Psalm 145:1, 10-21
SS Lesson for 01/26/2025
Devotional Scripture: Rom 3:3-6
Psalm 145, today’s text, is an acrostic. That means that each line, verse, or section starts with a word that begins with a successive letter of the Hebrew alphabet, which has 22 letters. There are nine psalms that are acrostic in nature, the other eight being Psalms 10; 25; 34; 37; 9-10; 111; 112, and 119. (Psalms 9 and 10 count as one because the acrostic spans both; see discussion in lesson 6.) Other acrostics in the Bible are Proverbs 31:10-31 and the entire book of Lamentations. Regarding the latter, notice that chapters 1; 2; 4, and 5 have 22 verses each and that chapter 3 has 66 verses, which is a multiple of 22. A sharp eye will notice that Psalm 145 has only 21 verses. So why the mismatch with the 22-letter Hebrew alphabet? It comes down to an uncertainty in the ancient manuscripts. In most of those manuscripts, Psalm 145:13 lacks a line of text that would have included the absent Hebrew letter. This was noticed in antiquity, and the ancient Greek translation of the Bible, known as the Septuagint (translated at least 200 years before Christ), includes an extra line between verses 13 and 14; see more on this in the commentary below. Last week’s lesson noted that the 150 chapters of the Psalms are traditionally seen as a collection of five sub-books. Within the fifth of those sub-books, Psalm 145 is the final chapter before the extended coda of Psalms 146-150 begins.
Your kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and Your dominion endures throughout all generations.
(Scriptural Text from the New King James Version; cross-references from the NIV)
1 I will extol You, my God, O King; And I will bless Your name forever and ever.
10 All Your works shall praise You, O Lord, and Your saints shall bless You.
11 They shall speak of the glory of Your kingdom, and talk of Your power,
12 To make known to the sons of men His mighty acts, and the glorious majesty of His kingdom.
13 Your kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and Your dominion endures throughout all generations.
17 I will give thanks to the Lord because of his righteousness and will sing praise to the name of the Lord Most High.
1 O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth! You have set your glory above the heavens.
2 Ascribe to the Lord the glory due his name; worship the Lord in the splendor of his holiness.
6 I will sacrifice a freewill offering to you; I will praise your name, O Lord, for it is good.
20 For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities — his eternal power and divine nature — have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.
18 For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.
5 so that your faith might not rest on men's wisdom, but on God's power.
20 For the kingdom of God is not a matter of talk but of power.
17 For the Lord your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great God, mighty and awesome, who shows no partiality and accepts no bribes.
5 I know that the Lord is great, that our Lord is greater than all gods. 6 The Lord does whatever pleases him, in the heavens and on the earth, in the seas and all their depths.
11 My name will be great among the nations, from the rising to the setting of the sun. In every place incense and pure offerings will be brought to my name, because my name will be great among the nations," says the Lord Almighty.
32 He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, 33 and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever; his kingdom will never end."
7 Of the increase of his government and peace there will be no end. He will reign on David's throne and over his kingdom, establishing and upholding it with justice and righteousness from that time on and forever. The zeal of the Lord Almighty will accomplish this.
14 The Lord upholds all who fall, and raises up all who are bowed down.
15 The eyes of all look expectantly to You, and You give them their food in due season.
16 You open Your hand and satisfy the desire of every living thing.
5 "Because of the oppression of the weak and the groaning of the needy, I will now arise," says the Lord. "I will protect them from those who malign them."
1 Again I looked and saw all the oppression that was taking place under the sun: I saw the tears of the oppressed and they have no comforter; power was on the side of their oppressors, and they have no comforter.
12 Therefore, this is what the Holy One of Israel says: "Because you have rejected this message, relied on oppression and depended on deceit, 13 this sin will become for you like a high wall, cracked and bulging, that collapses suddenly, in an instant. 14 It will break in pieces like pottery, shattered so mercilessly that among its pieces not a fragment will be found for taking coals from a hearth or scooping water out of a cistern."
9 "This is what the Lord Almighty says: 'Administer true justice; show mercy and compassion to one another. 10 Do not oppress the widow or the fatherless, the alien or the poor. In your hearts do not think evil of each other.'
5 "So I will come near to you for judgment. I will be quick to testify against sorcerers, adulterers and perjurers, against those who defraud laborers of their wages, who oppress the widows and the fatherless, and deprive aliens of justice, but do not fear me," says the Lord Almighty.
