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To many people, God is distant, uninvolved with the world, and inert.  The deists of the seventeenth century believed that He had created the world, but is no longer involved.  Many today take a similar view.  They assume that the Bible will, therefore, simply be a book of do’s and don’t’s.

But open it, and instead you discover that the Bible is a true story of the living, Creator God, at work in His world.

Psalm 105 is a song of worship, whose whole subject is how God has acted in history.  Sing to him, sing praise to him; tell of his wonderful acts.

Read it through: the psalm tells us how God has indeed acted in the history of his Old Testament people.  He protected them when they were nomads.  He (perplexingly!) called down famine, so that they went to Egypt.  He sent Joseph on ahead.  He multiplied their numbers; He brought them out of that place; He spread a cloud over them as a covering and provided food and water in the wilderness.

That is where the Psalm gets up to, but from our perspective in history, we might add a great deal more, right up to the coming of our Lord Jesus.

Throughout the psalm, the big point is: God works in real-life.

And there’s more.  Read it, and we find that His great acts are not random ones, as the supposed acts of the pagan gods were; rather, He was working to a plan.  He made a covenant with Abraham; He then delivered on His promises.  He is unstoppable.  

In view of which, surely the big question is: where He is heading with all this activity?  Clue to the answer: Jesus, and a whole renewed world, with the call to trust in Him.

The psalmist doesn’t just extol the mighty, plan-working acts of God: he also helps us see practical consequences.  Here are two:

We are to speak about them: Make known among the nations what he has done (v1)

Since he does mighty acts, we are encouraged to pray to Him: Look to the LORD and his strength; seek his face always. (v4)  We come to prayer knowing He is the God who works mightily for his covenant people.

This is our God!