Sermon for August 5th, 2018

Psalm 150:1-6

1 Praise the Lord!
Praise God in his sanctuary;
    praise him in his mighty firmament!
2 Praise him for his mighty deeds;
    praise him according to his surpassing greatness!
3 Praise him with trumpet sound;
    praise him with lute and harp!
4 Praise him with tambourine and dance;
    praise him with strings and pipe!
5 Praise him with clanging cymbals;
    praise him with loud clashing cymbals!
6 Let everything that breathes praise the Lord!
Praise the Lord!

The Last Psalm

Back in the days of the circuit riding preacher--the preacher who would ride on horseback across the plains to preach at several different churches each Sunday--a certain preacher wanted to train his horse, and, being a preacher he thought it would be clever to use biblical phrases as commands. So he taught the horse to giddy up and go whenever he said the words, "Praise the Lord." And he taught his horse to stop whenever he said the word "Hallelujah."

This worked out great, and really impressed the people when he rode into town, loudly shouting "Hallelujah," and bringing his horse to a stop. Then after the service, he'd mount his horse as the people gathered on the steps of the church, shout "Praise the Lord," and horse and rider would gallop off into the horizon.

One day, in between towns, the preacher fell asleep in the saddle. When he woke up, he found his horse had veered off course and was headed at a fast trot straight towards the edge of a cliff. Flustered, he tried hard to remember which command made the horse stop. He shouted, "Jubilation" and "God Almighty!" and even "transubstantiation" but nothing worked. Just as the horse was about to go over the edge, he remembered and cried out "Hallelujah" and the horse came to an abrupt stop two inches from certain death. Wiping the sweat from his brow, the preacher breathed a sigh of relief and said, "Whew! That was close, but we made it, praise the Lord!" He was never heard from again.

We've spent the entire summer talking about prayer, the psalms, and praising the Lord. Today, our sermon series comes to an end, and fittingly we're looking at the very last psalm in the book of psalms, psalm 150. It is a Psalm of praise, just like Psalm 117 (the shortest psalm) and like most psalms of praise, it begins and ends with the words "Praise the Lord" or in Hebrew, "Hallelujah!"

• Psalm 1 and Psalm 150 as bookends. Moving from obedience to adoration, from seeking wisdom to finding love.
• Calvin describes the heavens (firmament) as a "mirror" reflecting the power of God. When we look up at the night sky filled stars and contemplate the immensity of space, we cannot help but admire the one who fixed every star in its place. He says: "Though our minds can never take in this immensity, the mere taste of it will deeply affect us. And God will not reject such praises as we offer according to our capacity."