St. Luke’s Evangelical Lutheran Church -- Watertown, WI
Pastor Mark Gartner
1 Praise the LORD, O my soul;
all my inmost being, praise his holy name.
2 Praise the LORD, O my soul,
and forget not all his benefits—
3 who forgives all your sins
and heals all your diseases,
4 who redeems your life from the pit
and crowns you with love and compassion,
5 who satisfies your desires with good things
so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.
Dear children of God’s many blessings. Amen
One of the headlines of the news articles I was reading recently went like this, “Americans enter holidays in dark mood” This was according to a Reuters poll “The poll said that Americans enter the holiday season in a dark mood, with economic worries, security fears and a lack of confidence in government fueling growing pessimism . . . For the third straight month, Americans have a sense that things are not getting better, they are getting worse . . . Rising gasoline prices, a mortgage loan crisis and talk of a recession spooked the markets and hurt American confidence in the economy, while concerns linger about a potential conflict with Iran, unrest in Pakistan and the Iraq war. All that bad news has a cumulative effect. It feeds and festers.” With all this doom and gloom some might ask what are we gathering for a day of thanksgiving for? How in world can we be thankful when things are falling apart around us financially, politically and morally.
Maybe it is good for us to gather in God’s house and let God’s Word replace the worries of this world. As we look at this portion God’s Word which we are using for Thanksgiving Day, we see a phrase, “Praise the Lord, O my Soul, and forget not all his benefits.” As we gather in God’s house today, we are taking the opportunity that is given us to remember what things God has brought into our lives over the course of this last year. Even if we have forgotten these blessings over the course of this last year, today is the time of the year where we slow down, catch our breath and see why we as Christians can be very thankful. King David the Palm writer directs our hearts and minds very well today and we will use his words to be our theme:
Sermon Theme: Praise The Lord, O My Soul!
1. Why praise the Lord?
2. How should we praise the Lord?
As we look at these five verses, we see that there are many reasons for us to be praising God for his blessings on this special day. After reminding us to “forget not all his benefits” this psalm gets very specific about some of the reasons that we have to praise our God starting with the words, “who forgives all your sins.” While many people gather on this day to thank God for the many material blessings that are in there lives, isn’t it right and proper for us first and foremost to thank God for the single greatest thing that we as Christians have received. None of us would truly be filled with praise, if we hadn’t first been forgiven of all our sins by God’s free grace and favor. While some people seek after happiness in the form of things found in this world, we as God’s children need to keep our hearts and lives firmly grounded on the fact that God has forgiven me my sins. And as we look at this even closer, we realize that nothing is even close to the blessing of knowing that “all” my sins have been forgiven. In verse 12 of this psalm we hear it described this way, “as far as east is from west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us.” Our sins are completely gone. We can all stand up and “Praise the Lord, O my Soul!
Did any of you get sick in the last 365 days? Were you in the hospital for surgeries or illnesses? Did you miss days of school or work or just feel down right crummy? It is good for us to praise the Lord, because he also, “heals all your diseases.” This doesn’t mean that God healed us from all the things wrong with our bodies and health, but does mean that God did watch over us this last year. Just like every other year there are things in this world that make us sick or things that just don’t work in our bodies like they used to or things just break down and need to be fixed and repaired. I’ve made enough visits to hospitals and nursing homes to know that God has healed many of you or your loved ones from sickness and other earthly diseases. For this we praise our Lord. And what about the doctors, surgeons, therapists, specialists and pharmacists who with their God-given abilities were able to help take care of us and help us to get better. For them we also Praise our Lord!
As we read further in psalm we see that some of these things overlap. He writes, “who satisfies your desires with good things.” As we look around our beautiful city, state, and country or for that matter this whole world, we can only say that God has satisfied every part of my life both physically and spiritually. It is a marvel that God has blessed us and this world with the resources to feed and support over 6 billion people. That means every day 6 billion people are being taken care of. We can’t even imagine how much food and other resources it takes to support 6 billion people. Just to make it seem more and home, just think how much food it takes to feed just the people here in Watertown – our little town of 20,000+ people. Have we every woke up and wondered if there was going to be food in the grocery stores here in Watertown or the water was going to dry up or there wouldn’t be electricity or gasoline? NEVER! The reason is simple. God continues to shower his love and compassion upon us and this world.
