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“Shout joyful praises to God, all the earth! Sing about the glory of his name! Tell the world how glorious he is. Say to God, “How awesome are your deeds! Your enemies cringe before your mighty power. Everything on earth will worship you; they will sing your praises, shouting your name in glorious songs.” Come and see what our God has done, what awesome miracles he performs for people! He made a dry path through the Red Sea, and his people went across on foot. There we rejoiced in him. For by his great power he rules forever. He watches every movement of the nations; let no rebel rise in defiance. (Interlude ). Let the whole world bless our God and loudly sing his praises. Our lives are in his hands, and he keeps our feet from stumbling.” Psalms 66:1-9 NLT
The psalmist calls us to glorify God with our voices. God has given us the ability to articulate words. Those words should be utilized in their highest form to praise the One and only God!!! The two or three ounce muscle in our mouth should not wag itself in harmony with the world, rather in sync with its Creator. All of creation shouts the glory of God! How awesome is He!!! Let's harness our words as worship to Him. As the melody of heavens music plays in our hearts, by the Holy Spirit, let us adore Him in affectionate declarations! The psalmist rehearses the great things that God did in the past. He remembers the faithful, merciful deliverance from slavery in Egypt and the miraculous crossing of the Red Sea. He recognized the sovereignty of God over the nations and His power to put down those who defy Him. He calls on all people to join in the anthem of praise. Lastly, he humbly, and thankfully, recognizes that our lives are in God's hands. “See, I have written your name on the palms of my hands. Always in my mind is a picture of Jerusalem’s walls in ruins.” Isaiah 49:16 NLT He is the One who holds us up as we walk this path of life. God keeps us from stumbling and falling. “Now all glory to God, who is able to keep you from falling away and will bring you with great joy into his glorious presence without a single fault. All glory to him who alone is God, our Savior through Jesus Christ our Lord. All glory, majesty, power, and authority are his before all time, and in the present, and beyond all time! Amen.” Jude 1:24-25 NLT Isn't it absolutely comforting to know that our very steps are in His care? “The Lord directs the steps of the godly. He delights in every detail of their lives.” Psalms 37:23 NLT Will you join with the Bible believing, born again, international, multi-racial, universal body of Christ as we raise our anthem of praise to the One and only God? We give Him glory in the name of the Master-JESUS!!!
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What mighty praise, O God, belongs to you in Zion. We will fulfill our vows to you, for you answer our prayers. All of us must come to you. Though we are overwhelmed by our sins, you forgive them all. What joy for those you choose to bring near, those who live in your holy courts. What festivities await us inside your holy Temple. You faithfully answer our prayers with awesome deeds, O God our savior. You are the hope of everyone on earth, even those who sail on distant seas. You formed the mountains by your power and armed yourself with mighty strength. You quieted the raging oceans with their pounding waves and silenced the shouting of the nations. Those who live at the ends of the earth stand in awe of your wonders. From where the sun rises to where it sets, you inspire shouts of joy. You take care of the earth and water it, making it rich and fertile. The river of God has plenty of water; it provides a bountiful harvest of grain, for you have ordered it so. You drench the plowed ground with rain, melting the clods and leveling the ridges. You soften the earth with showers and bless its abundant crops. You crown the year with a bountiful harvest; even the hard pathways overflow with abundance. The grasslands of the wilderness become a lush pasture, and the hillsides blossom with joy. The meadows are clothed with flocks of sheep, and the valleys are carpeted with grain. They all shout and sing for joy!” Psalms 65:1-13 NLT
