Psalm 56:12 "Thy vows are upon me, O God: I will render praises unto thee."
It's a
shame that only one day a year is called Thanksgiving because we are to be
thankful every single day of our lives. God pours out His blessings, yes
He pours them out, every single day of our lives. Thankfulness (gratitude)
should be a way of life for each of us everyday.
Notice the verb tense of our text today. "Thy vows ARE upon me, O
God." That is not just one day a year; rather, the vows (promises) of God
are constantly upon us. David said in verse 10, "In God will I
praise his word." Why does He mention the Word of God more than once in
this Psalm? It is in the Word of God that we are taught concerning the
vows, or promises, of God. We do ourselves a great injustice when we neglect
time in God's Word.
We learn in God's Word that "Every good gift and every perfect gift is
from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no
variableness, neither shadow of turning." (James 1:17) Everything
that is good in our lives comes from our Heavenly Father. Everything. If we
only take time to think about the goodness that we enjoy, our hearts would be
filled with gratitude and love for God. The absolute greatest (and perfect)
gift from God is the giving of His blessed Son to die for our sins.
"Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and
sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins." (1 John 4:10) That
word, propitiation, means that Jesus offered Himself and His blood to the
Father as satisfaction for the sin debt that was against you and me. The Father
accepted that offering as full payment. If we have nothing else to be thankful
for, we must thank our Heavenly Father for the gift of salvation that was
freely given to us. That is one of the vows (promises) that are upon us and
nothing can take it away from us.
That is the perfect gift given to us and the Word of God is filled with
blessings that are bestowed upon us each day. There is one other blessing in
this 56th Psalm that I want to mention. In verse 9, the Word of God tells me,
"God is for me." I remember a little song our children used to
sing, "Nobody likes me. Everybody hates me. I think I'll eat some worms."
(just a bit of humor) The truth of the matter is "God is for
me." What greater blessing is there for us than to know our God is for us. "O give thanks unto
the LORD; for he is good: for his mercy endureth for ever." (Psalm 136:1)