Latest / Calvary Church with Ed Taylor Podcast / #20221009 - A Whole Person - Psalm 8

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#20221009 - A Whole Person - Psalm 8 · Calvary Church with Ed Taylor Podcast

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Welcome to the study of God's word recorded live at Calvary
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Church in Aurora, Colorado, to learn more about the many
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resources available, through abounding Grace, Media, or to
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tune into our live stream Services.
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Visit us online at Calvary. Co dot church or download our
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free Calvary Church app now. Let's open our Bibles and study
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God's word. If you guys would take out your
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Bibles you probably already there.
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We read Psalm 8 together which is where we're going to be, and
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I just want to express my thanks here.
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The final service of the weekend for all of your love and
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Hospitality this weekend. It's just been phenomenal being
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here with you. This is the kind of church where
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when the pastor shows up when the guest preacher shows up to
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preach at a service, there's like 12 different people that
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asked him if he needed. It's a cup of coffee or a bottle
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of water. You guys are just so loving and
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hospitable and it's just been so encouraging for me to see what
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the Lord is doing here in this place.
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We already read the text today so I'm going to open in a word
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of prayer and then we'll jump into this passage Lord, we come
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to you, we thank you for this Psalm this text and I thank you,
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Lord, for this church. I pray that your blessings would
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fall upon it to a greater and greater degree until you.
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You return. Thank you, Lord, for your word,
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the truth. Lord.
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That you've so clearly given to us and my prayer.
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Lord today, is that for me for every person that's here, every
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person, listening Lord, that we would be people who Center
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ourselves around you that we be aligned with you that we be
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worshippers Lord, that we would seek first.
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Your kingdom we'd be about you that you might Lord fill our
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lives with For meaning and board Dominion even so we pray for it.
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Lord, we ask that you teach us from this passage in Jesus name.
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We pray together. Amen.
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Amen. Well, what I want to say the
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beginning of this teaching is that the psalm that we just read
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this morning is a song? Just nine short verses in length
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that ancient Israel of course would sing and pray to God.
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It's musical in nature. Sure, the prescript mentions
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that it's to the choirmaster according to the giveth, which
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is probably some kind of musical chorus or two nor meter or
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something like that. It's a song, it's a prayer, but
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what it's describing is what I want to tell you about.
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It's describing a person who is absolutely flourishing in life.
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This Psalm is describing a person who is living the whole
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human experience as Originally designed us to experience and
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live. This person, we learn in the
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second verse is humble, they're like children before God
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dependent upon God. And as a result, they are very
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strong. So their lives are a reflection
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of the strength of God. They're making an impact in
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their world. In other words, because of the
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strength of God that is flowing through them.
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This person also is not searching and grasping for
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meaning and significance in the wrong things.
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Know they found their meaning, they found their significance in
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God because even though they look at the stars of the sky and
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the moon in the sky at the night and realize that they are small
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in comparison to the galaxies, they realized that despite their
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smallness. There is a God who loves them
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has called them and has made them the Pinnacle of his career.
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Asian. And so they find their meaning
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in God. And this person is also a person
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who has Dominion they are in self-control.
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They are working well in obedience to the Lord.
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They are serving and tending. The creation that God has
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committed into their hands. If you saw this person today,
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you might not describe them just like David describes them.
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In this song, you might use modern language to say something
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like now that person they're crushing it, or that person,
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they are on fire or to borrow maybe a term from my three
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teenage daughters that I've left at home.
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Thank you. By the way, for inviting me
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here, I've had a little break in the action.
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There's not a day that goes by that.
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Someone isn't crying in my house, so it's been nice to be
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away. No I joke I miss them a ton but
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to borrow a term from them they would say this person is slaying
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it. Alright this person is slaying
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in life. So what you have in this Psalm
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is maybe for an example. A young mom who though she's
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tired and stressed and has these little kids to be taking care
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of. She's handling it with Grace and
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dignity. This song might be describing a
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young man who's gotten control of his body.
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The appetites is sexual passions and desires, and is
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wholeheartedly seeking after God and his kingdom, this saw might
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describe a student who has a full academic calendar and load
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and maybe even work on top of it, to be able to pay the bills,
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but they're not dropping out of classes or not flaking on
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assignments, but they're putting forward their best effort every
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single day. This Psalm might be describing a
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small business owner Who has created a beautiful culture in
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their workplace, that is a blessing to their employees but
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also is creating something wonderful that is adding value
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to the community in which they live.
