The Blood Covenant #26: How Praise Releases God’s Strength

The blood covenant is an exchange, and praise is one of the clearest places it happens: you give God your weakness in praise, and He gives you His strength. In this 26th message of the series, Dr. William P. Hohman shows that praise and strength are linked in Scripture, revisits Leah’s turn to praise when she named her son Judah, and follows Paul and Silas as they sang in a prison at midnight until the doors flew open.

It continues directly from The Blood Covenant: Heaven’s Protection, Part 2 — The Blessing of Judah. Below you will find the full video, a structured summary, the Scripture behind each point (linked to the New King James Version on Bible Gateway), a timestamped outline, and practical steps for this week.

Sermon at a Glance

This message was preached at NTC Ministries in Merrill, Wisconsin, and posted on June 29, 2021. Pastor Hohman notes that the series has now run six months, and that every service could really be about covenant, because the whole Bible is about one covenant.

The sermon runs about 69 minutes, ending in worship. It moves from Leah’s tent to a Philippian dungeon with one theme: praise is where weakness is traded for heaven’s strength.

The Blood Covenant Is an Exchange

In covenant, Pastor Hohman reminds the church, both parties give a hundred percent. Under the old covenant that included sacrifices of lambs, bulls and goats, and the ceremonial element is done away with in the new covenant made by the blood of Jesus. That does not mean believers have no part. It means we give everything we have, which is next to nothing, and God gives everything He has.

He describes two kingdoms. The kingdom of this earth is divided and corrupted, while the church is meant to be perfectly joined together in the same mind and judgment, built by Jesus so that the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it (Matthew 16:18). We are in this world but not of it, so we must learn to live here while functioning by the rules and guidelines of heaven, under the authority of Jesus.

The heart of the blood covenant is what he calls the exchange system. Whatever we give to God, He gives back from heaven. The table below follows the exchanges he names in this message.

When we give our finances, he says, something immediately leaves God’s hand toward us, because He promises to supply all our need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus (Philippians 4:19). The blessing of the Lord makes one rich and adds no sorrow with it (Proverbs 10:22), whereas riches gained by giving in to a corrupt system bring sorrow with them.

Time works the same way. Not forsaking the assembling together (Hebrews 10:25) and hearing and obeying the Word bring a reward in this life and the next, just as God blessed Abraham when he obeyed.

Praise and Strength Go Together

Pastor Hohman turns to the day Jesus healed people in the temple and the children cried, “Hosanna to the Son of David!” When the religious leaders objected, Jesus asked whether they had never read, “Out of the mouth of babes and nursing infants You have perfected praise” (Matthew 21:15–16). He is quoting Psalm 8:2, where the same thought is expressed as strength ordained to silence the enemy and the avenger.

That is why Pastor Hohman teaches that praise and strength are identical in meaning here: when we give God our praise, He gives us His strength. When something blindsides us, our knee-jerk emotional reaction only reaps the corruption of this world. But if we train ourselves to give thanks in everything, because this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for us (1 Thessalonians 5:18), the exchange takes place even before we feel it.

God has ordained this, and he explains the word with a restaurant picture. You place an order and expect to receive what you ordered. God ordered that when we praise, strength is given, because of our enemies. There may be physical enemies, but there is certainly a spiritual one, and praise stills the enemy and the avenger. The Lord inhabits the praises of His people (Psalm 22:3), and heaven’s strength comes with Him.

Because this is covenant made with Jesus’ own blood, the weakest person in the body of Christ has the same strength as anyone else. The very youngest believer can see signs, wonders and miracles in the name of Jesus without a degree or special training. Pastor Hohman calls praise God’s prescription for changing our environment: over every municipality is a principality that should be under the church’s feet, and praise brings an atmosphere where everyone can partake of God’s presence.

He recalls footage of the healing revivals of the 1940s and 1950s, where reporters who came to discredit the meetings gave their lives to the Lord and were healed. Hebrews 13:14–15 calls us to offer a continual sacrifice of praise, because this world is not our permanent home. Even on days when you feel you have no strength for anything, you have enough strength to praise the Lord.

Leah and the Name Judah: From Self to Praise

Last week’s message, he reminds the church, was on the blessing of Judah. The name is built on the Hebrew word yadah, which he explains as lifting up hands to praise and give thanks, making a confession of goodness. Raised hands are a recognized posture of surrender. When we lift our hands, we tell the Lord we surrender to His power, strength and authority. Wherever you see Judah in the Bible, he says, you can read the word praise.

Jacob worked seven years for Rachel but woke after the wedding to find Leah, then worked seven more years for Rachel. Leah was rejected the morning after her wedding, and Pastor Hohman asks the church to imagine that turmoil. Genesis 29:31–35 then records the names she gave her sons:

• Reuben — “see, a son,” which he explains as a keeper of the family name; Leah hoped her husband would now love her.
• Simeon — hearing intelligently; she hoped Jacob would finally understand how she felt.
• Levi — united or attached to; she hoped they would finally make a home together.
• Judah — praise; she said, “Now I will praise the LORD.”

