The Unsearchable and the Outspoken Text: Psalm 145:3-7
Introduction: What the Righteous Love to Talk About
Every culture, every family, every man has a default topic of conversation. For some, it is the weather. For others, it is sports, or politics, or the latest outrage scrolling by on their phone. What we talk about when we are not forced to talk about something else reveals what we truly value. It is a diagnostic of the heart. When the righteous fear the Lord and gather together, what is it that they speak about with one another? Malachi tells us that the Lord hearkens and hears it, and a book of remembrance is written (Mal. 3:16). David, in this great psalm of praise, gives us the curriculum for that holy conversation. He shows us what the righteous love to talk about.
This psalm is an acrostic, a device used by the Hebrew poets to indicate a comprehensive, A to Z treatment of a subject. And the subject here is the praise of God. This is not a marginal activity for the believer; it is the central business of our lives. We were created to be worshipers, and if we do not worship the triune God of Scripture, we will not worship nothing, we will worship anything. And that worship of anything else is the fast track to ruin. Therefore, learning to praise God aright is learning to live aright. It is learning to be human in the way God designed us to be human.
In these verses, David lays out a glorious cycle of praise. It begins with the objective reality of God's infinite greatness, moves to the covenantal duty of passing that truth down through the generations, and explodes into both personal meditation and public declaration. This is a pattern for us. Our praise must be grounded in the truth of who God is, it must be intentionally cultivated in our homes, and it must overflow into our personal lives and public witness. This is theology that bites back, theology that sings, theology that shouts.
The Text
Great is Yahweh, and highly to be praised,
And His greatness is unsearchable.
One generation shall laud Your works to another, And shall declare Your mighty deeds.
On the glorious splendor of Your majesty And on the words of Your wondrous deeds, I will muse.
Men shall speak of the strength of Your fearsome acts, And I will recount Your greatness.
They shall pour forth the memory of Your abundant goodness And will shout joyfully of Your righteousness.
(Psalm 145:3-7 LSB)
The Unsearchable Foundation (v. 3)
David begins with the bedrock, the foundational truth upon which all other truths rest.
"Great is Yahweh, and highly to be praised, And His greatness is unsearchable." (Psalm 145:3)
The first clause, "Great is Yahweh," is the axiom of all reality. This is not a suggestion or a pious sentiment. It is the fundamental fact of the universe. Before anything else was, He was. And because He is great, not just in size but in essence, in power, in goodness, in holiness, the only logical, sane, and rational response is that He is "highly to be praised." Praise is not something we do to flatter God or to try to get on His good side. Praise is simply telling the truth about who God is. To fail to praise Him is to live in a state of delusion. It is to be fundamentally out of sync with reality.
But then David adds a crucial qualifier: "His greatness is unsearchable." This is immensely practical. We live in an age that thinks it can master everything, that believes every problem can be solved with enough data and a clever algorithm. But God cannot be put in a spreadsheet. His greatness has no bottom. You can explore it forever and you will never find a boundary. This is not a source of frustration, but rather the ground of eternal joy. Heaven will not be a static, boring place where we sit on clouds polishing our halos. It will be an endless, dynamic adventure of discovering more and more about a God who is infinitely discoverable. His unsearchable greatness means our praise will never run out of material. We will never get to the end of Him, and therefore we will never get to the end of our praise.
The Covenantal Relay Race (v. 4)
From the infinite reality of God, David moves to our finite, historical responsibility.
"One generation shall laud Your works to another, And shall declare Your mighty deeds." (Psalm 145:4 LSB)
This is the great commission of the family. The knowledge of the great God is not meant to be a private, mystical experience that dies with us. It is a testimony, a story, a heritage that must be passed on. This is a relay race, and the baton is the story of God's mighty deeds. The word "laud" means to commend, to praise, to present something as worthy. Fathers are to commend the works of God to their sons. Mothers are to declare His mighty deeds to their daughters.
