Good morning everyone. I want to invite you to take a device or your Bible and go to Psalm 57 as we continue this series called what is in a Name or what's in a Name. We've already looked at a few. We looked at Yahweh, Jireh. We looked at El Shaddai.

God is our provider, God Almighty. And today we're going to look at El Elyon. If you're already looking at your study guide, there's five blanks at the top of your page. El Elyon. Elyon just rolls off the tongue, doesn't it?

E, L, Y O N. And it means God most high. How many of you already today have had some kind of a problem that you encountered before you even walked out your door? It could be that the light bulb blew out on your vanity. And you ladies know that you have to have the proper balance of light so that the shading goes on the face, right? The mascara and all the stuff bulb goes out.

Or maybe if you've grown up with kids, especially boys, you went up to find the toilet flowing over because they just took the whole roll, shoved it down in there and flushed it thinking it would go. So you had to deal with a stopped up toilet. Or maybe you ran out of toothpaste. Please go see someone to get a mince.

Especially you boys. Or maybe, maybe talking about boys, maybe your son left the milk on the counter overnight and woke up this morning. Mom, I have no milk. Those are very minor problems, are they not? But maybe they get a little bit harder or larger and sometimes unsolvable.

Two Fridays ago I had this massive masterful plan to get ready for Breakaway. I was going to get some garbage out of my garage and get everything ready for those 9th, 10th grade boys to sleep in my basement. I went out and got my pilot, hooked up my trailer and noticed a little light on my dash because my back right tire was flat. Two hours later I got busy. Or maybe you get a call parents and your kid is at school throwing up and those are things that we could chuckle about.

But you know as well as I do, maybe you get up and you get a call that one of your family members have been in a wreck. If you're like me, if any of my girls call, the first thing I usually ask is are you okay? I don't know why. I've just got a little bit of a fear that my kids are going to call me and say, dad, I've been in a wreck. Or maybe if you remember, yesterday was a year anniversary from the hurricane coming through.

Maybe you wake up to find a tree laid over on your car, or worse, into your house. And even though those are still big problems, they're solvable. But what about if you're a victim of a crime? Someone's robbed you, someone's abused you, or maybe the economy is in such fluctuation that you can't make your house payment and your house gets sold on the courthouse steps. Or someone dies in your life and you're sitting here going, not just that you have a problem that happens, but there's this sum of problems, and it's bigger than you can handle.

We get weighed down, we get smothered under this mountain of tensions and problems, and we try to climb on top of the rubble, but we keep falling down and slipping to the bottom.

David was no different. David, after his defeat of Goliath, everything should be really good, right? Well, it's not because of Saul. Saul is currently the king. And David is immediately thrust into leadership because of his ability to fight wars.

He comes home and the women of the town come out and they say, Saul has killed his thousands. But David has killed his ten thousands. Saul is jealous. The Bible also says that Saul is afraid, and it drives him mad.

And from chapter 17 of 1st Samuel all the way to chapter 26, Saul is chasing David twice. He tries to pin him to the wall with a spear. He tries to put him in the front lines of battle so that he'll die. He wants David dead, he hates him so much. And David flees for his life.

I think that's a problem. Wouldn't you agree?

On any given day, if all of us could sit down and be honest, we have a mound of problems that comes against us over and over and over again. In fact, in chapter 22 of First Samuel, we learned that David flees to a cave man. You have a cave, don't you? How many of you have a man cave? A legitimate man cave.

These boys down here raising their hands.

I bet it involves deer heads or a tv. A place that you can find refuge. Well, David's no different. He ends up in an area called Adullam, which means literally the justice of the people. But it comes from a root that means the justice of Yahweh.

He's looking for justice. It's estimated that David spent seven to ten years of his life running from Saul, afraid for his life, not knowing what the next day might. Might bring. In fact, while he's at this cave, he begins to draw other people around him. The Bible says that everyone who was in distress.

