Thanks for What God has Done in Your Life

With 43 verses, Psalm 107 is the longest psalm we’ll study this week. It may have been written during the Babylonian exile and features four testimonies of God’s deliverance of His people. In today’s Scripture passage, we find four groups of people who may have taken the idea of “helping themselves” too literally, until they were helpless before God. The opening verses of Psalm 107 set a tone of thanksgiving for the entire psalm (verses 1 and 2). But the psalm then paints four poetic illustrations of people in distress:

1. Those who wandered (verses 4-9)
2. Those who sat in darkness (verses 10-16)
3. Those who were foolish (verses 17 – 22)
4. Those who sailed (verses 23-32)

Each of these groups reached what we might call “rock bottom”: the lowest possible point, given their circumstances. All their human wisdom, resources and initiative failed, and they came to the end of their self-sufficiency. When they accepted there was nothing left they could do, they cried out to God in prayer, and He delivered them from “their distress” (verses 6, 13, 19, and 28).

For each illustration, the psalmist shares three things:

1. What God did in each situation. For example: “He led [the wanderers] by a straight way to a city where they could settle” (verse 7).
2. What we’re to do in response to God. For example: “Let them give thanks to the Lord for his unfailing love and his wonderful deeds for mankind” (verse 8).
3. Why our lives should overflow with gratitude for God. For example: “He satisfies the thirsty and fills the hungry with good things” (verse 9).

Just as God answered each group’s desperate cry for help, He will do the same for us today. Whether we feel like a wanderer, prisoner, fool or sailor in a storm, when we come to the end of our self-sufficiency, our Lord of infinite grace and mercy will deliver us and supply everything we need ... if only we will humbly call upon Him (Psalm 50:15 and Philippians 4:19).

In the second and third illustrations, “those who sat in darkness” and “those who were foolish”, we find the people experiencing crises caused by their own sin. Still, when they cried out to God in repentance, He delivered them just as He delivered the people in verses 6 and 28. We are never too far gone for God to save us, and even when we walk through difficulties of our own making, He is faithful to rescue us. What a beautiful picture of God’s mercy and grace!

Respond

Craft your own prayer of thanksgiving today by “ponder[ing] the loving deeds of the Lord” in your life (Psalm 107:43). Think about your testimony, how God saved you and brought you into His family and delivered you from crisis. Then form a prayer of thanksgiving modeled after the pattern of the four testimonies in Psalm 107, beginning with your crisis, how you cried out to God, and what He did to deliver you. End your prayer by thanking God for His steadfast love and for what you’ve experienced through His deliverance.