What Does Praise Mean?

He will Reward them that Praise Him

It has been said that it doesn’t matter what church you go to or what is your belief, the Gospel is always the same. Jesus said,… For all the joy that is God’s, though many will insist on their own interpretation, it is this: For the joy of the Lord is to be a gladness. For the Lord disciplines those He loves, and the God of His children will again bring justice. (Psalm 16:11 KJV)

The word which was spoken out of Jesus’ mouth has power and does not FAIL!

Consider the power of this verse. In just these few sentences, we have dealt with so many things i.e. our thoughts, feelings, and actions. And the power of this one verse taken in the context will do so much for us. It states that the Joy of the Lord is a Peace that you experience. And I am sure that most of you know that the Peace that Creator has given us (His love) does indeed make us happy in more ways than one. It makes us joyful, not because of what we see or feel but in the knowledge that He has given us this Peace.

But if we look deeper down into the verse, we find the first sub-element that is mentioned, that being Praise saying.

An interesting thing about this verse is that it states that He will reward them that praise Him. Just what does Praise mean? praise occurs when we present our appreciation to our Creator. There are different ways of praising our Creator and while I am sure that you will have heard people praise God for what He has done, also, there are plenty of ways to praise Him without even mentioning His name. We all do it and it is a way that God is truly known.

Praise saying is the means by which we present our appreciation to God not because we do so because we feel obligated but rather because it is a duty. In other words, it is a thing done to a person not because they deserve to be praised. This is a way that God is knowing Himself and the end result is that He gives back to His own self and creatures who praise Him. Praisesaying instills that feeling of giving thanks to God no matter what we may be going through because these are times when our chances to praise Him are really highest.

For anybody that says they don’t have the time to praise God, I would like to tell them that there are certain things that we should be praising God for regardless of the time. I often wonder why it is so difficult for some of us to praise Him when there are times that we don’t have any troubles? It is the little things that we do that demoralize us no matter how hard the situation may look. Praising God anyway, no matter what may look like is never easy and takes effort, but if it is little things like praising Him and telling Him how much we appreciate Him then it won’t seem like such a chore and burden.

It is very easy to complain to others when we feel sorry for ourselves but when it comes to God, we should be willing to praise Him just because our lives are in His hands. Thus, whenever we feel that we don’t have enough faith in Him or want to ask for more by praising Him, He will do exactly that and give us even more.