Everyone who was in debt and everyone who was discontented gathered to him. And he, David, became the captain over them. And there were about 400 men. This became his army was a bunch of people who were rejects, who were left out, who had problems, and they're hiding in this cave called justice for the People.

I don't think it was a problem for David, but I think you and I have a problem that's bigger than our problems. You could sit there right now and you can even do this if you want to, in reflection, to write down, what is your biggest problem in your life right now? Is it solvable or unsolvable? Is it a tension you have to manage, or is there something you can do about it? Well, maybe you can't do anything about it today, but it's a weight and it's a burden that you carry.

The problem in our life isn't necessarily the problems in our life. It's how big we see the God who is sovereign over our problems. J.D. greer talked about how in his life that he believed that he was this big. He himself was this big, and that God was just a little bit bigger.

Kind of like my big brother. I get in trouble, I call up my big brother, and he comes and he rescues me. He says, almost all of our spiritual problems, like doubt, apathy, unhappiness, insecurity, comes from a view that God is actually too small.

And when I see God as too small, you know what I do? I don't take my problems to God, and I go find a cave to hide in.

No different than Samuel. I mean, David in the book of First Samuel. In your mind today, how big is your God?

How active and strong is your God? How mighty is the God that you know is he? When you think about God of the universe, what does it elicit inside of your soul? Apathy? Discontentment?

Or does your soul rise up in praise and in worship? Because he's actually bigger than I can ever describe, JD Greer goes on to say in Scripture. However, he says, I encountered a God who was big. Not just big, but bigger than all the words that I could use to say big. He's big, big, big, big, big, big.

I mean, like, we can just keep going on and on and on and on, but God is awesomely marvelous and big that we can't even describe him. And he says, only a God that's completely other than that is worthy of my worship and praise. He's big. He quotes Evelyn Underhill saying, a God that is small enough to be understood Is not a God big enough to be worshiped? How big is your God?

The word Elyon comes from a root word that basically means to ascend or go up to. When we talk about God Most High, our attention should be pointing up. When you look at buildings and you wonder why church buildings are built with steeples, do you know why there's a steeple on the church? Not necessarily so that people will be able to identify as the church. But when we walk up and we see that cross on top of a steeple, our eyes should go forward to the heavens where our marvelous God sits on his throne.

Years ago, I had the chance to go to Ecuador. You ever driven through the mountains and just been mesmerized by the size? Like, I thought I had seen mountains till I went to Nevada and went to Virginia City. The Virginia City, it's not flat like it is in Bonanza. They missed it.

But I remember standing on the street of Virginia City and looking behind the street at a mountain that I had to look up like this. And with my neck the way it is and that metal plate, I can't look up like I used to. And I just going, wow. And then I go to Ecuador. And where we worked in Ecuador was near an inactive, thank God, volcano called Cayumbe.

And there was a little town at the foot of this volcano. And we stayed in this place called the Hatun. Wasi. Don't know what it means. We were at about 9,000ft above sea level.

And every day that we went to work with the Quechua in that area, we would drive up to about 11,000ft. Yes. You didn't walk about from here to the door and you'd be like going, whew. Thought I was in shape. But here's the cool thing.

We'd wake up in the mornings and Cayum Bay was to the east to where we stayed. And so the sun was coming up. The tip of the volcano is at 19,000ft above sea level. Majestic, beautiful. I just wanted to catch a glimpse of the top because they said it was so high up.

And even at the equator, there was snow on top of the mountain. I just wanted to see it. Every morning we'd get up and we'd look and the clouds would begin to dissipate. And finally I think I took the picture and I sent it to Laura. I got to catch a glimpse of the majesty of the peak of that volcano.

I was like, wow, this is awesome. Years later, I went same area, same week, we went to do an outreach. And it was at night.

And in Ecuador, they don't have a lot of light. They don't have light noise, as they call it in America. You know, you go outside, you want these shooting stars. Well, you can't see them because there's too much light noise from Atlanta and Greenville and all these other places. But that night we went out.

