Psalm 148, if I'm not already turned there, Psalm 148 is our text. We've already been doing together what this psalm calls us to do. In fact, I hope as we read this psalm together today, You will see how very, well, it's not surprising that the song we sing in response to the Lord, the doxology as we call it, is so very psalm-like. In fact, it comes from a psalter. reflecting what God has revealed and what he calls us to. Psalm 148, as we continue in these great final psalms of praise, praising the Lord, the final Hallel or Hallelujah, this psalm calls, shows us the consummation of all created existence is to praise the Lord. The consummation of all created existence is to praise the Lord. Let's read our text together here. Praise the Lord. Praise the Lord from the heavens. Praise him in the heights. Praise him, all his angels. Praise him, all his hosts. Praise him, sun and moon. Praise him, all you shining stars. Praise him, you highest heavens and you waters above the heavens. Let them praise the name of the Lord, for he commanded and they were created, and he established them forever and ever. He gave a decree and it shall not pass away. Praise the Lord from the earth, you great sea creatures and all deeps, fire and hail, snow and mist, stormy wind fulfilling his word, mountains and all hills, fruit trees and all cedars, beasts and all livestock, creeping things and flying birds, kings of the earth and all peoples, princes and all rulers of the earth, young men and maidens together, old men and children. Let them praise the name of the Lord, for his name alone is exalted. His majesty is above earth and heaven. He has raised up a horn for his people. Praise for all his saints, for the people of Israel who are near to him. Praise the Lord. As our souls are shaped to seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness through the Psalms, we have come now to the pinnacle of praise. Because this is what the blessed life aims at. This is where Psalm 1 was starting you when you started the Psalms. Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly. Why don't you walk that way? What's the way you should walk? You walk in God's instructions. You walk in God's way. Why is that? Here's where this is all going. God is bringing us near to himself, as this psalm will put it, to enjoy his very presence forever. It's a life of praise. This is what the blessed life is all about. This is the fulfillment of all of our hopes and our desires. This is the satisfaction of our souls in singing the songs of our Savior. These final five psalms, as I've said, are all psalms of pure praise, beginning and ending with hallelujah. And Psalm 146 proclaimed, hallelujah, the Lord will reign forever. Psalm 147 calls upon Jerusalem to sing hallelujah for all the ways in which the Lord takes pleasure in his people, all the ways he sends out his word to accomplish his good purposes for his people. He's a great and a good God. And now Psalm 148 calls upon all creation and all creatures to praise the Lord. Interestingly, a difference of this psalm, as each one of these psalms of praise brings out a different dimension of the multifaceted praise of the Lord. Psalm 148, the bulk of this psalm is not about why you should praise the Lord. Although it's gonna include some of that. But you're gonna see here, or maybe you've already noticed that the major effort of this psalm is focused upon who and what should praise the Lord. Who should praise the Lord? Who is called to participate in this culmination of created experience? And we're gonna find that the answer of this psalm is everything. Everything that God has created. Creation is all that is not God. And everything that is not God has a singular purpose, a singular goal of existence that is the fulfillment of everything it was made for, and that is to praise the Lord. That's why the whole psalm breaks into two basic parts here. Hallelujah from the heavens in verses 1 through 6, and hallelujah from the earth in verses 7 through 14. The two poles, if you will, of all of created existence, heavens and earth and everything in them, everything that can be encompassed that was created is called upon here to praise the Lord. And we're going to see as we go through this psalm that it truly, literally, does not leave anything out. It doesn't matter if it's intelligent creation or not. it's called upon to praise the Lord. It doesn't matter if it's rocks and stones. It's called upon to praise the Lord. If it has created existence, it finds fulfillment in praising the Lord. And that's one main takeaway I want you to get from this psalm today, that this is true of you. In fact, it's going to become your calling through the very words of this psalm to become the voice of all of creation. to become the song of all of creation, to bring what is actually going on in all this world that God has made, that really is there, and bring it out into the open in terms of song and music and joy and rejoicing, because it's praising the Lord. So let's learn how to do that a little bit by walking through the training that Psalm 148 gives to us. Hallelujah from the heavens. Psalm 148 begins, hallelujah, praise the Lord, this command given to us to praise the Lord. But then it says, praise the Lord from the heavens. Praise Him in the heights. Praise Him all His angels, all His hosts, sun, moon, shining stars or stars of light, the heavens of heavens and the waters above the heavens. It begins in the celestial realm, the heavens, everything above the earth. and calls upon this whole realm of created existence to find fulfillment in praising the Lord. It calls upon angels. Praise Him, all His angels. I don't know about you, but I remember several years back, that striking me. It's something I had grown up with, something obviously, if you're gonna read the Bible, you're gonna encounter, calling upon angels to praise the