February, 2000

It is good to praise the Lord and make music to your name, O Most High, to proclaim your love in the morning and your faithfulness at night.

We are a very selfish people. We are all searching for others to love us, appreciate us, or acknowledge our worth. We tend to place the focus on our own wants, desires, and feelings. We are even selfish when it comes to our faith. That’s why most of our prayers are almost exclusively making requests to God. Someone once said that the average Christian cannot pray for longer than 20 seconds without using some form of the word “bless” -- either asking God to bless something or to send some blessing! I don’t know if this is true, but I do know that we need to spend more time blessing God.

These two verses in Psalm 92 tell us that it is good to praise the Lord. Here the psalmist is praising God with music. There are many ways to worship. But notice that the psalmist praises at morning and at night. In the morning he proclaims God’s love, and at night he proclaims God’s faithfulness. Do you realize that God loves you and is faithful?

When we spend time praising God and thinking of his love and his faithfulness and all the ways that he cares for us, we will discover a joy in our heart. It is amazing how beneficial it is for us to reach out beyond ourselves, to stretch our faith, and lift our hearts to heaven.

We have our children take Valentine’s cards to their classmates, we give Valentine’s gifts to our family members, and we always buy a special Valentine present for our sweetheart. But what Valentine gift do we bring to God? Maybe we should spend some time telling God how much we love him. Perhaps we should be like the psalmist who proclaimed God’s love in the morning.

This year, after you have purchased all the flowers, candy, and other gifts, spend a little time to give God a Valentine’s present -- tell him how much you appreciate his love!

Dave