It is difficult to imagine a lovelier Psalm than Psalm 103. When our children were growing up, the price they “paid” for their first leather-bound Bibles was memorizing Psalm 103. Across the centuries, countless believers have turned to these lines to find their spirits lifted, a renewed commitment to praise and gratitude, an incentive to prayer, a restoration of a God-centered worldview. This psalm could easily claim our meditations for the rest of the month, for the rest of the year. Instead, we focus on three of its features.
(1) The psalm is bracketed by exhortations to praise. At the front end, David exhorts himself, and, by his example, his readers: “Praise the Lord, O my soul; all my inmost being, praise his holy name” (103:1). Implicitly David recognizes that it is distressingly easy to preserve the externals of praise, with nothing erupting from within the heart of God’s image-bearers. This will not do: “all my inmost being, praise his holy name.” By the end of the psalm, however honest and profound this individual’s worship, the framework for praising such a God is too small, for after all, God’s kingdom rules over all (103:19): “Praise the Lord, you his angels, you mighty ones who do his bidding, who obey his word. Praise the Lord, all his heavenly hosts, you his servants who do his will. Praise the Lord, all his works, everywhere in his dominion. Praise the Lord, O my soul” (103:20–22). Now the psalmist’s praise is one with the praise of heaven, with the praise of the entire created order.
(2) When David starts to enumerate “all his benefits” (103:2), he begins with the forgiveness of sins (103:3). Here is a man who understands what is of greatest importance. If we have everything but God’s forgiveness, we have nothing of worth; if we have God’s forgiveness, everything else of value is also promised (cf. Rom. 8:32).
(3) David soon moves from the blessings he enjoys as an individual believer to the Lord’s public justice (103:6), to his gracious self-disclosure to Moses and the Israelites (103:7–18). Here he stays the longest time, turning over and over in his mind the greatest blessings the Lord has granted to his people. Above all, he focuses once again on the sheer privilege of having sins forgiven, removed, forgotten. All of this, David perceives, stems from the character of God. “The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love” (103:8). He deals with our sin—but compassionately, fully bearing in mind our weak frames. We may be creatures of time, but “from everlasting to everlasting the Lord’s love is with those who fear him” (103:17).
(1) The psalm is bracketed by exhortations to praise. At the front end, David exhorts himself, and, by his example, his readers: “Praise the Lord, O my soul; all my inmost being, praise his holy name” (103:1). Implicitly David recognizes that it is distressingly easy to preserve the externals of praise, with nothing erupting from within the heart of God’s image-bearers. This will not do: “all my inmost being, praise his holy name.” By the end of the psalm, however honest and profound this individual’s worship, the framework for praising such a God is too small, for after all, God’s kingdom rules over all (103:19): “Praise the Lord, you his angels, you mighty ones who do his bidding, who obey his word. Praise the Lord, all his heavenly hosts, you his servants who do his will. Praise the Lord, all his works, everywhere in his dominion. Praise the Lord, O my soul” (103:20–22). Now the psalmist’s praise is one with the praise of heaven, with the praise of the entire created order.
(2) When David starts to enumerate “all his benefits” (103:2), he begins with the forgiveness of sins (103:3). Here is a man who understands what is of greatest importance. If we have everything but God’s forgiveness, we have nothing of worth; if we have God’s forgiveness, everything else of value is also promised (cf. Rom. 8:32).
(3) David soon moves from the blessings he enjoys as an individual believer to the Lord’s public justice (103:6), to his gracious self-disclosure to Moses and the Israelites (103:7–18). Here he stays the longest time, turning over and over in his mind the greatest blessings the Lord has granted to his people. Above all, he focuses once again on the sheer privilege of having sins forgiven, removed, forgotten. All of this, David perceives, stems from the character of God. “The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love” (103:8). He deals with our sin—but compassionately, fully bearing in mind our weak frames. We may be creatures of time, but “from everlasting to everlasting the Lord’s love is with those who fear him” (103:17).
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