Praise

God is ever evolving my understanding of praise.

I have always loved to sing, I love praise & worship music.

I have often had a heart full of praise in nature, that is an easy one.

Of course, it's easy to pray praise when your prayers are answered.

Then there was a few years God would overwhelm my soul with gratefulness during worship that I actually couldn't really sing, I was too choked up and teary.  It taught me how to sing praises without actually having the ability to sing, or to sing well that is.

I have attended Churches where it is common to see people raise their hands during worship but until about 4 years ago I wasn't sure when and if I should do it myself. Then at a retreat they talked about kneeling during worship and that was another element I was even more uncomfortable with. They said if you feel God moving you to move, then you should just do it.  Later during that retreat, during a time of worship, I felt led to kneel, not just start with a little hand raise, no I was pretty sure I heard I should kneel. I just felt awkward though, showing my praise so outwardly for the first time, so I didn't. Not even a minute later the worship leader asked everyone to kneel. God had made a way to make it easier for me to praise him the way he wanted me to praise him! Since then I have not shied away from how he moves me to move during worship, and it just feels like a completely natural part of my worship now.

Lately during weed pulling, of all places, I have found a new way to praise God. Actually, it was the pulling of the weeds itself!
What a task, pulling out these plants, creations of God just like the other plants. What makes them the kind of plant we want to remove rather than keep? Were they created to be removed? And if so, why are their roots the longest and strongest? Or are they a creation that mutated over time to become 'bad'? I hardly think so, as they are used in a parable of Jesus' over 2000 years ago, and the description of them is exactly as they are found today, choking out the plants meant to grow. And it is so true that pulling the weeds before a plant's roots are deep enough then pulling the weeds will just uproot the plant too.
I'm still not entirely sure how, but a few hours spent on the not very pleasant task of weeding turned out to be a great few hours talking with God, learning, marvelling at how he works.

I'm very curious as to how God will evolve my paradigms about praise next!