A Glimpse

Praise the LORD! Praise God in His sanctuary! Praise Him in the sky, which testifies to His strength! Praise Him for His mighty acts! Praise Him for His surpassing greatness! Praise Him with the blast of the horn! Praise Him with the lyre and the harp! Praise Him with the tambourine and with dancing! Praise Him with stringed instruments and the flute! Praise Him with loud cymbals! Praise Him with clanging cymbals! Let everything that has breath praise the LORD! Praise the LORD!  Psalms 150:1-6 NET

Hearts filled with praise, with gratitude that brings us to our knees before our mighty, gracious Lord of all. Singing, praying, acknowledging with grateful hearts all that the Lord has done for us, is doing for us, challenges us to find our places in the story of Christ’s kingdom and to look for Him to write new chapters in the story through our lives.  

Praising God does this for us far more effectually than anything; it not only makes us aware of our ties to the saints who have gone before us, it challenges us to build upon that past.   And taking our praises to heaven in worship give usa glimpse of Holy Spirit that awakens us to the future at His side when we are called home.  

Philippians 1:9-11 NET  And I pray this, that your love may abound even more and more in knowledge and every kind of insight so that you can decide what is best, and thus be sincere and blameless for the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ to the glory and praise of God.  

And so we must worship now in light of God’s future, in ways that are helpful to all. Jesus Christ loves each of us who know Him as our Lord and Saviour.  He has always offered salvation, just as much as ever He did while walking the earth. And He extends that invitation to each and every person who seeks Him whether we have never known Him or have taken our eyes off Him!  

By His blood, Christ has brought us all the way behind the curtain and into a new and blessed way of life and worship before the face of God. Because new covenant worship takes place in heaven, it is spiritual and regenerative in its very nature. 

Romans 14:11 NET For it is written, “ As I live, says the Lord, every knee will bow to me, and every tongue will give praise to God.”

Our worship gets to be marked by God’s vibrancy and promises. With confidence we can draw near the throne of grace, asking Jesus’ help in these times of great need — His help to create harmony between all of His followers that captures all ages; His help to share Christ in ways that speak to circumstances; His help to offer a hope that gives souls opportunities to sing, write, speak, pray with a full range of emotion, from wailing lament to uninhibited joy filled praise. 

As we become aware that this great cloud of witnesses are actually fellow worshippers with us, we gain a new sense of the continuity of God’s kingdom across the ages!  He is all that is, all that was, all that will be!

Wow I’m just humbled with these thoughts, what a beautiful moment in time this is, we are so so grateful - May we understand that spiritual growth is about experiencing God’s eternal truths while living in a temporary world. We (each of us!) are being made new through the grace of Jesus.  Holy Spirit lives in us. The Lord’s love never fails us.  Desperate dependence on Christ, Holy Spirit, and God is what we are after. We cannot do a single thing of value for the eternal realm without His power. 

The following is our prayer for all of us as we head into the week ahead:

1) Live in the light of eternity. Holy Spirit is the key to wisdom. Life is short. Live fully surrendered to Christ with no regrets.

2) Be satisfied each day by God’s unfailing love, rather than by the status of the world, it’s success or approval.

3) Live for God’s work, rather than our own; God’s deeds, rather than our deeds.

4) Recognize the beauty of the Lord in one another, and seek His favor above all others.

5) It is God who establishes our work so that the fruit of our lives is bears His fruit.

We live in a world where we have to deal with uncertainty, and in spite of trying to be intentional about avoiding the bad news that seems to overflow from a multitude of sources  - we can hardly escape the gloomy realities of these uncertain times and many hearts become saturated with fear and anxiety. 

My friends this is not how God’s people are to live! With Jesus Christ we are saved we are strong we are His.  Stand beside Jesus. Kneel before Jesus. Pray with Jesus…... Be consistent and steadfast with your time spent in His presence. He is here within us, above us, among us

The world is scared.  People are scared.  We are scared.

But because of Jesus Christ we need not fear.