you have your Bibles, turn with me to Ephes
ians chapter 5 verse number 18.
Let's begin by reading verses 18 and 19.
And do not get drunk with wine, for that is
dissipation. But be filled with the Spirit,
speaking to one another in psalms and hymns
and spiritual songs, singing and making melody
with your heart to the Lord. Now, as you know,
we split verse 18 up into two sermons.
If you remember, Paul is giving a contrast in
verse 18, you look at it there, between
on the one hand being drunk with wine, and on
the other hand being filled with the Spirit.
That's the contrast. And last time, we
considered what being filled with the Spirit
means.
And I can't use much time today to go back
over all that. So if you missed that sermon,
I highly encourage you to go back and watch it
online to get a biblical understanding of what
it means to be filled with the Holy Spirit.
But I'll give you a little bit of review and
just remember this from last time. Being
filled with the Spirit is not where you come
up here,
and I tap you on the head, you fall over and
flop around like a fish on the floor. That's
not
being filled with the Spirit. Being filled
with the Spirit is not speaking in a babbling,
incoherent way that has nothing to do with a
known language. Known languages were very
clear
and present at Pentecost in that miracle. And
being filled with the Spirit we learned
is not even something that we pray for. And I
've been, I told you, I've been guilty of that.
Lord, fill us with your Spirit on Sunday
morning. No, we don't pray to be filled with
the Spirit.
Being filled with the Spirit is a command.
Being filled with the Spirit is something that
we are
to be. And we said that being filled with the
Spirit is a moment by moment by moment
experience
for us. And remember in the Greek, it's
literally be being kept continuously filled
with the Spirit.
That's how it reads. And simply put, that
means when you're filled with the Spirit,
you are not controlled by you in that moment.
When you're filled with the Spirit, you're in
the
position of being totally yielded in that
moment to the control of God's Holy Spirit
over you.
And remember this, the how to get there. How
does a Christian get to that point of being
filled with the Spirit was best given to us in
a parallel passage in Colossians 3. Here in
Ephesians
5, Paul is listing what being filled with the
Spirit looks like. Look again, verse 19. First
thing he lists, what is the Spirit being
filled with the Spirit looks like? Well, first
of all,
it looks like speaking to one another in Psal
ms and hymns and spiritual Psalms. And if you
have
your Bibles open, you go on and just glance
down and see, goes on to give examples for
wives and
husbands and children and slaves and masters,
which is applicable today for bosses and
employees.
But interestingly, all of those same examples,
Psalms, hymns, spiritual Psalms, husbands,
wise masters, all that stuff, is almost
exactly the same in Colossians chapter 3 and 4
,
even some of the same exact words. But the
difference is here in Ephesians 5, it starts
off
be filled with the Spirit. Look at Colossians
3.16, how it starts. "Let the Word of Christ
richly dwell within you with all wisdom." That
's the key, if you remember what we said.
That, since these are parallel passages, that
is parallel with being filled with the Spirit
from Ephesians 5. So, filling your mind with
the Word of God is the primary way that we are
to be
being kept continuously filled with the Spirit
. Now, since we started in verse 18 of Ephes
ians 5,
I told you that we're going to follow in the
context of this passage three primary points.
Number one was the contrast between being
filled with the Spirit, being drunk with wine
and being
filled with the Spirit. We looked at that. And
if you remember, number two was the command
itself
to be filled with the Spirit. And we went into
detail with that. But I want to add a little
caveat here, that being filled with the Spirit
is met with great resistance from our flesh
and from our adversary. Do you remember, and
we've said this many times,
your inner redeemed spirit always, always 24/7
desires to do that which is right and
pleasing to God, right? But you're encased in
this body of flesh. That's what God has ord
ained.
And what did Paul say about the flesh in it
for the Christian even? It dwells what? No
good thing,
right? And for example, parallel to this
passage also, look at Galatians 5.16.
We get a similar exhortation here, Galatians 5
.16. Paul says, "But I say, walk by the Spirit
."
