Amen.
Let's open our Bibles and let's turn to
1st Psalm 22.
Psalm 22.
Psalm 22, starting in verse 3.
But you are holy, who inhabit the praises
of Israel.
Our fathers trusted in you, they trusted, and
you delivered them.
They cried to you and were delivered.
They trusted in you and were not ashamed.
Look at verse 3, but you are holy,
who inhabit the praises of Israel.
Now, go forward in the Bible, past Psalms,
Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon.
Solomon, go to Isaiah.
Isaiah and go to the 57th chapter of
Isaiah.
And I want you to keep your Bibles
open, after we read, keep them open.
We'll refer back to this one verse.
It's a long verse.
Isn't it funny how the people who put
the verses in the Bible, some verses are
so long, and then other verses, for some
reason, they just quit after just a few
words, right?
There are no verses in the original Bible,
you know that, right?
There are no verses.
Verses are a more modern thing that really
happened after the Reformation, where the Bible, to
be able to find where we were reading,
etc., and reference, things like that.
Verses came in in chapter headings, but they
were not obviously in the original Bible when
it was written.
Verse 15, chapter 57, For thus says the
High and Lofty One, who inhabits eternity, whose
name is Holy, I dwell in the high
and holy place, with Him who has a
contrite and broken spirit, to revive the spirit
of the humble, and to revive the heart
of the contrite ones.
Let's read it again.
For thus says the High and Lofty One,
who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy, I
dwell in the high and holy place, with
Him who has a contrite and humble spirit,
to revive the spirit of the humble, and
to revive the heart of the contrite ones.
The name of my message...
Let me tell you what made me think
of it.
When I was raising my children, I used
to always sit and watch with them Sesame
Street.
Even though you're an adult, admit it, how
many have ever watched Sesame Street?
Come on.
Bert, Ernie, his paper clip collection and all
that.
And I didn't mind watching that, and when
my children were young, there was another program
on, it's not on anymore, but it was
called Electric Company.
Remember, how many remember the Electric Company?
Remember that?
That was good, that was funny, they had
funny things in that.
But the program I couldn't take was Mr.
Rogers' Neighborhood.
How many share my sentiments a little bit?
I know a lot of you love Mr.
Rogers, and that's great, and it's a great
program, I'm sure, but just that sweater and
that song just got to me.
I didn't want to be anywhere near Mr.
Rogers' Neighborhood.
The name of this message is God's Neighborhood.
You can get it in a tape as
you want at the end of the service,
God's Neighborhood, because how many want this year
to stay, all year long, all 12 months
of the year, you want to stay in
God's Neighborhood, close to God?
How many want to stay close to God?
Don't say, I'm a Christian, you know, I'm
always close to God, it's not true.
Why would the Bible say, draw near to
me, and I'll draw near to you, if
everybody was already living near God?
So this is about where God lives, because
you want to be in his neighborhood.
We're going to a different neighborhood, even though
it's a matter of just 20 blocks, to
downtown Brooklyn, you know, where we're going further
downtown.
Fulton and Smith and Livingston is a whole
different thing than Farbush Avenue.
It's a lot of action down there, a
lot of stuff going down, a lot of
stuff happening.
And sometimes people like to brag, when I
go around the country, and I hear, you
know, go out to eat with the minister
afterward, or the minister will tell me where
his church is located, you know, we're near
houses that cost a million plus.
Or someone says, I say, where do you
live?
And, oh, I live right outside LA.
Oh, yeah, what place?
Oh, it's called such and such.
Yeah, I haven't heard that.
Oh, you know who lives there?
This one lives there, or that one lives
there.
And they name drop because they want to
tell me that they live next to somebody
that's, you know, important.
You know, some of the people who live
down in Tribeca, you know, they drop names,
you know.
I live in Tribeca.
Yeah, you know who's in the next building,
and this, you know, famous person.
