Psalms that have impacted my life Psalm 66 

As we continue to be impacted by the Psalmist David expresses his confidence and complete trust in the Lord this Psalm is no different.  The title of this Psalm is ‘Praise to God for His awesome works ’, David had learned a lesson which is something that we all should learn. Despite the lifestyle and responsibility of being King, he chose to find time to regularly praise his God. The world in which we live places so much pressure on us daily that there is a danger that we get caught up in the business of life that we do we do not spend time in the presence of the Lord daily and this is something that we must guard against. In Verse, 1&2 David shows his passion for his Lord, “ Make a joyful shout to God, all the earth! Sing out the honour of His name; make His praise glorious”. The first thing about this verse that caught my attention is that it is our choice to worship the Lord and that choice is not one of duty or habit but it is something that we want to do. The second thing is that it is something new, it is not something that we have learned and just repeat what we have done before. The word ’make’ is another word for create, our relationship with our Lord can never be a habit but comes from the freshness or newness of our love for our Lord. Also, the word ‘make’ requires effort on our part and this comes from the choices that we make, we choose to follow Him. To ‘make’ we need a pattern, a formula or a recipe to follow to be successful and the Bible is full of ways to praise the Lord. Interestingly, David says to make a joyful shout to God. It is important to understand that you cannot fake a joyful shout to God, this can only happen when we are overwhelmed by the greatness of God in our lives. From that sense of awe and wonder it is easy to make a joyful shout to our God. David was declaring that God’s creation shouts to God and when we become aware of the greatness of His creation we can join in with shouts to our God. The Psalm goes on to say “ Sing out the honour of His name, make his praise glorious”. Again that verse commences with a decision that we have made, singing is something that we choose to do. The phrase ‘The honour of His name’ is so powerful and it is so good to remind ourselves of the power of the name of Jesus. This is something that we can forget at times when situations arise we should first use the name of Jesus because there is victory in that name. However,  we limit God when we do not use His name, this is something that we should be aware of because when we use the name Jesus we see the greatness of God manifested. Next, we are encouraged to “Make His praise Glorious “, this only happens when what we express comes out of our fresh relationship not out of routine. There is much pleasure when our relationship with the Lord is fresh and real. During this Psalm the Psalmist encourages us to pause and reflect on what he has written and may we do so.