[0:00] Please take your Bibles and open them up this morning to the book of Psalms. The book of Psalms. We're going to be in chapter 34 this morning.
[0:12] If you have not opened up your Bible to the book of Psalms before, you just take it right to the middle and open it up. You'll probably land somewhere close by and flip to the 34th chapter.
[0:24] And our text this morning is just going to be verse 3. And our passage is short this morning, but I promise you it is loaded. And so if you would, Bibles open to Psalm 34 verse 3.
[0:37] Please follow along with me as I read the word of God. David writes, Oh, magnify the Lord with me and let us exalt his name together.
[0:54] Let's pray. Lord, this is our aim. This is our desire that your name would be magnified.
[1:05] And we pray you would do it now through the preaching and the hearing of this word. We pray in Christ's name. Amen. Southwest Airlines made the news over the holidays and not in a good way.
[1:21] You may be familiar that the airline company, they canceled over 15,000 flights between December 22nd and December 30th as travelers were attempting to make their way to their destinations for the holidays.
[1:39] The bags were missing. Connecting flights were missed. Passengers were left stranded at the airport. And nobody had any answers. And by all accounts, this was a customer service nightmare.
[1:55] The airline, to their credit, has since tried to make up for the mistake by apologizing over and over and over and over again. And even going so far as to offer frequent flyer miles to those who were significantly affected by the issues.
[2:11] But let's be honest. They are not coming back from this one anytime soon. This was a major blow to the reputation of Southwest Airlines.
[2:23] Southwest, as a company, has had several different versions of their mission statement over the years. Right now, their mission statement is to connect people to what's important in their lives through friendly, reliable, and low-cost air travel.
[2:41] And their vision is to be the world's most loved, most efficient, and most profitable airline. And that's, I think, three strikes and you're out.
[2:55] After all of this, they certainly have a long way to go. A former version of their mission statement, you can look it up, was dedication to the highest quality of customer service, delivered with a sense of warmth, friendliness, individual pride, and company spirit.
[3:14] And the point here is not to pile on to Southwest. I'm sure that they're doing the best that they can. The point is that these words of their mission and their vision, they sound wonderful.
[3:26] But from December 22nd to December 30th, at least, they did not translate into action. They were clearly not understood and certainly not applied.
[3:41] And now, in the aftermath of this customer service disaster, they have to set out on the hard work of rebuilding their identity as a company. Well, why are we talking about Southwest Airlines this morning?
[3:54] It's because, Lord willing, as we've already said, in just three weeks, unless the Lord returns first, which would be much better, in just three weeks, the church at Seaweed Bay will be reborn, reintroduced as Seaweed Bay Baptist Church.
[4:11] If you're just joining us this morning for the first time, or you've just been blissfully unaware for the past six months or so, we are in the midst of a major transitional milestone in the life of this church family.
[4:27] So for roughly six years, the church at Seaweed Bay, this gathering has existed as an extension of First Baptist Mount Pleasant. It is a campus of First Baptist Mount Pleasant.
[4:39] But over the past six months, even back further than that, the elders at First Baptist Mount Pleasant, alongside Treg, alongside the Pillar Network, alongside myself, have been working towards what we believe God has providentially prepared this church family to do in this place and in this time.
[5:00] And so in just three weeks, Lord willing, January 29th, we will officially form a new church body, Seaweed Bay Baptist Church. In the forming of a new church, I'm sure you're aware, there are many moving parts, many important questions to be asked and to be answered.
[5:22] But the most important of these questions, I believe, is do we understand the mission? Do we understand the mission of the church as given by God?
[5:37] Do we understand what we are here to do? Do we understand the purpose of the church? Do we understand why we are here and what we are here to accomplish?
[5:49] What is it that is at the core of our identity that drives us, compels us, makes us distinct in the world around us, shapes the content of our message, shapes the content of our gatherings, shapes the form of our lives together?
[6:06] We absolutely must be clear on this. And so we have worked to clarify the mission and the vision of Seaweed Bay Baptist Church.
[6:16] And so over the next four Sundays, starting this morning, leading up to the birth of this church, we're going to talk about each part of our mission and vision. Because what we don't want is for this to just be a collection of nice-sounding words that never translate into action.
