Getting The Choir Together

Psalm 117

1Praise the LORD, all you nations.

Praise him, all you people of the earth.

2For he loves us with unfailing love;

the faithfulness of the LORD endures forever.

Praise the LORD!

Many children find it difficult to share. Often one of the first things they learn to say is, “Mine! Mine!” But adults can have the same problem. This has been true of God’s people over the centuries.

God told Abraham that his descendants were to be a testimony to the Gentiles, but this was hard for his people to learn. Jonah certainly didn’t get it at first. Isaiah had to spell it out for the people of his day: “Arise, Jerusalem! Let your light shine for all the nations to see!” (Isaiah 60:1). The religious leaders of Jesus’ day must have missed that page, because they deplored Jesus’ outreach efforts. The apostles needed the extra incentive of persecution to begin spreading the gospel to the Gentiles, although Jesus told them clearly to “go and make disciples of all the nations” (Matthew 28:19). In 1786, when young William Carey suggested that missionaries be sent out from his denomination, he was told, “If God wants to save the heathen, he doesn’t need human aid to do it.”

“Praise the Lord, all you nations,” sings the psalmist. In Revelation we read of a vast choir in heaven “too great to count, from every nation and tribe and people and language, standing in front of the throne and before the Lamb” (Revelation 7:9). Are you helping to get the choir together?

Let every kindred, every tribe, on this terrestrial ball,

To him all majesty ascribe, and crown him Lord of all;

O that with yonder sacred throng, we at his feet may fall!

We’ll join the everlasting song, and crown him Lord of all.

EDWARD PERRONET

A Word on Words

While the word translated “nations” in verse 1 is a broader term referring to Gentile nations, the word translated “people” is more specific and could be translated “people groups” or even “clans” or “tribes.”

Psalm at a Glance

Though it’s the shortest chapter in the Bible, Psalm 117 emphasizes the vastness of God’s vision and the length of his love.

Bible Networking

Notice the point that Paul makes from this little psalm in Romans 15:11.