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This Psalm might be describing a retiree who in their older years
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is, not just feeding the flesh, but is pouring out their lives
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for the Next Generation continuing to serve and make
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Disciples until the day that Jesus returns the person
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described in this Psalm has dominion over their environment.
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That's the word that is used in the latter half of the passage.
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Which by the way is the very thing that God made us for in
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Genesis chapter 12, fill the Earth to subdue it and have
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dominion over it. He made men and women for this
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Dominion. So this person is living the
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life that God intended us to live.
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What I want to say to you, the beginning of this teaching, is
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that the psalm gives us not just a description of this life, but
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it gives us the secret to living this kind of Life.
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What is the access code? What is the key into this life
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of human flourishing? Well, the key is found in the
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first And final lines of the song, you might have even
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noticed as we read them out loud.
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That the first and last line of the psalm are identical, their
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carbon copies of each other. David said, at the beginning,
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and end of the psalm, the book ends he said, O Lord, our Lord.
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How Majestic is your name in all the earth?
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That is the key. That is the secret into this
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life of flourishing. David was a man who was in
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raptured with who God is he was a worshiper of God, he was a
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lover of God and when David said, Lord, our Lord, I don't
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want you to miss the way that he's describing.
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God, he uses the word Lord twice in our English translations, but
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they're actually two separate Hebrew.
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Words of the first Lord comes from the word Yahweh or Jehovah.
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The the very name of God future translators had a Hard time
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writing down the full name of God.
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They felt it was disrespectful, but David had no issues to it.
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That he knew God, he wrote God's name, he spoke God's name, he
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had an intimate personal relationship with God, and I'm
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sure there's so many of you here today.
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And you say, I relate to God, in that way.
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He is mine and I am, his, he is my father.
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I know him. I'm close with him.
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He is mine, but the second, Lord, that David spoke.
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Lord, our Lord. Lord, the second Lord is the
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word Adonai, which indicates Sovereign or master or Lord,
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that position of being the Lord over someone's life.
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So David in effect is saying I know God, I love God.
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I'm personal with God. We're on speaking terms with
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each other. I write songs about him and who
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he is. We're in relationship together,
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but at the same time he's my master.
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He's my God, he's Sovereign, he's the director of my life and
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I must obey him what a beautiful relationship David had with God
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and he says of God, lord, our Lord.
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How my translation says Majestic is your name or the new King
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James version? How excellent is your name when
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David said that? He wasn't saying to God
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something, akin to God, your name, Jehovah or Yahweh.
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It's a really cool sound. In name.
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How excellent is that name? That's not what he was saying.
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What he was saying, was your character, God who you've
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revealed yourself to be in your word, and who I've discovered
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you to be in my life. Your character is what's amazing
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to me. Excellent, to me.
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Beautiful to me. So, as I said, what we have here
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is a man who is in love with God.
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Do I have any God lovers in the house today?
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You say that's me. I do.
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I resonate with what David is saying.
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It's name is beautiful is characters, beautiful.
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I love who he is. He's my father and I want him to
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be the master and Lord and Sovereign of my life.
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Well, that kind of life is the life that leads to the beautiful
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flourishing whole person. Life described in this song, I
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remember years ago, I was at a worship leaders conference.
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I'm not a worship leader, but I was asked to share a few words
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but they had all these incredible worship bands that
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were there at this particular conference.
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And one night, they had the worship leader.
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Matt Redman there, he's written. So many songs at the church has
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sung for so many years now, and he was leading us in a time of
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worship. And it was actually just like,
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Pastor, Ed was talking about with the New Life Worship team.
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He was such a servant, you know, you never know when someone is
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like that successful, like, what's their attitude going to
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be like, how are they going to be?
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But he was just such a servant, he was just loving on us.
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In between songs, he was sharing with us just different thoughts
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and I'll never forget, there was this moment where he just, he
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began talking about how, what worship does when we're loving,
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God celebrating God, including in corporate musical worship
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which is one facet of worshiping God he said what we're doing.
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It's like we are aligning ourselves properly, you know,
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when your car is out of alignment or you're driving
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behind someone on the highway, that's Is out of alignment.
