#DailyDevotion Recount The Deeds Of The LORD Jesus & Praise Him

Psalm 71 ¹⁶I will enter your house, O Lord GOD, and recite the triumphs You alone perform. ¹⁷O God, You taught me from my youth; I still talk about the wonderful things You have done. ¹⁸Even when I get old and gray, don’t forsake me, O God, until I tell this age what Your arm has done; and tell all who come about Your mighty action ¹⁹that Your righteousness reaches to heaven, O God. You have done great things, O God. Who is like You?

David grew up hearing the Torah, the first five books of the Bible. In all the festivals, the priests would recall Israel’s salvation from the Egyptians. He would have heard their failings and how the LORD disciplined them and forgave them. He would have heard how the LORD went out with them to defeat their enemies. Assuming his parents were good Israelites, his father would have spoken about all these things at home and while working. Then of course, David had all his personal experiences of the mighty deeds of the LORD using him to defeat Israel’s enemies and how the LORD delivered him from one situation to the next.

So when he went to Church (the house of the LORD), he would recount and recite all these things the LORD had done. Based on the LORD’s past actions he petitions the LORD not to forget him when he is old. He wants to live long enough to tell everyone what the LORD has done. God’s righteousness reaches to the heavens because He alone does all these good things. There is no one like the LORD. He alone deserves all praise and glory.

We too, as people of God should follow in David’s steps. When we gather in the house of the LORD, we need to recite to one another all the great acts of the LORD in the Old Testament and all that Jesus has done in the New Testament. We should ask God to let us live to an old age so we may recount all the LORD’s goodness to us in the present generation. We should tell others all the good things the LORD has provided for us. We should proclaim there is no one like our God and the LORD Jesus Christ.

²⁰Though You made me endure many troubles and miseries, You will restore me to life again, and lift me up from the depths of the earth again. ²¹You make me very great and come to comfort me. ²²Then I will praise You with a lute for being faithful, my God. I will play on a lyre to praise You, O Holy One of Israel. ²³My lips will shout happily as I praise You, my very being that You have freed. ²⁴All day long my tongue will loudly tell how righteous You are, and those who are out to harm me will then be ashamed and disgraced.

The Christian faith, the faith of Israel, is not everything is going to go great religion. God made David endure many troubles and miseries. The LORD disciplines whom He loves (Heb. 13). He disciplined Israel in the wilderness. He disciplines, trains up through hardships, His children. When we look to the cross of Christ we should remember we will participate in His sufferings so we may participate in His glory in the world to come. David proclaims his faith in the resurrection. Even as Jesus was raised up from the depths of the earth again, all mankind will be raised on the Last Day. Everyone who trusted in Christ will be raised to everlasting life and those who didn’t to everlasting damnation. On that day we will praise the Holy One of Israel, Jesus Christ of Nazareth. We will praise Him because on that day we will be freed from this body of death and have a living body. Those who mocked us for our faith in Him will be ashamed and disgraced.

Heavenly Father, though You discipline us, give us Your Holy Spirit so we can recount all Your goodness to us in Christ Jesus and praise You for our salvation You worked through Him for us now and the life You have promised us to come. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.