1 Praise the Lord!
Praise God in His sanctuary;
Praise Him in His mighty expanse.
2 Praise Him for His mighty deeds;
Praise Him according to His excellent greatness.
3 Praise Him with trumpet sound;
Praise Him with harp and lyre.
4 Praise Him with timbrel and dancing;
Praise Him with stringed instruments and pipe.
5 Praise Him with loud cymbals;
Praise Him with resounding cymbals.
6 Let everything that has breath praise the Lord.
Praise the Lord! (Psalm 150)
I tearfully rewatched the ending to the Hollywood movie, Mr. Holland’s Opus this morning. In case, you haven’t seen it, I will reveal a few spoilers here. Glenn Holland is a high school music teacher who early in his career has aspirations to write a modern symphony, make it big in Broadway, etc. Teaching high school is just a stepping stone to fortune and glory. He and his wife have a child who turns out to be deaf, and one financial struggle after the other including providing care for the hearing impaired drags him further away from his dreams.
But along the way, he develops both a talent and a passion for mentoring teens both in and out of music. As one graduating class after the other go onto live their own lives, Mr. Holland’s “opus” ends up being the thousands of students he ends up positively impacting over his years as a public school teacher.
That leads to the final scene where hundreds of his former students gather in the gymnasium to pay tribute to him upon his retirement. It culminates in a small orchestra of alumni offering the first public performance of Mr. Holland’s unfinished symphony. It makes most film watchers cry every time.
The point I wanted to make in this comes from the lifelong contribution Glenn Holland makes. It impacts so many in such positive ways that it causes them all to offer deep, meaningful praise to him at the end of his teaching career. What merits such praise?
Have you ever done something that caused other people to praise you for it? It might have been deserved. It might have been over or undeserved as well. Some heroes go unsung while others receive an enormous amount of credit for doing next to nothing at all.
But consider God for a moment. The Bible constantly tells us that He is deserved of our praise and adoration (Psalm 96:4). And while I am not one to argue with the Bible, it is worth our time to ask the question why God is deserved of our praise.
What did Glenn Holland actually do that got a whole gymnasium full of former students to offer such tribute? First, He sacrificed. The man had His own dreams and aspirations, but he laid them all down for his wife, his son, and every student who came through his classroom. Second, He inspired. He filled each student with the idea that they were capable of far more than they believed of themselves. They left feeling like they could accomplish more than when they started. Third, He gave without condition. His goal as a schoolteacher was not to generate some sort of quid pro quo from the students. He wasn’t waiting for them to walk back through the door at the end of it all and give him a world-class retirement party. He gave out of a deep love for every student.
And that’s our God. No person has ever given so deeply or meaningfully than God. First, He sacrifices. God loved you so much that He gave you His Son, Jesus Christ. And by “gave,” we mean that He allowed His Son to die on a cross so that all might be saved from eternal death. Second, He inspires. God calls you out of the darkness of life and into His marvelous light. When you surrender your life to following Jesus, God sees you not as you are but as who you are becoming. Who you were meant to be in His perfect design. He seeks to inspire you to live according to your potential. Third, He gives unconditionally. I know you think you’ve heard it otherwise, but don’t be deceived. God’s free gift of salvation requires no good deed on your part. You do not need to do anything to earn such a gift. You need only accept it.
And THAT is worthy of ongoing and never-ending praise. He deserves recognition for the great things He has done. When you consider the wealth of what you have received from Him, consider, then, the manner in which you show your gratitude. Is it a good feeling that you keep buried down inside that no one else knows about? Or do you declare His greatness in front of others? Do you gather with others who recognize all He has done for you? Consider the psalmist’s words above: let everything that has breath praise the Lord.