This message will not do this text justice, certain of that. No message would, nor ever does. But you will get some good things out of it if you ask the Lord to just let you watch for a little while. This is a marvelous portion of Scripture here, Psalm 29. Men and women and young people—are you with me? All right. Men and women and young people need to do more meditating and contemplating of God. Men and women and young people need to just do a little, just stop and be quiet. Scripture says, Be still and know that I am God. Contemplate God. Consider God's works, God's person. Stop and think about it a little bit. The old saying is, stop and just smell His roses. They're His roses that He made. Just stop. Our generation, oh my, it's too much noise in our generation. It's too much noise. Too many things going on amid the clamor of things. People can't seem to stop what they're doing for five minutes just to meditate, to think, to think. We have things that occupy our every moment. amid the clamor of TV sets and music and so on and so forth and voices. We need to just shut it all down for a little bit and just think. Just ponder. Contemplate. Ponder the person and the power of our Lord God. The psalmist did. David was a man who did that. would you like to have about a fourth of david's would you like to have just an ounce of of david's uh... relationship that was from sitting on the hillside communion with his god while with the the books of moses on his lap He must have written this psalm while he was outside on a balmy evening, perhaps, maybe overlooking the ocean or the mountains in the distance. He must have written this at a time such as that when maybe a storm was approaching out to sea and contemplating his Christ, the sweet psalmist of Israel, had his guitar out. This is how he wrote the psalms. Psalms are poetry written to music. That's what it means. And he had his lute out, or whatever it was, his harp out on the hillside, his Bible beside him, and he offered up sacrifice of his lips, sacrifice of praise unto his God while considering the majesty of his God and his surroundings. And that's what this is about. Look at verse 1 with me. Give unto the Lord, O ye mighty, ye sons of the mighty, sons of God, daughters of God. They're the only ones that will. They're the only ones that will give unto the Lord this glory. Give unto the Lord glory and strength. And the word there, give, is not add to or we can't give God anything. The word is ascribe to Him or render to His account or give Him all the credit. That's what the word there means. Give Him all the credit for all glory and all strength, the glory of all things. Give it unto Him. Attribute it unto Him. The glory of His mercy, His grace, His providence. Paul said it. Paul summed it up in just one sentence. By the grace of God, I am what I am. He is the I am that He is. And therefore, I am what I am by His grace. The glory of all things and all strength. Without Him, we can do nothing. Don't ascribe any glory to yourself or to anyone or anything. Don't ascribe any strength to your own self, not to your own mental capacities or physical strength. None of it. It's all of God. Every ounce of physical energy, health, is of the Lord. Every bit of knowledge attained is of the Lord. Ascribe unto Him all glory for all things. The first thing the Lord hates is a proud look. Anybody's proud of anything. Why does He hate it? Because all things are a gift from Him. Ascribe unto Him all glory and strength for all things. Verse 2, Give unto the Lord Ascribe unto the Lord the glory due unto His name. And I'm to preach right now of that verse. Oh my, it can't be done. But try it anyway. The glory due unto His name. His name. What is His name? Call His name Wonderful. Wonderful. But Bob Coffey preached a message one time, and on that passage in Isaiah 9, he said that maybe we should, from here on out, quit calling anything or anyone wonderful, because that's his name. Call his name wonderful, full of wonder, full of amazement, wonderful, counselor, the mighty God, everlasting God, a scribe under his name. the glory due unto His name. God, that's the reason taking His name on our lips without glory unto it is blasphemy. It's taking His name in vain. Any use of it, any use of His name, any light, flippant, careless use of that name that does not ascribe the glory due unto it is taking His name in vain. And God says, I will not hold them guiltless who do that. His name is His glory. God. Jesus. Oh, I hear that precious name, which means Savior. And I hear it used so lightly and so carelessly and so blasphemously. Give unto that name the glory due unto it. Jesus. Jesus means Savior. I am the Lord that is my name, he said. Don't say Lordy, Lordy now. Don't say that. Don't ever use that name. Accepting glory to it. Oh Lord my God, when I in all some wonder. That's how you use that name. Glory. Let's do unto it. Verse 2. Worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness. The only ones that will worship Him, the only ones that will truly worship Him in spirit and in truth are those who know something of His holiness. The only ones that will truly worship Him in spirit and in truth are those who know something