Remember what that means? Walk the manner of
living. Walk by the Spirit and you will not
carry
out the desire of the flesh. And so what is
the resistance to doing that? Look at the next
verse
in verse 17. "For the flesh sets its desire
against the Spirit and the Spirit against the
flesh,
for these are in opposition to one another so
that you may not do the things that you please
,
so that your inner redeemed spirit may not do
the things that you please, to please God."
The flesh, remember, as I just said, is that
in general can be described as that part of
our
unredeemed humanness that we still carry
around. And it's not just our physical body,
but also
including the mind and the will and the
emotions. And all of those are subject to sin,
which is also
where Satan lands with his temptations. I
remember Brother Moat used to say that the
flesh is the
beachhead of sin, and that's where Satan lands
on the beachhead to tempt us. Now, the way to
battle
against this for our own flesh and from our
adversary is not rocket science. It's actually
pretty simple. Paul just told us how to battle
against this. "Walk by the Spirit and you will
not carry out the desire of the flesh." Now,
this is not rocket science. Again, if you're
under the
control of the Spirit, you're not going to
have a problem with the flesh in that moment.
What do I
mean by that? That means in the moments. Think
about it. In the moments that you are
concentrating
on Christ, whether you're in prayer, whether
you're in worship like today, whether you're
reading your Bible, in the moments that you're
concentrating on Christ, guess what? You can't
be concentrating on the desires of the flesh
at the same time, can you? You can't do those
two
things at once. By necessity, you have to disp
el one or the other for one or the other to
happen.
Does that make sense to you? And yes, there is
a war going on there between the two that God
has
ordained for the sanctification of all
Christians as he's using your life and conform
ing you to the
image of Christ in your life. But that's not
our sermon for today. You just got that tidbit
for
free, and that will not be used against my
time, by the way, the tidbit, because we've
got to move
on to point three. The consequences. If you
are filled with the Spirit, what happens in
your life?
Well, there's three things that Paul gives us
next, and this is not an exhaustive list of
what
happened because you think about the fruits of
the Spirit and all the rest of that. This is
just
in the context in which he's speaking here. He
gives us three verses 19, 20, and 21. Number
one,
singing. Number two, saying thanks. And number
three, submitting to one another. Now, for
today,
we're only going to look at this first
consequence of being filled with the Spirit,
something that we
just got finished doing. Singing. Look again
at verse 19. Speaking to one another in songs
and hymns
and spiritual songs, singing and making melody
with your heart to the Lord. Now, we all know
that
music dominates our culture. I mean, think
about it. Music is all around us all the time.
Send a car,
send the home. It's on the radio. It's on our
phones. It's in restaurants. It's in bars
everywhere.
It's everywhere. And we all know that music is
a powerful, emotional stimulator, right? It's
a gift
from God. It's even a common grace gift. And
when you understand that term, common grace,
it's the grace of God that goes out to all
people, believers and unbelievers alike as it
reigns on the just and the unjust. Music is a
common grace gift to all people to enjoy, for
all
people to enjoy. Imagine the world without
music, right? Music is a great benefit to
mankind. Think
about the things it can do. It can quiet a
troubled soul. Have you ever had that happen?
It can settle down an anxious heart. Have you
ever had music do that for you?
Think about the use of music in our movies
that we watch. Think about the effect that
music has in conjunction with the storyline of
some of the greatest movies you've ever
watched.
You can be moved to tears in a movie with the
addition of the music that goes with it.
Music is a comfort. It's an encouragement. For
Saul, it calmed his troubled heart in 1 Samuel
.
Music can bring about great joy, right? I have
great joy when I come here and I'm singing and
I hear
you singing these great hymns of the Christian
faith. Joy unspeakable. Music can be high and
it
can be noble. As you know, I love the whole
time of Christmas and I have little traditions
. You
know I have a bunch of those and one of the
traditions I have at Christmas while I'm
preparing
my sermons is I listen to Handel's Messiah.
That is a high and noble and lofty piece of
music.
But unfortunately, in a fallen world, music
can be low. It can be degrading. It can be
nasty.
