I will extol you, my God and king, and bless your name forever and ever.
– Psalm 145:1
So I want to follow up a prayer from Psalm 144:15. The last verse in the Psalm right before this. There we see blessing on us as we know God is our Lord. And then the very next verse… The next chapter swaps it around and says, “I will bless your name forever and ever.” And you see it all throughout this Psalm. The very next verse, “Every day, I will bless you.” All the way down to the last verse in Psalm 144:21, “My mouth will speak the praise of the Lord. Let all flesh bless His holy name forever and ever.” I just want to encourage you to do this and experience the blessing of God in the process.
Psalm 145:1 shows us we were created to praise the Lord.
The beauty of how this works… As we bless God in our relationship with God. As we walk with God and bless his name. Just think about his name. The covenant-keeping Lord of all, Jehovah, Jireh our Provider, Jehovah Rapha, Jehovah Shalom, our Peace, our Healer. And then just think about all the names of Jesus, the Alpha and Omega, the Bread of Life, the Cornerstone, our Deliverer, Prince of Peace, King of Kings, Lord of Lords.
We could keep going on and on and on. Everlasting Father, bless his name, forever and ever. Every day, bless him and praise him. And the beauty is, as we bless him, we experience the joy of the blessing that comes and knowing these names of God, knowing who he is, not just in our minds, but having seen him as our Provider and our Protector, and our Defender and our Deliverer and our Father, and the one who gives us peace.
Oh, this is what we’re made for, relationship with God, where he pours out blessing on us and we bless his name every day where we praise his name forever and ever. And so I just want to encourage you today, view your life through this lens. View your life through the lens of blessing God as you enjoy his blessings in your life. Walk with God in this way every day, receiving his blessings and resounding with praise and honor and glory and blessing to his name.
Psalm 145:1 is an invitation to a deeper relationship with God through worship.
Oh God, help us to live in Psalm 145:1–2 and this whole chapter. We praise you for your blessings in our lives. And God, we bless your name. Even just right now in prayer. We bless you, oh God, we worship you. We praise you, we extol you. Oh, we exalt you as the Lord, as the one true God as the Holy One.
Holy, holy, holy. There is no one like you. We bless your name, Jehovah Jireh, our provider. We bless your name Jehovah Shalom, our Peace. Lord, we bless your name as our Deliverer, as our Father, as our King. We bless you, Jesus, as our Savior and our Lord. We bless you as the Satisfier of our souls. God, we bless you as the Way, the Truth, and the Life.
We bless you as the Good Shepherd, the Great Shepherd, the Great High Priest. We bless you as the image of the invisible God, the Judge of the living and the dead. Lord, we bless you for your righteousness, for your justice, for your mercy, for your love. We bless your name, oh God. And we praise you for the privilege of relationship with you. God, we pray you would help us to lead others to relationship with you, lead others to know your name.
In all these ways, we pray that you’d help us to encourage, build up other brothers and sisters in Christ today and to share the gospel, to share the good news of your name.
Prayer for the Jewish Diaspora
And God, we pray for people around the world who don’t know the truth about your name, who don’t know the truth of the gospel.
God, we pray even in light of all these Old Testament Psalms, we pray specifically for Jewish men and women and children scattered all around the world, who’s eyes have not been opened to the beauty of the name of Jesus, the Messiah, the Savior. God, we pray that you would draw Jewish men, women, and children to yourself, that they might bless the name of Jesus, the Messiah, Jesus the Savior, Jesus the Lord. Oh, God. We pray all this in light of your Word in Psalm 145:1 as we live today, to bless your name and not just today, but forever and ever. Amen.
David Platt serves as a Lead Pastor for McLean Bible Church. He is also the Founder and Chairman of Radical, an organization that helps people follow Jesus and make him known in their neighborhood and all nations.
David received his B.A. from the University of Georgia and M.Div., Th.M., and Ph.D. from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary. Some of his published works include Radical, Radical Together, Follow Me, Counter Culture, Something Needs to Change, and Don’t Hold Back.
He lives in the Washington, D.C. metro area with his wife and children.
