“Praise the Lord, all nations. Extol Him, all peoples. For great is His steadfast love toward us, and the faithfulness of the Lord endures forever. Praise the Lord.”
– Psalm 117
There is so much here. I’m preaching on this passage today. So I don’t have time to preach on it. I just want to pray it here, but I want to pray it specifically in light of something that kicked off on Friday night at secret church, that radical we’ll be talking a lot more about even this coming week, but a new initiative in radical called urgent, identifying and coming alongside indigenous believers in places in the world where you see the most extreme, urgent, physical, and spiritual needs. Just picture physical suffering, lack of food, clean water, medical care, freedom, slavery, and trafficking.
Praising the Lord Through Suffering
So physical suffering, on top of spiritual need, mainly places in the world where the gospel’s not even gone, where people don’t even know the name of Jesus. So wherever those two kinds of needs collide, that’s where we are working with brothers and sisters who live in these places. We’ve identified 12 initial countries. I’m just going to list them off, where we are doing work. Syria, Bhutan, North Korea, India, Iraq, Afghanistan, Iran, Laos, Lebanon, Yemen, Somalia, and Nepal. So that’s where we’re starting, focusing on brothers and sisters in those places who are making the gospel known.
And I just want to lead us in light of Psalm one 17, Praise the Lord, all nations. Extol Him, all peoples, in light of hundreds of millions of people, actually, more than a billion people in just those countries alone who have little to no knowledge of the gospel. I want us to pray. And especially, we’re praying during these days in light of this global pandemic for specific requests.
Psalm 117 Prays for the Steadfast Love of God
And so I want to pray specifically for the praise of God, for the steadfast love of God, Psalm 117:2, the faithfulness of God. Verse two, exemplified in the gospel, in what Jesus has done for our salvation to be made known in these places. God, we pray for this. We pray for this right now. Please, oh, God, please cause all of these nations and peoples, every group of people in is Syria Bhutan, North Korea, India, Iraq, Afghanistan, Iran, Laos, Lebanon, Yemen, Somalia, Nepal. God cause your praise to be made known in these countries we pray.
God, please send out laborers into those countries who are taking the gospel into the darkest most difficult places. Oh God, we pray for brothers and sisters who are doing that, the few that are there and are doing that at great costs. God, we pray that you would help us to partner together with them. God, please, I pray that you bless urgent this initiative toward that end. And just from all of our lives, all of our families, all of our churches, we’re praying right now. So God, use us to make your gospel known among all the peoples. God show us, lead us by your spirit and into how you want to use every one of our lives for your glory in the world.
Psalm 117 Prays for All Nations to Receive God’s Good News
God, when we look at this pandemic around us, we know, we know that it’s all the more severe in places where there is no medical care, in places where social distancing is impossible, in the slums of India. So God, we pray. We pray for your grace and your mercy for your steadfast love and your faithfulness made known among all the nations, all the peoples of the world. We pray that you use our lives, and our families, and our churches, use this initiative in radical, just use it all for the spread of your praise, that all the peoples might extol you. God, we pray Psalm 117 over the nations and particularly over those where there’s such urgent, spiritual, and physical need. We pray this 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.