And really just about anything in between with
music. And it's very interesting to take note
of
the history of music. In this fallen world, as
it's continued to descend deeper and deeper
into corruption, as the Bible says evil men
grow worse and worse, so has its music. Have
you noticed?
Today, what is labeled as popular music is
dominated by really more and more forms of
degenerate music, lyrics. Think about just our
own American musical history. Consider the
difference
of the music and the lyrics from the 1920s to
the 1950s compared with the top 40 songs of
today.
I mean, music videos today would give the
average person in those days, if they could
see one of
our music videos a day, an absolute heart
attack. I mean, think about they looked at
Marilyn Manson
video. They couldn't even conceive that that
would be something that we'd have in American
culture.
Same thing with art in the more modern era. In
general, compared to centuries past, some of
what is called art nowadays and for a while
now really is anything but art to me. And I
worked
at a museum and I'm telling you, I look at
some of that like what in the world are y'all
doing with
that. I guess I'm not smart enough to
appreciate that as art, right? But the music
of the church
is timeless. Now listen, I'm not talking about
seven 11 songs. What are seven 11 songs? Seven
words sung 11 times, sometimes 1100 times in
the church. I love you Lord, I love you Lord,
I love you Lord continuously until you're
about to pass out. I'm not talking about Jesus
is my
boyfriend songs either. You ever heard one of
those? If you haven't, I'll play you one. You
want to turn it off as soon as you hear it. I
'm talking about the songs we sing when we
worship.
Consider Martin Luther's. A mighty fortress is
our God. That was written in 1529 and we are
still
singing it this day. That is timeless. I mean,
that one will get me ready to preach. I feel
like
singing it right now. Matter of fact, worship
is the highest expression of a believer's life
.
And I think the music that accompanies our
worship should be the highest and most
doctrinally sound and best suited for congreg
ational singing. Let me get to more of that in
a minute.
With secular music, there is a reflection of
the attitude of the society in the time
it was produced. Think about the sixties,
right? Listen, now listen, don't go out of
here and say,
"Brother Phillips said we ain't supposed to
listen to no secular music." I'm not saying
that,
okay? Don't get the preacher wrong here. What
I'm trying to emphasize here is that the music
of the redeemed expresses the unchanging truth
of the Word of God. It transcends culture.
What we've sung today transcends culture. And
that's why we've been singing hymns like
a mighty fortress since the sixteenth century.
Consider with me the absolute timelessness of
amazing grace. How sweet the sound, right? Tim
eless. Our music, folks, in the church is to be
different
because it's reflective of the truth of God
and the truth of God is that truth that never
ever
changes. And the miracle of regeneration and
the granting of the gifts of repentance and
faith,
the changing of our natures have given us a
new song to sing. And it's a timeless song.
I think it would be just so great. And I don't
know because I hadn't been to heaven and I don
't
believe none of them, people that write them
books about it and come back. But I just think
it's just
this is just the preacher's wishful thinking
speculation here. But just wouldn't it be
great?
If when we get to heaven, we just keep on
singing the same songs and hymns that we
sung on lower hymns. Imagine how it would be
to sing it there. Imagine mighty fortress up
there
with all the saints and the angels gathered
around the throne. Now, another little side
note,
but this will count for my time because it's
connected to the text. But before we get to
the
text, actually, there is a common
misconception in the church that music is
worship. For a lot of
people, when they hear the word worship, what
's the first thing they think about? They think
about
music. I mean, it's time for the worship part
of the service. The music part is often what
people
think about. But I want you to understand this
clearly. Music is not worship. Music is a
means
that we use to express worship. You understand
the difference? Something that music is this
emotional experience that you need to go
through and the right kind of music will just
stir up
that emotion all in you. And for sure, no
question about it, music will do that. We will
get emotional
when we're singing God's praises, but that in
and of itself is not necessarily worship.
Music will give expression to things like love
and honor and adoration, and it will give
expression to worship, but it doesn't produce
it. What does produce it is the truth that you
have
in your heart and the work of the Spirit of
God in you. That's what produces worship.
