HAPPINESS BEGINS WITH PRAISE

Psalms 112:1-10 (KJV)

Praise ye the LORD. Blessed is the man that feareth the LORD, that delighteth greatly in his commandments.

His seed shall be mighty upon earth: the generation of the upright shall be blessed.

Wealth and riches shall be in his house: and his righteousness endureth for ever.

Unto the upright there ariseth light in the darkness: he is gracious, and full of compassion, and righteous.

A good man sheweth favour, and lendeth: he will guide his affairs with discretion.

Surely he shall not be moved for ever: the righteous shall be in everlasting remembrance.

He shall not be afraid of evil tidings: his heart is fixed, trusting in the LORD.

His heart is established, he shall not be afraid, until he see his desire upon his enemies.

He hath dispersed, he hath given to the poor; his righteousness endureth for ever; his horn shall be exalted with honour.

The wicked shall see it, and be grieved; he shall gnash with his teeth, and melt away: the desire of the wicked shall perish.

I thought about giving this message the title, “Hunting Happiness.”

Happiness, it seems to me, is not something a person captures through a one step process, “Do this and you will be happy.”

Happiness rather is a pursuit. It is attained through a series of steps.

It isn’t a once and for all thing either.

• • As we learn from God’s Word the things that ted to happiness, and 
• • as we put them into play in our lives, 

I think what happens is that we almost unconsciously find ourselves to be happy.

It is probably true that, if you spend all your time trying to evaluate whether or not you are happy, you won’t think you are. 

On the other hand, if you just learn the Word of God and obey it, you will be happy.

That means I can’t bring just one message to tell you how to be happy.

We have to pursue happiness together.

We are going to do that today by looking at Psalms 112.

Did you see that the word “blessed” is found in verse one and again in verse two?

• • The Hebrew word in verse one is Asher. It means to be happy.
• • The Hebrew word in verse two is Barak. It means to kneel before, to praise or to congratulate.

Taken together the two verses say that a happy person fears the Lord and keeps His commandments and, because of that, his children grow up to be well respected people.

I want to show you three things in this first verse of Psalm 112

Notice first,

I. A PRAISE

“Praise ye the Lord….”

A. It begins the Psalm

Aren’t you glad that there is such a thing as praising the Lord? 

That God allows us 

• • to have fellowship with Him, 
• • to bring our requests to Him in prayer
• • to worship Him and
• • to give praise to Him

Is such a blessing to the soul o the Christian.

• • He is not far off
• • He is not aloof

God is very present. 

The Bible assures us that He enjoys our companionship.

Our God, the Bible says, inhabits praise.

And so

B. Praise is a common theme in the Psalms

The word praise is found: 

• • 160 times in 
• • 132 verses in the Psalms
• • 20 Psalms contain the word praise in the first verse

The Psalms were mostly written by King David. 

He was a man who knew the value of praise. 

Mind you, it was not that David’s life was all easy and soft.

David didn’t praise the Lord just because God had made it so everything went his way.

God did anoint him to be king of Israel, but I guarantee you, his life would have had much less stress if God had allowed him to tend to a few sheep all his life.

But the Psalms are not only written by David. 

Some of the musicians of the Temple wrote Psalms and maybe even Solomon had his hand is one or two of them.

Praising the Lord is something every one of us ought to learn to do.

That said may I suggest to you that,

C. It is a good way to begin our days

Just as twenty of the Psalms begin with praising the Lord, it would get us a long way down the road to happiness if we trained ourselves to begin every morning by first praising the Lord.

And then,

D. It is a good way to characterize our lives

There was a contemporary of David named Nabal. The Bible says he was churlish. That means:

• • Rude
• • Impolite
• • Ill tempered
• • Bad mannered

I don’t need to go into the whole story of the man right now but the Bible says Nabal died when his heart turned stone cold.

Contrast that with David who probably died at just about 70 years old with this testimony, Psalms 37:25 (KJV)

I have been young, and now am old; yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging bread.