We were up on the side of a hill and they were doing a movie night inside. I went out and I just looked up and I could literally see the Milky Way. And I could see the colors and the stars, and you couldn't count them, they were so numerous. And I just stood there, awestruck. Guys, our God is bigger than that mountain.

Our God is bigger than all the stars in the expanse of the sky.

He's big, but we have a tendency to want to make him small. You know why? Because we want to control him. And our God is not controllable. He is God most high.

So before I ramble anymore about how big God is, would you stand with me? And I actually just want to read three verses of that psalm. I'm going to talk about the whole psalm, but let me just three read three verses so that we're not in here until 6 o' clock tonight. Verse one says, Be gracious to me, O God, be gracious to me. For my soul takes refuge in you.

And in the shadow of your wings I will take refuge. Until destruction passes by. I will cry to God most high, El Elyon to God who accomplishes things for me. He will send from heaven and save me. Did you catch that?

He will send from heaven and save me. He reproaches him who tramples upon me. God will send forth his loving kindness and his truth. God. As we dig into this, Lord, would you speak to us?

Because I believe somebody in here needs to hear this today, that their problems aren't too big for you to take care of them. They just need to feel, feel and sense that you're with them through the problems. Lord, we love you in Jesus name. Amen. So if you notice at the first of that chapter, if you're looking in your Bible, there's a little bit of a sub note before the psalm begins.

It reads this for the choir director said to altosheth a mictim of David when he fled from Saul in the cave. He wrote this Psalm reflecting 1st Samuel 22 through 24 when he was hiding in the wilderness those seven to ten years. In fact, it's not the only one he wrote about the cave. Psalm 142. He also wrote while he was in the cave.

David spent a lot of his life running.

But it's not that he wasn't believing God. David knew how big his God was.

God was waiting on God to solve his problems. See, the first point that I want us to know, and when we look at this text, what you're going to see is this, that God's bigger than anything we can handle. God hears us when we cry out, and he acts based on his truth. He's bigger than any problem we have. He hears us when we cry out, and he acts based on his truth and his grace, his mercy.

God. God cares about you. Do you know that? God loves you. God knows every problem that you are facing right now, and he cares.

But our problem is that sometimes we don't remember how big that God is.

And so if you look at that first verse again, he says this. Be gracious to me. Be gracious to me, oh God, for my soul takes refuge in you. If you back up to the psalm before that, Psalm 56, he says the same thing. Be gracious to me, O God, for man has trampled upon me, fighting all day long.

He oppresses me. My foes have trampled upon me all day long, for they are many who fight against me. And there he's reflecting about the Philistines David spent his life fighting. But David also made it very clear when he killed Goliath that it was God who went before him, that it was God that would give him that victory. And that's how he lived his entire life.

He knew where to go find his refuge, because he knew. Point one, God is bigger than any problem that we will face. Two weeks ago, when we read about El Shaddai, we read Psalm 91:1 4. Let me just read verse one again. He who dwells in the shelter of the most high will abide in the shadow of.

Of the Almighty. God is so big. He casts a really big shadow. And in that psalm, and in this psalm, when he talks about abiding under the wings of God, I want you to get this image in your head of an eagle. Have you ever really just seen an eagle?

A bald eagle? When I was a kid, we went to Silver Springs before they sold it out and there was a zoo there and they took in refuge animals. And I remember as a kid, I mean, you think about the things you remember, and as you get older, you know, video in your head becomes snapshots. Y' all know that, right? Some of y' all know what I'm talking about.

Like you Try to remember something that you used to play in your head. Now you can just remember a snapshot of it. And I went. And we were in this boat. And on the shore was this bald eagle.

I promise you. Maybe this tall. But it's what he did next that lit my fire when he spread his wings. You see, there ain't much a bird can do when his wings are furled in except roost. That's not how he's describing God here.

This God is described as his wings stretched out. And under the shadow of those wings, I can take refuge. Why? Because my God. My God is so big.

He. He soars over any problem that I have. He sees everything that I'm going through and he cares. Be gracious to me, God. Don't act on my behalf based on what I've earned because I earned death.

