Our Praise Brings Heaven To Earth

​Our family always listens to Christian music in the car, and often at home but more in the car (we spend a lot of time going from here to there).  Sometimes it’s a CD, sometimes it’s a radio station, and sometimes it’s from our phones.  But we are always listening to it as we drive.  Very often the girls and I will have the music up LOUD!  They’re in the ​

back, seat-dancing and singing, I’m driving and singing loudly too. 
 
The music, the praise, the singing, the dancing, the foot tapping or hands drumming – it always changes the atmosphere.  If one of us was grumpy getting in to the car, the grumpiness is gone within a couple of minutes of the music being on.  It changes things.  It changes our minds, our hearts, our attitudes, and our outlook.  And it always has.
 
I never really understood why that was.  For me, I just love music – it has always spoken to me – secular or Christian, different genres for different moods etc.  Music has always been a base for me.
 
Since discovering that Christian music was actually more than the dreary old hymns sung to organ music that I heard in church as a child, I have clung to it.  I have battle music for when I’m facing something challenging and need God’s help, I have what I call Holy Spirit music that just seems to reach the depths of my spirit when I am contemplative or meditative, I have a lot of worship and praise music when I just want to sing, I have music that lifts my spirit when I’m down, etc.  Music speaks to me.
 
And now I know why that is… Now I know why the music speaks to me and to God… Now I know why the atmosphere changes with the music…
 
Isaiah 42:10-13 says: Sing to the Lord a new song, And His praise from the ends of the earth, You who go down to the sea, and all that is in it, You coastlands and you inhabitants of them! Let the wilderness and its cities lift up their voice, The villages that Kedar inhabits. Let the inhabitants of Sela sing, Let them shout from the top of the mountains. Let them give glory to the Lord, And declare His praise in the coastlands. The Lord shall go forth like a mighty man; He shall stir up His zeal like a man of war. He shall cry out, yes, shout aloud; He shall prevail against His enemies.
 
When we sing to the music, regardless of what mood we’re in or what we are facing, we are declaring praise.  We are lifting our voices up to God and stirring His heart.  He then goes forth like a mighty man.  Our praise is stirring up His zeal, and He prevails against His enemies.  And His enemies are anything and everything that keeps us from Him.  Our moods, our attitudes, our issues – those things can keep us from Him.  Yet our praise changes all that.
 
Our praise, our singing and our worshiping, takes the focus off of us and places it on God.  It meets Him where He wants to be met.  Yes, Jesus came down as the Son of Man to serve, heal and set free, and while He is still right here with us and His Spirit is very much alive within us, He is also sat at the right hand of God – His work is done. 
 
And as Christians, we need to lift our heads up to see Him.  We need to raise our voices in praise and thanksgiving, no matter what our circumstances are, and honor Him.  We honor God not because of what we need or want or where we are; we simply do it because of WHO He is. 
 
Our circumstances should fuel our praise, not deflate our praise.  No matter what we are going through, IF we truly trust in Him, we should be praising and thanking Him for all that He has done, for all that He will do and for WHO He is.
 
Something happens when we capture the Heart of God in or through a song.  We allow Him access to ourselves, to our deepest parts, to do His work.  We get out of His way. 
 
Ephesians 5:17-21 says: Therefore do not be unwise, but understand what the will of the Lord is. And do not be drunk with wine, in which is dissipation; but be filled with the Spirit, speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord, giving thanks always for all things to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, submitting to one another in the fear of God.
 
When we praise, when we sing, we make way for Holy Spirit to fill us with all of God’s goodness.  Our praise brings Heaven to earth.