You can worship silently in your heart and say nothing, but you can't praise silently. Dr. Tony Evans says praise is the outward expression of our worship.
It is saying, I want you to know publicly how I feel privately. This is the alternative broadcast featuring the timeless biblical teachings from the archives of Dr. Tony Evans. In a world that celebrates fame and greatness, even believers can find themselves idolizing things that inevitably fade. In today's message, Dr. Evans reminds us that there's only one whose majesty remains unchanged and who is deserving of our continued praise, in times that we feel it and in times that we don't.
Let's listen in as he lays it all out. Praise means to give adoration, to boast, to express superlatives with regard to something or someone. When we praise, we're extolling, we are advertising, we are promoting the goodness and the greatness of this person or this thing that we adore and adorn with our expressions. Praise is worship expressed. You can worship silently in your heart, but you can't praise silently. Praise is the expression of worship.
It is saying, I want you to know publicly how I feel privately. I want you to hear me talk about it, speak about it, sing about it, advertise about it, brag about it, declare about it, because it's so good and so much, I just can't keep it to myself. Praise is worship that is expressed. It is the visible and vocal declaration of the value of who God is, what God has done, and what we are trusting him to do. And because we know who he is, we got to talk about it. Because of what he's already done, I can't keep it to myself. And because of the uncertainty of tomorrow and the needs I know that are yet to be addressed, I still have to talk about him because I need him to go in front of me, do some stuff, so when I arrive there, it's already been taken care of.
Praise is the visible and verbal expression of the value of who God is for what he has done and for what we are trusting him to do. We all have an address. We can give the address of where we live. We can say, I live on this number, on this street, and that is my home.
That's where I live. God has an address because according to Psalm chapter 22 verse 3, it says the Lord dwells in the praises of his people. So if you want to know where you can locate God, it's at a street called praise. And if you want to visit him, you got to hang out in the environment of praise because that is where he dwells in the midst of his people. I call it kingdom praise because Psalm 146 puts it this way. The psalmist and the psalms are where we find the most concentrated expressions of praise.
Psalm 145 rather says this. It says, I will extol you, my God, O King. I will bless your name forever and ever. Every day I will bless you. And I will praise your name forever and ever. Great is the Lord and highly to be praised.
And his greatness is unsociable. But Psalm 145 continues by making it a kingdom issue because he says in verse 12 to make known to the sons of men your mighty acts and the glory of the majesty of your kingdom. Your kingdom is an everlasting kingdom and your dominion endures throughout all generations. He calls him a king who runs a kingdom and he says and you ought to be praised. He said not only says that you ought to be praised, he says you ought to be praised every day. That there should not be one day out of 365 that you don't get praised. So that means he's not talking about Sunday in church if you're doing it every day. In other words, praise is supposed to be a lifestyle and not an event.
It's not a place you go. It's an attitude that you possess. Limited praise means you possess a limited relationship. If praise only comes now and then or in church on Sunday, it's because you got a now and then relationship. Because people who know their God make praise a lifestyle.
They make praise a way of being. So there is a expectation of praise, there is a request of praise, and then there is a requirement of praise if you want to stay connected to God on the highest possible level. Revelation chapter 4 verse 11 says you and I were created for his pleasure. Ephesians chapter 1 verse 6 says we were created for the praise of his glory, of his grace. So the reason why he wants praise was he created you for praise. So whenever you're not praising, you're not fulfilling why you were made in the first place. Now, we want people to praise us because we like the feeling of being recognized.
Well, God has given you a little bit of what he automatically deserves. And that is adoration and exclamation for who he is, what he has done, and what you and I are trusting him to do. Not because he needs it, he enjoys it. He enjoys the praises of his people. It gets him excited, it gets him juiced, it gets him amped. Not because of a need, but because of a joy and the joy of the Lord. In other words, that's why the Bible says the joy of the Lord gives you strength.
Because you're making him so juiced up at the excitement you have over him that he wants to react to it. And you'll see what I mean in just a moment. So what I'm trying to tell you today is that praise is why you're here. And therefore, the more you give, the more you are experiencing the reason for your existence.
Because now you're connecting with the one who put you here for that very purpose. How then do you praise a king? What are you going to do for the one who is the creator of the universe? He says, if you're going to praise me, then I expect, he says, for you to shout joyfully, and I expect for you to sing joyfully.
That's what the song says. So if you only show up for the sermon, you haven't praised. God says, I want you coming here for me. And if you're coming here for me, I want to hear you sing. I want to hear you mumble.
Shout joyfully to the Lord. He says, I want to hear your voices. Because you're singing to me. And I want to hear how you feel about me with the word you're singing.
I want to hear you declare it with your voice. So you haven't been to church if you haven't sung. Because God says, I'm here listening to you, how you feel about me by the songs that were written concerning me. And I'm just in here waiting to hear you sing.
