God is Good!

This past Sunday our pastor preached a sermon on Psalm 100 which was written by David, King of Israel (1011-971 B.C.).

A Psalm for Thanksgiving.


Shout joyfully to the LORD, all the earth.  
Serve the LORD with gladness; 
     Come before Him with joyful singing.
Know that the LORD Himself is God;
     It is He who has made us, and not we ourselves;
     We are His people and the sheep of His pasture.
Enter His gates with thanksgiving
     And His courts with praise
     Give thanks to Him, bless His name.
For the Lord is good;
     His lovingkindness is everlasting
     And His faithfulness to all generations.
                                --Psalm 100

I thought the main thrust of the sermon was that God is Good, God is Love, God cares about us lots and lots and He will love us forever.  For all these things, we should be very very thankful and show that thankfulness by living our lives with great joy (including giggling :-)).  

I liked how he helped us understand the immensity of God's goodness which no human can truly understand.  He used the ocean as an example:  you could say the ocean is wet or the ocean is water but you don't get the enormity of it until you say it is an ocean which, of course, is wet and made up of water.

I did take umbrage a bit when he talked about baby farm animals.  Specifically, he talked about smelly piglets and little calves not being very soft and cuddly whereas little lambs are.  I remember playing with the calves on our farm when I was a kid and, while they are indeed not very soft and cuddly, they were fun to play with :-).

But, his point was well taken and my raised hackles were soothed when he mentioned that lambs are not very bright and need a shepherd.  Of course, that's us!  We're often not all that bright when it comes to God which is why we really do need Jesus as our Shepherd.

I greatly enjoyed this sermon and I thought the message was superb reinforcement.  And, I apologize to Brother Steve for my mangling of his excellent message!

After the service, I happened to think about a person who once told me the God of the Old Testament  (wrathful) is very different from the God of the New Testament (kind of warm and fuzzy, I guess); she said He mellowed after His Son was born.  Oh, my!  Our Amazing God has always had a Son and He has never changed.  In fact, that's one of the many very wonderful things about Him.  When this world goes whizzing around in circles with things changing faster than one can think, I know I can seek the shelter of my God who is always the same - Loving and Good.

I think perhaps when people read the Old Testament, all they see is the wrath and the threatened wrath.  They don't see how very patient and loving the Lord is as he sends prophet after prophet to remind His people that they have turned away from Him and need to return.  He tells them over and over again what the outcome will be if they don't repent.  Although He knows the outcome before He sends the first prophet, He is still saddened by their lack of repentance and He is still so very patient.  The end result is His people do not repent and He finally does exactly what He has been telling them He would do.  He is full of goodness and love.  He is a Father who warns His sons about their evil ways.  When they don't listen and repent, that Father must take the actions He promised.

We should be exceedingly joyful that we have a God of Goodness, Patience, Faithfulness, Mercy and Justice (to name but a few of His attributes).

Blessings,

Mary