Lord. But I'd never considered how interesting that really is. Like, you really mean that? Like, you, you, you, mankind here, you are supposed to talk to angels, and you are supposed to tell them to praise God. How's that for something unusual? I mean, these are supernatural beings, we usually think of them. These are beings that are far superior to us in terms of created abilities, And yet we are given the task to call upon them to praise the Lord. Angels are God's messengers. In fact, that's just the term used here in this psalm, messengers. They do God's bidding. And we see them throughout scripture doing all kinds of things for the Lord. We see them singing, shouting for joy at the creation. That is, when God formed and filled this earth and made it good as a reflection of his glory, The angels rejoiced in that. We find the angels being sent on missions from God. We find the angels even observing God's work down through the centuries, down through the millennia, to learn about him in order to respond to him. You might remember how Ephesians chapter three, we were talking about the church in our seminar hour this morning, how Ephesians chapter three tells us that the angels observe the church in order to understand the wisdom of God. Consider that today. Consider that angels are watching you right now. And why are they doing that? Because you're so great? Because they're so impressed with you? Probably not, right? But because they are watching God unfold His grace in Jesus Christ in ways that even they could never have imagined. They are watching God take created things, small things, very little things, and yet things made in His image that he is destined for a relationship with himself. They are watching God redeem. They are watching God form a body for his son, form a family for himself, build a temple for his glory in which we get to take part. And they're seeing how wise and amazing God is by doing this. Pardon me. Do you ever stop to think that your praise helps the angels to praise? When they see you, the work of the Spirit of God in you, responding to God's grace, and therefore praising God, even as this little creature, a sinner saved by grace, and they see you doing that, that gives them all that much more reason to praise God. They see the manifold wisdom of God at work, and they praise Him. They delight in doing His bidding, even for His people, for you, for the church. And so as you respond to God, you are actually calling upon angels. All of God's hosts, they're described here, His armies, His innumerable armies that accomplish His will, you are calling upon them to praise the Lord. We are participating. Let me say this again today, that when we praise God, we should not forget that there's a real spiritual participation going on in the heavenlies in Jesus Christ. We have come to the new Jerusalem, Jesus tells us. By the Spirit of God, we have now a foretaste of that eternal kingdom, of that time when we will all be united in the very presence of God himself. But we get to enjoy that right now. and angels are participating. This is what's going on, that we get to say hallelujah from the heavens. Those highest creatures that we can possibly imagine that God has revealed to us, they are to praise him. Praise him then, if we come down a little bit in the created order. Sun and moon, praise him, all you stars of light. Sun, moon, and stars. As Psalm 19 says, the heavens truly are declaring the glory of God and the firmament, the expanse above, declares his glory. Pardon me. But as we enter into this Psalm, of course, it prompts the question, how do these creatures praise the Lord? We can think about angels praising God. Angels are intelligent beings. Angels are messengers of God. But what about sun and moon and stars? Aren't they just balls of gaseous something out there in space, burning brightly that we observe? How do they praise the Lord? I would suggest two important ways this Psalm actually touches on that we'll come back to here in a minute in verses five and six. It says, let them praise the name of the Lord, for he commanded and they were created. Verse five, that's the first thing. And then secondly, he established them forever and ever and gave a decree, and it shall not pass away. That is, they praise the Lord by first of all, being what they are. He commanded and they were created. Now think about that for a moment. Being what they are. Their whole nature is precisely what God commanded it to be. That's what they are, and nothing less than that. In other words, they're not just stuff. They're not just matter and energy sort of doing its thing out there, and nobody has any idea why. It's just there, right? That's not actually what's going on. They are there because God put them there. In all of his wisdom, in all of his intelligence, in all of his skill, God made them to be precisely what he wanted them to be in order to manifest his glory. He commanded and they were created. That's how they get their nature. But then they also praise him by doing what he says. He establishes them forever. That is, he upholds them makes them what they are, directs them in all that they do. He gives a decree, an apportionment, a definition, a prescription, and makes them do what they do. You see, not as God entirely over his creation, which is, by the way, the presupposition of all of this psalm. The highest created thing we can possibly imagine is still to exalt, look up to, praise God. Contrast this with what men typically do, exchanging the creature for the creator, right? We exalt some aspect of creation as the highest thing. Now, all of this is under God, so to speak, and yet, God is intimately present to all of it. He is not absent from any of it. He is present in its innermost being, making it what it is, calling it to do what it does. And that's how sun and moon and stars praise the Lord. That's why