The Daily Invitation
Every day, we have an opportunity to discover more about God and respond to his invitation to live in love and experience freedom. The Daily Invitation outlines the many ways Scripture calls us to know and follow God. By reflecting on these promises, believers are called to receive God’s gift of grace, seek him earnestly, and surrender their lives completely to him.
Look Back So You Don’t Forget
Christian worship flows from both the awe of God’s glory and the gratitude for his personal, gracious works. Remembering what God has done in the past strengthens faith, restores weary hearts, and deepens our response to him. As seen in Psalms 124 and 103, worship becomes richer when rooted in personal testimony—when we recall how God has delivered, healed, and walked with us. Reflecting on these moments renews our trust and invites us to engage with God not just in thought, but from the heart.
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Christian worship flows from both the awe of God’s glory and the gratitude for his personal, gracious works. Remembering what God has done in the past strengthens faith, restores weary hearts, and deepens our response to him. As seen in Psalms 124 and 103, worship becomes richer when rooted in personal testimony—when we recall how God has delivered, healed, and walked with us. Reflecting on these moments renews our trust and invites us to engage with God not just in thought, but from the heart.
“Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits.”
God is worthy of worship because he is a beautiful, glorious, and awe-inspiring God. Yet worship also flows as a response to God’s good and gracious works. These two aspects of Christian worship work together, and the practice of remembrance reminds our souls that God is great and that he is for us.
God stands alone in the heavens, demanding and compelling worship from all of creation. His glory radiates as an expression of his divine power, but he also actively works in the lives of his people. God’s activity on the earth makes him stand out against any other gods that humans may imagine.
There is no God like our God, because our God is living and he moves by his Spirit.
This reality of God’s works makes the Christian response of worship personalized and distinct. Whenever we worship God, we respond to his universal glory and his particular grace. We join in the collective recognition of God’s greatness, but we bring our piece of witness to what God has done in our lives.
Psalm 124:1-2 depicts this kind of personal testimony of God’s works: “If it had not been the Lord who was on our side— let Israel now say—if it had not been the Lord who was on our side when people rose up against us…”
David's praises are rooted in a story of God’s power to deliver him, and they anchor the general praises at the end of the Psalm in a personal witness. Psalm 124:8 closes with a general praise: “Our help is in the name of the Lord, who made heaven and earth.”
How much richer are these claims about the greatness of God when they are intertwined with the stories of God’s grace in our lives and in the lives of the Christian community around us?
It shows me that God’s activity is an important thing to pay attention to. It fuels faith and praise.
His Works Restore Us
Still, there is a deeper reason we need to pay attention to God’s works. His redemptive, saving, and healing work in our lives brings us to a place of wholeness and freedom.
It’s hard to give God praise when we are broken and bound. Maybe the greatest evidence of spiritual oppression is a lack of praise.
The problem is that it’s so easy to forget what God has done.
We can get fixated on the things around us and lose sight of the truth that we are not alone. Stress, trial, hardship, sickness, loss, and conflict obscure peace and make it harder to see God.
That’s why we are called to look back.
Is it possible that Psalm 103 was written from a place of weakness and vulnerability? We will never fully know, but it seems like David is moving through a workbook of remembrance to reset his heart.
He speaks to his soul and tries to align it with the truth. He looks back at all the ways God has healed and delivered. He lets the history he has with God be the medicine for his weary soul, and the result is true praise.
Look Back
Sometimes we get into a place where we know that God is good and worthy of worship, but we just can’t seem to open our hearts to him. Sure, we can offer God worship and praise based on the truth of his glory, but God doesn’t expect us to blindly praise him. The Christian life is built on interaction with God so that we can store up testimonies of God’s goodness that repair our hearts so we can trust in God.
When we are weary and feeling distant from God, it’s good to look back. Pull out an old journal and flip through the pages to recall the testimonies of God’s goodness. See the battles you struggled so hard against that are now testimonies of victory.
Scroll to the back of your photo album on your phone and remember how God was working in your life years and years ago. Find a random picture and think about what God was doing in your life then. Maybe you’ll even see that God was working to restore you even when you were walking away from him.
Don’t underestimate the power of remembrance to restore worship.
Reflect & Respond
Take a moment to remember God's greatness and consider how he has been good to you. Then, bring your wonder and testimony together in a moment of worship.
Are you living the Christian life in your head by knowing about God instead of living from your heart by experiencing God? Ask God to renew your heart today so you can respond to him. Bring your disappointment, confusion, and weariness to God.