Praise—the Overflow of Joy

[00:00:00] Let's go to Psalm number 33, Psalm 33. [00:00:16] I'd like to read Psalm 33:1 5. 1:5. [00:00:24] Psalm 33:1 5. [00:00:31] The Bible says, rejoice in the Lord, O ye righteous. For praise is comely for the upright. [00:00:40] Praise the Lord with harp. Sing unto him with the psaltery and an instrument of 10 strings. [00:00:48] Sing unto him a new song. Play skillfully with a loud noise. [00:00:53] For the word of the Lord is right and all his works are done in truth. He loveth righteousness and judgment. The earth is full of the goodness of the Lord. Let's pray together, O Lord, as we come to your word here tonight. And we're here, you said, where two or three are gathered together in your name, there you promised to be in the midst. So, Lord, we trust that you are in the midst of us. We know that you are in us by means of the Spirit of God. And Lord, we just pray that knowing that you are among us, that you would manifest yourself to us, that you would be our teacher, that you would help us to see these truths plainly. They would be plainly set before our eyes. Lord, help me to say and speak these things to your people clearly. And that we would all receive them and we would all be a joyful people, people who have the praise of God on our lips. [00:01:54] And so, Lord, we commit this time to you, we trust you with it, and that you will do whatever that you want to do in us, and you will do a great work in each of us and in all of us as a church body as well. In Jesus name, Amen. [00:02:12] Pray for those guys. [00:02:17] I want to point out we're just going to look at the first, really, the first three verses is what I want to look at tonight. Starting in verse one. The Bible says, rejoice in the Lord, O ye righteous. [00:02:31] For praise is comely for the upright. [00:02:36] Now, the thing I want you to see from this, and this might seem a little bit obvious, but I want you to see it because I think it. I think it matters. [00:02:47] The first word in the psalm is rejoice. And then the second in this parallel construction here, it says, for praise is comely for the upright. So the word in this psalm, the word rejoice and the word praise are connected. And this is not the only time you see this in the Psalms. This is an important, like, steady truth, consistent truth throughout the psalm that is significant. And I want us to see it. [00:03:17] Because to rejoice or that is to have joy. Joy is the rejoicing, obviously, is the exercising of joy. Right. Is that thinking upon that which gives you joy and rejoicing is connected to praise in this psalm, like it is in many places. And this is the way it's connected in the Psalms. And we're going to look at some verses to show this. [00:03:41] Praise is merely the outward, the outflow, overflow, if you will, of joy in the heart of a believer. So joy is something that is. Joy is not outward. Joy is inward. And like many Christian virtues or graces, as they say, it starts inwardly. It always starts inwardly. Everything in the Christian life starts inwardly. [00:04:07] And by the time you see it on the outside, it's already, you know, it's already happened inside. And that's a key point. So we're not trying to get people to just outwardly conform to our system or to our rules. No, we want people. And this is the guiding principle, right? With your kids, with the church, with your personal life, you want that thing, whatever that thing is, that virtue, that grace, to be inside of you first. And I promise you, if it is there, it will work itself out. It will come out. [00:04:44] And the benefit of that is that you never, if that's the case and that thing is inside of you, then when it works itself out, you'll never have the feeling that you're faking it or that you're just putting on a show that you're putting on airs because you know that it's inside also. [00:05:02] Now, all of us have been in a place when we've put on something that we knew it should have on the outside, right? We kind of put it on. We put the face on and we played the part, and we knew that inwardly it was hollow. We all know what that's like. Some of us have been in situations where that was expected of us, right? [00:05:24] But the Lord wants us to have the real thing, the genuine article on the inside, so that we never have that feeling at all that. That disconnect from the outside and the inside. And in the case of praise, praise is the outworking of the thing on the inside, which is joy. [00:05:44] So again, praise is the overflow of joy in the heart of a believer. So the question you have to ask yourself when you're talking about praise and, you know, having been in church and been to a lot of services, what I've seen is sometimes we try to put on praise, right? We try to put on. You just need to praise the Lord. And