I’m just telling you, you will be a much happier person all your life if you train yourself to praise the Lord and be thankful to God.

Notice secondly,

II. A FEAR

Blessed is the man that feareth the Lord…

The first question that comes to mind is

A. Happy and fearful?

I have been a Christian long enough now that it would not be difficult for me to pass over something like this without thinking too much about it.

I know that the Bible says, Psalms 111:10 (KJV)

The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom: a good understanding have all they that do his commandments: his praise endureth for ever.

So I could easily assume everyone knows that fearing God and being happy can mesh together.

However I have been a pastor long enough to know that not everybody – even those who say they are Christians get it.

They see fear as a negative thing.

• • They think to have fear is to have weakness
• • They think anything who makes us afraid is bad

Fear is not always negative. In fact,

B. Fear is a survival feature

Similar to pain. 

None of us like pain, but we would like no pain less.

• • If there were no pain would we not know we were being burnt by having our hand on a hot stove.
• • If there were no pain we would not realize we were being frostbitten in the freezing winter

Fear is what keeps a person from crossing the line and doing something so stupidly dangerous they are sure to die from it.

I am afraid of jumping out of a plane; even with a parachute.

And because I have that fear, I will never die having my parachute fail to open.

I am afraid of getting t-boned in an intersection.

And because I am afraid of that, I stop at red lights.

I am afraid of drowning in a boating accident.

And because I am afraid, I wear a life jacket to protect myself.

When I was an ironworker I worked in very high places with very little material under my feet.

To be honest, I was afraid all of the time.

• • Every day
• • All day

It didn’t prevent me from doing my job, but it did help me keep my eyes on my surroundings.

I wanted to make sure my feet had something to land on whenever I stepped.

Whenever I would get around other ironworkers, they would all talk about their accidents and near misses; the times they fell or almost fell.

There were, of course, uncontrollable accidents when I guy was knocked off the iron by something moving around him.

But most of the time when a man fell, it was because he forgot to look where he was walking.

He got so used to being up there that he stepped into mid air.

It is a healthy thing to be afraid.

And then

C. Fear motivates obedience

It works.

You’ve seen your child, haven’t you, ignore something to tell them to do until there is that something different in your voice, or that something different in your hand that lets them know this thing is serious.

Fear may not be the very best reason to obey a command, but it is certainly one of the first reasons anyone obeys.

That brings us to notice finally,

III. A DELIGHT

…that delighteth greatly in his commandments.

A. Notice the adjective, greatly

Websters 1828 defines this adjective as

• • Nobly
• • Illustriously
• • Generously
• • Magnanimously even
• • Bravely

The happy man doesn’t just obey God’s commandments; he enjoys them

The happy man doesn’t just enjoy God’s commandments; he thrives on them.

Greatly -

1. Not a little, a lot

Greatly

2. Not complacent, passionate

Greatly

3. Not passive, aggressive

Can you see how a person who doesn’t love God’s commandments might get irritated hanging around someone who delights greatly in His commandments?

• • He would think it was strange wouldn’t he?
• • He would think that sort of Christian was overzealous wouldn’t he?

Since we are talking about commandments

• • He would think he was a legalist, wouldn’t he?

And that brings me to my final point,

B. Notice what we are to delight in

His commandments

1. Not man’s, God’s

I grant you that there is something called a religious zealot who is: 

• • wrong, 
• • off base and very probably 
• • lost

Religion is all about coming up with rules and duties and making people conform to them. 

It is wicked and to be condemned, even if it happens in a Baptist Church.

But please, be careful not to dismiss the commandments of God just because you don’t want to be guilty of legalism.

Learn God’s Word – and greatly delight in doing what He teaches.

Because, after all, 

2. They are commandments, not suggestions

• • Do you have to obey them? 

No.

• • Will God force you to conform to them? 

No.

But we are talking about the pursuit of happiness.

And God says blessed, happy, are those “…that fear the Lord that delighteth greatly in His commandments.”