of this holiness. This holiness. Only those who have seen Him as holy, holy, holy. I contend, without apology, that no one worships God who doesn't know Him first as holy. No one knows God who doesn't know Him primarily standing as holy. Because that's how the Scriptures describe Him more than anything. We are holy. Holy, holy. That's why what we do here and the way we do it, this is solemn. This is serious. This is holy. It is. This is holy worship. We're for a holy God. It's a holy thing. We're a holy people. Offer up holy. lips and hearts and eyes. It's a serious thing. The beauty of holiness, holiness. Take off your shoes because we're on holy ground. Take off your spiritual shoes. Wear your real ones out of respect. Let the beauty of holiness worship Him in that way. Now, it begins in verse three to talk about the voice of the Lord, the voice of the Lord. And it says this seven times through this song, seven times, the number of perfection. It's alluded to more than that, but the voice of the Lord is spoken seven times, the voice, the voice, my voice you hear now, my speech. This is the spoken word. This is word. The word that you're hearing. Well, the scripture says, My sheep shall hear my voice. My voice. Now, we're going to look at several things on down through here. And they all have reference to Christ. Glorious references of Christ. glorious, ascribing glory to God. Bear with me. If you're uncomfortable, I'm more. Bear with me. This is glorious, okay? The voice of the Lord. Give me your attention. Verse 3. The voice of the Lord is upon the waters. The voice of the Lord is upon the waters. The God of glory, the Lord is upon many waters. The voice of the Lord is upon the waters, upon many waters. God's voice is heard in the elements. I jotted down a few things. They're in this. But God's voice is heard in the elements. It's heard in the water. It's heard in the wind. It's heard in fire. It's heard in the fire. And God's voice is heard in these elements. And it says here, the voice of the Lord is in the waters, upon the waters, upon many waters. Have you ever heard God's voice in a bubbling book? Well, not too long ago, the Parks and my family camped out along the shores, the pearly white beaches. and of those crystal blue waters of that ever-flowing oasis called the Pig River. We camped along that, and as small as that is and as polluted as it may be, yet, you know, we sat there and listened to that water bubbling over that brook. It says something about that, doesn't it? Something about it. You know, it speaks to me. Christ is all and in all. He's to be heard and seen and all things. And naturally, when you say water, every time you look at water, the minute that word is mentioned, you ought to think of Christ. Ascribe unto Him the glory due unto Him. He said the water of life. That water, oh, it can go on and on about a flowing body of water, couldn't you? It's ever the same, yet it's always different. It's always new and fresh. That's the mercies of God in Christ. Oh, that's the voice of God that's heard in the bubbling brook, the raging sea. I had the opportunity of going out to sea one time for ten days. I was on a sailing vessel with six other young men. And we went out to sea for 10 days, 150 miles out to sea on this sailing vessel. And we got into some, not gales, but I thought they were. I thought they were hurricane stand. It's landlubber, you know. I thought this is it, this is the end. And there was some experienced sailor on board who says it's just a little squabble, just a little squall. But to look out over that vast ocean, huge roaring waves, never-ending, never-ending. And the power, the literal power of that thing called the ocean of God, the voice of God is heard in the water. I am that I am. The Lord walked out there one day, Joe, and said, Now, y'all hush up. I'm talking. He couldn't be heard over the waters. He said, You hush. I'm going to do the talking. A raging sea, even still waters. Can you hear when he leads you beside, have you ever been beside a farm pond? Some of you have been fishing on a farm pond where the narrowest sound is to be heard. There is a sound to be heard in that still water, even in the still water, a sound of peace, peace. It speaks of Christ and upon the waters. His voice is upon the waters. That says the voice, the Word of God is upon the water. It made me think of an incident some nineteen hundred years ago. One stormy evening on the Sea of Galilee. some fishermen were riding in a boat, and they said, Who's that? There's somebody walking on the water. Who is that? That's the voice of the Lord upon the water. That's Christ out there. Look at verse three. The Lord is upon many waters. The Lord God, the voice of the God, the voice of the Lord, verse three, in the middle, thundereth. The God of glory thundereth. Do you not experience and hear the voice of our great God in the thunder? Huh? Do you not hear His voice in the thunder? One night in that little trailer, big trailer, we were all fast asleep. My father was visiting with us. For all practical purposes, he's deaf. He really is. Some of you found that out by trying to talk to him, even with hearing aids in both ears. His dad was that