Psalm 136 and Psalm 103 · Passage · Gratitude
Thanks for Who He Is
Two psalms of Israel's worship praise the LORD for His character first and for His deeds second.
Psalm 136 gives thanks three times for who God is before it names a single thing He has made or done.
Give thanks to the LORD, for He is good. His loving devotion endures forever. Give thanks to the God of gods. His loving devotion endures forever. Give thanks to the Lord of lords. His loving devotion endures forever.
- The passage
- Psalm 136:1 to 26, Psalm 103:1 to 5
- Book
- Psalms
- Hold in memory
- Psalm 136:1, Psalm 103:2
Summary
Scripture's first ground of thanks is God Himself. Psalm 136 thanks the LORD as good and as God over every god and lord. It then tells creation, the exodus, the land and the daily food of every creature as the work of His loving devotion. Psalm 103 calls the soul to bless His holy name and to forget none of His kind deeds, and it traces forgiveness, healing and redemption to the compassion the LORD proclaimed of Himself to Moses.
- Psalm 136:1 makes God's goodness the first reason for thanks. Israel sang its refrain at the ark, at Solomon's temple and at the foundation of the second temple.
- The second half of the refrain, "His loving devotion endures forever," names hesed, the LORD's steadfast covenant love, as the reason that holds through every deed the psalm recounts.
- Psalm 136 moves from God's being (verses 1 to 3) to creation (4 to 9), to the exodus and the land (10 to 22) and to His present care (23 to 26).
- Psalm 103 makes remembering the work of thanks: "Bless the LORD, O my soul, and do not forget all His kind deeds" (Psalm 103:2).
Two Psalms of Thanks for Who God Is
Psalm 136 and Psalm 103 teach God's people to give thanks to Him first for who He is. Psalm 136 recounts creation, the exodus and the gift of the land, and after each line it answers that His loving devotion endures forever. Psalm 103 calls the soul to bless the LORD and to remember His deeds, and it traces each deed back to His compassion and loving devotion.
Gratitude, the thanks God's people owe Him, has many parts, and this one is its foundation. Thanks that rests on gifts alone rises and falls with the gifts, while thanks that rests on God's character has a reason on every day. The page asks why Scripture grounds thanks in who God is. It answers from the two psalms, from the refrain Israel sang at the ark and the temple, and from Matthew Henry, Augustine, Jerome and Charles Spurgeon.
Give thanks to the God of heaven! His loving devotion endures forever.The last verse returns to the call of the first three and names Him the God of heaven, so every deed between stands inside thanks for who He is.
Bless the LORD, O my soul; all that is within me, bless His holy name. Bless the LORD, O my soul, and do not forget all His kind deeds—The psalmist speaks to his own soul, and the command not to forget makes remembering the work that thanks requires.
He who forgives all your iniquities and heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from the Pit and crowns you with loving devotion and compassion, who satisfies you with good things, so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.Each benefit is told as the act of the One who forgives, heals, redeems, crowns and satisfies, so the list describes the Giver as fully as the gifts.
The LORD is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in loving devotion.The psalm names the source of the benefits in God's own character, compassionate, gracious and abounding in loving devotion.
Then the LORD passed in front of Moses and called out: “The LORD, the LORD God, is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in loving devotion and faithfulness,The LORD proclaimed these words of Himself to Moses, so the thanks of Psalm 103 answers what God said He is.
Psalm 103:3 to 5, Psalm 103:8, Exodus 34:6
Psalm 136 in Four Bands
Four bands carry the psalm's twenty-six verses, and the same refrain closes every verse in each band.
Psalm 136 gives thanks for who God is before it gives thanks for what He has done.
An outline of Psalm 136 in four bands, each with its verse range and what it thanks God for; every one of the psalm's 26 verses closes with the refrain His loving devotion endures forever.
The bands widen as they go, from the LORD's own titles to the heavens, then to Israel's story, and at last to every creature on earth.
From the Heavens to Daily Food
The psalm names God's deeds one line at a time, from the making of the heavens to the freeing of His people from their enemies.
He alone does great wonders. His loving devotion endures forever. By His insight He made the heavens. His loving devotion endures forever. He spread out the earth upon the waters. His loving devotion endures forever. He made the great lights— His loving devotion endures forever. the sun to rule the day, His loving devotion endures forever. the moon and stars to govern the night. His loving devotion endures forever.Creation is told as the work of His insight, and the great lights are thanked as His gift for ruling the day and the night.
He struck down the firstborn of Egypt His loving devotion endures forever. and brought Israel out from among them His loving devotion endures forever. with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. His loving devotion endures forever. He divided the Red Sea in two His loving devotion endures forever. and led Israel through the midst, His loving devotion endures forever. but swept Pharaoh and his army into the Red Sea. His loving devotion endures forever. He led His people through the wilderness. His loving devotion endures forever.The exodus is told in the order of the book of Exodus, from the firstborn of Egypt to the divided sea and the wilderness road.
He struck down great kings His loving devotion endures forever. and slaughtered mighty kings— His loving devotion endures forever. Sihon king of the Amorites His loving devotion endures forever. and Og king of Bashan— His loving devotion endures forever. and He gave their land as an inheritance, His loving devotion endures forever. a heritage to His servant Israel. His loving devotion endures forever.The psalm names the two kings Israel defeated on the way, Sihon and Og, and thanks God for giving their land to Israel as a heritage.
