Morning Prayer: Praising God in Adversity

 


Today's morning prayer focuses on everyone and everything praising God. But what about when bad things (or things perceived as bad) happen?

Praising God in adversity is not about pretending suffering is good. It is about orientation: choosing to face God rather than collapse inward. Praise becomes an act of trust, a way of saying, “You are still God, even here.” It shifts the heart from fear to relationship, from isolation to belonging, from chaos to meaning.

🌿 Why praise God when life feels like adversity?

Three themes emerge across Scripture and Christian reflection:

1. Praise anchors you in God’s character, not your circumstances

Habakkuk praised God even as crops failed and disaster loomed, because his joy rested in who God is, not in what was happening around him. This is the heart of adversity‑praise:

  • Circumstances change.

  • God’s nature does not.

Praise becomes a way of saying:

“My life is shaking, but You are not.”

2. Praise reframes the experience of suffering

Paul and Silas sang hymns in prison—bloodied, chained, and uncertain. Their worship didn’t deny pain; it reframed it. Praise shifts the inner landscape:

  • from “Why is this happening to me?”

  • to “I am not alone in this.”

Neuroscience even confirms that gratitude rewires the brain toward resilience and hope.

3. Praise is a form of spiritual defiance

Worship in crisis is not passive. It is a declaration of loyalty:

“I don’t understand this, but I still believe You are good.” It is a refusal to let suffering define the story. It is a way of standing upright in a world that wants to bend you. Worship becomes a weapon against despair.

🌿 How does one praise God in adversity?

Not by pretending. Not by forcing cheerfulness. Scripture models praise that is honest, even raw:

  • Lament first (David does this constantly).

  • Name the pain without shame.

  • Remember God’s past faithfulness.

  • Speak truth aloud even when you don’t feel it.

  • Let praise be small if it must be—a whispered “Help me,” a psalm read slowly, a single line of gratitude.

Praise in adversity is often quieter, humbler, more stripped-down than praise in joy. But it is deeper.

🌿 Why does this matter for “everyone and everything praising God”?

Morning Prayer’s theme—all creation praising God—is not about noise or triumph. It is about alignment. Even in adversity, one can praise God because:

  • Praise restores relationship.

  • Praise restores perspective.

  • Praise restores hope.

  • Praise restores identity (“I am God’s, even now”).

Adversity does not silence praise; it purifies it.

🌿 A closing thought

To praise God in adversity is not to celebrate suffering. It is to declare that suffering does not have the final word. Praise is the soul’s way of staying turned toward the light when the valley is dark. It is the quiet insistence that God is still God, and we are still held.

 

Read more Morning Prayer posts: MSI Press Blog

Note about Morning Prayer: Each morning prayer post reflects on one phrase from the Morning Prayer from the Liturgy of the Hours. which can be found in the iBreviary (a downloadable app), Universalis (website) or Divine Office (publication and website). Post may be assisted by AI in image generation and content (research and/or wording).

Morning Prayer posts inspired by Being Catholic in Troubled Times (Dennis Ortman)

Book Description:

These are times that try our souls. This book is addressed to all, not just Catholics, who search for deeper meaning in tough times. Our age is marked by division and alienation. We long for some message that will bring peace to our world and our hearts.

This book suggests that the Catholic faith can provide strength in these troubled times. The word "catholic" means "all-embracing, universal." Nothing is excluded in the catholic mind. The truth that sets us free can be found everywhere, especially in unexpected places. It is often hidden in plain sight. In our darkest moments, we find new light and life. When we are most despairing, a ray of hope shines through.



Dr. Dennis Ortman, former priest and current psychologist, is the author of Anger Anonymous, Anxiety Anonymous, Depression Anonymous, Being Catholic in Troubled Times, and Life, Liberty, and COVID-19.


For more posts by and about Dennis and his award-winning books, click HERE.



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