Praise God in His Sanctuary

Sermon transcript

Let’s remain standing for the reading of God’s word My sermon text this evening Psalm 150 Psalm 150 the very last Psalm Last but not least let us hear God’s holy word praise the Lord Praise God in his sanctuary Praise him in his mighty expanse Praise him for his mighty deeds Praise him according to his excellent greatness Praise him with trumpet sound Praise him with harp and lyre Praise him with timbrell and dancing Praise him with stringed instruments and pipe Praise him with loud symbols Praise him with resounding symbols Let everything that has breath praise the Lord Praise the Lord The grass withers and the flower fades But the word of our God endures forever Let’s seek the Lord’s blessing upon the preaching of his word Our Lord and Father in heaven as we consider this evening this brief Yet joy filled portion of your holy word We ask that our hearts might be filled with joy overflowing We pray that we would indeed be a people of peace We need be a people of praise A people who declares your glory among the nations And we ask that by your spirit you would open our minds and our hearts to behold wondrous things from your word this evening We ask that your word would find a lodging place in our souls We ask that you would feed us With Jesus this evening the bread of heaven through the word We ask all these things through Christ our Lord and all of God’s people said Maybe seated Fyto of my sermon this Lord’s Day evening is praise God in his sanctuary And you’ll notice about six key words to be listening for I especially encourage you to listen for the words Sanctuary, temple, heaven and creation Praise God in his sanctuary Well dear friends Our Psalm for this Lord’s Day evening Psalm 150 Is a very appropriate ending to this collection of divinely inspired poems known to us today as The Book of Psalms for the Book of Psalms is a collection of these divinely inspired poems In this sermon series as we’ve explored various selections from the Psalms We’ve found ourselves on a journey that has taken us through the ups and downs that are experienced By God’s redeemed pilgrim people in their walk with Yahweh their God A journey of faith that has taken us into the valleys of lamentation Repentance, despondency and cries for deliverance and taken us all the way up to the mountaintops Of overflowing joy, thanksgiving and praise And it’s taken us everywhere in between as well The opening Psalms of this collection, Psalms 1 and 2 Sometimes described as the gateway to the Psalms These opening Psalms oriented us to the biblical Psalter By pointing us to the way of true divine wisdom The pathway of faith traveled by the blessed man The man who meditates upon God’s law His Torah, His covenant instruction Day and night Not only that, the man who unlike the foolish and rebellious rulers of the earth spoken of in Psalm 2 The man who recognizes and submits in faith to Yahweh his sovereign God And to God’s anointed messianic son And how appropriate then that the book of Psalms should close with these five climactic hallelujah Psalms Psalms 146 through 150 The Psalm, the Psalter begins with an orientation Towards the word of God, the Torah and divine wisdom And it ends with glorious praise in these hallelujah Psalms And how appropriate that is because after all A life of faith in the true and living God Yahweh, a life that is grounded in God’s word and The wisdom is a life that indeed gives praise to God A life that leads to ultimate eschatological joy Through the person and saving work of God’s messianic son Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ How appropriate that the book of Psalms should conclude With this cosmic and eschatological hallelujah Psalm Known as Psalm 150 Now in terms of the type and function of this psalm Again I know I’ve often quoted from Dr.

Willem Van Gemmerin I believe he is a reformed Bible commentator And he always has good insight into the psalms I have found in my studies and he puts it this way He says Psalm 150 is an enlarged introit Lacking the descriptive praise It functions as a final doxology Bringing the Psalter to a psalm and joyful conclusion And in terms of this psalm’s relevance To contemporary issues in the church Though this is a brief psalm I believe it has much relevance It speaks with much relevance to the issue of worship in the church And I would indeed suggest to you brothers and sisters That Psalm 150 helps us in the church To put our contemporary so-called worship wars Into their proper cosmic and redemptive historical perspective And I’ll flesh that out and explain that more in a little bit But as we begin our study and consideration of this psalm this evening We begin with the first two verses So I’d like to direct your attention Once again to verses 1 and 2 I’m just going to read those verses quickly Once again the psalm opens up as the hallelujah psalms do It both opens and closes with hallelujah And so we read praise the Lord in the Hebrew hallelujah Praise God in his sanctuary Praise him in his mighty expanse Or as it’s translated in some versions The his mighty heavens Praise him for his mighty deeds Praise him according to his excellent greatness So this psalm begins Praise the Lord Like I mentioned like all of the hallelujah psalms Psalm 150 both begins And ends with the Hebrew word hallelujah That word literally means praise YAH, YAH being a shortened form of YAHweh, the covenant name of God This my friends is an imperative call and invitation For God’s covenant people gathered together for worship To declare, to extol and to celebrate YAHweh Their faithful redeemer and covenant Lord When we gather together as gods Redeemed covenant people We gather to do many things Yes we gather to mourn over our sin and to repent Yes we gather to lament over the fallen state of our world Yes we gather to examine our hearts and confess our sins But we also gather to rejoice in the salvation That God has graciously and freely given to us In union with our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ And so when we gather for worship The imperative call and invitation Praise the Lord is most appropriate In all seasons and occasions For God’s covenant people Psalm 1 also carries this thought forward By telling us where to praise the Lord Of course we can praise the Lord In all circumstances the Bible says Rejoice in the Lord always Again I will say rejoice But the setting in view of course in this Psalm Is the worship of God’s people in the old covenants temple It says praise God in his sanctuary What is this referring to?