way, and his sister is that way now, and his brother was that way. At any rate, when he takes those out, you can forget about talking to him then. He says, you've heard him say it, he says to my mother before he goes to bed, he says, now you got anything else to say to me? Anything? No? Okay. And that's it, because he's not going to hear it. I'm going to hear a thing. Well, one night when he was here, it commenced a thunderstorm like I've never experienced since I've been living in my few short years, 29 years. I've never heard the likes of it. And it woke him up. And it woke me up. And it woke Hannah up, and it woke me up. We were all up. We were all up at the sound of that. Do you not hear the voice of our great God in the thunder? It's as if He's saying, now that's a still, small voice for Him. Now, that's a still, small voice for him. He who could obliterate the universe with a word. That mighty thunder at times, that's a still, small voice. But don't you hear it? He's saying, I am. I am God. Listen to me, mankind. I am God. I remember when our daughter was about three or four years old, There was another thunderstorm going on. She was standing at the window. I remember just like yesterday, seeing her little silhouette looking out that little window. Makes me want to cry. Three or four little silhouettes looking out our back window. It was thundering and lightning. She was standing there. She wasn't afraid. We've always tried not to make her afraid of anything. Don't be afraid of it. But that's God's thunder and lightning. And she was standing there looking out at the thunder and lightning. And she said, Dad, I see Him. I said, who, honey? She said, God. Well, she might not have, but then again, she did. The heavens declare His glory. See, His eternal power and Godhead are clearly seen by these things, clearly seen. And His voice is heard in that thunder. There was a time when the Lord actually audibly spoke from heaven. He said, This is My Son. When His Son was anointed, He said, This is My Son in whom I am well pleased. And what did the people say that were standing around that didn't know the Son, didn't know the God? They said it thundered. The next time you hear thunder, Barbara Ross, that's God saying, this is my son. Period. Hey, you think about that. The people didn't know him. They thought, well, it is thunder. Right? Detributed to natural causes. No, that was God speaking. Verse 4, the voice of the Lord is powerful. He created things by just saying, Be. Let there be. Try that. About anything. God Almighty created all things by His Word. He said, Let there be the Son. hanging in that vast ball of fire that sustains life. Be. Let there be then, let there be this voice of the Lord, just by His Word He created all things, the voice of the Lord. He upholds all things by this same Word. By this same voice of authority and Word He sustains. That sun is at a large hydrogen bomb, and I believe that's the thing that's going to do it all. I believe that's what's going to burn this earth up. That thing which is as a huge bomb ready to explode, it does explode. That's what makes it do what it does. It's explosions taking place. How many miles did they say that fire shoots off of the face of the sun? Well, God holds that ball from exploding by saying, by the same word, stay. Stay. Not yet. Not yet. The angels. Not yet. Not yet. There's a few more sheep. Not yet. That same Word holds these things in store, the Scripture said. And the same Word, the voice of His authority, the voice of the Lord, that powerful voice, provides us with all things. It provides us with all things. That same voice, though men can't hear it, He's speaking. He's speaking to a fellow and he says, give that fellow a job. And the fellow says, I don't know why I feel compelled to do this, but we're going to hire you. Something just told me. I tell you who told him. It's powerful. It's the same voice of authority that says, the hunter is out there, the hunter is out there and he's needy. Those hunters, those fellas down in Mexico, they don't go hunting for fun. They go hunting because they need the meat. And they're sitting out there looking, waiting, and God says, run in front of their gun. Run, little deer, in front of his gun. The voice of authority. The voice of power. It's the providing voice, the saving power. That same voice—oh, I love that portion of Scripture that says that God, who caused the light to shine out of darkness, has shined in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ—saving power in these old dark hearts of ours. These dark, sin-filled hearts of ours, when the gospel light comes, when God turns on the gospel light, like no less than He did the Apostle Paul on his road, God Almighty, a voice of God, a voice of power says, Hear this. Hear, my son. Hear of His work. Hear of His blood. shed for the remission of your sin. Hear of His righteousness impeded to your account. Hear. Repent of your sin. Repent. Come to Christ. Follow me. Follow me. Believe Christ. Trust Christ. That voice of authority, power, says, Come. And all those that hear it, as the shepherd's voice, all who hear it, they come, because He has all power. Look back at Genesis 3 very