Psalm 65:1 "To the chief Musician, A Psalm and Song of David. Praise waiteth for thee, O God, in Sion: and unto thee shall the vow be performed."
Psalm 65:5 "By terrible things in righteousness wilt thou answer us, O God
of our salvation; who art the confidence of all the ends of the earth, and of
them that are afar off upon the sea:"
Psalm 65:9-13 "Thou visitest the earth, and waterest it: thou greatly enrichest it
with the river of God, which is full of water: thou preparest them corn, when
thou hast so provided for it. (10) Thou waterest the ridges thereof abundantly: thou settlest the
furrows thereof: thou makest it soft with showers: thou blessest the springing
thereof. (11) Thou crownest the year with thy goodness; and thy paths drop
fatness. (12) They drop upon the pastures of the wilderness: and the little hills
rejoice on every side. (13) The pastures are clothed with flocks; the valleys also are covered
over with corn; they shout for joy, they also sing.
I've included several verses of this Psalm. As I read through the Psalm, I
realized there are so many things that I take for granted each day that I live.
The blessings of God overflow me every single day. How about you? This Psalm is
not intended to show the completeness of those blessings; rather, our hearts
and minds should be turned toward the Lord as we read the verses. Praise waits
for God. In our human way of thinking, we could also say that God waits for our
praise. How much time do I spend lifting up worship and praise unto my Lord? Verse
5 speaks of "terrible things of righteousness." We only think of the
word, terrible, as being something dreaded or bad. But in context of this
verse, we are reminded that God works things in our lives which are wonderful
and should bring thoughts of reverence unto the Lord. Verses 9-13 speak to us
of just a few, yet much needed, blessings in which God bestows His favor upon
us. I suppose farmers can understand and appreciate these verses more than most
of us, but we all receive blessings from God's works which we call
nature. May God bless us to be more mindful of those blessings and
include gratitude in our prayers unto Him.
For the beauty of the earth
Author: Folliott Sandford Pierpoint (1864)
For the beauty of the earth,
for the glory of the skies,
for the love which from our birth
over and around us lies.
Christ, our Lord, to you we raise
this, our hymn of grateful praise.
For the wonder of each hour
of the day and of the night,
hill and vale and tree and flower,
sun and moon and stars of light
Christ, our Lord, to you we raise
this, our hymn of grateful praise.