Due Praise!

Thine, O Lord , is the greatness, and the power, and the glory, and the victory, and the majesty: for all that is in the heaven and in the earth is thine; thine is the kingdom, O Lord, and thou art exalted as head above all. Both riches and honour come of thee, and thou reignest over all; and in thine hand is power and might; and in thine hand it is to make great, and to give strength unto all. 1 Chronicles 29:11‭-‬12 KJV

What deep words. It takes a man who has drunk deeply from the well of God's greatness to appreciate who God is and what he can do. Earthly men want to have glory, power and greatness, and they seem to think that something as ephemeral and untrustworthy like money can buy it. Man sacrifices his peace and joy in the pursuit of comfort, forgetting that nothing works outside the one who is defined as Lord.

Have you met an earthly king? Do you  appreciate the sphere of influence, control and ownership within his domain? As mighty as a king can be, his sphere is limited to his domain, his own people, his town, his community. Another king rules in the next town. Not so with this Lord. He owns and holds everything. He is exalted over all. Riches and honour, the right kind, come from him. In his hand is power and might, not by the  fiat or command of men. His hand makes great and gives strength to all who need it.

That is the Lord who David invites us to worship today and always. The same Lord who made Joseph sleep one night as a chief prisoner and the next night as a Chief Prime Minister. The same Lord who turned a fiery furnace into an air - conditioned room, simply because his children were passing through. The Lord who turned a fish's mouth into an ATM for payment of temple tax, and the same Lord who wipes the slate clean with his blood, and gives all who come to him a fresh start. That is who this Lord is. The one who does not define me on the basis of where I am coming from or where I am now, but by who lives inside of me.

Do you know him? Better still, does he know you as his own? It is not what earthly, ephemeral men tell you that matters; it is what God says that is fundamental. The verdict is clear; the Lord is the one who deserves all we can give.  His time of favour is here.