Psalm 103 is a favorite among students and preachers of scripture. It is a psalm of praise and thanksgiving beginning this way...

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"Praise the Lord, O my soul; all my inmost being, praise his holy name."

The KJV uses the word "Bless" in place of praise. To bless is more than to praise. It is to praise God with affection and gratitude.

David speaks of praising the "LORD." The Hebrew word is "Jehovah." It is Jehovah, the God who has revealed himself as "I AM WHO I AM," the God who is eternal and personal and from whom everything exists.

No matter what has happened, it is always time to bless the name of the LORD. Even after all the problems he endured, Job would still say, "The LORD giveth and the LORD taketh away. Blessed be the name of the LORD." Sometimes, like Job, we have to take ourselves by the collar and make a determination that no matter what has happened, we are going to bless the name of the LORD.

And who is telling David, "Bless the LORD"? It is David himself. "Bless the LORD, O my soul." David is concerned not first with the attitude and praise of others as much as he is concerned for himself. He refuses to allow his soul to become dull and listless and comatose amidst God’s blessings. He says to himself, "Come, my soul, wake up! You have great work to do."

And in what respect does David call for personal blessing and praise? He calls for this blessing to come from within his soul. So I am not to bless the Lord with my voice only. I am to bless God from within my own soul. The music of the soul is what pleases God’s ear. Singing and prayer must come from the heart and soul. The heart must be in every word, the spirit in every note.

And when we bless God, the excercise should be intense...

"... all my inmost being, praise his holy name."

We ought not to worship God in a half-hearted way as if it were only a weary duty we want to finish as quickly as possible so we can get out of here and go home to the important things. No, it is "... all that is within me, bless his holy name." David is rousing himself as we should all rouse ourselves to wake up, and put all that we have into our worship.

"Come, my soul, marshall all your faculties - your memory, your will, your judgment, your intellect, your heart, all that is within me." Mechanical worship is easy worship, but worthless. We are to put everything we have into the worship and praise of God’s holy name. God is not to be half praised. When it comes to praising God, give me a man on fire!

It is not specified that we are to praise God’s lovely name or his merciful or gracious name, but his holy name. The wonder of God forgiving us is that a holy God who is so morally just and pure as to be unwilling to even look upon evil is nevertheless willing to forgive.

And as if to underscore this call, David rouses himself a second time.

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"Bless the LORD, O my soul..." And how is it possible to always be blessing God and praising God? Why are we to be blessing God and praising him? For what purpose?

"... and forget not all his benefits toward me." They are not one, they are many. And they are easily forgotten. It is human nature to forget God’s blessings, to forget what we have to praise and thank God for. So Jesus instructs his disciples to "Do this in remembrance of me." "Remember me. Make it a point to think about and remember me." We have to remember God’s blessings on purpose. We catalogue, not what we don’t have, but what do have. Then, we can praise. "O, my soul, bless God, don’t forget a single blessing!" (The Message)

And what are those blessings?

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God forgives all our sins. Forgiveness leads the list of God’s blessings. This is first because it is the most important. If you have your sins forgiven, you have all - peace with God, a good life now, hope for eternity ... No matter what else is true, if you have your sins forgiven, you have been delivered from hell and therefore have a thousand reasons to bless the LORD, and no reason to complain. If you have been delivered from an eternal hell, you’re OK.

And it is not merely that God has forgiven or that he will someday forgive you while you lie on your deathbed. He presently forgives. He continually forgives. Were you more saved the day you were baptized than you are today? No, because God continues to forgive today as surely as he did yesterday. Forgiveness of sin is not merely available when it comes time to die. We are too often sinning, but the good news is that God is always forgiving. And the truth is that if God is continuing to forgive, you will not be more perfectly forgiven in heaven than you are right now!

And what a great word is that word "all". God is not stingy or grudging when it comes to forgiving our sins. God forgives all our sins, the ones we know and the ones we don’t know, the ones others know and the ones others don’t know, the big ones as well as the smaller ones. All our sins, every single one is forgiven!

And by the way, if this is the greatest of all God’s blessings, we need it before anything else. If the Holy Spirit puts it first, let us seek it first. If you are guilty, there is something you need before you need anything else. Before you need reformation or health or bible knowledge or anything else, you need God’s forgiveness. It is truly your greatest and most immediate need. Before you do anything else, get your sins forgiven! If forgiveness is a present blessing, seek it now. Do not be satisfied unless you are forgiven now.

The God who forgives all our sins also heals all our diseases. His name is Jehovah Rophi, the healer of all our diseases. He saves not just the soul, but both body and soul. Temporary healing might come right now, but perfect healing will come with the resurrection. It all comes from the Lord whose intention it is to save both body and soul.

The God who forgives, redeems life. He gives life back to us and redeems our lives from destruction here (KJV) and an eternal hell there.

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He puts a crown on us. He treats us like a king. The psalmist may be using the word crown in the sense of something that beautifies. We may well ask the question, what is the true crown of a man’s life? What is the true adornment, the true decoration of a human life? It is what God gives when he pours out his love and mercy on us?

Satisfaction. The richest man in America has not likely found it. The most powerful man in the world has not won it. The proudest king cannot command it. Satisfaction is a spiritual blessing that comes only from the hand of God who alone is sufficient to fill and satisfy the heart of man.

And he satisfies us with "good things" and only good things. God gives good gifts, good things. What a happy thought, to have good things from a good God and to have an abundance of them and to have such joy from them that you can say, "I am satisfied. It is enough. I am content."

Not only does God satisfy. He renews our youth. He makes us young again. This will be complete in the resurrection, but even now there is substantial renewal. Everyday we each get older. Someday soon, the second childhood will come - again no teeth, no sight. We can hardly slow down the aging process. But for Christians, God is making us younger. For even though outwardly we are wasting away (Everyone sees it but you!), inwardly we are being renewed day by day.

From personal blessings, David turns to the matter of the blessings for which the people of God can generally praise God.

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Are you poor, abused, taken advantage of? God works what is right and just for "all the oppressed." That means you. You may have to bide your time, but justice is coming for those who are oppressed. Count your blessings and praise God. Even the poor and downtrodden have reason to sing. "God makes everything come out right; he puts victims back on their feet."

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Quoting from Ex. 34 where God reveals himself to Moses as the "compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger and abounding in love..."

And these qualities are particularly demonstrated in the fact that God will not always accuse nor harbor anger forever, he will not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities. Otherwise, we would not be here this morning. His love is infinite and our guilt has been totally removed from us. David writes about it, but these are truths only clearly revealed in Jesus. It is worth our time this morning just to meditate on these truths about God - and to bless him for it.

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God is like a father to us, but not just any father. He is like a father who has great compassion on his kids, another concept about God only fully revealed in the New Testament. Nature never sheds a tear for us, but God does. And how does God work out this compassion in regards to man?

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God knows that we are going to get old and die. We are all like flowers that fade, strong and beautiful when young, but in a short time our flower fades. But there is something that is not a fading flower. God’s love is eternal. And his love will work for us an eternal good, an eternal home, and also for our children! We can all be together in an eternal family reunion to come.

19-22 The LORD is the King. And he is on his throne. He is in control. He rules over all. It is reason for all his creation to praise.

But David closes with the same call with which he began the psalm, a call to himself that while he was busy preaching to others to bless God and not forget all his benefits, that he himself would be sure to bless God and not forget his blessings. It is easy for us who are familiar with God’s blessings to forget them. So each of us must likewise look to ourselves and rouse ourselves and exhort ourselves, "Bless the LORD, O my soul."