it's not at all far-fetched to think with the Psalms and to say the sun rejoices like a strong man to run a race when he comes up every day, right? Is that just poetic fancy, you know, kind of fun tickle the imagination, but actually doesn't mean anything? No, it's really true. Creation is rejoicing in her creator, because God is making it to do that. When the sun shines out its light, it's not an accident that we associate that with joy and rejoicing, because that's what God makes it to be. That's who he God is, and it's reflected in his handiwork. It's not an accident that sunlight gives life on this planet. as the plants receive this gracious gift from God, and they are called forth to life themselves. And as that feeds this whole cycle of life here on this planet, that's because God is making His Son praise Him. That's what's going on. The same with the moon or the stars. The sun and the moon and the stars we find in Genesis 1 rule the earth. They rule the day, they rule the night, so that men will know the rhythm of life and worship. They are put there for signs and for seasons. In other words, we are guided in our relationship with God precisely because God has made a sun to rule the day and the moon and the stars to rule the night. Why are there things like calendars? Where did that come from? Because God made his creation to rejoice in him. And He even makes the cycles of the weeks and the days. And He creates things like the first day of the week in which we gather together as His people to take up all that we've seen and experienced in this world and bring it to Him in praise. This is what the sun and the moon and the stars are doing. They are rejoicing in our Lord even by calling us as human creatures to worship. The stars themselves reveal the vastness of God's handiwork. But they also worked to accomplish God's bidding. Deborah and Barak rejoiced that from heaven the stars fought from their courses. They fought against Sisera. Can you think about the stars fighting on behalf of God's people? God uses all of his creation to accomplish his goodwill. And that's what we should be seeing. That's what we're responding, and that's what we're calling upon all of creation to do. Be what God has made you to be. Do what God says. God's word makes them what they are. God's decree holds them together and makes them fulfill their purpose. And I want you to remember again today that that purpose is ultimately Jesus Christ. In Hebrews chapter one, it tells us that Jesus upholds all things by the word of his power. In other words, the reason the sun is shining and doing what it's doing and being what it is, the reason the stars are what they are is because Jesus Christ is holding them, upholding them to do that. He's making them shine in their courses. He's making them relate to us. In fact, he is that, Colossians 1 will tell us, he is that personal unifying principle of the universe. Why is there a relationship between the stars and you? It just happened that way? Or is it because that relationship is actually held together in Jesus? That's why. It's because of Jesus. And all of creation is never understood until it's understood in light of Jesus Christ. Again, to go back to Colossians chapter one, the Bible tells us that all things were created through him and for him. In other words, to understand why anything exists, you have to understand how it relates to Christ. And when you've begun to understand that, then you've begun to understand it. That is the true reason for all things. We see true reality in Christ, the way, the truth, and the life. Even the stars and the sun, all the heavens, the highest heavens, the waters above the heavens, and the clouds, all of this purpose is ultimately Christ. And we begin to understand that, it begins to make perfect sense to say, hallelujah, from the heavens, praise the Lord, from the heights, let everything and all of this creation in its highest expressions work together to exalt our God, our triune God, as he's revealed himself in Jesus Christ. And of course, that leads us to the second section of this psalm, hallelujah, from the earth, in verses seven through 14. Praise the Lord from the earth, it says. Now here's the response. You might think of this psalm like a great choir, calling upon all created existence in an antiphonal choir kind of a setup. Heaven sings, earth responds. Heaven sings, earth responds. That's the true driving force of life in creation. So praise God from the earth. And again, it walks through the manifold wisdom of God on this earth. You, first of all, you great sea creatures and all deeps. All of those amazing animals that God has made in the oceans and the rivers and the lakes. All these things that are so strange to us even, so massive and amazing from the whales to all sea creatures. These things are designed to praise the Lord. God made his world and formed it and filled it teeming with these kinds of creatures, all deeps. By the way, I should pause here. I alluded to this earlier, that this whole psalm is putting everything that man might tend to exalt as a supernatural power under God, in relationship to God, to praise God. One of the things you see in ancient Near Eastern cosmologies, that is their ways of explaining the world, was the chaos of the deeps. this unformed aspect of existence that's not solid like solid ground. It can't be counted on and is dangerous in fact. It's so powerful no man can control it and it does these things and this is some kind of a power a pagan worldview would look at, the deeps. But here, The deeps are tamed. The deeps are, in fact, created and controlled so that they praise God. And everything they do is to that end. There's nothing here above God or beyond God. God is sovereign and God is making these things be what they are. Great sea creatures and all deeps. Fire, hail, it goes on. Snow and mist. Stormy