The other day, I found myself thinking ahead to next year. Next May, to be exact. In the Lord’s will, my husband will graduate with his PhD in approximately 12 months.

(Not that anyone is counting, of course. BUT WE ALL ARE.)

As I thought about what an incredible time that will be, I imagined myself giving such praise to God for bringing us through the 4 years of PhD hard. Giving the courage and wisdom to begin. Giving the strength, mental fortitude, and financial resources to make it through all 4 years. I can already imagine it.

But God revealed something to me during my imaginary praise session. I’ll share three verses with you and I bet you’ll figure it out faster than I did:

I will bless the LORD at all times; his praise shall continually be in my mouth.
Psalm 34:1

In God we have boasted continually, and we will give thanks to your name forever.
Psalm 44:8

I will thank you forever, because you have done it.
I will wait for your name, for it is good, in the presence of the godly.
Psalm 52:9

Too often, I wait to praise God until the end. I want to see how it all turns out to make sure I get the result I wanted in the first place. So hey, God, you do your thing, and if I like it, I’ll praise you when this is all over, okay?

That attitude doesn’t quite align with those verses above, now does it?

So here’s a new idea: Instead of me imagining giving thanks to God next year, what if I go ahead and praise Him right now when we’re 75% through?

God, thank you for all you have done to bring us to this place in our lives.
You know better than we do what a struggle it was to get to this place because you’re the One Who brought us here!
I praise you for your faithful work, unfailing love, and constant goodness.
I praise you because no matter the outcome, YOU ARE GOOD.
Help me to stop waiting until the end to praise you, but to praise you the whole time!

I’m so thankful God is teaching me this lesson before we’re done with this PhD journey. I want to praise Him throughout the entire process. He is good and deserves praise through it all, not just at the end!

How about you? Is there an area of your life in which you’re waiting to praise God?
Join me in praising Him now?