Does Praise Really Make a Difference? | Phil Kniesel

As we begin a brand-new year, Pastor Phil launches our new series The Main Thing with a powerful reminder about what matters most. Jesus said the greatest priority in life is to love God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength, and praise plays a much bigger role in that than many of us realize.

In this message, we explore how praise realigns our hearts, guards us against fear, and pulls us back to gratitude. Praise is not just a response to good moments, but a deliberate choice we make even when life feels uncertain. When we praise, we shift our focus from our problems to God’s power and position our hearts around what truly matters.

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Transcript

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- Hey, this is Phil Kizza, lead pastor at Hope City Church. Thanks for tuning into our podcast. My prayer is that this helps and encourages you, gives you some practical ways to live out your faith and ultimately fills you with hope. Enjoy the message.- Happy New Year, hope City. I trust that you had a great Christmas and I just want you to know that I am praying for God's best for you and your family in the coming year. My heart is that 2026 may be a year where your faith goes further and deeper, where your love for the Lord increases and where you live it out in greater tangible ways. In fact, I've been praying that this year as a church we would just not grow exponentially in numbers. I mean that's part of our vision, that's part of making the message of Jesus known. But I'm praying that we as a church would grow exponentially in our love for the Lord. And our week of prayer starting tomorrow is something that will help lead us toward this. So I really hope you consider joining us for for this. Now, I'm curious, hands up, how many of you take the time to make New Year's resolutions or goals? Lemme see your hands here. There's a chunk of ya. It's a pretty common thing. And what cracks me up is the statistics tell us, most fail quickly. Like after about one week, 23% of people quit their resolutions. By the end of January, around 43% have given up By mid-February, as many as 80% have lost motivation. Now, I've even heard that the second Friday in January is known as Quitter's Day . Now if that doesn't deflate your hope in humanity, I'm not sure what will, we can't even hang on for two weeks. And then we have to have an official holiday called Quitter's Day so that we can feel better about ourselves in all 80 to 90% fully abandon their goals at some point in the year. And here's what kind of grip me. Human nature tends to quit the things we want most in our lives. And so for this year, what I want most for myself and what I want most for you is to know God greater and for you to excel in your walk with him. And my prayer is that this is not something you quit, but something you continually pursue. My prayer is that you would truly understand when God said, love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. Jesus reiterated the exact same thing He said, love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. This is the main thing. Notice two, describing words that Jesus uses first and greatest first, meaning put this above all else greatest meaning nothing tops this. So as Jesus followers, we, we wanna get this one right, we need to get this one right. And that's what this series is about at the start of 2026. Because here's the truth, if we don't choose our priorities, our pressures will. And I don't want you tapping out on this one by quitter's day or by any day. So how do we live out the main thing? What does this actually look like in our day-to-day in this series? I want to give us some practical ways this can happen, ways that we can love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, strength, and mind. And the first practical way is praise. Through praise you will be able to live out the main thing. It's amazing the impact and influence something like praise can have on us. Now, when I say the word praise, what comes to your mind Could be the songs we sing at church. Maybe it's your own worship playlist. Maybe it's the title of a song by a particular artist. We all have our own preconceived ideas and notions of what praise is. But here's a good definition. Praise is the intentional outward expression of honor, gratitude, and awe toward God in response to who he is and what he has done. I wanna say that again. Praise is the intentional outward expression of honor, gratitude, and awe toward God in response to who he is and what he has done. Praise acknowledges God's supremacy and his authority in our lives. It states that he is God and we are not. And praise is woven all throughout the Bible. It involves personal and corporate prayers. There's musical expression, singing, exhortation, exaltation, literary expressions, and worship. The word praise is used approximately 375 times in the new international version of the Bible. It's one of the most repeated responses God calls for in scripture. And so we can't ignore it. We can't think this doesn't have a big place in our lives and we need to understand the depth of it and why it matters as we strive to live out the main thing. Now, the vast majority of praise language is in the Old Testament with roughly 85 to 90% of all occurrences. So the books of the law, the Psalms, the prophetic books, these are all books in the Old Testament. They consistently call God's people to praise most of Israel's life, their worship life was built around corporate praise. And