His Praise in My Mouth (Psalm 34:1-3)

Recently, I was telling my aunt that Psalm 34 was one of my favorites. She told me how it was also my grandmother’s favorite psalm. She told me,

“When I was with Grandma on the last evening of her earthly life (May 11, 2001), I asked if she would like me to read something from the Bible.  She promptly replied, ‘Psalm 34.’  So I read the Psalm (with her roommate listening), tucked her in and kissed her good night.  That is a tender memory for me.

“I was reading Psalm 34 again two nights later, after your dad and I arrived in Boise.  I fell asleep with my Bible open to that page and it’s still wrinkled today, because the cat came and laid on my Bible!”

Let’s spend a few weeks looking at this precious Psalm:

“I will bless YHVH at all times;
His praise shall continually be in my mouth.
My soul shall make its boast in YHVH;
The humble shall hear of it and be glad.
Oh, magnify YHVH with me,
And let us exalt His name together” (Psalm 34:1-3).

To bless means to kneel to show respect. In ancient times, one would kneel before an honored person, often before presenting a meal. These were ways to show that one had a great respect for the honored guest. You can see examples of this in Abraham (Genesis 18:1-5) and Lot.

Then YHVH appeared to him by the terebinth trees of Mamre, as he was sitting in the tent door in the heat of the day. So he lifted his eyes and looked, and behold, three men were standing by him; and when he saw them, he ran from the tent door to meet them, and bowed himself to the ground, and said, “My Lord, if I have now found favor in Your sight, do not pass on by Your servant. Please let a little water be brought, and wash your feet, and rest yourselves under the tree. And I will bring a morsel of bread, that you may refresh your hearts. After that you may pass by, inasmuch as you have come to your servant” (Genesis 18:1-5).

Now the two angels came to Sodom in the evening, and Lot was sitting in the gate of Sodom. When Lot saw them, he rose to meet them, and he bowed himself with his face toward the ground. And he said, “Here now, my lords, please turn in to your servant’s house and spend the night, and wash your feet; then you may rise early and go on your way.” …So they turned in to him and entered his house. Then he made them a feast, and baked unleavened bread, and they ate (Genesis 19:1-3).

I am to bless YHVH at all times.

I am to invite Him in, to bow low before Him in respect and honor, and to refresh His heart with my words and actions.

I am to praise Him with my mouth. At ALL times I need to point out God’s amazing characteristics, inviting all around me to join me in praising Him because of all that He is.  When I see the word “praise,” I think of applauding the God of the universe because I’m so amazed at what He has done.

The convicting thing is that I’m supposed to do this at ALL TIMES.  His praise is to CONTINUALLY be in my mouth.

I fail at this!  I think that’s because our mouths spill out the leftovers of what our hearts are thinking about. My heart is the “worry-wart” type, and I tend to plot, plan, make lists, agonize over and debate all kinds of things in my heart.  However, if I were blessing God and praising Him in my heart—listing His fabulous attributes such as His goodness, His power, His omniscience, His mercy—then I’m sure His praise WOULD be continually in my mouth.

“A good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth good; and an evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart brings forth evil. For out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks” (Luke 6:45).

In fact, verse 2 hints at this idea.  “My soul shall make its boast in YHVH.” In my soul, I need to be boasting about God.

• If you’re a list-maker like me, then you might enjoy adding a list of everything God has done for you to that spot by your kitchen sink.
• Maybe, instead, you like to scrapbook and could make a Look at What God Has Done journal for your family.
• Maybe you could take a pad of Post-It Notes and boast about one fabulous work of God on each little sheet, then stick them all over your house as reminders.

No matter how you go about doing it, as you teach your soul to make its boast in YHVH, soon you’ll find praise spilling out spontaneously onto your tongue.  The humble people around you will hear of it, and they’ll be lifted up, too!

I first studied Psalm 34 in 1988 (I’m getting old…), when the cheerleading coach at our Christian school decided that we cheerleaders needed to dig in and study God’s Word if we were really going to have unity on our squad.  She required us to memorize the entire chapter before the end of the season, and in addition, she assigned us each several verses that we had to study and then present to the other members of the squad.  Verse 3 became our “Verse of the Year,” and we would recite it together before and after every game.  Strange stuff for cheerleaders, huh…

Oh, magnify YHVH with me,
And let us exalt His name together” (Psalm 34:3).

But this chapter was immensely encouraging to all of us mostly because our coach was a living example of these verses.  Whether you were around her for five minutes or five months, you couldn’t help but notice how she steered every conversation around to God and His goodness.  She literally had God’s praises continually in her mouth.  I got to know her quite well over the next five years, and I don’t think she woke up each morning and decided to be a fanatic. 🙂 Rather, she spent so much time in private, dwelling on God and His Word, she couldn’t help that it spilled out into every other area of her life.

And that is my personal prayer as well.  In fact, verse 5 says that when we look to Him, our faces become “radiant.”

They looked to Him and were radiant,
And their faces were not ashamed (Psalm 34:5).

The precious presence of God radiates literally out of our faces, and those around us can’t help but notice our sweet attitudes, our peaceful expressions, and our joyful perspectives.  It gives me goosebumps….

Now it was so, when Moses came down from Mount Sinai (and the two tablets of the Testimony were in Moses’ hand when he came down from the mountain), that Moses did not know that the skin of his face shone while he talked with Him. So when Aaron and all the children of Israel saw Moses, behold, the skin of his face shone, and they were afraid to come near him. Then Moses called to them, and Aaron and all the rulers of the congregation returned to him; and Moses talked with them. Afterward all the children of Israel came near, and he gave them as commandments all that YHVH had spoken with him on Mount Sinai. And when Moses had finished speaking with them, he put a veil on his face. But whenever Moses went in before YHVH to speak with Him, he would take the veil off until he came out; and he would come out and speak to the children of Israel whatever he had been commanded. And whenever the children of Israel saw the face of Moses, that the skin of Moses’ face shone, then Moses would put the veil on his face again, until he went in to speak with Him” (Exodus 34:29-35).

So, I challenge you, “Magnify YHVH with me, and let us exalt His name together.” Let’s make it our goal, over the next few weeks of studying this Psalm, to learn how to be so close to God that He becomes HUGE (magnified) and LIFTED UP (exalted) in the eyes of every one around us.  Let’s learn how to radiate for Him.

Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture in this blog post taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.