Rabbi Schneider - Make the Choice to Praise God
For many of us that love the scriptures, one of our biblical heroes is the King of Israel, David, we call him in Hebrew, Dovid Melech. In fact, we have a little song that we sometimes sing, it goes like this; "Dovid Melech, Melech Yisrael, Dovid Melech, Melech Yisrael. Dovid Melech, Melech Yisrael, Dovid Melech, lai lai lai lai lai. Lai lai lai lai lai lai lai". And we continue on, but it's all about this person that we're so drawn to in the scriptures, David. And the reason that many of us are drawn to him is because, we see that he was a man, a human being just like us with strengths and weaknesses.
We see, for example, some of the sins that David committed with Bathsheba, even putting her husband in the front lines on the battlefield so he would be killed so David could take his wife. I mean, we see some real situations in David's life that make us realize he's a human being. And he fell at times in his walk with the Lord, just like we do. But we also see his greatness. And one of the things that David said that so moves my heart was what he said to the Lord. "Your gentleness has made me great". I don't know if that resonates with you, beloved one, but that so deeply impacts my heart. David was saying it wasn't his own righteousness that made him great. It wasn't anything within him that made him great. David said his greatness came from the Lord's gentleness towards him.
Even when David fell, father God never forsook him. He disciplined him, He corrected him. David had to end up suffering for his sin, but God's covenant with His son was never forsaken. God's gentleness, His faithfulness to David is what made David great. And so, today we're going to be looking at one of David's Psalms. It's one of my favorite. It's Psalm number 34, the grass Withers and the flowers fade, but beloved ones, the word of HaShem, the word of God, abides forever. We're going to go verse by verse. If you have your Bible out, you might want to turn there with me. It's such a devotional Psalm. There's such a lifting up of our spirit. There's such an encouragement in this Psalm of David.
Hear the word of God, verse number one, David says, "I will bless the Lord" and as I've taught many times on this show beloved ones, whenever we see in the Tanakh or the old Testament the letters, capital L, capital O, capital R and capital D, what is actually happening here is that the English translators are translating this all cap Lord from God's personal name, which is Yud Hei Vav Hei, as revealed to Moses in the book of Shemot, in the book of Exodus. Moses said, "Who should I say sent me"? The Lord said, "I Am that I Am". And then the Lord went further on to declare to Moses, "Your forefathers Moses, knew Me as El Shaddai. They knew me as God Almighty, but by My name," and then the Lord breathed out a breathy "Yahweh," which is composed of the Hebrew letters, Yud Hei Vav Hei. The Lord said, "They did not know me".
So Yahweh, Yud Hei Vav Hei, is God's personal covenant name that He revealed to the children of Israel. So King David here is speaking of the Lord. He's calling upon the Lord and praising Him in His personal name. He's not just addressing God with an impersonal Lord, he's actually calling Him by His name. I will bless Yahweh, is what David's actually saying here. You see, 'lord' or 'god' is a title but Yahweh is a person, God is a person. David says, "I will bless the Lord. I will bless Yahweh at all times. His praise shall continually be in my mouth". Let this not just be a hopeful inspiration for you, but make it a declaration.
You see, David was giving a declaration here. He said, "I will," notice again, "I will bless the Lord at all times, His praise shall continually be in my mouth". David was setting the course of His will. He was becoming a soldier when he said, "Every day I will bless the Lord and His praise shall continually be in my mouth". Let me tell you something beloved, that declaration is within your grasp and within my grasp because the Lord has given us a will. David didn't say, "I will bless the Lord. I will bless Yahweh when I feel like it," because if he said, "I will bless the Lord when I feel like it," it wouldn't have been continual, but he said, "His praise shall continually be in my mouth". Why could it be continual? Because it was a choice. It was a matter of the will and you and I can control our will.
I remember many years ago when I was competing as a wrestler and we had to go to wrestling practice every day. Now, I didn't always feel like going to wrestling practice because you're sweating, you're exerting all your effort. You can hardly breathe sometimes because the battle is so intense. You don't feel like going to wrestling practice but it was decision of my will is because of what I wanted to accomplish and so we're making a decision in the same way. I will bless the Lord at all times, not because I always feel like it, but it's because that's what we want for our life. It's because that's where we want to go. It's because that's what our destiny is, to be united to Him in victory. And in order to walk in victory, we have to transcend living by our feelings and we need to become solid soldiers and live by our will. I will bless the Lord at all times. His praise shall continually be in my mouth.
You see, some of you are like me. Sometimes we can wake up in the morning and we feel fresh and we feel encouraged and we don't even know why. It just feels like it's a good day today. But other times we wake up in the morning and we're still feeling sluggish. Maybe we're feeling empty. Maybe we're feeling just kind of out of it. Maybe we don't have anything within us feeling-wise that's inspiring us to bless God or to praise Him with our mouth. But you know what we do beloved? Even when we feel nothing, even when we have no emotion that is propelling us to praise Him, we have a choice still. We still have the power over our will. And so what I do is, I spend time with the Lord every morning, which I encourage all God's sons and daughters to do, to start the morning, to start the day with God, to start the day blessing HaShem, to start the day blessing Father through Yeshua. Because when you start the day like that, regardless of how you're feeling, but you do it because of a decision of your will, you set the course of your life for the rest of that day, it's called the law of firstfruits.
