The final verse of the psalm, like verse 3, explains why you and I should thank God. But it is not just a repetition of the first explanation. The third verse said that we should thank God because of what he has done; he has both made and remade us. That is, he is both our Creator and Redeemer. The final verse invites us to thank God because of who he is. It tells us three things about him.
A point we need to notice about verse 3 is the implication of the words “he...made us.” If it is really God who has made us, not ourselves, and if we are his because he made us, then we are his to do with as seems best to him.
Yesterday we looked at three imperatives in this psalm. The fourth imperative is "know" (v. 3). It is very important, which is why I have set it apart. By including this word, the psalm tells us that our thanksgiving to God must be intelligent; we must know whom we are thanking. Do you remember Paul’s words to the Athenian Greeks? They had been worshiping "an unknown God.” But when Paul stood on Mars Hill to address them, he said, “What you worship as something unknown I am going to proclaim to you” (Acts 17:23). We cannot rightly thank or worship a God who is unknown to us.
Occasionally, when someone has done something special for us, we find ourselves asking, "What can I do for so-and-so to show my appreciation?" It is a valid question and not always an easy one to answer. But think that if it is hard to know how to show appreciation to another human being, how much more difficult must it be to show appreciation to God? How should we show appreciation to God? We cannot thank God by giving him something. He needs nothing from us. What can we do? The opening verses suggest three things.
It is a striking fact about the one hundredth psalm that it is the only one in the Psalter explicitly identified as "a psalm for giving thanks.” The words occur in the heading with which the psalm starts.
