One time I found a copy of this book, Praise Habit by David Crowder, in the church’s lost & found. By the way, if you’re missing that book, hit me up! I have it! The theme of the book is what the band Rend Collective calls “the art of celebration”, the habit of turning your heart to Jesus when things are good and also when things are not good. It’s about putting on the habit or clothing of worship, in a monastic sense, and also about making worship a habit. It’s not a book about “You should worship Jesus without ceasing.” It’s a book about HOW to worship Jesus without ceasing. It’s not a list of how-to’s, but it shows you what that looks like. It brings you into the author’s own worship, and in sharing his heart he shows how to worship.
True confessions, sometimes I don’t like reading the Psalms. I feel like they’re a cheap high, like the words are too easy, the feelings too relatable. The Psalms sometimes make me feel like I’m medicating myself with a faith that is just feel-good theology. The Psalms comfort me, and for some reason I feel like comfort is a dessert I haven’t earned. Like the Psalms are milk & honey and the rest of the Bible, with the difficult things, that’s where the meat is.
But Crowder’s book reminds me that I’m totally wrong about that. And I need reminding!
Following Jesus is hard. It demands the sacrifice of everything. It means selfishness isn’t an option. It means devotion and dedication of my life: soul, mind, heart, strength. And I’m like, how do I do that? What if I can’t seem to do that?
But I forget that following Jesus is also easy. I focus so much on the “should do” instead of the “how to do” that I end up trying to earn my salvation by my own self-righteousness. Because how do we follow Jesus? By grace. And how do worship in spirit and truth? By grace. No wonder I get overwhelmed by the expensive, expensive cost of following Jesus. I’m not cut out for this; that’s why I came to Jesus in the first place. That’s why I need grace. I need reminding!
And when I’m not sure how to live by grace, I look to the Psalms, and they point me to worship, which aligns my heart to find comfort in my Jesus. Worship is disciplining our hearts to remember, always remember that only Jesus can make me righteous.
And just as surely as He saved us, He will show us how to live.
