Welcome to From the Pulpit in Classic Sermons.
Each week we bring you a different message
from some of history's greatest speakers in the
Christian faith, and powerful sermons from modern preachers,
too.
This week we have Ben Crandall with his
message, Garments of Praise.
Wonderful!
All hail King Jesus!
I love it, praise God!
I'd like to read to you a verse
of scripture found in Isaiah, the 61st chapter
and the 3rd verse, "...to console those who
mourn in Zion, to give them beauty for
ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, and
the garment of praise for the Spirit of
heaviness."
I want to talk to you for a
few minutes this morning on the garments of
praise instead of the Spirit of heaviness.
God wants you to lay aside the Spirit
of heaviness, and worry, and fear, and discouragement,
and He wants you clothed with the garments
of praise.
Hallelujah!
Praise is so important.
It is so important, folks sometimes don't realize
the power and the importance of praise.
Praise is important because praise will lift your
faith up toward God.
Praise makes God who He really is when
you praise Him the way He asks us
to in the book.
Praising God increases your faith and reduces your
problem.
So many folks have a big problem and
a little God.
When you've got that situation, you're in trouble.
You're in real trouble.
But God would like to reverse that for
you, and He wants to give you a
big God, a big God, and He wants
to reduce your problem to the size that
you realize God is great to handle it,
and praise does that.
Praise lifts your faith.
It gets your eyes off of your circumstance,
and off of your problem, and onto the
answer, and onto the cure, and onto the
victory.
Hallelujah!
Praise is vital to you, and it's wonderful.
We've had such marvelous praise here today, just
wonderful.
But you've got to learn to be clothed
with praise, and to take praise outside of
these doors, and to live with praise to
where you're identified with it.
Garments identify you.
And Isaiah said, God wants you clothed with
garments of praise.
He wants you to be identified.
He wants to see you that way.
And you want to see yourself and realize
that, and let folks hear the praises of
God, because that's what is truth, and that's
where the victory is.
Hallelujah!
Praise God.
Another great reason, very vital reason for praise
is so important, is because praise is the
truth about God.
God deserves all of the credit.
He deserves all of the praise.
He will not share it with anyone, because
He is the one that gives the answer.
He's the one that does it.
And God is truthful.
He wants the truth.
There's no, nothing false about God.
And it's praising God is right, because it's
the truth.
None of us deserve what we receive.
Thank God.
Aren't you thankful that God doesn't give us
what we deserve?
He gives us the victory.
He loved us.
He saved us.
He is carried for us.
He is the one that defeats the enemy.
He's the one that has the victory, and
He wants us clothed with that, understanding that,
and filled with the power and glory of
praise.
Don't allow Satan to put on a, give
you a garment of heaviness.
Don't let him give you a garment of
discouragement.
I don't care what your problem are.
We've got a God big enough to handle
every problem in this building.
It doesn't matter.
God is greater.
And when you get into praise, God begins
to become who He really is, and your
problems become so that God can handle them,
and He gives you the victory, and lifts
you above the circumstances.
Hallelujah.
So let me just go through now.
The book of Psalms, in the Hebrew, it
is called the book of praise.
Now, the Greek calls it Psalms, but really,
it is the book of praise.
And let's turn to that and find out
why it's such a big book.
Why there's so much of it in this
Bible.
Because it is so vital to you, to
your success, to your future.
Praise God.
Psalm 100, and the fourth verse says, enter
into His gates with thanksgiving, and into His
courts with praise.
Be thankful unto Him, and bless His name.
Enter His gates.
The only way you get into the gate
is with thanksgiving.
You don't come in with heaviness, and complaining,
and burdens, and all of that.
That is not how you get in.
You enter the gate with thanksgiving, and when
you begin to praise God, the gates swing
open, and you get into His presence.
Hallelujah.
Enter His gates with thanksgiving.
Praise God.
Psalm 118, 19, and 20.
Open to me the gates of righteousness.
I will go into them, and I will
praise the Lord.
For this is the gate of the Lord.
Praise is the gate of the Lord.
Hallelujah.
Psalm 22, 26.
They shall praise the Lord that seek the
Lord.
If you're seeking God, begin with praise as
the Lord's prayer.
Our Father, which art in heaven, hallowed be
thy name.