Thank God for forgiveness of your sin!! Thank Him for such provision! Take a look around you! Soak up the vast expanse of His handiwork. Stand in awe of His matchless majesty. Consider the lush colors of the canvas before you. Silence the noise of the hustle and bustle of the rat race. Pause for a moment to saturate yourself in the splendor and glory of God's beauty. Don't let another second pass before you redirect your focus. Stop letting the ugliness of this fallen society distract you from the real substance of life. Take the time to bask in the Sonlight (yes I spelled that correctly) of His radiance! Swim in the river of life. Let the wind of the Holy Spirit blow in your face and into your heart. Rest by the still waters of His grace. Drink from the fountain of living water that flows from His throne. Gaze upon His grandeur. Sit upon His lap. Feel the embrace of His love and hear the affectionate tone of His voice. Reverence His awesome power. Bow before His Lordship! Give glory to the King of kings and the Lord of lords. Great and mighty is He! “Be still, and know that I am God!" Psalms 46:10a NLT What mighty praise, O God, belongs to you in Zion. We will fulfill our vows to you, for you answer our prayers. All of us must come to you. Though we are overwhelmed by our sins, you forgive them all. What joy for those you choose to bring near, those who live in your holy courts. What festivities await us inside your holy Temple. You faithfully answer our prayers with awesome deeds, O God our savior. You are the hope of everyone on earth, even those who sail on distant seas. You formed the mountains by your power and armed yourself with mighty strength. You quieted the raging oceans with their pounding waves and silenced the shouting of the nations. Those who live at the ends of the earth stand in awe of your wonders. From where the sun rises to where it sets, you inspire shouts of joy. You take care of the earth and water it, making it rich and fertile. The river of God has plenty of water; it provides a bountiful harvest of grain, for you have ordered it so. You drench the plowed ground with rain, melting the clods and leveling the ridges. You soften the earth with showers and bless its abundant crops. You crown the year with a bountiful harvest; even the hard pathways overflow with abundance. The grasslands of the wilderness become a lush pasture, and the hillsides blossom with joy. The meadows are clothed with flocks of sheep, and the valleys are carpeted with grain. They all shout and sing for joy!” Psalms 65:1-13 NLT
Simply joy in our Creator today! What a great Psalm of Praise to Him! We love you Heavenly Father! Great and marvelous are your works! No one is like you!!! “O God, listen to my complaint. Protect my life from my enemies’ threats. Hide me from the plots of this evil mob, from this gang of wrongdoers. They sharpen their tongues like swords and aim their bitter words like arrows. They shoot from ambush at the innocent, attacking suddenly and fearlessly. They encourage each other to do evil and plan how to set their traps in secret. “Who will ever notice?” they ask. As they plot their crimes, they say, “We have devised the perfect plan!” Yes, the human heart and mind are cunning. But God himself will shoot them with his arrows, suddenly striking them down. Their own tongues will ruin them, and all who see them will shake their heads in scorn. Then everyone will be afraid; they will proclaim the mighty acts of God and realize all the amazing things he does. The godly will rejoice in the Lord and find shelter in him. And those who do what is right will praise him.” Psalms 64:1-10 NLT
There have always been evil people and, until Jesus returns, there will always be evil people. Wicked men devise their schemes and plot how to fulfill them. With no regard for righteousness they do what naturally flows from their heart, evil. Jesus said that the heart of man is the source of wickedness. “And then he added, “It is what comes from inside that defiles you. For from within, out of a person’s heart, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, wickedness, deceit, lustful desires, envy, slander, pride, and foolishness. All these vile things come from within; they are what defile you.”” Mark 7:20-23 NLT Jeremiah the prophet described the heart as desperately and deceitfully wicked. ““The human heart is the most deceitful of all things, and desperately wicked. Who really knows how bad it is?” Jeremiah 17:9 NLT Because of the sinful nature of the heart, a transformation must take place for man to be changed from his innate, default condition of wickedness. The heart of the problem is the heart. It's all about a persons heart. The heart that I'm referring to is not the muscle in our chest that beats and keeps our blood pumping. The heart is the epicenter of life itself, the spirit of a man. This is the nucleus of life. When the spirit of a man is wicked, so will be his life. When the spirit of a man is righteous, so will be his life. “A good tree produces good fruit, and a bad tree produces bad fruit. A good tree can’t produce bad fruit, and a bad tree can’t produce good fruit. So every tree that does not produce good fruit is chopped down and thrown into