“Great is the Lord and greatly to be praised” (Ps 48:1; AMPC). Praise and worship are an important part of our Christian lives. According to what we read in Psalms there are several different ways we can and should praise the Lord. Psalm 47:1 tells us 3 things to do; clap our hands, shout and sing. Psalm 134:2 tells us to lift up our hands and Psalm 149:4 encourages us to praise with dancing and instruments (see also Ps 150:3,4). Why are we to praise and worship God? We find an answer in Psalm 150:2; here we are told that we praise God because of all the great things He has done for us and also because of who He is, “Praise Him for His mighty acts; praise Him according to the abundance of His greatness” (AMPC). Praise is a natural result of thanksgiving to God for all He has done, “Enter His gates with thanksgiving and His courts with praise” (Ps 100:4; CSB). We may not always feel like praising God; our bodies may be tired, our minds busy or our emotions may be unsettled but Hebrews 13:15 encourages us to, “continually offer the sacrifice of praise to God” (NKJV). In other words, we praise God even when we don’t feel like it. Jesus said that we will worship, “in Spirit and truth” (John 4:23,24). When we worship God from the heart (like David did) it helps to get the focus off our problems and onto God who is the solution for our problems. As David said, “I will bless the Lord at all times; His praise will continually be in my mouth. O magnify the Lord with me, and let us exalt His name together” (Ps 34:1,2; AMPC).

King David in Psalm 103:3 (NKJV) stated that God, “heals all your diseases.” The apostle Matthew in his gospel quoted the prophet Isaiah who foretold the healing ministry of Jesus, “He Himself took our infirmities and bore our sickness” (Matt 8:17; NKJV). Jesus was anointed to heal by the power of the Holy Spirit (Luke 3:21-22; Acts 10:38). There are many examples of Jesus healing, for example: a blind man (Mark 10:46-52), a man paralyzed, (Matt 9:1-8) and a woman with chronic bleeding (Luke 8:43-48). Often crowds of people came to Jesus and he, “healed all who were sick” (Matt 8:16b; NKJV) and “healed every sickness and every disease among the people” (Matt 9:35b NKJV). Jesus never changes (Heb 13:8.) Jesus gave His disciples power and sent them out to heal sickness and disease, first the 12 disciples (Matt 10:1-8) and later 70 disciples (Luke 10:1-9). In Jesus’ final words to His disciples, He exhorted them to preach the gospel and that as they prayed for the sick, they would be healed (Mark 16:15-20). In the early church many healings were seen, for example a lame man (Acts 3:1-10), a paralyzed man (Acts 9:34) and everyone on the Island of Malta (Acts 28:1-9). As disciples of Jesus, we are all part of His church and filled with the same Holy Spirit Jesus was, so we too can pray for the sick and see them healed. The apostle Peter wrote that, “By His stripes you have been healed.” Jesus bore chastisement on His body so we personally can receive healing. Healing is surely ours today and we receive it by faith (Mark 9:23).

“Even so consider yourselves also dead to sin and your relation to it broken, but alive to God (living in unbroken fellowship with him) in Christ Jesus” (Rom 6:11; AMPC). Powerful words! Unbroken fellowship with God, not just in the “sweet by and by” but now, today! Romans chapter 6, verses 1-11 are talking about baptism. When we are baptized, we symbolically share the death of Jesus, we die to sin and we also share the resurrection of Jesus, living a new life with Him. Another aspect of unbroken fellowship with God is “abiding.” 1 John 3:6 tells us that, “No one who abides in Him (who lives and remains in communion with and in obedience to Him – deliberately, knowingly and habitually) commits (practices) sin” (AMPC). In other words, if we are truly abiding in God, we will not deliberately sin, and when we do slip up, we can immediately confess our sins, knowing that God will forgive us right away and restore fellowship with Him (1 John 1:9). God is always with us, He never leaves us (Heb 13:5) but we need to stay connected to him through prayer, Bible reading and worship. As you know, if we want to have unbroken fellowship with God it’s not just a Sunday morning thing but constant communion throughout the day. I understand we have jobs to go to and stuff to do but we can still be conscious of God as we do these things. Increasing our fellowship with God doesn’t happen overnight, it develops over a lifetime. I’m reminded of Enoch who, “walked with God” (Gen5:22). That’s what I want, how about you?

How can anyone come close to adequately describing the character and nature of God? Let’s look at some scripture verses. “For the Lord your God is God of gods and Lord of Lords, the great God, mighty and awesome” (Deut 10:17a; NKJV). God is the beginning and the end (Rev 22:13), the creator of all things (Gen 1:1) and He knows when He will send Christ back to end the present age (Matt 24:36). God has unlimited power (Isa 55:11; Gen 18:14; Luke 1:37), He knows all things (1 John 3:20) and is present everywhere (Heb 4:13; Ps 139:7-10). He is our everlasting God; He never gets tired (Isa 40:28) and He never changes (Mal 3:6; James 1:17). God is light (1 John 1:5). There is no darkness in God and He doesn’t just love, He is love (1 John 4:16). “For the Lord our God is our sun and our shield” (Ps 84:11a; NLT). He is our rock or foundation, our power (2 Sam 22:32-33). God described Himself to Moses, “The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering and abounding in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity, transgression and sin” (Ex 34:6b-7a; NKJV). All God’s works are perfect; He is a God of justice, truth and faithfulness. He does no wrong; He walks in righteousness, a Holy God (Deut 32:4; Isa 57:15). We could write so much more but what we have written should leave us in awe of our mighty God. This is our God who chose to love each one of us and make us His children (1 John 3:1). Sit back and meditate on all of this for a while!