Notice what is to be passed on: "Your works" and "Your mighty deeds." We are not to pass on a set of abstract principles or a bland, moralistic deism. We are to tell the story. We are to tell of the God who acts in history. We tell of the parting of the Red Sea. We tell of the tumbling walls of Jericho. We tell of David and Goliath. And above all, we tell of the mightiest deed of all: the death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. This is how faith is transmitted. It is not through osmosis or good intentions. It is through faithful, articulate, joyful declaration from one generation to the next. If your children do not know the stories of God's mighty acts, it is because you have not told them.
From Public Story to Private Meditation (v. 5)
The generational testimony now becomes the fuel for personal devotion.
"On the glorious splendor of Your majesty And on the words of Your wondrous deeds, I will muse." (Genesis 145:5 LSB)
The baton has been passed, and now David says what he will do with it. "I will muse." This is not idle daydreaming. The Hebrew word means to meditate, to ponder, to mutter, to think deeply upon something. It is the same word used to describe a lion growling over its prey. This is an active, engaged, and robust contemplation. And what is the object of this meditation? The "glorious splendor" of God's majesty and the "words" of His wondrous deeds. In other words, he takes the story he has received and chews on it. He turns it over and over in his mind until the weight of its glory begins to sink in.
This is a lost art in our distracted age. We are experts at scrolling, but amateurs at musing. We consume information, but we do not meditate on truth. But true spiritual strength is not built on the volume of information we consume, but on the depth of truth we meditate upon. We must learn to shut off the noise and ponder the glorious splendor of our King. We must take the stories of His wondrous works and let them furnish the rooms of our minds.
From Private Meditation to Public Declaration (v. 6-7)
What is meditated on in the heart will inevitably come out of the mouth. The cycle continues, moving from the personal back to the corporate.
"Men shall speak of the strength of Your fearsome acts, And I will recount Your greatness. They shall pour forth the memory of Your abundant goodness And will shout joyfully of Your righteousness." (Psalm 145:6-7 LSB)
The private musing of verse 5 leads directly to the public speaking of verse 6. "Men shall speak." The praise of God is not a quiet, private hobby. It is a public proclamation. And what will they speak of? The "strength of Your fearsome acts." Some translations say "terrible acts." Our modern sensibilities can be squeamish about this, but the Bible is not. God's acts are fearsome to His enemies. The same flood that saved Noah in the ark was a terrifying judgment on the wicked. The same Red Sea that was a path of deliverance for Israel was a watery grave for the Egyptian army. To speak of God's salvation without speaking of His judgment is to tell only half the story. God's holiness is beautiful to the redeemed and terrifying to the rebellious. Our praise must be robust enough to include both.
And this public testimony is not a dry, academic lecture. It is an eruption of joy. "They shall pour forth the memory of Your abundant goodness." The word for "pour forth" is like a bubbling spring that cannot be contained. And they will "shout joyfully of Your righteousness." This is not the quiet, dignified hum of a funeral parlor. This is the roar of a stadium after a championship victory. It is exuberant, loud, and unashamed. Why? Because they are remembering His "abundant goodness" and His "righteousness." The greatest display of both was at the cross, where God's abundant goodness provided a substitute and His perfect righteousness was satisfied. The gospel is the ultimate reason for our joyful shouting.
Conclusion: Tune Your Conversations
So, what is the default topic of conversation in your home? What do you and your friends talk about when you get together? What do you muse on when you are alone? David sets the agenda for us. The greatness of God, the works of God, the majesty of God, the fearsome acts of God, the goodness of God, and the righteousness of God.
This is not a call to be weird or socially awkward, refusing to talk about anything else. Rather, it is a call to have this great reality undergird and inform all our other conversations. When we talk about the weather, we do so knowing the God who sends the rain. When we talk about our work, we do so as stewards of the God who gives us strength. When we talk about the future, we do so with confidence in the God whose greatness is unsearchable and whose kingdom is everlasting.
Let us commit to this covenantal duty. Let us be the generation that lauds His works to the next. Let us fill our minds with His majesty and our mouths with His praise. Let us learn to speak, to pour forth, and to shout joyfully of our great God. For He is great, and highly to be praised.