An Essential Exercise for Health and Beauty

      By Fern Horst

Looking for an activity that will both make you feel good and increase your attractiveness? No, I'm not talking about physical exercise, although it does make us feel good and increases our attractiveness physically. I'm talking about an activity that the Psalmist referred to over and over again - an active and constant praise of our Lord. He listed many reasons to praise God, and, he let us in on a secret: praising the Lord is both pleasant and comely ("comely" is an old-fashioned word meaning "becoming" or "beautiful"):

"Praise ye the LORD: for it is good to sing praises unto our God; for it is pleasant; and praise is comely." (Psalms 147:1)

In a sense, praise is the exercise of our hearts. Just as we exercise our bodies to make them stronger, so we must exercise our spirits to make them stronger. We become spiritually resilient as we praise the Lord for all that He is, and all that He does for us. Praise moves our focus from ourselves to our Lord, and strengthens our relationship with Him. The difficulty is that it doesn't come naturally for us to be thankful and to praise God. But, just like physical exercise, we need to make a conscious choice to make it a part of our daily lives. The more we do it, the more it will become a natural response as we become increasingly aware of the many ways God is working in our lives.

Perhaps you're wondering how praise will make you feel good and increase your attractiveness. Think about it: isn't it when you are so grateful for something that you feel compelled to express that gratefulness that you feel the best? And aren't we most drawn to those people who exude an attitude of thankfulness to the Lord, as opposed to those who are bitter and complaining?

The catch is that such praise needs to be genuine. When we praise the Lord in order to feel good, or to make ourselves attractive, it doesn't work. We must be truly praising Him out of a heart of genuine thankfulness and gratefulness. But isn't it wonderful to know that the Lord gives us such tremendous side benefits to those things He commands us to do?

© 2003 Fern Horst

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