quickly. Genesis chapter 3, and I'll try to hurry, but this is all we have today. Genesis 3. Is it warm in here to you? Anyone? Genesis 3, it is to me. But the gospel is His voice, and Christ is the gospel, and Christ is the voice. And I'll never forget when I first read this. In verse 8 of Genesis 3, it says, Adam and Eve heard the voice of the Lord God walking in their garden. The voice of the Lord God walking in the garden. That's Christ. That is Christ, isn't it? In the garden, the voice of the Lord come walking. The Word came walking. And that same Word walked this planet, didn't it? That same Christ who has all power, all authority. Verse 4, it says, The voice of the Lord is powerful. The voice of the Lord is full of majesty. The voice of the Lord Jesus Christ is full of majesty. There were some fellows that went to get him one day, sent by the Sanhedrin. Go apprehend this fellow. Go apprehend this false prophet. Go get him. Bring him to us. We want to try. And they went. These fellows went confident of their mission, these professional soldiers went, or servants, went to get Christ, and he was merely preaching, standing up or sitting before a crowd of people preaching. And the fellows came in, barged in, and before you know it, they were sitting on the back row. They dropped their swords and shields and were enwrapped in what he was saying. And they walked out of there in a stupor and walked back dumbfounded. And when they got back to where they were, the Sanhedrin said, Where is he? They said, Who? The Lord Jesus. Oh, we couldn't get him. Why? No man spake like this man. No man spake like this man. In another place they said, Why, he spake. Not as the Pharisees. Not as those pretender, pious people. Not as the Pharisees, in a fake tone of voice or whatever, in an attempt at power, that said, he spoke as one having authority. Why, he spoke as if his word was law. He spoke like he was somebody. Well, it was like you're in a king talk. It was. Listen to this verse in Ecclesiastes 8, where the word of a king is their power. Their power. They say Solomon, when he used to issue one of his edicts or commands, everybody used to Be of attention. What about the king of kings? The Lord Himself, huh? And he goes on to say, Who may say unto him, What doest thou? Verse 5, the voice of the Lord breaketh the cedars. Breaketh the cedars of Lebanon even. Cedars of Lebanon are considered some of the oldest of trees on our planet, some of the oldest. The hardest. They're not like cedars here. They're hardwood. Hardwood. The Gospel. God's Word can break the hardest heart. God's Gospel, God's Word can save the oldest. Doesn't matter how old. You remember old brother Herman Pruitt, didn't you? There was a dear old fella years ago. 75 years old. And he was an old, hard-working fellow. Oh, just a stern-looking face and calloused hands. Hard-working. That's all he'd ever known. A full, thick head. A bush of gray, solid gray hair. But his son was a preacher. And one day, at 75 years old, he heard the gospel. And it saved him, and it broke him like a puppy. And you'd sign him on the sack of raw and never forget it. And you know, Lord, he preached through time. I'll never forget those. He sat in on that preacher's class. A bunch of quipper snappers in there in their twenties, and here's a 75-year-old man, like a kindergarten student. He just said, I don't know anything. He said, I want to learn. He'd find him on the second row of every service. Those old arthritic knees, he can make them bow. Make them bow. They're sick. He makes those trees skip like a cat. He can make the heart flutter. Man, by nature, has a hard heart. I look into the faces of some of you, and you've got a little of that sternness in you. Yeah, you're that way. I'm that way. I'm that way. Well, I tell you, when the Lord speaks, he'll break that facade. He'll cause the sternest of sinners to be the tenderest. Verse 7 says, Make that heart skip. And verse 7 says, The voice of the Lord divided into flames of fire. God's voice is heard in the fire, heard in the roaring flames. The Scripture even says God is a consuming fire. We were looking into that campfire, weren't we? And then the sister said, You know something about fire? You're just drawn to it, aren't you? I said, Yep. No wonder the Lord ascribes unto himself attributes such as that. Fire. God is a consuming fire. Fire would consume you if out of control, wouldn't it? If you were put into it without protection. It's a roaring flame. To most people, God is going to be just that, a consuming fire. They're going to be consumed in his presence one day. But to some, they're merely warned. They're merely warned. I've consumed a warming. Oh, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. Oh, Shad, Meshach, and Abed. I heard one fellow was preaching. One guy, Careyway, said he talked about my shack, your shack, and the bungalow. Shad, Shad, Meshack, and the Bed and the Goat. They were in that fiery furnace. When I said that thing was burning so hot like a blast furnace. Any of you men ever been in a steel mill around a blast furnace? I have. One of the largest in the states down in Armco, isn't it? And it would consume you if you get near it. Well, it