Worship for Today

The Lord is awe-inspiring, fascinating, intriguing, majestic, and full of splendor: breathtaking! Here is what I saw of him in Psalm 147:10-11,

“His [the Lord’s] pleasure is not in the strength of the horse, nor his delight in the legs of a man; the Lord delights in those who fear him, who put their hope in his unfailing love.”

Here are the two appropriate responses for all of us to our Lord: to “fear him” and to put our “hope in his unfailing love.” Those who respond to the Lord in both are the ones the Lord delights in. The love of the Lord and those realities concerning his fearsome judgment and retribution are not in contradiction as some might seem to think. The notion that God in the Old Testament was a god of judgment but God in the New Testament is a god of love as opposites is simply not supported by what he reveals of himself in each. He is both things in both testaments. Those who fail to recognize the love of the Lord and labor under a concept of God as a demanding taskmaster do him a disservice. Those who fail to recognize the fearful aspects of the Lord and bounce along in life viewing God as little more than an old lovable fuzz ball do him disservice as well. God is both fearsome and loving: always has been, is today and always will be. In his love he sent his Son into the world to die a miserable death on our behalf, in his fearsome judgment and retribution he expressed his wrath on his Son to extract payment for sin.

What catches my eye this morning though, is something that has always struck me as astounding: the Lord delights in us when we respond to him aright! To think that the Creator of all, the Lord Almighty who can slay any nation’s army with a word, the One whose plans and purposes confound and perplex the wisest of enemies – this One delights in me when I respond to him appropriately! We all have the ability to delight the heart of the Lord! As I think of it this morning I consider just how important it is to me today to delight the heart of the One who sent his Son to hang on a cross for me, to take my punishment for the sin in my life, to extend his righteousness to me that I may have a place at his table! What a Lord this is! Worthy of our fear and our hope in his unfailing love!

Anything of the Lord capture your heart from Scripture today? Share your thoughts of worship with us from your Bible reading today. We’d love to hear from you!

Trevor V. Fisk

(314) 814-8486

trevorf@gracehill.org

 

 

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Worship for Today

The Lord is awe-inspiring, fascinating, intriguing, majestic, and full of splendor: breathtaking! Here is what I saw of him in Psalm 146:5-6,

“Blessed is he whose help is the God of Jacob, whose hope is in the Lord his God, the Maker of heaven and earth, the sea, and everything in them— the Lord, who remains faithful forever.”

From my perspective there are those in life who have strengths others of us may not have. Certainly athletes who prepare themselves and condition their bodies for things like the Olympic games, etc. have great strength. But as we all know strength is viewed from a number of perspectives. There are those who have strengths in technical areas, as engineers, scientists, doctors and so forth. There are those who have “strong” personalities, who are anything but “thin skinned”, resilient and not pushed in any direction by those around them. There is also strength of character, morally upstanding people with resolute control over the temptations many of the rest of us struggle with.

Which brings me to folks like me – the rest of us who seem to struggle with various weaknesses and recognize a need for help, a need for strength, a need for someone in our lives to help us in this life. I think that is what the major big idea of the Sermon on the Mount that Jesus gave is all about. We have great need. Simple lust in the heart or anger toward someone else betrays I have weaknesses. I suspect all do.

For folks like me, the psalmist points us in a direction. It is away from mortal men who cannot save. He tells us “Blessed is he whose help is the God of Jacob, whose help is in the Lord his God”, verse 5. It is he who remains faithful forever! And look at who it is the Lord has on his heart: the oppressed (verse 7), the hungry (verse 7), prisoners (verse 7), the blind (verse 8), those who are “bowed down” – struggling (verse 8), the alien (verse 9), the fatherless and the widow (verse 9).

Where this world seeks out the strong, the beautiful, the glamorous, the “cream of the crop”, the heart of our wonderful God seeks out those who struggle, who are at times desperate, the hurting and the needy. Such is the wonderful heart of our Creator God! What a heart this is!