And also, some folks think, well, we've got to
get the music in our church that appeals
to the unbeliever, or they're going to get
bored with our music, or they're not going to
like
the way we do music. But it's my position, as
you know well, that the music that you hear
here
at Providence on Sunday morning and indeed the
entire worship service that we have here
itself
is not designed at all for unbelievers.
Nothing that we do here is for unbelievers.
Everything that we do here is for God's people
, God's redeemed, the family of God. I would
fully
expect an unbeliever to come into this door
and come into this church and sit down and not
particularly
care for our psalms and our hymns and very
much be just bored with what we do. No
different than when
many of them come here once, never to return
because of my preaching. How often, if we had
everybody that came here once, we couldn't fit
in this building, right? And I'm sorry,
you might need to get a better preacher. But
none of what we do here in the church,
in God's church, is for unbelievers. Look, if
somebody comes in here and the Spirit of God
gets ahold of him and saves them while they're
in our service, raise God. There is nothing
more
joyous that could possibly happen. But you can
be sure of this. We will never do anything
here in a
worship service. But what we think brings
glory to God and edifies his people and is
prescribed in
his word alone for how we do worship. That's
how we roll here, okay? In the Psalms, the
word "new"
appears many, many times. And guess what? The
word "new" in the Psalms appears alongside the
word
"song" more than any other word. Because as
new people, as I said, we have a new song.
And that's what Paul is getting at here in our
text. Just do a study on how much singing
and music is found in the Bible. Like, let me
give you an example. Look at Psalm chapter 33,
verses 1 through 3. "Sing for joy in the Lord,
O you righteous ones. Praise is becoming to
the
uproar. Give thanks to the Lord with the lyre.
Thing praises to him with a harp of ten
strings.
Sing to him," here it is, "a new song. Play
skillfully with a shout of joy." You know what
that
means? God wants it loud. God wants you to
sing loud in the worship service. He wants,
in just in those verses right there, look at
it. He wants music that's loud, that's skill
ful,
that's joyful, and that expresses the new song
of the Christian. David says in Psalm chapter
40,
verse 3, "He put a new song in my mouth, a
song of praise to our God." Psalm 96-1,
"Sing to the Lord, a new song." Psalm 98-1, "S
ing to the Lord, a new song." Psalm 149-1,
"Praise the Lord, sing to the Lord, a new song
." Even Isaiah and Isaiah 42-10,
"Sing to the Lord, a new song." Do you get it?
Christians sing a new song because we are new
creations. Our music is not like the old song.
It never should be. Now, when we sing, we sing
the song of joy and praise and thanksgiving
for the gift of salvation that we've been
given,
the forgiveness of our sins, the promise of
eternal life, the imputation of the
righteousness
of Christ, none of which we deserve. So, just
remember this. Music and singing are not
worship,
they accompany worship. They are the means of
worship. All right, now let's get to our
checks.
Ephesians 5-19, look at verse 19. There are
three verbs here that carry the action.
Speaking,
singing, and making melody. Now, speaking here
is a very general word. Literally, it means to
say
or speak. Really, very literally, it's just
kind of like making sounds. It could even be
like the
sound of a bird chirping or a baby cooing. And
so, here, we are to make sounds to one another
,
to songs, hymns, and spiritual songs by
singing and making melody. So, we sing and
making melody here
literally, literally means this. To sing to
the accompaniment of an instrument or to play
an
instrument. How sad for centuries in the
medieval times of church, they didn't allow
any instruments.
That's what that word means. So, there's two
ways here in this verse to make sounds. With
the voice,
which is the greatest instrument that there is
. And with instruments, how blessed are we to
have
three great musicians in this church to
accompany our worship, right? So, singing to
the accompaniment
of an instrument is an expression of a spirit-
filled life. And that's what we get to do here
every
Sunday. Isn't it great? We get to come back
here every Sunday and do this. And we are
going to sing
forever around the throne of God. And what we
have here, guess what? Every Sunday is a foret
aste
of that glory that's going to go around the
throne of God with the angels for all time.
But that's a sermon for another day. Don't
have time to get to that one. Boy, I could,
though.
