Music (2)

"I will sing to the Lord as long as I live; I will sing praise to my God while I have my being."
-Psalm 104:33
      Last post I talked about music and how it is able to influence the way we feel. I only talked briefly at the end that we should use music to praise God, and today I wanted to expand on that. I also shared some of experiences I had with worship before in my blog, but I never really talked about using music to praise and glorify God. Today I want to talk about praising God using music.
      Music is used as a way to praise God in churches. In the church I attend we sing many songs in one worship service, and in almost every event we have we will sing at least one song. Why do we do this? There are many different reasons churches use songs in their services, but I think people are starting to just see it as a tradition. I wrote earlier about being complacent and how that can make us be too comfortable with where we are. Music and praise are two things that can become commonplace and make us complacent in praising God.
      If we took a moment and really thought about who God is, we should realize that He is everything. He is love, compassion, grace, mercy, powerful, awesome, true, life; He is everything. The Bible is full of places where people give praise to God, especially in the Psalms. Nobody praises someone that is weak, cruel, merciless, or unworthy. People praise those who deserve to be praised, and no one deserves more praise than the one who created us all. While God does not need our praise, He deserves all of it.
      Music is a great way to praise God because it has a way of setting our hearts right. While a Sunday message or prayer can be powerful, there's something about music that makes it even more powerful. However, even music can be half-hearted and fake. Don't let that happen when you sing praise to God. Remember who God is, and use music to increase your reverence for Him. Focus on the message and content of the song, and especially remember who it is you are singing to. God is not glorified when the music sounds good, but when our hearts praise and glorify Him. I myself am guilty of seeing music as a trivial thing rather than a way to glorify God. I hope that we all can learn to praise God with our heart, soul, and mind.
-Smart