God is one of one

All right, so this morning we will be reading out of Psalm

113. If you don't have a Bible, you

can find one under your seat and we'll be on page 477 if you're

using the Bible from here. Praise the Lord.

Praise, O servants of the Lord, praise the name of the Lord.

Blessed be the name of the Lord from this time forth and

forevermore, from the rising of the sun to its setting, the name

of the Lord is to be praised. The Lord is high above all

nations, and His glory above the heavens.

Who is like the Lord our God, who is seated on high, who looks

far down on the heavens and the earth?

He raises the poor from the dust and lifts the needy from the ash

heap to make them sit with Princess, with the Princess of

his people. He gives the barren woman a

home, making her the joyous mother of children.

Praise the Lord, this is the word of the Lord.

What's going on? Port City family and friends,

how are we doing? Good.

Well, I'm glad to be with you. My name is Tanner.

I'm the lead pastor here and I just got back from student camp,

so I have a lot of caffeine in me.

And yeah, I played a lot of sports and games this week.

And I just want to talk to our students for a minute.

Middle schoolers, high schoolers, or if you're new to

our church, like, hey, y'all aren't just the future, you are

the now. Y'all a student full of the

spirit. I heard a story this week of two

young girls who a a preacher has come to their town that had some

fame to him. And the night before his

arrival, they prayed all through the night because their dad was

lost and their grandpa was lost, didn't believe in Jesus.

They prayed all night. And then when the speaker showed

up and talked to him and said, we've been praying for you to

come. So what do you mean?

I've been praying for my dad and my grandfather.

They're lost, they're dying and they're sin and we want them to

get saved through your preaching.

And later that day, that's what happened.

And I need to hear stories like that and be reminded that like

y'all, we're not. Like y'all can lead us, if that

makes sense. Like y'all can lead adults who

get dulled and lulled by not seeing things happen and think

God can't do certain things. And y'all have an ability to

just read God's word, believe it, and go for it in ways that

we need to be challenged by. So just here y'all are awesome.

We love you and we want you to leave.

We want we want we want to see the ways that God wants to grow

us through you. OK.

And we we believe in you. We got your back here at Port

City. OK, well I'm going to pray for

our time in Psalm 113 and then we going to jump in.

Almighty God our Father, we're so grateful for your word.

God, you bring people from death to life at age 567 up to age 77,

age 8219, all over the place. And God, you transform the phase

that we're in. God, college can look totally

different. High school can look totally

different. Young married, singleness, Every

stage of life is radically different when you're at the

center. So God, we just pray you would

transform us from the inside out and God, it would be tangible.

It will be felt, it will be seen, and God, it starts not

because we're more committed and we're good at something, but God

because we see you clearly as awesome as you are.

So God, please show us who you are through Psalm 113 right now.

We pray in Jesus name, Amen. When was the last time you were

stunned? Like wow, like what?

When was the last time you leaned forward to somebody

telling you something and you could not believe what they were

telling you? In our age of just we, we, we

see stories left and right. It's hard to be wowed.

I remember the last time I was wowed, did not believe what I

was told. OK, me and, and some of the guys

around here, we go on old man runs at like 5:00 AM every once

in awhile. And I was with my guy Ron, OK,

Ron's on the box drum and it was about 6 months ago.

And he says to me, T, you're never going to believe this.

I'm like, sure man, tell me he goes bro, Luka Doncic just got

traded from the lake to the Lakers.

I was like, no, like I was like, there's no planet where I

believe that. Like just to put it in context

for you non sports people, OK, this is arguably like just pure

talent, a top 10 to 20 player in the history of the world.

Whether he amounts to that is debatable.

He's got an attitude problem, all that stuff.

But to trade this man at 25 years old, it literally I did

not believe Ron. We go on the whole run, don't

believe him at all. Get back, check my phone and

that text. I'm like what?

This can't be possible? I was stunned.

I was wowed. I was like this information.

I had no category for the possibility of this.

There's something amazing about being wowed like you're you're

blown away it it blows your categories for what you thought

right like it it it really erupts something in you where

you're like you're wowed like that literally is the right

word. It makes no sense.

It blows your mind, y'all. Many people sit under teaching

God's words, sit under Christian household, sit in Christian

spaces and the one thing that really has never happened in

their souls, they've never been wowed by God.

They haven't. And and what God wants to do in

your life is he wants to wow you.

God wants to bring something out of you that is mind blowing.

He wants to elicit a response of genuine mind blown, not because

necessarily he's and it happens once ultimately when you see

Christ and then it but it happens over and over again.