Well, I would say the best neighborhood to
live in, spiritually, and if you ever want
to boast and brag, you say, I live
near God.
I mean, that's better than living near some
movie star or athlete who, you know, nobody
remember that.
But where does God live?
I want to just tell you four short
things that you can remember this year, all
year long.
Let God renew your mind.
Let God give you the grace.
We can pray about these things this year.
God, keep me close to you.
Keep me in your neighborhood.
Because just because Jeremy plays the organ doesn't
mean that he's always going to stay in
God's neighborhood.
Playing the organ in a church doesn't guarantee
anything.
Being a pastor doesn't guarantee anything.
We have to daily abide in Christ.
And I'm going to phrase it this way
today, staying in God's neighborhood.
Well, the first thing we find from Isaiah
is that God says, I, let's look at
it, verse 15, look down again at your
Bible.
I, thus says the high and lofty one
who inhabits, where does God inhabit?
Eternity.
Look back up at me, please.
First thing I want you to remember is
that God inhabits and dwells in eternity.
Well, Pastor Simba, what does that mean to
us today?
It means this.
If you want to live near to God
this year, nearer than ever before, if you
want the blessing of God, if you want
to have open communion with God, you have
to be setting your mind on things that
involve eternity.
Even though God created the earth, God does
not exist.
His main home is not on earth.
He doesn't dwell here like He dwells in
eternity.
God doesn't dwell in time.
This is why many verses in the Bible
are hard to understand because God condescends to
explain Himself in our terms, time.
Today is Sunday, what's tomorrow?
Monday.
What was yesterday?
But there is no yesterday to God.
There is no today.
There's no tomorrow.
God doesn't know a Monday because God inhabits
eternity.
Time has nothing to do with God.
Time is something that's adapted to our existence.
We have a beginning, we have an end.
He was born in 1914, He died in
1988.
But God doesn't dwell in time.
He dwells eternity.
And everything that has to do with time
and earth is really foreign to God.
Material things, all the things on the earth,
like a gold watch that somebody really values,
that has nothing to do with God, no
value to God.
Because one day it will be destroyed.
See, everything that's on the earth will one
day be destroyed.
Everything having to do with time and earth
will one day be just wiped out.
But for us, we'll never be like God
in terms of, you know, being eternal.
That way we have eternal life through Him.
But this year, we have to set our
mind on things that have eternal significance, that
mean something to God.
You get it?
Something, set your mind, set your hearts on
things above, not on things below, the Bible
tells us in Colossians.
What is God saying there to us?
Saying, don't live for things that only last
for this long.
Your life is like a breath.
That's God.
Now imagine one day in your life.
God is saying, set your mind and your
heart and your affections on things that have
no end, where I dwell in eternity.
In other words, things have value on earth,
they don't have value in heaven.
The things that have value in heaven don't
have value on earth.
So the question is, what are you going
to do this year?
How are you going to live?
Are you going to live by what the
world says is important?
Is there an usher in the back or
a security person?
Is there an usher or a security person?
Willie, come up here.
That's okay, I'll use Willie.
That's okay, sister.
Come on, Willie.
This is our main security person.
Everyone know who Willie is?
Let's give our hand for our brother Willie.
Now, Willie gets here sometimes 6, 7 in
the morning to turn on the heat for
you.
Stays with me, watches my back all the
time.
Few months ago, remember, we were getting out
of the car and there was a guy
who wasn't too right, I don't think, in
his head.
But he was waiting outside my car as
it was pulled up.
And Willie was helping me out of the
car and my stuff for the day on
a Sunday.
And this guy made a sudden move toward
me and got right by us, right?
He was just right in my face.
And he reached into his jacket and he
was pulling something out.
And I just saw his hand and I
thought, oh, too late, whatever this is.
You know what he pulled out?
A piece of cornbread.
Am I right?
And it looked good, right?
It looked good, this cornbread.
I want to take a bite of that
thing so bad.
