“We have thought on your steadfast love, O God, in the midst of your temple. As your name, O God, so your praise reaches to the ends of the earth.”
– Psalm 48:9–10
Oh, I love Psalm 48:9–10 and I love each of them, just we could meditate on each of them, but I want to connect them together. So the first verse, verse nine, the Psalmist writes, “We have thought on your steadfast love, O God, in the midst of your temple.” I love that picture and I just want to encourage you with it today. In the presence of God, would you just think about his steadfast love? Like it is good before God, with God, on a regular basis, on a daily basis this Psalm, this verse reminds us just to meditate on the love of God. Would you just think today on how much God loves you and his steadfast love for you?
We should continually remind ourselves of the great love that God has for us.
Think on his steadfast love. What a phrase! Yes, let’s do this. This is what Jesus commands us to do in John chapter 15. “Abide in my love. As the father has loved me, so I have loved you.” Think about that statement. How much does the father love the son? Infinitely, can’t even imagine how awesome that love is. And Jesus says, “That’s how much I love you.” So think about that today. Think about it all day long, like live in that. That’s what he’s saying in John 15. “Abide in my love. Think about, meditate on, remember my love for you.” I don’t know what you’re going through right now, but I do know this. God loves you. For all especially who’ve trusted in Jesus, like you are a child of God. He loves you. Think about his love for you today.
Psalm 48:9–10 Reminds Us to Think on God’s Love and Praise Him for It
And then connect it with verse 10 in Psalm 48:9–10: “As your name, O God, so your praise reaches to the ends of the earth.” So this God, who’s steadfast in love, he doesn’t just love you and me. Yes, he loves us and it’s awesome and we should meditate on it, but he also loves the world, John 3:16 says. He loves the nations. He desires all people to know his love. So, “As your name, O God, so your praise reaches to the ends of the earth,” that the ends of the earth might praise you, O God, for your love, for your steadfast love. So yes, this is why we pray for the nations. This is why we pray for the spread of God’s love to the nations that they might meditate on his steadfast love also. So let’s do this in prayer.
O God, right now we pray that in a fresh way that we would think on your love for us in this moment. God, we praise you for your love for us. We praise you for sending Jesus to die on a cross for our sins and for your Spirit opening our eyes to who he is and to salvation, for somebody sharing the gospel with us.
May God’s Powerful Love Be Made Known
God, glory be to your name for saving us from our sins, for bringing us into your family, for giving us breath and water and food and all the things we take for granted. God, we praise you for your love for us, for your loving leadership in our lives. Lord God, I shudder to think where I would be without your love. I would be lost, totally lost. I’d be condemned. I’d be judged. And I’d be in hell forever without your love. God, thank you for your love for me. It’s so good to think about your love for each of us.
As we think on your love, O God, we pray that your love might be made known. God, we pray that others might know this love. God, we pray that you’d help us to lead others to know your love today, right around us, God, in the places where we work, in the places where we live. So God, please help us to share the good news of your love with others that they might know this love. God, we pray that there are many people who come to know your love through us today, this week, we would be a reflection of your love in their lives.
Prayer For the Gilakis People in Iran to Know God’s Love
And God, we pray for people far from us, God, for the Gilakis people in Iran, three million of them. No followers of Jesus among the Gilakis people in Iran; they don’t know your love. They can’t pause today and meditate on your steadfast love in Jesus. And they are caught up in a religion that is saying they have to earn their way to you. They have to do all of these things. They don’t know the good news of your love in Jesus.
God, we pray that would change, that they might meditate on your steadfast love. We pray for the Gilakis people of Iran. O God, we praise you for your steadfast love for us. And we pray that you would spend our lives today and every day, spreading your steadfast love to others, that your name and your love, O God, might be known and enjoyed and exalted to the ends of the earth. We pray Psalm 48:9–10 in Jesus’ name. Amen.