THE HAPPY DUTY OF DAILY PRAISE – Charles Spurgeon
THE HAPPY DUTY OF DAILY PRAISE
Scripture Passage: “I will extol You, my God, O King; and I will bless Your name forever and ever. Every day will I bless You; and I will praise Your name forever and ever.” Psalm 114:1, 2.
Introduction:
IF I were to put to you the question, “Do you pray?” the answer would be very quickly given by every Christian person, “Of course I do.” Suppose I then added, “And do you pray every day?” the prompt reply would be, “Yes, many times in the day. I could not live without prayer.” This is no more than I expect and I will not ask the question. But let me change the enquiry and ask, “Do you bless God every day? Is praise as certain and constant a practice with you as prayer?” I am not sure that the answer would be quite so certain, so general, or so prompt. You would have to stop a little while before you gave the reply and, I fear in some cases, when the reply did come, it would be, “I am afraid I have been negligent in praise.” Well, then, dear Friend, have you not been wrong? Should we omit praise any more than we omit prayer? And should not praise come daily and as many times in the day as prayer does? It strikes me that to fail in praise is as unjustifiable as to fail in prayer! I shall leave it with your own heart and conscience, when you have asked and answered the question, to see to it in the future that far more of the sweet frankincense of praise is mingled with your daily oblation of devotion. Praise is certainly not at all so common in family prayer as other forms of worship. We cannot, all of us, praise God in the family by joining in song, because we are not all able to raise a tune, but it would be well if we could. I agree with Matthew Henry when he says, “They that pray in the family do well; they that pray and read the Scriptures do better; but they that pray, read and sing do best of all.” There is a completeness in that kind of family worship which is much to be desired. Whether in the family or not, yet personally and privately, let us endeavor to be filled with God’s praise and with His honor all the day. Be this our resolve—“I will extol You, my God, O King; and I will bless Your name forever and ever. Every day will I bless You; and I will praise Your name forever and ever.”
I. THE RESOLVE OF PERSONAL LOYALTY
Brethren, praise cannot be a second-class business, for it is evidently due to God and that in a very high degree. A sense of justice ought to make us praise the Lord. It is the least we can do and, in some senses, it is the most that we can do in return for the multiplied benefits which He bestows upon us. What? No harvest of praise for Him who has sent the sunshine of His love and the rain of His Grace upon us? What? No revenue of praise for Him who is our gracious Lord and King! He does not exact from us any servile labor, but simply says, “Whoever offers praise glorifies Me.” Praise is good, pleasant and delightful. Let us rank it among those debts which we would not wish to forget, but are eager to pay at once. Praise is an act which is pre-eminently characteristic of the true child of God. The man who does but pretend to piety will fast twice in the week and stand in the temple and offer something like prayer. But to praise God with all the heart, this is the mark of true adoption! This is the sign and token of a heart received by Divine Grace! We lack one of the most sure evidences of pure love to God if we live without presenting praise to His ever-blessed name. Praising God is singularly beneficial to ourselves. If we had more of it, we should be greatly blessed. What could lift us so much above the trials of life; what could help us to bear the burden and heat of the day so well as songs of praise unto the Most High? The soldier marches without weariness when the band is playing uplifting strains; the sailor, as he pulls the rope or lifts the anchor, utters a cheery cry to aid his toil—let us try the animating power of hymns of praise! Nothing would oil the wheels of the chariot of life so well as more of the praising of God. Praise would end murmuring and nurse contentment. If our mouths were filled with the praises of God, there would be no room for grumbling. Praise would throw a halo of glory around the head of toil and thought! In its sunlight, the most common duties of life would be transfigured! Sanctified by prayer and praise, each duty would be raised into a hallowed worship akin to that of Heaven! It would make us more happy, more holy and more heavenly, if we would say, “I will extol You, my God, O King.”
Besides, Brothers and Sisters, unless we praise God here, are we preparing for our eternal Home? There, all is praise! How can we hope to enter there if we are strangers to that exercise? This life is a preparatory school and in it we are preparing for the high engagements of the perfected. Are you not eager to rehearse the everlasting hallelujahs?— “I would begin the music here, And so my soul should rise. Oh, for some heavenly notes to bear My passions to the skies!” Learn the essential elements of heavenly praise by the practice of joyful thanksgiving, adoring reverence and wondering love, so that, when you step into Heaven, you may take your place among the singers and say, “I have been practicing these songs for years. I have praised God while I was in a world of sin and suffering and when I was weighed down by a feeble body. And now that I am set free from earth and sin and the bondage of the flesh, I take up the same strain to sing more sweetly to the same Lord and God!”