[6:36] Amen? And we want this to shape the life of this church body. We want to drive and define the identity of this church family.
[6:48] So, what is the mission of Seaweed Bay Baptist Church? I would like for you to write this down. If you have a pen and a bulletin or a notepad, this is the mission.
[7:02] This is the grand banner that we want to fly across every ministry of this church, everything that we are, everything that we do. The mission is this.
[7:12] We exist to magnify the glory of God in the gospel of Jesus Christ. That's the mission.
[7:23] We exist to magnify the glory of God in the gospel of Jesus Christ. And in the coming weeks, Lord willing, we will talk about how we plan to go about that grand mission.
[7:37] But this morning, I want to ask why. Out of all the things that we could have put our foot down and said this is what we want to be about, why this?
[7:49] Why this mission? And there are about a billion reasons why. But this morning, I want to give you three. Three reasons why this is our mission.
[8:00] This will be our outline this morning. And if you're taking notes, three reasons why our mission is to magnify the glory of God in the gospel of Jesus Christ.
[8:11] First, first reason why is because this is the purpose of your life. This is the purpose of your life.
[8:23] Everyone, man, woman, boy, girl, rich, poor, everybody wants to understand their place in the world.
[8:36] Everybody wants to know their purpose. And everybody wants to thrive and live a life that's full and satisfying and filled with meaning. Let me tell you where that starts.
[8:49] It starts with the realization that your life serves a purpose outside of yourself. It starts with realizing that there is a God and you're not Him.
[9:02] And that your purpose, the reason that you exist is not to draw attention to yourself, not to make much of yourself, not to serve your own interests, but it's to draw attention to Him and to make much of Him.
[9:18] That's the purpose of your life. So I have two questions here that we need to understand. First is, what is the glory of God? If our goal is to magnify the glory of God, what is it that we're supposed to be magnifying?
[9:34] And that's not easy to define, is it? What is the glory of God? But here's a shot. God's glory is the sum total of all of His infinite goodness, all of His infinite holiness, all of His perfections, all of His worth.
[9:56] It is all of His praiseworthiness. And so when we say that we are magnifying the glory of God, we are magnifying Him.
[10:07] And we're saying that He is worthy of our praise. When we say that we glorify God, we're not adding anything to Him. We're simply acknowledging with our minds, with our hearts, with all of our entire selves, that He is supremely worthy of worship.
[10:26] That's what it means to glorify Him. This is what we were made to do. Do you realize that we are born as worshipers?
[10:37] Do you realize that? Sometimes we do this all the time without even realizing it. We praise what is praiseworthy. That's just how we're wired. That's how we're made.
[10:47] We are made to worship. We're designed to praise what is praiseworthy. And whatever it is that our heart finds satisfying, whatever it is that our heart finds worthy, we will praise it.
[11:01] When you eat a good meal, what do you do? You praise it. You celebrate. When you see something beautiful, a beautiful sunset, you go out to the ocean, what do you do? You praise it.
[11:12] You declare its worth. You make much of it. Tomorrow night, when the Georgia Bulldogs win the national championship, thousands of people throughout the country will praise the team and the coaching and the final score.
[11:29] There's nothing wrong with this. This is good. And it's right. That is not wrong. That's how we're wired. We are meant to enjoy and to praise and to declare worthy to magnify what is good.
[11:45] It is right to praise what is praiseworthy. But get this, so long as it is proportional to its praiseworthiness. You follow that?
[11:57] It is right to praise what is praiseworthy, so long as it is in proportion to its praiseworthiness. Christians are those who have had our eyes opened to the truth that God is infinitely worthy of our praise.
[12:19] that He is infinitely praiseworthy. So we worship God because God is infinitely good. He is infinitely satisfying.
[12:32] He is infinitely wise. He is infinitely sovereign. He is infinitely perfect in every single one of His glorious attributes, which means He is infinitely glorious and worthy of our praise.
[12:50] So my second question then is what does it mean for us to magnify His glory? To magnify His glory it means to make much of Him.
[13:05] It means to proclaim Him, to enjoy Him, to worship Him, to revere Him, to celebrate Him. It means you stop living and working and thinking and acting as if we, me, you, were the center of the universe and instead we begin to orbit our life around Him and His glory.