as I studied all this, here's something that was clear. Scripture presents praise not as optional but as a core spiritual posture. So that means praise is commanded, not suggested. The last verse of the book of Psalms and Psalms would be the collection of praises for the Israelites. It's also the longest book in the Bible indicating the importance of praise. But the last verse of the last Psalm says, this led everything that has breath. Praise the Lord. Praise the Lord. Now this is written in a command format and notice the command is repeated. The Psalms contain while over 150 references to praise related language. We read things like praise God because he is our hope and our salvation. Praise God because he is holy and his name is great. Praise God for he's righteous and his law is good. Praise God for his wonderful works and his unending love. Psalm 63 says, because your love is better than life, my lips will glorify you. I will praise you as long as I live. Do you hear that? I will praise you as long as I live. This is a life thing, not just a church thing. So why does praise matter? Why is praise important in our pursuit of the main thing? I'm gonna give you three reasons why praise matters. There's more. But I believe at the start of this year, these three things will give you perspective. And the first one is this, praise reorders our heart. Praise does something no New Year's resolution can it aligns or realigns our heart with what matters most. Jesus said, we need to love God with all of our heart. And the heart is the core of who we are from it flow our emotions, our desires, our wants, our feelings. Our heart is the epicenter of our lives. And it can be synonymous with our soul. And praise does more than surface level behavioral change. It goes to the core and it helps reshape our desire. Our heart will always follow what we value most. It's why Jesus said, where your treasure is there, your heart will be also. Now in that specific context, he was talking about money, but it goes for anything. Our heart will always follow what we value most. I read this quote just recently. It said The habits of the heart, not the brain, are the center of human activity. You don't just think your way to holiness, you worship your way to it. Praise helps to shift our heart because it doesn't start with me and my wants and my needs, but it starts with who God is. And that distinction is game changing. I want to take you to Psalm 1 0 3 and it's written by King David. Later in his life he would've known the defeat of sin as he gave into adultery, he would've known the heartache of prayers not answered as he lost a child, he would've known about having anything he could ever have as he was king. And as he's reflecting on his own life, this is what he writes in Psalm 1 0 3, he says, praise the Lord my soul, all my inmost being praises, holy name, praise the Lord my soul. And forget not all his benefits, who forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from the pit and crowns you with love and compassion, who satisfies your desires with good things so that your youth is renewed like the eagles. And I want you to notice something that David begins this psalm with a command, not to the world, not to the church, not to others, but to himself. He says, praise the Lord my soul, all my inmost being praise His holy name. So he's commanding his own soul, his heart, and he's telling himself, Hey, you're gonna praise today. I don't care what's going on. I don't care what's happening. Or if you don't feel like it, today is a day to praise. It's not based on maybe or if I have time because praise is both commanded and expected from God. And it's not because God is insecure or needs ego boosts, but because praise always reorders our heart. Friends, sometimes we just have to tell ourselves, come on soul, get up and praise the Lord. And that matters because let's be honest, you're not always gonna feel like praising. It's gonna be a rough day, it's gonna be a rough week. The circumstances are gonna be hard. You won't always feel like praising. And listen, I don't always feel like praising some weeks, there are things going on in my life and I would rather not. And just think about this. When it comes to church, I do this service multiple times every weekend. But no matter what is going on, no matter what my day, my week, or my month is like when we start singing here, I choose to raise my hands and praise God because it's not about what I feel. It's a choice that says, come on soul, get up and praise the Lord. You know, we all know that when left alone our desires drift, sin usually doesn't hijack us and come from left field. It slowly distracts over time. It slowly reams our wants. And what praise does is that it consistently recalibrates us to the main thing. And even if we aren't feeling it, we must do it. We must command ourselves to do it. In another Psalm, David wrote, delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart. Now, this isn't about getting what we want. It's a promise that says, when we delight in him, when we praise him, he will reshape what we want and put our heart in the right spot. It puts us in the right posture before the Lord. And so David commands himself to praise the Lord indicating it's not about him, it's about God. And by the way, I'm gonna say it, praise isn't about you. Work with me, okay? Especially when you come to church.'cause I know there are songs we all like better than others. And when the worship team plays your song, it's like, yes, Jesus, you are the best. And then they play a song you don't connect with. And