He remembered us in our low estate His loving devotion endures forever. and freed us from our enemies. His loving devotion endures forever. He gives food to every creature. His loving devotion endures forever.The singers now speak of themselves as us, whom He remembered and freed, and in verse 25 the care reaches beyond Israel.
Psalm 136:17 to 22, Psalm 136:23 to 25
Where Israel Sang the Refrain
The first line of Psalm 136 was sung at the ark, at the temple, on the road to battle and at the second temple, and Jeremiah promised it would be heard again.
Give thanks to the LORD, for He is good; His loving devotion endures forever.The line stands in the song David gave Asaph and his brothers on the day the ark came to Jerusalem (1 Chronicles 16:7), so the refrain belonged to Israel's worship from David's day.
When all the Israelites saw the fire coming down and the glory of the LORD above the temple, they bowed down on the pavement with their faces to the ground, and they worshiped and gave thanks to the LORD: “For He is good; His loving devotion endures forever.”At the dedication of Solomon's temple the people saw the fire and the glory, bowed to the ground and answered with the same words.
Then Jehoshaphat consulted with the people and appointed those who would sing to the LORD and praise the splendor of His holiness. As they went out before the army, they were singing: “Give thanks to the LORD, for His loving devotion endures forever.”Jehoshaphat sent singers ahead of his army with the refrain on their lips before any battle was fought.
And they sang responsively with praise and thanksgiving to the LORD: “For He is good; for His loving devotion to Israel endures forever.” Then all the people gave a great shout of praise to the LORD, because the foundation of the house of the LORD had been laid.When the foundation of the second temple was laid after the exile, the returned people sang the refrain responsively.
the sounds of joy and gladness, the voices of the bride and bridegroom, and the voices of those bringing thank offerings into the house of the LORD, saying: ‘Give thanks to the LORD of Hosts, for the LORD is good; His loving devotion endures forever.’ For I will restore the land from captivity as in former times, says the LORD.Jeremiah had promised that the refrain would be heard again with the thank offerings in the house of the LORD.
Psalms 106, 107 and 118 open with the same call to give thanks to the LORD because He is good, and Psalm 118 closes with it as well (Psalm 118:29).
2 Chronicles 20:21, Ezra 3:11, Jeremiah 33:11
Thanks Owed for Who He Is
Matthew Henry, Augustine and the letter of James ground thanks in God's unchanging character.
Matthew Henry, in his Commentary on the Whole Bible (1710), reads Psalm 136:1 as a call to thank the Lord because He is good as well as because He does good. In his words, "all the streams must be traced up to the fountain."
Augustine notes in his Exposition on Psalm 136 that "all its verses finish in the same way," so that "His mercy is most commended" above everything else the psalm praises. He reads that mercy as lasting forever because the blessedness it gives the saints will have no end.
The call of the refrain, "Give thanks," is hodu in Hebrew, the plural command of the verb yadah. The STEP Bible lexicon gives yadah a range from throwing to confessing and giving thanks, so the verb that thanks God in Psalm 136 is the verb that confesses Him.
Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, with whom there is no change or shifting shadow.James grounds every good gift in the Father, with whom there is no change, so thanks for who He is rests on what does not shift.
How the Refrain Has Been Taught
Jerome and Charles Spurgeon preached on Psalm 107:1, whose words repeat the first verse of Psalm 136.
died 420 · Jerome
“Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good, for his mercy endures for ever. Therefore confess to him your sins, because he is good and forgives sins. But if he were not good, he would not say to you, ‘Give thanks’; and, ‘Give thanks to him, for his mercy endures for ever.’ This is mercy: for the rest, above there is justice. ‘For his mercy endures for ever.’ As long as you are in this age, give thanks.”
Jerome · Homily 33, on Psalm 106 · on Psalm 107:1Patristic
1834 to 1892 · Charles Spurgeon
Jerome's Latin Bible numbered this psalm 106; in the Hebrew numbering, which the Berean Standard Bible follows, it is Psalm 107.
“O give thanks unto the Lord, for he is good. It is all we can give him, and the least we can give; therefore let us diligently render to him our thanksgiving. The psalmist is in earnest in the exhortation, hence the use of the interjection ‘O’, to intensity his words: let us be at all times thoroughly fervent in the praises of the Lord, both with our lips and with our lives, by thanksgiving and thanks living.”
Charles Spurgeon · The Treasury of David, Vol. 5 · on Psalm 107:1
Thanks That Begins with God
Bless the LORD, all His works in all places of His dominion. Bless the LORD, O my soul!Psalm 103 ends where it began, with the soul called to bless the LORD.
The New Testament reads the name proclaimed at Exodus 34:6 in Jesus: the Word who became flesh was full of grace and truth, and grace and truth came through Him (John 1:14 to 17).
The Word became flesh and made His dwelling among us. We have seen His glory, the glory of the one and only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.John gives the Son the grace and truth the LORD proclaimed to Moses.
Sources
Scripture is the Berean Standard Bible.
- Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible (1710), on Psalm 136:1.
- Augustine of Hippo, Exposition on Psalm 136.
- Jerome, Homily 33, on Psalm 106 (Psalm 107 in the Hebrew numbering)
- Charles Spurgeon, The Treasury of David, volume 5, on Psalm 107:1.
- Translators Brief lexicon of Extended Strongs for Hebrew (TBESH), STEP Bible, Tyndale House, CC BY 4.0.
Keep Studying
In this value8
People and groups4
Values1