Shout joyfully to the Lord. You ought to be in here, not only here, but he says he does it every day. So you know how we walk around the house singing those old school songs? You know, you walk around singing those old jams, you know, and you be having a good time singing to yourself. And he's saying, where's my song today? I ain't heard you sing about me, sing to me. You spoke about your girlfriend, you sang to God about your God friend. I ain't hear you sing about your God, sing about your Lord, sing about the one that you're depending on every day.
I should be the one, in fact, I should be the first one you're singing to because you're going to need me all day long. I can't hear you. He says shout joyfully to the Lord. He says, how else do you praise him? He says, serve the Lord with gladness. Serve the Lord with gladness. Don't be pouting when it comes to serving me. Don't be serving me with no bad attitude.
That's why when we ask you to choose a ministry, find something you're going to like. Because God don't want you to see you frowning when you serve him. He wants you smiling. Let's say you went to a restaurant and you got a waiter. What's the way the waitress is going to serve you? But they come up here and they're chewing their gum. What you want?
What you want? They take the plate and throw it down there. Hear your food, hear your food. They just throwing you any kind of service.
They say, you ought to be glad I'm here. I didn't have to be here to serve you. You wouldn't go back to that restaurant. You know why you wouldn't go back? Because you're paying your good money and you don't want bad service when you're paying for good money.
Guess what? Jesus has paid the price for your service. He's paid the price for your service on the cross. And he don't want you serving him with a bad attitude and with a complaining spirit. He says serve the Lord with gladness.
He says give thanks to him. Dr. Evans will have more on the power of praise when he returns in a moment. First though, today's message is part of a powerful series of lessons Tony presented earlier this year called Unleashing the Kingdom. This is the first time we've brought the 12 messages in this sermon series to our listeners here at the Alternative Broadcast. And we're excited to make them available to you now. In this collection, Dr. Evans takes you deep into Scripture to help you recognize that the Kingdom of God is not some irrelevant fairy tale, but rather it's real. It's here and now.
And it's waiting for you to access all it has to offer when you live life as it ought to be lived. You can receive the 12 full-length messages in this two-volume collection on either CD or digital download when you make a donation toward keeping this Bible-based teaching here on this station. We rely completely on the generous support of listeners like you to allow us to carry these messages to a world desperately in need of God. And as our way of thanking you for that support, we'll send you the Unleashing the Kingdom audio series along with an added bonus, One Kingdom Under God, a powerful paperback Dr. Evans has written that embodies the central theme of these messages. All the details are waiting for you at toneyevans.org, or you can call our Resource Center any time of the day or night at 1-800-800-3222.
That's toneyevans.org, or by phone at 1-800-800-3222. Well Dr. Evans, we'll come back with more of today's lesson after this. Arm yourself against the impending storm. The stage man said, Man, they love you out there. Why are you crying? He said, Because my master who taught me how to play, he's still seated. Everybody else is standing up, but he's seated. And if he's not satisfied, I've failed no matter how many people like me. I know we living, I know everybody here wants folk to like you, but if God ain't applauding you, if God is not saying, I heard that praise, I heard that, I saw that, I saw that service, I saw that joy, that heart.
If he not standing, you're a failure no matter how many people are applauding you for who you are or what you have done. God wants our praise, but he wants it authentically. Not just words being spoken, but a heart expressing our value of him.
And that's where he lives. And because he lives in the environment of praise, if you hang out there, you're hanging out where he hangs out. Psalm 113 is another praise song. Let me just say a word about Psalm 113. It says, Praise the Lord. Praise, O servants of the Lord. Praise the name of the Lord. Blessed be the name of the Lord. From this time forth and forever. From the rising of the sun to its setting. The name of the Lord is to be praised.
Did you see that? From getting up to laying down. He says, all your waking hours.
From the rising of the sun to the going down to the same morning to night. The name of the Lord is to be praised. He wants you to praise him as a way of living. Like you say thanks all day long. He wants a praise to be part of our role.
Part of how we operate. Why should we give him all that kind of praise? Verse 4, the Lord is high above the nations. His glory is above the heavens.
Okay. He way up there. He says, you praise him high because he is high. He says, who is like the Lord our God? The reason you only praise him like this because there's nobody else like this.
So you give him what he uniquely deserves because who is like him? Who is enthroned on high? King of the kingdom. He's in charge up high. Oh, wait a minute.
Stay with me here. I'm going to give him high praise because he's in a higher place. But in the higher place he's in, he's enthroned. That means he's sitting on a throne way up there. And I'm sending my praise way up there to where he is way up there. Sitting on a throne where he rules as a king over his kingdom. Now, why do I need to know that I need to praise him from the time I get up to the time I go to bed because there's nobody like him.
He's sitting on a throne way up there. Why should I do all that? Now I should do it because he deserves it.