He wanted to talk to me about something
and he started chewing on this piece of
cornbread.
Takes all kinds, doesn't it?
How many love a good piece of cornbread,
by the way, right?
Well, anyway, where was I?
I'm going off here.
Willie and I see a lot of things.
So, Willie gets here and serves, or some
usher who works all week long and comes
here early to pray.
And right now they're counting money and they're
doing all that.
To the world, you know what we pay
them to do that?
Nothing.
Pay them nothing.
He's here thinking about you, trying to protect
everything.
To the world that would be like, that's
nothing.
What are you doing?
You're wasting your time.
Now, if somebody goes and if the market
makes a hundred thousand this week, does the
world think that's something or half a million,
right?
The world said, to heaven, it's nothing.
It's nothing.
This is something.
That's nothing.
Thank you, brother.
Watch out for that cornbread.
So, what do you want to set your
mind on and your heart on?
Do you want to live near where God
lives?
What are you doing that has eternity stamped
on it?
Is there anything?
In other words, don't tell me you're making
a living, don't tell me you're getting an
education.
People don't even know God do that.
But what do you have that has eternal
significance?
It can be something small.
Even if we give a glass of water
in Jesus' name to someone, we're going to
have a reward, right?
In other words, there's things, brothers and sisters,
that have significance, that have eternity stamped on
it.
And remember, God inhabits eternity.
To live close to God, you have to
be in sync with God this year.
I have to be in sync with God.
I have to be thinking eternal thoughts, not
temporary thoughts.
Think of how Christians are losing out with
God, because they think just like the world
thinks.
They get excited about what the world gets
excited, and the angels in heaven are getting
excited about a whole different kind of thing.
What do you get excited about?
This year, if we want to live near
God, in God's neighborhood, we have to have
eternity stamped on our mind, so that when
we say words, and we make a phone
call, Lord, what can I say, or do,
or pray, or be used, or invest, or
whatever, that has eternity?
Because now you're in sync with God's way
of thinking.
Think of the foolishness of everything is going
to disappear, with all due respect.
I mean, when you move in this new
building, Carol and I were there this week,
and our decorator friend is here, who's helping
us in so many ways.
It's going to be so nice for the
children.
When you see this dome that they painted,
this ceiling, they just happened to put the
lights on while we were there, and two
people just gasped on the platform.
We were watching, you know, to see something,
that they're hanging a chandelier.
And it's just, I'm so happy for you.
It's going to be, God would give you
people, you're so precious.
The prettiest church I've ever seen.
Imagine that, in the hood of all places.
But you know what?
It's all going to burn up.
That building is going to burn up, just
like this one.
It's what goes on in the building, that
has eternity.
So, what do you do, if you want
to live in God's neighborhood?
Look at me, everyone.
Do you do anything?
Do you pray anything?
Do you give anything, that has eternity on
it, because God inhabits eternity.
God doesn't dwell in time, and with material
things, unless they're used for an eternal significance,
giving to someone, helping someone.
Don't go by the world, and how they
measure things, because they measure things backwards, and
they laugh at things that God says are
great.
So, if you want to live near God
today, you've got to stay in the Bible,
and renew your mind, and say, God, teach
me what really matters, otherwise you're going to
live your life, and at the end of
it, find out it was all for zero.
Is that a bummer, or what?
Notice where else God lives.
I dwell in the high and holy place.
To live in God's neighborhood, we can't have
unconfessed sin in our life, because God is
holy.
If we're going to live in God's neighborhood,
we have to be sent.
I didn't expect this to get a lot
of amens, but it's still good preaching, wouldn't
you say?
We can't have unconfessed sin.
We can't have bitterness toward people.
We can't have some secret thing going on
somewhere with someone.
We can't be cheating on the job.
Am I right, Pastor Warren?
How are you going to dwell with God,
who lives in the high and holy place,
if we have unconfessed sin?
Do we all make mistakes?
Yes.
