Open your Bibles to 1st Chronicles chapter 4 and 1 verse. 1st Chronicles chapter 4, verse 1. Yeah, that's okay. Thank God. I know that shout. That's familiar. It's my kind of people. The Lord put her next door to my mansion in heaven. Thank God. 1 Corodicals chapter 4 and verse 1. The sons of Judah, Perez, Hezron, and Karma, and Hur, and Shobal. That's the text. The sons of Judah, Perez, Hezron, and Karma, and her and Sheobal. If you've listened to us preach much over the years, Brian and I, you know that we oftentimes, when we go to a text, we'll break down the meaning of the names, because every name in the Bible has a meaning. And if you want to get what this message is all about, it starts with Judah. For any of you that have been a Bible student for a number of years, you know the name Judah means praise. Let me back up over that. That seems like a speed bump for some of you. The name Judah means praise. Well, a hundred of you got it. The name Judah means praise. The sons of praise. The children of praise. Your children came from you. What the Lord is saying here, He names these five boys together. Because what He's trying to tell us is, this is what comes from praise. Go ahead and grab it. If you're looking for a good place to shout, you just missed it. Praise is something that's just about gone in the church world today. At old time meetings like this, they say it's a thing of the past. But yet there's some things, please listen to me, I'm not being cynical of the way you worship. I'm not preaching on worship tonight. I'm preaching about praise. I'm not telling you how to worship. You worship God in spirit and in truth. But praise is different. There are some things that you cannot get unless you praise. There are some things that will not come unless you praise the Lord. What comes from praise? Well, first of all, Phares. The name Phares means breaking forth. Bursting forth. It's a picture of someone that has dug a well, and they keep digging, and they keep digging, and they keep digging, until finally they take the right strike with the mattock, and put the shovel in the right spot, and out of nowhere, water breaks forth. That's a picture of power. We're talking about the breaking forth of God. Do you know why that God doesn't touch our services like He used to? Because we don't try to touch God. There'll never be a breaking forth until you break through. Praise is not us responding to God, it's God responding to us. There is a power that comes through praise that you will not find it any other way. That power touches not only the believer, but that power touches the unbeliever as well. I don't care if you're setting the side of the worst sinner in this whole county or this whole state, someone that thinks they're the most vile person that has ever lived. You get in the Spirit of God and start praising God in the Spirit, and you see if it doesn't touch a sinner's heart. I dug up the words of an old song, and it goes something like this. At first, when I heard of some people who claimed that old-time religion was real, I said, I'll go down, take a look at that crowd for just that weak-minded I feel. I walked up the steps and peeked in the door, but the devil said, don't you go in. I said, it won't hurt me. I'll just step inside, and I'll set as far back as I can. But something got a hold of me. Yes, something got a hold of me. I went there that night, but I'll tell you that night, something got a hold of me. They sang like they did it. They all clapped their hands. I said, it's commotion, that's all. When they get down to pray, I'll just get up and leave, for I don't want to be seen here at all. But about that time, the preacher started to preach, and he looked straight down at me. He told everybody how mean that I was. He didn't talk like he thought much of me. I sat in the seat just thinking it over, and then they all started to pray. that fire fell from heaven, and I fell to the floor, and I prayed there, and God had His way. Yes, something got a hold of me. Praise God. Something got a hold of me. I went there that night, but I'll tell you, that's right, something got a hold of me. When you really get to the place that you know, God has taken hold of your hand and brought you up. out of the miry clay, out of that horrible beer can. Put a new song in your mouth. It'll be praise to God. That's why there is power in praise. I didn't ask you, do you feel like praising? I don't care if you feel like it or not. You'll never read the Bible where God says you gotta feel like praising. He said, well, you don't know what I'm going through, preacher, but you better tell God he wrote it all wrong in this book, because we recorded everything. I hear it all the time. I hear people say, but it's not my style. But it's not about you. It's His style. Thank you, I appreciate all ten of you trying to help me out. You say, well people will think I've lost my mind. It's not your mind you've lost, it's your sin. I'm telling you what, we were blessed six months ago yesterday with our first grand baby. And when our first grand baby came, my wife and I absolutely have lost our mind. We get the sight of ourselves when we get with that grandbaby. Go ahead and laugh if you want to. I've seen some of you carry on when you're around your grandbabies. But you know, we come into church and we so easily, after the years pass on, we forget what it was like to be in sin and the pain that we were lost. But then God in grace, he reached