Praise is powerful

The other week I heard a testimony of a man with horrific injuries, having been hit by a truck at 50mph. God spoke to him about praising Him in and through the pain and trauma and praising Him for every little bit of healing as it came. This man, who was not expected to live, was eventually completely healed. Not in one dramatic moment, but over time and he attributed it to the power of praise. He listened to praise music even right through the night, and that brought healing to the nightmares and flashbacks he would have at night. His testimony really got me thinking about the power of praise.

It reminded me of the story in 2 Chronicles 20 where a huge army is coming against Judah. King Jehoshaphat calls a fast and humbles himself before God, praying “We do not know what to do but our eyes are on you” (v.12). The Lord brings a word of prophecy through Jahaziel: “Do not be afraid . . . You will not have to fight this battle . . . stand firm and see the deliverance the Lord will give you . . . go out and face them tomorrow and the Lord will be with you.” (v.15-17).

Jehoshaphat and the people respond in praise and worship instantly. They don’t wait to see the fulfilment of the prophecy before they praise God for their deliverance. What an incredible act of faith – they’re praising God while the enemy is still advancing against them, before the battle has been won.  They took God at his word and received the victory by faith. They then respond in obedience to go out to the battlefield.

Further evidence of their faith and trust in God’s deliverance is shown in verse 21:

“Jehoshaphat appointed men to sing to the Lord and to praise him for the splendour of his holiness as they went out at the head of the army”.

The worshipers were in front of the army because actually it was the praise and worship of God that was winning the battle in the heavenly places:

“As they began to sing and praise, the Lord set ambushes against the men of Ammon and Moab and Mount Seir who were invading Judah, and they were defeated.” (v.22)

What if they had decided they wouldn’t praise God until they had seen the victory? Would those ambushes have been set against their enemies? We don’t know the answer to that, but in a way we cannot often see and cannot understand, praising God is a powerful weapon in fighting spiritual battles.  Here are a few reasons to praise God:

1) Praise lifts our eyes to God and that reminds us how great and powerful He is.

“I will lift up my eyes to the hills. Where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord who made heaven and earth.” Psalm 121 v 1, 2

As we declare his greatness and meditate on it in song, our faith rises and is strengthened.

2) Praise takes our eyes off the circumstances which so easily drag us down.  

When I look at how sinful and broken I am, I despair. When I look at the things I cannot control, I feel hopeless. When I try to understand everything in order to sort it out myself, I am left crushed and helpless. When I lift my eyes and sing “How great is our God”, I remind myself of how great the One is in whom I have put my hope. He is my reason to praise.

3) Praise blesses us.  

The enjoying of God and expressing it is not simply a duty and service to Him, but something that does us good too.  When I enter into His presence in praise and delight myself in the greatness of my God, it is one of the greatest pleasures – praising Him who is truly and completely worthy of all praise. 

Hezekiah Walker’s ‘Every praise’ is one of my favourites at the moment: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UuuZMg6NVeA

I recommend turning the volume up and try dancing for joy to this one.

For those who prefer a more intellectual response, there’s a C S Lewis quote that expresses all of this much better than I’m doing on this website: http://www.cslewisinstitute.org/God_Invites_Us_to_Enjoy_Him#.VTTroxcn5lE.facebook

4) Praise brings us into the Lord’s presence.

“Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise; give thanks to him and praise his name.”  Psalm 100 v 4

God is everywhere and we can never get away from him, and yet there is also a very real variation in the experience we have of his power and presence. As we worship and praise God, it is as though in the spiritual realm, we come closer to God. It increases our awareness of the reality that was there all along – God with us. It clears our gaze to see that God is present.  It tunes us in to hear what He would say to us. It removes the barriers that block our hearts from receiving the love and grace He wants to pour in.

5) Praise changes the atmosphere.  

I found our home was more peaceful and relationships seemed more harmonious on the mornings I spent time in worship first and continued to have worship music playing through the morning routine. It’s not a magic spell to make everything rosy, but as the words of the worship songs kept bringing my heart back into a place of worship, God was able to minister to me and the family to receive His love and so be able to let that love flow between us, when our own love falls so woefully short.