wind fulfilling his word. Walking through the experience of these various elements and even meteorological phenomenon that we experience on earth. One thing you'll notice about these, just like in the previous verse, all of these things can be very dangerous. Fire and hail are not normally things that we think of as safe things. They're things that in insurance we call acts of God, right? Because they're things that do things that we don't control. They can be dangerous. They can destroy everything very quickly. And yet, God has brought them into being to praise Him. Their whole point of existence is to praise Him. Snow as well, the smoke or the mist that arises from fire, stormy winds. Every time you see a news report about a hurricane, we don't have those here in Colorado, by God's grace, we shouldn't just think, This is very powerful, it is that, and it's amazing in that way. But you should think stormy wind fulfilling his word. God accomplishing his purposes, revealing his own nature in this. Pardon me. Mountains in all hills, fruit trees, and all cedars. Now the geological formations, the plants growing upon them, these too are part of God's good purposes. Moving now to animate. creatures, beasts, and livestock, creeping things, and birds of wing. All that God has made, walking through the creation week, walking through from inanimate creation to animate creation, everything you lay your eyes upon, God has made this to bring forth praise to himself. Pardon me. Nothing exists that is not designed to bring praise to God. But now the psalm comes to a kind of a high point in this response to God, because it has moved from inanimate things to now animate things, to now intelligent creatures, human beings, mankind, in all of our life together. It starts off here with kings of the earth and all peoples, princes and rulers of the earth. We should recognize that even all political entities, the forms of human association, how we live our lives together and structure and order our lives together, not just as individuals, but even as political entities, are for the purpose of praising God. Why did God make you political animals, so to speak? Because he made us to form associations, he made us to accomplish things together as a manifestation of his image, to accomplish his purposes, ruling the earth for him, relating to him, to bring all of it to worship. All political entities are for the purpose of praising God. And this is a powerful part of our witness as we praise the Lord as God's people. Kings of the earth, What do we as God's people call upon the kings of this earth and the rulers and the princes to do? What is it ultimately that is the fulfillment of their very reason for existence? It's to praise the Lord. Now, how's that for a campaign trail? We're right in the middle of an election season or almost to the end here, right? And we might say in our society, mercifully, we're almost to the end of another election cycle. And as we get weary of all this, But can you imagine a campaign trail that was all about praising the Lord? This is why God has created these offices. And this is why God has created these structures. They have temporal responsibilities. They don't have eternal responsibilities. They have temporal response. But what's the point of those temporal responsibilities? So that we can praise the Lord together. Because God is giving us life together. You ever stop to think about your political leaders as being responsible to praise the name of the Lord? That's what they're there for. Don't forget that, by the way. I think the church's praise is powerful when she understands its true nature, that this supersedes everything that men think is so important. You see, what do politicians, we'll call them politicians because that's what we talk about here in our, we don't talk about kings and things of that nature here in our society. What do they go on the campaign trail about? Well, they'll say things like, what's important to the people? These are the issues that matter to the people. And so that's why I'm here and I'm here to, you know, take care of this issue for the people. This is what matters to you. And they might talk about taxes, and they might talk about inflation, and they might talk about regulations, and all kinds of things like that. And all those things are part of life together in this earth that we have to work through, and somebody has to take responsibility for, and things of that nature. Pardon me. Those are all, many times I should say, at least legitimate exercises that humans need to do together. But the whole point of these things is so that mankind can praise the Lord. They are going to tell you what they think you believe will fulfill your life. But what is this psalm teaching us? Is the consummation of all created existence. What is going to fulfill your life? the most joyful, the most beautiful thing you can ever do. It's praising the Lord. That's what you're created for. And that's why God puts us in societies. And that's why we have kings and princes and rulers. It's to praise the Lord. This is revolutionary. It goes on to talk about young men and maidens, old men and children. Pardon me. all stages of life, of both sexes, men and women, in all of our relationships, in all of our responsibilities, the whole objective here, the consummation of being what we are, is to praise the Lord. I don't need to beat this horse here, we've talked about it before, but we live in a culture that has lost its way entirely on its even reason for existence. Why are you a young man and why are you a young woman? Many people don't know. They feel lost. They even think if I could somehow be different than what I am, I would find some kind of fulfillment in life. I would find some kind of happiness and satisfaction and feel like, okay, now I'm really who I'm supposed to be. But you can't find who