When you give God the first part of your day, it orders the rest of your day. So sometimes getting back to living by feeling and by choice because we have power over our will. Sometimes when I wake up in the morning, just like you, and I'm feeling blasé, I'm feeling disconnected, I'm feeling tired. Maybe even we had bad dreams the night before or we didn't get much sleep. Still, we have a choice to praise Him. So what I'll do is I'll just begin to say, "Father, thank you today". I begin to pray over my wife. "Father, thank you for the life that you've given us for the opportunity, Lord, to know you and to love you. Father for the potential that's in this day to overcome and to be transformed. Father, thank you for all the goodness that you shown us over all these years" and beloved, when we make that decision to praise Him, to bless Him, to speak forth His glory and to speak forth His wonders, all of a sudden our emotions change.
Just five minutes ago, we were feeling disconnected and we had no desire to praise Him, but because we chose to do so, because we have a will and we can choose, we begin to declare His praise. David said, "His praise shall continually be in my mouth". After doing that for five minutes, all of a sudden we feel good. All of a sudden, life comes into us. All of a sudden we have joy. All of a sudden our perspective of the day has been completely changed. Why? Because we transported ourself in the spirit by choosing, by using our will. Jesus didn't say, "Whoever feels, come". He says, "Whoever will come," and so I want to encourage you today, when we read David's words, "I will bless the Lord at all times". He's making a declaration. He's setting the course of his life. It's not whether he feels like it, he said, "I will".
You see Marines, every day they get up and they're not making a choice based upon their feeling, whether they feel like being a Marine today, but they've set their will. I am a Marine today. I'm going to get up. I'm going to do my job. I'm going to go out to battle. I'm going to be strong. They transcend their feelings by making a choice with their will. And friends, beloved ones, my mishpocha, my family, my chaverim, my friends. You have the power to choose. You can say, enough of this, enough of this lukewarmness, I'm not going to let the enemy control me any more by my emotions. I am going to set the Lord continually before me. His praise shall continually be in my mouth. I'm going to start every day, Father God with you, reading my devotional or reading some scripture and I'm going to bless you Father. I'm going to thank you for your goodness, for all that you've done for me all these years, for bringing me into a knowledge of your son. Father, I bless you today. I thank you for the day. It may not be easy, but beloved, as you continue to do this, you're going to get strong and when you get strong, you'll be happy.
Once again, and we're going to continue on. David begins, "I will bless the Lord at all times. His praise shall continually be in my mouth". Now, if we're setting our course so that His praise is continually in our mouth, you know what that means? It means we're not just going to praise Him in the morning when we're alone in our prayer closet, in the room in our home or wherever we are where we're praising Him. But it means that it's continual. So it means as you go about your day, there's going to be a natural praising God all day long. It's going to be reflective if you go to the store to buy something.
When you check out in line, you're going to say something to the checkout person, "God bless you, God loves you. Baruch HaShem, praise the Lord". His praise is going to be in your mouth all day long. People are going to know it. Your friends are going to know it. The people that you work with are going to know it. You're going to be able to say, "Praise God," out in the open, out in the public. You're not going to hide your faith because His praise shall continually be in your mouth. You're a light in the world. We should not let the fear of man stop us from continually having the praise of the Lord in our mouth. Now, I know that we need to have wisdom and I know that there's appropriate timing, but too many of us are not bringing the praise of God into the world in our lives at all. We may praise Him privately. We may open our mouth and praise Him in our congregations when we're worshiping Him and everybody is singing together, but when you think about your lifestyle five days a week, when you're out in the working world or six days a week, whatever, is your praise emanating from your life then so that people can see it?
David, he didn't walk around and he didn't compartmentalize His life so that he only praised God when he was in certain places at certain times. All of David's talk was seasoned with praise to HaShem. Baruch HaShem, bless the name. Bless the name of the Lord. People should hear that or similar phrases coming from our mouth all the time. So what if they don't understand us? So what if not everybody can receive it? Let's not let them control us. Let's not let the culture control us. Let's change the culture by being a positive force of light for HaShem, for God in the world. Let's continue on. His praise shall continually be in my mouth. I want to challenge you today. Open your mouth and praise Him and don't let the world or anybody shut you up. Your mouth should be a continual fountain of praise to God and everybody should know that you're a light in the world shining for God. Whether they accept it or reject it, they know who you are and what you stand for, that you've got a grateful heart to HaShem, to God your father.
David continues in the next verse. "My soul will make its boast in the Lord. The humble will hear it and rejoice". Now let's think about this. There's really two different concepts that we want to focus on. First David says, "My soul will make its boast in the Lord". What this means is, David's confidence in God was apparent to all. The Bible says, "Let he that boast, boast in the Lord. Let he that boast, boast that he knows me". When you're coming from the right spirit, there's nothing wrong with boasting in God, boasting about God. People see your confidence in God. People see that you're confident in yourself, in God. Sometimes we're so concerned that we need to stay humble, that the enemy is actually using that against us because we're not receiving the confidence God wants us to have in ourselves, in Him.