Every one of you in this room. I don't want you to forget that you are a sinner. That may sting a little bit, but you are a sinner. There is nothing that you can do righteous enough to enter into the presence of God in heaven. So not only is God Most High lifted up above all the earth, he sent his Son to put on human flesh, and he was lifted up from the earth.

God most High. And only a man who was fully God could hang on a cross as the weight of his body is pulling against those nails and the weight of the sin of all humanity of on his body.

No man could handle the crucifixion, but no man, earthly man could ever handle the sin of the world hanging on him. As he hung on the cross high and lifted up, he said, if I be lifted up, I will draw all men to myself. Be gracious to me, O God. Don't give to me based on what I've earned. Don't give to me based on what I deserve.

God, act upon me based on your loving kindness. And I think we need to remember today what God has done for us, how he's done it. And he cares for you. If he cares for the lilies of the field and the birds that fly in the air, how much more does he care for you and somebody here today? You've given up on God.

You have given up. You have prayed and prayed and prayed. And God hasn't answered the way that you want him to pray.

Can I be honest with you? If you spend all of your time shaking a fist at heaven and blaming him for all your problems, rather than opening your hands and say, God, I receive whatever you have to give to me, he can't send you the comfort that you need. As long as God is the thrust of your blame, he cannot comfort your heart with his love. Today, somebody in this room, you need to forgive God. Even though God doesn't need to be forgiven, you need to let that weight go so it would open up the doorway for God to be able to give you that peace that transcends all understanding that guards your heart and your mind.

You're not experiencing that peace because you're still throwing up close fists to a God who wants to reach down with his hand. Gently, gently. Love you finding refuge under his wings. And some of us in this today we're hiding in the cave, but we're not trusting God. Some of you have some caves that it's time to put a big boulder in front of it and stop going in there.

For some of you, it's addiction. Whatever that addiction may look like, you've run, it's time to stop running into that cave. God's called you to something different. In fact, one author suggests that talking about this cave at Adullam, that the overarching side of the cave in which David hid may have reminded him of what it looked like for a bird to outstretch his wings. Our God is so much bigger than we can ever fathom.

So whatever your problems are today, if you could take and put them in a box and say, all right, here's my problems, what do I do with these?

God wants to take those problems off you, he may not solve it the way you want it solved. If you've lost somebody in your life, I'm sorry, they're gone, they're not coming back. So that's not the solution to your problem. But it doesn't mean that God can't comfort you through that. Are you with me?

God is bigger than anything you will ever face. In fact, there's another story in the Old Testament found in, in First Kings chapter 19. In First Kings 18, there's a prophet named Elijah and man about like a Bama fan yesterday had big success. Well, I wouldn't say it was big success. Three points.

That's not a whole lot. Nobody said amen to that.

Most of us, our teams lost yesterday. Can we just agree most of our teams lost yesterday. But Elijah didn't lose that day. He went up against 450 prophets of Baal and said, come on, you go and you sacrifice and you call on your gods and I'll call on my God. And whoever's God comes down and burns up the sacrifice that's who is the God of the universe.

And they even poured water on Elijah's sacrifice and God came down and consumed the sacrifice. That's a big God, isn't it? They slew the 450, 50 prophets of Baal that day. And you would think, here's Elijah taking his victory lap, right? Just a few verses later, the first verse of chapter 19, Elijah runs.

He hears that the Queen Jezebel has heard about the defeat of the prophets, and he runs for his life. In fact, he. He runs to the point where he says, I wish I was dead. I'm the last prophet. And now they're going to kill me too.

You've been there, haven't you? God does something really cool in your life. And then the next day you go from here to here, and you go, where's God? He was here yesterday, why is he here today?

And you get discouraged and he's running and an angel comes and ministers to him and gives him food and says, you need to eat cause you got a long journey ahead of you. But where was Elijah going? And why was he going? He was headed to a place called Mount Horeb or Mount Sinai. You may have heard of this place before in Genesis, chapter three.

