Celebrating His Deliverance
Today’s Reading: Psalm 116 (SOAP 116:12-13)
Lord I Love you
The Psalmist declares his love for the LORD. Why? Because the Lord heard his plea for mercy and listened to him. Not only does he declare his love but he says, for as long as he lives, he is going to call on the Lord whenever he needs help. I get it. It’s an awful feeling to talk to people who you think – or worse yet – who you know don’t hear you or just aren’t listening. I get the sense by the Psalmist’s response, that this is how he had been feeling but notice how – when he realized he had been heard – everything changed.
Everything Changes When it becomes personal
When our relationship with God becomes personal everything changes. His testimony becomes one of praise and declaration of God’s mercy and fairness, of His compassion and protection. Now, because he knew, first hand, these things about God He knew he could rest in Him and what He had done. He tells how God rescued him from death, kept his eyes from tears, and his feet from the wrong path. So, in response, the Psalmist declares that he will serve the LORD and wants to know how he can repay Him for all His acts of kindness.
How Then Should I Live?
Like the Psalmist, when he truly realized the truth of all God had done, our hearts should be moved to seek a way to repay Him for all of His kindnesses and, as the Psalmist said, “to celebrate the deliverance” the LORD has given us and call on “the name of the LORD”. The LORD, our God, has delivered us from the power of sin and death and while we can never repay Him for what He has done – His word does give us a hint as to how we can show our love and appreciation. In John 14:15, Jesus said, “If you love me keep My commandments”, defining, in Mark 12:29-31, that the greatest commandment is loving the LORD our God with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength. The second is equal to the first and it is to love our neighbors as ourselves. Remember, God isn’t after our burnt offerings and sacrifices, but as Samuel said to Saul, He simply wants our hearts. The same applies to us today.
May we be moved to give Him our heart.
“What is more pleasing to the LORD: your burnt offerings and sacrifices or your obedience to his voice? Obedience is far better than sacrifice. Listening to him is much better than offering the fat of rams.”
1 Samuel 15:22
Prayer and worship Response
Lord, I give You my heart! For all You have given me. For all of Your kindness. For Your deliverance from sin and death, for Your faithfulness to me through the years, Your healing hand that I have seen, Your provisions that I have needed, Your love and guidance that I would be lost without. – I will praise You and seek to walk in Your ways all of my days! – Oh yes LORD, I give You my heart! – In Jesus’ Name +
(I do not own this song)
More Insight
Want more on this Psalm and “Celebrating His Deliverance”? Visit the link below –
Love God Greatly Blog Post