Here is what is so wonderful about our Lord. He has always, in faithfulness, proven himself to have our very best in his heart in his own righteous way! All he has ever done proves just that!

Trevor V. Fisk

(314) 814-8486

trevorf@gracehill.org

 

 

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This electronic transmission and any documents accompanying this electronic transmission contain confidential information belonging to the sender. This information may contain confidential health information that is legally privileged. The information is intended only for the use of the individual or entity named above. The authorized recipient of this transmission is prohibited from disclosing this information to any other party unless required to do so by law or regulation and is required to delete or destroy the information after its stated need has been fulfilled. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any disclosure, copying, distribution or takinf of any action in reliance on or regarding the contents of this electronicallytransmitted information is strictly prohibited. If you have received this E-mail in error please notify the sender and delete this message immediately

Worship for Today: The Lord is faithful and righteous - he brings relief!

The Lord is awe-inspiring, fascinating, intriguing, majestic, and full of splendor: breathtaking! Here is what I saw of him in Psalm 143:1,

“O Lord, hear my prayer, listen to my cry for mercy; in your faithfulness and righteousness come to my relief.”

In this psalm David cries out to the Lord. His crushing enemy pursues him and thrusts him into a deadly “darkness”, verse 3. This results in his spirit growing weak in dismay, verse 4. A disheartened and desperate David looks to his Lord with a thirsting heart as a dry parched land looks for refreshing rain, verse 6.

Although many of us show up on Sunday mornings in church all cleaned up, in our best clothes with smiles and our best face forward, the reality is that every one of us lives in a cursed and fallen world with its challenges and as we struggle with those challenges we are each dogged with a sin nature that has its own agenda. In short, life can be somewhat perplexing and even discouraging at times – to all of us. Although I am prone to view the enemies that David had from a military combat or political perspective, I suspect that at times in his psalms the enemy that we read of is his own struggle with the discouragement and despair that the world and his own sin nature brought to his life.

David responds to his discouraging struggle by calling out to the Lord, making his plea for relief. We also read of his meditation, as he remembers the “days of long ago, I meditate on all your works and consider what your hands have done.” Verse 5. It is from this perspective that David acknowledges the “faithfulness and righteousness” of the Lord. It is on the very basis of these that David makes his appeal to the Lord to come to his relief.

Here is what is so wonderful about our Lord. He has always, in faithfulness, proven himself to have our very best in his heart in his own righteous way! All he has ever done proves just that!

Anything of the Lord capture your heart from Scripture today? Share your theme of worship with us from your Bible reading today. We’d love to hear from you!

Trevor V. Fisk

(314) 814-8486

trevorf@gracehill.org

 

 

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This electronic transmission and any documents accompanying this electronic transmission contain confidential information belonging to the sender. This information may contain confidential health information that is legally privileged. The information is intended only for the use of the individual or entity named above. The authorized recipient of this transmission is prohibited from disclosing this information to any other party unless required to do so by law or regulation and is required to delete or destroy the information after its stated need has been fulfilled. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any disclosure, copying, distribution or takinf of any action in reliance on or regarding the contents of this electronicallytransmitted information is strictly prohibited. If you have received this E-mail in error please notify the sender and delete this message immediately

Worship for Today: The Lord exalts his name and his word!

The Lord is awe-inspiring, fascinating, intriguing, majestic, and full of splendor: breathtaking! Here is what I saw of him in Psalm 138:2,

“I will bow down toward your holy temple and will praise your name for your love and your faithfulness, for you have exalted above all things your name and your word.”