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It's like it looks like they're riding sideways, but they're
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going straight. But when we're in alignment,
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when we're worshipping God, it's like we are living the life that
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God designed for humans to live underneath him, but above his
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creation. And so, Matt was just talking
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about that. That's what I call a mat.
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We're on first name basis together.
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Mr. Redmond was saying to us, we need to be aligned to God.
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One author said it this way, he said the ideal.
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Chill life in the Christian way of thinking is one where all the
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essential parts of the human self are effectively organized
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around. God, as they are restored and
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sustained by God, this life is the human self fully integrated
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under God. That's what we're talking about
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here in Psalm 8, David's life in this song is completely
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organized around and integrated. Under God.
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All right, so that's the secret to having this flourishing life
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be a person who's loving God, with all your heart mind, soul,
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and strength, just like Jesus said, but what are the results
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that we might expect will come? When we let God be, who he
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should be God, when we let him be the Lord Of Our Lives.
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When we give him the priority, the first place in all things in
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our lives. What are the results I want to
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show you three from this. Search today.
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If you're a note taker today, the first one is this.
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You receive strength you receive strength.
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Now when I say strength I'm not talking about that braggadocious
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false strength. You know.
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I'm going to do this and I'm going to accomplish that and
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here's how amazing I am. I'm not talking about that kind
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of strength. I'm not talking about a foes
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strength or acting strong. Well, what I'm talking about is
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a childlike dependence, upon God, That then leads God to say,
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I will lend you my strength. I will take care of you.
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I will I will Infuse you with my strength because you are
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dependent on me and I'm the source of the strength that you
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need. That's what we discover in verse
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2. If you'd look at it again, in
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your Bibles, David said, out of the mouths of babies and
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infants, you have established strength because of your foes to
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still the enemy and the Avenger Sure.
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What is David saying there? He's saying that with God even
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little babies and infants were strong enough to fight against
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the enemy and the Avenger every opponent of God was able to be
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put down, even through little babies and infants.
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You just imagine like it's like a comical verse almost like a
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little army of babies. A little army of infants with
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their little camo on, you know, crawling over and it's like what
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are Are they going to do? But they have his image, is they
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have God, even the weakest human being even the weakest Fighting
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Force. If they have God on their side,
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they can do anything, they can accomplish anything, and I love
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this picture because it's the way of God, it's God's way for
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us to lower ourselves under him to celebrate him personally, to
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set him as the Lord Of Our Lives.
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Because when we do, We receive strength.
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You guys know this. You know, that it's the way of
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Jesus isn't it to look for those who are weak, so that he can
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demonstrate his strength. Amen.
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I mean, when Jesus came, who did he always seemed to have his
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sights set upon? It, seems like he always saw the
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weakest person in the room. A man comes up to him and says,
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Lord, I have leprosy. I'm unclean my Society thinks of
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me as unclean, but Lord. You can make me clean and
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Jesus's heart opens up to this man.
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And he touches this man, that no one else was willing to touch
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less that uncleanness be transferred to them, but Jesus
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is cleanliness is transferred to him or a woman like Mary
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Magdalene who would want to have anything to do with a woman,
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like, Mary who had been possessed by the Bible says
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seven demons but Jesus found her.
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He delivered her. He loved her and then he brought
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her into his ministry team. It wasn't like, you know, I've
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delivered you you had seven demons, you're a little weird.
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So you got to be over in the corner.
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He's like, no, you can be on my, in my inner circle, part of my
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Ministry team. It's the way of God, the way of
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Jesus looking for the week so that he can Infuse them with
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strength. I love this from the lord, it's
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the way of Christ the week. Her you are the weaker, you
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admit to being the more strength you receive from God.
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A Jesus even quoted. This verse Psalm 8, verse 2 in
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an episode in Matthew chapter 21, it was in the temple
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precincts and he'd been healing many people that day and little
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children began singing Hosanna to the son of David save now,
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son of David and the religious leaders didn't like, but the
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children were ascribing a messy. Anak davidic title to Jesus.
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And so they rebuked, not the kids, but Jesus, you should stop
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them. They shouldn't be saying these
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things. Jesus quoted Psalm 8 verse 2,
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which we just read and said to them.
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Have you never read out of the mouths of infants and nursing
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babies? You have prepared, praise.
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It was Jesus is way of saying to them.
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These little kids, they're on my team.
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They lowered themselves and now they'll receive my strength but
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it was Also his way of saying to these highly intellectual.