you go to some of these. You go to some of these churches and, you know, they artificially tell you to raise your hands and Everybody I remember my wife knows exactly what I'm talking about. But I was in one service and the song leader was like, now everybody just raise your hands to the Lord and they're, you know, and you know, you're trying to work it up, you know, work it up. And here there was one person that was there and they were doing, literally doing this. [00:06:32] It was the funniest thing. I'm not going to give any specifics, but they were doing this. I would dare say that this body position betrays that whatever is the source of praise was not inside. I'm just saying it probably wasn't there if this is all you can muster. But again, you can't work that up. Song leader can't. Brother Ari, you know, the multi talented Brother Ari is not that talented. He can't work up praise in people. And I've said this before, and I'll say it again because it fits in this context, right? You want to have a good time in your hearts singing songs that are. When we come into our church services, do you know what makes a church service, song service lively? You know, we talk about lively. It's not the tempo. You know, what makes it lively is that you have joy inwardly before you ever get there. [00:07:34] That's where it comes from. [00:07:37] We want to blame Ari. Ain't Ari's fault. It's not Ari's fault at all. Ari picks good songs. It's not his fault. [00:07:46] The joy has to be inside, right? It's not other people's job to stir us up to get us to praise the Lord. No, that's not the way it works at all. And I want to show it to you in just a minute. So let me say this. Knowing that joy is the source and praise, which is the, you know, that's outward, right? Praise is the outflow, the overflow of joy. [00:08:09] Therefore, if we find ourselves lacking praise outwardly, right, we're not praising God outwardly. That is, praise can be to God or praise can be of God. But if we are lacking the outward expression of praise, the source of that is a lack of inward joy. [00:08:31] You can't work it up. [00:08:33] And who wants to work it up, right? [00:08:36] I don't want to just go through the motions of praise to God. No, let's work on the inside. [00:08:44] And the reason why, again, the reason why we lack praise is because there is a lack of inward joy and a lack of inward rejoicing. And to put it frankly, here it is, we're just simply not happy in Jesus. [00:08:59] It's that Simple. [00:09:02] It really is that simple. [00:09:05] Because if we were happy in Jesus, which is a common parlance for having the joy of the Lord, right? If we were happy in Jesus, the evidence of that would be outward praise. And you know what I'm saying is true, because you have had. You have known the joy of the Lord in your heart. And it just comes out. It just comes out. Let me go through a few psalms and show it to you. Then I want to go to Galatians really quick in Psalm. Go back to Psalm number nine. We'll just walk through from the beginning to the end. Psalm number nine, verse number two. [00:09:45] Psalm number nine, verse two says this. [00:09:49] I will be glad and rejoice in thee. Where does that happen? [00:09:56] Happens inside, right? That's inward. [00:10:00] I will sing praise to thy name. O thou most high. Note the order. [00:10:06] You have the inward, and then the outward. You have the inward joy, and then you have the outward expression in Praise. Psalm number 28. Look at that, if you would. Psalm 28, verse number 7. [00:10:22] Psalm 28, verse 7 says this. The Lord is my strength and my shield. My heart trusted in him, and I am helped. Therefore my heart greatly rejoices. What rejoiceth in this verse? My heart greatly rejoiceth. And with my song will I praise him again. The heart first, then it overflows into the song which is outward. All right, Psalm 42. Look at that. [00:10:53] Psalm number 42. [00:11:00] This is an interesting way that the Scripture puts this. Psalm 42:4 says this. When I remember these things, I pour out my soul in me. For I had gone with the multitude. I went with them to the house of God. Listen. Listen to what it says. Notice I went with them to the house of God. Now just. I'm sorry, I've got to be technical and doctrinal here, okay? [00:11:24] This is not the house of God. [00:11:27] We are the house of God. But the connection is when we meet together. That's the Old Testament equivalent of going to the house of God. We gather together when the people of God come together. And so this has direct relationship to what I was talking about a minute ago, which is the song service. He says, I went with them to the house of God. In other words, I went to church, right? [00:11:51] With the voice of joy and praise. With a multitude that kept holy