you're supposed to be in yourself. Because who you are is all related to God. And you find your fulfillment in Him. If you don't find your fulfillment there, hear me well, you will never find it anywhere. The consummation of all created existence is to praise the Lord. If you can't find fulfillment in praising the Lord, then you really are lost. you really don't know what life is about. But the point of this Psalm is to say, this is really good. All stages of life, everything God has given you, wherever you're at in life, whatever God has given, the whole point is to praise the Lord, to bring honor and joy to Him. So let's bring this to a conclusion here today. If praise is the purpose for all created existence, then it must be true that it is built into the very nature of created existence. It's built right in. We talked about this with the sun and the moon and the stars. It's true of you too. Here's what you were made for. And that corresponds perfectly with the way God made you. You see, you have a great privilege as a human being. We sang about this in the third stanza of that last hymn, that if rock and fire, though mindless, mute, and of soul and spirit, destitute, can their creators praise, and I'm gonna lose the words exactly here, then how much more should we who have heart and soul and mind praise the Lord? In fact, in a real sense, as the pinnacle of God's created work here on earth, you, as mankind, were meant to take everything else up into praise. Why did God make you a creature that can use tools, let's say? You can fashion tools, sometimes very complex ones like computers and things like that, and you can do stuff with them. Why did God make you to be able to do that? so that you could take all of these elements in the earth and turn them into something that eternally praises God. Do you realize that's what you've been given to do? This is an amazing thing. Everything you touch can be turned into praise to God. In fact, we've talked about this before in the Psalms, you can take in the very air around you. You can breathe it in and you can exhale it in intelligent praise to God. That air just got turned into praise because you're a living soul. That's what you were made for, to be that cosmic transmuter of all of creation into praise to God. It's a wonderful calling. Pardon me. That's your very nature. Does not that say to you that you should give yourself to praising God in everything you touch, everything that you see, Folks, you actually do violence to your own nature when you do not cultivate all of your powers to praise God. You are doing violence to your own nature, what you were made for. Just up the hill from us here is a university, a place where people go to study and to learn things. But what is the point of that? Why should humans study and learn things in order to praise God? And when they begin to detach their study and their learning from its true fulfillment in the praise and the worship of God, what do they do? They begin to do violence to themselves. They begin to tear apart our own mental furniture, our own spiritual nature, in order to not praise God with the very things that he's given us to praise God with. We perfect our nature, on the other hand, when everything we do becomes a participation of God's gift of existence in Christ by the Spirit. You can see here, folks, by the way, how the gospel really is good news. This is the fulfillment of all of your powers. This is everything you were made for, to know God in Jesus Christ, in resurrection life in Jesus Christ. Embrace that. The purpose of your existence is built right into your nature. and your nature comes to fulfillment in resurrection life in Christ. Worship the Lord. That's why I think this psalm is the perfect anti-idolatry psalm. Because what is idolatry? It's exchanging the creature for the creator, getting the very relationship backwards. But what does this psalm do? It puts everything right, right? Everything that's been created, its whole purpose is to worship God. and your creator is your redeemer, Jesus Christ. In fact, I love how this psalm concludes in verses 13 and 14 when it talks about all of the earth bringing praise to the Lord. It says, let them praise the name of the Lord for his name alone is exalted. His majesty is above earth and heaven. He has raised up a horn for his people. What is a horn? In the Old Testament scriptures, that's strength, that's power. That's ability to do things. He has raised up a horn for his people, and notice how it defines it. Praise for all his saints. For the people of Israel who are near to him. That is, his chosen people. The people he's brought near into a relationship with him. And in Christ, folks, you enjoy being near to him. You who are formerly far off in Christ, you have been reconciled by his blood. You are brought near to God. You can find fulfillment of your purpose. Hallelujah, praise the Lord. Your creator is your redeemer. Creation and redemption are not contrary purposes in God's plan, in God's mind. Creation simply sets the stage for God to accomplish his mighty works of redemption. And we should respond to him in praise for that. You see again how this psalm is calling you to the good life. In fact, you might even say this, this psalm is commanding you to be happy. Praise the Lord. That's what you were made for. You want a good life? Okay, praise the Lord. Rejoice in him. Take in everything around you and praise him with it. How's that for a good God? A good God who shares his life with you so that you can enjoy him forever. Folks, this is our God. This is what He's done in Jesus Christ. Will you praise Him? Will you praise Him forever? Let's be those who sing Psalm 148 well. If you would believe this, if this is your faith today, would you confess your faith with hallelujah, Jesus is Lord? Let's do it together as a congregation. Hallelujah, Jesus is Lord.