This morning I think of just how exalted is the name and the word of the Lord. I acknowledge that there is nothing created the Lord did not create. All of us owe our existence to our Creator God. Whether we choose to acknowledge him, let alone embrace him in faith, he nevertheless is the one who has brought all of us, all things, into existence. As we read in John’s gospel, “Through him [the Word: Jesus Christ] all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made.” Due to this alone it is understandable when we read that every knee shall bow, “Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” Beyond this, there is the wonderful love of the Lord, his kindness, mercy, forgiveness, and sacrifice on our behalf as well as his fearful wrath and judgment. Surely the name of the Lord is and will be exalted!

In conjunction with the exaltation of the Lord’s name, the psalmist speaks of the Lord exalting his word. I don’t think enough can be said of the Lord’s word which we have in our Bibles. We read that it is the just cause of the Lord’s word that the kings of the earth should praise the Lord and sing of his ways, “when they hear the words of your mouth”, verse 4. It is due to this word that the psalmist is able to take great comfort in the Lord’s love and faithfulness, verse 2. The Lord has chosen to reveal himself to us in his word. There we learn of him, who he is, what he is like, what his agenda is and the purposes for which he created us. Any who reject the Bible, God’s word, is a fool. Recognizing the veracity, authenticity, truthfulness and authority of the Scriptures is the first step in gaining a heart and mind of wisdom. All who assail it will ever flounder about never knowing the Lord and his purpose for their lives.

Surely both the name of the Lord and the word of the Lord are exalted!

Anything of the Lord capture your heart from Scripture today? Share your theme of worship with us from your Bible reading today. We’d love to hear from you!

Trevor V. Fisk

(314) 814-8486

trevorf@gracehill.org

 

 

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This electronic transmission and any documents accompanying this electronic transmission contain confidential information belonging to the sender. This information may contain confidential health information that is legally privileged. The information is intended only for the use of the individual or entity named above. The authorized recipient of this transmission is prohibited from disclosing this information to any other party unless required to do so by law or regulation and is required to delete or destroy the information after its stated need has been fulfilled. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any disclosure, copying, distribution or takinf of any action in reliance on or regarding the contents of this electronicallytransmitted information is strictly prohibited. If you have received this E-mail in error please notify the sender and delete this message immediately

Worship for Today: The Lord will remove the wicked.

The Lord is awe-inspiring, fascinating, intriguing, majestic, and full of splendor: breathtaking! Here is what I saw of him in Psalm 125:3,

“The scepter of the wicked will not remain over the land allotted to the righteous, for then the righteous might use their hands to do evil.”

We live in a world that has rejected and spurned God. From the days of Adam people have sinned and rebelled against the Lord and gone their own way. Each of us has inherited a sin nature, as Paul speaks of in Romans 1:21-32. Collectively, this sin nature of mankind flourishes and is expressed in so many ways in our culture and society. At times it can be very perplexing and discouraging to live in this world, in its estrangement from God and the things we see taking place around us.

This verse from Psalm 125 reminds me of another day, a better day that is coming our way. For those of us who have turned to the Lord and embraced him in faith, we look for a time when there will be a great change. We read of a new heaven and a new earth, Revelation 21:1-4, where God will live with men! There we read of no more death or mourning or crying or pain. It will be a new order. One very exciting aspect of this is that the wicked will no longer be in our midst. What confounds and discourages us about governments and leaders and elections, attitudes toward what is considered right and respectable in our culture, the push for personal power and wealth over principle will drop from our midst as the Lord brings to an end the world as we know it today.

Of this “new Jerusalem” we read, “The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their splendor into it. On no day will its gates ever be shut, for there will be no night there. The glory and honor of the nations will be brought into it. Nothing impure will ever enter it, nor will anyone who does what is shameful or deceitful, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb's book of life.” Revelation 21:24-27.

That wonderful day is coming when we will no longer be subject to “the scepter of the wicked” as the Lord will remove the wicked entirely from our midst!

Anything of the Lord capture your heart from Scripture today? Share your theme of worship with us from your Bible reading today. We’d love to hear from you!

