Psalm 99

Psalm chapter 99 is a wonderful Psalm of praise, just simply speaking about God's holiness. And before we read this Psalm, can I just tell you that holiness has gotten a bad rap. The whole idea of holiness. Because in the past, churches that emphasized holiness, and by the way, we called them holiness churches or holiness movements. There's been holiness movements that have swept through our nation in the past. And those places, those churches, were considered places where, if you wanted to be a part of that church, you had to trade in happiness for a somber, sullen attitude that was sour on life. But that's not the biblical picture of holiness. The idea behind the word, holy is of separation. And it is applied to God, foremost. Because He is completely separate from, really, everything you and I know, including all evil, all wickedness, all darkness. He is completely separate from that. He is completely other in a total class by Himself and that makes Him holy. And that's why the angels in heaven are constantly crying before His throne, Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God almighty and this Psalm speaks of the holiness of the LORD. And it says,

And again, when it says, "Let them praise your great and awesome name!..," the name of God represents His nature. All that is true about Him is in His name. It says,

This is really a fascinating statement here in verse 8 because, it's basically saying, that our God is a forgiving God, but there are also consequences for wrongdoing. Did you catch that? That's what he says there. He says, you are a forgiving God to them, but you are also an avenger of their wrongdoing. And that's one thing I got to tell you that I love about the Bible. The Bible never tries to hide from us, the reality of the failures of the people who it writes about. Abraham made some, had some failures. Isaac, failures. Jacob, lots of failures. You go on to Moses. He had some significant failures. And then you get into the kings of the land. And David... And of course, it just gets bad from there. But none of those things are kept from us. And I like that. Because it reminds me that a relationship with God is not about being perfect. It's about being forgiven. But it's also about understanding that there are some things that I do in my life and there are consequences that the Lord, just can't sweep away. Verse 9,

Three times - "...the LORD our God is holy."