This seems to be referring to God’s Temple sanctuary, his earthly temple sanctuary In Jerusalem, however This praise is not to be limited to the Jerusalem temple For this almost goes on to say By way of expansion if you will Praise him in his mighty expanse Praise him in his mighty expanse What is he talking about? Well as some versions like the English standard version translated In his mighty heavens What is in view here? Well as one commentator explains Literally the expanse of his power In other words the expanse that Displays or symbolizes his power Or in which his power resides Usually thought to refer to God’s Heavenly temple It may signify the vaulted ceiling Of the visible universe viewed As a cosmic temple And so the reason I point this out Brothers and sisters is that Sometimes the Psalms elsewhere speak of God’s sanctuary As a reference not just to his earthly Sanctuary in the Jerusalem temple But to his heavenly sanctuary Where the where God dwells in glorious luminescent light With the angels in glory For example, this is the way it’s used In Psalm 11 verse 4 If you turn to Psalm 11 verse 4 It reads as follows It says the Lord is in his holy temple Does that mean that Yahweh’s presence?

It was limited to this earthly temple in Jerusalem? No, it says the Lord is in his holy temple The Lord’s throne is where? The Lord’s throne is in heaven His eyes behold, his eyelids test The sons of man God is omnipresent All of God is present everywhere But he dwells and he reigns In a special sense in the heavenly realm This wording is significant, beloved Because the scriptures indicate That the temple sanctuary under the old covenant The temple in Jerusalem Was simply meant to be an earthly type That is to say a copy or a picture of something greater Namely, the heavenly sanctuary And that being the case, I would also suggest to you That this language may be pointing us To the ultimate eschatological goal of redemptive history What is God’s ultimate eschatological goal for the creation?

Well, God’s ultimate goal Is that the creation itself The heavens and the earth would one day be renewed And transformed to become a holy cosmic temple A holy dwelling place of God That is what the new heavens and the new earth Will be all about This will of course happen When our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, ushers In the consummated new heavens and new earth That is glorious future, second advent The old covenant sanctuary Was a copy of the heavenly sanctuary Where God and His holy angels dwell in heavenly glory And as such, this sanctuary served as the intersection of heaven and earth The place where the worship of God’s covenant people on earth Intersected with and united with the worship of the angels in heaven As saints and angels join their hearts and voices together To praise the Lord in His sanctuary Praise the Lord, praise God in His sanctuary Praise Him in His mighty heavens Let heaven and earth in other words join together Let the angels in heaven and God’s people on earth Join their voices and their hearts together to praise the Lord Just remind you brothers and sisters That’s what’s going on when we gather in the name of Christ for worship For Christ is the living temple Christ is our mediator and advocate He is our intersection with heaven and earth Christ brings the presence of heaven to our earthly realm And He does so as we receive Him by faith and through the Holy Spirit And so when we gather for worship we’re not just gathering together To perform some kind of social duty Or to hang out with our brothers and sisters in Christ And rub shoulders with our fellow believers But we are gathered here in the presence of the King With holy angels attending it If the Lord was able, well he’s able, but if the Lord were to open our spiritual eyes To see the heavenly realities that are around us at this very moment We would see angels in glory joining with us in worship There’s something of cosmic significance that takes place in our worship of God So we by the grace of God through faith in Christ are able to praise God in His sanctuary But what are the reasons given for this praise?

