Psalm 29:1–2 (ESV) — 1 Ascribe to the Lord, O heavenly beings, ascribe to the Lord glory and strength. 2 Ascribe to the Lord the glory due his name; worship the Lord in the splendor of holiness.

There is little that leaves us less prepared to deal with life, than when we have a small God. One who is inglorious. Impotent. Wishy-washy. Grim. Uncaring or distant.

The call here is for each of us to remember God as He is, by a worship that ascribes to Him the glory that is truly and rightly His. Such worship is for our own good. For it forces us to reckon with how good and great He is – that we might not faint in the days of adversity. Worship – to remember.

And it is why when we neglect the gathered worship of the saints we injure our own souls. For spiritual truth does not remain static in the heart and mind at all times, let alone grow, without attention. Ever since the Fall, our ability to retain the great and glorious soul-renewing truths which sustain the heart and mind in trial has been rendered defective. We are like spiritual sieves in this regard. We need a steady influx of Biblical truth to maintain even basic health in Christ.

We must never forget that when it comes to spiritual health, we are much like one trying to ascend the down escalator – standing still will in fact find us going backward.

And even apart from the Fall – we must remember that as Christ is the Son (sun) – we are but moons, reflecting His glory. We do not generate it. The light we are to the World is light we reflect from being exposed to His. And without this exposure, we soon have no light to give, like the luminous hands and numerals on a watch face.

Spurgeon put it this way: “Depend upon it, there are countless holy influences which flow from the habitual maintenance of great thoughts of God, as there are incalculable mischiefs which flow from our small thoughts of him. The root of false theology is belittling God; and the essence of true divinity is greatening God, magnifying him, and enlarging our conceptions of his majesty and his glory to the utmost degree.¹

¹ C. H. Spurgeon, “A Harp of Ten Strings,” in The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit Sermons, vol. 37 (London: Passmore & Alabaster, 1891), 446.

Take the time to ascribe to the Lord the glory due His name, and to worship Him in the splendor of holiness. His ego doesn’t need it, but your soul does.