“Is this not the great Babylon I have built as the royal residence, by my mighty power and for the glory of my majesty?” ~Daniel 4:30
We must be praisers of God. We are mostly praisers of people, praisers of things, praisers of ourselves, praisers of almost anything and everything but God. But we must learn to praise God. We must give him glory. We must give him honor. We must give him credit.
We must stop praising technology. We must stop praising innovation. We must stop praising politicians and platforms and parties, celebrities and athletes, preachers and churches, corporations and CEOs. We must learn to praise God.
Without him, we are sinners condemned to hell; with him, we are righteous sons and daughters of his eternal glory. Without him, we are an assembly of misfits and morons with no potential for good; with him, we are a community of heaven’s ambassadors on a mission to change the world. Without him, we are blind and lost; with him, we can see and we are saved. We must learn to praise him more and praise him better. We must give him more glory and honor.
We must stop just sitting there in our Christian assemblies, Sunday morning after Sunday morning, refusing to praise our God. Young people, old people, and everybody in between — we must learn to praise God. We must stop sitting there as spectators while others praise. We must stop the selfish and sinful practice of choosing when to praise and when not to praise according to who’s leading and what they’re leading. We must stop the arrogant practice of, even in our singing, while singing, being proud that we’re praising correctly, being proud that we’re doing it right. We must stop spending twenty minutes at a time writing down requests for prayers of physical healing and financial deliverance and start spending hours on our knees together in earnest prayers of praise and thanksgiving to the God who has already rescued us.
We were made to praise him, created to bring him glory, empowered by God’s Holy Spirit to give him honor. We were meant to turn our eyes and energies toward him, never toward ourselves. Good things happen when we praise. When we praise God, we actually feel better — physically, emotionally, spiritually — because we’re doing what we were always designed to do.
Power and wealth and wisdom and strength and honor and glory and praise. None of it belongs to us. All of it belongs to our God.
Peace,
Allan
Thanks for this reminder today, brother. As a worship leader it’s hard for me to focus on truly worshipping God when others lead me in worship because I all I can think is, “I could do a better job than this guy.”
A couple of weeks ago a gentlemen at our church took me to lunch to say he didn’t like my song leading, and to apologize for some things he had said about me to some of our other church members. He said, “I was wrong to ever say those things, and frankly, I was focused on the wrong thing.” Wow. What an example.
It reminded me that worship is not how we sing, or what we sing. Worship has nothing to do with acappella songs or instruments. It has everything to do with the heart and posture that we use to approach the throne of the Almighty. True praise to our Father is what shapes our basic outlook on life – a heart that is grateful for another day of life and a posture that is ready to serve in the Kingdom at a moments notice. That heart couldn’t care less if the person next to him were Republican or Democrat, rich or poor, old or young, clapper or non-clapper, church of Christ or Baptist. That heart just wants to shout, “Thank you, LORD!”
Thanks for the thoughts, Allan. Tell the girls I say hello, and that I miss them!
Peace
You are wound up – must have finally let CJ’s sorriness hit you.
I’m with you on the praise of technology et all – celebrate it but don’t praise it.
As to the Sunday morning stuff, I get a sense of some finger pointing. What are you doing to change it – you have a position that allows you to drive things more than a Spare like me.
Drake, Ceej is sorry; but that has nothing to do with this post. You know, you’re focusing on just one paragraph. And, yes, honestly, the whole thing probably stems from my annual Sunday-Morning-After-Tulsa-Letdown. I’m over it now; I’ve gotten it off my chest. Hopefully, the other paragraphs in this post — along with everything else I write and preach and teach — remind us of the countless reasons to spend and be spent in the praise of our Father.
Lance, thank you. We miss y’all, too.
“We would worry less if we praised more. Thanksgiving is the enemy of discontent and dissatisfaction.”
Harry A. Ironside