6.10.18 Sermon Notes

Summer in the Psalms:  Psalm 8
“God Knows Me?”
 
Psalm 8 (NIV): Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!  You have set your glory in the heavens.  2 Through the praise of children and infants you have established a stronghold against your enemies, to silence the foe and the avenger.
3 When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, 4 what is mankind that you are mindful of them, human beings that you care for them?  5 You have made them a little lower than the angels and crowned them with glory and honor.  6 You made them rulers over the works of your hands; you put everything under their feet:  7 all flocks and herds, and the animals of the wild, 8 the birds in the sky, and the fish in the sea, all that swim the paths of the seas.  9 Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!
 
God, the Creator of the Universe, Knows Me!!! 
 
Who is the center of your universe?  Is it God?  Or is it yourself?  Let’s contemplate that for a minute.
 
Revelation 3:19-21 - 19 Those whom I love I rebuke and discipline. So be earnest and repent. 20 Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with me.  21 To the one who is victorious, I will give the right to sit with me on my throne, just as I was victorious and sat down with my Father on his throne.

Open the door – what door???  where is the door???

It’s the door of the heart!  What?

How Big Is God – Stuart Hamblen
Though man may strive to go beyond the reach of space
To crawl beyond the distant shim'ring stars
This world's a room so small within my Master's house
The open sky's but a portion of His yard
 
How big is God? How big and wide His vast domain
To try and tell, these lips can only start
He's big enough to rule His mighty universe
Yet small enough to live within my heart
 
God is big enough to rule the mighty universe but small enough to live within my heart!
What do we mean when we say; “the heart?”  The heart is really combination of everything we are.  The dictionary has many references to what the “heart” is!

Getting past the definition as it relates to the organ that pumps blood, we find the heart as “the center of the total personality, especially with reference to intuition, feeling or emotion.

The heart is the center of emotion and all these other things combined, the head is the center of the intellect.  The heart has the capacity feeling the gamut of emotions from sympathy to affection.  The heart is the origin of spirit and courage and from it comes enthusiasm.  The heart is the core – the center of a person’s very being.

To further understand the impact of God in our heart, let’s look at some popular idioms about the heart.

• After one’s own heart – in keeping with one’s personal taste or preference
• Taking something to heart – making it reality
• Breaking someone’s heart – to cause great disappointment or sorrow
• Crossing one’s heart – to make a promise and affirm one’s integrity
• To do someone’s heart good – to give happiness or pleasure
• To eat one’s heart out – to have jealousy or longing
• From the bottom of one’s heart – with complete sincerity
• To have a heart – to be compassionate or be merciful
• To have one’s heart in the right place – to be kind or generous – having the right intentions
• To do something with heart and soul – enthusiastically, fervently
• In one’s heart of hearts – deep within one’s being
• To take heart – to gain one’s courage
• To set our heart at rest – to dismiss our anxieties
• To pour out one’s heart – to reveal one’s thoughts or private feelings.

 
And we could go on and on!  How important is the “heart” of everything?
 
In our Psalm today, we see that God fills his creation – the entire universe – and is able to fill the hearts of all who live in the universe – that is every definition, every idiom and reference to our heart!
 
And at the “heart” of this Psalm is the fact that God made humans and put them as the heart of His creation!
 
Look at this excerpt! 
 
Psalm 8:3-6 - 3 When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, 4 what is mankind that you are mindful of them, human beings that you care for them?  5 You have made them a little lower than the angels and crowned them with glory and honor.  6 You made them rulers over the works of your hands; you put everything under their feet: 
 
I mean seriously?  This is God we’re talking about!  Not some philosopher or guru or famous actor or sports figure – this is God and He made us only a little lower?

A.W. Tozer - The widest thing in the universe is not space; it is the potential capacity of the human heart. Being made in the image of God, it is capable of almost unlimited extension in all directions. And one of the world’s greatest tragedies is that we allow our hearts to shrink until there is room in them for little besides ourselves.

What do you think happens when God comes into the human heart where before only sin was there?  Does God become smaller or does our heart expand? 

Has your heart shrunk to encompass only what the world sees (and has convinced you to see) as your full potential?  Are your thoughts for yourself or are you willing to expand to become all that God wants to do through you?

The brilliant scientist Sir Isaac Newton said that he could take his telescope and look millions and millions of miles into space. Then he added, “But when I lay it aside, go into my room, shut the door, and get down on my knees in earnest prayer, I see more of Heaven and feel closer to the Lord than if I were assisted by all the telescopes on earth.”