[13:29] John Piper says that there are two kinds of magnifying. There is microscope magnifying and there is telescope magnifying.
[13:39] The one makes small things look bigger than they are and the other makes a big thing begin to appear as big as it really is. When we say that we want to magnify the glory of God we are not microscope magnifying.
[13:59] We are striving and pursuing with all of His energy, all of His power at work in us to begin to see Him for as big and as glorious as He really is.
[14:14] We are striving to focus the lens with our lives and with our speech so that the whole world around us can look and taste and see how magnificent God is.
[14:26] That is what it means to magnify His glory. This is exactly what David is doing here in our psalm. Psalm 34. Look there with me again. You see this language that he is using here throughout the psalm.
[14:39] Verse 1. He says, I will bless the Lord at all times. His praise shall continually be in my mouth. My soul makes its boast in me, in my kingship, in my wisdom, in my accomplishments.
[14:56] No. My soul makes its boast in the Lord. See, these are the words of someone who has had his eyes opened to the worth of God. He has realized by the grace of God that the purpose of his life is to make much of him.
[15:13] Oh, magnify the Lord with me. Let us exalt his name. So David, he invites us here to praise him for his work of salvation.
[15:25] Verse 4. I sought the Lord and he answered me and he delivered me. He invites us to praise him for his mercy and his grace to poor men and poor women like us. He says, verse 6, this poor man cried and the Lord heard him and saved him.
[15:41] He invites us to praise him for his constant protection over his people. The angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear him. Verse 7. He invites us to praise him for his promises, to praise him for his goodness, praise him for the hope he gives to his people.
[15:58] He's just rattling off reason after reason after reason after reason why God is worthy of your worship. We praise him because he is infinitely worthy of our praise.
[16:13] Do you see the Godward magnification of this psalm? The Godward orientation of David's heart? That is what you were created for.
[16:28] And here at the beginning of a new year and at the beginning of the new life that God is giving this church, now is the time to ask yourself, is this how my heart beats?
[16:46] Is this what my heart sounds like? Is this the orientation of my heart? And if not, there's a very clear simple reason why, and it's sin.
[17:02] It's sin. Sin is failure to magnify the glory of God. And so we magnify the glory of God's gifts and minimize or completely ignore the glory of God.
[17:19] I said earlier that Christians are those who have had their eyes open to behold the truth of God's glory. glory of God's glory of glory of God. If you have not had your eyes open by his sovereign power, then you are blinded to the glory of God.
[17:32] You cannot see it. The heavens declare it, the earth is full of the glory of the Lord, and you don't see it. You don't have the capacity to see him for what he's worth.
[17:45] All you see is what you see around you, and so that's what you love, that's what you pursue, that's what you build your life around. You wonder why our non-believing friends just ignore God completely, make their lives about money, about success, about whatever it is, you fill in the blank.
[18:05] The reason is they can't see the glory of God. They are blinded to it. If they could see him for what he's worth, they would love him.
[18:17] They would worship him. They can't see it. 2 Corinthians 4, verse 4 says, The God of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.
[18:41] And if that's you this morning, I just want to invite you this morning, right now, to pray in your heart something simple like this. God, give me spiritual sight, that I might see you for how good you are.
[18:58] God, give me spiritual sight, that I might begin to understand your worth, that I might see it and live in light of it, that I might see the light of the glory of Christ.
[19:10] It starts there. But we know even as believers, we still struggle with this, don't we? this is not just a non-believer problem.
[19:21] Instead of magnifying his glory, we tend to still stray and fixate on earthly treasures, money, earthly systems, politics, earthly worries, all of it where moth and rust destroy.
[19:36] And all too often, our biggest problem is that we want to be magnified. That we want to be the one at the center of the lens.
[19:48] We want God to look through a telescope at us. Magnify us. So our lives are about us. Our decisions are about us. Our thoughts are about us.
[19:58] Our needs, our comfort, our preferences, our actions are about us. Everything is about us. I may have told this story before, forgive me if I have, but I will never forget this.
[20:13] When I was in college, I was a brand new believer, being discipled for the first time in my life, and I was just awestruck with the way that these men loved and studied the word of God.
[20:25] I had never seen someone so seriously think about God as these men did. And one of the assignments that they gave me in our discipleship meeting, this was me and like four other guys, and so you did the homework, otherwise they knew.