And the reason that's gonna happen is because God's not like

us. So if we keep reading and we

keep seeing him, we're like, oh, this all checks it checks it

checks. It's like we're not reading it

right because he's not like us. He is mind blowing and y'all the

the word the Bible has the word the psalms uses for wow is

praise. The word Hallelujah literally

means praise Yah praise. They would not say his name

Yahweh. So Hallelujah was praise the

Lord. That's what that word means.

So psalms 113 to 118 are known as the Hallel psalms.

They're the praise psalms and that word praise, it's deeper

than thank you. It's deeper than thinking a

meal, you know, like thank you for this provision.

It is a wow at who God is. That's praise, and some of us

know we're supposed to praise, but we've never actually praised

because we've not been wowed into praise.

So God doesn't want you to tolerate Him.

God wants to wow you. That's what we're going to see

in Psalm 113 today. We're going to take it in three

terms. We're just going to ask the

question, what does this Psalm teach us about who God is?

What does this Psalm teach us about who we are?

And lastly, what should we do? I got three things for each.

If you are ready, let me hear you say I'm ready.

OK, number one, what does this passage teach us about who God

is? I got three things #1 the Lord

is exalted. The Lord is exalted.

Verses 4 through 6 say this. The Lord is high above all

nations and his glory above the heavens.

Who is like the Lord our God? Who is seated on high?

Who looks for down on the heavens and the earth.

We see in this Psalm the essence of who God is is high.

We talk about this a lot at port city.

There's a difference between who somebody is and what they do.

These verses are talking about this is just who God is.

He is that and many of you know anytime you see Lord in all caps

that's that's God's name. It means I am that I am, I will

be that I will be. I am.

God is and in God's isness He does things, but He is something

before He does something. He does what He does because He

is who he is. OK, so who is God?

Verse 4 tells us the Lord is high.

That's who he is. He is high.

His glory is above the heavens. Verse 5 who is like the Lord our

God? Who is seated on high, verse 6,

Who looks far down? He has to look down on the

heavens and earth. I don't know if you notice, but

heaven did not precede God and he lives in it, right?

Like God created the heavens and the earth.

God is uncontainable. God chooses where to dwell, but

He himself is not contained by anything in which he chooses to

dwell. God is uncontainable, He's high.

He made the heavens and the earth.

God has eternally been Father, Son, Holy Spirit.

He's eternally been within himself, relational and

uncontainable. He did not create to add to his

profile. He created because he's creator.

He. He exploded into goodness and

it's just overflowing. And we're still discovering

species of things and we will be until the end of time because

there's no end to God's creativity.

God is high in, in the, the, the older way of thinking and in the

Psalms. Height implies 2 things, safety

and power. The one who is highest is

safest, right? So like if you, if you take the

high ground, anybody who approaches you is vulnerable,

right? So three people could take on 10

coming up at them because I could just throw stuff at you,

right? One of my, again, I'm not a huge

Star Wars guy, but it's a great illustration.

OK, there's a famous scene and anytime you number A Star Wars

movie you're like, is it movie #3 or 300?

I'm not sure. But in the one where Anakin is

about to go full blown Darth Vader mode, he is mean.

His acting is super questionable in this movie.

Amen somebody. And he's super mad at Obi Wan

and fighting him and they're on the lava.

He's like, you underestimate my power.

And he's like, just it's just cringy, right?

It's a little cringy. But he gets in the fight and Obi

Wan is doing his thing and he does a little backflip and then

he goes on this little platform and he says it's over, Anakin.

I have the high ground implication.

I'm safe, I'm strong. Don't do it.

And then he says some cringe line, probably like you

underestimate my power. And he does like a a backflip.

And then Obi Wan sizzles them, you know, but the idea and and

on that scene that the polarizing theologian that is

Kanye West wrote a line about that scene.

He was talking to all the rappers in the game.

And you know what he says? Don't jump Anakin.

I got the higher ground. He's implying all of you rappers

are down low and I am up high. You see how he used it?

Shout out to Kanye, who is super questionable, but the point is

height is safe. Height is power, height is I'm

on another level. You look up to me, I look down

to you. God is beyond us.

He's above us. He's transcendent.

The Lord is exalted. The second thing we learned

though about this God who is exalted and safe and powerful is

that the Lord exalts. Look with me.

In verses 7 through 9, he raises the poor from the dust and lifts

the needy from the ash heap to make them sit with Princess.

With the Princess of his people. He gives the barren woman a

home, making her the joyous mother of children.

Praise the Lord. So the God who is exalted, the

God who is high, the God who is seated, what does he do with his

safety and power? He exalts, he lifts, he raises,

he gives. Do we see that the Lord is

exalted? And what he chooses to do is

exalt, right. And quick note there where it

says he, he makes the barren woman a joyful mother.

