Society’s slide into moral and spiritual degeneracy seems sometimes unstoppable, yet from time to time the Lord grants relief. The Scottish Parliament had been considering a reckless piece of legislation to allow assisted suicide in Scotland, yet at the last minute this appalling wrong has been averted.

Enough MSPs to provide a clear majority (of 69 to 57) voted to reject the bill, which would have allowed terminally ill adults with less than six months to live to obtain medical assistance to end their lives. Mindful that there remains a determination to drive similar assisted dying legislation through Westminster, and it is unlikely to mark the end of attempts within Scotland, we should nevertheless give thanks for every token of the Lord’s goodness. As the sudden and dramatic liberalisation of the law around abortion in England and Wales has shown in the same week, the decision in Scotland certainly doesn’t mean a total turning of the tide. Yet in a context made bleak by the imposition of so many different progressive ideologies and practices, this decision gives us reason for profound gratitude to the Lord whose mercy is for ever. In discussing Psalm 136, David Dickson traces an abundance of reasons for thanksgiving. In the following updated extract he points out how we can continue to praise the Lord for long-ago mercies as well as praising afresh for contemporary deliverances.

Psalm 136 is an exhortation to confess God’s goodness and mercy, and to praise and thank Him for manifesting it in so many different works of His. The fountain of His mercy, where His works flow from, is still running, and endures for ever, to the benefit of His own people especially.

There are as many reasons in Psalm 136 for giving thanks and praise as there are verses, and to every single reason one common reason is added — the everlasting endurance of His mercy.

Praise the Lord for Who He Is

From the threefold exhortation to give thanks as the psalm opens (v.1), we learn that when we have praised God for whatever reasons were offered to us in one psalm (such as Psalm 135, for example), we must begin again, and praise for other reasons, and when we have done so, we have not got beyond our task, for the duty still lies at our door to be done afresh.

We are to acknowledge and praise God as the fountain of the being, continuance and preservation of all the things that are in the world, and as one who fulfils all His promises, “O give thanks unto the Lord, Jehovah.”

The knowledge of God’s attributes, properties, or name, and especially the knowledge of His goodness, is able to draw praise for God from every believer. “O give thanks unto the Lord, for he is good.”

And God isn’t weary of doing good, nor is His mercy spent, by what He has already let out of it, but it continues, like a river that keeps flowing. “For his mercy endureth for ever.” Whatsoever is the Lord’s praise is for our profit and advantage, and so it is a matter of thanks from us to His majesty. “O give thanks unto the Lord, for he is good.”

The Lord is more excellent than all the magistrates, rulers, princes and kings in the world. Indeed, He has in Himself all the perfections which idolaters feign to be distributed among their idols. They imagine one of their gods excels in one thing, and another in another thing, but we say, “O give thanks to the God of gods!” He is the only sovereign Lord of all things, the only potentate, who has absolute right and absolute power to do what He pleases, and can, when He wills it, overtop all principalities and powers, to the benefit of his followers. “O give thanks to the Lord of lords!” (v.2–3).

If the Lord is God by covenant to anyone, He is their God always and for ever, “for his mercy endureth for ever.” The perpetuity of God’s mercy makes the benefit of God’s sovereignty forth-coming for ever to the believer, and it stands as a matter of constant praise and thanksgiving to Him.

Praise the Lord for His Work of Creation

Every work of God is wonderful, and able to make anyone astonished if it is well considered. (v.4). The constancy of God’s mercy to his own means that God’s wonderful power is constantly forthcoming to them, as their need requires.

The making of the heavens, as it is a wonderful work, and a matter of constant praise unto God, so it is a wonderous benefit to His people in many respects (v.5), and it is the mercy of God that the heavens do continue in their service to sinful men.

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