It seems as though every time something goes sideways in my life (as it does in everyone’s life), my first reaction is to get anywhere from wanting to run and hide – to being upset – to getting depressed! You would never know that I did copious research a few years ago to teach a weekend-long Women’s Conference on the ‘Principle of Praise’. The Principle of Praise is an amazing way to ‘reset’. Matthew 22.37 says that we should love the Lord with all our heart, our soul and our mind. ALL of that needs to ‘reset’ – and can with praise!
In II Chronicles 20 we learn when difficulty arises that we are to ‘praise’ – the ‘battle’ is not ours, it is God’s. (v.15) Verses 21 and 22, tell us that as Judah was about to be attacked by all those ‘ites’ – Jehoshaphat did not run and hide, he did not get upset, he did not get depressed – he knew that the answer to the problem was to ‘sing to the Lord and praise Him in holy attire’. And so it was that ‘when they began to sing and praise, the Lord set an ambush against Ammon, Moab and Mount Seir’ (the ‘ites’).
I have used this ‘Principle of Praise’ to ‘reset’ at different times in my life. I’ll mention just two. As I was in labor with my second son, such pain I had never felt in my whole life – not even with my first born. I told the Lord that I didn’t know if it would ‘work’, but I was going to try to not beg and plead with Him to remove the pain, but rather I would praise Him during the pain. The discomfort was so great that the only song of praise my clouded brain could think of was ‘The Doxology’. As I felt the next contraction coming on, I began with what little strength I had left in me to sing ‘Praise God from Whom all blessings flow. Praise Him all creatures here below. Praise Him above ye heav’nly host. Praise Father, Son and Holy Ghost.” I know what you’re thinking -– is that the only ‘praise’ song you could think of? Yes, it was. And with each contraction coming on, I sang the same lines over and over again. You’re wanting to know if this ‘reset’ ‘worked’ . . .
Another time, I was so distraught concerning a relationship with a – ‘frenemy’. I had been invited to her home for lunch on this particular day, but with her strong and aggressive personality, my stomach was in knots about going – and, about how I would conduct myself. It was ‘eating me alive’! I decided to get busy and clean out a closet to take my mind off the situation. That didn’t work. Then I decided to mow the lawn. Surely, expending that amount of energy and strength would take the matter off my mind. But those were ‘resets’ that didn’t work. Finally, I remembered the ‘Principle of Praise’. I sat at my piano, opened a hymn book, and just started singing whatever hymn it opened to – and the next page, and the next page, and the next . . . Are you wondering – ‘did it work?’
Lately, I have gone through a long stretch of seemingly ‘every’ thing going sideways, up-side-down, backwards, and inside out. First of all, it may shock you, that I didn’t even think of praising God in song during any of this time. I praised Him in my ‘quiet time’ – literally all through the day – but not in song. Come to think of it, I didn’t have enough strength in my whole body to even utter a praise on pitch!
But I was reminded of another ‘reset’ – Psalm 46. This psalm was written by the Sons of Korah during a time of extreme political crisis and military siege. How could they possibly write a psalm/song including the words ‘Be still and know that I am God’ when Judah was under attack, and the brutal Assyrian army was surrounding Jerusalem? I am thinking that they had learned beyond a shadow of a doubt that God was their fortress, their strength, their answer, their peace. They had learned to praise the Almighty God in such a dire time of stress rather than ‘run and hide or become depressed’. They had learned to trust that the ‘zeal of the Lord, not them, would accomplish this’. (II Kings 19.31) They apparently had learned and knew how to ‘reset’ from David’s life expressed in Psalm 18 -– in particular verse 2 knowing that God was their ‘everything’!
It would be impossible in this space to list the availability of all and what and Who our God can be to us. But the Scripture is full of His assurance to us no matter what the need. (BTW, in case, I get so low again that I can’t even think of that ‘P’ word (PRAISE), I’m going to bookmark this writing to go back to it reminding myself that HE is truly my ALL in all!)
Now, back to the first story of my trying out the Principle of Praise in childbirth – and did it work . . . I almost could not believe it! But as soon as I felt a contraction coming on, the Doxology it was! – and the minute I started praising with that song, the pain disappeared. I could not make this up! He had allowed me to prove Him. (Malachi 3.10 doesn’t just refer to ‘finances’, but in all areas of our lives.)
And the second story I told of being invited to a very difficult ‘friend’s’ home for lunch . . . After cleaning out the closet and it’s not working to remove my anxiety – after mowing the lawn, and still no hope – it was after spending some time in the hymnal praising God that I arrived at this woman’s door, and her greeting me with, “I need to apologize to you”. She was not criticizing me – not lambasting me – not even a hint of negativity, but – “I need to apologize to you”. I couldn’t have made that up either. PRAISE is the ‘reset’ that I need to remember!!
Psalm 71.14 – “But I will hope continually and will praise You yet more and more.”