We Pray Wednesday: Praise in our Praying

Praise in our Praying

A couple of weeks ago, I helped a church group that went downtown in New Orleans and worked with many homeless people that were living in conditions that many of us could not imagine.  I had seen many people living in conditions that are this way before or begging for money; however, this was my first time picking them up and giving them things that would help them to better the condition that they were in or to get out of it altogether.  This prompted me to begin thanking and praising God daily in my prayer time for the many things that He has provided to me that I have begun to take for granted.  I believe that there are many of us that use our prayer time as an opportunity to ask God for things that will make our life easier instead of praising Him for the things that He has given to us already.  Many of us have heard the phrase, “What if we only had tomorrow what we were thankful for and praised God for today?”  Do we believe it?  We need to take time daily in our prayer time to praise God for the things that He has done for us.  Do we actually know what praise is and how to accomplish it?  Here are a few things to think about concerning praise.

            Psalm 34:1 says, “I will bless the LORD at all times: his praise shall continually be in my mouth.”  This verse leads to several questions that we should ask ourselves.

1.  What is praise?

The dictionary definition of praise is, “To commend; to applaud; to express approbation of personal worth or actions.”  This is how our praise should be to God when we pray to Him daily.

2.  Who is to praise God?

Psalm 150:6 says, “Let everything that hath breath praise the LORD. Praise ye the LORD.”  That means if you are breathing, you should praise God.  Now if you are no longer breathing, then you don’t have to praise Him; otherwise, we should be praising God.

3.  Who should we praise?

Again Psalm 150:6 says that we should praise the Lord.  Here is a list of things that the Bible says why He should be praised: His majesty, His glory, His excellence, His greatness, His power, His lovingkindness, His salvation, His comfort, His judgments, His counsel, His mercy, His forgiveness, His protection, His deliverance, His answer to prayer, His blessing both spiritual and material, and His daily blessings.

4.  When do we praise Him?

Again Psalm 34:1 say that we should bless Him at ALL time.  I Thessalonians 5:18 say that in everything we should give thinks,whether it seems good or bad, because it is according to His will. 

5.  Where do we praise Him?

We should praise God everywhere.  There is not a place on the earth that He is not, so we should praise him everywhere.  I believe that a good time is when we are talking directly to Him during our daily prayer time.  We should also praise Him in His house when we attend church.  The Bible say in Psalm 100:4 that we should enter into His gates with thanksgiving and into His courts with praise. 

6.  Why do we praise Him?

We should praise Him because He is worthy of our praise on a daily basis.  Too often we only praise Him when we want to praise, but He is always worthy of our praise no matter what situation we may find ourselves.