It's the very place where God appeared to Moses in a burning bush. It's the same place that the children of Israel came. And they're camped out at the base of Mount Sinai. And God appears and thunder and lightning and fire as Moses proceeds to go up on the mountain and receive the words of the covenant. So of course, Elijah is running to a familiar place.

But he gets there and he finds a cave.

He finds a cave and he goes into the cave after 40 days, hasn't eaten in 40 days since he came to that cave and he lodged there. And behold, the word of the Lord came to him and said, what? What are you doing here, Elijah? Some of us need to hear God speaking to us today. This big, enormous, awesome God.

And he's saying, what are you doing here?

Rather than running from your problems, I need you to run into your problems.

And Elijah's feeling sorry for himself. Like a lot of times, you and I do. We feel sorry for ourselves. Well, I've been very zealous for you. God and the sons of Israel have forsaken your covenant, torn down your altars, killed your prophet.

And I'm left alone and they're seeking to take my life too.

Sometimes we don't see how big God is because we're too focused on seeing how small we Are.

So he said, this is God. So we can go forth and stand on the mountain before the Lord. And behold, the Lord was passing by, and a great. And a strong wind was rending the mountains, which means to break them apart. And the rocks were breaking apart before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind.

And after the wind was an earthquake. But the Lord was not in the earthquake. And after the earthquake, a fire. But the Lord was not in the fire. Now listen.

And after the fire, a sound of a gentle blowing. I believe the King James says, a small, still voice.

God had to remind Elijah of what he just saw with the prophets of baal, that he could send fire from heaven, that, that God, that God who is most high, who is powerful beyond comparison, could do whatever he wanted to do. And when Elijah heard this gentle blow in this small voice, he wrapped his face in his mantle, and then he went out of the cave. And the voice came and said again, what are you doing here, Elijah, today? I don't know where you stand, what may be pressing and weighing down on you, but I'm here to tell you God is bigger than the problem that you're going through. And God wants to know where you are.

He's calling out to you and wants you to realize, where are you? Are you standing in the midst of the problem and trusting that God will bring about a solution? Or are you running away and cowering in faithlessness because your God is only about this big?

Point number two. Because, and this is. This is important, because if you really agree that our God is so big, then you got to understand that that same God, he hears when we call to him. I will cry to God most high. In second Samuel 22:7, David reflects back in his running away from Saul.

And when he does, he writes this. In my distress, I called upon the Lord. Yes, I cried to my God. And he heard from his temple. He heard my voice, and my cry for help came to his ears.

The same chapter appears again in Psalm 18. A little bit kind of just parallel to each other. When you pray, when you cry out to God. Can I assure you today, no matter how you feel about it, God hears your cry.

I think we have lost the art of crying out to God.

And God wants us to cry out to him. And there's only one thing I see in Scripture that would hinder God from listening by his choice. God hears everything. There's only one thing I see in Scripture that would cause him not to listen to us. And it may be why you here today are going like, well, I'm right back in these problems again, right?

Here I am. And part of it's because you're still in your sin. That's a hard one to listen to, isn't it? You are still in your sin. Isaiah 59:1 2 says, Behold, the Lord's hand is not so short that he can't save, nor his ear so dull that he cannot hear.

He just said there, God hears everything. But your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God. And your sins have hidden his face from you so that he does not hear.

Listen, if you claim to know Jesus Christ as Savior, implied in that faith is repentance. And if you're still walking in the same sin that you claim that God has saved you from, that may be why you don't think God hears you. And we need to let God solve our sin problem. How? By repentance and Faith.

First, John 1:9 is very clear. If you confess our sins, he's faithful and just to forgive us of our sins, which we want. We want it taken away. But he also cleanses us from unrighteousness. Why is that important?

Because I want to have a relationship with God. I want to be able to dwell under the shadow of his wings. And I don't want the insecurity of feeling like that. I'm distant from my God. I want my God to be beside me.