But go back to verse 19 and look at that first
phrase. Speaking to one another. Clearly, what
does
that mean? Believers. Speaking to other
believers. We sing among ourselves is maybe
the best way
to put it. This is a mutual ministry amongst
the saints that we have here on Sunday morning
. And
let me tell you, be very clear, this is not
entertainment up here. Too many churches have
entertainment. This is not entertainment. This
is not even evangelistic. As I said earlier,
none of this is for outsiders. It's among us.
It's among family members. Again, listen to me
. If an
unbeliever comes in here and God uses our
worship service to save them, pray to God. But
it's not
designed for them. This is not the seeker-
friendly church. It's the only way it's a see
ker-friendly
is because we understand the only people that
seek God are believers. No man seeks after God
in his natural condition. Romans tells us. So,
this speaking to one another in this verse is
clearly meaning that these actions, speaking,
singing, and melody, obviously, if we're
having to
speak to one another, it's done publicly in
the setting right here that we're in here
today,
the congregation of God's people. Look at
Hebrews 2.12. "I will proclaim your name to my
brethren in
the midst of the congregation. I will sing
your praise." Now, I'm going to come back to
that verse
at the end. You just hold on to that one. You
're filled with the Spirit. Listen, you can
sing praise
when you're all by yourself. You can't. There
's nothing wrong with that. I've been guilty of
that.
Now, I come out of one of these men. I mean,
we had 44 men up in here singing to the top of
their
lungs of the night. It wouldn't be unusual for
me to belt out, "I'm on my feet for a drink,
driving
down the road, man. I'm fired up." You know,
somebody looks over at me and like, "What is
this crazy
man doing?" Right? But listen to this. You can
't be obedient to sing in the midst of the
congregation
if you're not in a congregation on Sunday
morning. You know what that means in the Greek
? Go to church
every Sunday. That's the Greek. "Do not fors
ake the assembling of yourselves. Together is
not a
suggestion, folks. This is a grace that we've
been given to do this every single Sunday
morning
for the rest of our lives." Now, go back to
verse 19, singing and making melody. Look at
that next
phrase, "with your heart." This comes from the
heart. It's the overflow of a redeemed heart.
It's a
literal bubbling over of a redeemed, saved
Christian person. It's an expression of the
joy of the Holy
Spirit that indwells you. If it's not from the
heart of a believer, guess what? You can't
sing the way
that God wants you to sing. Period. You can
sing the same words and you can even sing them
loud.
But if they're not in saving faith and not
under the grace of having been given the gifts
of repentance
and faith, it's not the way God wants it to
sound. In fact, you're still in disobedience
to Him.
God, in fact, indicted the people of Israel
through the prophet Amos because the people
of Israel in that time period kept singing and
they were doing all their offerings,
but their hearts were all wrong when they were
doing those things. And look at what God says
through the prophet Amos in Amos 521 about
this situation. Hearts were wrong, yet they're
still
worshiping outwardly. This is God. I hate. I
reject your festivals. Nor do I delight
in your solemn assemblies. Then look at verse
23. "Take away from me the noise of your songs
.
I will not even listen to the sound of your
hearts."
Can you imagine God feeling that way about our
service? I hate your songs. I reject your
worship
service. Take away the noise of your singing
and get them instruments out of my hearing.
Can you imagine that? That's why when you come
to church to worship, you better come correct.
That's what that says to us. Have your heart
right when you come to Sunday morning worship
with God's people. God has given a high
priority to our singing because it is the
release again
of a redeemed heart. That's why I believe our
music by necessity has to be different from
the
world's music because the Spirit of God is so
unique. We should never try to mimic the world
in our worship service or the world's music.
Plenty of churches do that. God is nothing
like this world system. I tell you, when
anybody leaves out of here, if they don't know
anything
else, they should never be confused about the
fact that they just went to church.
Not some kind of concert. When you come to
church, again, you have to understand this is
not
a performance that we have going on up here
with our very talented musicians. And guess
what?
When you come to worship service, you are not
the audience. God is the audience, right?
And we're all singing to God. We're giving
worship to God. Look again at the end of verse
19.