When you look, for example, at Jesus who is our example and our model, let me ask you a question. Was Yeshua confident in Himself? Absolutely. He was confident in Himself, beloved one, in God. Now notice that David continues this thought by saying, "The humble will hear it and rejoice". So first David is saying, "My soul will make its boast in the Lord. My soul will make its boast in the Lord. The humble will hear it and rejoice". Why would the humble rejoice when David is making his boast in the Lord? Because David's humility is giving confidence to those that are struggling, that God will help them as well. Humility has to do with dependency.
So when David says he's making his boast in the Lord, what David is saying is that he's going to make it known to people that his confidence and his strength is not in his own abilities, but in God who has become his ability. That he's depending on God and because he's depending on God, he's confident. This gives the humble confidence and comfort because the humble realize there may be an answer for me. Or if there's somebody that already knows the Lord and they're humble, it encourages them because they then can believe in the Lord in a deeper way. So if we have somebody that's really beat up in society, they've really been oppressed, they've been mistreated, they have no hope, they have no confidence. And someone that's really humble in the Lord comes to that one and starts ministering the love of God to them and starts sharing with this one that's struggling, "You know what? I was in your shoes too at one time. I was so broken. I was so needy. I was so desperate. I had no hope. And then I met the Father through Yeshua. I met Jesus and my life started changing and God started giving me victory, brought me into victory".
All the sudden then, this one that's struggling, that has a humble spirit, they're now encouraged. And so David says, the humble will hear it and rejoice. It's important to realize that when we are bringing the light of HaShem to the world, we're not doing it in a way that we're lecturing people. We're not doing it in a way, beloved ones, that they feel that we're lording ourselves over them. We're doing it as those that are just like them, but we found the Lord and He became our help and now our boast is in the Lord. This gives confidence to everybody. It doesn't feel to them like you're competing against them. Instead, it feels like you're pulling for them, that you're in a place of humility just like they are. That you've come from a place of brokenness just like they are. And when they understand that you're just like them and you found restoration and wholeness in HaShem that gives them hope. And so David says, "The humble will hear it and rejoice". David continues on and he says, "Oh, magnify the Lord with me and let us exalt His name together".
Beloved, this is Rabbi Schneider saying, I love you, today. Our testimony is so needed in this world that we're living in. It's getting darker and darker. People are committing suicide now more than ever. People need to see those that truly have a relationship with God. So let's be like David, let His praise continually be in our mouth. Let the humble hear of our love for HaShem, hear of our love for Jesus, that they can find hope for their own lives. I want to tell you, God's got big plans for you. Let's keep on putting one foot in front of the other every day and giving Him our best as we do beloved ones, God's blessings are going to continue to be poured out on you in a rich and deep way.
Some of you may or may not know that I used to pastor a congregation and was with the people that I was sheepherding every single week. It was such a blessed, rich time in my life. Beyond that, you may know that we've traveled to many far-reaching places in the earth and preached the gospel whether it's Haiti or Africa or Brazil or some of the other places that we've been to in the world gathering tens of thousands of people on the ground, preaching the gospel, many of them hearing it in a way that they understood it for the very first time. We've seen thousands and thousands of people come to the Lord in person whether it's been pastoring or whether it's been in evangelism in different parts of the earth. But the Lord gave me a prophetic dream some time ago and there were really two phases of the dream.
In the first phase of the dream I saw what I'm describing as a King David priest-like figure that was ministering to people physically on the ground where they were, like I was when I was pastoring or during my outright evangelism trips throughout the earth. Then suddenly the dream shifted, and I saw the same King David priest-like figure and he was ministering the Word of God in a brand-new cutting-edge way. I couldn't see what the way was, but then I heard a voice. And the voice said to me, "He's no longer ministering from amongst the people". And I sensed in my spirit, beloved ones, that he was reaching far more people in this cutting-edge way that was no longer on the ground, but it was through, I intuited, some type of cutting-edge technology. I believe the Lord is fulfilling that dream in my life right now. I believe that the King David priest-like figure was, in a sense, a symbol of me. And the Lord was showing me that "you used to minister more on the ground, but I'm bringing you away from that to minister in a way that's gonna reach far more people".
And beloved one, you that are watching YouTube right now, you are the fruit of that. I wanna ask you today, if you believe in the word that I'm delivering, if you believe that the Lord has sent me into the earth to bring His Word to people that need to hear it, many of whom are lost and in darkness and don't know Him, and many others like you that know the Lord but are being built up in your faith through this ministry, beloved I'm asking you to support us in this cutting-edge technology that I believe the Lord prophesied over me that He was sending me into in that dream to you that I just described. You'll be sowing into good fruit, lives will be changed, transformed, and many saved through this cutting-edge technology of YouTube and through the ministry that the Lord has opened up for me through it. Beloved, everything that we do for the Lord is gonna come back to us pressed down, good measure, running into our lap. It's the right thing to honor the Lord with our finances. It's the right thing to invest in the building of the kingdom. So I wanna ask you today, would you support me financially, and in Jesus' name, I thank you.