it's kinda like, yeah, worship, lack this morning, listen with all the love that's in me, please hear this. Praise is not about you. It's always always about God. And in Psalm 1 0 3, David gives us reasons to praise. He says, he's the God who forgives all your sins. He's the God who heals your diseases, who redeems your life, who crowns you with love and mercy, who satisfies your desires with good things, who renews your life. And notice something about that list. Everyone is a declaration of God's supremacy over parts of our life. We cannot change on our own sin, diseases, redemption, love, mercy, renewal. We can't do anything for those. They're beyond our control. And so we praise God for the things that are beyond us because that is what makes him God. And so the first reason why praise matters in our pursuit of the main thing is because praise reorders our heart. Secondly, praise guards against fear. Now for a lot of us, fear is a real thing. It debilitates. It cripples. And many times it's irrational. Like I have a fear of snakes. It's not because I've been attacked or even bitten by one, I just don't like them. And I might have some good biblical premise there just saying, but when I see snakes I'm like, nah, no way. Get outta here. Let's move on. How much is fear a part of your life? Like maybe you fear the state of our country. Maybe you fear the evil in the world. Maybe you fear your kids' futures or your future. Maybe you fear job security, financial issues, the security of your marriage. Fear is a very real human emotion and praise in its simplest and most impactful way, guards against this. There was this time in King David's life when his enemies captured him in a place called Gath. He would've been worried, he would've been scared. He would've been wondering, is my life gonna end? What does the future hold? And in that moment, he writes this, when I am afraid, I put my trust in you. In God whose word I praise when I have, when I'm afraid, who do I look to? Not the stock market, not the healthcare system, not the assets I own, not even to others. I look to God. I trust in God, he's my savior, the one who will never fail. And praise is one of the best ways to guard against fear. So hope city, when you sense fear creeping up, you know what you're gonna do. You're gonna start to praise God. You're gonna say, praise the Lord, oh my soul. All that is within me. Praise His holy name. Because praise reminds yourself of what God can do. Praise lessens fear and increases faith. You know one of the best examples of this we have in the Bible is when these two guys called Paul and Silas were put in prison for telling others about Jesus. We can read about this in the book of Acts. It says this, at about midnight, Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God. And the other prisoners were listening to them. Now these guys, they had every reason in the book to be discouraged and full of fear. And yet, while in prison, while bound in stalks, they chose to praise God. And you can't tell me that came easy. That wasn't their first inclination. And you can almost picture Paul looking at Silas as they were bound, as they were beaten, saying, Silas, I know you're scared, Silas, I know this looks really bad. I know you're worried, but sing this with me. It's your breath in our lungs. So we pour out our praise, hope, city praise guards against fear. And so whatever is going on, you can choose to entertain the fear and let a cripple you or you can choose to praise. And here's why this matters. When we praise, we declare God's truth and God's character over our reality and our insecurities. When we praise, we shift our focus from our problems to God's power. Did you hear that? We shift our focus from our problems to God's power And that's how praise guards against fear. And maybe maybe you've experienced this like during worship in church you felt seen or you felt secure. Maybe for the first time in a long time you felt lighter like you can make it through, like you can carry on. Maybe you even cried during worship. Why is that? Because praise shifts your focus from the problem and puts it toward a God who is all powerful and who can do anything? Praise replaces fear with faith may praise be your default anytime you sense fear creeping in. So praise matters in our pursuit of the main thing because number one, praise reorders our heart. Number two, praise guards against fear. And number three, praise pulls us back to gratitude. The default pull for many is to focus on what we do not have or on what is not happening. Why can't I ever get a break? Why do they have that? Why do they have a nice house? Why? Why can they go on that trip? Why is this not happening? Why do they, and you just fill in the blank like have you ever been in a group of people and everyone starts complaining, it's actually super contagious. Have you seen the price of milk? Oh bro, yeah. My grocery bill, have you seen the cost of gas? Fact that our house taxes are going up this week? Have you seen the roads? Like we could go on and on. And it's easy to get pulled into areas where all we see is negative and praise pulls us outta that mess. It pulls us toward a different posture.'cause when we praise, we are reminded about all that God has done in our life and for our life. It's the exact opposite of entitlement. And whether we verbally say it or not, we can at times live with an entitled mentality. Almost like because I've done this, this and this. And because I know God is good, he essentially owes me. Pray, says God has already given me more than I deserve. So if he doesn't do