the fire. Yes, just as you can identify a tree by its fruit, so you can identify people by their actions.” Matthew 7:17-20 NLT This is why we must be born again! Men are not, innately, good hearted. To the contrary, men are born into sin and they are essentially wicked. Humanistic psychology cannot transform the spirit of a man. Only the shed blood of the Lord Jesus Christ can wash a black heart with red blood and make it white as snow. We must be born again (see John 3:1-7). Until we get to our eternal home, we will battle with the wickedness of this fallen world and its sinful inhabitants. The beautiful, glorious, Biblical hope is the return of our Marvelous Master and Lord, Jesus Christ. Every eye will see Him! “Look! He comes with the clouds of heaven. And everyone will see him— even those who pierced him. And all the nations of the world will mourn for him. Yes! Amen!” Revelation 1:7 NLT Every knee will bow! “that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue declare that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” Philippians 2:10-11 NLT Some will bow and receive everlasting punishment and some will bow and inherit everlasting life. “and they will rise again. Those who have done good will rise to experience eternal life, and those who have continued in evil will rise to experience judgment.” John 5:29 NLT Which one are you? “But those plotting to destroy me will come to ruin. They will go down into the depths of the earth. They will die by the sword and become the food of jackals. But the king will rejoice in God. All who swear to tell the truth will praise him, while liars will be silenced.” Psalms 63:9-11 NLT
Children of God should not worry about their enemies. God will take care of them. What we should concentrate on is God. Stop measuring up your giants and start measuring up your God! David would have never went out to fight Goliath if he would have focused on the size of his enemy compared to himself. Naturally speaking, he was no match. However, David recognized the battle as God's fight, not his. “David replied to the Philistine, “You come to me with sword, spear, and javelin, but I come to you in the name of the Lord of Heaven’s Armies—the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied. Today the Lord will conquer you, and I will kill you and cut off your head. And then I will give the dead bodies of your men to the birds and wild animals, and the whole world will know that there is a God in Israel! And everyone assembled here will know that the Lord rescues his people, but not with sword and spear. This is the Lord’s battle, and he will give you to us!” 1 Samuel 17:45-47 NLT Let God fight for you. You are not a victim. You are a victor! Relinquish control into His hands. Stop trying to fix it. Let God fix it. If you are His, victory is assured. You aren't fighting for victory, you are fighting with victory. He has never lost a battle. He is the undefeated champion of all time!!! The war has already been won! In Jesus Christ we are more than conquerors! Lift up your head weary saint. He is with you! If He's with you, what do you need to fear? “O God, you are my God; I earnestly search for you. My soul thirsts for you; my whole body longs for you in this parched and weary land where there is no water. I have seen you in your sanctuary and gazed upon your power and glory. Your unfailing love is better than life itself; how I praise you! I will praise you as long as I live, lifting up my hands to you in prayer. You satisfy me more than the richest feast. I will praise you with songs of joy. I lie awake thinking of you, meditating on you through the night. Because you are my helper, I sing for joy in the shadow of your wings. I cling to you; your strong right hand holds me securely.” Psalms 63:1-8 NLT
Are you thirsty for God? Does your soul cry out in utter desire to spend a moment in His presence? Have you found yourself in a place and time where your whole body earnestly cries out for Him? Do you lie awake at night thinking of God? Do you commune with Him in the quiet of the early morning hours? The things of this life leave us longing and unfulfilled. Only God is our oasis! He is our refuge and strength, a present help in trouble (see Psalm 46:1). When we come to the end our ourselves, there we find Jesus! He is our Rock!!! He is so much more than what this life can offer!!! When life is "good" and we recall the times of refreshing that we have experienced in worship, we praise Him! However, the purest praise comes when we raise our hands up through the ashes of a dry and parched ground and exalt Him in the midst of adversity. Is your heart set on Him above all things? No matter what David went through, he praised the Lord! Let's do the same!! “Common people are as worthless as a puff of wind, and the powerful are not what they appear to be. If you weigh them on the scales, together they are lighter than a breath of air. Don’t make your living by extortion or put your hope in stealing. And if your wealth increases, don’t make it the center of your life. God has spoken plainly, and I have heard it many times: Power, O God, belongs to you; unfailing love, O Lord, is yours. Surely you repay all people according to what they have done.” Psalms 62:9-12 NLT