day. [00:12:00] Notice. Notice the language. It's beautiful here. With the voice of joy and praise. [00:12:10] We know that joy is inward. But the voice of joy is the voice in which joy speaks. That which is inside comes out, and it is expressed with the voice. It's expressed with the words. It's expressed in song, in praise. But where does joy get its sound? The voice of joy refers to the expression of joy. [00:12:41] And so what you see in this is you see both the inward joy and the outward expression. For joy speaks. That's what we're talking about when we talk about praise, when we talk about songs. Joy is speaking the voice of joy. [00:12:57] Look at Psalm 63, Psalm 63, same thing here. [00:13:11] My soul, verse 5, Psalm 63, verse 5. My soul shall be satisfied as with marrow and fatness. And my mouth shall praise thee with. Notice what it says. We're talking about praise. We're talking about praise which is done on the lips, which is done with the voice. [00:13:28] He says, my mouth shall praise thee with joyful lips. [00:13:36] Joyful lips. In other words, as the lips move, the heart is happy. You see that? Joyful lips. That's what that means. [00:13:47] It's not that the words you're saying are words of joy. It is that the words you're saying are being animated by inward joy. That's joyful lips, right? Look at one more. Psalm 98. [00:14:03] Psalm 98, verse number four. [00:14:11] You've heard this very common verse, but maybe another. Look at it. Kind of look at it again, or you might see something, a new facet to it. Psalm 98, verse 4 says, Make a joyful noise unto the Lord all the earth. Make a loud noise and rejoice and sing praise. Notice what kind of noise is it? It's a joyful noise. Not so much a reference to the quality of the sound, but to the character of the person who's making the sound, to the inward condition of the person who's making the sound. Have you ever heard someone who does not particularly a good singer, but they obviously have joy. And that's being expressed, right? That's a joyful noise, a joyful noise. [00:14:54] And so again, what I want you to see is the connection between rejoicing and joy inwardly, with the overflow of that outwardly in the form of praise. Now go Back to Psalm 33, if you would. [00:15:11] And we're going to be in Psalm. We're going to be back in the text in just a minute. But I do want to show you one other passage. Because we all. At some time or another, sometimes it's frequently. Sometimes it's a habitual matter of our life that we live in such a way that we do not praise God. It's just not there, right? [00:15:36] We do not praise God. [00:15:39] The answer to that and the way to remedy that is not to just do it. [00:15:45] The remedy to that is to look at the inward condition and ask ourselves, why am I not happy in Christ? [00:15:56] Why is my joy lacking? [00:16:00] Because if it was there, the praise would come easy. Why is it lacking? Look at Galatians, chapter five. Don't lose Psalm 33. But I want to show you Galatians, chapter five real quick. [00:16:15] You say, well, okay. [00:16:17] And this is a Classic Baptist way to. Way to answer this. Okay? So what was that? [00:16:27] Oh, that was my. That was our little sign that stuff was falling apart. All right? [00:16:35] The Classic Baptist answer to this is, I'm just not happy in the Lord. I'm just. I don't have joy. And the Classic Baptist answer is, well, just have joy. [00:16:46] Well, thanks. That's kind of the problem, right? [00:16:51] How do you get joy? Okay, you look at your life and you think, man, I just. I don't praise God. [00:16:58] I sing and there's nothing there. I sing the songs, but there's no praise behind it, right? I don't praise God in prayer, and I don't praise God to other people. I'm just. [00:17:08] I just don't do it. [00:17:12] Well, the reason is a lack of joy. Okay, well, where do we get the joy from? Where do we get the joy from? It's actually really simple. [00:17:21] Galatians 5. [00:17:24] Look at verse number 22. [00:17:29] But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace. [00:17:36] See that? [00:17:37] It's very simple. Can't work up joy. [00:17:43] The Spirit of God produces joy in us. [00:17:49] The Spirit of God puts it there. The Spirit of God is the one who does it. These are fruits, that is byproducts, things that. Not that we work up into a lather in our own heart. These are things that the Spirit of God puts in us. [00:18:08] He is going to do it in the heart of every one of his people because he is in us. And he is going to make us more and more like the Lord Jesus Christ. Whether we do it willingly or whether we do it kicking and screaming, he is going to do it. He is purposed to conform us to the image of his Son. Romans, chapter eight. Right? He is purposed to do that, and nothing is going to thwart that. And