And y'all this, this Psalm is not a prescriptive promise that

every person ever who is barren and trusts in Yahweh is going to

have their dream come true of having a child.

There are many who have sang Psalm 113 in pain, right?

It's not talking about what God will always do.

It is talking about who God is. This is who God is, the type of

God he is. And barrenness is deeply rooted

in the the story of Scripture, starting with the call of

Abraham and his barren wife Sarah, right.

And barrenness through Hannah and others all throughout the

Scriptures is are the types of people that God worked through.

And then famously, not a, a barren woman one day would give

birth to the Messiah, but a virgin like God is in the the

the business of choosing those on the bottom and exalting them.

That's who God is already alluded to you that psalms 113

to 118 are kind of special in scripture.

For thousands of years they've been saying during the Passover,

OK so this is how it would work is before the Passover festival

they would read 113 and 114, they would do Passover then they

would read 115 through 118. So y'all, what that literally

means is that when we what they think, what scholars tell us,

it'll say sometimes in the gospels, it'll say that Jesus

and his disciples saying to him, those hymns are Psalms.

So before Jesus instituted the Passover new supper, Last

Supper, like breaking of the bread that we're going to do

here in a little bit that we call communion, he read this

song and sang it with his guys. Like just think about that.

The Lamb of God with his people, who is the son of a virgin

woman, is singing about what God is like before he institutes the

new Passover, which is not through the blood of some lamb,

but through him. Isn't that pretty cool?

That's what God is like. That's who God is.

He is the type of God that leaves people out of slavery to

send to themselves to bad situations, and he does it not

because they earn their way out, but he purchases their way out

through his own blood. That's what God does.

The Lord exalts y'all. I don't know if you noticed.

God wants to exalt you first. Peter 5 like humble yourself

under the mighty hand of the Lord.

He opposed the proud. He gives grace to the humble.

He wants to exalt you at the proper time.

I heard one man say God wants to exalt you more than a

grandparent wants to exalt their grandkid.

And I was like, that is an image right there.

Because to a grandparent, that kid can't do no wrong.

Sometimes as the parent, I'm like, can you hang out with him

for another like month? Like, can you just dial it back

like 2%? Can you see some of what I see?

But they can't. That's kind of the point.

They want to exalt that kid. And the preacher said God wants

to exalt you more than a grandparent wants to exalt their

grandkid. We struggle to believe that

because we think about what's wrong with us, but we're not

focused on who God is. God is exalter.

He exalts. He is the exalted One who

chooses to exalt us. It's amazing.

Which leads us to the third thing that teaches us about God.

The Lord is one of one. Verse 5, who is like the Lord

our God who is seated on high? That is a rhetorical question

and the answer is nobody. I don't know if you've heard

this phrase. I'm one of them once.

I don't know if you heard that one.

That one irritates me a lot because of this verse.

It's one that how do you say people will use in context where

they're trying to imply I'm on another level than you?

I am one of them once I am a great one.

I am self-made. I am whatever and it's like,

think about the phrase one of them once, like I'm in another

category. Y'all, there's only one who is

one of them once. There's only one of one and it

is God. He is the 1, He is the great 1.

He has all power, He is the highest, He is the safest and

with all of his power and goodness and greatness and he

created, He uses it to exalt. Y'all, that is amazing.

We don't do that. We get some power and we are so

petty so quickly. I told you I was at student camp

this week. Shout out to my students.

We were playing the game sorry every night and in sorry you get

some power when you pull the sorry card because basically you

could switch pieces. You can knock anybody back to

jail on the board and you could do the most logical thing to

help you get home closest. Or you can get back the person

who got you when they got the sorry card and you're like, I'll

do the right thing, I'll do the right thing.

You get that sorry card, which is like 1% of power.

You become the pettiest. Like you pick up the piece and

you're like, you want it, you want it and you just launch it

across the road. That's what we do with power.

We get just a little bit exalted and we're like, I'm like .1

centimeters higher than you guys.

It's, it's just unbelievable. That's what we do.

We get power and we use it to elevate ourselves further.

Whatever lead we get, we use to build a bigger lead.

We, we, we whisper or imply ways that you should notice something

about us. Like we want every conversation

to turn back to us. Yo, we and we are so obsessed

our culture with GOAT, the concept of GOAT.

How stupid is that? The greatest of all time.

How would we know who is the greatest of all time?

How arrogant is it to even imply you know what of all time is?

You weren't there. You don't know, you don't know

nothing. But it's just so funny.

We we think we are so awesome. We want to be the GOAT.

We want to now The thing is to last, not just be really good

for one season. You got to be able to be the

best player ever until you're 80 like you need to.

I made, I was really good till I was 32.

That used to be amazing. Now you have to be good till

you're like 57, OK? And if you don't, you'll never

be the GOAT. So just hilarious man.