Why? It says in the text, to God, who accomplishes all things for me, the greatest crisis of faith today is when we pin all of our hope on our prosperity. And then God doesn't act the way that we think he should. I'm still waiting for that brand new truck. Our Wednesday night.

I told him, I said, listen, I'm asking for God to give me a new truck. But isn't that a Misinterpretation of Romans 8:28? God works all things for my good. No, it doesn't say that. It says for good.

And what is the good there? It's God's good, God's will, God's plan to conform me into the image of His Son. And if his Son suffered, then why should it be I be caught unaware if I suffer too? Paul said, I bear in my body the marks of Christ. In my suffering, how much more will the followers do?

So you're going like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, stop. I didn't sign up for that.

But that's what he's called us to do. If we're going to present. We don't need to present a sanctified Jesus hanging on a cross. It was bloody and gory and nasty. And for us, if we suffer, well, we show the gospel to the world through our lives and our words.

And when things get hard, the first thing I should do is cry out to him because God is listening rather than stepping in and solving the problem for myself. So that brings me to 1st Samuel 24. In 1st Samuel 24, David is hiding in a cave near the rocks of the high goats.

I just love that. It almost sounds kind of. Kind of like something out of some Tolkien book. So he's in this cave and Saul and his entourage shows up. And Saul has to go to the bathroom.

The kids aren't snickering. I thought the kids would snicker at that. Yes, there is a record in the Bible of someone having to go and go really bad. And so Saul steals away by himself into the cave where David is. And his men are there.

And the men are going, david, listen. We're tired of running. We're tired of every day getting up, being afraid he's going to catch us, go over there and slit his throat, take him out. And David, because he was a good man, a man after God's own heart, says, no, I know I've been anointed to be king, but I'm not going to make it happen. He right now is the anointed of God, and I will not bring harm to him.

Now hold on a second. Let me chase a rabbit. One little bitty rabbit.

I have heard men stand in pulpits and say, touch not God's anointed. And point their finger out there and say, don't you come and bring things against me because I'm God's anointed. Shame on those men and women that do that. You're quoting Saul. You want to be like Saul.

So you know what David does? He goes over, sneaks up behind him, just cuts the corner of his garment off. Saul finishes up, gets out of there, and David comes out and says, hey, yo, that's my translation. Look what I got. But he did that to show his grace towards Saul.

What was David's cry at the beginning of this psalm? Be gracious to me. We can't expect to receive the grace of God if we don't extend the grace of God ourselves. You know why? Because we want to appreciate it.

You know, it will change your life more than anything when you become more grace filled, merciful and forgiving. It will liberate your life in ways you can never imagine. And you'll be more like Christ, which is a benefit.

I would love to tell you that Saul stopped chasing him. It would be two more chapters later, same kind of situation where David could have taken him out, but he chooses not to. Why? Because he was waiting on God to bring about the response. He was waiting on God to solve the problem.

And David was saying, nope, my hands are off. I'm going to let God do this. When he wrote Psalm 142, he said, I cry aloud with my voice to the Lord, and I make supplication with my voice to God. I pour out my complaint before him. I declare my trouble before him.

When my spirit was overwhelmed, you knew the path in the way where I would walk. They have hidden a trap for me. Look to the right and see for no one who's there regards me. There's no escape from me no one cares. Does anybody connect him with this?

No one cares for my soul. He felt lonely, but he told God about it. I think we need to be reminded of what it means to cry out to God. We need to state our intent. We need to reveal our heart and our sorrow.

But then we need to shift our thinking from want to supply and declare that God is more than able and celebrate God. And God acts toward us not on our works, not on what we deserve, but he acts for us based on his loving kindness. Look at verse three.

He says this. He will send from heaven and save me. He will send from heaven and save me. God Most High lifted up will save me. Point number three says, God acts for us based upon love and truth.

In fact, if you look at the end of that verse, he says, God will send forth his loving kindness and his truth. Some translations read faithfulness, but they go hand in hand. When John wrote his gospel in John 1:14, he said, and the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we saw his glory. How did they see his glory? That he was full of truth and that he was full of love.