Trevor V. Fisk

(314) 814-8486

trevorf@gracehill.org

 

 

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This electronic transmission and any documents accompanying this electronic transmission contain confidential information belonging to the sender. This information may contain confidential health information that is legally privileged. The information is intended only for the use of the individual or entity named above. The authorized recipient of this transmission is prohibited from disclosing this information to any other party unless required to do so by law or regulation and is required to delete or destroy the information after its stated need has been fulfilled. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any disclosure, copying, distribution or takinf of any action in reliance on or regarding the contents of this electronicallytransmitted information is strictly prohibited. If you have received this E-mail in error please notify the sender and delete this message immediately

Worship for Today: The Lord provides wisdom in the Scriptures!

The Lord is awe-inspiring, fascinating, intriguing, majestic, and full of splendor: breathtaking! Here is what I saw of him in Psalm 119:99-100,

“I have more insight than all my teachers, for I meditate on your statutes. I have more understanding than the elders, for I obey your precepts.”

Who is the wisest among us here on earth? Who is it that has the greatest understanding of God and the things of God? Who knows which movement of the church, which teaching that comes along, which perspective in a theological debate is the right course? Who is it that can sense best what it is that God might be doing in the world today?

Is it the pastor of the church, one who serves in the denominational hierarchy? Is it the theology professor that teaches in seminary? Is it the author of the latest best-seller at the Christian bookstore? Is it the leader of the latest movement within the church? Is it the one who orchestrated the most successful church plant that resulted in a stadium-sized ministry? Is it the one who evangelizes more, who feeds more of the poor and destitute in third world countries?

The answer to these questions is found in our verses here. The one who “meditates on your statutes” and obeys them! God has provided for all of us the opportunity to be wise, to have greater insight and understanding through his statutes and precepts, that is, his word, the Scriptures! Paul puts it like this in his second letter to Timothy, “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.” 2 Timothy 3:16-17.

How wonderful it is that it is not the “elites”, not just the academics, not just those who have earned a measure of visible success that can pursue and apprehend wisdom! God has made wisdom available to us all and it is found in our meditation and obedience to the Bible! The Lord provides wisdom for any of us, not just the teachers and elders!

Anything of the Lord capture your heart from Scripture today? Share your theme of worship with us from your Bible reading today. We’d love to hear from you!

Trevor V. Fisk

(314) 814-8486

trevorf@gracehill.org

 

 

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This electronic transmission and any documents accompanying this electronic transmission contain confidential information belonging to the sender. This information may contain confidential health information that is legally privileged. The information is intended only for the use of the individual or entity named above. The authorized recipient of this transmission is prohibited from disclosing this information to any other party unless required to do so by law or regulation and is required to delete or destroy the information after its stated need has been fulfilled. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any disclosure, copying, distribution or takinf of any action in reliance on or regarding the contents of this electronicallytransmitted information is strictly prohibited. If you have received this E-mail in error please notify the sender and delete this message immediately

Worship for Today: To the Lord belongs eternal praise!

The Lord is awe-inspiring, fascinating, intriguing, majestic, and full of splendor: breathtaking! Here is what I saw of him in Psalm 111:10,

“To him belongs eternal praise.”

This is the last phrase in a wonderful psalm that, in ten short verses, tells us anything and everything we would ever need to know about the Lord. What is revealed here in this short psalm about the Lord could be studied for years and that study would only begin to scratch the surface of what this psalm presents about who the Lord is, what he is like and the kinds of things he does. The theology presented in this psalm is full-bloom and matured. Contained within it is what anyone needs to know about the Lord to keep from the rampant apostasy and false teaching the world is immersed in today. Just look at what is presented in this psalm about the Lord:

The works of the Lord are great, verse 2, they are glorious and majestic, verse 3, they are “steadfast” and done in faithfulness and uprightness, verse 8.

The Lord causes his wonders to be remembered (he reveals himself with purpose), verse 4.

The Lord’s righteousness endures forever (he never will ever change!), verse 3.

