Let everything that has breath praise the Lord. (Psalm 150:6)
The glorious Book of Psalms ends on the
highest of notes. If you had to boil down
all of the 2,598 verses in the Psalms to one, this is exactly what you would
come up with. Praising the Lord should
be as easy and as natural as breathing, but it is not. Praising is not our default mode.
Don’t believe me? Well, I have never had a parishioner walk in
our red doors and say, “As I was driving to church this morning 58 cars passed
me going the other direction and not a single one swerved into my lane! Praise the Lord. And of the 19 cars going my way, none cut me
off or forced me to take evasive action.
Praise the Lord. Oh sure, there
was that one car in front of me driving really slow, but what is such a mild
inconvenience compared to so many blessings?
All in all, I just have to praise the Lord because God is good… all the
time!” No, even in this sanctuary of
praise we are more likely to hear, “Some idiot was driving so slow in front of
me I never thought I would get here on time.
There ought to be a law against…”
If you
find yourself drawn more toward the negative and critical than the positive and
affirming, you are not alone. And there
is good reason for it. From a cognitive
perspective, our brains process good and bad experiences in different
hemispheres. We are hard-wired to invest more time and
deeper thought in what has gone wrong than what has gone right. Rather than praise, human brain functioning
is actually set up to focus on the negative.
From an anthropological perspective this can be advantageous because survival
often involves urgent attention to what can go wrong. Our ability to do detailed processing of bad
things gives us an evolutionary advantage.
And from a theological perspective we might attribute this aspect of our
being to the Fall. Because our human
nature is marred by sin we are unable to dwell (either physically or
psychologically) in the blessings God has created for us.
Even the most positive among us tends to
remember negative things more strongly and in greater detail. No matter how many A’s are on your report
card it is the C that stands out. A
single rotten childhood experience has the power to eclipse fifty wonderful
memories. One hundred compliments cannot
outweigh one criticism. The friend who let you down festers even
though there are ten who stand by your side.
All the drivers in Suffolk can operate a motor vehicle proficiently, but
that one little old lady who doesn’t realize her blinker is on has the ability
to get your boxers in a bunch.
This is who we are, whether we want to
admit it or not. And while it may be an
adaptive way to look at reality, it is by no means an accurate one. We are like wealthy misers; rich beyond
measure, but living like paupers. Our
lives teem with an abundance of grace and blessing. There is an old adage holding it is better to
light a candle than to curse the darkness, and while this is true, I submit we
might just be desensitized to all the light that is always around us.
If the part of our brain in charge of
processing challenges and negative experiences is far more muscular than the
part responsible for identifying and enjoying all that is going well, perhaps
we need to train ourselves to think differently. If only there was a spiritual gym where we
could go to strengthen that part of us designed to wallow in what is going
well! – something like, oh I don’t know, perhaps a church.
If you want to develop the equivalent of a
six-pack of praise, let me offer a three work-out tips.
First, pick a manageable number – say
5. Identify five people you relate to on
a regular basis (daily, if possible). Every
day be intentional about offering each person some word of praise. Pick a second number – say 10. Offer to ten different people a word of
praise over the course of the week. This
one may require some intentional record keeping, but (as they say at the other
kind of gym) “no pain, no gain.” If you
do the math, this little exercise will require to make 45 statements of praise
over the course of each single week, but just imagine how quickly you will
develop your six-pack of praise! It
occurs to me I am asking you to begin jogging for the first time by running a
marathon. If it feels like this, take
the challenge to do this every day for the next week. It will be kind of like how Public Television
does their fundraisers. Commit yourself
to a week-long Praise-a-Thon!
And think what you will do to enhance the
self-esteem of people you love and care about.
Self-esteem is on of the most necessary and elusive aspirations we seek.
One survey determined 80% of all 3rd
grade students feel good about themselves.
This number drops to 20% by 5th grade and 5% by the time a
person is a senior in high school. Many
never recover. Studies indicate 2/3rds
of us suffer from low self-esteem. When
you offer praise, not only do you begin to change the way you see the world,
you change how others experience it as well.
Here is the second thing you can do. Freely and graciously receive praise from
others. Most of us, reared in the
dictates of modesty, are dismissive of even the most innocent compliment. Why is it when a person says, “This dinner is
delicious” the typical response is something like, “Oh, it was nothing” or “The
potatoes could have been better.” Why
not respond, “You mean a great deal to me so I am glad you enjoyed it.” Now the praise is flowing in both directions!
Years ago, after serving several months at
a new parish, I commented to a church leader that people did not engage me in
conversation about what I said in my sermons.
That had not been my experience in previous churches and I wondered what
was going on. The church leader told me
if you mentioned to the previous rector you enjoyed the day’s sermon his
typical reaction was, “What was wrong with last week’s sermon?” Can you see how praise muscles tend to
atrophy in that kind of environment?
So, be intentional about offering praise
and be welcoming of any praise coming your way… here is a third thing to
do. Make a list each day of the grace
you experience. It may be a just mental
exercise, or perhaps you will find it helpful to sit down and put it to
paper. Make sure your list of graces
contains everything that is extraordinary, but do not neglect the
ordinary. While you may not want to
delve into the minutia of every single automobile that did not hit you head on,
you will want to grow your awareness of the blessing of safety and care
surrounding you on every side.
And this is just one facet of life’s
blessings. Relationships, health, food,
shelter, a sense of meaning and purpose, the intricate way each person
contributes to the common good, beauty and art and entertainment… I could go on
and on. As I said, our lives teem with
grace and blessing. Begin to use your
list as a resource for praising God.
From what I read in the bible, God likes to hear it and, from what I
know of human nature, it will begin to influence how you experience life.
2,598 verses all pointing to one profound
truth ought to get our attention:
Let everything that has breath praise the Lord.
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