Monday, January 24, 2011

Finding God everywhere: "Praise Habit: Finding God in Sunsets and Sushi" by David Crowder

Nothing screams "Praise
God!" like raw fish
God is everywhere. He is in the mountains. He is in the trees. He is in your most trusted friends and most venomous of enemies. He is even in those little pre-wrapped sausages that you find at Wal-Mart. But how often do we actually see God in life?

Oh sure! He is apparent in the miracles. He is apparent in death. He is apparent in close calls. And sometimes even, He is apparent in church. Yeah, we like to find God in church. I liken it to charging your cell phone once a week... You can make it, but it's pretty dang difficult.

David Crowder is one of the foremost artists in the Christian music industry. His iconic hairstyle, reedy tenor, and melodically addicting tunes set him apart from most within any music industry, Christian or not. But what most people don't know is that he is also a writer. A really talented one, actually.

In his book Praise Habit: Finding God in Sunsets and Sushi, Crowder attempts to teach even the most raw and unpracticed of Christian hearts how to find God in everything. According to Crowder, people have lost the inherent ability to praise. As children, praise comes naturally. From acquiring new toys to seeing their daddy throw the perfect spiral, children just know that they are witnesses to the greatest thing on Earth. And they're thankful for it!

As we age we seem to lose this ability. Our care shifts not towards how awesome other people can be, but instead upon our own self-images, comfortable lifestyles, and personal pleasures. We become "I." With this change comes an inability to see beyond one's self. And Crowder hates that! He instead encourages each of us to find things to be thankful for. Once we run out of ideas to be thankful for, we continue to praise God just for life! It is in this constant joy and searching for God that we rediscover our own inherent "praise habit."

I encourage each of you to take this message to heart. Find God in everything. Find him in snow, or tea, or books, or video games, or stilt-walking, or music, or the habitual kindness of others. Learn to praise, and learn to be thankful in all things. There is more to praise than the rockin' worship tunes you sing on any given Sunday. Praise so much that it becomes habit. And then you will recognize God's voice in your life as the ultimate source of joy. "Praise is something we are, not something we do."

Sharing the reason we were created,
Troy

3 comments:

  1. So true! I'm currently studying biochemistry in college, and some of my favorite moments of praise are when I'm sitting in lecture, starting to understand some of the most intricate workings of our biological processes, and it clicks. "Woah, this is so freakin' *cool*. And God made it!" I had one today, learning about the enzyme that catalyzes part of glycolysis, and it was as beautiful to me as the "formal" worship of my church service yesterday.

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  2. Which is something I kind of envy! I miss learning about how the world really works in a physical sense. Such is life for somebody in humanities, eh?

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