But it shows just how secure God is, doesn't it?

We do that because we're insecure.

We do that, we get our power and we got to get back, right?

We got to get our vengeance. We got to launch your peace.

We got to do it. God is not insecure.

God is not petty. Isn't that amazing?

He's stable, He's confident, He's full, he's overflowing.

He doesn't do what he does because he's feeling a little

down. Need to remind everybody, which

is why our test prayers and our ways of messing with him.

He is going to operate within who he is.

That's why Jesus could disappoint people constantly.

He didn't give in to test. He didn't give in to getting

cornered. And if you're this, then do

this. He'd go to sleep just fine.

Sleeping great. You can write a book about me,

be a best seller talking trash about me.

He ain't going to respond. God is truly one of one.

So I just want to appeal to some of y'all who don't follow him.

I just want you to think about the concept as we'll talk about

more a little bit like we choose who we follow.

I want to follow somebody secure.

I want to follow somebody who uses their power like that.

I don't even want to follow myself because I'm not like

that. I want to follow somebody that

good who uses power like that. We're going to talk about how we

should use power in a similar way, but we pattern everything

we do after him. He is the standard.

He is the source. He is 1 of 1.

So I just want you to be thinking through who do you

follow? Can you trust them the way that

the psalmist trust the Lord our God #2 what does this passage

teach us about humanity, about us?

First thing, we are praise ERS. We praise.

That's what we do. We praise verse one, praise the

Lord, praise those servants of the Lord, praise the name of the

Lord. Verse 9 ends with praise the

Lord. You know, the word praise means

like boast or shine or like basically like the the way my,

my mind just kind of thought about it was like burst, like

explode with joy at like rejoice is a similar type word.

It's it's this idea of just like exploding, boasting, shining.

It's yes, like it's yes, y'all. To be human is to praise.

At some level. You were created to praise.

So you get to choose what you praise, but not if you praise

you with me because you were made to praise.

So the question you might ask yourself is what am I praising?

Who am I praising? And he's like, well I'm not

religious so I don't praise. Wrong answer.

OK, you could be praising yourself as a self sovereign.

Look at how well I run my life and I came from nothing or

whatever it is. Or look at my political party or

whatever. You can praise all kinds of

stuff but you can't opt out of the praise category.

Does that make sense? Praise is to say, yes, you are

boasting over something. You are shining you when you eat

food, you're like, yeah, like this junk is incredible.

Like we're all the time in little ways and in big ways we

are praising because we are praisers.

And to continue to help you think what's the what is praise?

Y'all Praise is a little deeper than Thanksgiving.

Thanksgiving is really important.

Thanksgiving is gratitude for something that happened.

You're saying thank you to somebody for something.

Praise is like a deeper yes just based on the essence of a thing,

not the activity of the thing. Does that make sense?

Thanksgiving is yes for what you did.

Praise is yes for who you are. Does that make sense?

So we see this in in things like marriages and and relationships

that are covenantal, like a a child or siblings.

There comes a point where you're grateful for that person, but

trust is built. Praise is a part of that process

because you trust their essence, not just their actions.

So y'all in our sin, our praise has been twisted.

Does that make sense? So we are praisers.

I praise. Let me hear somebody say I

praise. That is a fact.

I agree with you. And in our sin we don't remove

the praise category, we just fill it with things unworthy of

that praise. Does that make sense?

So our praise has been twisted, I've heard it said, made to be a

river through which things flow back to God, the source to the

ocean. Like praise God and praise God

from whom all blessings flow, right?

But we become in our sin, we become pawns.

The basic idea is we want all things to kind of flow downhill

to us and just stay like just just accumulate right here,

right? And the image of a pond is that

glossy mossy stuff on top of it, right?

Where when the water ain't moving, it just gross, man.

You know, that's that's kind of what sin does to this concept of

praise is it makes us those who hog glory, who hog praise.

We think we were created to be praised instead of to give it.

Does that make sense? So we live to be exalted instead

of to exalt others. We begin to think we are the end

of all things. We think we are God.

That's really what it comes down to in our sin, is we want to

receive praise, not give it. And when we do give it, in some

kind of way we're using it to get it.

So for some of y'all, this is the invitation process, your

praise at a base level. Are you OK with your existence

as a pond because you were made to be a river?

And there is more joy in finding yourself in the flow of all

things that flow from a personal God, not an energy, A person

that you can know and love and be in relationship with.

You are not made to be upon receiving praise like people can

appreciate you and thank you and you don't cease to exist but

yourself. Hood gets enveloped into this

God who is much greater than you and has displaced your need to

be praised and you find so much more joy in giving it than you

once did in craving it from others.