another thing, he is worthy. Listen, friend, it is love. God sent Jesus to the cross so that you can be forgiven and have life both now and eternally. Our response is to receive this gift. And folks, that's ultimately it. That is enough. The cross settles the question of God's goodness forever. Jesus paid it all. And praise recenters us on this truth. It reminds us that everything we have, salvation, forgiveness, hope, breath itself is undeserved and freely given. Paul writes, he says gift thanks in all circumstances. For this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. He's not saying give thanks for all circumstances, but in all circumstances, gratitude anchored in praise is not dependent on outcomes. It's rooted in God's character. And I've seen this progression in my life, okay, when praise fades, gratitude shrinks. And when gratitude shrinks, entitlement grows, praise pulls us back to gratitude. So three reasons why praise matters and how it helps us in the pursuit of the main thing. Praise reorders our heart. Praise guards against fear and praise pulls us back to gratitude. But there's something else I wanna mention. It's a pattern I notice in scripture about praise. And it's this praise is a forethought, not an afterthought. The Bible repeatedly shows praise happening before outcomes, not just after them. So in the Old Testament book of Joshua, we read how Israel was facing a giant in their life. It was a city called Jericho. And God says, I need you to do something a little unconventional. You're gonna march around the city once for six days, but then you're gonna do something else. And this is, I wanna read you outta the book of Joshua, what the Lord says on the seventh day march around the city seven times with the priests blowing the trumpets. When you hear them sound a long blast on the trumpets, make the whole army give a loud shout. Then the wall of the city will collapse and the army will go up everyone straight in. So they're commanded to play instruments and to shout to praise for six days before the walls ever fall. And on the seventh day for seven lefts, they've got no evidence of victory, no visible progress. All they could do was muster enough faith to believe that if I praised before this giant god's gonna come through and do something only God can do. And it wasn't until after they praised that the walls fell down at another time. In the nation of Judah, which is the southern kingdom of Israel, they're facing a crisis during the reign of a king called Jehoshaphat. You could read about this in Second Chronicles. There's this massive coalition army made up of the Moabites am Ammonites and others from the East. And they're on their way to attack Jerusalem. And it doesn't take much for Judah to realize that they're completely outmatched when it comes to their military. And so King Pha does something counterintuitive. Instead of relying on alliances or armies, he calls the nation to fast, to pray and to seek God together. And after they do this, they head to the battlefield. And this is what we read. Two Chronicles 20 pha appointed men to sing to the Lord and to praise him for the splendor of his holiness. As they went out at the head of the army saying Give thanks to the Lord for his love and endures forever. As they began to sing and praise the Lord set ambushes against the men of Aman and Moab and Mount Sr who were invading Judah and they were defeated. Jehoshaphat sent worshipers ahead of the army and it's then God does something miraculous for them. In fact, he takes control of the very thing that seemed impossible for them. Praise was a forethought, not an afterthought. In Psalm 100, we we read enter his gates with thanksgiving, his courts with praise. Praise is the entry point to God's presence. In another psalm, David said, I will extol the Lord at all times. His praise will always be on my lips at all times. I'm gonna praise the Lord. That means before I have clarity, before the provision, before I get an answer, before I have understanding, before the problem is solved. Before anything happens or changes, I will praise the Lord in Hope city. I don't know where you're at, but I know one thing. All of us are in a before moment because we have a whole year ahead of us. And so before anything else occurs this year, I wanna call you to praise. I want to encourage you to praise like maybe, maybe you just need to command your soul. Come on soul. Get up and praise the Lord no matter what is going on with all of your heart, with all of your mind, with all of your strength, instead of starting the year saying, God, there's so much I need from you. There's so much I'm asking from you. There's so much I'm anticipating. Can you say God in my before? I'm gonna praise you and I'm gonna praise you alone. May you begin this here declaring I'll praise you in the valley. I'll praise you on the mountain. I'll praise you when I'm sure and I'll praise you when I'm doubting. I'll praise you when I feel it and I'll praise you when I don't. I'll praise 'cause I know you are in control. Church, let's get up and praise the Lord. Let everything that has breath, praise the Lord. And so stand with me if you are able to and we're gonna sing this song. And I wanna encourage you wherever you're at, to just praise the Lord- God. Praise in the valley. Praise on the Mount God. Praise when I'm sure.- Praise- When I'm down. I praise when outnumbered. Praise when surrounded- Because- Praise is the water. My enemy is drown as long as I'm breathing, I've got a reason to- Praise- The Lord my soul. Sing it out church.