Why should we praise God in His sanctuary? Well verse 2 tells us, gives us the reasons for such praise Praise Him for His, what? His mighty deeds Praise Him according to His excellent greatness What are the reasons that this all must gives us for praising the Lord? Well first of all, Yahweh’s mighty deeds His mighty acts, in fact God has revealed His power, His justice and His mercy in His mighty works His mighty works of creation and providence But especially His mighty works of redemption and salvation In Old Testament times the paradigmatic, if you will, act of salvation Was the Exodus event where God miraculously and supernaturally Delivered His people Israel from their slavery in Egypt And brought them into the Promised Land Bringing them through the Red Sea on dry land Giving them His law from Mount Sinai and so forth But that earthly salvation, if you will, pointed forward to the ultimate salvation And that is the salvation accomplished by Jesus Christ Our Lord and Savior, by His life, death And resurrection And so we are to praise God for His mighty deeds We serve a God who acts in history, who intervenes To rescue and redeem His people, a God who shows both His Justice and His mercy in the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ We are also told to praise God for His excellent greatness Yahweh’s excellent greatness is another reason given This speaks to our Lord’s glorious divine attributes And these glorious divine attributes are revealed in His mighty deeds God reveals who He is, He reveals His glory in what He has done He not only does mighty things, but then He interprets those mighty works By His Word Now, what are some lessons we can learn from this?

Well, first of all, friends, again, as we, I like to tell the children Whenever you read the Old Testament, you’ve got to put your Jesus glasses on You’ve got to ask yourself, how does this point forward to Christ? How does this reveal or anticipate Christ? Well, friends, as we read this joyful, hallelujah Psalm That speaks of God’s mighty deeds and His excellent greatness We must remember, as believers living, privileged to live in this new covenant age That in the person of our incarnate Lord Jesus Christ, the realms of heaven and earth unite The heavenly sanctuary and the earthly sanctuary unite in the person of Christ For Christ Himself is the living temple He is the living temple that the temple of stone in the Old Testament Anticipated and pointed forward to For Christ is the Word made flesh who came to do what?

Who came to tabernacle to make His dwelling in our midst And is this not the ultimate goal of God’s covenant of grace? What is God’s promise throughout redemptive history in His covenant of grace? He says, I will be God, I will be your God, and you shall be my people And God will come and dwell amongst us And all of creation, the new heavens and the new earth will be a holy dwelling place A cosmic dwelling place of God And of course Christ is the dwelling place of God He is Immanuel, what does Immanuel mean? God with us Only in and through Christ the one mediator between God and sinful man Only in Christ can we sinners approach God In holy worship only in Christ and through faith in Christ Can we praise the Lord in His holy sanctuary?

Can we enter in only through Christ can we enter in To the heavenly holy of holies by faith and through the holy spirit So dear listener, let me ask you, is Jesus Christ your mediator, your savior? The Bible says there is one God and one mediator between God and man The man Christ Jesus, he is the only one who bridges the gap Between the holy God and sinful man Christ has bridged that gap Receive and rest upon him for your salvation turn to him as your mediator I think another lesson beloved is that we must remember That the greatest of God’s mighty deeds were displayed in the cross And resurrection of Jesus Christ Great David’s greater son David was the sweet solace of Israel But he was also a type and picture of Christ And so David’s son of Christ And the songs are filled with Christ in anticipatory form For they point to great David’s greater son the Messiah, the Lord Jesus Christ And so friend, if you want to know his excellent greatness better How do you know?

How do you get to know the excellent greatness of God better? I would encourage you dear listener Study Jesus as he is revealed in the word Study Jesus Christ, get to know him better in his word And so we have seen this invitation and command to praise God in his sanctuary But as we move on in this psalm, I want you next to consider with me From verses 3 through 5 The centrality and significance of musical praise in old covenant temple worship The centrality and significance of musical praise in old covenant temple worship Again let me read verses 3 through 5 This central section of Psalm 150 The Psalmist writes Praise him with trumpet sound Praise him with harp and lyre Praise him with trumpet sound Praise him with timbre and dancing Praise him with stringed instruments and pipe Praise him with loud cymbals, praise him with resounding cymbals And so we’ve got wind instruments, string instruments We’ve got cymbals, percussion, all kinds of musical praise Was employed in the sanctuary of the old covenant This including Psalm highlights, inevitably highlights and brings to our attention The issue of musical instruments in the worship of God And if you know the situation in our Christian culture today You know that music and music style and worship preferences Can be very divisive among the people of God People often choose or leave churches based upon their musical style Some people prefer traditional worship So they leave contemporary churches to join a more traditional church And the other direction happens as well Some folks get tired of what they view as the old stale hymns And they want something more fresh, more exciting And so they go to a church that has more contemporary worship Again, one of the biggest controversies in the contemporary Christian world Is the so-called worship wars Some of our contemporary evangelical brothers and sisters would no doubt point to passages like this one To justify the multiplication of musical instruments in worship Including loud ones like drums and maybe even electric guitars in Christian worship As they see, we’re supposed to worship God loudly It says praise him with loud symbols Praise him with resounding symbols There’s a lot of clanging and banging going on, right?