he's going to work that in you, in me. No matter what we do or don't do, whether we're obedient or whether we're not obedient, he is going to do it right? [00:18:38] It's not up to us to produce joy. [00:18:42] We must simply yield to his working. [00:18:46] And when we yield to his work in us, the Joy will be there. [00:18:52] You know what that comes down to? It really comes down to our personal walk with God. [00:18:59] That's really what it's about. Because every day we get up and we. Every day we got to get up and we have to yield to the Spirit of God anew, right? We have to yield to his work. In other words, he's the force doing everything. [00:19:11] The problem is, is that when we. When we have our own way, we have our own things we want to do, we. We resist what he's doing. Instead of yielding our members as instruments of righteousness right unto God, we yield our members of instruments of unrighteousness unto sin. Romans 6. You know these verses? So God, the force of the current of the Spirit of God is pushing us, and we're swimming against the current. [00:19:35] We're not yielding to Him. If we just stopped. [00:19:39] If we just stopped resisting him and just laid on our back and floated down the river, you know what would happen? [00:19:46] He would take us where he wants to go, and the result would be joy in our heart, among other things. [00:19:53] That's why, again, all of this goes back to our personal relationship with God. You want to be happy in Jesus, you have to walk with Jesus, yield to his work. [00:20:09] He will make you happy. [00:20:12] He will make you happy. [00:20:16] I know that seems simple and maybe somewhat elusive, but it's that simple. [00:20:24] It's not Me doing the work. It's Christ doing the work in me. [00:20:31] And when you're happy in Jesus, the outward expression of that will naturally be praised, which is what we have in Psalm 33. Now, it just goes to show you, and this is a good gauge, a good thermostat, or maybe thermometer is the right word, a good thermometer. Am I walking with God? Well, are you happy? [00:20:56] Right? [00:21:00] Because people who are the result, walking with God is joy. One of the results of walking with God is joy. And so a lot of people live without any joy. They're not happy. And of course, it's evident everybody around them. But the reason they're not happy is even though oftentimes they read the Bible and they have their prayer list and all those things, they're checking the boxes off, but there really is no real yielding to Him. [00:21:30] They're doing the deeds, but they do it in pride. There's no joy in that. [00:21:37] It's when we're yielded to him and we say, lord, your will be done. [00:21:44] It's that simple. [00:21:46] He does the work. Psalm 33. Look at what it says in verse number one. Again, it says, for Praise is comely for the upright to cut. Being comely just means beautiful. It means attractive, it means pleasant. Now, of course it says praise is comely, but there's a little condition for the upright, for the upright. Because we know that praise from lips of someone who is perverse and wicked is not something that is comely. [00:22:21] It is not something that is comely. [00:22:25] And you remember times, and this is played out in real Life in Mark 1, verses 24, 5. And this is one of many occasions that these people that had devils in them would cry out words that could be considered praise. I know thee who thou art, Jesus, the Son of God, I know, torment us not. And all these words that acknowledged who he was. And what did Jesus say? Inevitably, in those cases, you know what he said? [00:22:56] He says, hold thy peace. In other words, be quiet. [00:23:00] Your lips are not worthy of praise. Because praise is comely for the upright. For the upright. So here's the truth I want you to pull out from this and you notice how it all goes together. [00:23:14] If our life is not upright, but we're praising God, it's going to create a problem, because people which praises outward people are going to see that and know the inconsistency of our life. [00:23:29] And it's going to present a problem because it's going to reflect upon the Lord. [00:23:35] But usually we don't have to worry about that. You know why? Because people whose lives are. Are out of order and who are not in fellowship with God and who do not walk uprightly are not generally the ones who praise. [00:23:49] But there are some exceptions because there are people who have learned to put on words of praise. [00:24:00] And it's fake. That's a real thing, too. [00:24:03] That's a real thing too. Praise is comely for the upright. [00:24:09] Praise is comely for the upright. [00:24:14] So we continue into verse number two. It says this. Praise the Lord with harp. [00:24:20] Sing unto him with the psaltery and an