"Hallelujah!" Praise the Lord! So begins, and ends, the last psalm of the Psalter, Psalm 150. This is a hymn of the community that gives praise to God. It recounts none of the Lord's benefits, as other psalms do. It asks nothing of God, as other psalms do. It does not lament anything God has not yet done, as other psalms do. It is pure praise. The psalmist identifies WHO should praise (everything that has breath), why they should praise (God's surpassing greatness), and how they should praise (with every kind of music imaginable).

I find this interesting because it sort of makes this psalm the answer to the Satan's charge against Job. Remember that scene in the heavenly court when the Satan approaches God and says, basically, that the only reason Job, and other human beings, worship God is because of what God does for us? "Have you not put a fence around him (Job) and his house and all that he has, on every side? You have blessed the work of his hands and his possessions have increased in the land. But stretch out your hand now, and touch all that he has, and he will curse you to your face."

Satan's charge is that human worship of God is based solely on THANKSGIVING. We can be grateful for what God has done for us and what God gives us. But absent those, we will not worship God for Who God is. Our worship of God is not based on PRAISE. Or so charges the Satan.

Psalm 150 is therefore the "anti-Satan." It is pure praise. No thanksgiving for what God gives us or what God does for us. No asking God for anything. Just pure praise for God's "surpassing greatness."

Job never knew of the heavenly debate. But in the end, Psalm 150 vindicates him!

Praise the Lord!