I think that most of us are familiar with the Verizon commercials where the person with the Verizon phone always is surrounded by his Verizon network. You see the person with the phone and then we see the large group of Verizon people following that that person wherever he goes. In a way that pictures God in our lives. With God in our hearts, we are blessed. David writes that God “crowns you with love and compassion.” Doesn’t this little phrase sum up just about everything we just talked about. In everything we do, we see God’s love and compassion. From the forgiveness of our sins to the satisfying of our every desire, we see God’s love and compassion. Wherever we go, God’s love and compassion goes. Wherever we are, God’s love and compassion is. When I’m healthy and cruising along in life, God’s love and compassion are with me. When I’m stuck in the murkiness of sin, God’s love and compassion are with me. When I’m sick and in the hospital or dealing with one of life’s troubles, God’s love and compassion are with me. Praise the Lord, O my Soul!
2. How Should We Praise The Lord?
With all of these things firmly rooted in our hearts, we might ask ourselves “How in the world should I praise God for all of these things?” That is good question and this psalm reminds us what it means to praise God. David says, “Praise the Lord, O my Soul; all my inmost being praise his holy name.” We need to praise God from the deepest parts of our hearts and soul. From the bottom of my heart. From the heart, means that we have sat down and realized that everything I am and everything I have has come from God’s good grace. It means that when I pray my prayers at mealtime, I am 100% aware that God has blessed me with this meal by his grace. This means that my heart is eager to do anything to say thanks for what God has done for me. It means that I pray often to God to thank him for his forgiveness and blessings. It means that I spend as much time as possible in God’s Word and using the God’s gifts of Baptism and Lord’s Supper to strengthen my faith. It means that the attitude inside of us is full of complete gratitude and praise that just overflows in everything we do.
And one of those ways that praise overflows from our hearts is with our voices. We can use those voices as we are doing today to sing songs of praise and thanks. What would be a good reason to sit in Church and mumble through the words or even worse to not open our mouths at all? Our voices are a wonderful way for us to say thank you God for everything. We can use our voices to tell others about what a wonderful God we have as we proclaim God’s Word in the world. This might be through our everyday contacts. This might be with our mouths which are always filled with God’s love when we speak at work or in our homes or around the town. People are listening and people can hear our thanks and praise in everything we say and do.
We can also praise Go with our lives. What do people see when they look at your life? Do they see a grumpy person who is always angry, frustrated or living in despair? Or do they see a person who always has a smile on their face and a bounce in their step, even in the most difficult of circumstances? But you might say, “Pastor I don’t want to put up a false front. Sometimes life is too hard and difficult to live a life of joy.” Granted, we are going to have some very trying times in this world, but compared to knowing that our sins are forgiven and that God continues to shower us with his love and compassion, how long should we live in gloom and doom. Not very long! Even at our worse, God’s love is at its best. Even when we are at our lowest, God is reaching down with all his strength to pull us back up. By our lives, we can show others what it means to trust that God is doing exactly what he has promised. He is with me and will be with me forever.
Have you ever forgotten God’s love and mercy? Have we ever let the worries and cares of this world cloud our view of what God has does and continue to do for us? Over the course of this last year, did we forget that God has been with us every step of the way? If we are truthful, we would say yes there were times that we forgot some of the wonderful blessings that God brought into our lives both spiritually and physically. But I pray that once again we have let God’s Word open our hearts and minds to see that we can and should praise God from the bottom of our hearts for everything that he has brought into our lives. “Praise The Lord, O my Soul; all my inmost being praise his holy name. Praise the Lord, O my Soul; and forget not all his benefits.” Amen