Finally I want to share a beautiful song that blessed me greatly  recently – a simple, lovely song which has helped me praise God:

http://bethelmusic.com/praises-be-lifted-up-acoustic-josh-baldwin

Father, I praise You. You are worthy of all praise. Thank you for the privilege of praising You – that it is not just a duty, but a means of receiving even more of your blessing in my life.  Teach me to praise You more and more each day. Amen.

I’ve struggled for several weeks over writing this post – partly because I’ve felt that I haven’t expressed myself very well and there’s so much to say about praise that I’ve not covered.  And also because I have been falling so woefully short of truly learning this lesson myself. I’ve had a really struggly time where I’ve felt really low. I have found praising hard work and it hasn’t transported me effortlessly onto fluffy clouds of ecstasy. When I have praised, it hasn’t instantly lifted my spirits or stopped arguments in the home.

It’s a spiritual battle. The enemy doesn’t want me praising. I’ve finally felt that maybe the reason I’ve felt so much ‘opposition’ to writing this post, is because the enemy doesn’t want even one more person to be encouraged to praise God more. So here it is, rather imperfect like me, but I offer it with a prayer that God may use it to encourage you to find out more of the power and blessing of praise.

What am I supposed to be doing?

The answer to that question is something I have agonised over long and hard many times, but ever so more intensely since becoming a mum and finding a huge range of options before me. I want to share a couple of quotes that have helped me with this question recently.

The first is a quote from Heidi Baker:

“All fruitfulness flows from intimacy.”

This is something Heidi frequently says. She talks of the importance of time spent in the ‘secret place’ with the Father. She knows what she is talking about as she spends hours daily with the Lord and is seeing thousands coming to Christ and many miracles in Mozambique.

I always want the ‘quick fix’, the instant answer. Tell me what to do and I’ll do it! But there is no short cut to intimacy. It is simply developed through regular, daily investment of precious time with God.

My relationship with my husband has continued to grow, deepen and develop through our ten years of marriage. I loved him so much when I married him but I couldn’t have the same depth of relationship with him then that I have now because that has only come through sharing our lives together.  My husband expressed amazement just the other week that he is still learning new things about me! I guess that’s a life long journey and one we can have the Lord as well.

The second quote is from a sermon by Bill Johnson:

“It is the Spirit of God that takes the simple things we do and makes them supernaturally effective.”

The word ‘simple’ really jumped out at me and I realised that actually God is not asking me to do anything complicated or work out some difficult instruction. I don’t have to find the exact right thing to do and do it perfectly to be used by God.

The core thing God wants me to do is spend time with Him, deepening my relationship with him, my love for him and my knowledge of him.  And then really I just need to walk on into my life and it will be natural to share out of what I’ve received when spending time with him. 

By spending time in His presence, I will carry some of that into the way I respond to people and situations in my day.  In some ways it doesn’t matter so much what I am doing but who I’ve been with that makes the difference.

Jesus, you died to bring me into relationship with you. Help me put that relationship above running around thinking I’m doing things for you. Teach me what it means to seek you above seeking instruction, information or direction; to want to know you more than I want to know what you want me to do; to stop thinking everything has to be achieved by my effort; to stop wanting to look good in others’ eyes; to realise seeking you is the most valuable investment of my time. Amen

Linger until you have met him

Last year I was reading John 20 about Mary and the disciples coming to the empty tomb on Easter Sunday morning. As I reflected on it, God showed me how it is an allegory of Bible study. I felt it was something I should share back then but didn’t know how to.  I remembered about it today and think that the blog is the way I should share it now.

In the chapter, first Mary comes and sees the stone rolled away. Then John comes and looks in at the door of the tomb. When Peter arrives he actually goes in and sees the grave clothes.

How does this relate to Bible study?  Mary seeing the stone rolled away is like the simple immediate observations we can make when reading a Bible passage. She simply saw the stone rolled away but didn’t know what to make of it.

Then John looking in the tomb is like looking more closely at a Bible passage. Looking carefully at the words and thinking about them. John examined the tomb more closely to check that not only was the stone rolled away but that the body of Jesus was no longer there. He still did not know what this meant.

Peter going into the tomb seemed to me to be like delving more deeply into the meanings of the words and their interpretation. Peter was the one who saw that the grave clothes were lying there. He found out some more information by going deeper. But he still did not fully understand that Jesus had risen.

