I will praise the name of God with a song, and will magnify Him with thanksgiving. This also shall please the LORD better than an ox or bull, which has horns and hooves. Psalms 69:30-31
How big is God? No, that’s not a trick question, it goes to the heart of our verses for today. Since it is impossible to put into words how big God really is, let’s settle for putting the answer to that question in perspective by answering a question that is answerable. Who or what is bigger than God? That one is easy, there is nothing or no one bigger than God. Period. He is the creator of all things and He upholds all things just by His word.
For the use of the word magnify here we can define it as, “To make large, to lift up, to advance, to promote.” For an antonym there are many choices to denote the opposite of magnify, but a couple of examples to get the gist would be “to decrease” or “to diminish”.
Praise and thanksgiving lift up the Lord’s name. In fact, the more time you spend praising God, the bigger He is in your life. When you are giving thanks to God, you are lifting Him up and He is magnified in your life and even in the circumstances of life, whether good or bad. But, how can the Lord be exalted in the midst of negative circumstances? Because, when He brings you through to the other side of those circumstances and you are still praising God, He gets the victory (And you get the victory as well, for your faith and spiritual strength is increased in the process!).
There are plenty of examples of those who try to diminish the Lord, not only in their life but in the lives of others as well. Pharaoh told Moses in so many words that he didn’t even know who his God was and was not about to obey him. We see how that turned out! Then, there was that giant, who thought he was so big he could taunt a little shepherd boy by diminishing his God. Oh well, the bigger they are, the harder they fall!
Hezekiah, the thirteenth king of Judah, faced a formidable enemy in Sennacherib, the king of Assyria, who had captured all of the fortified cities of Judah. He taunted the people of Judah and diminished the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob while at the same time proclaiming himself to be the great king. But Hezekiah brought this threat before the Lord and began to exalt the Lord and magnify Him. In one night, the angel of the Lord struck down one hundred and eighty-five thousand of the Assyrian army. And what about that so-called great king, Sennacherib? He got out of town straight away and went home.
So, back to our original question: How big is God? But, this time, make it personal. How big is God in my life? Do I let circumstances or people diminish who God is in my life? Are my thoughts and words in line with who the Lord has declared Himself to be, or do I let these other factors get in the way of praise and thanksgiving to the Almighty, Omnipotent God?
You will face your share of Pharaohs and Goliaths in your Christian walk, and they will always try to diminish the Lord. Sometimes, if you are walking by what you see or feel, you may even give in for a moment, but when you get back to praising, you magnify the Lord!
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