O Magnify the Lord with Me

Chapter 34, verse 3. We'll read through the verse

and then we'll pray. We'll get started. O magnify

the Lord with me and let us exalt his name together.

Let's pray. God, we thank you for being good

to us, dear Lord. We thank you that we have air

on this hot day. I thank you for the beautiful

people that are in this church. I thank you for

loving us. I thank you that you allow us to love

each other, dear Lord. I thank you for the work

that has went into this VBS this week. I thank

you, God, just for all you do for us, dear Lord.

We cannot praise you and glorify you enough.

And I pray that in these few minutes, dear Lord,

that these simple words that we have read would

have an impact on our life, dear Lord, that we

would... That we would focus on you and your

goodness and your mercy and your grace and your

love and your forgiveness, dear Lord. That your

Holy Spirit would be among us, God. You know

where we are in our lives today. You know what's

going on. There are struggles and there are stresses

and there are fears. Life is hard, dear Lord.

There's sin in our life. It's just a lot of stuff,

God. We need you to give us the strength and

the power and the forgiveness and the grace to

get through. So I pray, God, that everything

that is said here today will be for your glory.

And that it would uplift us, dear Lord. And we

would praise your holy name. And I ask these

things in Jesus' name. Amen. This verse is really

quite beautiful. And it's simple enough, but

really to understand what's going on, we have

to... look at the context of the verse just a

little bit now if you go and read in psalm 34

in your bible it's likely you're going to see

a superscription there that says that it's a

psalm of david when he intended to be insane

in front of abimelech or something along those

lines now here's some homework for you this week

if you want some homework go to first samuel

1 Samuel 19 · chapter mention

chapter 19 and read those those three or four

chapters around there and you'll begin to see

what's going on and why david is writing these

words that he is writing here now david was soon

to become the king of israel but The big problem

was that they already had a king, King Saul.

And Saul, he really didn't start off on too good

of a note from the get -go. And things really

went downhill. And it was decided by God that

Saul was no longer fit to be king. And he was

going to be replaced by David. So you can understand

why there was some tension there. And as Saul's

mental health and spiritual health, I guess we

could say, began to decline, he kind of was really

going crazy. He had this hatred and this desire

to kill David. Things really got pretty intense.

Now, David, of course, God had blessed him. David

had killed the giant Goliath. And David was phenomenal

in his military battles. He had killed thousands.

And Samuel, it even talks about that, the people

talking about, Saul's killed his thousands, and

David has killed tens of thousands. And things

were very, very difficult between Saul and David.

There was a lot of tension there. And Saul had

a son by the name of Jonathan, and Jonathan and

David were quite good friends. And as Saul was

continuing to try to kill David, Jonathan said,

Look, I don't know if my dad's going to kill

you, but I'll find out if he is. And you hide

out in a certain spot. I'll go see if he's going

to kill you or not. And if I think your life

is in danger, I'm going to come out here and

I'm going to shoot some arrows. Some of you may

have heard this story before. And I'm going to

have an old boy out there and he's going to go

get the arrows. And if the arrow is short, if

I fire it short and I holler to the boy, come

back. The arrow is closer this way. And you'll

know it's safe. But he says, if I fire the arrow

long and I tell the old boy to go out there a

little bit further to get the arrow. then you'll

know that it's not safe and you need to head

out. And so David began to flee from Saul. And

obviously this was difficult. You've got somebody

that's trying to take your life, and here David

is fleeing. And we see as the story unfolds,

we see some other stories that maybe are referenced

in the New Testament that you may recall. There's

an instance. As David leaves and begins to flee,

then he comes to the tabernacle, and the priest

Abimelech is there. And David and his men are

hungry, and there's nothing to eat. And Abimelech

says, well, all we have is the showbread, the

bread that's inside of the tabernacle. And that's

not for normal people, but nonetheless, he gave

it to David. And Jesus even references that story

in the New Testament. Later on, David goes before

another king in an area where David's life may

be in danger because they know of David and his

greatness, and they may very well kill him. They're

afraid of him. And David pretends to be insane

in this king's presence. And this is where the

psalm brings us to. This is why this psalm was

written. This is when this psalm was written.

After David was fleeing and God had been good

to David throughout David's life, not just in

this instance, but in so many instances, we see

that David's life is in jeopardy. We see that

David sinned greatly. Now, don't misunderstand

this. We see in the scripture that David is a

man after God's own heart. But do not read into

that that David was perfect. Because David was

not perfect. And throughout some of these stories

of David, there are some things that are sometimes

questionable, that we're not quite sure about.

But nonetheless, it makes the story of David

that much more beautiful. That God continued

to bless him, that God continued to deliver him,

that God continued to lift him up, and God was

going to use David to do something so magnificent

that the very Messiah was going to come from

the bloodline. of David. And so David knew what

it was like to suffer. He knew what it was like

to suffer in his sin. He knew what it was like

for his life to be under attack. But he knew

what it was like when God came to the rescue.

He knew what it was like to receive forgiveness.

He knew what it was like to receive deliverance.

And he wrote this beautiful psalm after these

events that we just saw. It's a beautiful psalm,

and it's a certain style of psalm that sometimes

that we see in the scriptures. It's called an

acrostic. And the first letter of every verse

of the psalm would have been the first letter

of the Hebrew alphabet. The first letter of the

Hebrew alphabet is Aleph, and the second letter

is Beth. which is where we get our word alphabet

from. And it's a way of saying that I've covered

this topic from A to Z, so to speak. From beginning

to end, I've covered this topic. What is the

topic? It is the topic of praise. It is the topic

of praising God and proclaiming His name. Some

of your translations may say, I proclaim the

Lord here. I give God the glory. I glorify God.