I wish I knew how to speak so as to stir up every child of God to praise. As for you that are not His children—oh, that you were! You must be born again! You cannot praise God aright till you are. “Unto the wicked, God says, What have you to do to declare My statutes, or that you should take My Covenant in your mouth?” You can offer Him no real praise while your hearts are at enmity to Him. Be you reconciled to God by the death of His Son and then you will praise Him! Let no one that has tasted that the Lord is gracious; let no one that has ever been delivered from sin by the Atonement of Christ ever fail to pay unto the Lord his daily tribute of thanksgiving! To help us in this joyful duty of praise we will turn to our text and keep to it. May the Holy Spirit instruct us by it!
II. THE CONCLUSION OF AN INTELLIGENT APPRECIATION
In our text we have, first of all, the resolve of personal loyalty—“I will extol You, my God, O King.” David personally comes before his God and King and utters this deliberate resolution that he will praise the Divine Majesty forever. Note here, first, that he pays homage to God as his King. There is no praising God aright if we do not see Him upon the Throne, reigning with unquestioned sway. Disobedient subjects cannot praise their sovereign. You must take up the Lord’s yoke—it is easy and His burden is light. You must come and touch His silver scepter and receive His mercy—and acknowledge Him to be your rightful Monarch, Lawgiver and Ruler. Where Jesus comes, He comes to reign—where God is truly known, He is always known as supreme. Over the united kingdom of our body, soul and spirit the Lord must reign with undisputed authority. What a joy it is to have such a King! “O King,” says David, and it seems to have been a sweet morsel in his mouth. He was, himself, a king after the earthly fashion, but to him, God, alone, was King. Our King is no tyrant, no maker of cruel laws. He demands no crushing tribute or forced service! His ways are ways of pleasantness and all His paths are peace. His Laws are just and good and in the keeping of them there is great reward. Let others exult that they are their own masters—our joy is that God is our King! Let others yield to this or that passion, or desire—as for us, we find our freedom in complete subjection to our heavenly King! Let us, then, praise God by loyally accepting Him as our King. Let us repeat with exultation the hymn we just now sang— “Crown Him, crown Him, King of kings, and Lord of lords.” Let us not be satisfied that He should reign over us, alone, but let us long that the whole earth should be filled with His Glory. Be this our daily prayer—“Your Kingdom come. Your will be done, in earth as it is in Heaven.” Let this be our constant ascription of praise—“For Yours is the Kingdom, and the power, and the Glory, forever. Amen.”
III. THE PLEDGE OF DAILY REMEMBRANCE
Now Brothers and Sisters, have you been losing your own personality in the multitude? As members of a large Church, have you thought, “Things will go on very well without me”? Correct that mistake! Each individual trust has its own note to bring to God. Let Him not have to say to you, “You have bought Me no sweet cane with money, neither have you filled Me with the fat of your sacrifices.” Let us not be slow in His praise, since He has been so swift in His Grace. Once more upon this head—while David is thus loyally resolving to praise God, you will observe that he is doing it all the time. The resolution to praise can only come from the man who is already praising God. When he says, “I will extol You,” he is already extolling! We go from praise to praise. The heart resolves and so plants the seed. And then the life is affected and the harvest springs up and ripens. O Brothers and Sisters, do not let us say, “I will extol You tomorrow,” or, “I will hope to praise You when I grow old, or when I have less business on hand.” No, no! You are this day in debt! This day acknowledge your obligation. We cannot praise God too soon. Our very first breath is a gift from God and it should be spent to the Creator’s praise! The early morning hour should he dedicated to praise—do not the birds set us the example? In this matter he gives twice who gives quickly. Let your praise follow quickly upon the benefit you receive, lest even during the delay you be found guilty of ingratitude! As soon as a mercy touches our coasts, we should welcome it with acclamation. Let us copy the little chick, which, as it drinks, lifts up its head, as if to give thanks. Our thanksgiving should echo the voice of Divine loving kindness. Before the Lord our King, let us continually rejoice as we bless Him and speak well of His name.
