Sermon Central
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Studies In The Psalms
Contributed by Glenn Pease on Apr 5, 2021 (message contributor)
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1. The Majesty Of Man
Contributed on Apr 5, 2021
Man is the only creature God ever made that was worth the cross. The price which is paid for anything determines its value. This means that man is the highest valued part of the universe, for God paid the highest possible price for his recovery.
King Louis XIV of France was once reminded by the chaplain of his court that he was a sinner and in danger of damnation. He shrugged his shoulders and said, "All true, no doubt, but the good God will think twice before He casts out so good of Prince as I am." Here was a man of pride ...read more
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2. We Are Born To Rule
Contributed on Apr 5, 2021
Here in Psa. 8:6 it says clearly, "You made him the ruler over the works of your hands; you put everything under his feet." Man is made the ruler of nature, and he is made king of creation by the Creator Himself.
David did not need a telescope to consider the heavens and the wonders of God's creation. What he could see with the naked eye left him in awe at the majesty of God. Today we go far beyond the vision of David, not only into the macrocosm of the vast universe, but because of new instruments ...read more
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3. Sanctified Silence
Contributed on Apr 5, 2021
Silence has the advantage of being a two way street. By silence we speak to God, and also allow Him to speak to us. Silence is both saying something, and listening to something being said.
You can learn in silence what sound can never teach you. Howard Thurman tells of one of his University students who was a deep sea diver. He wrote of his experience of being on the bottom of the ocean. The water was clear and he was in the midst of a coral rock garden. He sat down to look around. ...read more
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4. Saints In The Complaint Department
Contributed on Apr 5, 2021
The God who built us this way is telling us by these negative Psalms that we have to get rid of the poison or we will have a breakdown. Our health on all levels: physical, mental, and spiritual, depends on our being able to remove the pollution from our inner life.
It is always a shock when an innocent little child all of the sudden lets loose with a swear word, or some other sort of vulgar language. We are startled because we had no idea the pollution of the world had seeped into their little mind. We have the same emotion when we read the Bible, and all ...read more
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5. The Pleasure Of Positive Thinking
Contributed on Apr 5, 2021
Positive thinking does not mean, if you always think positive nothing will ever go wrong. That is wishful thinking, and it won't work. Positive thinking is telling yourself that even when things do go wrong, that is never the last word.
Have you ever watched a movie or play that ended with some basic problems unresolved? It is a great let down, for we expect that no matter how bad the situation is the bottom line will be a happy ending. We are conditioned to this. It is a part of our heritage through our fairy tales, novels, ...read more
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6. The Pleasure Of Passion
Contributed on Apr 5, 2021
Christians have used the word so often for evil that it is hard to accept the reality that you can also be passionate for good. It is Biblical and Christlike to lust for the pleasure of those things that are pleasing to God.
Jesus said in Luke 22:15, "I have eagerly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer." Jesus used the same word used all through the New Testament for lust to describe His passionate desire to eat the final Passover with His disciples. He had a passion for the Passover. Paul ...read more
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7. The Pleasure Of Perfection
Contributed on Apr 5, 2021
Psalm 84 begins with an expression of pleasure in God's dwelling place. "How lovely is your dwelling place, O Lord Almighty." There is a deep longing in this song to experience again the pleasure of being in this lovely environment where the presence of God could be felt.
Christians have always had mixed feelings about pleasure. They know God made us to enjoy many pleasures of life, and yet there are also the forbidden pleasures. These are often just extremes of what is acceptable. Sex is good, but immorality is bad. Food is good, but gluttony is bad. Abundance is ...read more
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8. The Pleasure Of Power
Contributed on Apr 5, 2021
Power to do the will of God is one of life's greatest pleasures. Weakness that lets the flesh determine our direction in life is one of life's greatest pains. The great battle of life is between pleasure and pain, and which one dominates is determined by our source of power.
Every day of your life you enjoy the pleasure of power. The power to flip switches and give light in the darkness, and heat in the coldness. The power of electricity is the source of abundant pleasure. When we lose that power we are deprived of all our electric devices, and it is a major pain. ...read more
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9. The Pleasure Of Progress
Contributed on Apr 5, 2021
Every Christian is to be pressing on to gain that more in Christ that can never be exhausted. Progress is to be a permanent part of the Christian life. There is no level where we have arrived at the end of our potential.