[20:40] The assignment that I was given was to make a pie chart of my time. And I was supposed to think through how my time worked and how I allotted my time and what portion of my life I was giving to selfish things, what portion of my life I was giving to the Lord.
[21:00] And I tried to make some positive changes as I did the assignment at the last minute, but what I handed in was a pie chart that had a section here for sleeping, a section here for eating, a section here for studying and classwork, a section here for friends and recreation, sports, a section here just for whatever I have free time wanted to do, and a section right over here for God.
[21:27] This is when I plan to read my Bible and pray, and this is the portion of the pie that I give to God. And I handed it to the student who discipled me, and he said, what is this?
[21:40] I said, well, this is my pie chart. You asked me to do this. This is the section here that I want to give to God.
[21:52] And he said, let me see that for a minute. He wrote in big letters over the entire thing, God. He handed it back and said, keep your time in the word, keep your time in prayer, don't lose that, but you need to remember that all of your time, all of your life is for him.
[22:16] You don't just fit God into your schedule. You don't fit him around your plans and your desires and your wants and your needs, your ambitions for your life.
[22:28] You live every minute for him, for his glory. He's the one that gives purpose and meaning to everything on your schedule, whether you eat or drink or go to school or take a nap.
[22:45] Do all for what? Help me. The glory of God. Some of us need to remember this morning that our life is not about us.
[22:58] It's about him. And you will never find more joy, more satisfaction, and more genuine, lasting, purpose than when you live as you were made to live, to magnify the glory of God.
[23:16] So reason number one why this is our mission as a church is because this is all of our mission as individuals, but not just as individuals, which is why number two, the second reason why this is our mission as a church is because this is the mission, this is the purpose of the church.
[23:38] This is the purpose of the church, not just our church, not just our gathering, our body, but the church.
[23:50] Don't you think that our church ought to fit in with the purpose of the church? That our mission needs to be the mission. We're not trying to be unique here, we're trying to understand what has God said the mission of the church is.
[24:06] And Lord willing, again, we'll talk over the coming weeks about how we go about this mission by equipping the saints, by enjoying God, by evangelizing the lost, but the end goal of all of these things, the point of all of it, is to magnify the glory of God, not just as individuals, but together as a church family.
[24:32] That's the purpose of the church. Look what David does here in this psalm. I love this. See, he starts with personal devotion, but that personal devotion spills over into corporate devotion.
[24:47] His personal commitment cannot remain singular. It lasts about a verse and a half, and then it's plural. Look there to verse one again. He says, I will bless the Lord at all times, and his praise shall continually be in my mouth.
[25:03] My soul makes its boast in the Lord personal. Let the humble hear and be glad. That's corporate. You see, David knows delight is not meant to just stay personal.
[25:19] It's meant to be shared. It's better shared. It is great to go watch the game by yourself at home on TV, but how much better is it when you go and gather and celebrate and shout and cheer in the same direction as 10,000 other people.
[25:37] It is good and right and necessary to have a personal relationship with the Lord, but that relationship is never meant to be private. It's meant to go public.
[25:51] It's meant to be shared with others in a big, messy family called the church. And so David says, let's do this together, together, magnify the Lord with me.
[26:05] Let us exalt his name together. He shares his own personal testimony in verse 6. It says, this poor man cried and the Lord heard him and saved him out of all his troubles, but it is for corporate rejoicing.
[26:22] Verse 8, oh, taste and see that the Lord is good. He has personally tasted the joy of the blessing of fearing the Lord, so he invites others.
[26:35] Verse 11, come, oh, children, listen to me that I might teach you the fear of the Lord. See, he is inviting others to join in to his exaltation.
[26:49] David knows that joy is compounded in community. That's why the church exists. I don't know how anybody can come and gather with this church family and not understand this.
[27:05] I don't know about you, but when I come and I gather here with you all on a Sunday morning, I am encouraged by the fellowship of the saints. Amen?
[27:16] I am lifted up, I'm built up and spiritually strengthened when I hear you sing songs of truth as we did this morning. I am, my soul is nourished and fed.
[27:30] As Randy read the words of scripture from John chapter 12 this morning, my soul was encouraged as I heard you recite the answers to these catechism questions. What is the chief end of man?