The Lord is gracious and compassionate, verse 4.

The Lord provides, verse 5.

The Lord remembers his covenant forever (he is true to his word, faithful!), verses 5 and 9.

The Lord reveals his power to his people in his blessing of them, verse 6.

What the Lord does is faithful and just (he is fair and just all the time!), verse 7.

His word is trustworthy (truthful – we can trust what we have in our Bibles!), verse 7.

The Lord provides redemption, verse 9.

The Lord’s name is holy and awesome (he is holy and awesome!), verse 9.

Anyone of these could take a lifetime of study. We are told in verse two that the works of the Lord are pondered by all who delight in them and verse ten tells us that all who follow his precepts have good understanding! “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom”. I would suggest a thorough understanding of this psalm is a great place to start. What a wonderful Lord we have, certainly to him belongs eternal praise!

Anything of the Lord capture your heart from Scripture today? Share your theme of worship with us from your Bible reading today. We’d love to hear from you!

Trevor V. Fisk

(314) 814-8486

trevorf@gracehill.org

 

 

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This electronic transmission and any documents accompanying this electronic transmission contain confidential information belonging to the sender. This information may contain confidential health information that is legally privileged. The information is intended only for the use of the individual or entity named above. The authorized recipient of this transmission is prohibited from disclosing this information to any other party unless required to do so by law or regulation and is required to delete or destroy the information after its stated need has been fulfilled. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any disclosure, copying, distribution or takinf of any action in reliance on or regarding the contents of this electronicallytransmitted information is strictly prohibited. If you have received this E-mail in error please notify the sender and delete this message immediately

Worship for Today: The Lord's love endures forever!

The Lord is awe-inspiring, fascinating, intriguing, majestic, and full of splendor: breathtaking! Here is what I saw of him in Psalm 106:1-2,

“Praise the Lord. Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; his love endures forever. Who can proclaim the mighty acts of the Lord or fully declare his praise?”

In the first of these two verses is a refrain not uncommon in the book of Psalms, “his love endures forever”. In Psalm 136 it is the second line of each of the 26 verses of that psalm. That psalm raises in my mind the thought that possibly the singers in the temple worship in Jerusalem were divided into two groups, the one extolling the Lord’s wonderful works and the other responding with the refrain, “his love endures forever” as each work of the Lord is told.

The phrase “his love endures forever” to me is much more than just window dressing to adorn this psalm. It holds a vital truth about God that is very important to me. To know that God’s love is not something that is here today and may be gone at some time in the future is very important to me. It is in God’s love that I rest secure, knowing that he has my best interests in his heart. It is God’s love that prompted him to send his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. It is God’s love that has prepared a place for us in his kingdom. It is God’s love that keeps us in him until we reach the resurrection! It is God’s love that provides for us all we need to find joy, happiness, fulfillment and purpose in life!

To know that this love of the Lord endures forever, that it will never change and that it will be the driving force for his interaction with those of us who have embraced him in faith is simply a wonderful and awesome thing. Those who have not embraced him in faith will face his wrath, but for us, we have a hope and future for which we could never fully declare the praise due him! Possibly this is why we find this phrase repeated in various places.

Anything of the Lord capture your heart from Scripture today? Share your theme of worship with us from your Bible reading today. We’d love to hear from you!

Trevor V. Fisk

(314) 814-8486

trevorf@gracehill.org

 

 

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This electronic transmission and any documents accompanying this electronic transmission contain confidential information belonging to the sender. This information may contain confidential health information that is legally privileged. The information is intended only for the use of the individual or entity named above. The authorized recipient of this transmission is prohibited from disclosing this information to any other party unless required to do so by law or regulation and is required to delete or destroy the information after its stated need has been fulfilled. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any disclosure, copying, distribution or takinf of any action in reliance on or regarding the contents of this electronicallytransmitted information is strictly prohibited. If you have received this E-mail in error please notify the sender and delete this message immediately