Praise is how you begin your prayer.
Hallelujah.
Praise God.
Psalm 56, 12, and 13.
I will render praise to you, for you
have delivered my soul from death.
I'm going to praise you, God, because you
saved me.
You redeemed me.
You saved my soul from death, from eternal
death and destruction.
I am going to praise you.
I don't care what the devil says or
what the circumstances are.
I am committed to praise.
Hallelujah.
Psalm 63, 3.
Now this is a great verse.
Because thy loving kindness is better than life,
my lips shall praise you.
I am going to praise you, because your
love and your kindness is better than life.
Hallelujah.
What is better than life?
What in the world is better than living?
Incredible statement of praise.
Because without the Lord's kindness and love, you
would have eternal death.
You would have death.
Jesus said, what would it profit you if
you gain the whole world and lose your
soul?
Without God's salvation, life is going to end
in total death.
Eternal death.
So he said, there's something better than just
plain living.
Because that ends in death.
It's God's kindness and his forgiveness.
Hallelujah.
It is better than life.
More important because that gives us eternal life.
His loving kindness is going to save me
from death.
Hallelujah.
And it's going to give me eternal life.
Hallelujah.
There's nothing as important as God's gift of
life.
His eternal life.
So he said, I'm going to praise you.
It's the best thing there is.
It's better than just plain living, because that
leads to death.
My living in God leads to eternal life
and with you forever.
Forever.
Hallelujah.
Why should I praise God?
He's given me the gift of life.
He's given me the gift of eternal life.
He saved me from hell.
He saved me from death.
He saved me from destruction.
And he's brought me into his family.
I will praise God.
Hallelujah.
Thank you, Jesus.
Thank you.
Psalm 136 and 1.
Give thanks to the Lord for his good,
for his mercy endures forever.
Because his mercy will never run out.
My mercy is not long.
Your mercy isn't long if you have any.
And if I have any, it's not for
long.
But God's mercy is forever.
And it embraces us.
So we praise him for his mercy.
Hallelujah.
Psalm 118, 21.
I will praise you for thou hast heard
me.
I want to praise you because when I
called, you heard me and answered my prayer.
Isn't that a great, great, wonderful.
I praise God because he hears me when
I pray.
Hallelujah.
Now, how do we praise him?
Psalm 9, 1 and 2.
I will praise you, Lord, with my whole
heart.
I will show forth all of thy marvelous
works.
I will be glad and rejoice in thee.
I will sing praises to thy name, O
Most High.
I will praise you with all of my
heart.
And I felt like, choir, I felt like
we were getting into that this morning.
I felt like, boy, that we were praising
God with all of our heart.
Now, half praise and half-hearted praise and
half-hearted thanksgiving is worthless to God.
He wants all of it.
He said, I will praise him with all
of my heart.
I'm praising him honestly.
I'm praising him sincerely.
I have no reservations.
I have nothing holding me back.
He has saved me and I'm praising him
with all of my heart.
With all of my soul.
With all of my life.
I praise you because when I was lost,
you found me.
When I was going to hell, you stopped
me.
And you rescued me.
And you protected me.
And you have kept me.
And you have kept me until this hour.
He brought you here today.
He has watched over you.
He has fed you.
He has clothed you.
He has kept you.
And he says, I'm going to praise you
with everything within me because it all goes
back to you.
Hallelujah.
Praise him with all of my heart.
Hallelujah.
Praise God.
Sing praises to God.
And we were doing that today.
Sing praises to our King.
For God is the King of all of
the earth.
Hallelujah.
Clap your hands, all you people.
Shout to God with a voice of triumph.
Hallelujah.
Shout with a voice of triumph.
Shout with a voice of victory.
You're victorious this day.
I don't care what the devil says.
If you're in Christ, you're victorious.
We won.
We won the victory.
Hallelujah.
Praise God.
We won.
We are victorious.
Praise God.
With a voice of triumph.
Victory.
You know, I don't know much about sports.
Nothing against it.
Just kind of ignorant.
But I do remember about a year ago,
this past year, not this season, but a
year ago, the Red Sox won the World
Series.
Now, they hadn't won it for decades.
They went crazy.
They won the World Series.
They were triumphant.
Talk about shouting, horns blowing, people going crazy.