[27:41] And it's to, what is it? And enjoy him forever. I'm encouraged. My soul is built up and edified.
[27:53] That's the purpose of the church family. We need to remember that God never intended to just save us as individuals, distinct and separated individuals.
[28:05] His plan from the beginning of time was to create a people for himself. a family of worshippers, a collective group of redeemed sinners who would gather together, encourage one another, spur one another on to love and good works, correct one another, admonish one another on occasion, rebuke one another if necessary, teach one another, train one another, love one another with brotherly affection, proclaim the gospel alongside one another bear one another's burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ, to submit to one another, a people who would magnify the glory of God together.
[28:54] That's the mission of the church. Our mission is to magnify his glory together. together. You know, if we could just get this right, everything else would fall into place.
[29:12] If we could just keep this simple mission before us, it sounds so simple, and it is, but believe me, churches have a hard time keeping this central.
[29:24] And the enemy does not want a church to magnify the glory of God. So he will do anything and everything he possibly can to distract us from this, to keep us from this, to cause our attention to divert from this, focus on anything else but the glory of God.
[29:49] God, we need to be clear on this. You may have been to church your whole life and for whatever reason never quite caught this.
[30:00] Maybe you've been a part of a church that just never made this the central aim, never made so much about this main priority of the church. Some of your church experiences I know are just so messed up from your past that whether you realize it or not, you may have absorbed some of these misunderstandings about what the church is and what the church is supposed to do.
[30:23] And so let me tell you some things the church is not. I want to be very clear. The church is not a social club that exists primarily to build relationships and to build community.
[30:38] Good things, not the primary thing. The church is not a political organization that exists for public policy or to promote any individual candidate or political party.
[30:53] The church is not a charity. It just exists primarily to do good deeds. The church is not a business that exists primarily to make a profit.
[31:08] The church is not a theater where you come to be entertained or where you come feeling like you need to be the one to put on a show and to be something you're not and to act as something you're not to entertain or to deceive others.
[31:25] The church is not a gathering of perfect people. Tim Keller says the church is not a museum for saints. It is a hospital for sinners.
[31:37] Here's what the church is. The church is a family. bound together not by common blood or by common skin or by common country but by common exaltation.
[31:57] We share one Lord one faith one baptism one God and father of all.
[32:08] our heartbeat as a family is to magnify the glory of God. It's that simple. And let me tell you something.
[32:20] When that is made primary here we will see God work and move like we have never seen it before. Don't you want that?
[32:32] Don't you want to be a part of that? a church that makes that the mission. So let me invite you to do something. When you go to pray this week and next week and the week after that and I would just invite you to pray every single day.
[32:51] If you would commit with me to pray every single day leading up to February 5th our first Sunday as Seawee Bay Baptist Church and then go ahead and keep praying every day after that.
[33:02] That would be great. I want you to pray not only for the Lord to be magnified in you personally in your life but would you just pray every day that the Lord would be magnified in this church family?
[33:20] It's very simple. Here's what I want you to do. Just take Psalm chapter 34 verse 3 and pray it over this church. It'll look something like this. Lord magnify your name at Seawee Bay.
[33:34] Let us exalt your name together. Amen. Simple. Pray it for one another by name. Lord I pray that Linda and Breeze and Priscilla and Joe and Dick that they would magnify the glory of God in their lives.
[33:55] Work your way down a list. Pray for one another that God would be magnified here in this family. Would you pray over our gatherings as a church? Pray for me.
[34:05] Would you please? Would you please pray that the Lord would magnify his glory through the preaching of the word here at this church? Would you pray that the Lord would be magnified in our singing together as a congregation as we gather to worship?
[34:23] worship? I'm confident the Lord is already answering that prayer here. And I'm confident he will continue to answer that prayer.
[34:36] Would you pray that God would magnify himself in this church family? Third and finally our mission is to magnify the glory of God because this is the purpose of the gospel.
[34:58] This is the purpose of the gospel. Mission statement we exist to magnify the glory of God in the gospel of Jesus Christ.
[35:12] Why do we add that? why do we add that phrase? Why not just leave it as magnify the glory of God and call it a day? It's shorter sweeter we probably easier to memorize and remember why do we have to add in the gospel of Jesus Christ?
