THE POWER OF PRAISE

‘Let us , then always offer Praise to God as our sacrifice through Jesus, which is the offering presented by lips that confess Him as Lord’ (Hebrews 13:15).

Introduction

Obviously hard times are inevitable in the human life. Today so many things have strong grip on our hearts. Many things troubles us – financial need, global economic crisis, joblessness, relational stress, security and terror threat, difficult circumstances, and lingering and crippling illnesses, and debilitating diseases creating deep fear and feeling of anxiety. Yet in all these overwhelming distress, the Holy Bible tells us to trust God and give praise and thanks to Him not just with request for the removal of these problems, but with thanks for strength and grace to endure (1 Thessalonians 5:16-18). We can thank God no matter what we feel or what the outcome may be, while trusting Him to see us through. We must not let anxiety conquer us. In these challenging situations, we should remember to discover the Power of Praise. Focusing on obstacles rather than God distorts our vision. Thankfully God guides us through times of turbulence (Psalm 23). The key then to dealing with difficulty lies with the One in control of all things. Yes, we might be in terrible dilemma, but through the power of the Holy Spirit, we can endure struggles with the Peace of Christ. Praise is powerful and it conquers all things! God’s beautiful design in nature is all praise – birds, flowers, sea, ocean, wind, thunder and lightning, sky, stars and sun. Similarly, everybody in life responds to praise – children, adults and aged are all created for praise. So lay aside your list of request and petition for a moment, and praise God as never before. Just lift up your hearts, voices, hands and feet in a burst of Praise to God.

 Praising the Lord

Praising the Lord means adoring, worshiping, thanking, exalting and glorifying Him. Praise seems easy, but in reality, it is not very easy in the midst of storms, troubles, trials and turmoil of our time. In theory this sounds great and fairly easy, but we know how hard it can be in practice. Problems may seem to loom so large that we cannot see to take the next step in faith. Yet sincere praise is the remedy. Praise brings down God’s presence, glory, and manifest His power – that blesses, redeems, saves, heals, and delivers (Acts 16:30-31). In fact, it raises us up in joy and faith, and keeps us connected to God’s presence. More often than not, we tend to devote our time and energies to complaints and asking God to help us with our problems and needs rather than praising and worshipping Him. Yet it is in Praise and Worship that our hearts can be lifted up to God’s presence, where we can gain new vision and heavenly perspective. There is great healing and blessing through praise. We are created for praise and worship and it is in praising God that we find ourselves most fulfilled (Isaiah 43:7; 1 Peter 2: 5, 9). God takes delight in praise and worship. So do not put it off and waste no time about it!

Ways of praising God

King David knows the power of praise. He truly expressed this in the Book of Psalms and placed a sense of urgency of it in the minds of Believers. We praise God in the way we live, the way we do things, think and the thoughts we convey (life style, words, actions, and attitudes). Our praise can be expressed in many ways:

·         Spending time in God’s presence: The author of Hebrews invites us to spend ourselves on God, pouring out prayers and hymns of adoration to Him. ‘Let us continually offer a sacrifice of praise to God’ (Hebrews 13:15).

·         Making a joyful noise: By singing joyous songs before Him with grateful hearts (Psalm 98:4; Psalm 147:1; Psalm 150). We can praise Him by words, music and gestures like raising hands and dancing.

·         Blessing the Lord at all times: By turning our hearts to Him during the day (Psalm 34:1).

·         Exulting His great Deeds: By recalling all He has done for us, and praising Him for what He is doing and for what He will continue to do (Psalm 9:1-16).

·         Dancing before the Lord: As King David did in thanksgiving (2 Samuel 6:14).

·         Crying out along with the multitudes in heaven: ‘’Holy, Holy, holy is the Lord God of Host’ (Revelation 4:8). Generally, we praise and worship the Lord with our whole being – heart, mind, spirit, soul and body.

A Beautiful Testimony to ponder upon

We never cease to marvel at the power of prayerful praise. The WORD among Us of Lent 2005 edition tells this beautiful story: Bob went into his office early, just as he had done the previous four days this week. He had worked about fifty hours a week for the past two months trying to keep up with the workload. He had a good job, enjoyed the little time he had to spend with his children, and loved his wife dearly. Yet this morning, as he sat down and faced his computer monitor, he suddenly felt very empty. ‘What am I doing here?’ he asked himself. ‘What is the purpose of my life? There’s got to be more to it than just going to work and coming home tired at the end of the day. Is this really all there is?’ On the same morning, a woman named Jill was praying about 1,200 miles away. She felt especially led by the Spirit in prayerful praise, to pray that the Lord would touch someone who was feeling empty and alone. So she spent the next ten minutes praying that the lonely would be open to God’s mercy and love. At the same time, without her knowledge, Bob broke down and began to weep. He realized that he had been pursuing things that really didn’t matter. He began to ask God to help him.[1] There are countless ‘Bobs’ in the world today that God wants to offer freedom out of the desert of loneliness and emptiness through our prayer and praise. Are we really praising God and interceding for them?