I magnify His holy name. Would you magnify the

name of the Lord with me? All of us together,

would we look back and see the beautiful and

wonderful and great things that God has done?

And would we praise God together, David says.

Now, we just read this whole, or recall this

whole story of what went on with David, but what

does that got to do with our VBS? Well, it's

kind of a play on words. Our theme this year

is... magnify you see magnifying glasses all

around now certainly when we see the word magnifying

this in this psalm it's not talking about david

who's sitting there with a magnifying glass looking

at god saying oh god i magnify you that's that's

not what he's talking about here but for vbs

with this verse it's a play on words it's it's

it's david saying look I've recognized the greatness

of God I have focused on. I have seen all the

little things and the big things that God has

done. And therefore, I will praise His holy name.

And that's what our theme is in Bible school.

And maybe that should be our theme in life. Maybe

our stories are not so unlike David's. Maybe

our stories are full of bad decisions and sins

that we have committed. Maybe our stories are

full of difficult times and people who are out

to get us are just a variety of hardships that

we face. Whatever our story may be, our stories

are hard. They are hard and life is hard and

life is difficult. But what we have to stop sometimes

and do is realize that God is with us. That we

serve a God who has created everything. This

week we're going to celebrate the bigness of

God. And we need to celebrate that every day

in our lives. And as we look at the universe

and we look at everything all around us and the

complexity of our human body and the beauty of

this world and all the things that we see, these

things magnify God. They show us the power of

God. And the most beautiful thing about God is,

is He's big enough. to create all of these things,

but he's not so big that he forgets about you

and I. God knows your problems. He knows your

struggles. He knows your sins. God doesn't want

us to live in those things. He doesn't want us

to live in our fear. He doesn't want us to live

in our worry. He doesn't want us to live in our

sin. He wants to give us freedom in Jesus Christ.

So maybe this week, even if you're not a... a

wee little tyke, and even if you're not going

to be attending VBS, maybe today is a good time

for you to reflect and think for just a moment

about the goodness of God in your life. And maybe

right offhand you think, there ain't no goodness.

My life is bad. Well, think a little harder.

There are probably more good things in your life

than you realize. Even in the midst of difficulty,

there may be more blessings in your life than

you realize. And maybe we need to take the song

to heart and count our blessings and name them

one by one. And maybe when we really stop and

begin to look at our life and push everything

to the side, our sin and our stresses and our

struggles and our worries, and we just begin

to focus our hearts and our attention on God,

and we turn the world off for just a moment,

and we just focus on God and look at Him. Maybe

then we begin to see his greatness. Maybe then

we begin to experience his love. Maybe then we

know that God has not forgotten us. God does

care about us. God does love us. We can begin

to reflect and think about all the things in

our life. Yeah, there's bad days. But think about

the goodness of God and the ways that he has

been with you. And the ways that He has brought

you right where you are right now. Sometimes

we have to go through some really tough stuff

to get to where God wants us to be. We don't

like the journey, but we do appreciate the destination.

And everything that God allows in our life is

to cause us to draw closer to Him. And that's

where our destination needs to be today. That

we stop trying to seek and go after things of

the world. But that we recognize the goodness

and the grace of God. And that we seek just to

set up camp with Him. So maybe there are things

in your life today, maybe like that of David.

Things that you need to reflect on. And you need

to remember the goodness of God. And the result

needs to be the same as the result in David's

life. When David recognized the goodness of God

and how God had been with him. David said, I'm

going to magnify the Lord. Oh, magnify the Lord.

Let us exalt his name together. Let us see the

bigness of God, the grace of God, and the love

of God, and all of the things that God has done.

And let us praise God this morning. There's no

greater thing that God has done for us today

than sending Jesus Christ to die. on the cross

for us we struggle we are full of sin we are

full of wickedness we are full of stress we are

full of worry and there is only one way that

we obtain deliverance there is only one way that

we obtain peace today and that is through jesus

christ he died for you he was buried in a grave

for you and god rose him from that grave so that

your sins may be forgiven That is a God that

is worthy of our praise today. So let us exalt

God together. Let's pray. God, we come to you.

We thank you for your good word. I pray, dear

Lord, that we don't fail to realize your goodness

just in creation and the things that you do,

dear Lord, and the way that you put things into

place in our life, dear Lord. Let us not... fail

to see you working in this world. God, it may

not always seem like it. It may not always seem

like you're with us or it may not seem like you

care, dear Lord, but you do. And you have not

abandoned us. You have not forsaken us, dear

Lord. You care for us and you love us and you

are with us and you have done so many great things.

So God, I pray that you help us not to fail to

realize your goodness today. God, I pray that

if there is one in here that does not know Jesus

Christ, That maybe today, for the first time,

they would repent. That right now, God, they

would ask you to forgive them of their sinfulness.

God, maybe they've seen some of the ways you've

worked in their life, but maybe they've never

really given their life to you, dear Lord. I

pray that today that they would put their faith

in Jesus Christ. Maybe there are some in here

today, dear Lord, and they are yours. And maybe

just the hustle and the bustle and just the busyness

of life and stress and sin has caused us to lose

sight of you, dear Lord. But I pray that you

would reshift our focus, that we would recognize

the grace that we have received through Jesus

Christ, that we would recognize the ways in which

you work and continue to bless us, and that today,

dear Lord, we would magnify your holy name. that

we would praise you, that we would proclaim you,

that we would glorify you, dear Lord. And I pray

that as a church body, as brothers and sisters

in Christ, dear Lord, that we would exalt your

name today, this week in VBS, and every day of

our life, dear Lord. I pray that you would just

bless these next few minutes. God, if you have

spoken to anybody, I pray that they would respond

to you, dear Lord. And I ask these things in

Jesus' name. Amen.