The dear ones, whatever your personal preference may be In terms of worship song and musical style and all of that I would caution all of us That we need to be very careful about how we use passages like this one Because we need to understand the close connection in old covenant worship Between the offering up of sacrifices on the altar on the one hand And the offering up of musical praise by the Levitical musicians and choirs on the other hand Let me just give you a sampling of that It’s actually something that’s very fairly clear in the Old Testament scriptures But just one passage that shows this close connection I’d invite you to turn to first chronicles Not first Corinthians, first chronicles in the Old Testament Chapter 25, and let me just read verses 1 through 7 Where the chronicler speaks of the number and services of musicians in the temple Let’s hear God’s word It says this, Moreover, David, the sweet psalmist of Israel Moreover, David and the commanders of the army set apart for the service Some of the sons of Asaph and of Heiman and of Jeddotham Who were to prophesy with liars, harps and symbols And the number of those who performed their service was Of the sons of Asaph, Zechor, Joseph, Nithania, Asher, Rella The sons of Asaph were under the direction of Asaph who prophesied under the direction of the king Of Jeddothan, the sons of Jeddothan, Gedaliah, Zere, Jeshaiya, Shameh, Hashibiah and Matathiah Six under the direction of their father, Jeddothan With the harp who prophesied in giving thanks and praising the Lord Of Heiman, the sons of Heiman, Bukhaya, Matania, Uzziel, Shebuel, and Jeremoth Hananiah, Hanani, Eliyyatha, Gedalthi, and Romanti, Asher, Jash, Bukhasha, Malothi, Hothar, Mahos, Yath All these were the sons of Heiman, the king, Sier, to exalt Him according to the words of God For God gave him fourteen sons and three daughters to Heiman All these were under the direction of their father to sing in the house of the Lord That’s the temple where the sacrifices were offered With symbols, harps and liars for the service of the house of God Asaph, Jeddothan, and Heiman were under the direction of the king Their number who were trained in singing to the Lord with their relatives All who were skillful was 288 Now a lot of genealogical information there But did you notice, beloved, in that passage The close connection between the use of musical instruments in praise And prophecy, look for example again back at verse one David and the commanders of the army set apart for the service This is the musical service to take place in the house of the Lord in connection with the sacrifices These men, Asaph, and Heiman, and Jeddothan who were to do what?

To prophesy! They are said to prophesy with liars, harps, and symbols This close connection between musical instruments and prophecy is also brought out in verse three Jeddothan, the sons of Jeddothan, and so forth Under the direction of their father with the harp Who prophesied in giving thanks and praising the Lord And then notice how one of these musicians is described in verse five It says, all these were the sons of Heiman the king’s seer The word seer is another way of speaking about a prophet Now, so do you see the words that were sung in the temple As well as the musical instrumentation had a prophetic function about them And they were performed in connection in conjunction with the offering up of sacrifices on the altar Now in light of these considerations Some of our confessional Presbyterian brothers and sisters, like our Reformed Presbyterian and Covenantor brethren, believe that musical instruments are prohibited by the regulative principle Since there is no New Testament command to praise God with musical instruments And since we no longer offer sacrifices, we no longer have a physical temple in Jerusalem With which to offer such sacrifices because Christ has offered the final sacrifice Historically speaking, there is a strong strain of historic Presbyterian worship practice Advocated by many of our Presbyterian forefathers and heroes in the faith Which advocated for the non-instrumental, acapellic singing of worship song Especially if not exclusively the divinely inspired Psalms And so it is argued by these fellow Reformed brothers and sisters That the musical instruments and Levitical choirs and temple musicians that were organized By King David were inextricably connected to the old covenant sacrificial worship of the tabernacle And the temple, the sanctuary, such as is referred to in this song You see the picture is this As the slain bodies of the sacrificial animals were offered up on the temple altar And as the smoke of these sacrifices ascended up into heaven They were often accompanied by the lifting up of musical praise By the Levitical musicians and the Levitical choirs And so from this historic Presbyterian perspective The musical accompaniment of sung praise was tied to old covenant worship And therefore it is argued by those who hold this view The use of musical instrumentation as an element of new covenant worship, they would say, is actually Strange fire, a violation of the regulative principle of worship And thus a Judaizing of Christian worship I’ve heard some of our covenant or an RP brethren say That whenever musical instruments are used in the praise of God under the new covenant That’s a Judaizing of Christian worship, a harkening back to the worship of the temple Now how should we respond to this?