That makes sense. Some of us are so addicted to

praise. I just want you to hear it's

possible to not be. You can get to where you don't

need it, you just busting with giving it to others.

You can become one who blesses others because you're praising

the Lord. But the more you crave others

praise, the more your soul shrinks.

Second thing we learned about us, we are needy, says in verses

7 to 9. He raises the poor from the dust

and lifts the needy from the ash heap to make them sit with

Princess, with the Princess of his people.

He gives the barren woman a home, making her the joyous

mother of children. It's a very natural experience

to read that Psalm and be like, what?

I guess I'm not poor, I'm not barren.

So like, does this apply to me? Right.

It's similar to maybe the experience you felt if you read

the Beatitudes, Matthew 5 one through 11.

They're either increasing and making sense to you or

decreasing and you avoid them. And every few years when

somebody preaches how you listen to it.

But the concept is y'all those, those demographics, if you will,

are not what it means in and of itself to be blessed.

It's like what Jesus says blessed are the poor.

He's not literally meaning apart from me.

Those people haven't made 'cause then people would just be

throwing their stuff like left and right, get rid of it.

Like, you know, it would be kind of like a martyrdom complex

would become what Jesus is cosigning, if that makes sense.

Yo what what the scriptures are saying is that in the Lord these

things become blessed in the recognition of the need those

positions bring about and how the Lord meets them.

There is blessing. This is why those with nothing

flocked to Jesus. This is why those on the bottom

were coming to him and he was saying you're blessed, they're

not going home. Well, I don't need you.

I guess I'm blessed. The point is in me you're

blessed. That was the point of Jesus's

ministry, is that your need finds its solution in me.

So y'all, to be blessed is to know your need and go to God to

have it met. That's the blessed life.

That's when you have it made. It's when you recognize your

need and you know where to go to find it met and it's in the

Lord. You're not blessed if you have

no needs or if you don't think the Lord will give them to you.

You are blind. You are not blessed.

So y'all, we are needy, y'all, That's good news.

Let me hear you say I need. So the two phrases I've had you

said are I praise and I need. If you can connect those, you're

on your way. But if you're allergic to need,

praise will feel like something you have to do.

And we are allergic to need, are we not?

You know what I mean? Like, I don't think we're

feeling pressure from our culture to be needy.

I think we're feeling pressure to show that we are the most

independent, autonomous, awesome person ever.

And if you make your brand need, maybe it's for the purposes of

growing a platform around your need.

We could do that. We could find a way to do that.

I could brand need doesn't mean I want to need.

We are allergic to need. Y'all got a confession to make

when I was 18 years old? They didn't have Spotify wrapped

yet where it told you the most listened to songs of the year.

But if they did y'all one of the songs that was the most listened

to. This is so embarrassing what I'm

about to tell you. I was not in Christ yet.

I'm sure I still listened to it some after.

There was a song by TI featuring Drake called Pledge Allegiance

to the Swag and I am not kidding that I would walk around listen

that song, Pledge Allegiance to the Swag.

What a loser, right? But here's what's crazy.

Maybe every song is not as explicit as that, but basically

the whole industry of that type of music I was listening to was

to elevate you and show you you are awesome.

You know, you are the man, you are great.

So then we get around Jesus stuff and we hear about need.

Need. Oh, man, I don't need enough to

pledge allegiance to the swag, man.

You know, So even in a culture where therapy is cooler than it

once was and something like need is cooler than it once was,

we're still allergic to it. And at the end of the day, we'll

need it for a little bit. So then we could tell the story

about how we once needed stuff, but now I don't once did.

Now I don't figured it out. And it's like, guys, that ain't

it. OK, Then I heard this other song

right when I was coming to faith.

It was called Angels. And he says got a lot of money,

got a got a lot of clothes. Everybody praise you everywhere

you go. The idea was like it was talking

about a big headed person that I was.

And it says but you ain't got no angels praising you, You're not

the man. Then he says you ain't never

healed the sick, you ain't never raised the dead, you ain't never

had 5000 with two fish, 5 loaves of bread.

The point was you are not the guy.

He's the guy. He's the exalted 1.

He is one of one. You are not the one of ones.

Stuff is just so toxic to what the Bible wants us to do.

And I just got to be honest, it's still in me.

Y'all. It didn't die when I was 18 and

stopped listening to that song that I'm one of them ones and

pledge allegiance to the swag is in US.

It's in the songs we listen to. It's in the movies we watch.

It's in our souls somewhat that we want people to worship us.

We want people to see us for the greatness we are and the the

rags to riches and we make our stories seem so much worse than

they are. We want so badly people to pity

us, worship us, need us, and all of that communicates we're going

to really struggle with being the needy one.

