As 2015 begins, I want to remind myself, my family, my friends, all of us – that God is awesome and worthy of our praise. You see, 2014 wasn’t the best year for us on many levels. I wrote about a major milestone in our lives which began an unexpected transition about 3 months ago. Through this time, we’ve learned we have some truly great friends, family, and even realized how large the Kingdom is by having complete strangers hold us close to them and their prayers.

I’m not the first to go through a rough end of a year, and I won’t be the last. My problems are petty compared to most, but they are my reality. One thing I have to remember through all of this is that I not blame God, but rather, praise Him. Its time to come back to the heart of worship. I declare 2015 as the year of praise to our Lord.

In I Chronicles 15, David brings the Ark of the Covenant to Jerusalem. At the end of the chapter we read of David shedding some garments and dancing in the streets because of his jubilation, and while this upsets the daughter of Saul, it set forth a motion of worship that would seemingly be unequal in its day to God and His Glory!

You see, the Israelites worship had become, well, non-existent. David was bringing it back. Can you imagine what your life would be like without worship? The temple was not there, and David set up a sort of “temporary worship place” with the Ark. In I Chronicles 16, the Ark is placed, and David, the original “worship leader”, led the nation in worship to God. After this, David assigned specific tasks to several of the Levite nation, in order to establish an ongoing worship session, as they were to play their instruments before the Lord “regularly”.

What follows is a song of praise, taken from various verses in Psalm 96, 105, and 106. In this song of praise – we find a few things for us to take notice of:

1. If you consider yourself a Christian, you need to be offering praise to God. You can sing, you can tell others about what God has done for you, you can “tell of all His wonderful Acts.” (verses 8, 9)

2. You can rejoice proudly in His name. Be proud to wear the name of God. Look to the Lord for strength. (verses 10, 11)

3. We can remember what He does for people who belong to Him. (verses 12-22)

4. We can know that if we don’t praise Him, the earth certainly will – all the earth will Praise Him. (verses 23-27, 31-33)

5. We can know that whatever the world may dream up, think of, and try to pass of as “true” that the world is firmly established and cannot be moved. There is no good that will come to those who reject the Lord, so we should ascribe to Him. (verses 28-30)

6. Everyone should praise God, and everyone should seek Him as their Savior. (verses 31-36)

After this worship service, David assigns permanent positions to several of the priests. What does that mean for us? When we are done offering worship, perhaps we should not just consider things done for the week. Perhaps you have a permanent place of worship you can find yourself in if you just look. The last few verses of this chapter tell me a few things too. Read verses 37-43, and then consider:

Worship is not ever finished.

We all have talents to use for God.

Make your friends and your family part of your worship (verse 43).

2015 has just begun. Its not even close to being over. You have talents that you can use for God. Find them, use them. And finally, make sure you include those you love in your worship.

May 2015 be the year of praise to our Lord.