Psalm Meditation 944
Proper 11
July 22, 2018

Psalm 138
1 I give you thanks, O LORD, with my whole heart; before the gods I sing your praise;
2 I bow down toward your holy temple and give thanks to your name for your steadfast love and your faithfulness; for you have exalted your name and your word above everything.
3 On the day I called, you answered me, you increased my strength of soul.
4 All the kings of the earth shall praise you, O LORD, for they have heard the words of your mouth.
5 They shall sing of the ways of the LORD, for great is the glory of the LORD.
6 For though the LORD is high, he regards the lowly; but the haughty he perceives from far away.
7 Though I walk in the midst of trouble, you preserve me against the wrath of my enemies; you stretch out your hand, and your right hand delivers me.
8 The LORD will fulfill his purpose for me; your steadfast love, O LORD, endures forever. Do not forsake the work of your hands.
(NRSV)

‘Thank you’ seems to be so easy to say until it comes to actually saying it. The words do come trippingly off the tongue of some folks, and they obviously mean it when they say, “thank you.” The rest of us feel the weight of the baggage that these two little words carry. To say ‘thank you’ acknowledges that I am beholden to you in some way. You have given me something in the way of time, effort, energy, goods, or services. To say ‘thank you’ means that I am not the rugged individual so highly prized in the world in which we live. To say ‘thank you’ acknowledges our dependence on each other.

The psalmist pauses to give thanks for a rich variety of ways that God is active among us. In this psalm the thanks are for loving us, being faithful to us, and providing us the spiritual resources to meet the challenges and opportunities of our lives. Sometimes we take all this for granted so it is a good reminder to pause In the middle of whatever is going on in our lives to give thanks for all that God does among us. Giving thanks to God is a good habit to form. If we get to the point in which our habit becomes going through the motions and saying the words without the meaning, it is good to break free of the habit and give thanks from our hearts.

Givng thanks is hard. It is hard to thank the people around us and it is hard to thank God. Every exercise is hard at first. Lifting weights, taking first steps, writing the first paragraph, initiating a conversation each take effort and energy. Each of these activities get easier the more we do them. It is a good idea to step back from our habits to make sure we are using proper form, that we are making progress toward a goal rather than being stuck at a comfortable pace. Giving thanks to God, saying ‘thank you’ to the people around us is good exercise. To give thanks with our whole hearts is great exercise.

July 16, 2018
LCM