All of us are but dust, naturally speaking. An old secular song by the group Kansas articulates this reality so well. Written by band member Kerry Livgren, the song hits at the heart of every humans experience. The original video of this song on YouTube has 138 million hits. That is astounding. This tells us that we all identify with that reality. The book of Genesis identifies our origin. “Then the Lord God formed the man from the dust of the ground. He breathed the breath of life into the man’s nostrils, and the man became a living person.” Genesis 2:7 NLT The Spirit of God within us is what gave us eternal life. When man sinned in Genesis 3:1-7 the Spirit left him and he became a dying creature rather than a living one. We are all dying creatures. Our bodies are decaying. However, our spirit will last eternally in one of two places - Heaven or Hell! We, because of sin, are hell bound. However, we can be born again by the Spirit of God (see John 3:1-8). Because of the blood and body of Jesus, we have salvation through repentance of our sin and acceptance of His sacrifice for us. This is the only way for us to live forever. Our mortal lives are temporary, short lived. We place so much emphasis on things that don't last and will one day be gone. Yes, we should appreciate and be thankful for the blessings we now know but we must never lose sight of our mortality. We cannot buy another day of life. We are not identified by our financial status. We are all sinful creatures that are dying. No matter how much paint we put on the surface, we are deteriorating. “For then the dust will return to the earth, and the spirit will return to God who gave it.” Ecclesiastes 12:7 NLT “That is why we never give up. Though our bodies are dying, our spirits are being renewed every day. For our present troubles are small and won’t last very long. Yet they produce for us a glory that vastly outweighs them and will last forever! So we don’t look at the troubles we can see now; rather, we fix our gaze on things that cannot be seen. For the things we see now will soon be gone, but the things we cannot see will last forever.” 2 Corinthians 4:16-18 NLT True life is locked up in Jesus Christ. The only way to know that life is by repentance and salvation through His mercy and grace. The best thing we can do is embrace every day as a gift from God, know Him as our personal Lord and Savior, love Him, and honor Him in each and everything we do. There is no other meaning to life. Those who think there is are simply deceived. “O God, listen to my cry! Hear my prayer! From the ends of the earth, I cry to you for help when my heart is overwhelmed. Lead me to the towering rock of safety, for you are my safe refuge, a fortress where my enemies cannot reach me. Let me live forever in your sanctuary, safe beneath the shelter of your wings! Interlude”
Psalms 61:1-4 NLT The place to run to when life is overwhelming is God! He is a strong tower and a fortress in which we can run to find security and safety. If we will live in His presence we will experience the protection, provision, and peace that we so long for. When things get out of control simply trust in the Lord our God! He will not fail us!! “Justice—do you rulers know the meaning of the word? Do you judge the people fairly? No! You plot injustice in your hearts. You spread violence throughout the land. These wicked people are born sinners; even from birth they have lied and gone their own way. They spit venom like deadly snakes; they are like cobras that refuse to listen, ignoring the tunes of the snake charmers, no matter how skillfully they play. Break off their fangs, O God! Smash the jaws of these lions, O Lord! May they disappear like water into thirsty ground. Make their weapons useless in their hands. May they be like snails that dissolve into slime, like a stillborn child who will never see the sun. God will sweep them away, both young and old, faster than a pot heats over burning thorns. The godly will rejoice when they see injustice avenged. They will wash their feet in the blood of the wicked. Then at last everyone will say, “There truly is a reward for those who live for God; surely there is a God who judges justly here on earth.”
