Word for the day by Christian Education Forum

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Worship Celebration of the Faith of the people of God

Lijo Chacko
Long Island MTC, NY

1.Praise the Lord . Praise the Lord from the heavens; praise him in the heights above....7.Praise the Lord from the earth, you great sea creatures and all ocean depths,


As we grow up in this society, we are praised for many things such as accomplishments, deeds, status. In our culture, our parents always praised us when we came home with good grades or when we finally got the dream job (doctor,  lawyer,  pharmacist, etc) that they wanted us to have. These accomplishments indeed deserve a praise!

But when we look at Psalms 148, we see the psalmist repeat the words “PRAISE THE LORD” in the poem.  They begin and end the poem with it.  However, when we dig in closer, we see that the praises are for different times in our lives, while we are in heaven and on earth. Verse 1 to 6 is us praising God for everything that He has created in Heaven. Verse 7 to 14 is praising God for everything that He has created from the smallest to the biggest things on earth.

General theme is that God deserves our complete and total praise at all times. The verses 7 to 14  looks at praise from our mortal world perspective and gives God the praise that He deserves. He is worthy of our praise, when we receive a good grade or get an incredible job opportunity or even something as simple as being able to walk and breathe (may not be simple, yet we take it for granted)  He deserves our praise for everything that is good in our lives because  He gave us that life and everything that's around it.  

Verses 1 to 6 is regarding the Heavenly praises. It says “Praise him, all his angels; praise him, all his heavenly hosts.  Praise him, sun and moon; praise him, all you shining stars.  Praise him, you highest heavens and you waters above the skies.”  psalmist here says that even in heaven, we still need to continue  to praise God for what He has done in heaven.

So from our earthly life and God willing heavenly life, we need to give all our thanks and praises to our Lord. Without Him, we would have nothing. So the next time we get that good grade, job, spouse, car etc, we should praise our Heavenly Father that gave us the abilities to achieve those goals and not think that it is on our merits.

PRAYER

Heavenly and precious Father,  we thank You, Lord,  for giving us the opportunity to praise You. Father, we know we are not worthy of everything You have done for us. Yet, You continue to shower us with Your unconditional love. We pray that we give You all the glory and praise now and forevermore. Amen.
 
THOUGHT FOR THE DAY:
Faith comes through God’s Word and through praise. Faith grows as you praise the Lord. Wesley L. Duewel

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