The Red Sox won the ball game.
And that's fine.
I'm glad they did.
They needed to.
But we have won over Satan.
We have won.
Hallelujah.
we won we won over the grave we
are winning over the grave death will not
hold us we're gonna be resurrected we have
won over all of life's problems Satan is
defeated and we have won hallelujah hallelujah thank
you Jesus this is this is a great
verse here Psalm 57 7 and 8 I
will sing and praise God now I should
sing more we should sing even by ourselves
even though people around you may not enjoy
it like with me but saying for God
hallelujah anyway he said David said I will
awaken the lute and the harp I will
awaken the dawn he said I will get
up before sunrise and speak to my instruments
and say to the lute get up you
instrument get up wake up and to the
harp wake up and he was such a
harp player wake up harp and he said
because when the Sun comes over the eastern
horizon with the first light shades first beams
of light when you're coming with a golden
sunrise we're going to be praising God we're
gonna welcome the day with praise to God
he's given us another day I'm gonna play
this instrument I'm gonna blow this horn I'm
gonna shout and sing when the Sun rises
because it has risen in my soul and
someday it's gonna rise never to set with
me hallelujah so I will awaken the dawn
I'll get up to praise God I will
get up to worship him I'll get up
to honor him hallelujah he'll be the first
thing that I'm gonna think about and I'll
get up early just to praise God in
that fantastic hallelujah praise God praise God praise
God this is a very interesting verse 71
23 my lips shall greatly rejoice I never
thought about happy lips before did you ever
think of that but when you stop and
think I've seen sad lips and I've seen
happy lips up smiling lips he says when
I praise God my lips get happy I
never thought of that before did you praise
God my lips will greatly rejoice when I
sing to thee my soul thou has redeemed
and my mouth is happy praising God hallelujah
very different praise God thank you Jesus hallelujah
how wonderful the praises of God Psalm 98
Oh sing to the Lord a new song
for he has done marvelous things his right
hand and his holy arm has gotten him
the victory sing keep singing old songs but
sing new songs because he gives us new
experiences he's got another experience for you he's
got another blessing for you and with it
comes a new song and another song hallelujah
I love the singing here in this church
I really I get lifted up when I
come here praise God because I love the
singing I love the choir I love the
music because it lifts us to the Lord
hallelujah praise God sing a new song for
he has done marvelous things now it says
make a joyful noise unto the Lord now
I'm not against churches that sang funeral songs
but I'm really not blessed much by it
I really don't feel like sad when I
go to church make a joyful noise to
the Lord all the earth make a loud
noise there's a minister that I knew in
some denominational man said him and why do
you Pentecostals think God is deaf he said
we don't think he's deaf but he's not
nervous either and he loves us to praise
God because the Bible says make a loud
noise and rejoice and sing praises well the
Red Sox made a loud noise just over
a ball game we're gonna make a loud
noise because of our Redeemer hallelujah and praise
him with all of our heart hallelujah hallelujah
thank you Jesus praise God Psalm 107 second
verse let the redeemed of the Lord say
so whom he has redeemed from the hand
of the enemy now here's a cry of
God's heart in the eighth verse oh that
men would praise the Lord for his goodness
and for his wonderful works to the children
of men oh that folks would understand what
God has done and praise him then in
the 15th verse oh that men would praise
the Lord for his goodness then in the
21st verse oh that men would praise the
Lord the cry out of the heart of
God why don't they understand and praise me
and realize what I've done and then in
the 31st verse oh that men would praise
the Lord that we would praise him praise
God the psalmist challenges me in one verse
119 and 169 the 119th Psalm it says
seven times a day I will praise God
that challenges me I don't always do that
you must think boy he must be praising
God all the time no I'm preaching to
myself as well as you I think of
his some days look I haven't praised God
seven times I have why should he praise
God more than I praise God why should
he praise God seven times a day and
some days I hardly praise him that's not
right I want to praise God seven times
a day I want to wear a garment
of praise that I've got it on all
day long and praise him in the morning
praise him at the coffee break praise him
at lunchtime praise him in the middle of
the afternoon praise him at dinner praise him
when you go to bed just wear the
garments of praise that you are praising God
all day long because he is worthy he
is worthy he is worthy he has redeemed
us from every nation and kindred and tongue
he's brought us back to God and he's
