PRAISE HIM – FOR THE LORD IS GRACIOUS!

Praising God, should be at the heart of every Christian. Of the many reasons to praise our God, praising Him for His grace must be at the very top. If not for God’s grace, showered upon us unmeritedly, would any of us be seeing, what we are seeing and experiencing in our lives?
– “8 The LORD is gracious and full of compassion, Slow to anger and great in mercy. 9 The LORD is good to all, And His tender mercies are over all His works. 10 All Your works shall praise You, O LORD, And Your saints shall bless You.” – Psalm 145:8-10

David, who understood like very few do, the majesty, the grandeur, and the whole character of God in few words, in the above verses. The use of words like, “GRACIOUS, full of COMPASSION, SLOW to ANGER, GREAT in MERCY, is GOOD to ALL, and HIS TENDER MERCIES are over all His works” gives us a glimpse of the very heart of God – who He is, and how He desire to deal with the fallen and rebellious enemies. Berean Study Bible Notes sums up Psalm 145:8 beautifully to help us see the goodness and the grace of God.
– ‘Psalm 145:8 offers a fourfold portrait of God: He freely gives, deeply cares, patiently waits, and relentlessly loves. Recognizing these attributes draws us to worship, instills confidence in prayer, fuels repentance, and inspires us to treat others with the same grace, compassion, patience, and steadfast love we daily receive from Him.”

Oh who can describe God and who He actually is? It is an exercise in futility, to say the least. What is the worth of man, and the depth of his intellect that he should grasp the greatness of God? 
– “The heart of Christ, the great Head of all the saints, is more full of love than the heart of any saint can be. He loves all the saints far more than any of them love each other. But the more any saint is loved of Him, the more is that saint like Him, in this respect, that the fuller his heart is of love.” – Jonathan Edwards

We are but dust…full of sin, rebellion and darkness. Oh the sinfulness of man, and the darkness within us. Who can know its depth, and who can fathom its depravity? But for the grace of God that lit our hearts, which made it possible for us to see ourselves, the darkness within, and seek with repentance, for His forgiveness, there is nothing that could help us.
– “Repentance was never yet produced in any man’s heart apart from the grace of God. As soon may you expect the leopard to regret the blood with which its fangs are moistened,—as soon might you expect the lion of the wood to abjure his cruel tyranny over the feeble beasts of the plain, as expect the sinner to make any confession, or offer any repentance that shall be accepted of God, unless grace shall first renew the heart.” – Charles H. Spurgeon

We can appreciate God’s grace and His mercy only when we truly and fully realise our own wretchedness. The day we truly see the darkness that we are, is the day when praise begins to flow freely from our hearts, on to our lips…unceasingly.
– “Knowing God without knowing our wretchedness leads to pride. Knowing our wretchedness without knowing God leads to despair. Knowing Christ gives the balance.” – Blaise Pascal

Have we grasped the grace of God? Have we understood His mercy? May we seek the LORD always, to help us know more about His grace and mercy, than about anything else. May we make this our prayer, more than anything else, and any other need in our lives. For the day we grasp the grace of God, nothing else matters. We begin to clearly see that, when we were utterly lost, and were God’s enemies, He chose to die for us [Romans 5:6-11] – then what are our earthly needs to us – would not our God take care of all such needs? Therefore, let us seek to know God, and in particular, His grace. The rest will be taken care by our LORD – Romans 8:31-32. Even so, the LORD help us.