The first three names were about winning Jacob. Everyone, he says, is born with inherent self-centeredness; one of a child’s first words is “mine.” Leah had to have that broken, and she finally said she was not doing this for Jacob but would praise the Lord for what He was doing for her. That pleased God, and Judah received the greatest favor of Jacob’s twelve sons. The message of Judah, he says, is that God’s power comes through our praise.

She held a private praise session in spite of her husband’s scorn, and God changed her future and her family. Thinking life is unfair, Pastor Hohman says, is a rejection of God’s presence. Let God be true and every man a liar (Romans 3:4): praise Him for who the Bible says He is, and remember that it is the thief who comes to steal, kill and destroy, while Jesus came to give abundant life (John 10:10).

He reads a Christian Herald story about a dying Civil War soldier who, instead of asking the chaplain to pray for recovery, asked him to kneel and thank God for his mother, for his salvation, for grace to die with and for a home beyond. The prayer held not a single petition, only gratitude.

Praise the Lord at All Times

We often look for God somewhere else, Pastor Hohman says, when we should be creating an environment for Him right where we are. Jesus said the kingdom of God does not come with observation, for it is within you (Luke 17:20–21). The world’s many religions show that people are looking for God, but the good news is that He found us.

In Psalm 34:1–3 David resolves to bless the Lord at all times, with His praise continually in his mouth. He ties this to the Lord’s Prayer: “Your kingdom come. Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven” (Matthew 6:10). Continual praise is how heaven comes into your life, home and family. Complaining that the world is corrupt helps no one; the world needs people declaring that God is good, that He heals and that miracles still happen.

He returns to Psalm 24:7–10: lift up your heads, O you gates, and the King of glory shall come in. The gates are our five physical senses, enslaved since Adam’s sin. That is why people cannot see the kingdom unless they are born again (John 3:3), and why Jesus went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil (Acts 10:38). If we do not lift our senses to God, our feelings become a stronghold and we are in bondage to them.

Holding back praise because of how we feel positions us toward the corruption of this world. Jesus asked why people call Him Lord and do not do what He says (Luke 6:46). The King of glory is the Lord of hosts, and the strength of heaven’s armies comes in when we praise. In marriage, he adds, one spouse is often up when the other is down, and covenant partners help each other turn back to praise, submitting to one another in the fear of God (Ephesians 5:21).

Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, nor does corruption inherit incorruption (1 Corinthians 15:50). Galatians 6:7–10 says whoever sows to the flesh reaps corruption, but whoever sows to the Spirit reaps everlasting life, so we must not grow weary in doing good. Praise is sowing to the Spirit. He urges the church to build an atmosphere that draws people, as strangers in the grocery store have been drawn to talk with him.

Turning Trials Into Praise

When bad news, disappointment or hurt comes, as it did for Leah, the tendency is to shrink back. Pastor Hohman points to David’s words that when father and mother forsake him, the Lord will take care of him (Psalm 27:10). One of the most important ways to deal with the problems of this world is to press in with praise. Some of the hardest seasons of life, he says, contribute to the greatest blessings, but a person who will not praise only sees things getting worse and lives under Murphy’s law.

Those who have grown in intimacy through praise can say this too will pass, and then God will show Himself strong. Jesus said that in this world we will have tribulation (John 16:33). Christians face the same problems as everyone else, but praise turns problems into blessings and weaknesses into strengths.

Every one of us needs reminding, Pastor Hohman admits, including him. That is why Paul says to seek those things which are above and set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth (Colossians 3:1–2). He applies it to our affections, our emotions. God does not want pain to simply fade over time; He wants to wash it away until you forget it, as he says he has with many past issues.

Trials clarify what we really believe. James 1:12 says, “Blessed is the man who endures temptation; for when he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life.” He shares a saying the Lord gave him: God will change our circumstances and deliver us from every bondage when we exchange our complaints for praise.

Paul and Silas at Midnight

The closing story shows the blood covenant exchange in action. In Acts 16:16–18, a slave girl with a spirit of divination followed Paul and his companions for many days, crying out that they were servants of the Most High God. Pastor Hohman reads it as mocking. Paul, greatly annoyed, commanded the spirit in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her, and it left that very hour.

Her masters, seeing their profit gone, dragged Paul and Silas before the magistrates (Acts 16:19–24). They were stripped, beaten with rods, thrown into the inner prison and fastened in stocks. Most of us, he says, would have moaned about the injustice. They were in real agony in a filthy dungeon.

Instead, Acts 16:25 says that at midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening. They used what strength they had to praise rather than complain. In covenant, God had to answer with His strength. Acts 16:26–28 describes a great earthquake: the foundations shook, every door opened and everyone’s chains were loosed, not only theirs.

