He [Jesus] says, I will declare your name to my brothers; in the presence of the congregation I will sing your praises." And again, "I will put my trust in him." And again he says, "Here am I, and the children God has given me. (Hebrews 2:12-13)
Some families just look happier than others. A common denominator seems to be the fact that the father and mother love the children. Whether the children are biological, or adopted, they know they are loved. And they are happy.
To God, we are all His children (Galatians 3:27), not just Jesus. And Jesus feels that same way: the church is all his brothers and sisters. Jesus says that with his brothers, he will sing the praises of God the Father and in the presence of the congregation he will sing praises. When we praise God, however it is that we do, we join Jesus in that praise.
When our children go out on dates, or to school, or wherever, we want them to bring honor to us. We don’t want to go downtown in the middle of the night to get them out of jail. We don’t want to hear other people talking about what delinquents they are. We want our children to make us happy.
Jesus praised God as his child in all aspects of his life. As a carpenter, he was fair and accurate, he didn’t overcharge, he was the embodiment of God in flesh working with others. As a teacher, he did all he did with the blessing of God and he made sure that he had that blessing by bathing every effort in prayer. As a prisoner, he was humble and submitted, even knowing it was wrong and that if he wanted to, he could call a legion of angels to stop it and help him. As the Son of God, he rose from the dead.
Everything he did was to the praise of the Glory of God (Ephesians 1) and never to his own. When we do these things in our lives, we declare his glory by our participation in praise – “Life Praise”, a Lifestyle of Praise, whatever you may want to call it.
Our living for God is like his living for God: less in degree maybe, but the same in quality. Our life is a reveling in the knowledge that we are his children and that he loves us.
We are part of a great family.
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