5 He provides food for those who fear him; he remembers his covenant forever.
10 Your people settled in it, and from your bounty, O God, you provided for the poor.
9 He provided redemption for his people; he ordained his covenant forever — holy and awesome is his name.
19 And my God will meet all your needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus.
8 Let them give thanks to the Lord for his unfailing love and his wonderful deeds for men, 9 for he satisfies the thirsty and fills the hungry with good things.
7 He upholds the cause of the oppressed and gives food to the hungry. The Lord sets prisoners free, 8 the Lord gives sight to the blind, the Lord lifts up those who are bowed down, the Lord loves the righteous. 9 The Lord watches over the alien and sustains the fatherless and the widow, but he frustrates the ways of the wicked.
10 The lions may grow weak and hungry, but those who seek the Lord lack no good thing.
15 The eyes of all look to you, and you give them their food at the proper time. 16 You open your hand and satisfy the desires of every living thing.
17 The Lord is righteous in all His ways, gracious in all His works.
18 The Lord is near to all who call upon Him, to all who call upon Him in truth.
19 He will fulfill the desire of those who fear Him; He also will hear their cry and save them.
20 The Lord preserves all who love Him, but all the wicked He will destroy.
21 My mouth shall speak the praise of the Lord, and all flesh shall bless His holy name Forever and ever.
1 Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, 2 through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand. And we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. 3 Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance;
15 But the gift is not like the trespass. For if the many died by the trespass of the one man, how much more did God's grace and the gift that came by the grace of the one man, Jesus Christ, overflow to the many!
20 The law was added so that the trespass might increase. But where sin increased, grace increased all the more,
5 So too, at the present time there is a remnant chosen by grace. 6 And if by grace, then it is no longer by works; if it were, grace would no longer be grace.
9 But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me.
22 So with you: Now is your time of grief, but I will see you again and you will rejoice, and no one will take away your joy. 23 In that day you will no longer ask me anything. I tell you the truth, my Father will give you whatever you ask in my name. 24 Until now you have not asked for anything in my name. Ask and you will receive, and your joy will be complete.
5 If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him.
16 Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective. 17 Elijah was a man just like us. He prayed earnestly that it would not rain, and it did not rain on the land for three and a half years. 18 Again he prayed, and the heavens gave rain, and the earth produced its crops.
21 Dear friends, if our hearts do not condemn us, we have confidence before God 22 and receive from him anything we ask, because we obey his commands and do what pleases him.
13 I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life. 14 This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. 15 And if we know that he hears us — whatever we ask — we know that we have what we asked of him.
16 I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile.
8 But since we belong to the day, let us be self-controlled, putting on faith and love as a breastplate, and the hope of salvation as a helmet.
15 and how from infancy you have known the holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.
27 Just as man is destined to die once, and after that to face judgment, 28 so Christ was sacrificed once to take away the sins of many people; and he will appear a second time, not to bear sin, but to bring salvation to those who are waiting for him.
3 Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, 4 and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade, kept in heaven for you, 5 who through faith are shielded by God's power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time.
5 Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.
3 This is love for God: to obey his commands. And his commands are not burdensome,
28 And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.
12 And now, O Israel, what does the Lord your God ask of you but to fear the Lord your God, to walk in all his ways, to love him, to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul,
23 Love the Lord, all his saints! The Lord preserves the faithful, but the proud he pays back in full.
Verses 1-2
David resolved to praise the Lord daily and forever. The reasons follow.
"When one has come to the point of knowing the Lord in a personal way, the desire to sing His praise and sing it often becomes very strong." [Note: Leupold, p. 975.]
Observant Jews used to repeat this psalm three times a day: twice in the morning and once in the evening. [Note: Ibid.]
This acrostic psalm begins a series of six psalms, the last six in the Psalter, which are especially full of praise to God. The title, "a psalm of praise," occurs only here in the Book of Psalms. The word "praise" appears 46 times in the last six psalms. In this psalm David praised God for His powerful acts, for His mercy and grace, for His everlasting kingdom, and for His response to those who pray to Him. As such it resembles history psalms, but its genre is most similar to the psalms of descriptive praise.
"In the psalm there is no development of plot or building of intensity. Indeed, it is essentially static in form, articulating what is enduringly true of the world. What is true at the beginning of the psalm is still true at the end. What is true from beginning to end is that Yahweh securely governs, and that can be counted on. We are given a series of affirmations that could be rearranged without disrupting the intent. . . . This is Israel in its most trustful, innocent, childlike faith." [Note: Brueggemann, pp. 28-29.]
