Today's Devotional

August 8, 2002

Subject: What about Madonna and Bill Gates?

Matthew 5:45 - "That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust."

cliché - "When praises go up, blessings come down" 

If this cliché is true, then grace can't be.  Actually, He blessed us all before we ever uttered a single word or performed a single act of praise.  Even today, whether we know it or not, we get blessed when we aren't praising Him.   So that cliché is out the window.

It used to be that we praised God because He was simply worthy of the praise.  When did we start praising Him to receive blessings?  The reality is that if we think that's why we got our blessings, then that doesn't explain the many blessings of people who've never thought about praising God a bit.  The word itself identifies that blessings often come without regard to righteousness and likewise, hard times can do the same.  

Praise is not something we do for the benefit that we receive, but instead it is part of who we are as children of God and our new nature is one to give thanks, honor and glory to the one who is on the throne, and is the very cause of our eternal existence through His matchless grace.  When praises go up, then we're doing what we were created for -- glorifying Him.

Carlen