Praised God

(Today’s audio reading on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/3eh4YlCaehY2KfmjL5bySI)

All the while, praising God. (Acts 2:47)

The believers were marked by praise. In the midst of all of this overflowing generosity and sharing and caring for one another, sparked on by this amazing set of supernatural events, they remained steadfast in praise. The act of praise was (and is) important, but it’s not the act that is in focus. In focus is the object of the praise.

Yahweh was the One on whom they lavished their attention. Within the climate of generosity, it would be easy to be effusive with praise towards the generous, and we are naturally thankful to those who share with us. But the way the text is written, praise for Yahweh is the underlying feature.

No doubt in praise they thanked God for the way He had intervened mightily in their lives. A key part of that intervention was the way He had used these new believers to bless one another. He had given them much to praise for!

Their response is so different from the history of the people of Israel. In my personal reading, I’m just finishing the long story of God leading His people out of Egypt, through the wilderness, and into Canaan. The response of His people is marked by long-term and short-term memory losses. They grumbled, complained, rebelled—that one is a particularly constant, evaluative word from God—and they were anything but praise-motivated. They quickly forgot all that He had done for them—sometimes it seems like the next day they had a memory lapse!—and they forgot what He had promised to do for them in the future. Their posture contrasts dramatically with this picture of the Pentecost-Day-Harvest people of God. Looking at the verse on which this devotional is written—“all the while praising God”—the history of the people of Israel could read in part, “All the while complaining to God for what He was or wasn’t doing! They loved to say, ‘I reckon He just doesn’t care about us!’”

These Pentecost Day people were aware of what God had done for them and in them, and their response to Him was praise. What a great marker and description of the people of God! May it continue to be so!

“Father, build in us hearts of praise that respond to you with thanksgiving and overflowing generosity!”