But there is a fountain filled with blood,
drawn from Emmanuel's veins, and we can run
and get that cleansed, and keep a very
short account with sin.
But you can't live in God's neighborhood, if
you're not aspiring to live holy.
The Bible says in Hebrews, Pursue peace with
all men, listen, and holiness, without which no
one will see the Lord.
Pursue peace with all men.
Don't be fighting with anyone this year, or
you'll move out of God's neighborhood.
God is a God of peace.
If you have a fight going on, and
yelling at everyone, and have big vendettas against
people, and you're explosive, or worse, got racial
prejudice, just stereotype people, and you have it
in for the black person, or the white
person, or a different person, from another country.
I'm finding out, it's not even colors anymore.
People don't like other people, because they're from
the wrong island.
Is that nasty or what?
Get a life.
Wherever you were born, don't you get it?
It's by accident.
Why you make a big thing about where
you were born?
You didn't ask to be born there.
You just woke up there, in the hospital,
and you were crying.
Now you're making a big thing about it?
If you were born in another place, why
would you be making a big thing about
that country?
It's not about the country, it's about you.
You're trying to make it like you're special,
because you were born there.
We don't buy that.
Everybody's the same.
How many say amen?
Amen.
Let's put our hands together, and thank God
that He's no respecter of persons.
That goes for America too.
Thank God for the blessings of America.
But America won't save you.
America's full of sins, and problems, and made
mistakes, and have a history of all kinds
of nasty things our country has done.
Just take slavery.
That'd be enough to shame any country.
So, live at peace with all men, and
pursue holiness, without which no one will see
the Lord.
If you and I want to live in
God's neighborhood, Pastor Ware and I, we have
to pursue being like Jesus this year.
That has to be a daily consciousness.
I want to be like Jesus.
And if we say, and think, or do
something wrong, we've got to run to Jesus
and say, God, forgive me.
The minute the Holy Spirit convicts you, just
get to God quick.
Come on, how many say amen?
Otherwise, sin will just mess up your engine,
your spiritual engine, and you'll be drifting away
from God's neighborhood.
You can't dwell with God in His neighborhood,
if you have unconfessed sin, because He dwells
in the high and the holy place.
So, number one, He inhabits eternity.
Set our mind on eternal things, Edgar, Pastor
Hammond.
Let's think spiritual thoughts, not just material thoughts.
Number two, holiness, purity.
Let's stay away from dirt.
Do I get a witness here?
Dirt, dirty thoughts, dirty words, dirty acts.
God is pure.
Notice the angels in heaven, they don't just
say it once.
What do they say around the throne constantly?
Holy, holy, what?
Holy, three times holy.
That's the overwhelming consciousness that they have close
to God.
So, whenever you meet someone who deals lightly
with sin, you know they're not living in
God's neighborhood.
No matter what they tell you.
They can be doing their talk and their
rap about, oh God, the good Lord, the
man upstairs, and all of that.
But when they live comfortable with sin, you
know, they're just deceived.
It's God's holy.
That doesn't mean we're perfect, but it means
we're sensitive about these things.
Which brings me to my third and next
to last point.
That's where God dwells.
He inhabits eternity, and He lives in the
high and holy place.
And when we get there one day, we'll
be with those angels singing, holy, holy, holy.
The purity of God.
Not a little shadow or any taint of
anything in Him.
Totally pure.
But God has two places on earth that
He dwells.
Now this gets closer to Mr. Rogers' neighborhood
than what I even said before.
Did you know there's only two places the
Bible says that God inhabits on earth?
Number one is in our text.
Let's look at it again.
The second part of the verse.
And then I'll close.
Making this and one more point.
I dwell in the high and holy place,
and with Him who has a contrite and
a humble spirit.
Why?
To revive the spirit of the humble and
to revive the heart of the contrite one.
Now look up here.
That means that this high and holy God
who inhabits eternity says that's where I dwell
in my heavenly glory, but there are two
places on earth that I'm drawn to where
I can sit down and dwell.