That was not all. In Acts 16:29–34 the jailer fell trembling and asked what he must do to be saved, and he and his whole household believed and were baptized. Pastor Hohman says this is what praise in church should do: people come in weary and bound, and as the church praises with all its strength, they too are loosed. Reverence, he says, is not seeing how quiet we can be.

He asks what prison is holding you back from the dreams God gave you. God can do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think (Ephesians 3:20). He recalls being publicly pushed out of town in the church’s early days, yet they kept praising, and he points to what God has done since. If you praise, he says, the Lion of the tribe of Judah will stand up in your prison and break open the walls. The church closes with Psalm 54:6: “I will freely sacrifice to You; I will praise Your name, O LORD, for it is good.”

Living the Blood Covenant This Week

Pastor Hohman ends with an invitation to receive Jesus and an extended time of worship. Here are practical steps drawn from this blood covenant message:

• Trade weakness for strength. On the days you feel you have nothing left, use the strength you do have to praise God for who He is.
• Lift your hands as surrender. Like Judah’s name, let raised hands say you yield to God’s authority and strength.
• Move from “mine” to “thank You.” Notice where you are trying to earn love or recognition, and turn it into thanks for what God has done.
• Praise at all times. Make Psalm 34:1 a daily habit in the morning, at work and before you sleep.
• Help each other back up. In marriage and friendship, when one is down, the other leads the way back into praise.
• Sing at midnight. In your hardest moment, choose a hymn or a Scripture of God’s goodness over a complaint, and watch for Him to open doors.

Timestamped Outline

• 0:00 Six months and 26 messages on covenant
• 2:18 A hundred percent from both parties
• 4:28 The exchange system of the covenant
• 6:30 Giving our energy in praise
• 8:25 Psalm 8:2: ordained strength
• 10:30 The weakest believer has God’s strength
• 11:38 Healing revivals and Hebrews 13
• 14:43 Enough strength to praise
• 15:36 Judah, yadah and surrender
• 17:49 Jacob, Rachel and Leah
• 19:48 Leah’s sons: Genesis 29:31–35
• 26:27 The dying soldier’s prayer of thanks
• 28:38 The kingdom of God is within you
• 29:37 Psalm 34: praise at all times
• 32:52 Psalm 24: lift up your heads
• 38:15 Praise in marriage
• 39:09 Sowing to the Spirit: Galatians 6
• 41:20 Pressing in with praise in trials
• 44:39 James 1: trials clarify what we believe
• 46:45 Paul, Silas and the slave girl
• 49:58 Midnight praise in the dungeon
• 54:42 The jailer’s household is saved
• 58:02 The Lion of the tribe of Judah
• 59:12 Prayer of salvation and worship

Blood Covenant Series

This message is part of a long teaching series at NTC Ministries. Start from the beginning or continue where this one leaves off:

• First message: The Blood Covenant
• Previous: The Blood Covenant: Heaven’s Protection, Part 2 — The Blessing of Judah
• You are here: The Blood Covenant #26: How Praise Releases God’s Strength
• Next: The Blood Covenant #27 — Praise That Changes Your Environment

Frequently Asked Questions

Does the new covenant mean God does everything and I do nothing?

No. Pastor Hohman teaches that the ceremonial sacrifices are done away with, but covenant still means both parties give a hundred percent. Our part is to give God everything we are and have, including our time, our finances and our praise. The difference is that what we bring is small and what He brings is everything, so the exchange is overwhelmingly in our favor.

Is quiet worship more reverent than loud praise?

Pastor Hohman challenges the idea that reverence means seeing how quiet we can be. He describes Paul and Silas singing so that every prisoner heard, and he encourages the church to praise with all its strength. His concern is not volume for its own sake but holding nothing back, because praise is where we hand God our strength and receive His in return.

Will praising God make my problems go away?

Not in the sense of a life without trouble. Pastor Hohman says Christians face the same problems as everyone else, and Jesus said we would have tribulation. What changes is the outcome. Through praise, he teaches, problems are turned into blessings and weaknesses into strengths, and some of the hardest seasons become the source of the greatest blessings. Those who refuse to praise tend to see only things getting worse.

Scripture References

All passages open in the New King James Version on Bible Gateway:

• Psalm 8:2 and Matthew 21:15–16 — praise ordained from the mouths of babes
• Genesis 29:31–35 — Leah names Judah
• Hebrews 13:14–15 — a continual sacrifice of praise
• Psalm 34:1–3 — I will bless the Lord at all times
• Psalm 24:7–10 — lift up your heads, O you gates
• Galatians 6:7–10 — sowing to the Spirit
• James 1:12 — the crown of life
• Acts 16:25 — Paul and Silas sing at midnight
• Psalm 54:6 — a freewill offering of praise

How this summary was made: written with AI assistance from the sermon’s own transcript and checked against the Scriptures listed above.

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