Wasn't 50 50. So here's what you get. You've heard me say this before, I'll say it again. If you've got a God who's all love and no truth, it's cheap. If you have a God that's all truth and no love, it's unjust.

But because he's both, because he's both, I can have confidence that when God acts on my behalf, he acts based upon his love and his truth. He fights for me based upon his will. In hope that we believe that because God is bigger than anything. And I can cry out to him, that he will act out of his character. And then I get to be with that God.

I get to interface with that God. Here's what it does, and this is the part I couldn't wait to get to what it does. Point number four is it awakens worship in my life. When I see how and remember how big God is, when I cry out to him with my problems, when I know that he will act based upon his love, his chesed and his truth, when I know those things, worship then becomes the greatest weapon that I can ever have in times of trouble. If you look at the Psalm in verse number seven, he reads this.

Now I have to read it the way I feel it. Is that okay? Is everybody all right with me reading it the way I feel it? My heart is steadfast. That word in Hebrew means it has been confirmed and planted.

It's got strength in the way that verb is used. It is steadfast, immovable in the truth of God. If your heart is wishy washy, it may be because you haven't embraced the truths of God. Not how you feel about it, but how they are relevant in your life and how much above those us those things are. You can't base truth on how you feel about the truth.

And when I fix my heart on those things, then yes, I will sing. I will sing praises. Don't tell me you're going down the road. But you don't start whistling and humming a tune when you're feeling happy. We all do it.

I got the joy, joy, joy, joy down in my heart. Y' all got that one. I mean, you go around and you whistle a tune, you sing a song because there's joy erupting in your life. How much more will joy flow? When my heart is fixed on his truths and he begins to feed that joy, he says, awake my glory, Awake harp and lyre.

I will awaken the dawn. My dad would get up at probably 3 o' clock in the morning just like Kevin Hurt does.

I don't. Pam, maybe you could tell us, does he get up singing?

There he goes. He gets up energetic and singing. He awakes the dawn.

And sometimes he wakes you up too. Gosh, I wish he'd stop singing. Listen, y' all ever been around somebody who's got that kind of joy? You just can't help but be around him for a few moments and it just. It really starts impacting you folks.

As Christians, we all ought to be those kind of people. When our heart is fixed and steadfast and it begins to awaken my soul, to sing forth the praises of God. Get on Amazon this week and order yourself a liar. And make a joyful noise.

Or a ukulele. Either one.

One of the things Laura confessed to me a few years ago is that I had taken my guitar and hung it up in my office here. I stopped playing it.

And we began to recall those times that we would just sit down and get that guitar out and sing. You need to change a playlist on your car. Yes, a dirge is good from time to time, but you need something just awakes your soul that just sets a blaze and a fire. Why? Because it's reminding you of the truths of God.

He says, I will give thanks to you. I will sing praises among the nations. In other words, my worship affects the people around me. How much more awesome can worship be when we all come in here and we're in unison and doing it together with joy and passion? He says, for your loving kindness is great to the heavens.

What does he mean by that? That means his love encompasses all of us and all around us. That benevolence. He knows what you're going through, and he's on your side and he's working for you. And he actually likes you, too.

He's for you, not against you. Our God. God Almighty. God Most high wants you and I to be successful. And so we have to be resolved in this.

We have to be resolved in who God is. That way we could cry out, be exalted above the heavens. Oh, my God. Be exalted and let your glory be above all the earth. His glory already is.

I need to take the blinders off of my eyes and see the splendor of God Almighty.

Maybe you should have drank some Mountain Dew this morning, too.

We have the means to sing. We have an audience. We have the basis of truth. And I'm crying out to my soul. Soul, wake up.

You remember Paul and Silas in Acts, chapter 16? Go ahead, if you don't mind. David, put that last. Oh, you already have it up there. We have hope, because God most high is above all things.

Write that down. I'm going to talk to you about Paul and Silas. Paul and Silas were thrown into prison. And we learned that around midnight they began to sing praises. Now, here's what we don't know.

