crown of his creation as humanity made in his image. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 The question is, do you trust him that way? 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And I can tell you the evidence of whether or not you have is seen by the praise of your life. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 What stirs my heart to praise? 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 It's recognizing the faithfulness of who God is. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 You know, one individual in recent history that I think has lived this out more than any other that I know is a man by the name of Louis Zamperini. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 He actually passed away just a little bit over a decade ago. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 It was in 2014, an incredible story of God's grace in his life. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 They actually made a movie about it the year he passed away. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 The movie came out a couple months after he passed away. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 It was made by Angelina Jolie — like that matters. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 But she produced it. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 It was called Unbroken, and she told just a portion of his story but failed to share really the totality of his story. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And I think it's extremely compelling. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Louis Zamperini was an athlete. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 In fact, he was an Olympic athlete who went to fight in World War Two as a pilot. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 His plane crashed in the Pacific and he was lost at sea for 47 days. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Miraculously, he survives, but he's captured by the enemy, and he's put into a Japanese prison camp. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And in that prison camp, he's tortured for over two years until finally he's liberated. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And when he comes home from the war, the problem with Louis Zamperini was that the war came home with him. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And through all that he endured, those monsters followed him, and his life turned to alcohol to cope. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And he became a raging alcoholic, and it negatively impacted all of his relationships in life. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And he was absolutely desperate, until one day he learned Billy Graham was coming to his town, and out of desperation, he thought, I'll go listen to what Billy Graham has to say. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And when he went and listened to the message that Billy Graham shared, in those moments Louis Zamperini gave his life to the Lord, and those demons that he wrestled with were conquered in Christ. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 So much so that Louis Zamperini went back to Japan, and he visited those same soldiers who tortured him in prison. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And he told those soldiers he forgave them. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 This moment was even further highlighted when, some 50 plus years after he was held in prison, he went to the Winter Olympics that were held in Japan in Nagano in 1998. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And one of the most incredible things about Louis Zamperini is they allowed him to run with the torch for a kilometer through Japan, and not just any place in Japan — the very town where he was held as a prisoner. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And once again, he declared his forgiveness for those who had tortured him because of what Jesus had done in him. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 He found the faithfulness of the Lord. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And in so doing, rather than be riddled with hatred, his life was one of praise. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Understanding the significance of who God is transforms our life. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 God is infinitely great, yet intimately near. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 His greatness is what makes his care so comforting, to know that the grandeur of this God would care for me specifically. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 So that when we see the faithfulness of God made known, number two, we can do this: trust him fully. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 As I see his faithfulness, it encourages me to place my faith in him, and therefore I can trust him fully. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And you see in verse seven it goes on. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Sing to the Lord with thanksgiving. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Make melody to our God on the lyre. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 He covers the heavens with clouds. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 He prepares rain for the earth. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 He makes grass grow on the hills. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 He gives to the beasts their food, and to the young ravens their cry. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 So here he is again, this God caring for everything in all his authority and power, intimately made known. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 You see the magnitude of who this God is and how personal he becomes as his power is expressed intimately in our lives. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 But then he says this in verse ten. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 This becomes important because we might think to ourselves at this moment, this is great, this God making himself known both powerfully and personally. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 I better make this God happy. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 I better show God why I'm worthy of his love. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 I better perform enough that God owes me something. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 That tends to be the way that we react in a religious sense to the Lord. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 But then he says this in verse ten: His delight is not in the strength of the horse, nor his pleasure in the legs of a man, but the Lord takes pleasure in those who fear him, and those who hope in his steadfast love. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Here's what he's saying. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 The purpose of praise is not for you to come to God to impress him with who you are, but for your life to understand how great he is and for you to surrender to it. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 You know, when you think about spiritual health, we don't measure our spiritual health as Christians based on our capability, but our dependency. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Because if we're not careful, we might have the tendency of saying, I come to know the Lord, I grow up in him, and I start to learn what the Bible says — and look how great I am. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And we just kind of climb this pedestal of intellectual understanding of God. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And we think, I have arrived. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 I'm better than the peons beneath me because I can quote more scripture now. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And I want you to know that those who truly understand what praise is about, it's not expressed in how independent you become through this God, but rather how dependent you realize you are based on who he is. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 The only reason we're able to do anything for his glory in this world is not because of us, but because of him. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And so therefore, learning to trust in the Lord — there is no path forward with God without humility in our lives. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And can I just tell you our greatest battle in living this out? 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 The battle with this passage isn't that we disagree with what the Bible says or who God is. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 We can intellectually agree with that. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 However, at the end of the day, we can still struggle with trusting him because we're more interested in trusting ourselves than entrusting the Lord. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Meaning we can come to the Lord and have this intellectual understanding and say, you know what, I agree that the Bible says this about Jesus. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 But at the end of the day, still not truly surrender our hearts. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And James 2:19 tells us, even the demons believe. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And it's not a big deal to know about God. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 When you read the Gospels, you find out the only people that ever understood who Jesus truly was, it wasn't the religious leaders. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 It really wasn't any human being. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 It was the demons. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 The demons got Jesus right every time. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 But they didn't ever surrender to him. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Because it can be the same with us. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Praise can just be this practice of the flesh but never the true surrender of the heart. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 That's the scandalous thought of grace. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And we may know about what grace is — God's riches at Christ's expense. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 I don't earn it. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 I didn't deserve it. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 God gave it anyway. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 I might be able to say that, but not truly surrender to what God's done for me. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Grace offends our sense of pride. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 I like to be independent. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 I don't want to admit that I am dependent. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And this is what the psalmist is saying. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 If you're going to connect to God in this way, you got to understand who he is and how really dependent you are in your life. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 That's why praise is necessary. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Praise is that reminder of the fact that we need him. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 We can't live independent. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 We're designed to be dependent. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And therefore grace becomes scandalous because it's losing all that we are in who he is. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 But then when we look at who he is, we realize the gift of God and the power and his personal nature being made known. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 So trusting in him — praise is not for him. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 It's truly for me. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 It's to the benefit of his people, but for his glory. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 So to learn to trust in him. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And let me give you this last point, because I got to end. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 But the last thing we need to do then is receive his work. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Receive his work. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 You see in verse 12 it says, praise the Lord, O Jerusalem, for he strengthens the bars of your gates. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 He blesses your children within you. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 He makes peace in your borders. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 He sends out his command to the earth. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 His word runs swiftly. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 He hurls down his crystals of ice like crumbs. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Who can stand before his cold? 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 He sends out his word and melts them. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 He makes his wind blow and the waters flow. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And it makes you think that this psalm was likely written in the winter time. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 But then in verse 19, he declares his word to Jacob, his statutes and rules to Israel. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 He has not dealt thus with any other nation. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 They do not know his rules. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Praise the Lord. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Well, you know, there's a really important concept being taught here. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And it comes to the idea of through the Hebrew word for wind, spirit and word. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 The Hebrews developed this concept of ruach in Scripture, in the Old Testament, and the New Testament is the word pneuma, from where you ultimately get the word Holy Spirit. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Pneumatology — study of the Holy Spirit. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And so when we think about what the Holy Spirit does in our life, or we think about the ruach, the wind, there's this connection between God's Spirit and the Holy Spirit, or the idea of God's word and the wind being made known. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 If you go back to the book of Genesis, as God creates, it says, and the Spirit of God hovered over the waters, and God spoke. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Ruach — the Spirit of God hovering. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Ruach — God's presence made known. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And there's power in his presence as it's made known. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And there's transformation and there's life. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And ultimately, when he created you and me, in Genesis 2:7 it says, he made you different than anything else. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 He spoke everything into existence. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 But for you and me, he formed us from the dirt. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And then he breathes into us. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 The breath of life. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And man became a living being. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And then when you get to passages like John chapter three, verses five and six, as Jesus is talking to Nicodemus, he says, you know, the wind blows where it desires, and where it comes and goes we have no idea, but you can see its effect. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 You can see its presence. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 So it's given the idea of authority, the idea of power. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 You think in terms of you as a human being, you have a little bit of power maybe in your home. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 You have this thing called a thermostat. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And most of the time you can control the temperature of what is blowing within your home for about 5 to 15 years until it breaks. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And then when it breaks, you tell everyone for the next three days until you get someone to come there and fix it. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 But then when you step outside, you're back in the elements of the Lord. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And everything surrenders to his power and the wind recognizes his authority. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 It blows, who knows where it's coming from and where it's going, but we see its effect and things in creation surrender to it based on the power of the wind made known. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Even for you, you're dependent on this wind. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 For a moment you might capture it within you, breathe it in, but you can only hold on to it for just a moment. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And you've got to let it out. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And you have to entrust that you'll find another breath to fill you. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And the Hebrews had this way of saying, that is the Word of God being made known. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 But more than that, the Word of God has been specifically shared with you that you could know the power of this God through his Word. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 That's what the concept is. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 He's saying this all the way down to verse 19 and 20, to the point that even the Hebrews expressed it this way. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And in 2 Timothy chapter three, Paul wrote, all Scripture is breathed out by God. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Literally the inspiration, the ruach, the pneuma of God, the breath of God, made known his power to you in a personal way. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 How do you know his work? 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 One of the best places to turn is to his word. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 If you really want to praise the Lord, it's to get into his word to understand the work of God. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 I need to end with this. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 If I just thought about the concept of praising the Lord and what it means for us — praise, no doubt, hopefully you've got this idea in our minds now, that praise is critical for our well-being. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And I think one of the ways it's most expressed in Scripture is through the concept of sheep. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And if you read throughout the Bible, you find out that the idea of being a shepherd is not something that's praised in really most cultures in the Old and New Testament. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 In fact, it's considered one of the lowliest positions someone can have. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Now, I'm not saying that's our position. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 We love shepherds, okay? 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 That's the way the Bible expresses shepherds. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And if the Bible sees shepherds that way, or at least cultures express themselves towards shepherds that way, you gotta think how much worse then is the sheep. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And sheep are some of the dumbest animals in all of creation. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And the Bible calls you a sheep. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 I don't know that that's nice to insult you, but that's what the Bible says. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 We are sheep. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And probably one of the sheep that I find most amazing out of all the sheep I know, which is really just this one, is the sheep Shrek that's there on your left screen, that some of you may have seen this picture before. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Shrek was a sheep that was lost in New Zealand in 1998. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 He wandered from his shepherd, and six years later he was found. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 I don't think he could have gone six years one day longer, because you look at that sheep and you think, how does a sheep eat grass like that? 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 I don't even think you can see the grass, let alone been able to eat it. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 But Shrek was found, and because it was such an anomaly that a helpless sheep — I mean, once a sheep is lost, it's to the elements. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Something's going to eat it. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 It's done. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 You count your losses and move on. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 But for this particular sheep, somehow miraculously survived. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 It made international news. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Shrek survived. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 Now that's an anomaly. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And it reminds us, don't wander from your shepherd. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 But one of the things that's maybe endearing about sheep is, one, they seem like harmless animals, but also how much they appreciate community. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And in that way, you're not much different than a sheep. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 God made you to belong. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 God made you for an important reason. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And we want to know we have purpose, and we find that sense of purpose in community. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 But that community is only as healthy as its shepherd. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And if you can find a good shepherd, the trajectory of your life will go well. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 When you understand the picture that the Bible paints of Jesus, that's who he is. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 He is our good Shepherd. 00:41:18.280 --> 00:41:18.280 And praise is that way we turn our hearts to him so that we can experience his richness all of our days.