Atmospheric Pressure

Pastor Roger J. Roth

Ps 150

1 Praise ye the Lord. Praise God in his sanctuary: praise him in the firmament of his power.

2 Praise him for his mighty acts: praise him according to his excellent greatness.

3 Praise him with the sound of the trumpet: praise him with the psaltery and harp.

4 Praise him with the timbrel and dance: praise him with stringed instruments and organs.

5 Praise him upon the loud cymbals: praise him upon the high sounding cymbals.

6 Let every thing that hath breath praise the Lord Praise ye the Lord.

 

Gen 1:1-6

1 In the beginning God created the Heaven and the earth.

2 And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.

3 And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.

4 And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.

5 And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.

6 And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.

·        Some teach that without form and void means the Earth was an indistinguishable mess and in dire need of help.

·        Without form and void really means the Earth was in its foundational stage. There was still work to be done. (God deals in principle. He did not create the Earth with no plans for it and then think what now? He laid the foundation, then built it in His time, His way. When He let you into His kingdom, He laid the foundation of Salvation according to the Acts 2 plan and then began building a man/woman of God upon that principle.

·        What did God ever create that was a mess? Not one thing…until man got hold of it.

·        The first thing He did was turn on the lights.

·        Then He made a sustainable atmosphere…firmament.

·        No Earth movers, no cranes, no around the clock crews, HE JUST SPOKE!

·        The power was in His word… HE spoke; just like when He said, I will never leave you nor forsake you, I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh, the gates of hell shall not prevail against my church…

In the opening text, verse 1 and 2 tell us what to do:

1 Praise ye the Lord. Praise God in his sanctuary: praise him in the firmament of his power.

2 Praise him for his mighty acts: praise him according to his excellent greatness.

·        First, we need to get to His house with two or more of His people (it would really help the cause if we quit asking the preacher and the ‘praise team’ to stir it up for us, and just brought CHURCH with us instead)

·        Then, we have to admit He has done and is doing amazing and mighty acts.

·        Then we have to recognize the atmosphere – the firmament – of His power.

·        Then, we recognize His greatness and the rest is history, because it says to pick up anything we can get our hands on and let her rip…Just praise Him like you have lost your mind!

·        All of a sudden, we will be in the firmament or the sustainable atmosphere of His power, where He can do great and wonderful things.

 

Ps 149:4-9

4 For the Lord taketh pleasure in his people: he will beautify the meek with salvation.

5 Let the saints be joyful in glory: let them sing aloud upon their beds.

6 Let the high praises of God be in their mouth, and a twoedged sword in their hand;

7 To execute vengeance upon the heathen, and punishments upon the people;

8 To bind their kings with chains, and their nobles with fetters of iron;

9 To execute upon them the judgment written: this honour have all his saints. Praise ye the Lord.

·        The high praise of God coming from a child of His becomes that child’s greatest weapon, a two-edged sword that gets your enemy coming and going.

·        With that ‘in hand’ you can defeat ALL of the accusers vicious, and even not so vicious, onslaughts. Just what does execute vengeance, punishments upon the people, bind their kings and nobles sound like to you?

·        Sounds to me like once we learn the value of high praise in any situation, we enter into the POWER of or the ATMOSPHERE of His presence, and when God steps into the room because our unfettered praise invited Him, all bets are off.

If you think even for a moment that 120 people just happened to be in an upper room 2,000 years ago and just out of the blue there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, you are dead wrong. They had to get in the atmosphere of faith, the atmosphere of desire, the atmosphere of “I’m not leaving until I get what God has for me”…the firmament of His power.

·        They knew where the room was and they knew what they were supposed to do when they got there.

·        More than 500 were aware and were likely invited, but only 120 showed up

·        Maybe it took seven days for them to get serious, maybe it took them that long because He wanted them to know it was worth the wait, or to show them He would come in His time not theirs.

Here is what I would do for you if I could.  Here is what I want to hold on to for the rest of my days.

Eph 1:17-19

17 That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him:

18 The eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that ye may know what is the hope of his calling, and what the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints,

19 And what is the exceeding greatness of his power to usward who believe, according to the working of his mighty power,

The biblical principle of ‘knowing’ is that of having an intimate relationship; a deep experiential knowledge of a thing, not just hearsay or even eyewitness, but having touched it yourself.  That you may KNOW what is the hope of His calling, the riches of the glory of His inheritance, the exceeding greatness of His power.  And, you don’t get that outside the firmament or sustainable life giving atmosphere of HIS power.

You just need to understand that God did not come to hurt you, He came to take your sin away.

He did not come to condemn you for your sin, He came to take your place in judgment.

He also came to demonstrate what victorious living was really all about.

Diamonds are the rarest of gems on Earth. They are created deep in the core of the Earth by intense heat and pressure, where carbon, which is otherwise common and mainly useless, is transformed into something extremely valuable and beautiful that people are willing to go to extremes to take possession of.

If they did not suffer the heat and pressure they would never be more than a lump of coal; if they are in the wrong atmosphere, nothing good can ever come from it.

When we get in the atmosphere of His power, walls come down and faith goes up.