did. Some men. The men that threw Shadmeesh and Obed in that thing, it consumed them. Can you imagine the sound of that fire? Well, it consumed them, those men that threw them. But to Oshadrak, Meshach, and Obednego, they were in it, but they were consumed. They were consumed by it, the wonder of it. Can you imagine the roar of it? But do you know what they heard above that roar? They heard a voice in the midst of the fire, saying, Fear not, I am with thee, O be not afraid. I am thy God, I will still give thee aid. When through fiery trials thy pathway shall lie, My grace all sufficient shall be thy supply. The flame shall not hurt thee, I only design the dross to consume, the gold to rely. They heard the bulls as of the son of man walking in the fire with them. And then when they came out of that fire, you know the only thing that was burning about them? Their hearts. I bet you they said it long before Peter and the boys did not. Our hearts burned within us while we were within the flames. with him." Huh? Who's that with you, Shad? Verse 8, The voice of the Lord shaketh the wilderness. This earth is as a vast wilderness of sin, and God's voice has been heard upon it. As by a John the Baptist who said, I'm the voice of one crying in the wilderness. Oh, that voice shook this earth and shook this planet. And then when he said, there cometh one mightier than I, hear his voice. And then when that voice spoke, come unto me, it is I. Oh my, this wilderness shook. Huh? It shook. And when he hung on that cross and said that actually the world shook, The earth did shake. The earth on an earthquake. The earth did shake. The whole thing. And someday, the Scripture says, once more, do I shake not only the earth, but the heavens. How? His voice is going to be heard. I'm going to shake this thing. Lo, I come. I come, the Bridegroom coming. Behold, the Bridegroom coming. Verse 9, the voice of the Lord makes hens to calf, cows to calf. The voice of the Lord gives new birth to them. We're born again by His voice, by His Word. It says it gives, it discovers the forest. You looking at that? Just a couple more minutes, would you? A couple more minutes? It says in verse 9, the voice of the Lord discovered the forest. You ever heard the old saying, they can't see the forest with trees? Well, that's true about man concerning himself, seeing himself. Barbara, men, when they talk about their sins, They talk about them in these terms, my faults, my mistakes. You know, yeah, I've got, I said a white lie. You know, they can't see the forest through trees. You know, this thing, man's heart by nature is more than a few faults. It's a vast wilderness of sin. And the voice of the Lord, John, when the Gospel comes, when the Word of God comes, it opens that up to you. It discovers to you your sin. My sin is ever before me. It also says, discovers unto you, my sin, O the bliss of this glorious cross, is nailed to the cross and I bear it no more. Praise the Lord, it is well with my soul. It discovers this forest of iniquity. And in his temple, in closing, verse 9, in his temple, this is his temple, this is his church, which is his temple, in his church, does everyone speak of his glory. That's what we're doing here. That's what this is all about. That's my subject this morning. That's why we're here. That's what we're to be doing, worshiping him, all to his glory. Ain't nobody else worth talking about. Ain't no other name worth mentioning. Ain't no other thing worth doing. The glory of the emperor. All things. Verse 10. The Lord sitteth upon the flood. What's yonder boat floating out there on that overflowing scourge of God's wrath against this earth? See a little boat floating. What is that? That's God's voice. That's God's ark. That's God's Christ. And there's some folks in it. And they're safe. Who's that walking on the water out there? That's God's voice. Walking on the water. The voice of the Lord sitteth on the flood. Yea, the Lord sitteth king forever, sitteth on the circle of the earth. And all of this, contemplating these things. You know, we just looked at natural things and natural illustrations. Everything. Some everyday things, everyday occurrences, common occurrences. Things all about us. Things we experience all the time. And in it, we ought to hear the glory of the Lord. We ought to hear the voice of the Lord. We ought to see the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ in all these things. God grant it. End these things. That's the reason I started out this message. If I say men and women and children ought to just stop and contemplate God. Just stop and think of Him. Just turn off that radio for just one moment. Travel along in your car. Get the sounds of Nirvana out of your ears for whoever it may be. And just think about your God. He might speak to you. He just might speak to you. And all of this contemplation ought to cause us, verse 11, to say then, the Lord will give strength unto His people. The Lord, who has all strength, will strengthen me to the task. The Lord will bless His people. with peace. All of this ought to give you strength and peace of mind and heart and life. But wash the Lord. All right, Brother Joe, you have a song picked out? What is it?