I think it’s pretty obvious that we do use musical instrumentation in our sung praise We have some excellent pianists who accompany our singing of praise So how should we respond to this kind of argumentation? I mean are we as a congregation singing against God When our singing of praise is accompanied by a piano? Well let me offer to you three thoughts in light of this First of all brothers and sisters, whether or not our non-instrumental brethren are correct on this matter Their position reminds us of something important Their position reminds us that the most important instrument in our singing of praise Is the living instrument of the human voice Unless you have some kind of medical or vocal disability that does not make it possible for you to sing You all, we all… all know how to use at least one instrument and that is the instrument of the human voice.

And so whenever any non-living instrument, whether it be a loud pipe organ, sort of a highbrow instrument like a pipe organ, or a more folksy instrument like a guitar, whenever any instrument drowns out or replaces the voices of God’s people, the singing of praise as a divine ordinance of worship is compromised. And I know about you folks, I’ve had in my walk with Christ over the years, I’ve had occasion to worship in a number of different church settings. I remember one time, I think it was a college student, I was visiting, I think my parents church, it was an Episcopal church, and those Episcopalians, they love the pipe organ. And I love the pipe organ too, it’s one of my favorite instruments. But I remember during this particular, and it was a very excellent pipe organist at that particular church, I remember during the singing of one of the hymns, the organist cranked up the volume so loud, you know, and it sounded like he was showing off.

I mean he was an excellent musician, but the music was cranked up so loud that it was like being at a rock concert, you know where the music is so loud that it feels like it’s pounding against your chest, it was so loud I could hardly hear myself singing. It drowned out the vocal praise, the pipe organ drowned out the vocal praise. And I’ve had the opposite experience as well, I’ve had occasion at times to worship in a more contemporary church setting. I remember one particular church that I worshiped at once where they had one of these praise bands, basically a rock band. And the church, the preaching at that church was pretty sound, but I remember again, the focus was the praise band. It didn’t feel like worship to me, it felt like a concert, worshiped attainment if you will.

Either of those settings beloved, that kind of phenomenon compromises the ordinance of sung praise. So that’s the first thought I have. But here in responding to our non-instrumental brethren, I would also suggest that here the reformed distinction between the elements of worship and the circumstances of worship is very helpful. See the elements of worship are those things that we do in worship, actual acts of worship that are commanded in God’s word. So for example, when we gather together for worship, there’s the public reading of Holy Scripture because the Bible commands us to do that. There’s the public preaching of the word again because the Bible commands that. It’s an element. It’s part of an actual act of worship. We gather for prayer. We offer prayer unto God. We sing Psalms and hymns and spiritual songs as we are commanded to in places like Ephesians 5, 19, Colossians 3, 16.

And so the elements of worship are actual acts of worship that are inextricably a part of the worship of God. But circumstances of worship are things that are only circumstantial to the worship of God. So for example, the Bible nowhere commands that the pastor preach behind a pulpit. I could preach from a pulpit. I can preach from behind a podium. I could preach without either. The Bible doesn’t command one way or another. The Bible does not tell the church when to meet for worship. What color the carpet should be in the church sanctuary? Those are circumstances of worship. And I would suggest to you brothers and sisters that musical accompaniment that is intended to assist God’s people in their vocal praise and not to replace or overwhelm that praise can be viewed as a circumstance rather than an element of worship.

One of the things that’s interesting and some of you folks who are familiar with our Reform Presbyterian brethren, you know that in their worship services where they sing the Psalms without musical instrumentation they sing acapella and some of the singing in those churches is beautiful. But what is the custom? Well usually when the congregation is getting ready to sing a Psalm, there will be an individual, a gifted singer, either a man or a woman will get up in front of the congregation with a pitch pipe and blow the pitch pipe to get the congregation on key. They would say that’s a circumstance of worship and I would agree with that. But then I would ask the question, okay if it’s okay to use a pitch pipe to get the congregation on key, what’s wrong with having a piano or an organ or even a guitar to help the congregation stay on tune, stay on key.

