Psalms 34:1-3 ESV
“I will bless the Lord at all times;
his praise shall continually be in my mouth.
My soul makes its boast in the Lord;
let the humble hear and be glad.
Oh, magnify the Lord with me,
and let us exalt his name together!”
At all times. In the good times and in the bad times, I must
bless the Lord. For he is God. And he is the one who made me. And he is the one
who gave me salvation from my sin and the hope of heaven when I die. And he is
worthy of my praise because he is holy and righteous and good, and in him
dwells no evil at all. I must praise him and thank him for all that he is and
for all that he has done to save his people from their sins.
And this praise that must be continually on my lips is not
to be lip service only. We can praise the Lord with our lips but our hearts can
be far from him, for words are just words unless they are backed up with action
and heart change and walks of obedience to him, and submission to him as Lord.
But yes, we need to be verbalizing our praise to him, but the praise is only
genuine when our lifestyles follow suit.
So, if we are to truly magnify the Lord and to exalt his
name, this will be evident by how we live. Are we still living to please the
flesh? Or are our hearts truly dedicated to following the Lord in obedience to
his commands? Are we walking in his ways and in his truth, or are we still
doing our own thing? So many people have this idea of worship of God as just
singing songs of praise and worship. But true worship of God is giving our
lives to him as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to him (Romans 12:1-2).
Psalms 34:4-5 ESV
“I sought the Lord, and he answered me
and delivered me from all my fears.
Those who look to him are radiant,
and their faces shall never be ashamed.”
As followers of Jesus Christ we are not to be fearful
people. Now this is not to say that we will never feel fear. We may feel fear
in our emotions sometimes, but we are not to give in to those feelings. We are
not to yield to letting fear overtake us. For when we respond in fear to our
circumstances, and not in faith, it shows we are lacking in faith and that we are
not trusting the Lord entirely with our life’s circumstances.
So, when we come up against situations in our lives that may
put fear within us, in our emotions, we need to pray for deliverance, and then
we need to reject those feelings of fear and trust the Lord. And we can feel
the fear but go against it, too. And sometimes it is that act of faith in
stepping out in faith and in obedience to the Lord despite the feelings of fear
that alleviates the fear. I have seen the Lord do this in my own life where I
went against the feeling and then the feeling of fear disappeared.
I was brought up by a very abusive father when I was growing
up as a child, so I had a lot of fear instilled inside me. I know I prayed and
prayed over his treatment of me and I sought the Lord for comfort and help to
make it through each day. But living with a man who was like a time bomb and
you never knew when that bomb was going to explode was a fearful situation. And
I ended up with much fear I didn’t even know I had. And then one day the Lord
did deliver me and my face was absolutely now radiant.
Psalms 34:6-7 ESV
“This poor man cried, and the Lord heard him
and saved him out of all his troubles.
The angel of the Lord encamps
around those who fear him, and delivers them.”
We all have troubles. And the Lord doesn’t always deliver us
out of our physical troubles. For he said if we follow him with our lives that
we will be hated and persecuted as he was. And he said we would have trials and
tribulations which come to test our faith. But the Lord will deliver us through
our troubles. He will give us the strength we need to endure, and he will carry
us through, and he will give us wisdom and discernment in making wise choices.
So he saves us from the troubles destroying our lives.
But sometimes he physically rescues us from our troubles,
too, but sometimes that might be after he has let us suffer for a while,
because he is working his purposes in our lives through our suffering. But the
main thing here is that the Lord saves us from our troubles having devastating impacts
on our lives in the negative to where we end up caving to the troubles and
yielding to them rather than trusting the Lord through them. But he can only
save us so much as we are willing to be saved.
Now the Lord takes care of his own. He will provide for us
who walk in the fear of the Lord, who honor God with our lives and who take him
and his word seriously. Those who fear the Lord are those who honor him as
Lord, who walk in his ways and in his truth, and whose lives are dedicated to
following the Lord in obedience and ceasing with sin. He will carry us through
every trial and every difficult circumstance so that our circumstances do not
get the best of us, but so that we are able to rise above our circumstances to
keep following the Lord in obedience.
[Matt 5:10-16; Matt 10:16-25;
Matt 24:9-14; Matt 28:18-20; Lu 6:22-23; Lu 21:12-19;
John 15:1-21; Jn 16:33; Acts 1:8; Acts 14:22; Acts 26:18; Rom 5:3-5; Rom 12:1-8; 1 Co 12:1-31; 2 Co 1:3-11; Eph
4:1-16; Eph 5:17-27; Phil 3:7-11; Col 3:16; 1 Thess 3:1-5; Jas 1:2-4; Heb 3:13;
Heb 12:3-12; 1 Pet 1:6-7; 1 Pet 2:9; 1 Pet 4:12-17]
Eternal
Father, Strong to Save
William Whiting
Eternal Father,
strong to save,
Whose arm does bind
the restless wave,
Who bids the mighty
ocean deep
Its own appointed
limits keep;
O hear us when we
cry to Thee
For those in peril
on the sea.
O Savior, whose
almighty word
The winds and waves
submissive heard,
Who walked upon the
foaming deep,
And calm amid the
rage did sleep;
O hear us when we
cry to Thee
For those in peril
on the sea.
O Holy Spirit, who
did brood
Upon the waters
dark and rude,
And bid their angry
tumult cease,
And give for wild
confusion peace;
O hear us when we
cry to Thee
For those in peril
on the sea.
O Trinity of love
and pow'r,
Your children
shield in danger's hour;
From rock and
tempest, fire, and foe,
Protect them where-so-e'er
they go;
Thus, evermore
shall rise to Thee
Glad hymns of
praise from land and sea.
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