Tuesday: Praise the LORD, O My Soul

Theme: What We Learn about Worship

In this week’s lessons from Psalm 146, we learn more about worship and the God who is the subject and object of our praise.

Scripture: Psalm 146:1-10

Roy Clements, the pastor of Eden Baptist Church, Cambridge, England, has a sermon on these last psalms in which he observes that there are three words that are understood in every language on earth: Amen, Hallelujah, and Coca Cola.1 Amen we know, and Coca Cola we know. But these psalms all begin and end with hallelujah. What does hallelujah mean? 

Our culture has trivialized this word, as it has so many other biblical terms. Not long ago I was given an ad for Nicorette gum, which is supposed to be effective for those who want to stop smoking. It showed a package of the gum bursting through majestic clouds while the sun shone through like an end-time theophany. The copy read: “Nicorette gum is now available full strength without a prescription. Hallelujah!” Well, defeat of an entrenched habit like smoking may be a cause for rejoicing. But it is a trivialization of hallelujah to use it to celebrate the appearance of a gum. 

Hallelujah is a compound word made up of two Hebrew words: hallel (an imperative verb meaning “praise”) and jah (a contraction of the name for God, Jehovah). So hallelujah means "Praise the LORD (or Jehovah).” Hallelujah was often used as a liturgical response in Jewish worship, much as we might also use it. The leader would say something like, “The Lord is good; his love endures forever.” The people would respond, "Hallelujah." 

Yet, as Clements points out, the person who composed these last psalms of the Psalter 

is not content that the congregation of God's people should just repeat this great word of praise, Alleluia, as some trite jingle. Still less, does he use Alleluia as a mantra to be chanted like a Hare Krishna in order to artificially work up some state of spiritual ecstasy. He sets these Alleluias as parentheses, enclosing songs which are very rich in theological content. In fact, you could regard “Alleluia” in each case as a kind of liturgical alarm signal to the sluggish in the congregation. Alleluia, you've got to be alert, you've got to wake up, there's business in hand, praising the Lord.2

This implies a number of important things about worship. 

1. Worship is work. A Lutheran woman named Marva J. Dawn has written a book about worship that I have found particularly helpful, called Reaching out without Dumbing Down. As the title suggests, she is concerned about the dumbing down of worship in the same way Western culture is dumbing down just about everything. We live in an entertainment culture where everything is supposed to be fun, effortless and easy. So Christians who come to church on Sunday expect the same environment. “If it's worth doing at all, it must be easy," we suppose. Dawn says that ours is a lazy Christianity and that the church's problem is not wrath but sloth.3 We need to discover the truth that praising God is not something we can do in an apathetic passive state.

2. Worship must engage our minds. If worship is praising God for who he is, then we must know who he is, and that means understanding and thinking about God's attributes. This is what John Stott writes about in Your Mind Matters.4 He recalls how the psalms set the worship of God in the context of teaching about him and suggests that if we are not reflecting on what God is like and has done, we are not really worshiping. 

1Roy Clements, Songs of Experience: Midnight & Dawn through the Eyes of the Psalmists (Fearn, Scotland: Christian Focus, 1993), p. 186. 

2Ibid. 

3Marva J. Dawn, Reaching Out without Dumbing Down: A Theology of Worship for the Turn-of-the-Century Culture (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1995), p. 12. 

4John R. W. Stott, Your Mind Matters: The Place of the Mind in the Christian Life (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 1972), pp. 29-33. 

Study Questions: 

  1. What two words make up “hallelujah”? What do these two words mean? 
  2. How was the word hallelujah used in Jewish worship? How was it used by the psalmist? What two things does this use imply about worship? 
  3. How has our entertainment culture affected worship? What do we need to do to counter and correct that problem?

Reflection: How can worship be done in a slothful manner? How should worship be work? 

Key Point: If worship is praising God for who he is, then we must know who he is and that means understanding and thinking about God's attributes.

For Further Study: For another look at worship, download and listen for free to Philip Ryken’s message, “Giving Praise to God.” (Discount will be applied at checkout.)

 

Think and Act Biblically from James Boice is a devotional of the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals. It is supported only by its readers and gracious Christians like you. Please prayerfully consider supporting Think and Act Biblically and the mission of the Alliance.