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We're above you. Jesus kind of guys, you're not
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on my team and you won't receive my strength because you've not
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humbled yourself under the hand of God.
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The Lord is looking for those who are willing to say I and we
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can anybody say that to the Lord today?
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Lord I'm weak before you? I need your help.
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I need your grace. I need your strength.
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I was talking to my dad recently and he was reminiscing with me.
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His high school sporting athletic career.
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As men are prone to do and he was kind of looking back,
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telling me about the good old days of his football career and
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also his wrestling career. And then he brought up this
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really funny story of a of a match that he had while he was
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in high school, his team. His high school down in Southern
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California, was up against another school.
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Who in my Dad's weight class had the reigning state champion.
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So my Dad was scheduled to wrestle against the reigning
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state champion. He's kind of getting psyched up
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for it, you know, young teenage guy.
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Alright, I'm going to wrestle the state champ.
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Apparently, his coach pulled him aside.
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I can't imagine this really happening in modern times, maybe
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this is a wrestling coach kind of thing, but he pulled my dad
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aside and my dad's name is Bill. He said bill, I need to tell you
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you're going to lose tonight. You have no chance against this
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guy. He is that good.
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But Goal is to lose less badly. Because if you lose terribly,
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you're going to cost our team a lot of points.
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So the goal is to lose less badly and cost, our team fewer
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points. So my dad first was discouraged
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but then he embraced the vision and he went out on the mat and
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he basically played dead for the first period, just kind of
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flopped around was dead way. The guy couldn't do anything to
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him some 100 after the first period and he started thinking
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in the second period you know I'm doing pretty good maybe I
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Hold my own against this guy. Maybe my coach is wrong and he
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said, I just had the thought, I'm gonna try a move and he said
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the second I moved a muscle to try uh move this guy knew
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exactly what to do. I was on my back always pin and
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I cost my team as many points as I could possibly cost them.
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I lost the match wrestler, came up to me in between services and
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I was like did I get it right? Is that how the points thing
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works? And he said Ed.
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Yeah. Basically in baseball terms what
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your dad did was give up a bases-loaded home, run a grand
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slam to lose the game. What was happening there?
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His opponent was waiting for him to think I'm strong.
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I got this and I think we have an enemy, an enemy of our souls.
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That is waiting for us. To say the same thing.
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I don't need God, I don't need God's strength.
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I don't need God's help things are good, things are coasting,
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things are cruising. I don't need him in my life.
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I got this on my own. The enemy loves when we think
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we're strong, that's when he can take us out.
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So, the first thing, the person who humbles himself daily and
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says, I need God's strength. I love God.
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God, I love your name, I love who you are.
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My Lord, you're you're my master your beautiful, that person
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receives strength from God. The second thing I wanted to
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show you is that this person receives number 2, meaning from
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God, not just God's strength but also meaning or significance
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from God. What wouldn't you agree that so
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often as human beings? We look to the wrong things for
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significance, we look to the wrong things for meaning.
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We looked for the to the wrong things, too.
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Define us or approve us or make us feel that we are significant
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as human beings. We look to the wrong things so
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often. But this person who's centered
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themselves around God, they are getting their significance from
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God. The god of the universe is
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saying over them. You are important to me and
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every facet of your life can be lived in direct relationship and
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connection to me. So that even the smallest things
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that you're doing on Monday morning in your workplace can be
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done for my kingdom for my Lori for my honor, as an act of
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worship unto me. He can give our lives such great
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meaning. And what we see in the passage
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is David saying this in verse three and four, look at it
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again, with me in your Bibles. He said, God, when I look at
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your Heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon, and the
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stars, which you have set in place, what is, man that you are
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mindful of him and the son of man that you care for him.
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That's not hard for for us to Imagine David having a little
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episode or Moment Like This in his life you might remember that
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David before he became king he was the eighth son of his father
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Jesse and his job in the Family household was to tend or care
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for his father's sheep. He was a Shepherd, there'd be
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long, stretches weeks, maybe even months where he would take
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his dad, sheep out into the Wilderness around Bethlehem
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caring for them and at night Alone without the pollution of
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modern man-made light. David would look to the skies
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and he would see the Brilliance of the Sun or the Brilliance of
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the stars of the Brilliance of the Moon and he would be filled.
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He says with a sense of his own smallness, he asked the
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question, what is man in relationship to all of this?