instrument of ten strings, sing unto him a new song. Play skillfully with a loud noise. Now, notice this. You start in verse one with rejoice. Then you get to praise. In verse one, after rejoicing, verse two starts with praise. And then you get into song. You see that? So there's a progression here. Number one, joy. Two, praise. Three, song. Because praise can be in song or it can be in word, right? [00:24:54] Joy in the heart overflowing to praise, leading to song, leading to song. [00:25:03] That's the process, that is the progression. So in fact, songs of praise should be songs that are sung with lips of joy, right? If you get to the song of praise, it should be because there's joy in the heart. Now, notice a song is different than praise because a song involves music, whereas praise doesn't necessarily involve music. It involves the characteristics of God and. And the goodness of God. But when you go that extra step and you cross over into song, you're involving music. And just as a reminder, I'm not a music person. I like music. I appreciate music as an outsider, not as an insider. My wife's a music person. Some of my kids are music people. I view music scientifically. [00:25:53] Like, my wife describes her love for music as she feels the music. I don't feel anything. I don't feel anything. Like, if there's a, you know, if there's like a bass or, you know, if there's a bass playing, you know, I feel that like. But I don't feel the music. Who here feels music? [00:26:12] Whoa. Okay. I'm in the minority. [00:26:16] When I look at. This is just for me. I look at music from a scientific perspective. So when I. There was a time when I was trying to learn how to play music, my wife's shaking her head because she knows I shouldn't have done it. [00:26:30] I wanted to know why all the notes, why there are eight notes on the piano in an octave. I want to know why. But here's the thing. When I look at that, and I'm being serious now, honestly, what it reminds me of is the God of creation and order that has created the laws of nature that govern what we know is music. I mean, those of you who are music people, you know that music is very ordered. That's why you can have notation. And it's not just a hodgepodge of just sounds. It's not random sounds. There's order to the sounds, right? That's what makes sounds intelligible. And you know why that is? Is because when you get down into the very nitty gritty of it, God has created the physical universe with frequencies of vibrations and all of that that overlap and resonance and all of those things which to us creates music. [00:27:25] God is the one who created and ordered the universe such that music was possible. So what does that tell us? [00:27:36] Because God is the one who made it. [00:27:40] The praise of God is music's first, highest, and best use. [00:27:47] Now, there are other uses for music. You know, they have music at weddings. We have music. Romantic music. Song of Solomon is a romantic song, okay? [00:27:58] But the first, best, and most important use for music is for God. For he created the very thing that we use. He Created the very thing that we use. Again, joy leading to the overflow of praise, which leads to praise in the expression of song. So music is good. Now, in the song here, the Lord mentions a harp. He mentions a psaltery. He mentions instruments of 10 strings. [00:28:27] Other parts of the songs. The psalms describe other instruments as well. The trumpet is mentioned. We see the psaltery, the harp, there's also a timbrel. Other kinds of stringed instruments are mentioned. The 10 stringed instrument is here. You also have. Organs are mentioned. Cymbals are mentioned. Horns are mentioned. And there's probably some others we could mention. You notice in that there's like all the different genres of music. You've got woodwinds or wind instruments are mentioned in organs, you have horns. You could say brass, although that might be a stretch because I don't know that they had horns out of brass. They had them out of animal horns and such. But probably where the word horn came from. Just a thought. You have stringed instruments, you know, you have like harps and things like that. And like the psaltery that's mentioned here is thought to be a flat instrument that has like a wooden sounding board right where you would pluck it like a. Help me, Andrew, you know what that's called? [00:29:31] Dulcimer. [00:29:33] Yeah, something like that. Yeah, what they said, because they know and I don't. [00:29:38] And then you have kind of bothers people, but then you have timbrels and cymbals. They're there. Those are percussion instruments. [00:29:49] Percussion instruments. [00:29:53] Some people say, well, some people say, well, percussion instruments do not belong and are not to be used for the praise of God. [00:30:00] Or