worthy of our praise and he redeemed us
when nobody else could we are going to
praise God with all of our heart hallelujah
hallelujah thank you Jesus we're gonna praise him
hallelujah now here's a great reason for praising
God a tremendous argument Psalm 6 5 &
6 listen to these next four verses for
in death there is no remembrance of thee
in the grave who shall praise you Psalm
6 5 & 6 Psalm 39 what profit
is there in my blood when I go
down to the pit shall the dust praise
thee shall it declare your great truths Psalm
88 10 will thou show wonders to the
dead shall the dead arise and praise thee
question for God the answers in 119 Psalm
175 let my soul live and it will
praise you he's the argument that David is
putting is this God if I'm dead I
can't praise you but if you will keep
me alive you've got a great praiser hallelujah
hallelujah hallelujah if you heal me if you
resurrect you keep me going then you've got
somebody that's gonna really praise you and that's
valuable because it's the truth hallelujah so he
says keep me alive that I can praise
you keep me alive don't let anything happen
to me God because you lose a great
praiser hallelujah hallelujah that's a great argument in
it hallelujah hallelujah God is watching you because
you're a great praiser you're honoring him you're
lifting up his name because it's the truth
because he's worthy because he's the one that
gets the praise hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah thank you
Jesus thank you Jesus praise God I love
that keep me alive and I'm gonna praise
you now I want you to turn with
me if you have your Bible you can
turn with me to the psalm will turn
over to Psalm 148 148 and one 150
listen to this 148 praise the Lord praise
him from the heavens praise him in the
heights of the skies praise him all of
his angels of heaven praise God all of
the angels of heaven are praising God praise
him all of its host other than angels
praise him creation praise him son son God
created you praise God moon praise God because
God created you praise him all of you
stars of light all of you stars twinkling
stars and galaxies that no one has ever
seen the end of it no one knows
could go forever nobody knows how vast his
creation is but he says let every star
let every star in the sky praise God
hallelujah hallelujah now wonderful praise him all heaven
of heavens all the waters above the heavens
in the clouds praise him let them praise
the name of the Lord for he commanded
and they were created he also has established
them forever and ever he's established them he
has made a decree that shall not pass
away praise him from the earth now that's
the heavens every angel every creature everything in
the heavens praising God everything in heaven everything
in the earthly heavens praise God hallelujah praise
God then he says after that praise him
all the creatures of the earth the great
sea creatures in the depth praise him fire
every fire in California and all over the
world praise God fires hail the hail storms
praise God every hail bit of hail snow
praise God snow praise God clouds stormy winds
hurricanes tornadoes praise God you great powerful winds
that show the power of God fulfilling his
word mountains Mount Everest the Alps praise God
all of you mountains praise God with your
peaks pointing to the sky and all little
hills you rolling hills praise God you hills
praise God and fruitful trees you preach peach
trees of Georgia and you apple trees of
New England and the pear trees praise God
with your fruit hanging down you're a praise
to God and every moving cedar and every
pine and every tree praise God and all
you beast of the field all the cattle
and all the animals and all the lions
and all the bears and every beast of
the field praise God you praise God you
beast and all the cattle and he says
you creeping things you little ants praise God
you praise God running around that floor you
praise God you little ants praise God hallelujah
hallelujah and the flying fowls from the little
hummingbird to the majestic eagle praise God every
time you flap your wings kings of the
earth praise God all people princes judges all
young men and women and old men and
children everybody praise the Lord praise the Lord
hallelujah psalm of 50 praise God in the
sanctuary praise him in his mighty firmament of
the heavens praise him for his mighty acts
opening the Red Sea bringing out the children
of Israel raising Christ from the dead hallelujah
praise him according to his greatness praise him
with the sound of the trumpet praise him
with the lute and the harp praise him
with the dance with stringed instruments and flutes
with loud cymbals high-sounding cymbals that everything
in the heavens and the earth praise God
praise God praise God praise God you've been
listening to the from the pulpit and classic
sermon series this week you heard Ben Crandall
and his message garments of praise tune in
next week to hear Leonard Ravenhill speak about
when a storm arose and Christ arose on
from the pulpit and classic sermons