Make some noise, people! There’s nothing wrong with shouts of joy.
Don’t you hear the noisy relief that some tennis players get when they grunt? You want to concentrate and they exhilarate. Or consider the power that martial arts practitioners claim when they shriek through breaking block and wood? Obstacles removed. Have you ever listened to the merry-making dancers who seem unperturbed throughout their noisy celebrations? You’re vexed and they’re overjoyed.
It’s OK to make some noise to show and tell that you’re outright happy with what God is doing in and around you, so, “Sing aloud to God our strength, shout for joy to the God of Jacob. Raise a song, sound the tambourine, the sweet lyre with the harp. Blow the trumpet…” (verses 1-3)
It’s OK to make some thank you noise to God.
Even as I write, though, I recall the days when making noise was clearly not my thing. It still isn’t! I remember the literal headache of sitting through a service at a Pentecostal church when I thought that the noise making thing had gone too far. But I endured, in pretty much the same way that I’ve endured conversations with persons who punctuate their statements with expletives. I hate swearing. I don’t use cuss words, and I’m thankful that the Bible doesn’t say ‘Cuss, cuss, cuss!” I only listen through the cussing because the angry (I cannot but believe that anger hides beneath every cuss word) need to be heard. If we don’t listen, hell won’t have a cure for their anger.
So, as I was saying, making noise isn’t exactly my kind of thing. But I’ve grown enough to know that it’s OK to make some noise and even exercise your lungs to show that you’re in awe of what God has done. Hallelujah!
Sound a Hallelujah to remember that “I relieved your shoulder of the burden ; your hands were freed from the basket.”- You know what I mean? Relief from the shame and anguish that was weighing you down so you couldn’t breathe properly. Now you can breathe. Clear your lungs! Say thank you Lord with shouts of joy.
After you’ve passed the test “in distress you called and I rescued you. I answered you in the secret place with thunder” ( verse 7) , then your noise pales in comparison to the re-organising thunder of God. Loudly, if you can, loudly if you must, register thanks and praise. It’s not always the decent Kyrie of submission, but sometimes also the hand-clapping, feet-stomping noise-making rhythms of praise that split the atmosphere and spiral their waves into God’s hearing.
And mark you. Some might still not understand your posture of praise. If, I’m to be honest, I must admit that making noise is still not my kind of thing.