some people say, well, instruments in general should not be used for praise of God. Well, okay, dump that out. It's right here in scripture. So it's really this simple. [00:30:12] It's really this simple. And then in addition to that, let me cover this. Just touch on this really quick. Okay. How many of you ever heard the idea that music is amoral? [00:30:26] Okay, now music, you know, it's kind of like the. It's kind of like the catch all to say music. You can just say music is all moral and therefore no music, no notes played with instruments can ever be judged as good or bad. That's kind of the going argument, right? Music is amoral and it's stated like this. Can an A be moral? Is B or B flat moral or amoral? And that's dumb kind of loaded questions they ask. No, a note is not moral or amoral. No more than a letter that you write is moral or amoral. The problem is when you put it together and the message you're trying to send when you put it together. So I say this because all of these instruments, including things like timbrels and cymbals, which are percussion, which are often off limits, people say, well, you can't use that. Well, it depends on what message you're trying to convey. [00:31:28] And here's the. Let's just boil it down to the truth of the matter. [00:31:33] Whenever we talk about music and how it's used for the glory, supposedly for the glory of God, the truth of the matter is it's not a matter of whether the music is moral or amoral. It's really about, well, I want my music to sound just like Led Zeppelin. [00:31:53] That's really what it's about. I want there to be not a distinction because I like that music since I was a kid and I want it to sound like that. [00:32:02] I'll talk about that in just a minute. [00:32:05] So we get distracted with all these questions about, well, is this instrument bad or is this instrument good? And some people think the. Like, we had an organ here. Some people think the organ is like a holy instrument or the piano is a holy instrument. You know, there are some churches that don't have a piano. They use a guitar as their main instrument. Is that a sin? No, it's not. A piano doesn't. Having a piano in a church doesn't make it more holy. I like the piano. One reason we have a piano is because a piano can play like almost anything, right? It can play anything. And it looks kind of cool too. [00:32:39] But again, it's. You take those things that the Lord has given us in the form of musical instruments, using them for his praise. And if it's going to be used for his praise, it must be consistent with God's nature, right? It's really that simple. And if there's something in someone's heart where they're like, well, you know, and they want to borrow the music that is used for, that's not for God at all. [00:33:09] Because there's a deep seated love for that and a deep seated aversion for being the oddball, having weird music that people say is kind of corny or whatever. If that drives our decisions on music, we got a problem. [00:33:27] It's the fear of man. That's what it is, right? [00:33:32] So look, a few principles in review and then we'll look at the rest of the verse, which is this joy, then praise, then song. [00:33:39] The praise of God is music's first, highest and best use for he, the one that created it. [00:33:45] All these instruments can be, and more similar to them can be used for the praise of God. And then you have in verse number two, he adds one other instrument. And it's in verse two, it says, praise the Lord with harp. Sing unto him with the psaltery. And that's the voice, the voice of man used as an instrument. That's where you get into words. [00:34:08] That's where you get into words. [00:34:15] Now notice as you go down to verse number, verse number three, sing unto him a new song. Notice what it says. Play skillfully with a loud noise. [00:34:30] Play skillfully. [00:34:32] Skill. So you have instruments, right? You have voice. [00:34:37] Now you have skill. [00:34:41] You know, when a person really, really knows how to play an instrument well, and they play it for God's glory, that's a key. [00:34:54] It speaks to the value they place upon the Lord. For they spent time and energy to learn that with the express purpose to use it for God's glory. You know what that says? God, you're important. [00:35:10] By contrast, just throwing it together. And this principle applies to things outside of music as well. Going to serve God, I'm just going to throw it together. I'm not going to pay attention. I'm not going to be conscientious. I'm not going to make sure that it's done right. I'm not going to make sure it's high quality. And I'm just going to throw something together just to say, just to get it done. [00:35:32] It speaks to the value that we place upon the Lord in that thing. [00:35:37] See, when