down to us and the blood of Jesus cleansed us of all of our sin. And now we sit so dignified saying, I've heard it all. I know it all. But let me tell you, if you've really got it, you don't get over it. And the longer you go, the sweeter it gets. That's why we ought to praise God. I don't care if I get to another point or not, I'm going to preach this tonight. You know, in Psalm 120 to Psalm 134, if you look in your Bible, you'll see a little connotation at the beginning of each one of those psalms. It will say, a song of ascent. Not a song of descent. A song of ascent. Now, there's strong evidence to say that there were 15 steps that led up into the temple. And as they came into the temple, on each one of those, as they would climb another step, they'd sing another song. Each step they took a little higher, they had a new praise for God. And the strangest thing struck me this afternoon while I was praying about this service. When you get to Psalm 134, that's the last song of ascent. And let me tell you what Psalm 134 says, Behold, bless ye the Lord, all ye servants of the Lord, which by night stand in the house of the Lord. Lift up your hands in the sanctuary and bless the Lord. The Lord that made heaven and earth, bless thee out of Zion. And here's what caught my eye when we come to that phrase, which by night stand in the house of the Lord. Here they are in the darkest time of the night, at the highest step that there is, before they enter into the temple. Do you know that there were two shifts of praisers in the Word of God? There were daytime praisers and there were nighttime praisers. But the ones that got the highest were the ones that were still praising when it was dark outside. Even though it was night time, there they were still praising the Lord anyway. Didn't matter how bad that things looked. Didn't matter how awful that things were. And so many of you are sitting around saying, well, when God gives me a blessing, then I'll praise the Lord. That's not what God's looking for. God's saying, don't you know, I have just as much power in the night time as I do in the day time. God says, it may be dark right now. You have cancer in your body. And the devil's saying, this is the end of the way. that you go ahead and praise God anyway, because when the Lord calls you out of this world, you'll go to a place where you'll have a new body, a glorified body, like and under the resurrected Lamb of God. Oh, you have a right to praise the Lord. Too many daytime praisers. when they get their income tax check back. Whoo! Glory to God. I've seen some of you get so excited over some of the silliest of things. I sat on this platform a little bit ago, and I said, Lord, every one of us just about deserves a whipping. Boy, it's quiet now. If we had a body, we'd have a good funeral. I thought almost every one of us deserve a whipping. The only one in this place that's closest to the front, one of the only ones, I see some others, Jacob Berry can't walk. He's the only one running the aisle. Then somebody else took off. Then somebody else took off. You know what you're waiting? You're waiting on God to come along and nudge you some way to make you get out of your seat and make you praise the Lord. You preachers are waiting on them to stand in standing ovation to the greatest sermon you ever preached, and then you're going to preach your heart out. Now let me tell you something. Sometimes you're going to get up to preach, and they're going to grunt and growl. I've had them clip their tongue nails while I was preaching. balance their checkbooks. I've had them sit there and talk about raising tomato plants and finding the closest route to this and that. I've heard them talk about where they're going to eat after church. I've heard about everything. And sometimes you've got to rise above all of that. I've seen them sit there and say, you've preached everything there is in the book and you're not going to bless me. But the truth of the matter is I'm not out to bless you. I'm out to bless the Lord. A while back I was in a service, and the preacher come up back to service, and he said, Brother Evans, I have a revival scheduled with you. And he said, I've got to cancel that revival. I said, why's that? He said, I heard you say, bless the Lord. I said, that's right. I'll say it again. Bless the Lord. He said, what do you have to bless God with? God has everything. He said, God doesn't need nothing. I said, there's one thing that God said He wants, that's my praise. The Lord inhabits the praise of His people. Great is our God and great to be praised. He said, well, I don't agree with that. And he said, that's not scriptural. I said, let me give an illustration. When my kids were little, when they were just five, six years old, four and five years old, come Christmas time every year, they wanted to buy my wife, and I did. And they'd come to me, and you know what they'd say? Now, they didn't have jobs. Things keep going like they're going. They'll have to have jobs when they're five. But they didn't have jobs. They didn't have no money. They'd come to me and they'd slip around and they'd say, Daddy, can I have some money? And I'd reach in my wallet and I'd hand them some money. And then they'd get a hold of one of my family members. They'd get a hold of someone else that would take them out shopping. They would take my money that I gave them and buy my wife and I a gift. In other words, I bought my own presence. If you want to be technical about it, they didn't have anything to offer me. What they had to offer me was what I gave them. They couldn't afford one thing. They couldn't give me one thing. Without me, they wouldn't have had anything. But instead, they'd go buy us a gift, and it didn't matter if I wanted it. If I didn't want it, when I'd open it up, I'd cry, and I'd take them in my arms, and I'd pat them, and I'd say, oh, kids, I love you. I brought my own present. If you want to be technical about it, I bless myself. But by the way, the very breath you have in your lungs tonight, God gave to you. And the Bible says, let everything that hath breath Let everything that hath breath praise ye the Lord. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me. Bless His Holy Name. I tell you, we're too far behind on our praise. I don't want to offend anyone tonight, but I have a wedding band on. You can't see inside of that, but I know what's inside of that. When my wife and I first got married, we'd start playing a game. We didn't mean for it to be a game, but you know how things are. And I'd look at her sometimes and I'd say, honey, I love you. And she'd look back at me and she'd say, I love you more. And then I'd look back at her and I'd say, I love you most. Inside my wedding band are the words that say, I love you most. I want to tell you something, there's a love that you may know God loves you, but there's a love that you can only experience when you come into a meeting like this and you shake off the binders and the chains and the shackles and you say, Lord, I just going to have to stand up and tell you tonight how much I love you. And when you stand up and tell the Lord, Lord, I love you, all of a sudden there's a sweet voice down in the depths of your soul that says, I love you more. Then all of a sudden you go from saying, Lord, I not only love you, but I love you most. He'll say, no, I love you most. No, I love you most. You'll say, no Lord, I love you most. For you know it climbs gold and for 30 minutes you've stood there. Tell them one another how much you love each other. But today, we sit in a service and we say, if they sing just right, if they preach just right, I'll go ahead and thank the Lord. But the truth of the matter is, every one of us here tonight, Every single one of us here tonight should be more than happy to stand on our feet, to lift our hands unto the Lord and say, Lord, I love you. Lord, I love you. Lord, I love you. You know what he's going to say back? I love you more. I love you more. I love you more. You ought to tell him tonight. Haven't you loved him? See, that's what's wrong with you. You go stand in a restaurant for two hours, stand for 30 seconds, praise and go, and you wear out. Sorry about that. No wonder sinners don't come back to church. No wonder we can't get people to be committed to church. If I didn't enjoy it anymore and what they do, I wouldn't come no more and what they do either. What do you go to church for? What are you doing here tonight? I didn't come to see if you got a new car or a new suit. I can care the least about that. I've come to tell the Lord how much I love Him. I've come to welcome Him in our midst. And since the Lord inhabits the praise of our people, if we really want Him to show up, we'd better start doing some praising. And the more we praise Him, the more real He gets in the lives of others, and the more power of God that is present to touch the hearts of others. Will of glory. How you doing tonight? Then there's hezron. Hezron means surrounded by walls. There's a protection that comes from praise. Yeah. You'll find a source. It's like God put you in a bubble of grace when you praise the Lord. Doesn't matter how bad the news is, when you still look at it, they said, we're going to throw you in the fiery furnace. Those boys can look at them and say, that's all right. He's in there before we ever get there. There's a sense of protection when you praise the Lord. If you don't have real praise in your heart, people will terrify you. Preachers, church members will terrify you. You get people out of the will of God, they're meaner than a two-headed copperhead. And they'll terrify you. Fear will grip your heart. The devil will say, you preach like that, you'll run them off. But you'll sure have a good time with what's left. See, it's all right to shout and praise God when your church is growing and everything's doing all right. But what about when the church divides and they split over the color of the carpet or where to put the water fountain? You look back and you drop your chin. I asked a dear old pastor one time, I called to check on the revival. I said, brother, did you have any additions to the church? No, but he said, bless God, we had some great subtractions. I think I understand what he means. This isn't about you getting your way, me getting my way. There's going to be times the devil will attack your church, your life, your family, with every ounce of power that he has. But let me tell you, you just go ahead and praise the Lord anyway. And you say, Great is our God, and greatly to be praised. And say, I know that the victory belongs to the Lord. The battle is the Lord's. I'm not going to fear or be afraid. I know what God has in store for me. Back some time ago, our church ventured out to try to build a new sanctuary. The first group that we dealt with said it would be three and a half million dollars. We'd worked and planned and saved, and I looked at what was in