Tag: awe

Psalm 63 (Part Eight)

I will praise you as long as I live, and in your name I will lift up my hands. I will be fully satisfied as with the richest of foods; with singing lips my mouth will praise you (63:4-5 NIV).

Our focus is on being satisfied in our relationship with the holy and majestic God, the overflowing source of love, joy, and peace. This happens as we worship (declare and display the worthiness) in the fullness of life. God did not “invent worship” to make us feel miserable or to give us an emotional high. Instead, the Lord wants us to be satisfied or filled. In his book Desiring God, John Piper mentions three stages of worship that saints go through.

  • The lowest stage is that of barrenness of soul, where a person scarcely feels any desire for God, yet is repentant for having so little love for God (Psalm 73:21-22). In this stage, we have our souls focused on ourselves and the events of life. We do not think of God properly (according to how he has revealed himself in the scriptures), and we may feel frustration or perhaps even bitterness. Yet we continue to know that God is involved in life.
  • The second stage is that of tasting something of God and longing to know more of him (Psalms 42:1-2; 84:2; 143:6). The soul begins to hunger and thirst for personal fellowship with our sovereign God. We begin to experience hope and preach that to our souls. Why, my soul, are you so dejected? Why are you in such turmoil? Put your hope in God, for I will still praise him, my Savior and my God (Psalm 42:5 CSB).
  • The third stage is that mentioned in our text. We begin to rejoice in the Lord. Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! (Philippians 4:4 CSB). We are satisfied in what he is. We drink of his living water and are glad (Psalms 4:6-7; 5:11; 9:2) We taste of him with our spirits and find in our experience that he is good. Taste and see that the Lord is good. How happy is the person who takes refuge in him! (Psalm 34:8) Our hearts become stirred by a noble theme as we lay hold of the ascended Christ by faith (Psalm 45:1).

However, the experience of many evangelicals in the previous 150 years to the present has been reduced to a barren intellectualism or decisionism. They have acted like or taught that the experience of the early church (cf. Acts 2:46-47; 4:23-31; etc.) is not for today. They have become strangers to truth written in passages like (Ephesians 3:14-19; 5:18-20; Philippians 4:7; 1 Peter 1:8; 2 Peter 1:8; etc.) Since most teaching in churches concerns how to be happy personally and to solve one’s problems, God has become the missing person in most churches.

“Where is the knowledge of God? Where is the sense of awe? Where is this great thing found in the Bible, when men and women have known that they have been in the presence of the living God? Surely this is the great difference between modern evangelicalism and that older evangelicalism that obtained until the middle of the last [nineteenth] century…? Where has this sense of godliness gone, this sense of wonder and amazement and the ‘joy unspeakable and full of glory’?” (Lloyd-Jones, Enjoying the Presence of God, p. 115)

“The end God designs is, to draw our hearts and affections unto himself, and unto this end he gives unto us a glorious internal light, whereby we may be enabled to discern the true nature of the things that we are to cleave unto with love and delight. Without this we have nothing but false images of spiritual things in our minds; not always as unto the truth or doctrine of concerning them, but as unto their reality, power, and efficacy… He that believes in Christ in a due manner, who thereon discovers the excellency of his person and the glory of his mediation, will both love him, and, on his believing, ‘rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory’” (Owen, Works, Vol. 7, p. 447).

You love him even though you have never seen him. Though you do not see him now, you trust him; and you rejoice with a glorious, inexpressible joy (1 Peter 1:8 NLT). Amen.

Grace and peace, David

Thinking about God and His Friendship with His People (Part Five)

Psalm 25:8-15

Our focus in this series concerns God as the friend of his people. The Lord is good and upright, he forgives great sin, and he confides in his people. We are now considering how to respond to God’s friendship. What does God expect of us in friendship? This text mentions four ways to express friendship with God (humility, obedience, godly mindedness and fear of the Lord). Last time we learned that we express friendship with God by being humble before him (25:9).

Let us think, next, about a matter that troubles many: friendship and fear of the Lord (25:12, 14).

