The Nearness of Judgment Text: Psalm 75:1
Introduction: A World of Wicked Horns
We live in an age of insolence. We are surrounded on all sides by men who lift their horns on high, who speak with a stiff neck. Our culture is defined by a defiant pride, a chest-thumping arrogance that shakes its fist at the heavens and dares God to do something about it. The wicked boast, they prosper, and they preen. And in the face of this, it is easy for the saints to become discouraged, to wonder if God is paying any attention at all. Does He see the proud strutting across the world stage? Does He hear the blasphemies whispered in the halls of power and shouted in the public square?
Psalm 75 is God's answer to this insolence. It is a psalm of Asaph, a man who knew a thing or two about wrestling with the prosperity of the wicked, as he confesses so honestly in Psalm 73. But here, the wrestling has given way to a settled confidence. This psalm is a prophetic declaration that God is the judge, and He has an appointed time to act. He is the one who puts down one and sets up another. The entire psalm is a thunderous rebuke to the arrogant, reminding them that their horns will be cut off, and the horns of the righteous will be exalted.
But before Asaph gets to the horns and the judgment, he begins with the only proper foundation for such a confidence. He begins with worship. He begins with thanksgiving. Our text this morning is just the first verse, but it sets the stage for everything that follows. It is the anchor that holds the ship steady in the storm of worldly arrogance. It is the reason we do not despair when the wicked seem to have their day. We give thanks, not because the world is right, but because God is near.
The Text
We give thanks to You, O God, we give thanks,
For Your name is near;
Men recount Your wondrous deeds.
(Psalm 75:1 LSB)
The Foundation of Thanksgiving
We begin with the first clause:
"We give thanks to You, O God, we give thanks..." (Psalm 75:1a)
Notice the repetition. This is not a throwaway line, a polite throat-clearing before getting to the main point. This is the main point. The entire reality of God's coming judgment is bracketed by, and founded upon, the joyful gratitude of His people. "We give thanks... we give thanks." This is the heartbeat of the covenant community. It is a corporate "we." This is not the isolated piety of a mystic in a cave; it is the public, liturgical confession of the people of God.
Why is this so important? Because thanksgiving is a potent weapon of spiritual warfare. Ingratitude is the native language of the fallen heart. The apostle Paul tells us that the root of paganism, the reason God gave them over to a debased mind, was that "although they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks" (Romans 1:21). Ingratitude is the first step away from God. Therefore, deliberate, repeated, corporate thanksgiving is the first step back. It is the declaration that we are not autonomous, self-made men. We are creatures, utterly dependent on our Creator for every breath, every crumb, and every beat of our hearts.
When the world is full of arrogant men lifting their horns, the natural human response is to grumble, to fear, or to scheme. But the supernatural, Spirit-filled response is to give thanks. This is not a denial of the problem; it is the affirmation of the solution. We are not giving thanks for the wickedness, but to the God who is sovereign over the wickedness. This repeated thanksgiving recalibrates our entire worldview. It forces us to look up from the mud and the mire of current events and to fix our gaze on the throne of God. And from that vantage point, the proud horns of the wicked begin to look very small indeed.
The Reason for Thanksgiving: God's Nearness
But this is not a blind, content-free gratitude. The psalmist gives us the precise reason for this confident thanksgiving.
"For Your name is near..." (Psalm 75:1b)
This is the bedrock of our confidence. God is not a distant, deistic clockmaker who wound up the universe and then went on vacation. He is not an abstract philosophical principle. He is near. In the Old Testament, the "name" of God is not a mere label; it is the representation of His character, His power, and His presence. To say His name is near is to say that He Himself is near. He is immanent. He is involved. He is paying attention.
Think about what this means. The God who is about to judge the earth with equity (v. 2), the God who holds the pillars of the quaking earth firm (v. 3), the God who holds the cup of foaming wrath for the wicked (v. 8), this God is near. He is near to us, His people. This is both a profound comfort and a solemn warning. It is a comfort because we know that we are not alone in the fight. The righteous judge is not far off; He is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble (Psalm 46:1).
But it is also a warning to the wicked. They act as though God is a thousand miles away, as though He is deaf and blind. They speak their defiant words as if into an empty room. This verse is a declaration that the Judge is not just on His way; He is already in the courtroom. His presence is the unseen reality that makes their boasting utterly absurd. They are like mice, throwing a party on the floor, unaware that the cat is sitting silently on the chair, watching. God's nearness means that judgment is not a distant possibility, but an imminent certainty.
The Evidence of Thanksgiving: Recounting His Deeds
How do we know His name is near? What is the evidence that fuels our thanksgiving? The psalmist tells us in the final clause.
"Men recount Your wondrous deeds." (Psalm 75:1c)
The nearness of God is not a feeling or a mystical intuition. It is a historical fact, demonstrated by His actions in time and space. The "wondrous deeds" are the undeniable fingerprints of God on the pages of history. For Asaph and his hearers, this would have immediately brought to mind the Exodus, the parting of the Red Sea, the conquest of Canaan, the victories under David. These were the public, verifiable acts of God that proved His character and His covenant faithfulness.
This is why the regular recounting of these stories was so central to the life of Israel. They were commanded to tell their children and their children's children what God had done. This is how faith is built. Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God, which is the record of His mighty acts. When we forget what God has done, we begin to doubt what He will do. When we stop recounting His wonders, we begin to believe the lie that He is distant and uninvolved.
And this is precisely why our corporate worship must be filled with the telling of God's wondrous deeds. We sing the story of creation. We confess the story of the fall. We preach the story of redemption. We celebrate at the Table the central, wondrous deed of all history: the death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. The cross is the ultimate demonstration that God's name is near. In Christ, God drew nearer than we could ever have imagined, taking on our flesh, living among us, and bearing our judgment upon Himself.
Every time we tell these stories, every time we sing these psalms, every time we preach this gospel, we are pushing back against the arrogance of the world. We are declaring that history is not a random series of events. It is a story, and God is its author. His wondrous deeds are the plot points, and they all point to the final chapter, when He will come to judge the world in righteousness.
Conclusion: Thankful Testimony in a Hostile World
So what does this mean for us, here and now? It means our first response to the cultural chaos and the arrogance of the wicked must not be panic, but praise. It must be a rugged, robust, and repeated thanksgiving.
We give thanks because we know the end of the story. We give thanks because the Judge is not just coming, He is near. His presence is the ultimate reality, and the bluster of the wicked is a temporary charade. They are playing dress-up in the king's robes, but the King is about to walk into the room.
And our thanksgiving must be tied to our testimony. We must be a people who constantly "recount His wondrous deeds." We must tell the story of what He has done in history, and what He has done in our own lives. When the world tells its story of autonomous man, of progress, of chaos, of meaninglessness, we must tell the true story. The story of a God who creates, who judges, who redeems, and who is near.
This thankful testimony is not naive optimism. It is hard-headed realism. It is looking at the world as it is, in all its rebellion, and then looking to the God who is, in all His sovereignty. And it is this confidence that allows us to live without fear, to work with diligence, and to wait with patience for the day when He will cut off the horns of the wicked and lift up the horns of the righteous. Until that day, let our defining characteristic be this: "We give thanks to You, O God, we give thanks, for Your name is near."