FERVOR IN PRAISE

November 8

FERVOR IN PRAISE

Psalms 34:3 O magnify the LORD with me, and let us exalt his name together.

There is a time when praise and worship, verbalizing love and thankfulness to our Lord, is solely meant for personal edification, for the feeding and nurture of our relationship with him.

There is also a time when praise and worship is meant as a witness of God’s power to those who do not know Him; a conduit for them to realize that He is the never failing Rock on which we can stand steadfast and assured.

The second verse of this psalm claimed that the humble will hear and be glad when one “boasts” himself of his God. In the third verse, an invitation is extended to us to magnify and exalt the Lord with its author. To magnify, means to make greater; to exalt means to put higher. King David here invites the humble, the simple, those under his care who benefit from his blessings to come so he can share with them all the mighty acts and miracles God has done for him in delivering him from the hands of Abimelek, the king of Gath (1 Samuel 21:10-15). He wants to make sure to give the glory to God and use the event as a testimony for the humble, as if it were not for the Lord, they would have all been made prisoners.

It is good to give credit where credit is due, and the Lord is the one to be thanked for all His goodness to us. He performs His mighty acts of supply, provision and safety towards us so we acknowledge him to the world, as a testimony of his greatness. Acknowledging publicly of all the things the Lord does for us is one of the greatest form of witnessing one can do. How sad it must make Him when we either do not see, or realize all His benevolent acts towards us. How disappointed he must be when don’t thank him, but rather attribute our blessed state to ourselves or to our social environment.

Let us always put as much fervor and desperation in our thanking as we did in our asking.

“A clergyman included in his annual parochial report the item, "Nine persons lost at sea." When the congregation expressed shock & amazement, he said, "Well, eleven persons requested prayers for a safe voyage, & only two asked me to give thanks for a safe return, so I assume that the other nine were lost at sea."

1Thessalonians 5:18 In every thing give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.