Psalm 100

Today's reading is a short psalm - Psalm 100. Go here to read it in your preferred version.

Make a joyful noise unto the Lord, all ye lands.
² Serve the Lord with gladness: come before his presence with singing.
³ Know ye that the Lord he is God: it is he that hath made us, and not we ourselves; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture.
⁴ Enter into his gates with thanksgiving, and into his courts with praise: be thankful unto him, and bless his name.
⁵ For the Lord is good; his mercy is everlasting; and his truth endureth to all generations.

Yes, just five short verses, but something we have to be reminded of so frequently. 

God is so worthy. All the lands should just be shouting in joy to Him. Making joyful noise to Him. We should be serving Him gladly and singing praises when we come into His presence. HE IS GOD. He has made us, NOT ourselves as we sometimes act. We are merely His sheep. We should be thankful and praising Him, and just blessing His name constantly. He is so good. His mercy lasts forever and it's constantly being renewed for me. His truth will never fail us.

Thank you Lord, for your qualities which are so unlike us as humans. We are not good (Psalm 14:3 says "there is none that doeth good, no, not one."), we are not merciful and we are not truthful (we show this every day unfortunately). 

And yet, sadly, we do give ourselves these attributes. We act like we are so special and fabulous. We give ourselves so much credit. 

We went to camp last week with our youth group and someone there, one of the speakers, said something that really struck me. Who are we to love? God, others, and our enemies. So many people say we are told to love ourselves. The problem is, we love ourselves too much already. That is exactly why God told us to love our neighbor as yourself, because He knew it was engrained in us to have that self-love already.

The next time something good happens in your life, praise God for it. Not your hard work or your smarts. 

I was reading something on CNN.com last night and came across an old 2007 quote by Kathy Griffin. She is a comedian and actress (I think she's an actress) and in 2007 she won an Emmy. This is her quote from her acceptance speech - "A lot of people come up here and thank Jesus for this award. I want you to know that no one had less to do with this award than Jesus. Suck it, Jesus. This [the award] is my god now!"

Well, that attitude which is very widespread is a very good reason why America is falling apart right now, in my humble opinion.

Comments, questions?