I just want you to hear we aren't high, we are low, He is

high. We are needy.

And some of what enjoying God comes down to is are you glad at

that? It comes down to falling on our

face and just saying God, you're a God and I'm not.

And I'm so glad at that. And please make me glad at that

because there's still this pledge allegiance to the swag

Tanner driving the car down the road.

And when you cut me off, I could have cut you off, you know, like

we want to self justify so quick.

And if I could the Lord love the Lord loves me man, think about

that y'all. I was bumping that song like

crazy. So this is my this is my

statement. You are needy.

Do you agree with that? Do you agree with God that he is

high and you are low? Do you agree with God that he is

God and you are not? Do you agree with God that you

are needy? Third thing we learn about us,

we can be united to God. We can be.

Verse 5 is my blowing. Read it.

Just read the first phrase with me, who is like the Lord our

God? All right, if I had to ask you,

what's the most staggering word in that phrase, I'll give you

like 3 seconds. You don't have to answer it out

loud. It's not about being right or

wrong. But what is staggering about

that statement? Who is like the Lord our God?

I'm a read it and give you the answer.

You ready? Who is like the Lord our God?

This God who exalts, this God who's high?

We can say we own him, we could say we belong to Him, we could

say He's ours, we possess him. That is mind blowing.

The pomp listening to pledge allegiance to the swag can lay

claim to the Lord who is. How can this be?

That is so presumptive isn't it? Or is it y'all?

Jesus says in Luke 1910 the Son of Man came to seek and to save

the lost. Y'all the idea is who God is, is

the God who seeks people out. He exalts, he looks for us.

He doesn't recruit people looking for him.

Y'all nobody is. People are are not looking for

God, but they should be. God is looking for people y'all.

That's our hope in life and death is that we are not our own

but belong to God. That God is looking for us, that

he came to seek and to save the lost.

We are in darkness and he shines the spotlight and he's searching

for us y'all. The story of scripture is that a

people can say the Lord is ours. How can that be?

Because God came and bought them out of slavery, that's how.

Not because we found him, not because we earned our way to

him, but because we heard a message about a God who came to

exalt us. We heard a message about a God

who took our place, who looked at that punk and the punk that

all of us are or were, and says I'll take them.

Not because of their potential, but because of my character.

I choose them. I choose them.

I will die in their place. I will die of their death.

You can say God is yours, it's true, but first you must admit

you're not his. You do.

You could say God is yours, it's true, but first you must admit

you're not his. You do if you've defaulted into

thinking you're just in with him.

But I hear this phrase all the time.

I'm spiritual, I hear that constantly.

Not religious, but I'm spiritual.

I think by that people mean I just know God automatically.

So I kind of interact with him how I feel like, not what the

Bible teaches. God buys you.

God purchases you. You were a slave to sin.

You have to agree with Him about where you were before.

You could say where you are. You don't get to dictate those

terms. That's not how it works.

God wants to purchase you. That's what the cross is about.

But before you can be bought, you have to acknowledge you did

and you, you need to be purchased by his blood.

That's the gospel. OK #3 what should we do in light

of this passage #1 Live to exalt, not be exalted.

Live to exalt, not be exalted. Y'all we've read who the Lord

is. He's the raiser, the lifter, the

giver, y'all. That's, that's who.

Those who are in Christ, the anointed ones, the little

Christ. That's literally what Christian

means is a little Christ. Not because we are in our

strength becoming like Him, but He indwells us.

That's the people of God. We aren't just following a model

exemplar. We have been filled with the

Spirit of God and He is one who uses his exalted status to

exalt. God gives grace to the humble.

He opposes the proud y'all in the the all throughout the

scriptures we see Jesus just saying, hey, humble yourself,

you'll be exalted. Exalt yourself, you'll be

humbled. You know, that's kind of the

pattern. And here's the point.

You don't be humble to get God to love you.

You don't exalt so that God will put you on the good list.

You don't use your power for good so that God will love you.

If you exalt, it's because you recognize the Exalted One has

exalted you. The order matters.

We don't humble ourselves to get God to love us because God has

loved us so freely when we were the punk listening to pledge

allegiance to the swag. We then use our power to exalt

others as evidence of that transformation, not to somehow

get it on the back end. Does that make sense?

It's not a back end reward, it's an outworking of the

transformation we freely received.

So yes, we should exalt those who have nothing.

We should use whatever semblances of power we got,

whether you're a sibling to your younger sibling.

You got power man. It's facts.

How are you using it in our streets, in our schools, in our

neighborhoods, in our workplace? Whatever influence you got,

whatever money you got, use it to exalt those who cannot exalt

themselves. That's what the Lord has done

for you, and in the power He provides, we get to do that for

others. We don't have to live to be

exalted anymore because He handles that for us.