It said nowhere in that text that they sang praises because they expected God to break them out of jail. Most of the people in this room. If you were in that jail cell and those doors flung open, what would you do? You would run like Roadrunner out of there. You would have gotten out of Dodge, wouldn't you?

But Paul and Silas didn't. You know why? Because they weren't singing to be freed. Listen to me. They weren't singing to be freed.

They were singing to get under the wing of the Almighty.

Paul's already written time and time again to say I'm exactly where God needs me to be. So, God, give me the strength to be in the problem. Aren't you glad he stayed there? I know one man that's glad he stayed there. The jailer.

Think about this. If Paul and Silas and all the other prisoners have ran out, there'd have been a suicide that night because the jailer would have killed himself and he'd been successful. They stopped him when he drew his sword and said, no, we're still here. Because they weren't singing for God to let them out. They were singing for God to be with them where they were.

I don't think you're catching it yet. Because if you're in your problems and God hasn't taken care of the problems yet, he needs you right there where you are.

He promised to hear you. And I believe God will give you the strength to endure. So if he doesn't take your problem away, he's got a purpose for the problem.

And just like Paul and Silas, we can sing anyway. And we can find joy even in our despair. In fact, last night, you know what I did, Laura, while you were going to the grocery store. You don't even know this. I picked up my guitar and I recalled an old Third Day song.

Any Third Day fans in here? Mac Powell's got a new song called the 99. You need to listen to it. Your love, O Lord. Y' all know this song reaches to the heavens.

Your faithfulness stretches to the sky. Your righteousness is like a mighty mountain. Y' all know this song? Your justice flows like the ocean tide. And I will lift my high voice to worship you, my king.

And I will find my high strength in the shadow of your wings. Y' all know that, don't you? If you don't go listen to it and let it wake up your soul and sing to our God. Because our God, he knows our problems and he's bigger than them. He hears our voice when we cry, and he acts based on his truth and his love.

How much more will the sword of worship take me through, whatever I may go through? So I want you to bow your heads. I'm sorry I went a little longer, but I appreciate you letting me do that. I get in these things and, man, I just get so excited. But you know what I want?

I want you to get just as excited as I am. I'm gonna teach you to do something right now. Every head bowed, every eye closed. Here's what I want you to do. We're gonna open this altar up in a few minutes.

And if you've got a need this morning, or I'm gonna give you some instructions, in just a minute, it's gonna be open. But right now, I want you to whisper to God and tell him how bad your situation is. He already knows, and he knows how you feel about it. So confess it. Tell him.

God, I can't bear this anymore. I'm tired of being ridiculed. This really stinks, God. However you need to say it right now, whisper it and tell him what you are feeling. Release it, open up your heart and let God take it out.

Cast your care on him.

Do that right now. Just whisper it to him.

Okay? You said it, right? You told him how bad it is. He already knew it. He already knew it before you said it.

He knew how you were feeling about it. Now I want you to flip it around and I want you to say, but, God, I know that even as bad as it is, you are still God. And you still have my life in your hands. And you are still holy, and you are still good. And I know your word teaches me that you love me.

And you may not take this problem away from me today, but I will be committed to you through it all, because I know you're committed to be with me.

So in just a minute, this altar will be open. And if you say, hey, you know what? I. I just can't carry these burdens by myself. I know our people well enough to know that if you come to this altar to pray, other people will come and pray with you and pray for you and pray beside you and lift your arms up in prayer. They will be there for you with no judgment.

And if there is judgment. Stop it. Stop it. You need to renew in your mind. I don't know what that person's going through, but they just went down to the altar because there's something to heavy that they can't carry.

And they need to go give it to the God most high, humble ourselves under the mighty hand of God and that he may exalt us in due time, casting our care on him because he cares for us. So if that's you today as we stand and sing, this altar is open. There's counselors down here if you want to talk about being saved. Or maybe you just need to talk about your problem. We're up here.

Let's stand and sing.