Great Expectations For The New Year

GREAT EXPECTATIONS FOR THE NEW YEAR

PSALMS 30:1-5

Preached on 31 December 2008

at Shiloh Baptist Church

Waukegan, IL

By

Rev. Kelvin L. Parks

Psalms 30:1-5

[v.1] I will extol thee, O Lord; for thou hast lifted me up, and hast not made my foes to rejoice over me.

[v.2] O Lord my God, I cried unto thee, and thou hast healed me.

[v.3] O Lord, thou hast brought up my soul from the grave: thou hast kept me alive, that I should not go down to the pit.

[v.4] Sing unto the Lord, O ye saints of his, and give thanks at the remembrance of his holiness.

[v.5] For his anger endureth but a moment; in his favour is life: weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning.

Subject: GREAT EXPECTATIONS FOR THE NEW YEAR

I recently read about an article that listed the five most popular resolutions made every New Year. Fifth on the list was to take up a new hobby, the fourth was to make more money, the third most popular resolution was to improve relationships; the second was to stop smoking; and the most popular New Year’s resolution ... you guess it to lose weight.

Well, this reminds me of a story about a woman who walked into her master bathroom and saw her husband standing on the scale weighing himself, sucking in his stomach. The women thought to herself, “If he thinks that sucking in his stomach is going to make him weight less, then he is dumber than I first believed.” So she sarcastically said to him, Honey, Bunny sucking in your stomach is not going to help.” He said sure it will ... that is the only way that I can see the numbers.

Let us look at our text [v.1] We see here David giving us three examples of how we can have GREAT EXPECTATIONS FOR THE NEW YEAR

#1. The first thing that we need to do is Look Back Over Your Life

Let us examine our text ... [v.1] I will extol thee, O LORD

Extol means to lift up, to glorify on purpose. It is an “intensive” or “intentional” action.

David in saying, I will extol THEE, O LORD ... in other words, I’m gonna praise YOU on purpose.

Why ... (v.1) thou hast lifted me up, (v.2) thou has healed me, (v.3) thou hast saved my soul. So, we see here David saying, I will extol THEE, O LORD, I will praise YOU on purpose ... others may forget YOU, others may murmur against YOU; others may despise YOU, ... but I’m gonna intensively and intentionally praise YOUR Name.

It is as if David is saying ... I do not need a pep talk from a preacher ... I do not need to be fired up. David is saying I’m gonna praise you on purpose, because when I look back over my life ... and I think things over, I remember how you

- lifted me from the pit of hell

- lifted me from the ditch of sin

- lifted me from a bed of sickness and pain

- lifted me a bondage of doubt and fear

And ... for that I will extol THEE O, LORD because when I think of YOUR Goodness ... I have no choice but to praise YOUR NAME

G. S. Bowes asked the question of his congregation back in 1863, what is praise? The answer he said was the rent that we owed GOD. Bowes concluded that larger your house the greater the rent should be... in other words, the more you get the more your praise.

Well let me help you ... you see some of us have gotten trip up in our pursuit of prosperity, that we have forgot from whence God has brought us from. Well, that is what happened to David in (vv. 6-10) when he said, “And in my prosperity I said, I shall never be moved.”

You see ... the pride of prosperity had caused him to forget his need to trust in the LORD and caused him to boast in a spirit of self-confidence and self-sufficiency.

Well, so this doesn’t happen to any of us ... allow me to help you take a stroll back down memory lane to remember HIS goodness so that you too can praise Him

Well ...

- Remember when you were flat broke and didn’t know where the next meal was going to come from?

- Remember when you didn’t have two dimes to rub together. To buy your family a loaf of bread.

- Remember when you were lying on your back in that hospital room sick and didn’t think that you would ever get well.

- Remember when all you had to eat was a syrup sandwich; ketchup sandwich; mayonnaise sandwich; or two pieces of bead together (wish sandwich, I wish I had some meat)