[35:29] It's because the gospel of Jesus Christ is the clearest the grandest the most spectacular display of the glory of God.
[35:44] God what could display God's wisdom more than the gospel where the wisdom of this world is just shattered to pieces as the Son of God becomes man and comes to die the death that we deserve.
[36:02] What could display God's holiness more than the perfect righteousness of Christ never sinning living in our place succeeding where we have failed perfectly fulfilling the law of God?
[36:17] What could display the wrath of God against sin his perfect justice more clearly than the death of the Son of God on the cross in the place of sinners?
[36:30] What could display God's perfect power more than the victory of Christ over the grave? his triumph over sin and death and the devil?
[36:44] What could display God's perfect faithfulness more than every promise answered and fulfilled in Christ? What could display God's perfect mercy and grace towards sinners more clearly than this wonderful plan of redemption that all who call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved?
[37:04] See the glory of God is revealed and extended to sinners most clearly in the gospel of Jesus Christ this is why we we must keep this message central to everything we are and everything we do the gospel is the good news that although we have sinned against him God has made a way for us to be saved through the blood of his son so that we might enjoy and extol his glory forever that's the point of the gospel do you ever wonder why God saves sinners why does God save sinners why would God who is infinitely totally completely perfect does not need a thing does not need anybody why would he work all of this up why why put this plan into place and create a world create people knowing full well we would rebel and sin against him why would he send his own son to die in the place of rebels and sinners why go through all why create anything at all why not just snap his finger and bring us straight to him why go through all this trouble have you ever asked those questions
[38:33] I'll tell you what your answer to questions like those they say more about you and your theology than just about any question I could ask because your answer tells us where the telescope is pointed it's like when you have a child you remember having children that were young and you say something and they just keep asking why get in the car we're going to the store why because we need to get groceries why because we have to eat why because we'll be hungry if we don't eat why just get in the car I'm going to leave you some of us stop asking why when the answer gets to us we're satisfied why did God save you because he loves you absolutely that's true but why why does
[39:42] God shower his love on undeserving sinners it's because in his infinite wisdom God made a plan to create a redeemed family of worshipers from every tribe tongue and nation who would never cease to praise the glory of his name for the rest of eternity in the words of Ephesians we are saved through the gospel to the praise of his glorious grace Ephesians chapter one this is where we'll close in Ephesians Paul just just overflows with an explanation of the gospel and he spans all the way from eternity past all the way to eternity future and all throughout he is giving us why he says he chose us in him before the foundation of the world in love he predestined us for adoption as sons through
[40:52] Jesus Christ why to the praise of his glorious grace in him we have redemption forgiveness knowledge of the mystery of his will unity between heaven and earth and inheritance hope in Christ why to the praise of his glory in him we heard the word of truth we heard the gospel we believed it we were sealed with the promised holy spirit who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it why to the praise of his glory we exist the church exists the gospel exists for the glory of God for the praise of the glory of God and because of this gospel you know what our hope is it's not just to arrive in heaven and and to be free from this world it's not just to go and to live forever you know what our hope is all those who belong to him have all of eternity to plunge the depths of the glory of
[42:09] God in the gospel of Jesus Christ that's our hope as Paul says in Ephesians chapter 2 God loved us made us alive with Christ raised us with Christ seated us with Christ why so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace and kindness toward us in Christ Jesus why that he might be glorified forever these are important words church very important words I want every one of you to know these words I want to just sear the mission of this mission statement this sermon onto your heart but it cannot remain just words if it remains just nice sounding words we have missed it
[43:16] I want you to live it I want you to love the glory of God in the gospel of Jesus Christ so would you help me would you help drag help one another to keep this mission central that we might magnify his glory as we enjoy him as we equip one another as we evangelize the lost let's pray Lord there is no greater purpose than to magnify your glory and we pray that as individuals that would be the desire of our hearts God would you correct and convict where there sin where we either rob from your glory or ignore it all together would you give us eyes to see your worth and together as a church family
[44:18] Lord we we want to just make much of you that's our aim Lord you've put that desire in our hearts and we ask that you would magnify your glory here at Sea We Bay make your name known and praised and enjoyed and delighted in throughout this area and throughout the world we pray in Christ's name Amen