Spain once controlled both sides of the Mediterranean Sea at the Straits Of Gibraltar. On her coins were stamped the two Pillars Of Hercules. They represented the two great rocks, and the words NE PLUS ULTRA=no more beyond. As far as they were concerned, Spain was the end of the world. Paul ...read more
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10. Revival
Contributed on Apr 5, 2021
Revival is not only a good word used in Scripture, it is also a good and positive experience. When rightly understood, we will long for it in the religious realm as we do in all other areas of life.
Clovis Chappell, the great Southern preacher and author, said in one of his messages, "What announcement could the average pastor make to his people next Sunday that would create less enthusiasm, less approval, less holy expectancy, then that he would soon to begin a revival?" ...read more
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11. A New Song
Contributed on Apr 5, 2021
God is infinite, and therefore, only infinite creativity is worthy of Him, and adequate to glorify His name. It is also essential to keep joy alive in the worshipper. Variety is the spice of life, and a new song is like a tonic that lifts and enables us to feel afresh the love that is always there.
It is easy for us to do what the psalmist urges us to do, "Sing to the Lord a new song." The number of new songs to sing today is enormous. Back in 1891 Dr. Julian in his famous Dictionary of Hymnology examined four hundred thousand hymns, and he did not cover them all. There are, ...read more
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12. This Is The Day
Contributed on Apr 5, 2021
There is little we can give to God that is not a returning to Him of what He has already given to us. Time and substance are God's gifts to us. Thanksgiving, however, is a product of our own will, and to give God thanks is to give something that is uniquely our own.
Many years ago Rudyard Kipling was a popular writer, and it was reported that he was getting ten shillings for every word he wrote. Some students at Oxford University, who were not impressed with Kipling, sent him ten shillings with the request that he send them one of his very best words. He ...read more
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13. Turn On The Light
Contributed on Apr 5, 2021
The famous saying, it is better to light a candle than to curse the darkness, applies to our subject. There is only one way to overcome and defeat the darkness of sin and ignorance, and that is by turning on the light of the lamp of God. The Bible alone can give us the light we need for guidance.
Almost everyone knows of Lazarus, the man whose name has become immortal because of his experience of being raised from the bondage and darkness of death to the liberty and light of life. Few people are conscious, however, of the Jewish woman by the name of Lazarus. Her poem is engraved on the ...read more
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14. A Mountain Top Experience
Contributed on Apr 5, 2021
Mountains force the thought of God upon you, for there is nowhere else the mind can go and be relevant. Man becomes insignificant and humanism melts into oblivion before these rocking monarchs of the earth.
Mountains have made men marvel at the majesty of God's creation all through history. Man needs the mountains, for the heights are in his head and heart. Mountains awaken in man the instinct for heaven. He knows when he looks at the mountains that he was made for a high and lofty purpose. ...read more
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15. What Is Sin?
Contributed on Apr 5, 2021
Sin is so powerful, even in the Christian life, because it is so easy to miss the mark of God's high calling. It is the most foolish attitude a Christian can have to think that he could not fall into sin.
I was talking to a man who is a member of the Holiness Church. He said his church was a split off from the Free Methodist Church. When I expressed my surprise by saying that I thought the Free Methodist were a very fundamental group, he responded by saying, "Yes, but what was sin 50 ...read more
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16. Confession Of Sin
Contributed on Apr 5, 2021
All sin is sin against God. If we sin against people it is only sin because we violate a law of God. All confession, therefore, is legitimate before God, but not all sin should be confessed before men. Confession is to go as far as the sin.
Charles Francis Berry, a major league umpire, was once asked if he ever made mistakes in calling balls and strikes. He looked at the person as if he were joking, and said, "Of course I may mistakes. My only trouble is I can't admit it." The tragedy is that the inability to admit ...read more
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17. Honest To God
Contributed on Apr 5, 2021
Dishonesty will hinder the work of God in the soul of any man, whether they be believer or unbeliever. Honesty, therefore, or facing up to the full truth about ourselves in relation to God and the world, is a subject we cannot afford to neglect.
Branch Rickey use to coach the University of Michigan baseball team before he became manager of the Dodgers. One day they were playing Brown University, and the Brown catcher, Walter Snell, hit what might have been a three bagger, but he stretched it into a home run. The first baseman, however, ...read more