Verses 3-7
David said parents would declare God’s great acts to their children. He himself would meditate on the Lord’s majesty and His wonderful works. People would retell His awesome deeds and would praise the Lord for His greatness, goodness, and righteousness.
"The text calls for a sacred fluency, and I would exhort you liberally to exercise it when you are speaking on the goodness of God." [Note: C. H. Spurgeon, Treasury of David, 2:316.]
Verses 8-9
These verses are a classic expression of praise for God’s character. David moved from considering the greatness of God’s acts to reflecting on His motivating attitudes. The same statement in Hebrew occurs in six other places in the Old Testament (Exodus 34:6; Nehemiah 9:17; Psalms 86:15; Psalms 103:8; Joel 2:13; Jonah 4:2). God’s grace is His favor and divine enablement that He gives to those who do not deserve it. His mercy is the forbearance He demonstrates to those who deserve His wrath. He is patient with those who arouse His anger with their sinning. His loyal love is amazingly strong and long-lasting. He is good to everyone, even sending rain and many other blessings on the unjust as well as the just.
Verse 10
Moreover, He exercises His powerful works under the constraints of His mercy. Because of these things, all of God’s works and people will praise Him.
Verses 11-13
God’s faithful and consistent control of all things, from one generation to the next, call for praise of His eternal reign. He rules over all with power and glory. People speak of the great King and His kingdom because of all His wondrous acts. The universal rule of God is in view here rather than the Davidic kingdom.
Verses 13-16
The NASB translators did not translate the last portion of Psalms 145:13. It reads, "The LORD is faithful to all His promises and loving toward all He has made" (NIV). The Septuagint translators supplied this verse to fill out the acrostic, the line beginning with the Hebrew letter nun being absent in the Hebrew text.
God consistently sustains the fallen, uplifts the oppressed, and provides for all. Therefore, every person looks to God for His provision of his or her needs. Since God’s dominion is everlasting, He cares for His creatures faithfully and lovingly all the time.
Verses 17-21
Everything the Lord does is right. Kindness also marks all His deeds. He is attentive to those who pray to Him sincerely. He will grant the petitions of believers and will deliver them in times of need. He will protect those who love Him, but will destroy those who do not. For these reasons, David said he would praise Yahweh, and all people will bless Him forever.
This psalm is a great catalogue of reasons to praise God. Like the other acrostic psalms, it is a model for us to use in recalling many of the things about God for which we should praise Him.
(Adapted from URL:https://www.studylight.org/commentaries/eng/dcc/psalms-145.html)
On a first reading, Psalm 145 may seem to lack the emotional intensity and attention to life’s struggles that appear in many other psalms. It may appear to be a collection of general truths or even platitudes about the life of faith. Such platitudes do not stand up to the challenge of life, and so the psalm may appear less substantial than others. It is better, however, not to read this psalm alone but to recall its function in the overall book. The book of Psalms contains both prayers for help and prayers of thanksgiving. Early in the book, laments or prayers for help overwhelmingly predominate, but as the book goes along, the balance changes in favor of hymns of praise. The concluding five psalms are loud, exuberant songs praising God. Psalm 145 is closely connected to them. In other words, if we consider the book as a whole, we see it move from times of distress, during which we call out to God for help, to times of rejoicing over God’s saving works. That same shift appears in many individual psalms that begin with lament and end with a promise to praise. In other words, the organization of the book tries to move its readers along the spiritual road to greater confidence in God’s mercy. Psalm 145 marks the conclusion of that movement. When understood this way, Psalm 145 is much more than a bundle of clichés. Psalm 145 celebrates the permanent nature of God’s kingdom and his work in the lives of people. It reminds anyone singing it that God aims at the highest and best possible things, including the best possible outcomes for our lives. God desires that we be saved and rescued from all the manifestations of sin and death in this world and the next. God has communicated that desire through the prophets and apostles, and most fully through the life and teachings of Jesus Christ. Awareness of that communication leads to a life filled with wonder and practical attention to spiritual and moral growth. It is not easy to adopt a superior purpose when we are trying to live our best life now. The superior purpose calls upon us to reexamine ourselves and reform aspects of our lives. We refine our values, redirect our affections, and reshape our behaviors in the direction of God. Even our language becomes infused with grace and mercy, as God’s is. To give up on the possibility of growth is to lose hope itself. The wonder of God’s love for us compels us to rise above the passions of the moment toward the splendor that awaits us in God’s presence. This psalm points us to that splendor as it celebrates the compassion and beauty of God as it challenges us to pursue noble causes rather than short-term goals of pleasure or power.