Y'all. The Lord exalts us in Christ,

and He will choose the times and the places where we get exalted

in other ways. But we can let go of living to

be exalted. We can leverage our energy to

exalt. But we get that backwards

sometimes from fear, like, hey, if I don't live to exalt myself,

nobody will notice me and I'll get passed up for things left

and right, right? So it's in good fearful kind of

paradigm. We seek to be exalted, be all.

We can trust the Lord. He is the exalter of those who

have nothing. We can trust Him, we can exalt.

The Lord will exalt us in His way in his time #2 praise the

Lord. I don't think we can read this

Psalm and say one of the applications is not just

straight up praise the Lord. Praise and y'all, this is deeper

than Thanksgiving. It's deeper than thank you for

what you've done. It's looking at who God is and

just saying yes and shouting about that.

For many of us, we've so normalized the feelings of guilt

and dread and toleration. We think that's the extent of

what we can hope for in our walk with God.

I'm supposed to I should and it's that's not what God's

after. Sometimes we get there, but what

God's after is wowing you. What God's after is just a

spontaneous reaction that we have all the time.

You see an awesome sunset. You're like, whoa, get get a

camera out. You eat a new candy.

You're like you're tasting. You're like, give me some more

of those. You ask for one and you're like,

come here. You see a movie with a really

cool ending. You cry, you hear a funny joke,

you laugh. Those are immediate.

You're not like, maybe I'll left to this joke.

Ha ha ha. It is just automatic.

It made you laugh, it tasted amazing, you went, there's no

calculation. Does that make sense?

That's what praises to your soul.

It is an uncalculated response to being wowed by who God is and

what He's done for you. It's bursting and y'all,

hopefully you've had a time where the cross where what

Christ has done for you while you're a Sinner bursted you with

joy. It amazed you, but maybe it

hasn't. I just want to say like, that's

I, I, I pray that over you. And if you, you have always just

lived in toleration of how you're supposed to always feel,

If you've never experienced joy at who God is, we should talk.

If it's never impressed you, amazed you, wowed you, or filled

you with joy, we need to talk. Because God is not after an army

of tolerators. He's after a family of

celebrators. He's after a group of people who

just that was amazing. That's awesome.

I love it. And for disciples in Christ, I

want us to want the one thing I want you to hear from followers

of Jesus. Y'all praise is a posture.

It's not always it can feel like it's supposed to be hype.

I just want, I just want us to hear it.

You don't have to be hype to be praising.

That makes sense. Like I love the song Praise by

Elevation. I think it's dope.

If you go listen to lyrics, they're actually really good.

Praise you when I feel it, praise you when I don't pray,

you know, like they're good lyrics, but it's a hype song.

You're like, you know, like you're dancing, like you're a

hype. You like it, right?

This is the Lord. But y'all, you can praise the

Lord and be weeping. You can praise the Lord and be

suffering. You can praise the Lord and be

down and out. So let's not get twisted with

the radio's always going to put that on.

And they should. It's a bop.

Listen to it on your way to give that test to your kids.

OK, that's great. But don't confuse that mood with

what praise means. Does that make sense?

Don't conflate mood with posture.

OK, I want you to hear praise is about becoming the type of

person who's wowed by God spontaneously and rhythmically.

You're just wowed. You're amazed, you're in no

matter what comes. And then what happens is your

praise shapes how you interpret what happens to you instead of

letting what happens to you shape your mood and your praise

once you get to where they're in the right order because it's

genuinely who you are and you've become that type of person.

Now I interpret my suffering through my praise instead of

letting my suffering dictate whether or not I praise.

Are you tracking with me? Because suffering is going to

come in little ways and in big ways.

That's life in a broken world. So if we can become these type

of people, I think our joy will increase.

Third thing, pass the praise. Praise the Lord and then pass

the praise. I want to read verses 2 and

three over you. Blessed be the name of the Lord.

From this time forth and forevermore, from the rising of

the sun to its setting, the name of the Lord is to be praised.

OK, from this time forth and forevermore, and then from the

rising of the sun to its setting.

Y'all. If I'm honest, I thought both of

those phrases were time based phrases about praising the Lord.

The first one says from this time forth and forevermore and

the second one says from the rising the sun to its setting I

hear all day long praising. Maybe you hear that that is

true. It also means to a Hebraic kind

of mind y'all where the sun is rising and setting.

It's rising and setting all over the world all the time.

The idea is let God's praise be coast to coast.

It's not just time, it's geography.

Does that make sense? So let God's praise be eternally

filling everywhere. That's the idea from the rising

of the sun, which is always doing somewhere and it's always

setting. The rising of the sun, not just

where you stand, but where it's rising and setting.

