Continual Praise
“I will bless the LORD at all times. His praise shall continually be in my mouth.” Psalm 34:1
There are times when I praise the LORD really well. There are times when I am truly thankful for something God has done or provided for me and I express my thankfulness to Him via praise. But unfortunately, there are also times when I don’t praise Him very well. While I wish it weren’t true of me, I must say I struggle to have praise “continually be in my mouth.”
I am convinced our church culture does not understand “praise.” We have time set aside for it in our services. We do this activity called “worship” but I wonder if we really grasp what praise is to be in our life.
If I am to imitate King David as he writes Psalm 34, then I need to learn about praise. David says “I will bless the LORD at all times” and his praise of his King will “continually be in my mouth.” There were plenty of praise offerings done in ancient Israel and especially upon completion of the temple. We see this again in Acts when the young church was singing praises. However, I still have to wonder if praise/worship is to be more than a 20 minute time of congregational singing. I wonder if we are missing out on some of the bounties the LORD has for us when we neglect to see praise in a bigger light.
It would seem praise is to be a way of life, something more than just what I do, but rather what I am as a follower of Christ. Praise is to be how I think, how I act and how I speak.
In verse 2 of Psalm 34, David says his boast will be in the LORD. David would have been a fine candidate to boast about his accomplishments, but instead he “boasts in the LORD.”
These verses have been a challenge to me as I need to rearrange my thinking to reflect Him in all things, at all times. This is easy to do when I am having a good day, but quite another exercise altogether when life circumstances have taken a turn for the worst.
The task before me, before all of us, is to better understand praise. We must see it, not just as a thing I do but something I am living. I need to be a life of praise.
Blessings my Friends!
Jeff Millslagle