Saturday, July 12, 2008

Shout to the Lord!

Thursday morning the song "Shout to the Lord (of Hosts)" by Kevin Prosch kept going through my head. I don't even like that song. I'm not much of a shouter, not even at football games. (note this is not to be confused with the song "Shout to the Lord" by Darlene Zschech, which I really like!)

Anyway the song kept playing on my mental radio station, especially the line "it breaks the heavy yoke...when you shout to the Lord". Since I don't recall hearing that song recently anywhere, I wondered if God might be telling me something. Like maybe I should shout to the Lord. And maybe it would help me somehow if I did.

I couldn't think what to shout. I didn't want to just make noise. So I looked up "shout" in my concordance. I was surprised at how many verses there are telling us to shout for joy to the Lord. (this wasn't even an exhaustive concordance. Later I searched for the word "shout" in the NIV's website and found 59 verses with "shout" in them.)

I looked up Psalm 47 which starts out, "Clap your hands, all you nations; shout to God with cries of joy." I read it out loud. Reading the lines "For God is the King of all the earth," "God reigns over all the nations" and "He is exalted" extra loud. Not quite shouting, but getting there. Then I moved on to Psalm 66. Felt led to stand. Even got a few "woo hoos" out. Felt kind of silly--even though only the cats could hear me (besides God I mean :). But God is worth it. Because he really does reign!!

So what happened? Did any heavy yokes break off? I don't know. Some of the "fog" seemed to clear from my brain and I did feel a little more envigorated. Of course physically it got my blood flowing faster (but I had worked out earlier in the morning and that did not make me feel the same sort of envigorated.)

Since then I've done it a couple more times. It seems like I am feeling a little more hope and confidence in God. It is interesting to note that in scripture much of the references to shouting have to do with triumph over enemies. I am reminded that through Jesus we do have the ultimate victory over the enemy. Even if things seem grim at times in this life. The enemy of course doesn't want us to remember that. Maybe that's why it's so hard to get ourselves to do things that help remind us.

Psalm 100
"Shout for joy to the LORD, all the earth.
Worship the LORD with gladness;
come before him with joyful songs.
Know that the LORD is God.
It is he who made us, and we are his;
we are his people, the sheep of his pasture.
Enter his gates with thanksgiving

and his courts with praise;
give thanks to him and praise his name.
For the LORD is good and his love
endures forever;
his faithfulness continues
through all generations. "

1 comment:

  1. > Felt kind of silly--even though
    > only the cats could hear me
    > (besides God I mean :).

    I think the demons hear this as well. It is a statement of faith to them!

    You go girl! :-)

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