Speak Out!
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Speak Out!
by Bobby Wheat
"I sought the Lord, and he answered me; he delivered me
from all my fears," (Psalm 34:4, ESV).
There are many reasons to spend time with the Psalms.
They help us express praise to God. They give
expression to feelings of despair. They draw us into
dialogue with God.
There are four words used in Psalm 34 that I am
endeavoring to make a part of my daily vocabulary as I
also try to live out the activities they express. These
four verbs occur together in the first three verses of
this Psalm, setting a tone for everything that follows.
Take a look:
I will extol the Lord at all times (verse 1). To extol
something is to lift it up high, to give it high
praise.
My soul will boast in the Lord (verse 2). Boasting,
normally thought of negatively, takes on a divine
beauty by pointing toward God. Even Paul found boasting
in the Lord to be positive (1 Corinthians 1:31).
Glorify the Lord with me (verse 3a). To glorify is to
bestow honor, praise and admiration. It is a strong
worship word, pointing to its object with the intent to
illuminate.
Let us exalt his name together (verse 3b). When a
person is raised in rank or power, he is said to be
exalted. The word also gives a quality to his position.
If you look in a dictionary, you'll notice a great deal
of overlapping in the definitions of these four words.
They belong together in our language, even as David saw
their Hebrew equivalents drawing together for a
particular purpose in his own time.
Each word describes the activity of calling attention
to something important. And what could be more
important than the activity of a loving and righteous
God?
You might take note of verse four which seems to give a
reason for David's praise. It was personal, arising out
of knowledge that God hears, answers, and supports the
person who loves and calls out to him.
Some folks go to dowdy extremes to avoid calling to
themselves attention rightly belonging to God. In the
process, they succeed in the very thing they wish to
avoid. What is required is for God's people to speak
aloud about the things that God has done/is doing for
them.
David apparently made a lot of noise in his attempts to
draw attention to God. How much noise will you make
this week as you extol, boast, glorify and exalt, all
to call attention to our great, loving, powerful God?
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