The great preacher Charles Spurgeon said, "When you get to the 145th Psalm, you enter the Beulah Land of the Psalms." In other words, Spurgeon thought of this psalm as superior in certain respects to all the rest. And as I was reading through the psalms choosing which ones to use as texts for our study, I wrote the word "Sermon" at the head of this one.
Poetically, the psalm is an acrostic, with each verse beginning with the corresponding letter of the Hebrew alphabet. And as a poem it is arranged in three stanzas of seven verses each which makes a convenient order for our study.
Section one is a declaration of the greatness of God and the proper response to this greatness. The first two verses serve as David’s introduction to this section and to the psalm.
1-2
This hymn is about praising God... For David, it is about praising "my God the King." David himself was a king in an earthly fashion, but to him God alone was the King. And as he goes on to say, nothing but a good King whose rule is a kindly and benevolent and just and righteous rule, whose laws are all just and good laws for our welfare and blessing. Our joy is that such a God is our King.
David will praise the name of this God. The name of God represents the attributes of God, who God really is. David is saying that God being who he is, God is such a God that I am going to praise him. David’s praise is not blind praise but rather it is a rational praise that flows from an understanding and appreciation of who God really is.
"Everyday I will praise you..." This is something to be done everyday. "Give thanks in all circumstances..." (1 Thess. 5:18) "Sing and make music in your heart to the Lord, always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ." (Ephesians 5:19-20) There is alwasys some reason for praising God. Even on difficult days, and especially on difficult days we should make sure we praise. God is never more glorified and faith is never more real than those times when we can praise God during sad and depressing times. There should never a day go by when I have not offered my praise and thanksgiving to God. A day without a word of praise to God is a day that much wasted. If I were to ask any Christian, "Do you pray? Everyday?", most would probably, hopefully answer in the affirmative. But if I were to ask, "Do you praise God everyday?", I am afraid fewer would answer in the affirmative. Too often we pray to God but fail to praise him.
Daily praise was David’s practice, it was Jesus’ practice, and it ought to be our practice. It is fitting to God and of great benefit to us. What can lift the spirit and brighten the disposition and what can do more to cleanse us from the ugly spirit of complaint more than the simple practice of praising God everyday in prayer, remembering and counting and verbalizing our blessings everyday in prayer?
This David personally resolves to do. "I will praise your name..." It isn’t enough for the congregation to praise God, David wants to do it for himself. The praises of the congregation are precious only to the extent each individual with all his heart is honestly and sincerely praising God in prayer and song.
And for David, praise is a choice, a determination, something he resolves to do. "I will ..." He seems to understand that in order to praise God, certainly to praise him everyday, I must resolve and decide to do it. Otherwise circumstances will hinder me. Depression, tragedy, sickness, death, injustice, poverty, losses and crosses all make it difficult to have an attitude and conversation of praise, and therefore if I am to praise God everyday, I must make a choice and determination to do everyday, the good days along with the bad, the pleasant along with the unpleasant.
In this way David introduces the theme to the psalm - praise to God for who he is and what he has done. And who is he?
3-7
God is great and therefore most worthy of praise. Indeed, his greatness no one can fathom. "God is magnificent. There are no boundaries to his greatness." (Peterson) Since God is so great, there is never any danger of praising him too much. We can never praise him too highly.
And God is so worthy of praise each generation should hand on the praise of God as a precious legacy to the next one. "One generation will commend your works to another..." This is the way God’s praise is continued from one generation to the next. We teach our children to praise God for the same reasons we have spent our lives in God’s praise. One of the saddest statements in the Bible is that which reports that "there arose a generation who knew not the Lord.." Pity the fathers and mothers who fail to pass on this legacy to their children. Of all our priorities in life, surely few would compare to the task of passing on to our children the practice of giving God praise. It is a wonderful thing when a Marta Francisco and Thomas Ibbetson and Terry Collins and Jonathan Bryan and others can be seen carrying the banner of God’s praise to the next generation.