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But he didn't just stop with a feeling of in.
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In significance or smallness. He then said the and that you're
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mindful of man and that you care for him or that you visit him.
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In other words David was filled with awe that despite his
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smallness in comparison to the Grandeur of the galaxies God
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cared for him. Now, you might feel today, like,
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oh, that's really cool. Probably, what I should do is I
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should go out and I should go on a camping trip.
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For something like that to really get in connection to my
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smallness and relationship to the bigness of Nature and you
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might even feel a little jealous of David, you know, like man all
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those weeks and months even later when he was King and he'd
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have to run and flee for his life out in the wilderness or
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even before he was King fleeing from his father-in-law's saw, I
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saw out in the wilderness, all these moments out in nature o,
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you might say to yourself. I'm jealous of David.
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He got to feel his smallness because he was A man of the
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natural world. What I want to say is I think we
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ourselves even though we're on our screens a lot and looking at
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TVs a lot I think we have an advantage over David.
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His advantage over us was he spent a lot of time in nature
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but our advantage is that we live in a scientific age this
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last summer it was my birthday in July and our family was on
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vacation. So we got to spend all day
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together and that meant that I got to choose whatever I wanted
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to do. All day long.
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I was always my choice all day, Dad, what do you want to do?
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What's next, what are we going to eat, you know, all day long?
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And we decided as a family that we were going to watch a movie.
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Now, if you're a dad with three teenage daughters and a loving
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wife, being able to select whatever movie, you want to
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watch is like, a really big deal.
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You feel like you just won the lottery or something like that.
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So I always when birthdays are coming around or whatever I save
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the movie that I know they're going to buy.
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Walk at the most for that night. So, I'd had it in my mind that I
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wanted to re-watch the movie. Interstellar, any of you guys
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ever seen this movie, it's about seven hours long.
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And if you really want to understand what's happening in
26:04
this movie, you need a PhD and I don't have one of those.
26:08
So it kind of goes over my head in a lot of ways but it's a
26:11
space sci-fi movie and there's wormholes in it, black holes in
26:16
it, astronauts in it. There's time travel in it,
26:19
there's Intergalactic Interstellar travel in it.
26:23
In short, what I'm saying is there's a lot of Concepts in it
26:27
that we have a loose affiliation, to even if we're
26:31
uneducated people on these matters.
26:33
That if you'd said them to David, thousands of years ago,
26:38
it's a, what in the world is an astronaut.
26:41
What are you talking about, now? We live in a scientific age.
26:45
This helps us understand. When we look at the Sun, When we
26:50
look at the stars, when we look at the Moon, we're able to
26:53
understand the Staggering distance.
26:57
The Staggering size of these objects and with each successive
27:02
discovery that we make, we learn ever increasingly of our
27:07
relative smallness in this universe.
27:12
Now, for some people, all this means is that the more we
27:17
discover how small we are all. We're discovering is that we are
27:21
more of an accident than we used to think we were But for the
27:25
Christian for the believer, for the person who's centered around
27:30
God what it helps us understand. His God, it's amazing that you
27:35
love us that on the sixth day of creation, after making all of
27:40
that you said it's time for my final piece, it's time for my
27:46
crowning Jewel. It's time for the part of my
27:49
creation. That is going to be above all
27:52
the rest of my creation. When I make man, And woman in my
27:56
image, how incredible that God would look at us in that way
28:02
that God would give us that kind of meaning in life.
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I don't know if you've ever seen one of those nature shows where
28:10
they've got, like a group of chimpanzees and their community
28:13
and they're observing them. I mean, it's fascinating, it's
28:15
like, here's their societal rules and here's the way they've
28:18
built their community. And here's the guys that are in
28:21
charge and here's the ones that are inferior.
28:24
Look at the The community that these chimpanzees have made and
28:28
I kind of look at it and I'm like, I mean it's cool but it's
28:31
not that impressive. They're like, picking bugs off
28:35
each other. Eating them, you know, stuff
28:36
like that. It's not like what we're
28:39
building. It's not what like, what humans
28:42
are like we are far beyond because God has made us in His
28:46
image, he has given us meaning God sees you brothers and
28:50
sisters. You might feel small, you might
28:54
feel insignificant, you might feel overlooked, but you're not
28:57
overlooked by God. He sees you, he knows you, he
29:00
loves you, he's chosen you, he's called you, he has a plan for
29:04
your life. There's a novel that I like
29:07
called Jaber Crow where the main character is named Jaber.