Discovering the Power and Benefits of Praise

Praise is absolutely essential to the knowledge of God and His Will. Its benefits are numerous:

ü  Praise honors, magnifies and pleases the Lord. God is worthy of our praise (Psalm 18:31; Psalm 22:3; Revelation 5:11-12). Praise is a reminder of God’s greatness and our dependence upon Him.

ü  Praise brings deliverance and healing, and dispels darkness and depression.

ü  Praise of God free us from the bondage of endless condemnation and blames

ü  Praise strengthens our sense of assurance in God, takes away anxiety and worry, and increases our faith.

ü  Praise creates joy, peace and good health and produces more divine favors. Adoration of God modifies our estimation of self. It challenges our pride and humbles us.

ü  Praise purges the body and purifies the mind, it brings about tranquility and serenity (Psalm 150:6). Physically, tension leaves us and we find new strength.

ü  When we focus on Jesus’ goodness and begin to surrender ourselves to Him in praise and worship, changes start to take place in our lives.

ü  Whenever we surrender to God in prayer and praise, he can work a miracle in us through the power and grace of the Holy Spirit.

ü  God wants to strengthen us to choose His ways and obey Him. Every time we obey His Word, ask for His help or turn to Him in worship and praise, we open ourselves to His water of life.

ü  Through praise and worship, we become firmly rooted in God by letting Him influence every dimension of our lives, our work, our family, our finances and our leisure time.

Conclusion

I conclude with the encouraging words of St. Paul to Thessalonians: ‘Be joyful always, Pray at all times, and be thankful in all circumstances. This is what God wants from you in your life in union with Christ Jesus’ (1 Thess. 5:16-18). So, worship Him with praise as you spend time in His presence today. Let us glorify and praise God through our actions, thoughts and creativity for the small miracles we see in our everyday lives. What can you praise Him for today?

Rev. Fr. Michael Adefemi Adegbola, Director, media Service Centre Kaduna, Nigeria 2013.

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[1] The WORD among Us Lent 2005 edition, p.23.

Social Networks: portals of truth and faith; new spaces for evangelization

Introduction

It is a great delight to be here today. Happy 47^th World Communications Day. Communication is indeed a binding force which holds groups together, and makes our day to day existence possible. To be human is to communicate. In our everyday experience it is an activity which creates connections, that brings about the flow of ideas, beliefs, opinions, experiences and information. It would seem pretty obvious that we need communication to for survival, cooperation, satisfy personal needs – physical, need to feel secure within ourselves, to have a good opinion of ourselves, and to feel wanted and valued, to be involved with others in relationships, to satisfy our social needs and to hold our society together in a practical sense.

Challenges of Pope’s Message to Communicators

In his message for the 47th World Communications Day with the theme "Social Networks: portals of truth and faith; new spaces for evangelization", Pope Benedict XVI urges effective and active engagement of Communication in spreading the faith. He states, ‘Social networks are the "new 'agora,' "an open public square" where "new relationships and forms of community can come into being." As such, they offer new ways for Christians to introduce the faith to others, as long as they are savvy to the medium.

In this digital environment and forum, the Pope encourages members of the social media networks to use wisely and responsibly these great gifts. ‘Social media “need the commitment of all who are conscious of the value of dialogue, reasoned debate and logical argumentation”. Social forums need to be used wisely and well, which means fostering balanced and respectful dialogue and debate, and paying special attention to “privacy, responsibility and truthfulness”. The pontiff urges mutual respect, responsibility, honest dialogue and accountability in social media networks. We are challenged through our engagement to promote, share and defend the values of our Christian faith with great conviction and commitment to counteract relativism, secularism, fundamentalism, aggressive atheism and indifference to religion.

Social Communicators and Social Responsibility in a digital environment

We are called Social Communicators because we are responsible and accountable to the society, in building and fostering development through the spread of useful information. Therefore, communication serving the society should be influenced in her crucial role by a people centred vision based on respect for human rights, respect for the sanctity, dignity and value of human life, social justice, honesty, peace, truth and sustainable development of our parish communities, dioceses and the society at large. In fact, this concept of corporate social responsibility has continued to flourish and blossom over the last few decades. Service to the society rather than profit is seen as a great priority. The challenge before us is in getting people behave and act responsibly with the view to improving the society and bettering the living standard of the people. We should not be driven primarily by the logic of profitability and capital accumulation, but to ensure that the public interest is served responsibly. Our responsibility to the society is a collective one and we need to build together healthy network of communication and social relationships to the greater glory of God.