- Lord- I praise when I feel it. No praise when I don't. Now praise 'cause I know you're still in control- Because - My praise is a weapon is more than a sound. My praise is the shout that brings Jeremy down. As long as I'm breathing, I've got a reason to pray. Oh my lift your voices up. I won't be quiet my God. So how can I keep it inside? Soul, my soul.- Let's- Put those hands back together. We're gonna sing this net. Visit together, right? We're gonna make this our declaration this morning. Here we go. Well I'll praise'cause you're sovereign praise 'cause you reign. Praise 'cause you rose and defeated the great I'll praise'cause you are faithful praise 'cause you true praise.'cause is nobody greater than you sing. Praise. I'll praise 'cause you so praise 'cause you, oh praise'cause you rose and defeated the great I praise'cause you faithful praise'cause you're true praise greater than you the soul.- Praise- Soul.- Praise- Soul be God is alive.- Well how- Can I keep it inside? I won't be quiet. My God is alive. So how can I keep it inside? I won't be quiet. My God is alive. Well how can I keep it inside Soul- Hope city, as you go into this year, may praise be your forethought, not your afterthought. May you say, I will praise God in every situation, through every circumstance with all of my heart, soul, strength, and mind. I will praise the Lord. Why? Because he is always, always worthy. Let me pray for you. God, I thank you that you are the king of kings and the Lord of lords. I thank you that as we praise you, we lift you up. We know that we can trust you. And so I prayed for my friends here today that we may be men and women of praise at all times. I pray that we put praise on our lips no matter what is going on, no matter what is happening. And at the beginning of this year, may we be known as Jesus followers who lift up the name of the Lord, who exalt the name of the Lord, who prays the name of the Lord in and through all things God. May we do that with all that is within us. And so God, may that praise reshape our heart. May that praise guard against fear and may that praise always pull us back to gratitude for what you have done for us. And so we give you praise God, we exalt your name today before we know that you are the king that we can trust. You are the God that we can depend upon and you are the Lord that makes a way where there doesn't seem away. And so I ask that today in our hearts we may just say and put this stamp in the ground that says this year 2026, my life song will be to praise the Lord no matter what may come my way. No matter what I face, I will praise God in every circumstance. I will exalt his name. I will lift his name. My life will live to glorify the Lord. And I pray this God for all of us, for your glory and for your honor, you know if you joined us today at a campus online in the house and you don't know Jesus personally, friend, I said earlier, Jesus went to the cross to die for your sins. He rose to offer you life and life forevermore. And the best decision you can make at the beginning of this year is to follow Jesus. The best decision you can make in your life is to invite him in and say, I wanna make you Lord and leader and I wanna understand what it means to have you direct my steps and guide my path. And so if that's a decision you wanna make today, let me pray. And why don't you pray these words along with me. Jesus today I see my need for you. And I thank you for going to the cross. I thank you for dying, for my sins, for rising and offering me life and hope both now and forever. And so today I believe in my heart that you are Lord. And I believe that God raised you from the dead. And like your word says, I want to be saved, meaning just made right before you. And so help me to follow you. Help me to know you. Help me to make you Lord and leader of my life from this day forward. Help me to understand what it means to pursue the main thing. And God, I pray over every individual, every couple and every family. Lord, I ask as they go into this year, may they just rely upon you in all ways. May they look to you for all things and may they grow deeper in their love, in their heart and in their passion for the Lord. Holy Spirit, I pray that as they go from this place, you speak to them, you guide them, you direct them. I pray God, that there is just a, your presence surrounding them in and through all that they put their hands to in the coming year. And I pray that we, and they may be known as individuals of praise before all things as individuals who lift up your name in all things. And I pray this blessing over and for them in the powerful, in the wonderful and in the magnificent name of Jesus. Amen. Amen. You know, if you prayed the prayer of surrendering your life to Jesus today, I want to say way to go. If you can just tap the disc on the seat back in front of you, we have a digital booklet we'd love to get in your hands that talks about knowing and following Jesus. And it's also our way of trying to connect with you in a large church. We'd love for that. If you're joining us in the house and you want prayer over anything, uh, we're gonna have a prayer team available down at your front left after the service, you can just come up here and they would love to pray over and for you before you leave, I wanna speak up blessing over you, friends over you, hope city for the new year. The Lord bless you and the Lord keep you. The Lord make his face shine on you. And the Lord be gracious to you. The Lord turn his face towards you and the Lord give you peace. Love you. Hope City have an incredible day. Thanks for being in church today. God bless.