a person is skilled, they say, lord, you're important enough for me to spend the time and the practice and put my heart and effort and energy into it so that I can then use it to glorify God. Lord, you are that important. But see, again, it goes to the motive of the skilled player. Because I want to tell you something. There are many and those of you who are music people and are skilled players, and we have a number of them in our church, thank the Lord for that. But you as well as I, know that it is perfectly possible for a person to play skillfully and have no joy, isn't it? [00:36:12] And if a person plays skillfully and they don't play for the glory of God, person plays skillfully without joy. [00:36:19] It's vain. [00:36:22] It's vain. The Lord's not impressed. Do you think our Lord is impressed with how sweet our music sounds? [00:36:30] He created it. You know what he's looking at? He's looking straight to the heart, that's when the music becomes beautiful. Right now to us, we can't see that. We only hear the outside and we appreciate it. But the music should come from praise, which comes from joy. [00:36:49] So the skill is not the most important thing. The joy is the most important thing. But that's not to say skill is not important, because it is. It reflects upon the value we place upon the Lord. Absolutely, it's important. I certainly hope that if I'm. As a preacher, I certainly hope that I put my time and effort into studying and knowing the Scriptures, right? Don't just throw something together and just not worry about whether it makes sense or whether it's going to help anybody or whether, you know, no, it matters that there's effort put into it. And you should give God your utmost, whether it be in music or anything else. Now, notice, the last thing I want you to see is this is in verse 3. Sing unto him a new song, a new song. [00:37:41] This term new song is also mentioned in Psalm 43, in Psalm 96, verse 1, in Psalm 144, 9, in Psalm 149 1. And in all of those cases, a quote new song is always directed toward the Lord. A new song is always praise toward the Lord. [00:38:05] And even the word new song implies a certain kind of freshness. [00:38:11] Think of new versus old, right? [00:38:15] A new song is a song that is in some way different than the song that existed before. It's a new song. And I thought about two ways that this, that we could say, this is a new song. Now, this is not definitive, but when you think about the idea of a new song as contrasted with an old, you have this. [00:38:34] This goes back to the instruments and the music we choose to listen to and we choose to use. [00:38:40] Why are we going to borrow the stuff that we had listened to prior? [00:38:46] We should have a new song to be distinctive from the old that we used to used to listen to. So the very idea of bringing that old stuff when the Lord repeatedly says in the Psalms, a new song of praise, it's not just we're going to tweak the words, it's a new song, right? It's not the same song with a few different words make it Christian, it's a new song. [00:39:14] So that's one way you can look at it. And I think that's a valid way to look at it. [00:39:19] The use of the instruments now is different than the use of the instruments before. [00:39:27] But there's also another way you could say this is a new song. [00:39:31] It could perhaps refer to a new cause or new occasion to give praise that we previously didn't know, didn't understand, or had not experienced before. You know, when the Lord works in your life and does something great in your life, you know what that does? It gives you a new song that is just like in, you know, these hymn writers, they write a song and then they go through something like. As an example, it is well with My Soul. Right. Was written after a huge tragedy. Did I get that right, brother Ari? Yep. The loss of the songwriter's family and coming out of that produced a new song, a new experience, a new aspect of God that wasn't previously understood or experienced, and that can produce a new song. In either case, look fresh, coming out, growing out of our life. [00:40:27] That's what we're talking about with a new song, not the old stuff. It should be constantly new. Constantly new. Constantly new. [00:40:40] So as we. As we go to prayer here in a minute, we should be people. I should be a person of praise. [00:40:49] It should be on my lips. Should be on your lips. It shouldn't be hard to talk about the Lord. Shouldn't be hard to thank God in the presence of others to talk about him. That shouldn't be hard. The. The reason it's hard. [00:41:02] The reason when we do sing it's drudgery is we're lacking the joy. We're lacking the joy. [00:41:11] Lord, give us joy. Give us a relationship that generates joy. By the spirit of God, let's pray together.