It is good to give thanks to the Lord, to sing praises to your name, O most high; to declare your steadfast love in the morning, and your faithfulness by night.
– Psalm 92:1–2
Oh, I love that. A part of me wants to just keep reading the rest of the Psalm. It’s so good, but just the way it starts.
Psalm 92:1–2 Is a Psalm of Honor and Praise
It is good to give thanks to the Lord. That is true. It is really good to give thanks to God. It is good for us to give thanks to God. To sing praises to your name, O most high. It is good, it’s right, it’s pleasing. It’s delightful to give thanks to God and to sing praises to his name. I want to encourage you to make it a priority in your life to give thanks to the Lord, to sing praises to his name.
Make sure there is a regular routine pattern in your life where you are stopping and giving thanks to the Lord. Specifically for his goodness, his grace, and his mercy and his gifts, and where you are singing praises to his name. Yes, when you gather together with the church, but also on your own. It is good to be alone with God and just sing praises to his name.
Then I love verse two. To declare your steadfast love in the morning, and your faithfulness by night. Just picture that kind of day. You get up in the morning and you declare the steadfast love of God from the beginning of your day to say, God, I trust in your love. Your love never fails. Your mercy is new every morning. To declare that in the morning and then at night, to look back at God’s grace during the day and to praise him and thank him for his faithfulness, for his presence with us, his provision for us all day long. It’s good to declare his steadfast love in the morning and his faithfulness at night. What a way to live.
Psalm 92:1–2 Is a Psalm of Gratitude
We pray, oh God, according to your word in Psalm 92, it is really good to give thanks to you and we have so much reason to give thanks to you, oh God. We praise you for your grace, for your goodness, for mercy in our lives. For all the good gifts we have. From the breath we’re breathing to the water we drink and the food we eat to the good gift of friends, family, brothers and sisters in Christ.
We thank you for the church. We thank you for your salvation of us. For forgiving us of our sins. For making us new creation. We thank you for hope. Lord, we thank you for peace and passes all understanding. We thank you for joy that supersedes circumstances. God, we thank you for the way you love us and lead us and guide us and provide for us. We sing praises to your name.
Oh God, if I had more confidence in my ability to lead others in song, I would just start singing right now. God, we love singing to your name. We love shouting your praises and we declare your steadfast love in the morning. You wake us up with love for us. You wake us up with new mercy waiting for us every day. We declare your steadfast love in the morning and your faithfulness by night. Every night as we walk through this world, we can look back in the day and see you have been with us. You have helped us. God, you have guided us. You have never forsaken us. You are always faithful to us. Oh God, we give thanks to you. We sing praises to your name. We declare your steadfast love and your faithfulness.
Praying for the Lao People
In God we pray. You help us to spread your steadfast love and your faithfulness. You would help us to lead others to give thanks to you and sing praises to your name. God, we pray specifically for the Lao people of Laos in Thailand. The small people group engrossed in Buddhist beliefs and practices mixed with animism and spiritism.
Oh God, we pray that they would know that you are the most high God. That Jesus, you love them and have died on the cross for their sins. To restore them to you, to reconcile them to relationship with you. God, we pray for your salvation, your steadfast love, your faithfulness to spread to the Lao people of Laos and Thailand so that they might give thanks to you, oh Lord, and sing praises to your name almost.
Lord, we pray that for all the peoples of the world. God, bring them all to give thanks to your name for your steadfast love. Every morning in your faithfulness by night. We pray all of this according to your word in Psalm 92:1–2. In Jesus name, amen.
David Platt serves as a pastor in metro Washington, D.C. He is the founder of Radical.
David received his Ph.D. from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary and is the author of Don’t Hold Back, Radical, Follow Me, Counter Culture, Something Needs to Change, Before You Vote, as well as the multiple volumes of the Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary series.
Along with his wife and children, he lives in the Washington, D.C. metro area.
