Why Should We Give Unto The Lord?

• In verses 1-2 of our text, to: Sing! Sing! Sing!

• In verses 3-6, He tells us to: Honor! Honor! Honor!

• In verses 7-8, He tells us to: Give! Give! Give!

• In verse 9, He tells us to: Worship! Worship! Worship!

All of this teaches us the importance of giving.

Look at verse 7 and part of verse 8. We read, “Give unto the LORD, O ye kindreds of the people, give unto the LORD glory and strength. Give unto the LORD the glory due unto his name.”

Notice, we are to give two things unto the Lord.

1. We are to GIVE GLORY UNTO THE LORD!

This is one thing every person had better be careful about. Not everyone is quick to give God the glory! And, God will not share His glory with anyone.

This is one of the reasons Satan was expelled from heaven. His pride caused him to exalt himself to be a god. He tried to rob God of the glory due Him and Him alone!

We often rob God in at least TWO ways:

a. We rob God by possession.

That is, every day God is so good to us! Yet many take the good things He allows them to enjoy and then act as if God has not done anything for them in the last ten years. When God is good to us we often do not give Him the glory for His goodness. This is robbing God of His glory.

b We rob God by position.

That is, there are those who have declared themselves to be their own god and the way they live demonstrates they think they have all they have because of their own doing. That is, they think they provided those things for themselves by themselves. They often walk around and brag, “Look what I have done!”

The truth of the matter is that they would not be able to crawl out of bed without God’s help. How can they have the gall to try to give the impression they have obtained any good thing without it’s being a blessing of God.

Parents need to be sure to teach their children to give God the ALL the glory in ALL things! For example,

Illus: A young man might be blessed with the ability to learn quickly. That is, he may be able to open a book and scan through it and answer the questions and make straight “A’s” while others may have to struggle through the same text book and end up with “B’s.” The young man who makes straight “A’s” can strut around as if he accumulated that gift to learn all by himself, but if he is truly smart he will fall on his knees and give God the glory for blessing him with such a gift!

Illus: Also a young lady might be blessed with physical beauty. She may even be the most attractive girl in her class. All the other girls may envy her. She could strut around school as if that inherited physical beauty was something she had accomplished by herself, but if she is truly smart she also will fall on her knees and give God the glory for blessing her with such beauty.

We need to be careful not to rob God of the glory that is due Him. The psalmist said, “Give unto the Lord the glory due unto his name...” (Verse 8a)

Every day of our lives we should make sure that God gets the glory that is due Him. Also, notice the psalmist said-

2. We are to GIVE STRENGTH UNTO THE LORD.

Notice verse 7, “...give unto the Lord...STRENGTH”

This is not saying what we might first imagine. God IS NOT WEAK! He does not need our little strength.

Illus: Remember, He is the vine and we are the branches. We draw strength from Him. He does not draw it from us.

So, what does it mean to say we are to give God STRENGTH? It means as we worship the Lord, we are recognizing and affirming that He is a God of STRENGTH.

What a shame it is to find Christians who face the same problems lost people face and their REACTIONS and RESOURCES are the same as those of the lost world. For example-

Illus: There are some Christians today who are legal drug addicts. They are on all those drugs because they do not know how to handle their problems.

• The sinner may run the streets and find a dope peddler from which to obtain drugs to help him face his problems.

• The Christian runs to the local pharmacist to have a prescription filled that will help him face his problems.

What is the difference between the two? There is no difference whatsoever.