IV. THE HOPE OF ETERNAL ADORATION
The last sentence of the text sets forth the hope of eternal adoration. David here exclaims, “And I will praise Your name forever and ever.” I am quite sure when David said that, he believed that God was unchangeable, for if God can change, how can I be sure that He will always be worthy of my praise? David knew that what God had been, He was and what He was, then, He would always be. He had not heard the sentence, “Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and today, and forever,” nor yet that other, “I am the Lord, I change not; therefore you sons of Jacob are not consumed,” but he knew the Truth of God contained in both these texts and, therefore, he said, “I will praise Your name forever and ever.” As long as God Is, He will be worthy to be praised! Another point is also clear—David believed in the immortality of the soul. He says, “I will praise Your name forever and ever.” That Truth was very dimly revealed in the Old Testament, but David knew it right well. He did not expect to sleep in oblivion, but to go on praising and, therefore, he said, “I will praise Your name forever and ever.” No cold hand fell upon him and no killing voice said to him “You shall die and never praise the Lord again.” Oh, no! He looked to live forever and ever—and praise forever and ever! Brothers and Sisters, such is our hope and we will never give it up. We feel eternal life within our souls! We challenge the cold hand of death to quench the immortal flame of our love, or to silence the ceaseless song of our praise! The dead cannot praise God and God is not the God of the dead, but of the living! Among the living we are numbered, through the Grace of God, and we know that we shall live because Jesus lives. When death shall come, it shall bring no destruction to us! Though it shall change the conditions of our existence, it shall not change the object of our existence! Our tongue may be silenced for a little while, but our spirit, unaffected by the disease of the body, shall go on praising God in its own fashion and then, by-and-by, in the resurrection, even this poor tongue shall be revived—and body, soul and spirit shall together praise the God of Resurrection and eternal Glory. “I will praise Your name forever and ever.” We shall never grow weary of this hallowed exercise forever and ever. It will always be new, fresh, delightful! In Heaven they never require any change beyond those blessed variations of song, those new melodies which make up the everlasting harmony. On and on, forever telling the tale which never will be fully told, the saints will praise the name of the Lord forever and ever! Of course, dear Friends, David’s resolve was that, as long as he was here below, he would never cease to praise God, and this is ours, also. Brethren, we may have to leave off some cherished engagements, but this we will never cease from. At a certain period of life a man may have to leave off preaching to a large congregation. Good old John Newton declared that he would never leave off preaching while he had breath in his body—and I admire his holy perseverance—but it was a pity that he did not leave off preaching at St. Mary Woolnoth, for he often wearied the people and forgot the thread of his discourse. He might have done better in another place. Ah, well, we may leave off preaching, but we shall never leave off praising! The day will come when you, my dear Friend, cannot go to Sunday school—I hope you will go as long as you can toddle there—but it may be you will not be able to interest the children—your memory will begin to fail. But even then you can go on praising the Lord! And you will. I have known old people almost forget their own names and forget their own children, but I have known them still remember their Lord and Master! I have heard of one who lay dying and his friends tried to make him remember certain things, but he shook his head. At last one said, “Do you remember the Lord Jesus?” Then the mind came into full play, the eyes brightened and the old man eloquently praised his Savior! Our last gasp shall be given to the praise of the Lord! When once we have passed through the iron gate and forded the dividing river, then we will begin to praise God in a manner more satisfactory than we can reach at present. After a nobler sort we will sing and adore. What soaring we will attempt upon the eagle wings of love! What plunges we will take into the crystal stream of praise! I think, for a while, when we first behold the Throne of God, we shall do no more than cast our crowns at the feet of Him that loved us and then bow down under a weight of speechless praise. We shall be overwhelmed with wonder and thankfulness! When we rise to our feet, again, we will join in the strain of our Brothers and Sisters redeemed by blood and only drop out of the song when again we feel overpowered with joyful adoration and are constrained, again, in holy silence to shrink to nothing before the infinite, unchanging God of Love. Oh, to be there! To be there soon! We may be much nearer than we think. I cannot tell what I shall do, but I know this, I want no other Heaven than to praise God perfectly and eternally! Is it not so with you? A heart full of praise is Heaven in the bud! Perfect praise is Heaven full-blown. Let us close this discourse by asking Grace from God that, if we have been deficient in praise, we may now mend our ways and put on the garments of holy adoration. This day and onward, may our watchword be, “Hallelujah! Praise the Lord!”