Psalm 149: Praise with a New Song

Verse 1: 

Praise the Lord. Sing to the Lord a new song, his praise in the assembly of his faithful people.

The poet urges us to praise with a new song. What does it mean to praise with a new song? Firstly, a new song corresponds to an old song. Both songs praise God. However, if the old song implies a song stuck in mannerism, the new song is one that breaks away, a song that encompasses heart, life, will, and strength. This song is both familiar and unfamiliar. This is because, surprisingly, people cannot pour their bodies and hearts into anything other than Mammon. The old world that the poet speaks of is a world that praised with all its will and strength to something other than God. The poet asks us to escape from that world and sing a new song in a new world. The new world is a space and time that praises God with body and heart. In this new world of praising with a new song, God becomes the creator of the one who praises (verse 2). This world is inseparable from God and the one who praises Him. It's a new world where God and the one who praises communicate through God's life force, and the sound and melody resonating from the clay (Adam) filled with God's life force is the new song. The ability to sing a new song is the glory that the poet speaks of (verse 9). The poet invites us, beyond the ages, to resonate and praise each other with such a new song in the assembly of saints, where each person plays (resonates) God's life force.