God is to be praised because God is great, and he is great simply because he is so perfectly good. "They will celebrate your abundant goodness and joyfully sing of your righteousness." (Verse 7) Maybe the greatest thing about God is that he is good. For how praiseworthy would his power or his eternal nature or his self existence or his position as King or his character or his standards or even his mercy be, how praiseworthy would any of this be if God were not - good?
And because God is so perfectly good, they will "joyfully sing of your righteousness." Singing is the God ordained language by which men can express their highest joy. Singing is the language of the holy angels at the birth of the Christ. Singing is the language of heaven itself and most marvelous of all, it is God’s language. "The Lord your God is might to save... he will rejoice over you with singing." (Zephanian 3:17) We sing because God is great and because God is good. The child’s prayer says it all - "God is great. God is good. This is why we praise God in song.
And what is it about God that is so good? First, his predominant nature and his kingdom is one of love. This is section 2.
8-13a
There are surely two sides to God, the fiery side and the light side, the unpleasant side and the pleasant side, God’s anger as well as his love. But the psalmist highlights God’s love over his anger. God is "slow to anger but rich in love." We can be thankful it is so - and here is a great reason to offer God praise.
The real will of God tends toward love that expresses itself in compassion and mercy. Wrath is only the background of his nature which he reluctantly and only after a long time of waiting lets loose against those who spurn his great mercy. God’s love excludes no one who does not exclude himself.
For this reason, God’s saints declare the glory of God’s kingdom whose King is such a loving and compassionate and merciful King and which kingdom, unlike all other earthly kingdoms, knows no bounds either in space or in time. God is a King over all the earth, indeed over all the universe, and his subjects come from every nation. And this loving God is an eternal king whose kingdom will endure forever. Nations rise and fall, kingdoms come and go, centuries begin and end, but God’s dominion is forever. There is no danger of God being voted out of office!
And God’s goodness is not only expressed in his nature of loving mercy, but his goodness can be clearly seen in what he does. This is section 3...
13b-21
Earthly kings often glory in the terror of their power and the splendor of their majesty, but here is a King whose most noticable quality is his love toward all his creation and his delight in blessing the poor and needy. He sends his rain on the just as well as the unjust. He is loving toward all that he has made. Here is a King who condescends to the poor and needy and who upholds (holds up) all who fall and lifts up all who are bowed down! What a God and what a King. Ever been there? Fallen, bowed down with whatever burden or grief or trouble or failure might have come your way? God is a God and a King who stoops to hold up those who have fallen and lift up those who are bowed down!
Here is a God whose goodness is demonstrated in his provision for all creation for whom God "gives them their food at the proper time." He opens his hand and satisfies the desires of every living thing. God is good because he is generous to a fault. His hand is open - and generous.
And God is near (in mercy) to all who pray to him sincerely, in truth. God is there, listening to all who pray and mean it. He fulfulls the desires of those who fear him, hears their cry and delivers them out of all their troubles. (Verse 19)
Finally, this God watches over all who love him while im time he will destroy all the incorrigibly wicked with an everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord. But in every respect, in all that he does, God is righteous and loving. God is good, and God is great because he is good. In life we have a choice - God’s blessing or his curse. God excludes from his blessing only those who exclude themselves!
David’s conclusion? "My mouth will speak in praise of the Lord. Let every creature praise his holy name forever and ever." The KJV has it "... and let all flesh bless his name forever." To bless a person is to do something good to or for that person. "He blessed me" means "He did something good to or for me."
The proper response to such a great and good God is to bless him by doing something good for him. Would you like to wash Jesus’ feet? You can wash his feet by caring for his poor people and relieving their needs. You cannot invite Jesus over to a meal or feed him exactly. He is not hungry, but some of his people are. I’ve seen them. Give them a cup of cold water in Jesus’ name, and he will accept it as a blessing to himself. Do you love God today such that you would like to do something for him? Arise, and do it and you will be a blessing to him.