Therefore, Christian Communication is ultimately meant to glorify God. It is a challenge to witness to God’s transforming power in all areas of human life. Effective usage and application of it will serve to facilitate integral human development, harmony, peace and progress in the modern multi-cultural, multi-religious and pluralistic world; build fraternal encounter and mutual relationships, and foster faith renewal, and a renewed challenge to create other pastoral agenda and strategies for today’s fast changing cultural patterns and pastoral circumstances, with particular context of the Catholic Church in Nigeria.

Some Benefits of Social Networking

Social networking is becoming an increasingly important method of communicating in schools and the workplaces and business. So it is good for us to be prepared for its proper usage and application in evangelization. While there are risks and disadvantage inherent in online social networking, there are also many potential benefits. Social networking can.

§  provide opportunities for new relationships as well as strengthening existing relationships. Creates connections. You can search for people, places and things. Keeping in touch with family members that live far away can become much easier through the use of online social networking. By sharing updates, photos, videos, and messages, family members can stay connected even if they live across the country—or the world.

§  Allows you to post messages, upload pictures and stories on to your own personal page where friends, family, colleagues can visit to see what is going on.

§  Some sites provide Blogs, forum, automatic links to your favorite music, artist, online games and others.

§  Some social network sites offer advertising to its subscribers for a small fee.

§  Social networks offers opportunities for prayer, meditation and sharing the Word of God.

§  Helps faithful who are isolated and reinforces their sense of real unity with the worldwide community of believers.

§   Social network facilitates sharing of religious, spiritual, biblical and liturgical resources.

§  Promotes daily meditation of gospel on face book

§  It is greatly appreciated by young people. So, on face book we can present Church activities, programs, vital information and Church views on important issues and questions. Educationally teachers can take advantage of students’ social networking abilities to create class blogs, discussion forums, videos, and more.

Effective  and active engagement of Communication in spreading the faith

 

Since religion itself is basically a communication experience between God and human being, the task before the Church is effective communication meant to ultimately glorify God. We should get more deeply involved in evangelization through the media.

·         Web presence is very important where you have variety of good news on line packed with news, articles, reflections, talks, powerful spiritual testimonies and inspiring prayers

·         prayer line for prayer request and for questions and answers of the Christian faith should be opened

·         e-ministry, e-apostolate, e-pulpit should be encouraged through blocs, U tube, chat, text messages, web radio, web television, and face book because they provide great place for interaction, exchange, connecting to people and keeping in touch with friends, and also posting photos and videos

·         The use of electronic media – radio and television should also form an important part of our evangelistic ministry. Holy mass, Church services, fellowships, biblical and catechetical programs should be packaged for radio and television broadcast;

·         CDs, VCDs, Tapes and inspiring books on sermons, life of Saints and the Catholic Social Teachings, newsletter, Bulletins, pamphlets and magazines should be made available and sold in our Bookshops and Churches.

·         The culture of reading and building family and parish Library should be developed and encouraged.

·         Seminarians and Priests should be encouraged to take courses in computer information technology

·         Do awareness courses in technology for computer appreciation and knowledge; courses on information management and communication

·         Our lay people are also faced with the challenge of active engagement, involvement, contribution and participation in public discourse on vital issues on the Holy Bible, and Church doctrines and politics. Good religious publications, motivational and inspiring books on human development, Social Teachings of the Church and Papal messages should be carefully studied and taken seriously.

 

Conclusion

The following are fundamental questions for us: Are we on social networking site? What is on our profile? How do we feel our employers, teachers, parents, and parishioners seeing what we have posted. We must evaluate our social networking accounts and postings to see whether we are giving the desired witness and testimony in this year of faith. The Pope warns: ‘In this digital environment, too, where it is easy for heated and divisive voices to be raised and where sensationalism can at times prevail, we are called to attentive discernment. In this period of dramatic technological and social change, effective evangelism needs to cultivate a variety of new types of pastoral strategies to make the Gospel relevant to the demands of the new age. We now have the power through information technology to choose a radically different path by our positive and fruitful engagement in the social media.

Rev. Fr. Michael Adefemi Adegbola, Director Media Service Centre, Kaduna Nigeria 2013