The word that I want to point out
to you today is, as we finish this,
is the word inhabit or dwell which speaks
of sitting down and resting for more than
a moment.
It means some pattern of permanence where God
can rest.
Wouldn't you like to know where God rests
and be that place and be near that
place?
Because wherever God is, there's blessing, there's reviving,
there's supply.
Wherever God is, I mean it just goes
out from Him.
Whatever we need, everything.
But see, people live far from God and
then wonder why they don't sense His presence,
don't experience much of His blessing, and they
go, well, you've got to get where the
action is.
You've got to get in God's neighborhood.
So this word inhabit or dwell means to
sit with permanence and rest.
And this high and holy one who dwells
in eternity says there's two places on earth
that I find a place to settle.
Imagine the Spirit of God if you picture
it like this.
The Spirit of God just hovering.
And the Bible says the eyes of the
Lord run to and fro over the whole
earth looking on whose behalf He can show
Himself strong.
Where can He rest?
What church can He rest in?
Imagine He goes to some churches and they
have a steeple and a cross and a
Bible and all of that.
But it's a black church.
It doesn't want white people.
So He goes, moving on from there.
There are white churches that want black people.
Well, moving on from there because How could
God dwell and settle when people don't want
some of His creation?
Some of His own children?
How could I be comfortable at your home
if you didn't want my brother or my
mother or my sister in your house?
No way I would ever be comfortable because
that's my family.
That's how God feels.
So God says this.
I dwell with a person who has a
contrite and a humble heart.
Not Trump Tower.
The White House totally leaves God unimpressed.
The plushest mansion in Beverly Hills is a
dump to God.
He dwells in heaven.
What's some two-bit house to Him?
Made of wood.
Wood means mansion.
God getting excited about something made of wood
beams.
He says, but what I'm looking for is
somebody with a contrite heart.
That's where I dwell.
You know what the word contrite means?
It means pierced and stabbed with a consciousness
of our sin and our need of God.
In other words, God's looking for someone who's
very tender before Him and says, Oh God,
I'm so sorry I said that.
I want to be like you, Lord.
I want to live a life pleasing to
you.
Oh God, I need you.
Pass me not, oh gentle Savior.
Hear my humble cry.
While on others thou art calling, don't pass
me by.
God, I need you.
I need you.
Wherever God sees that kind of humility and
contriteness and tenderness, God says, that's where I
settled down.
Look in the Bible.
Did God use great people when the Christmas
story was worked out?
Who were the high and haughty and famous
people God used?
Zechariah and Elizabeth?
Nobodies.
But contrite and humble.
Listen to how they lived and prayed.
Who was the mother of Jesus?
A nobody.
But Mary found favor, and when you hear
her pray, I rejoice in God my Savior.
Oh how great you are, God.
It reveals her contriteness and her humility.
So what does that tell us?
That if we walk in pride and self
-sufficiency this year, we will never dwell in
God's neighborhood.
Pride and self-sufficiency and insensitivity to sin
and justifying everything we do.
And when someone points out our failures, which
we're all prone to do, when somebody points
out our failures, to quickly defend ourselves, no
ability to say, I was wrong, I'm sorry.
But whenever there's someone who will say, Yeah,
I'm wrong.
Correct me.
I really need that.
I want to be better.
I want to be more like Christ.
Whenever God sees that, He goes, Come on.
I'm settling down over here.
Oh, how many want to have that kind
of heart?
And imagine wherever God comes, listen to what
He says.
When I come there, it's to revive the
heart of the contrite and to revive the
heart of the humble one.
In other words, when God sees people who
sense their need of Him and who are
tender, He says, I will fight for you
and I will be your strength and I
will take care of you and anyone becomes
your enemy, they become my enemy and I'll
be with you.
That's how Moses was.
The Bible says he was the meekest man
on the face of the earth.
