Where it's due?

Why is it so difficult to receive praise?

Someone comes up to you and says, "thank you, you did that so very well." How do you respond?

I'm sure that you respond very politely and graciously, but how does receiving prayer make you feel? Awkward? Embarrassed? Desirous to change the subject?

Why? Isn't it nice to get praise?

Part of the awkward feeling is, "well what do you do with it?" as if you've been handed some mystery gadget with bells, whistles, a sink plunder and a hooter attached and have been told to go away and master it. Criticism you can deal with more obviously. You can defend yourself, your methods and your actions, or you can listen and note what you need to do in future to prevent further criticism. But beware; preventing further criticism might lead to praise!

Then, of course, there are the suspicions. "What is she after?" This is a typical response in an age of cynicism when folk are not to be trusted. You question the sincerity of the person - are they after something, or are they trying to poke fun behind your back?

Another reason for this awkwardness is guilt. "Well done," they say and you think, "ah, if only they knew the truth" and then begin to enumerate every possible way in which your praiseworthy action fails to satisfy your demands on your own ability. Christians are particularly good at the latter, particularly those with a good sized guilt complex. Other Christians fear that receiving praise might injure their reward in heaven. You can imagine the vicar being battered by an irate parishioner for publishing his name beside his sizable donation on the grounds that he was hoping for a Ferrari in Heaven.

Or else, there is the fear that praise will tempt fate to cause some major catastrophe. If one is being praised, then one is receiving something to be proud of, and pride goeth before destruction! This is faulty logic based on equivocation on the word pride. We can think of Wesley (Was it Wesley? I've forgotten.) being told how brilliant his sermon was and replying, "I know, the Devil told me on the way down the pulpit steps."

Isn't it nice to be praised? Someone has found something you did to be brilliant and wants to tell you that it's brilliant. Why not take this at face value? The Christian praises God and rightly so, for God has caused all things to be, and while they do not make sense and may appear dismal and distressing, other things do possess an obvious beauty which gladdens our hearts? And what does God do? Go red and say, "aw shucks, 'tweren't nothing"? He enjoys it and lets others share it. We see him in Isaiah, Ezekiel, Daniel and the Apocalypse sitting while all around him offer their praises, and He responds by enjoying that praise with those who praise Him. The praise becomes its own reward.

One might say that since we are mere vessels of God's Holy Spirit that we are due no praise whatsoever. A clay pot holds water and is due no praise for what it does, because, that's what it does. If, however, the clay pot has a choice to hold the water and not to leak, warp or spill, then it has actions which can be deemed good and thus praiseworthy.

Praise is better if we don't try to possess it. All our fears above occur because we try to hold onto praise - we don't know what to do with it when we've got it; we hold it up to the light to see if it's genuine; we feel guilty for having it, or try to measure ourselves with it. Praise is about sharing our enjoyment of the good that has been done. Try to possess it, and we lose any joy in it.

Of course Humanity is capable of great evil, but it is also capable of great good from our own free choice. That Good needs to be acknowledged for the simple reason that it is Evil that seems to be predominant in the World and more obvious when it ain't necessarily so. Evil may sell newspapers, but perhaps that is because Good is so abundant that it isn't as noticed.

Thank you for reading so far. Very kind of you.