29:11
He's a barber in an old-time town in his whole life.
29:15
He struggles because he loves a woman that he feels, she's too
29:19
good for him, but he describes On in his story a time where he
29:25
sees her on the street and she looked back at him and makes eye
29:29
contact with him and he says the brief laughing look that she had
29:34
given me made me feel extraordinarily seen as if after
29:39
that I might be visible in the dark.
29:44
That's what this Psalm is. Describing that there is a God
29:48
who even though we are. But a DOT aspect In the expanse
29:53
of his creation. He extraordinarily sees us sees
30:00
you. You are visible in the dark to
30:04
his loving eyes. So God gives us meaning real
30:09
meaning, true. Meaning the last thing though
30:12
that, I want to show you that this life of centering ourselves
30:16
around, God gives us is Dominion.
30:19
It's the word dominion. David speaks of this in verse 5,
30:24
through the end of the song when he says yet you have made us or
30:30
him or mankind Humanity, a little lower than the Heavenly
30:35
beings. And crowned him with Glory and
30:37
Honor, you have given him dominion over the works of your
30:41
hands, you have put all things under his feet and then he goes
30:45
on to list various animals on the land.
30:47
And on this, see the humanity has dominion over All of this
30:52
recalls, of course, the first chapter of the Book of Genesis,
30:55
which, by the way, I know you as a church are studying on
30:59
Wednesday nights together, I think Genesis 15 or so is where
31:03
you're at as a fellowship together and on that first day
31:07
of creation are at first chapter of creation on the sixth day.
31:11
God said that he made men and women to have dominion over the
31:16
fish Birds. Livestock over all the Earth and
31:20
every creeping thing. So in other words, God created
31:23
us to exert dominion over our surroundings on his tyrants.
31:28
But as servants we were supposed to with this Dominion cultivate
31:32
the world as we know it. So I like to think of it like
31:36
God made during creation, the most complicated math equations.
31:43
He made all the beautiful music on musical notations.
31:47
He made all the minerals of the earth and then he put us.
31:51
In the world and said, go figure it out, find those minerals,
31:56
find those codes, find those equations, figure them out and
32:02
apply them so that you can subdue and fill the Earth that I
32:07
have given to you. In other words, we're gone,
32:09
special Creation, with a special task, with a special job.
32:14
We're not here to just wander aimlessly without a mission, and
32:18
of course, on this side of the Cross.
32:20
We, as Christians have Something even better than merely filling
32:23
the Earth and subdue it, but subduing it, but we get to go
32:27
into all of the world and to also make disciples of all
32:31
Nations, teaching them all that Jesus has taught us and life and
32:36
proper alignment with God, gets this Dominion aspect, right?
32:43
It does not seek to advance itself above God.
32:46
As so many people do. If I were God, this is what I
32:50
would do or if God is really God, then why does he do this
32:53
advancing themselves above God? Nor does it lower itself to a
32:59
life of animalistic impulse? A life that is just following
33:04
the passions and desires of the body?
33:08
Instead, this person like David said, in the psalm is below The
33:13
Heavenly beings, but is above the animal species above the
33:18
created order, right in the middle reporting to God
33:22
managing, all that God has entrusted to us in Luke chapter
33:27
15. There's a great example of those
33:29
two extremes. You might know Luke chapter 15
33:33
is the chapter that houses. Jesus's parable of the prodigal
33:37
son. There are two men two sons in
33:41
that story though. The first is the prodigal, he
33:45
wanted his inheritance early, he went and spend it on partying
33:50
and wild living until he was so broken by life that he found
33:54
himself lower than the pigs that he'd been hired to take care of
34:00
you. Remember the story, he said to
34:01
himself, if only, I could eat the slop that I've been hired to
34:05
feed to the pigs. And so, he determined, I'm going
34:08
to go home, I'm going to see if my dad might let me come into
34:12
His household. Is a son, but as a slave, but
34:15
when he returned his father, saw him from afar off and ran to
34:19
him, put the ring upon his finger killed, the fatted, calf
34:23
and throw a feast for him. He received him fully and by the
34:27
way brothers and sisters. If you're here today and you're
34:30
wondering if God is willing to embrace, you willing to accept
34:34
you, you might be thinking to yourself.