The next bit really blew me away. Peter and John go away again but Mary stays weeping. She then sees the angels in the tomb, one at the head and one at the foot of where Jesus lay. I felt God whisper, “The angels were there all the time. I just opened her eyes to see them.” I felt God showed me that for those who linger and long for more revelation, he opens our hearts to truths and messages He has for us in His word that cannot be found by mere intellectual study and digging. The angels were in the tomb when Peter and John went there but they were in a hurry and on a fact finding mission and so they missed out on this further revelation.

The final part of what God showed me left me weeping. Because Mary still stayed. Her heart was seeking Jesus. She did not want to go without finding him. She continued to search and long for Jesus and stayed even after the angels had spoken and it was then that Jesus himself came to her and revealed himself to her. When he said her name she knew it was him.

I felt God say “The greatest treasure is for those who truly seek Me in the scripture, whose hearts are not satisfied until they have found Me.” It is to those who seek and linger and don’t give up that I reveal myself. Then they know that they have met with Me.

Most of the time I just read the Bible in order to have ‘done’ my Bible reading for the day. How little I linger. How quickly I move on. I read for information, maybe I dig a bit deeper and read some Bible notes to get a better understanding. But am I seeking a revelation? Am I prepared to wait, to linger and to press on to seek meeting my Saviour Himself?

I want to be more like Mary and long to meet with Jesus enough to linger until I see him.

Jesus, increase my longing for you so that like Mary I seek you and don’t give up until I have met with you and heard your voice speaking to me.  Amen.

Running into his arms

John 21:7 "That disciple whom Jesus loved therefore said to Peter, "It is the Lord!" When Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he put on his outer garment, for he was stripped for work, and threw himself into the sea."

As I read this passage about Jesus appearing on the shore while the disciples were fishing, I just felt I got a glimpse of Jesus' smile and how his heart warmed at Peter's response.  As soon as he heard it was Jesus, Peter grabbed his coat and jumped in the water, abandoning his boat, nets, friends and awesome catch of fish.

This was the third time the disciples had seen Jesus since the resurrection. I guess Peter was thinking, "I don't know how long Jesus will stay with us this time. I don't know if and when I may see Jesus again. I just want to make the most of every possible moment I can spend with him."

Peter had been fishing all night without catching anything so he would have been tired, hungry and cold and yet he jumped fully clothed into the sea in his effort to be with Jesus as quickly as possible. His love for Jesus gave him an energy that overcame his tiredness, made his physical hunger less important than his spiritual hunger and burned in his heart warmer than the cold the sea could send through him.

Jesus’ heart thrilled to see Peter splashing his way messily through the water to be with him.

I have a little boy named after this same disciple who tends to wake early. We have a rule that he has to wait until 7am (“seven –oh-oh”) on his digital clock before he can come out of his room (apart from toilet trips of course!). He learnt to read the time quickly and soon grasped that “seven-oh-oh” came after 6:59am. I can be sure on any given morning that he is counting down the minutes to “seven-oh-oh”. Because of the various toilet trips and other ‘reasons’ to leave their bedrooms early from our two, I tend to get up and try to read my Bible sitting on the top stair on the landing so that I’m on the spot to police any ‘happenings’. I too keep an eye on the time, knowing my minutes of being alone are numbered. The moment the clock turns to 7:00 the cry goes up “It’s seven-oh-oh!” and he comes bursting out of his room, running, stumbling, blinking and into my lap for his morning hug.  His sister is less keen-eyed on the clock and has learnt just to wait for her brother to announce the time and comes and patiently waits her turn for the morning hug.  If I’ve not got out of bed before 7:00 then he comes and climbs on top of me, as the first essential act of every day is a hug with mummy. 

It struck me that my little Peter is a bit like Simon Peter. He wants to be with the one he loves – and the moment he can, he comes running.

In comparison, oh how reluctant I am to get out of bed to go running to Jesus’ arms. And yet he loves me more perfectly and passionately than I do my little boy. If only I could grasp the greatness of his love for me and the amazing privilege of being able to spend time with Jesus any time I want.

Jesus please forgive the feebleness of my love for you. I want to be like Peter, running to you whenever I can just to be with you. Please give me a greater revelation of your amazing love for me and set my heart on fire with love for you. Amen