Praise calls us to go deep, to concentrate on He who is worthy of our praise. There is a need for focus, a time to push all other distractions aside, leaving only room for thoughts of God. Praise is intimate like the Songs of Solomon, an intense awareness of the Beloved and a knowledge of being beloved. Enveloped in Him, our praises flow forth as we enter oneness with the Father, the Christ and the Holy Spirit. He is the One to Whom our praise is due as we turn all that we are toward God, our great creator, redeemer and friend.
The Great Creator
He is the triune God who in the beginning looked over the empty darkness and said, “Let there be light.” His titles include the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. There is no start, no finish apart from His hand. He is the source of all in existence and when He had finished, He saw it was “very good”. We become distracted by powerless, lifeless, empty idols such as the Psalmist speaks of in Psa. 115 when he writes:
“The idols of the nations are silver and gold, the work of men’s hands. They have mouths, but they speak not, eyes have they but they see not, … may you be blessed of the Lord, who made heaven and earth.”
Redeemer
Jesus, the right hand of God shines throughout the scripture as the Redeemer. Job spoke prophetically when he said, “I know that my Redeemer lives. And He shall stand at last on the earth.”
Isaiah puts it this way,
“Thus says the Lord, your Redeemer, and He who formed you from the womb; I am the Lord, who makes all things, Who stretches out the heavens all alone, Who spreads abroad the earth by Myself.”
“But now says the Lord, who created you O Jacob, and He who formed you O Israel Fear not, for I have redeemed you, I have called you by your name, You are mine.”
God is the great I am. Thus He lives! He lives for us today as One who purchased us with His blood.
Friend
Solomon declared, “There is a friend that sticks closer than a brother.” Jesus also spoke of friendship when he told his disciples there was no greater love than to lay down their life for a friend. He fulfilled those words as He gave His life as a ransom. Again Jesus spoke of his friends, when in John 15, He no longer calls them servants but friends. Now, whatever His father told Him he would share with his friends. To think our creator and Redeemer calls us “friend”. Such is the One to whom our praise is due.
Triune God, Creator, Redeemer, Friend: We lift our voices in praise to You, the giver of life, and its sustainer. We see your splendour in creation, sunsets, rivers, and it reverberates through the lives of the redeemed. We who You have called “friend” set it apart as sacred.