the treasury, and I looked to see what it would take to build that. And then I'm telling you, in the middle of the night one night, I could feel the cold breath of the devil down my neck. Saying, what are you going to do if you lead these people into that? And you get in the middle of it, and you get sick. Or you die. Or you get in the middle of it, and there's not enough money. Or you get in the middle of it, and there's a recession. Well, I'm not dead. But here we are, slapped clean in the middle of a recession. We have now spent 2.3 million dollars cash. Somebody said, where did it all come from? That ain't my business. That's God's business. The devil said, yeah, but what happens if you get in the middle of that and you come down sick? See, that's what a lot of church leaders do. God starts leaving, they get afraid. Well, if the preacher up and leaves us, well, who are you serving? The preacher or God? I thank God for pastors. I thank God for preachers. But the truth of the matter is, one day on down the road, I won't be in heaven shouting it out. But the truth is, the Word of God will still go on, and the church will still be alive, and they'll still be meeting and having church. There is a wall of protection that comes about us. So in the middle of the night, I just got up. Went up to that property. In the darkness of night, walking all over that parking lot and praying. Praying. Praying. And a little while, it's like a voice said to me, said, what are you asking me for? That's my church. And God started saying, can you see right there? Right there's where you're going to stand and preach. You know what? I started shouting and before long, I couldn't find that devil nowhere. He cannot stand it when you praise God. There is a protection that comes from praise. Then there is karma. That name means a gardener or a keeper of the vineyard. There is production from praise. Praise produces more praise. Let me run back over that. Praise produces more praise. You think I'm crazy? I'm telling you, this thing's contagious. Forget the swine flu. Brother, they can get in the Spirit over here, and you know what? People all the way over there can catch it. Now you don't think I'm absolutely crazy when I say this. On the day of Pentecost, when they came to where they were, they looked at them and they said, what's wrong with these people? They're drunk. How long has it been since someone accused you preacher of being drunk? While you were preaching, how long has it been since someone looked at your people and said, those people, I think there's something wrong. I think they drank something before they got to service this morning. Do you know what kind of meeting we have, need to have in this week of revival? We need to have a meeting where we get about three sheets in the Holy Ghost. I am being spiritually intoxicated. Do you know that a drunk man loses himself He don't remember come tomorrow morning what he did the night before. He does superhuman things when he's drunk. He thinks he can stop cars by standing in the middle of the road. He thinks he can jump off bridges and not break his neck. Would you help me preach this thing tonight? See, that's the problem. See, even with us preachers, the only time we shout and carry on is when we're preaching. You're still a preacher, aren't you? You still have the Holy Ghost, don't you? Oh, I better not go there. Oh, but this seat feels so comfortable. It's been a long time since I was in a meeting that they had to call the law. Some of you say, well, I'm Baptist. Old Mays Jackson told about a bunch of Baptist preachers got in a pastor field, and they got so carried away in the spirit, they called the law out. Not too far from here, there was a camp around a few years ago that you all know good and well. They got in the spirit and got the praise in God. They called the law at night. This is what I've been told. When they got there with their lights on and they saw it was a bunch of Christians that were spiritually intoxicated, they just turned their lights off and went back into town. They knew there was something greater than them back there. How long has it been since the world's seen that out of us? Do you know you can get temporarily healed when you're in the Spirit? How many times, preachers and singers, have we had to get to the pulpit, lean on it, to hold us up, but then the great creature shows up, and the power of God comes, and suddenly there's a power that we did not possess within ourselves. Where did that come from? It came from our praise! Worries me a little bit that some of y'all quit running around and shouting, carrying on. Well, this is not my church. I've been to your church and you ain't doing it there either. Well, I'm tired. Well, so am I. I'm about to get plugged into Heaven's 220. Her, the word her comes from a word that means white, as white linen. There is purity in praise. You know something? It's hard to sin while you're praising God. I think that's why the old-timers lived such a life that was so close and clean, was because I don't care what was going on, they were praising God. Two things it's hard to see them do. Hard to see them while you're praying. I know it's possible to pray amiss, but it's hard to see it while you're praying, especially if you're praying in the Spirit, you won't see it. And if you're praising God, Somebody got to get loosened up right now. You're thinking about you're thinking whoa. I like just get my hand up there just a little