So friends that all being said, as a circumstance of worship I would suggest to you that musical accompaniment to aid our praise is indeed permitted. So ladies you who play the piano for us, don’t worry. I don’t believe you’re sitting against God when you lead us in the playing of the piano in our vocal praise. Again the issue is to accompany the vocal praise of God. Well what then you may wonder what is the significance of this kind of loud musical praise that was pointed by God through David in the Old Covenant Temple. What was the significance of that? Well think about it this way beloved. The joyful sound of musical instruments in Old Covenant Temple worship pointed God’s people forward to the overflowing joy of salvation that would be accomplished in Jesus Christ the living temple and in the new covenant that he ratified by the shedding of his lifeblood on that final altar the cross of Calvary.

Again as I mentioned it was often the case that in Old Covenant Temple worship as the sacrifices which pointed forward to Christ were being offered up on the altar, the animal sacrifices. Musical praise, joyful musical praise was also being offered up. But now that Christ has offered himself once and for all for our sins we praise God with living instruments, the living instrument of our voice. We are overflowing with joy or we ought to be overflowing with the joy of the Lord, the joy of salvation. And so we lift up a sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving to our heavenly Father who has accomplished such a great redemption for us in his Son the Lord Jesus Christ. Just a couple of lessons here. First of all biblical imperatives like these verses must be interpreted in their redemptive historical context.

You know how I’ve said that some would point to these verses verses 3 through 5 as a justification for the multiplication of musical instrumentation in the Christian worship in Christian worship and they would say well hey we’re supposed to worship God loudly, we’re supposed to worship God with this instrumental musical instrumentation so so there. And I would say okay let’s think about this let’s step back. If these verses are literally binding upon us today at Grace Orthodox Presbyterian Church what does it say? Praise him with the trumpet sound where are the trumpets here at Grace OPC. Praise him with harp and lyre where’s the harp and the lyre? Think about this praise him with timbrell and dancing. What do you think about that dancing idea? Should we be present with costals? Dancing in the pews a little bit.

Praise him with stringed instruments I guess the piano is a stringed instrument. But again if these instruments were commanded by God and appointed by God through David if this is still binding strictly binding on us today then we got to make sure that we’re using all of the instruments that God’s people used that the temple musicians used in the temple. Again brothers and sisters we need to understand passages like this. Let’s not take a proof text approach to scripture and yank these verses out of context. Again our contemporary brothers and sisters will mishandle these verses by saying see this gives us sanction to have a praise band and others would go the other way and say well no these are these are more classical instruments we ought to have an orchestra. The point is we ought to rejoice in the Lord because Christ has accomplished our redemption.

Christ has the living temple has made it possible for us to praise God in his sanctuary. And so friends let us all use the living instrument of our voices to praise God. Wherever you come down on the question of musical instrumentation in worship and this is a question that brothers and sisters in Christ that fellow Christians can have different convictions about. Wherever you come down on that particular issue we should all agree that the vocal praise of God is a divine ordinance. Let us use this living instrument of our voices not only to tell people about Jesus but to praise the Lord in song. And so that brings me to my final point the last verse and I promise we’ll be done in just a moment. Consider finally a universal call to all God’s creatures to praise him in his cosmic eschatological sanctuary a universal call to all God’s creatures to praise him in his cosmic eschatological sanctuary.

How does this psalm in the entire Psalter end with this universal call to praise verse six let everything that has breath every living thing in other words let everything that has breath praise the Lord and then we have the final hallelujah praise the Lord. Here the biblical Psalter comes full circle as it points us to that ultimate eschatological hope the time when the new heavens and the new earth will be ushered in with consummation glory when all of creation will serve as God’s cosmic temple his holy dwelling and when God’s royal reign over all will be recognized and celebrated by all and all of this is made possible of course through Christ and by Christ alone let us praise him let us praise the Lord hallelujah amen let us pray heavenly Father we thank you for the joy of our salvation we thank you that you have come to dwell in our midst in the person of Christ and that by your spirit you dwell within us and among us we ask Lord that you would give us the grace to live lives of praise may we praise you God by our lips and by our service by our lives and by our worship in Jesus name we pray and all of God’s people said amen let’s close our Lord’s day worship tonight by rising and we’ll sing 150c sing hallelujah praise the Lord 150c let’s use our living in the living instruments of our voices in praise to God 150c

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