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Addressing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with your heart, giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ (Ephesians 5:19-20).
Noticing small things for which to be thankful can change your life.
Becoming a person of praise heals. Ninety percent of disease in America has roots in stress. The number one predictor of divorce is not finances, sexual issues, or lack of love – but lack of conflict resolution.
Addressing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with your heart!!!
How do you become thankful, conflict-resolving, in great health, and the wonder of every living person? Learn to praise God! Praise through everything – trials, happiness, great accomplishment, and little things.
Giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ!!!
For years I have practiced the discipline of Praise Bits! Noticing little things throughout the day for which I am thankful.
Passages on joy in the Bible – like James 1 with “consider it all joy when you encounter trials” or Philippians 4 of “rejoice in the Lord always” – I once found to be a big challenge.
Self-confession: For years, I misconstrued James and Philippians as big disasters. My thought when I heard of a trial was, “God, help me to have joy if I go through a trial like that.”
Then I would avoid the topic and go about my life as a pastor.
That changed one day while visiting an elderly saint. Talking about her trials she said, “I was prepared for this sickness and pain because I have spent my life praising God for little things!”
Wow.
Little bits of praise throughout your day build your joy muscles for endurance in trials. You strengthen your soul to consider it all joy and rejoice in the Lord always.
The reverse is also true. In Interruption #528, I discussed Bitter Bits or living a life of accumulating offenses until they become a pile of tinder waiting for a spark! Praise Bits throw water on the pile. You remember the Bitter Bits, but they don’t ignite.
Praise vs. Bitter: You want praise to win!
Let’s consider the Pastor Grant Effect (and I apologize for the self-aggrandizing name).
A life of Bitter Bits finds increasingly smaller bits for offense. The explosions of anger require fewer and fewer inflammable incidents. The opposite effect of Praise Bits accumulates joy against difficulty. We become impervious to trials that ruin our peace.
That’s the Pastor Grant Effect – Praise Bits increase upward strength of joy and Bitter Bits spiral downward to frustration.
What can you do?
Determine in 2022, at morning, noon, and before sleep, to praise God for three things. That’s it. Praise Bits is easy, and over time it inoculates you against discouragement.
Remember to tell your friends about the Pastor Grant Effect.