Their concern can be traced to a misunderstanding of 1 John 4:18. There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love (ESV). What they overlook is that John is talking about having fear on the Day of Judgment. That fear is cast out by the love of God set forth in Christ’s propitiatory sacrifice (1 John 4:8-17). However, it is still very clear that we are to fear God (Luke 12:4-5; 2 Corinthians 7:1; Hebrews 12:28-29; 1 Peter 2:17). That a correct fear of God is consistent with friendship with God is clearly seen in our text (25:14).

What does it mean to fear God as part of friendship with him? Consider the relationship between knowing God and fearing him. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight (Proverbs 9:10 ESV). In this connection, we can say that the fear of the Lord is the inner responsiveness to learn of the Lord in his majestic greatness. So then, if we are learning God, as he has revealed himself in nature and in the Scriptures (cf. Psalm 19), what are we learning? People who learn the Lord carry with them a deep awareness or awe or reverence for God’s infinity, transcendence, immanence, power, wisdom, holiness, grace and love. Let’s think of some truths that God reveals about himself. Read and meditate on the texts below and pray for the Spirit of God to cause you to react in awe of your covenant Lord. God (is):

  • the First and the Last. I am the Living One (Revelation 1:17-18)
  • the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God (1 Timothy 1:17)
  • Holy, holy, holy… the whole earth is full of his glory (Isaiah 6:3)
  • the Rock, his works are perfect, and all his ways are just. A faithful God who does no wrong, upright and just is he (Deuteronomy 32:4)
  • from everlasting to everlasting (Psalm 90:2)
  • (does) not change (Malachi 3:6)
  • wonderful in counsel and magnificent in wisdom (Isaiah 28:29)
  • the Judge of all the earth (Genesis 18:25)
  • His wisdom is profound, his power is vast. Who has resisted him and come out unscathed? (Job 9:4)
  • is in heaven; he does whatever pleases him (Psalm 115:3)
  • Who is like the LORD our God, the One who sits enthroned on high, who stoops down to look on the heavens and the earth? (Psalm 113:5-6)
  • is God in heaven above and on the earth below. There is no other (Deuteronomy 4:39)
  • is not far from each one of us (Acts 17:27)
  • works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will (Ephesians 1:11)
  • eyes are too pure to look on evil… cannot tolerate wrong (Habakkuk 1:13)
  • does not change like shifting shadows (James 1:17)
  • does as he pleases with the powers of heaven and the peoples of the earth. No one can hold back his hand or say to him: “What have you done?” (Daniel 4:35)
  • everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him (Hebrews 4:13)
  • from him and through him and to him are all things (Romans 11:36)

As we learn the Lord and communicate with him by faith, we will experience a deeper, richer, more vibrant friendship with him.

As we experientially learn who the Lord is, various characteristics will develop in us, though perhaps at unequal rates from believer to believer.

  • We cherish an awesome sense of God’s infinite greatness and excellence. Consider a scene from heaven (Revelation 15:1-4). We can see this in our time, for example, in many of the newer worship songs. An unexpected event has occurred through these songs. Where there has really been the desire to worship God, they have become the doorway for many to a more Biblically correct and mature theology. As people have studied God’s revelation of himself, they have come to regard God as far greater than they ever have previously to that study. We could say that such people become “treasure hunters”. Once they get a glimpse of God’s surpassing value and brilliance, they start out on a quest for more of it. They avoid what hinders them finding the treasure. Are you a “treasure hunter” of God’s glory in Christ?
  • We come to a conviction that God’s favor is the greatest of all blessings and his disapproval is the great of all evils. In other words, we take God seriously, living consciously in his presence.
  • This leads us to seek practically God’s favor as our chief good, and to avoid his disapproval. This remakes the way we live in this present age (2 Corinthians 5:9-11). For example, a missional attitude flows from the fear of the Lord.

How is your growth in perceiving the greatness of the Lord? Are convictions in your inner person about God remaking your ideas, values, and attitudes? What new godly choices have you made? We all must think practically. Let’s avoid the trap of merely listening to the word, while not doing it.

Grace and peace, David