Let the praise of the Lord be known.

Does that make sense? The idea is God's praise is to

be everywhere. Hey y'all, the reality is right

now I don't know if you know these just pure facts.

There are 8.2 billion people on this earth.

OK to the best we know right now a billion people are hearing the

gospel and believing it, believe it, trust it, love it.

Praise another 2 1/2 billion as best we could tell are hearing

it and not trusting it, not believing it.

Which leaves around 4.3 billion people are not even hearing it,

inadequately hearing it. Does that make sense?

So you got hearing it, believing it, hearing it, not believing it

and then another large over half the world is not hearing it.

Why do I tell you that y'all? Some of it is.

It starts right where you are. Are you owning what it means to

praise the Lord in your spheres of influence?

Have you just said God put me here?

You might have sought out that opportunity, but God put you

there. You might live on that street,

but God put you there. You might be in that class, but

God put you there, might be on that team.

God put you there. One of the ways that the praise

passes. You just have to become

self-conscious of the fact that God put you there.

You have to become self-conscious of the fact that

God put me here and I have some responsibility in this.

I can't save nobody, but I can praise the Lord and live.

So if you are bursting the way you laugh at a joke, if God's

goodness is bursting out of you, your spheres of influence will

be impacted by your praise of the Lord, right?

And then it goes viral. It goes to other geographic

context as an overflow of that. But when we send people to other

places, it's not like they're doing something radically

different. They're still the types of

people that have become praisers of the Lord, and they've chosen

to go live in a different context to give other people

access that wouldn't have it unless they moved there.

OK, some people don't know nobody don't know nobody who

knows nobody who knows nobody. Nobody knows, nobody who knows

who Jesus even is. There are many places on this

earth like that. So I just want you to hear that

God intends for his name to be praised from sea to shining sea,

from coast to coast, land to land, everywhere.

So part of what we get the opportunity to do is sing Psalm

113. And part of what you're singing

is God spread your praise. God, please spread your praise.

Does your prayer closet look like that?

The mine looks like bless this, bless that, help this, help

that. Help me do this and it's

Christianized, but it still smells a little exalt me ish at

times. But what this Psalm is filled

with is Lord, let your praise be heard everywhere.

People are singing. So I don't know the last time

you were wowed, y'all? I was wowed this week, Speaker

pointed out in John 18 the night when Jesus is getting arrested.

OK, Judas is rolling up. They got a squad torches.

They're rolling up on them and they come to Jesus and he's

like, who y'all here to see? He knows.

I love how he asks questions because he wants to hear you say

it. Who are you here for?

Jesus of Nazareth? I'm he Jokers just fall down,

start worshiping. They just fall on their faces

when he says I'm he. Then they get up.

He said, who are you here for? They say Jesus and Azarus.

He said, I already told you I am E Then he says this phrase,

which I hadn't really caught before.

He says if you came to get me, let these men go.

So he says, if you came for me, then let these men go.

He steps out in front of the Pledge of Allegiance to the swag

crew and says, take me. And man, that just blew my mind.

Like, have you had the image yet that Jesus of Nazareth imagine a

group of soldiers coming for you, coming for me, as they

should be. Are you the one who's listened

to pledge allegiance to the twag 8,000,000 times and uses all of

your time, energy and talent to get people to like you?

Why yes, I am. Thank you.

I'm really good at it. I have extreme victim of the

complex and I am totally into myself.

What's your name? Follow me on Instagram.

And Jesus in that moment steps out in front.

Isn't that amazing? He doesn't step out in front for

the version of you that is awesome for the version of you

that is Psalm 113, He steps out to buy you.

He steps out to say I claim these guys.

These are my guys. They're about to desert me in

about 30 seconds, but they're my guys.

Just that image of Jesus stepping out.

I wonder if that might wow you that he would claim you.

It amazes me that he would claim me.

I'm like you, sure, but He did, and He went to the cross for

you. If you think you're the goat, I

feel bad for you, son. Who is like the Lord our God?

Nobody, not one. I sense many of us have never

fallen down in reverence. Maybe it's time we consider the

depths of God's relevance. Once His beauty is seen, once we

are acquainted with His ways, there's only one response, never

ceasing and always expanding Praise.

Let's pray together. Our Father, we love you.

Thank you so much for your word. Thank you so much for our time

and your Word. God, would your praise spread to

the ends of the earth where people don't know, they don't

know that they don't know. And God, would you wow us with

your grace? God, would you wow us?

Would you just have us bursting with joy at seeing you for who

you are? God, help us get our eyes off

ourself for one second and just see you clearly as the exalting

and exalted God that you are. We pray in Christ's name, Amen.