Hebrews 13:15 (ESV)
15 Through him then let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of lips that acknowledge his name.
Psalm 146:1-2 (ESV)
1 Praise the LORD! Praise the LORD, O my soul!
2 I will praise the LORD as long as I live; I will sing praises to my God while I have my being.

It may be easy to think, when we consider the self-sufficiency of God, that our adoration of Him would make no difference. Saint Augustine put it well, when he said, “God thirsts to be thirsted after.”

And yet adoration, thanksgiving and praise is not something that comes naturally to us. It is like the relationship between a parent and a child. Asking for things come naturally to a child and as a parent we want to provide what is good for them, but oh, what it means to a father to hear words of adoration and thanks from a grateful child. So it is the same for God.

In his book, “Letters to Malcolm”, C.S. Lewis provides four reasons why we can be distracted from the adoration of God. The first is inattention; getting distracted by the blur of life. The second is the wrong kind of attention, where we get focused too much on the frustrations of life. We try to analyze rather than praise. The third is greed, where instead of reflecting on what God has provided for which we should adore Him, we instead focus on getting more. Finally, the last is conceit, where we don’t understand why others can’t see the beauty of God and instead focus on how wonderful we are because we can.

I know I have been guilty of what Lewis has described. What a blessing that God has provided words of adoration, praise and thanksgiving to us in the scriptures. As we immerse ourselves in God’s Word each day, we begin to understand what the Psalmist said in the following verses.

Psalm 34:1 (ESV)
1 I will bless the LORD at all times; his praise shall continually be in my mouth.
Psalm 22:23 (ESV)
23 You who fear the LORD, praise him!
Psalm 40:3 (ESV)
3 He put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God.

The prayer of adoration is a sweet aroma to God. It’s the best way I know of to transform us from knowing about God to knowing Him. For He will draw near to us and make Himself known to us as we adore Him.

Always praying for the glory of God,
Chris McKean