34:36
Maybe I've done too much. God cannot forgive me, not bring
34:39
me back. Will not bring me back into his
34:42
family. You Need to know.
34:43
We have a kind of God who will gird himself and run to you.
34:48
He wants to receive you if you will receive him.
34:53
But there was a son, an older son who saw the actions of his
34:57
father that day and was angry. He was miffed that his dad had
35:01
behaved in this way. He rebuked his father.
35:03
Why have you done this? He's been off living in this
35:06
way. Why have you killed the
35:09
fattened? Calf thrown a party and a
35:11
celebration for this. Rebellious son.
35:14
What I want you to see is that both of these Sons were out of
35:19
alignment with their true position.
35:22
The first lowered himself to be like the animals.
35:26
The second, exalted himself above the Father, the first
35:31
lived by his animalistic, impulses and desires, and the
35:36
second thought of himself like a god smarter than the dad that
35:42
God had given him. But when we are in a position of
35:45
proper worship, and love for God, we regain our proper
35:49
position. We're not like the animals.
35:52
Nor Are we more intelligent than God?
35:55
We're in the middle, were below, him below the Angelic realm, but
36:01
above creation. And when we worship the Lord,
36:06
like, David in this Psalm, we get that Dominion that God has
36:10
given to us back. We get that Issue in back from
36:14
him. Now at this point, as I wrap
36:18
things up it's good to ask a couple of kind of soul searching
36:24
questions. It's good for us to ask how our
36:28
lives are going. It's good for us to ask the
36:32
question, who is the man? Or who is the woman that has
36:37
this level of self-mastery? Who out there is actually
36:42
flourishing like this? And If we're honest, there's
36:47
even a temptation to kind of fake this a little bit, isn't
36:51
there? You know, in the church Lobby
36:53
your life's a mess. Someone says, how's it going?
36:57
Oh, good super good. Flourishing, you want to say
37:02
that? You want to believe that you
37:04
want to experience that. But who Among Us really has this
37:08
level of strength. who Among Us really turns to God only and
37:13
exclusively for our meaning who Among Us has dominion and
37:17
self-control the book of Hebrews, even talks about this
37:21
issue, this problem, It quotes from Psalm 2 by saying in
37:27
Hebrews 2 verse 7, you made us for a little while lower than
37:32
the Angels you've crowned us with Glory and Honor, you put
37:36
everything in subjection under our feet but now Hebrews Says
37:40
this now in putting everything in subjection to us, God left.
37:46
Nothing outside of our control. But at present, he says, we do
37:52
not yet, see everything in subjection to us.
37:57
This is the Hebrews author way of saying, look around, we might
38:04
have been created for Dominion. But there's chaos creation Wars
38:12
against us. So many things are outside of
38:15
our control hurricanes and natural disasters.
38:20
So easily overcome us and then look at our own lives.
38:25
Personally, it's hard to even keep our own schedule under
38:29
control. We feel overrun, we feel we
38:32
don't have dominion, but listen to what the author to the
38:36
Hebrews tells He says, but we see him who for a little while
38:44
was also made lower than the Angels namely Jesus, crowned
38:49
with Glory and Honor because of the suffering of death.
38:52
So that by the grace of God Jesus might taste death for
38:58
everyone. So the question is, who really
39:02
does live the whole person life who really has flourished, As a
39:08
human. And the answer is so simple,
39:10
none of us, but Jesus, amen, Jesus came and lived the perfect
39:16
flourishing life in total control with total strength with
39:21
total meaning, total purpose, total significance that you and
39:26
I could never really live. And then died on the cross on
39:32
our behalf and rose from the dead.
39:35
So that if we believe in him, he brings us into his family.
39:39
And now listen to me here. This as we walk with Jesus as we
39:46
sing and live a life of verse 1 and 9 Lord.
39:50
Our Lord. How Majestic is your name?
39:52
In all the Earth has we live that way.
39:55
Guess what? We get back progressively little
39:58
by little from Rita glory to use some new testament terms for it.
40:04
We get our Dominion back. He begins to restore us more and
40:10
more into the original intention and purpose that God had for us
40:15
when he made us but that we lost because of sin.
40:21
I'm going to wrap it up today with a quotation from a lil from
40:26
a from a children's book that many of you may have read at
40:29
some Point called The Little Prince you ever read this book.
40:32
I read it this last summer, just for fun.
