Psalm 75:1 pulls us into a moment where gratitude rises fast, God’s nearness becomes personal, and the right response is to speak up about what He has done. It’s not polite religion—it’s a heart waking up to reality.

Thanks That Refuses to Whisper

There’s a holy insistence in this verse: “We give thanks… we give thanks.” Not because life is always easy, but because God is always God. Gratitude isn’t ignoring the hard parts; it’s refusing to let the hard parts be the loudest voice in the room. “Give thanks in every circumstance, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.” (1 Thessalonians 5:18)

And when gratitude feels thin, it helps to remember what we’re actually saying: the God who rules over today is also the Giver who has been faithful before. “Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, with whom there is no change or shifting shadow.” (James 1:17) Thanksgiving steadies us because it ties our hearts to His unchanging character.

His Name Is Near

God’s nearness isn’t sentimental; it’s covenant reality. His “Name” means His presence, His authority, His faithfulness—who He is, not just what we know about Him. So even if your emotions are lagging behind, His closeness isn’t. “The LORD is near to the brokenhearted; He saves the contrite in spirit.” (Psalm 34:18)

That nearness also confronts our self-reliance. If He is near, then we don’t have to scramble for control or live like we’re alone. He has said, “Never will I leave you, never will I forsake you.” (Hebrews 13:5) And Jesus makes it even more personal: “And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” (Matthew 28:20)

Tell the Stories of His Wonders

The verse doesn’t stop at private gratitude; it moves outward: people declare His wondrous works. That means your story matters—not because you’re the hero, but because God is. The world is flooded with bad news; testimony is one way God puts light on display through ordinary people who have seen His mercy up close. “But you are a chosen people… that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.” (1 Peter 2:9)

Declaring His works doesn’t require a microphone—just honesty and courage. Sometimes it’s as simple as naming one answered prayer, one rescue, one sustaining grace. This is spiritual warfare with warmth: “They have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony.” (Revelation 12:11) When you speak about what God has done, you strengthen others—and you remind your own soul what’s true.

Father, thank You for Your nearness and Your wondrous works; help me give thanks on purpose today and boldly tell someone what You’ve done. Amen.

Many times in history the Christians in various towns, cities and even whole countries have given up their defense for reasons wholly evil. Worldliness, sinful pleasures and personal ungodliness have often been the cause of the churchs disgraceful surrender to the enemy. Today, however, Satans strategy is different. Though he still uses the old methods where he can do so with success, his more effective method is to paralyze our resistance by appealing to our virtues, especially the virtue of charity. He first creates a maudlin and wholly inaccurate concept of Christ as soft, smiling and tolerant. He reminds us that Christ was brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth, and suggests that we go and do likewise. Then if we notice his foot in the door and rise to oppose him he appeals to our desire to be Christlike. You must not practice negative thinking, he tells us. Jesus said, He that is not against Me is for Me. Also He said Judge not, and how can you be a good Christian and pass adverse judgment on any religious talk or activity? Controversy divides the Body of Christ. Love is of God, little children, so love everybody and all will be well. Thus speaks the devil, using Holy Scripture falsely for his evil purpose; and it is nothing short of tragic how many of Gods people are taken in by his sweet talk. The shepherd becomes afraid to use his club and the wolf gets the sheep. The watchman is charmed into believing that there is no danger, and the city falls to the enemy without a shot. So Satan destroys us by appealing to our virtues.

Comfort ye, comfort ye My people saith your God, - Isaiah 40:1

This magnificent chapter is the prelude or overture to the grand music of the second part of the prophecies of Isaiah. Its first words are its keynote: " Comfort ye. comfort ye My people." That purpose is kept steadily in view throughout; and in this introductory chapter the prophet points to the one foundation of hope and consolation for Babylonian exiles, or for modern Englishmen, to that grand vision of the enthroned God "sitting on the circle of the earth, before whom the inhabitants thereof are as grasshoppers."

"They build too low who build beneath the sky."

For nations and for individuals, in view of political disasters or of private sorrows, the only hold-fast to which cheerful hope may cling is the old conviction, " The Lord God Omnipotent reigneth."

Notice how, first, the prophet points to the unwearied God; and then his eyes drop from Heaven to the clouded, saddened earth, where there are the faint and the weak, and the strong becoming faint, and the youths fading and becoming weak with age. Then he binds together these two opposites - the unwearied God and the fainting man- in the grand thought that He is the Giving God, who bestows all His power on the weary. And see how, finally, he rises to the blessed conception of the wearied man becoming like the Unwearied God. " They shall run, and not be weary; they shall walk, and not faint."

And let me say, here is a lesson for us to learn of meditative reflection upon the veriest commonplaces of our religion. There is a tendency amongst us all to forget the indubitable, and to let our religious thought be occupied with the disputable and secondary parts of revelation rather than with the plain deep verities which form its heart and centre. The commonplaces of religion are the most important. Everybody needs air, light, bread, and water. Dainties are for the few; but the table which our religion sometimes spreads for them is like that at a rich man’s feast - plenty of rare dishes, but never a bit of bread; plenty of wine and wine-glasses, but not a tumblerful of spring water to be had. Every pebble that you kick with your foot, if thought about and treasured, contains the secret of the universe. The commonplaces of our faith are the food upon which our faith will most richly feed.

And so here, in the old, old Word, that we all take for granted as being so true that we do not need to think about it, lies the source of all consolation-the Hope for men, for churches, for the world. We all have times, depending on mood or circumstances, when things seem black and we are weary. This great truth will shine into our gloom like a star into a dungeon. Are our hearts to tremble for God’s truth to-day? Are we to share in the pessimist views of some faint-hearted and little-faith Christians? Surely as long as we can remember the name of the Lord, and His unwearied arm, we have nothing to do with fear or sadness for ourselves, or for His Church, or for His world.