29 But I am poor and sorrowful;
Let Your salvation, O God, set me up on high.
30 I will praise the name of God with a song,
And will magnify Him with thanksgiving.—Psalm 69:29-30
I want to imitate David here! Oh Lord, when my day is darkened and trouble surrounds me, help me, by Your Spirit, to do as the Psalmist does here:
I will praise the name of God with a song,
And will magnify Him with thanksgiving.
Praising God brings perspective and shifts our focus off of our circumstances and onto our Father in Heaven. Psalm 50 tells us that when we do this, we order our conduct aright. We put God in His rightful place…at the very center of our hearts and our lives. When we sing and give God thanksgiving, our life and our circumstances are brought into focus. Our countenances are lightened….and not only ours but those around us as well. Jesus becomes high and lifted up. Our troubles lose their sharp edges and, as a result, their ability to cut and affect us viscerally.
God is good all the time...His thoughts toward us are thoughts of peace and not of evil…to give us a future and a hope. He makes His goodness follow us and covers our missteps with mercy. May His praise then, be continually on our lips as we go through our day. By His Spirit, let us praise Him despite our own fleshly inclinations to complain. Let us purpose in our heart to praise Him especially during those times when it is the last thing that we want to do. Oh Father, our feelings are so fickle. Help us to walk with You by faith according to the promises in Your word, not according to the state of our emotions.
Raise your hands and praise the One who has been so faithful in the past, whom you know is working in the present and who will not turn aside but will complete the good work He started in you. Beloved, at that very moment we begin to praise, even the night will light about us.
But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord.—2 Corinthians 3:18
For we do not preach ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord, and ourselves your bondservants for Jesus' sake. 6 For it is the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness, who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.—2 Corinthians 4:5-6
But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellence of the power may be of God and not of us. 8 We are hard-pressed on every side, yet not crushed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; 9 persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed— 10 always carrying about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body. 11 For we who live are always delivered to death for Jesus' sake, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh. 12 So then death is working in us, but life in you.
13 And since we have the same spirit of faith, according to what is written, "I believed and therefore I spoke," we also believe and therefore speak, 14 knowing that He who raised up the Lord Jesus will also raise us up with Jesus, and will present us with you. 15 For all things are for your sakes, that grace, having spread through the many, may cause thanksgiving to abound to the glory of God.—2 Corinthians 4:7-15