Psalms 58:1-11 NLT This reminds me so much of our civil, social, and political climate. Wickedness flaunts itself in our faces and taunts us with its mockery. The most basic decency that any human being should have is seemingly gone from this culture. Self respect, respect in general, common courtesy, and moral conscience are lost in our time. We are a nation gone amuck. We advocate the killing of the innocent while protecting the rights of murderers. We elevate immortality to a civil right. We call good evil and evil good. “What sorrow for those who say that evil is good and good is evil, that dark is light and light is dark, that bitter is sweet and sweet is bitter.” Isaiah 5:20 NLT Many of our judges sit behind a bench and implement their own idea of justice rather than godly righteousness. Our Supreme Court expelled God from the classroom in 1962 and decided to allow the legal killing of the most innocent, the unborn, in 1973. Look at the consequences of those decisions. Our SAT scores have nose dived, teen age pregnancy has skyrocketed, illiteracy has soared, drug use has flooded our communities like an open sewer, the national debt is staggering, and the family is being shredded like cheese. Yet we think we can solve our problems with a good economy, better health care, or some new ideology or philosophy. We think that we need a political leader who will "solve" our problems. Hogwash!! We have lost our minds!! Even in the "church" we have those who are pro choice (pro murder), sympathetic to the plight of the LGBTQ community, and even deny the authenticity and authority of God's Holy Word (the Bible). We have replaced the fiery preaching of holiness with a feel good, anything is acceptable false gospel. We have become more user friendly than God friendly. We desire personal gratification over self sacrifice. We want the benefits of salvation without the consecration of sanctification. We want to go to heaven but live like we are in hell. We use God instead of love Him. We pray selfish prayers and demand immediate satisfaction. We are a spoiled people that have lost our way. We need a true, Holy Spirit filled, Jesus loving, sin killing, devil chasing revival. I'm not talking about all of these empty services we call revival that equate to nothing more than a conscience appeasement and an annual event. We need an awakening!! Is your soul vexed with the conditions around you? Do you feel out of place in this culture? Do you long for holiness and righteousness to rule and reign? If so, please join me in anguish over the plight of our beloved land and seek God for authentic revival. It's the only answer to our problems!! One last thing: Righteousness will prevail! Eternity will bring to full fruition the desire of the children of God! “And we believers also groan, even though we have the Holy Spirit within us as a foretaste of future glory, for we long for our bodies to be released from sin and suffering. We, too, wait with eager hope for the day when God will give us our full rights as his adopted children, including the new bodies he has promised us. We were given this hope when we were saved. (If we already have something, we don’t need to hope for it. But if we look forward to something we don’t yet have, we must wait patiently and confidently.)” Romans 8:23-25 NLT “My heart is confident in you, O God; my heart is confident. No wonder I can sing your praises! Wake up, my heart! Wake up, O lyre and harp! I will wake the dawn with my song. I will thank you, Lord, among all the people. I will sing your praises among the nations. For your unfailing love is as high as the heavens. Your faithfulness reaches to the clouds. Be exalted, O God, above the highest heavens. May your glory shine over all the earth.”
Psalms 57:7-11 NLT Wow! What an exclamation of praise! My heart is, indeed, confident in my Lord Jesus Christ. He is my God! Let my heart wake up with singing and celebration! Let my mouth shout His praises! Let all of God's children rise up in praise! Let those who play instruments play them with vigor. Let the congregation of the saints swell in adoration of the King! Let us give Him thanks due to Him because of His merciful and marvelous acts! Let the nations be served notice! We are the children of the Most High!! God's love and faithfulness are unmatched! Let the earth rejoice in its creator. Give Him praise child of God! Give Him praise!! |
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Rev. Curtis Norris Archives
March 2020
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