Did you know that he became so meek?
He became such a house.
He so dwelled in God's neighborhood, spiritually speaking.
Did you know that when you picked on
Moses, you automatically provoke God?
How many would like to have a relationship
this year that anybody touches you, God gets
upset?
Remember when Moses married that Ethiopian woman?
Which it was nobody's business who he married.
Just like it's nobody's business who someone else
marries, so you don't have to give your
opinion.
You notice how people do that?
I've been around that since I was a
kid.
Everyone has an opinion of when two people
get married.
I don't see what she sees in him.
I don't know why he married her.
That will never last.
This is from church people and some people
like to make it sound spiritual like, you
know, the Lord showed me.
Ah, you're just critical.
The Lord didn't show you anything.
Well, he married a black woman and that
must have set off his brother and sister,
Aaron and Miriam.
So they had a remark.
And you know when they accosted Moses and
started going at him?
And he was the one who got the
Ten Commandments.
He was the one who had to fix
up the mess Aaron made with the golden
calf.
Remember that?
Remember how Aaron excused himself?
He said, I don't know.
They handed me all their earrings.
I put it in the fire and out
came this calf.
I don't know.
I just work here.
I didn't do anything.
I mean, that's a joke, right?
Aaron had messed up like that.
Right, Pastor Winter?
Moses had been up with God for 40
days, 40 nights, fasting with God, came down
to that mess and here Aaron is in
his face now about who he married.
If I was Moses, I'll tell you what
I would have said to Aaron in a
second and Miriam.
You know what Moses did?
He dropped on his knees.
He wouldn't even answer them.
But when he did, the cloud of God's
glory moved right over where they were.
And God spoke out and said to Aaron
and Miriam, Who are you to talk to
my servant Moses?
How many want that kind of umbrella of
protection?
Listen, let's lift up our hands right now
and just praise God.
Can you do it right now?
Come on, just lift up your hands and
say, God, humble me this year and let
me have a contrite spirit.
God, let Jim Simbala have a humble and
contrite spirit, Lord, so that you can dwell
with me and I can dwell with you,
Lord.
As the musicians play, one last point.
All right, let's review our class.
God inhabits eternity.
Say eternity.
He also lives in the high and holy
place.
Say that, high and...
But he also dwells with the person who
is of a contrite and humble heart.
Say that, contrite and...
So that's three points.
One last place.
Boy, imagine that.
If you kept your mind...
We put our minds on eternity.
We pursued holiness and kept no unconfessed sin
in our heart by God's grace.
Number three, we lived humble, esteeming others better
than ourselves, open to correction, trusting God to
protect us, not full of ourselves.
You know, it's...
When someone's full of a devil or a
demon, that's so easy to deal with because
Jesus sets the captives free.
But when you're full of yourself, it takes
sometimes decades for God to deal with that.
You know, it's very hard to get self
out of self.
The last place, David says, God, I've learned
another thing about you.
You are the God who inhabits the praises
of your people.
But doesn't that mingle the three together?
Listen.
In eternity, the Bible says, when we get
into eternity, in the book of Revelation, when
John is lifted up into eternity, into heaven,
the four and twenty elders, the four living
creatures, the seraphim and the cherubim, what's the
only thing going on up in that eternal
setting that we see is praise and adoration.
There's purity.
There's holy, holy, holy.
There's the glory of God.
And everybody keeps falling and at the throne
and praising God.
So what does that mean for us this
year?
We want to dwell in God's neighborhood.
We got to praise God at all times.
We got to give thanks in every kind
of season, in the good times and in
the bad times.
We got to give Him thanks.
What does this mean on the negative side?
When you study the Bible, ask what the
opposite is and see if it gives you
any teaching.
It means we're never going to dwell in
God's neighborhood.
We're never going to enjoy the fullness of
His blessing if we're walking around moping and
negative and complaining and bitter and man, nothing
works out.