bit Then all I better not do that they might think I'm Pentecostal Word will spread everywhere. Let me tell you, the generation I was raised out of, when I started preaching 32 years ago, sometimes you'd preach about 5 or 10 minutes, you'd have to go over and sit down and let them shout it out. You had a whole lot less problems, too, getting people to live right in those days. But you know, if you're professing Christ and you're living with somebody you're not married, it is kind of hard, praise God. You know, it's kind of hard to praise God if you're wondering if you've got the winning numbers in your pocket tonight. Some of you get more excited about good morning America. What the latest fashion trend is, that you do come in and meet with the King of Glory that saves your soul and turns your life around. There's purity in praise. Then finally, shabbat means overflowing, like the train. of a bridal gown, a wedding dress. I performed a lot of weddings, and I know these other preachers have too. The bride comes down the aisle, she's got her best dress on, but that train follows her as she comes down the aisle. Now, I want to tell you something, folks. I've seen people do a lot of things in this world. I sure have. But do you know what it's like to preach the funeral of an old-time saint of God? That you get in the middle of their funeral service, and hearts are broken, but it's like a little bit of them still trembling for their works, do you follow me? And it's like that same spirit that they had is still there. Overflowing. There's something about it spilling over to somebody else. You don't get over that. Oh, thank God. Lord, would you come on us tonight? Brian and I have a dear friend. His daddy was an old-time, old-time child of God. You preachers will understand this, and you, those of you that lead the devotion in your church, you'll understand what I'm saying when I say this. There's some people, when they come into meeting, you just look at them, and you say, meeting's on tonight. You know how they live and you know how they love God. He was that way. I don't care if it was the deadest church in the country. When he got there, things livened up. There was no going to sleep around him. No sir, you dare not nod your head off around him. Cause when he'd start praising God, For some reason, he must have thought that somebody's ears was a key to start him. Because he'd ring their ear. And if that didn't work, he'd ring both of them once. I mean, they'd turn blood red. But he had church if nobody else did. Boy, I miss them kind, don't you? That old cancer got ahold of his body and ate his body away. The doctor come in and said, you're going to be dead probably before the day comes to an end. He said, is that right? Yeah, that's right. Doctors went out and his boy was standing there just crying and crying. He looked up, he said, son, would you help me up? He said, Daddy, I can't help you up. We got to take a fleece blanket and turn you. He couldn't stand to be touched. Constant pain, he said, son, he said, now I know it's going to hurt, but I got to get up. And he looked at him. He said, Dad, don't make me get you up. I can't get you up. He said, son, I've never asked anything out of you in my whole life. I want you to get me up. And he said, OK, daddy. And he reached under him. He said, when I started to take hold of him, said he screamed in pain. But he said, keep going, boy, keep going. And he said that I took my daddy probably weighed eighty five, ninety five pounds. And he said, I got him up and said he hadn't been on his feet in a few days. He said he was weak and wobbly and he balanced himself on me. And he said, I looked at him and said, Daddy, you're up. Do you feel better? He said, Thank you, son. He said, Dad, I don't understand. Why was it so important for you to get up? And he looked at him. And he said, Boy, every day of my life since I met Jesus, I've praised Him. And he said, They tell me I'm going home today. And I just felt like I had to stand up one more time and lift my hand toward heaven and say, thank you, Lord, for being so good to me in this life. And Lord, I pray that my life has been acceptable to you. And he said, my dear old daddy started to clap his hands. And he said, bless the name of the Lord. Oh, bless the name of the Lord. Bless the name of the Lord. And he said for some time he stood there till about all the energy was out of him. I laid him back down on the bed and he took his last breath. And the Lord called him home to heaven. And he said, Oh, I wish I could have seen the other side. Because no longer was daddy frail and weak, but he had a strong body. And finally he was able to praise the Lord the way he had always Wanted to praise God that let me tell you something if you're here tonight. You've got every right to praise God There's some things you only get from praise Some of your in some dark places tonight I You're working during the night time. But listen, that means you're on the highest step up you can go. A new level of praise. Do you know Him? Your heads are bowed throughout this sanctuary. I'm going to ask you just to be as sincere with God tonight as you possibly can. If you're here in this place, you're saved, you know you're saved. But there's some things that has come into your life that right now, there's things you're facing that it is so dark. And you're saying right now, Lord, I just wish I knew you had it. I just wish I knew it was really in your hands.