Who is it that you're singing to on Sunday
morning? End of verse 19. To the Lord.
Think about when we sing the hymn. Oh, God,
our help in ages past. Our hope for years to
come.
Who are we talking to there? Who are we
singing to there? God. When we are singing,
there is
a fountain filled with blood drawn from
Emmanuel's veins. Who are you singing to?
Jesus Christ,
the one who gave his blood for you. The great
composer, my favorite classical
composer, Johann Sebastian Bach. He used to
sign his music with SDG. You've seen me put
that on many
of our church group texts. You've seen me put
that on many of our Facebook posts. What does
it stand
for in the Latin? One of the five great solos
of the Reformation. Soli, Deo, Gloria, to the
glory
of God alone. And that is our motive here in
all of our worship services. With everything
we do,
especially with any music, we have to first
ask the question, will it honor God? Will it
reverence God? Will it bring glory to God? And
that brings up another point we need to
address
here in Ephesians 19. With what do we sing?
Well, look again. Paul says it in Psalms, hym
ns,
and spiritual songs. Now, there's a difference
of opinion with the commentators on what these
things represent. And I'm not going to take
time to take you through all the different
opinions,
because really, there's not huge differences
between these things. But there are dist
inctions
between these three. And there's a lot of
overlap between these three. I mean, Psalms is
pretty
self-explanatory, right? The Old Testament
Psalm. We just sang, what was it? Psalm 145.
The Greek word, psalmos. It's also used the
idea as anthems to God. And that is really so
much of
what the Psalms are, right? And as you know,
we sing the Psalms that we read every single
Sunday.
I just said, Dale said the other night, in our
15 years, we've read through the entire book
of Psalms
five times in our 15-year history. When we get
to the end, we go back to the beginning. We do
the
same thing with the New Testament. I mean, you
ain't getting nothing but Bible up in here.
And the reason why we get you to stand up, and
it might be a little aggravating for the
visitor
that comes down. Wait, we just sat down. Why
we got to stand up back up again? There's a
reason
for that. It's not just because we want you to
stretch your legs. It's because even though
the
lyrics are the paraphrase of the Psalm, we are
together literally singing the word of God.
And it's time to stand up when we do that. So,
many Psalms speak of the nature and the work
of God,
and we have many hymns that do that as well,
as you know. So, like I said, there's some
overlap here
in kind of the definition, but next we have hy
mns. Now, what's the first thing you think of
when you hear the word hymn? Well, whatever's
in the hymn book is a hymn, right?
But the Greek word, humnos, really the general
meaning is a song of praise. Okay, and that's
very
general. John MacArthur says this, a hymn
means a song of praise and is generally
related to salvation.
So, right there, think of this distinction.
You got Psalms, great anthems to the nature
and the
work of God, and then you got hymns, songs of
salvation that are often connected to the
person
and work of Jesus Christ on the cross, like
the old rugged cross or at the cross, and
think of hymns
like that. And then next we have spiritual
songs, you see there. That's a very broad term
, of course.
The idea, though, is more toward personal
testimony to the spiritual work of God
in our lives. Again, there's overlap in these
distinctions, and I don't really think you sit
down and come up with a strict set of rules
for, you know, lining all these out, but for
spiritual
songs, think of, I'd rather have Jesus than
anything. I think that would qualify as a
spiritual song,
more personal testimony, right, about the work
of God in your life. So, I think these broad
categories
that describe what Paul is talking about here,
but just think of that mixture. Psalms, anth
ems to the
nature and work of God, hymns, songs about the
cross and salvation and the redemptions of
Christ,
and then great testimonies to what God has
done in our life. What a great mixture, right,
of things
for us to sing. All of those are the
expression of a spirit-filled heart, and that
's what Paul
noticed, list first under this category in our
text. So, we have a new song, and we have to
understand everything we do here in our
service, again, is very deliberate, very
thought-out,
very purposeful, every aspect. We don't just
sing hymns from the hymn book because we're
Baptist,
and that's the way the Baptist always do it.