And what she do that and I'll never
forget.
I know what happened when I was in
the eighth grade, but I'll never forget what
that friend did.
I don't know where she is now, but
that Rosemary, I hope she paid for what
she did to me in the eighth grade.
You think you're going to dwell in God's
neighborhood with that kind of nonsense?
Why don't you let it go and just
praise Him.
How many here today have more blessings than
problems by far?
Come on, come on.
Wave your hand at me if you have
way more blessings than your problems.
Then why are you dwelling on the problems?
Why do I dwell on the problems?
God's given me ten thousand blessings.
I have nine problems and why do I
dwell on the nine rather than the ten
thousand?
No.
God sits down as a king ready to
bless His subjects.
That's the word used in the praises of
His people.
There's something about praising the Lord and waiting
on the Lord and adoring the Lord.
It draws God's presence because most people on
the earth curse Him.
Osama Bin Laden curses the name of Jesus.
Hindus have no use for the name of
Jesus.
People in crack houses are selling crack and
using His name in vain.
Ah, for Christ's sake, give me the money.
Think of all the places in the world
where Jesus' name is mangled and butchered.
So when people start to give Him praise
and offer up a sacrifice of thanksgiving and
take time to do it, not just for
a second, but take time to worship and
praise the Lord, it's just like God goes,
Oops, there's a place I can live.
There's a place I can settle.
There's a contrite, humble heart.
You know, proud people can never worship.
You never see a proud spirit worship.
Oh, they might say hallelujah if you yell
at them and say, Say hallelujah.
But a real worship of God, you have
to humble yourself, don't you?
You have to be aware, Oh, He's everything.
Can you imagine where you would be today
if it wasn't for Jesus?
Have you ever thought about that?
How many shudder at the thought of where
you and I might be today if it
wasn't for Jesus Christ?
I'll say for myself, I have no idea,
but it would be horrible.
But imagine how blessed I am today.
My mother's sitting not a couple hundred feet
from me in another part of the building
listening to me on a screen.
She's 87.
She's closer to God now than she's ever
been in her whole life.
My wife is sitting in the auditorium.
God's hand is upon her.
He's blessing her.
She loves the Lord.
She's reading through the Bible this year in
one of her through the Bible in a
year thing.
She wants to get closer to God.
My three children are serving God.
All are involved in the work of the
Lord.
I have five grandchildren.
They all love Jesus.
I have so much to thank God for.
How about you?
Do you have a lot to thank God
for?
Don't we have a lot to praise Him
for?
Oh, let's just lift up our hands now
and open our mouths and just give Him
praise.
Now come on, not for 10 seconds or
20 seconds, but can you just tell God
from your heart, we bless you today, Lord.
You, oh God, who inhabit the praises of
your people, we magnify, we praise, we glorify
your name.
Oh God, how great you are.
We bless you, Lord.
We magnify you, Lord.
We praise your name.
We bless you, we praise you, we exalt
you, we extol you, Lord.
God, our words, there's not enough words to
say how we feel about you today, Lord.
We praise you today, Lord, because we're going
to live in your neighborhood today and we're
going to live this year in your neighborhood,
Lord.
We're going to live with eternity on our
mind, Lord, and we're going to live pursuing
holiness, Lord, by your grace.
And you're going to give us a contrite
and a humble heart, Lord, so that all
year long we're going to walk lowly in
your sight so that you can dwell with
us.
You are going to defend us and you're
going to take care of us when we're
in our hour of need and trouble, Lord.
Yes, you will, because according to your word,
you revive the heart of the contrite, you
revive the heart of the humble, Lord.
You, who inhabit the praises of Israel, we
bless you, Lord.
We praise you, Lord.
We magnify your name.
We glorify your name.
We bless you today, Lord.
Get rid of the junk out of our
lives.
Clean us up, Lord Jesus.
Let your blood cleanse us from all unrighteousness,
Lord.
We bless you and we praise you today.