40:35
It's an interesting story. It's about a little prince of an
40:40
asteroid or a little planet out in space and he makes a decision
40:45
to go on a voyage. It actually reads a lot like a
40:48
metaphor for Jesus. He comes to Earth and he
40:52
everything he sees on the way, speaks to him, of the Brokenness
40:55
of humanity, the depravity of man, but he comes to Earth and
41:00
Is in a desert. He meets different animals,
41:03
they're able to speak, they have conversations together and one
41:07
day he meets a little fox. He'd never seen a fox before,
41:11
but the fox had seen little boys before, and so they begin to
41:14
speak and the Little Prince asked, the fox about his life.
41:20
What is life? Like for a little fox?
41:22
The fox said this, he said my life is monotonous.
41:28
I hunt chickens and Men. Hunt me all chickens are alike
41:33
and all men are alike. So I get a little bored with my
41:36
life. But if you were to tame me, my
41:41
life would be full of sunshine. I would recognize the sound of
41:46
footsteps different from all others.
41:50
Other footsteps, send me hurrying underground to hide but
41:54
yours would call me out of my burro, like the sound of music
42:00
and Look over there. Do you see the corn fields?
42:03
I don't eat bread. Wheat is of no, use to me.
42:07
Those cornfields don't remind me of anything and I find that
42:12
rather sad but you you have hair the color of gold.
42:18
So it will be marvelous when you have tamed me, we which is also
42:23
golden will remind me of you. And I will love the sound of the
42:28
wind in the wheat. The fox became silent and gazed
42:34
for a long time. At The Little Prince and said, I
42:38
beg of you. Tame me.
42:43
I believe that that fox is like us in our Natural State without
42:49
god without Jesus without him in our lives.
42:51
Our lives are, as he said monotonous repetitive without
42:57
point or flavor, or excitement, where untamable?
43:01
But when Jesus comes into our lives and does what could not be
43:05
done by ourselves and tames us, we begin to get purpose and
43:11
passion and meaning in life. Life.
43:14
And this is what we need brothers and sisters for Christ
43:18
to tame us to diffuse our lives with significance and meaning
43:24
because it's only Jesus that can make us Thrive.
43:28
It is only Jesus that can truly tame our souls.
43:34
Amen, let's pray together church and ask God to do just that in
43:39
US. Lord, we thank you for who you
43:42
are today. We thank you a fresh that even
43:47
though we're so small in light of the cosmos, you love us.
43:52
And we invite you Lord, more and more into our lives to change
43:56
and transform us from the inside out that we might experience the
43:59
Dominion that you have for us. I think, Lord right now of A
44:04
man, whose life is off the rails.
44:07
Out of control, his passions have dominated him to the point
44:12
that he's being driven into the ground, Lord rescue.
44:18
Lord become beautiful to him and tame him.
44:22
Or we ask that you do this in all of our lives and as I pray,
44:27
perhaps you're here this morning and you recognize that you don't
44:30
yet know Jesus. The good news for you is that he
44:35
came to live the perfect life that none of us could ever live
44:40
and die a death in our place. Taking all of our punishment in
44:45
the cross. We know that it was effective
44:48
because he rose from the grave on the third day.
44:52
The Bible teaches that if you believe in your heart that Jesus
44:57
has done this for you and if you confess him with your mouth, You
45:03
will be saved. You will be brought into the
45:05
family of God. He'll wash from you, all of your
45:09
shame and guilt and imperfection, and he'll make you
45:14
new and continue to renew you until the day he comes again.
45:20
What you need to do today is to turn from your old life and
45:25
believe in Jesus. And if you feel today that that
45:30
describes you, I want you in your heart to say something like
45:34
this to God, say God have mercy on me a sinner.
45:41
Come into my life today right now.
45:45
And make me new. Forgive me of all that I've ever
45:49
done and all that I ever will do.
45:54
Thank you for sending Jesus to live a life.
45:59
I never could. And to die death, on my behalf
46:07
and to rise from the grave. Help me now.
46:11
Lord, to live my life. No longer for me but now for you
46:20
In Jesus name, we pray together. Amen.
46:24
God bless you guys. We pray that you've been
46:27
encouraged by this Bible. Study delivered live from the
46:29
sanctuary of Calvary Church for prayer, call us at 877, 30
46:35
Grace. That's eight 77304, 2:53 to
46:41
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46:44
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46:49
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