Psalm 148: Things Celestial & Things Terrestrial Praising The Lord

May 12, 2004

Title: Psalm 148: Things Celestial and Things Terrestrial Praising the Lord

Text: Psalm 148

Introduction

1. A sheep rancher in the remote mountains of Idaho found that his violin was out of tune, …

• He tried and tried to make the violin sound like it should…

• But without a tuning pitch, he was unable to get it right.

• He was a frequent listener to a radio station in California,

• So, he wrote the station concerning his problem,

• And he asked them--at a certain hour and a certain minute on a certain day-- to strike the right note for him.

• And they did!

• They stopped everything else,

• They silenced all other sounds for a moment, …

• Then they struck that note.

• And, In his shepherd’s hut in the distant mountains, …

• the shepherd heard that sound, …

• and from that single note he put his instrument into tune again.

• That’s why we are here tonight…

• This is a special time to get in touch with God….

• We need to listen for the note…the perfect pitch…

• So that we can keep our hearts in tune. (source unknown)

• Our lives get out of tune sometimes, don’t they?...

• Listen to God’s voice tonight…

• He is sounding the note…

• And if you listen…

• And adjust your life to His note…

• Then your life will come back into tune with Him.

2. As we continue our study of the Psalms, we turn our attention to Psalm 148.

• Psalm 148 is a beautiful picture of praising and worshiping the Lord.

• This Psalm contains 2 stanzas of glorious praise for God…

• With each stanza ending with the reason for that praise.

• As Spurgeon says in the “Treasury of David”…

• “as a flash of lightning flames through space, and enwraps b oth heaven and earth in one vestment of glory, so doth the adoration of the Lord in this Psalm light up all the universe and cause it to glow with a radiance of praise”. (1.)

Read Text: Psalm 148:1-14

1. Things Celestial Praising God vs. 1-6

A. In our study of the Purpose Driven Life…

• We’ve learned that our first purpose in life is to worship God…

• Here in this first stanza, we see that this doesn’t just apply to us, as human beings…

• But the purpose of all created things above the earth…

• Is to praise the Lord.

• The Psalmist starts out by simply saying “Praise the Lord”…

• In those 3 words, David sums up the whole of the message of Psalm 148.

• But, not content to leaven it at that, he goes in to more detail…

• “Praise the Lord from the heavens…

• And from the heights above” Vs 1.

• This is an all inclusive statement that everything above the earth shall praise the Lord.

B. But then, the Psalmist gets even more specific about the praise…

• He mentions that the angels and the heavenly hosts…

• They should lift up their voices in praise…

• And we see throughout Scripture that they have indeed lifted up their voices in praise…

• Luke 2:13 says, “Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God”

• John describes the sounds of the heavenly hosts praising God in Revelation 19:6-7, when he writes, “Then I heard what sounded like a great multitude, like the roar of rushing waters and like loud peals of thunder, shouting: "Hallelujah! For our Lord God Almighty reigns. Let us rejoice and be glad and give him glory!”

C. David mentions the sun, moon, stars…

• How can the sun, moon and stars praise God?

• David tells us in Psalm 19 that, even though we know that these celestial bodies have no voice…

• Yet, they DO have a voice that praises God…

• The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands. Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they display knowledge. There is no speech or language where their voice is not heard. Their voice goes out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the world. Psalms 19:1-4 (NIV)

• Wherever you go around the world…

• You can glance up into the sky and see the beauty of God’s creation…

• Day or night…as you look into the sky…

• You can almost imagine them giving glory to their Creator…

• And, in fact, based on Romans 1:20…

• God will actually speak to people who have no knowledge about God whatsoever…

• Simply by looking up into the night sky…

• Seeing the expanse of the stars…