The Bible tells us as Christians to put off the spirit of heaviness – the weight of the world and all its challenges – and to put on the garment of praise. When you got dressed today, what did you do? If you are like me you walked into your closet and chose the clothes you are wearing right now.  It was a conscious choice, based not upon your feelings but upon your will.

So it is with praise to the Lord. We don’t praise God because we necessarily feel like it, or because praise is something that suits our emotional frame of mind at that particular moment.  There are times when praise doesn’t even occur to us. It may not be something that we want to do right then. But the Word says that we are to put on praise like we put on a coat.  We clothe ourselves with praise by a conscious act of our will.

As we put on the garment of praise and learn to focus that praise against Satan’s strongholds, we will walk in victory and power. Those strongholds are going to be blown apart by the power of praise coming from the lips and the hearts of God’s people. Now I realize that sometimes it is hard to praise. But Hebrews 13:15 says:

…Let us continually offer the sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of our lips, giving thanks to His name.

That word “sacrifice” is tied in with praise throughout the entire Bible. There are times when we hurt and we don’t want to praise God because the hurt is so intense. That is when praise to God is a sacrifice, because making a sacrifice means doing something you don’t want to do or don’t feel like doing.  Sacrifice is the giving up of your own desires for the benefit of someone else.

“Let us continually offer the sacrifice of praise to God.” This means that we  are to walk in praise, live in praise, cover ourselves with praise, confessing thanks to Him at all times.