This past week, I asked one our youth, Sarah Navarro – this question… “When God views people how big would you says he views us as being?”  Sarah’s answer, “pretty big – we’re his creation after all – and He would view us as bigger than any other of His creation…  in fact, definitely big – we are after all, His prized possession.”

Wow!  What great perspective from a very insightful 16-year old young lady. 

Do you view yourself as His prized possession?
James 1:17-18 – “Whatever is good and perfect is a gift coming down to us from God our Father, who created all the lights in the heavens. He never changes or casts a shifting shadow] 18 He chose to give birth to us by giving us his true word. And we, out of all creation, became his prized possession.”

The enemy of our souls wants to destroy your identity…. to try to diminish your existence….  Do not let Him lie to you – don’t even entertain what’s just simply not true!

Let’s give you some ammunition to combat the world’s attempt to “steal” your heart!
1.      When it comes to God – don’t put Him in a box – don’t deny His “bigness!”
2.      It’s us that puts limitations on God and what He can do in us – God can be only as big as your intellect can understand Him to be.
3.     Our intellect processes the content of our heart or our emotions – then we decide how to think and what to do.  It is important that we give both our heart and our mind to God!

Let me unpack this just a bit more using some definitions:
a.      Each human being possesses Mental Intelligence or IQ (Intelligence Quotient).  It’s the ability to think and reason, in terms of logic and language.
b.     Each person also possesses Emotional Intelligence (EQ).  This is your ability to recognize emotions of both yourself and others.
c.      We also posses a Spiritual Intelligence (SQ).  This is the ability to connect to a being that is higher than we are.  Believers in the Trinity know this as God the Father, God the Son & God the Holy Spirit – the Godhead!

The world wants to define for us what is best for us, i.e. what constitutes success, why we need recognition and validation and how we should act, think and believe to best become “all that we can be.”

There is one simply problem with allowing the world to determine what all that is for us.  The world is ruled by a leader who was and will eventually be a total loser!

Rev. 12:7-12  - 7 And war broke out in heaven: Michael and his angels fought with the dragon; and the dragon and his angels fought, 8 but they [a]did not prevail, nor was a place found for [b]them in heaven any longer. 9 So the great dragon was cast out, that serpent of old, called the Devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world; he was cast to the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.  10 Then I heard a loud voice saying in heaven, “Now salvation, and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of His Christ have come, for the accuser of our brethren, who accused them before our God day and night, has been cast down. 11 And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, and they did not love their lives to the death. 12 Therefore rejoice, O heavens, and you who dwell in them! Woe to the inhabitants of the earth and the sea! For the devil has come down to you, having great wrath, because he knows that he has a short time.”

Evaluation:  The enemy – the devil – wants you to use your IQ and your EQ to affect your SQ!  When we follow the world’s definition about what’s important, we follow a loser – one who did not and cannot win.
So, what’s going on with your heart?  Let’s remember the words of A.W. Tozer again!

A.W. Tozer - The widest thing in the universe is not space; it is the potential capacity of the human heart. Being made in the image of God, it is capable of almost unlimited extension in all directions. And one of the world’s greatest tragedies is that we allow our hearts to shrink until there is room in them for little besides ourselves.

The world wants you to believe it’s all about you and your health and your wealth.  And our Mind and Heart becomes filled with anything that will diminish the power of God in you.

Does God see you differently than you see you?  Ask yourself these questions:
1.      Is my heart expanding as I grow in your knowledge of God and my personal relationship with Him?
2.     Am I allowing the world’s definition of what success is to possess me to where I can’t see myself as God’s creation and be content with that?
3.     Can I see myself as the heart of God’s creation and then can I submit my will to God so I can be used mightily by Him?
4.     Do I realize that if I live only for the world and its definitions of success that the one I’m following has already been defeated?

Let’s go back to the statement from Sarah Navarro’s answer to the question “When God views people how big would you say he views us as being?” “We are actually pretty big – we’re his creation after all – and He would view us as bigger than any other of His creation…  in fact, big – we are after all, His prized possession.”

Are you acting like you’re God’s prized possession or are looking elsewhere to be something else?
God wants to do something incredible through you!  He wants to do His handiwork through you!
 Ephesians 2:10 - “we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.”

​Go forth, Child of God, His creation made only a little lower than the angels – crowned with His incredible honor and glory!  Go forth, Child of God, you are His!
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