Hallelujah: our life a psalm.
There is no distinctive truth taught here; each verse gives utterance to that which has been sung before (see especially Psalms 148:1-14.). But the strain of the psalm is that of an earnest summons to make the praise of God the prevailing note of our life. Let life be charged and crowned with praise.
1. If regularly at the sanctuary, there in order that it may be offered elsewhere, everywhere.
2. If on the sabbath day, then that it may be presented every day.
3. If with trumpet and cymbal, thus that it may be sounded on every instrument that can make music unto the Lord.
4. If rendered for his "mighty acts" especially, it is not to be withheld for his daily and hourly loving-kindnesses.
5. Praise should, in its fullness and sweetness and heartiness on our part, answer to "the abundance of his greatness"—"his excellent greatness" (Psalms 150:2).
6. Praise should proceed from every lip, from every life (Psalms 150:6); from the youngest who is old enough to lisp his Name, and from the oldest who has strength enough left to make mention of his grace; from the sick on their couch as they anticipate the time when there will be "no more pain;" from the bereaved as they realize all that their departed friends were to them through years of health and service, and as they look forward to the glad day of reunion, and from the strong and active in the midst of the strife of life; from those who study, and from those who "labor, working with their hands;" from those who rule, and from those who serve. A life of praise is a life of holy fragrance, acceptable to God and well-pleasing to man. It is excellent in itself, and it is pro-motive and prophetic of the time when "the whole earth shall be filled with his glory."
HOMILIES BY R. TUCK