We just sing it out the hymn book. That's the
way
it's always been done. There are multiple
reasons for why we sing the hymns. They are
theologically rich, boy, we're saying
something this morning, right, that are the
ologically rich.
They are God-centered. They are not man-
centered. They are Christ-exalting. They focus
on the glory
of God. Well, we were discussing Wednesday
night this subject, Rogel pointed out that the
hymns are
even designed for congregational singing, the
way that the melodies go, so everybody can
sing them.
I mean, if we spice up our songs to kind of
like the melody of one of the top 40 songs of
today,
not everybody's going to be able to sing that.
Not all of us have the same amount of rhythm
that
my dad has, okay? And then what winds up
happening, if you got songs like that, not
everybody can
sing them, so some people aren't even singing
at that point. And that happens. I've seen
that in
many churches happen where it's really a
performance and the guys up there, they're
going to town,
man, it sounds great, but nobody's really
singing. Nobody's, nobody's using that as an
expression of
worship. And when you're singing from the
heart and your spirit fills, it doesn't really
matter if
you can't sing in the right key. It don't
really matter. I mean, we're all singing in
together,
so it all kind of just blends together, right?
You're singing, folks, as an expression of a
spirit
filled heart in the midst of the congregation.
I mean, what activity during your week is
better
than that as a Christian? That's why you want
to know what happens, whether it's Roger Dale
or me
leading the music, we turn this microphone off
. We want to hear all your voices.
And we also want to spare you from our less
than Grammy-winning abilities as well, but
beside that,
I go to, I've been to churches where the mic
is turned up so loud on the music leader,
you can't hear the people. I want to hear
everybody singing in congregational worship.
Now,
I want to close by taking you to two verses
that really broaden this action of singing out
to the absolute highest level possible.
There's going to come a day
when the music of this world is going to stop,
and it's going to be no more.
I'm absolutely certain there's going to be no
music in hell, okay? Because that's a gift of
God's
common grace. There's no even common grace in
hell. Eventually, there's going to be a new
heaven
and a new earth, whatever eschatology you have
, we all get to the same place, new heaven, new
earth.
And there's going to be a lot of singing there
. And let me give you an example.
Zephaniah chapter 3 verse 17 in heaven. It
says this, "The Lord your God
is in your midst a victorious warrior. He, God
, will exalt over you saints with joy.
He, God, will be quiet in his love. He, God,
will rejoice over you with shouts of joy."
That's God
right there. In the Hebrew, as I said earlier,
also translated into the King James Version,
singing, loud, singing. Can you imagine? This
verse is telling us that God himself
in the midst of the congregation of all the
saints, of all the ages, and all the angels
gathered round is rejoicing over us with loud
singing. That is the ultimate solo.
God singing to us. I can't fathom it. Can you?
Well, guess what? There's one more.
It's not done. Hebrews chapter 2. And I quoted
this earlier. Now I'm going to give you the
full
context. This, of course, is Jesus speaking of
Jesus. And just to give a little run up the
ramp
in context, let's read verses 9. And the
primary verse here will be verse 12, speaking
of Jesus.
"But we do see him who was made for a little
while lower than the angels, namely Jesus,
because of the suffering of death, crowned
with glory and honor, said by the grace of God
,
he might taste death for everyone. For it was
fitting for him for whom are all things,
and through whom are all things, and bringing
many sons to glory, to perfect the author of
their
salvation through suffering. For both he who
sanctifies and those who are sanctified are
all
from one father, for which reason he, Jesus,
is not ashamed to call them brethren, saying,
I will proclaim your name to my brethren in
the midst of the congregation. I will sing
your praise."
Can you imagine? I will proclaim your name in
the midst of the congregation. I will sing
your
praise. This is Jesus Christ, the God-man in
his glorified, resurrected body, singing
praise to
the Father in the midst of all the saints and
angels of all time. Can you, can you grasp
that?
No, you cannot. No, you cannot. But you can
grasp the tip of the iceberg of the concept of
it,
can't you? And that brings us to the table
here for today. This is the table of the one,
think
about it, the one who will one day sing praise
to the Father as we are there to witness.