I should do it because there's nobody like him. But he says, if you do it, if you get your praise on as a lifestyle and then come together as an event. Verse 6 says, who humbles himself to behold the things that are in heaven and in the earth. He raises the poor from the dust. He lifts the needy from the ashy to make them sit with princesses, with the princesses of his people. He makes the barren woman abide in the house as a joyful mother of children. Praise the Lord.
Now I don't know if you caught all that, so stick with me. He says, praise him, praise him, praise him, praise him. From morning till night, I want you to praise him. And then he says, the one who you're praising is in charge because he's in throne. But when he hears this praise, he humbles himself.
God humbles himself when the praises are going up. And he looks at the situations on earth. He looks at your pain. He looks at your problem. He looks at your finances. He looks at your health. He looks at your circumstances.
He looks at your situation. When the praises are going up, he bends down lower and humbles himself to pay attention to what your situation is. See, everybody wants God to be in their situation who don't want to give him praise. But he says, if I ever hear the praise I deserve, if I ever hear the praise I have earned, if I ever hear the praise I am warranted, I'm going to bow my knee and listen more carefully to your situation, to your need, to your poverty, to your barrenness, to your hurt, to your difficulty, and I will engage into your circumstance. Praise can address your problems. Praise can address your situations. I know you're asking me to solve it, but why don't you praise me till I solve it?
I know you're requesting a solution, and that's okay. The Bible says to ask, but why don't you stir some praise up in there so that I know you're not just using me for the moment. You're not just coming to me because you want a quick fix, but you are praising me because of who I am.
And when I know your praise is real, I'm going to get down, and I'm going to look into your situation. If you don't believe that's true, ask Paul and Silas in Acts chapter 16. Paul and Silas have been illegitimately thrown in jail. We're told it was at midnight.
Midnight is when everything is gloomy. They're in shackles, in jail, in a bad situation. But in a bad situation, it says Paul and Silas sang praises to God. When nothing was going right, they gave glory to God. And when God heard their praise, it says He shook the prison. He got rid of the shackles, and the prison door was open.
They even led the jail in the Christ, because when the praises went up, God joined them in prison. If you don't believe praise works, ask Habakkuk, because he's dealing with a depression. He's in depression. He doesn't know he can live another day. He's discouraged.
He wants to give up. But in chapter 3, verses 17 to 19, Habakkuk says, Though there's no cattle in the store, though there are no figs on the tree, and there are no grapes on the vine, I'm going to rejoice in the God of my salvation. Now, my situation has not changed.
My circumstances have not changed. But God's going to give me hind's feet, so that I can climb the mountain of my depression and get to the top of my situation, because I'm going to praise Him in the middle of my problem. If you don't believe praise works, why don't you check with Joshua, because he has to deal with walls called Jericho. Some people are walled into a problem, walled into an addiction. He says, walk around the walls one time for six days, on the seventh day, you walk around the seventh time, but when you hit that seventh time, you do a shout of praise.
I want to hear everybody's voices go up. And the Bible says, and when they did a shout of praise, the walls came tumbling down. Did you know you can praise your way out of your addiction? You can praise your way out of your depression?
You can praise your way out of your problem? He says, when I hear praise, I bow a knee to the problem, and your situation. Dr. Tony Evans, with some good news on the power of unleashing Kingdom praise.
And we'll hear from him again in just a few moments. But first, I'd like to remind you to check into getting a copy of that special resource package I talked about earlier, the entire Unleashing the Kingdom audio series, along with the One Kingdom Under God paperback from Dr. Evans. We'll send the entire collection to you as our gift in appreciation for your contribution to the alternative broadcast. Just visit tonyevans.org to make your donation and request today. That's tonyevans.org. Or call 1-800-800-3222, where members of our resource team are always ready to help.
Again, that's 1-800-800-3222. A popular declaration you may hear nowadays is, I'm living in my truth. But next time, we'll learn why people who champion that philosophy are selling themselves short and setting their lives up for failure.
Right now, though, Dr. Evans has a few important words to share with you. Salvation, redemption, and eternal life. The Bible says, by grace are you saved through faith. That is, God gives it away, but He won't let you buy it, earn it, or go to church. Or any other religious activity to try to make yourself worthy for it.
And as a result, the Bible says God gets the credit and the glory, and we don't get to share in it, which is why He demands that it's free. Not only does this grace save us, but this grace sustains us. So even if you are already a Christian but you're backslidden, grace is ready to kick in, if you will, and get you steered in the right direction once more. So would you go to God and ask Him for the free gift of grace, which He gives away when faith is exercised? You say, well, what do you mean exercising faith? I mean believing that what Jesus did, He did for you personally.
This is not just generic. It has to be personal salvation and personal restoration. So you say to the Lord, I personally receive you as my Savior, or I personally return to you as my Deliverer, and I'm looking for your gracious supply to deal with my sin and to give me your salvation. To follow up on what Dr. Evans has been sharing, and to find out more about what it means to be a real Christian, we encourage you to visit tonyevans.org and click the link at the top of the homepage that simply says, Jesus.
